Antedatings in the Yale Book of Quotations -- 16: Funny Peculiar

[Jonathan Lighter]

FWIW, I first encountered this as an Ike-era tot while watching the old Ann Sothern _Private Secretary_ show on TV. I'm quite sure the phrasing was "You mean funny ha-ha or funny peculiar?"

  And so it's been for me ever since. Rhetorically effective, since "ha-ha" is the fundamental meaning of "funny."

  No fun intended.

  JL

Fred Shapiro <fred.shapiro at YALE.EDU> wrote:
  ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: Fred Shapiro
Subject: Antedatings in the Yale Book of Quotations -- 16: Funny Peculiar
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

funny peculiar, funny ha-ha (OED 1938 for both)

1928 Mariel Brady _Genevieve Gertrude_ ch. 7 "Do you mean funny peculiar,
or funny ha-ha?" she inquired politely. ... "Cause," explained his mentor
gravely, "our teacher don't allow us to say funny when we mean peculiar.
It's bad English, you know."

Fred Shapiro


--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Fred R. Shapiro Editor
Associate Librarian for Collections and YALE BOOK OF QUOTATIONS
Access and Lecturer in Legal Research Yale University Press
Yale Law School ISBN 0300107986
e-mail: fred.shapiro at yale.edu http://quotationdictionary.com
--------------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org



---------------------------------
Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail beta.

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org