Query: dating of "the ugly American"

[Jonathan Lighter]

FWIW, the it's the hero of Lederer & Burdick's novel who's physically unattractive ("ugly") but who connects with the Asian locals in a genuine way while his glamorous colleagues are fouling up and giving America a bad name at every turn.

As used since then, the phrase refers to  Americans abroad whose attitude toward foreign societies is arrogant and "ugly" in the metaphorical sense. Not, evidently, what L & B had in mind - except perhaps as irony.

If the above is the whole story, then it would be quite surprising to find a citation antedating the novel.

JL

"Cohen, Gerald Leonard" <gcohen at UMR.EDU> wrote:
---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: "Cohen, Gerald Leonard"
Subject: Query: dating of "the ugly American"
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I was asked today whether the phrase "the ugly American" was used prior to the 1958 book by that title authored by William J. Lederer and Eugene Burdick.
Would someone perhaps know?

Gerald Cohen

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