"Hobson's Choice"

Laurence Horn laurence.horn at YALE.EDU
Sat Aug 22 18:18:10 UTC 2009


At 12:55 PM -0400 8/22/09, Jesse Sheidlower wrote:
>On Sat, Aug 22, 2009 at 12:44:32PM -0400, Shapiro, Fred wrote:
>>  A common phrase that seems not to be in the OED is "Hobson's
>>choice."  Jesse, can you tell us whether this is slated for future
>>inclusion in the OED?
>>
>
>It's in OED s.v. _choice_ n. 2.c., with a first quote from 1660.
>
Indeed, thanks apparently to Milton--but nothing for "Hobbesian
choice", for which the interested reader must have recourse to the
eggcorn database: http://eggcorns.lascribe.net/english/593/hobbesian/
(with a nice mini-essay by Arnold)

LH

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