the magoffin?

[Jonathan Lighter]

The OED's new entry on Hitchcock's _McGuffin_  says it is "probably from the
surname _MacGuffin_,
allegedly borrowed by Alfred Hitchcock (1899-1980), English film director,
from a humorous story involving a diversion of this kind."

Could be. But since no one has discovered the story, I'll throw out the
possibility that the name to look for might have been spelled "Magoffin."

However, the utter lack of corrobration makes it quite plausible that
Hitchcock, for reasons unknowable, arbitrarily began to use the
less-than-commonplace surname {MacGuffin/ McGuffin/ Magoffin} etc., as a
kind of synonym for "whatchamacallit" in a uniquely narrow sense - and that
his story of the men on the train is, well, just another Hitchcockian
McGuffin.

JL


"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

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