strong like ball

[Jonathan Lighter]

My grandmother knew "greedy-gut" too, but I only recall her saying it once or twice.  "Guts," however, in the plural and with no mitigating modifiers, was not in her active vocabulary.  Her synonyms were "nerve" and, where physiology was concerned, "intestines" for people and "innards" for poultry.  I don't recall my grandfather saying "guts," either, and I know my mother does not.

JL

Wilson Gray <wilson.gray at RCN.COM> wrote:
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Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: Wilson Gray
Subject: Re: strong like ball
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As is usual with me, I can't provide a cite, but my grandparents, born
in the 1870's, used the term "greedy-gut" as a synonym for "glutton" in
the figurative sense.

-Wilson Gray

On Mar 2, 2005, at 9:26 PM, James C Stalker wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society
> Poster: James C Stalker
> Subject: Re: strong like ball
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
> --------
>
> Just because I have my Farmer and Henley at hand, would you consder the
> following to be figurative/metaphorical?
>
> To fret one's guts:...to worry
> To have plenty of guts, but no bowels: To be unfeeling, hard,
> merciless.
>
> Farmer and Henley: "gut"
>
> Jim Stalker
>
> Jonathan Lighter writes:
>
>> And anyone who can supply 19th C. exx. of "guts" in a figurative
>> sense should please do so.
>> In the days before search engines and databases, I couldn't find much.
>>
>> JL
>>
>> "Baker, John" wrote:
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> -----------------------
>> Sender: American Dialect Society
>> Poster: "Baker, John"
>> Subject: Re: strong like ball
>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>> ---------
>>
>> Yes, "guts" used to be considered coarse. Here's an illustrative
>> quotation from Richard Grant White, A Desultory Denunciation of
>> English Dictionaries, in The Galaxy (1869), via Cornell University
>> Making of America:
>>
>> <>
>>
>> Here's an 11/22/1928 use of "intestinal fortitude" from the online
>> Harvard Crimson (Merriam-Webster has c. 1937), which also illustrates
>> the point:
>>
>> <>
>>
>>
>> John Baker
>>
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU]On
>> Behalf
>> Of Gordon, Matthew J.
>> Sent: Tuesday, March 01, 2005 7:38 PM
>> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>> Subject: strong like ball
>>
>>
>> I heard a new-to-me phrase on the radio: "testicular fortitude" which
>> I took to be a form of "intestinal fortitude" gone south. The context
>> was a local sports program discussing a particular coach. As
>> expected, Google show 11k hits for it (cf. 63k for "intestinal
>> fortitude").
>>
>> While I'm at it, I'd always thought of "intestinal fortitude" as a
>> humorously formal alternative to "guts." Does the evidence suggest it
>> arose as a deliberately funny coinage? I see OED has a 1945 citation
>> from Edgar Bergen/Charlie McCarthy.
>>
>> Also, was "guts" seen as vulgar or coarse at some time? Today it
>> seems mostly just informal.
>>
>> -Matt Gordon
>>
>>
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>
>
> James C. Stalker
> Department of English
> Michigan State University
>


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