Antedating of Bazooka(the instrument) 1918

[Jonathan Lighter]

I for one doubt that P. G. "Plum" Wodehouse would have or could have included a conscious, intentional phallic reference of this sort in a book openly published in 1909.

  What some of his readers may have made of it is another story.  An English music-hall ditty of ca1913, called something like "When There Isn't a Girl About" was parodied in the British and related armed forces during WWII - if not WWI - somewhat as follows:

  Little Miss Muffet
  Sat on a tuffet
  Eating her curds and whey.
  Down came a spider
  And sat down beside her

  And he pulled his old bazooker out and this is what he said:

  "Get a hold of this," [etc.]...

  It never seemed likely to me that the word was based on either of the familiar U.S. meanings
  of "bazooka."

  JL


"Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET> wrote:
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Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: "Joel S. Berson"
Subject: Re: Antedating of Bazooka(the instrument) 1918
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Absolutely. The "two gas-pipes and a whiskey funnel" [OED 1935 for
the "musical" instrument] are two legs and a penis.

Joel

At 3/26/2007 12:39 AM, you wrote:
>I'm going to suggest another body part for the "bazooka" based purely
>on the formula in some medieval lit of describing someone in battle
>being split "from head to saddle": I think "bazooka" might be
>groin/penis. I really like the pattern of cleave-bazooka-falchion and
>the accent. "Cleave" and "falchion" I think really stick out in terms
>of the diction of the passage.
>
>---Amy West
>
>>P. G. Wodehouse, _The Swoop_ (1909) [Project Gutenberg] (Ch. 6):
>>
>><<"'Ow about not waiting, chaps?" he suggested. "I shouldn't 'arf wonder,
>>from the look of him, if he wasn't the 'aughty kind of a feller who'd
>>cleave you to the bazooka for tuppence with his bloomin' falchion. I'm
>>goin' to 'urry through with my dressing and wait till to-morrow night to
>>see how he looks. No risks for Willie!">>
>>
>>----------
>>
>>By analogy with the usual "cleave [someone] to the
>>brisket/waist/teeth/etc." I suppose "bazooka" here refers to a body part.
>>My casual guess would be that it's an alteration of "bosom" (cf. "bazooka"
>>= "bazoomba" = "bazoom" = "breast"). Any relation to the musical
>>instrument's name?
>>
>>-- Doug Wilson
>
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