"Living Large"

[Garson O'Toole]

Jonathan Lighter's invaluable reference Random House Historical
Dictionary of American Slang has "live large" under the entry for
"large" on page 399 of volume 2. The first cite is the one in 1975
given in a previous message. JL indicates the phrase was a "motto of
The Executioner, crime-fighting hero of a popular action-adventure
series by Don Pendleton, published [1969-.]"

On Thu, May 12, 2011 at 8:51 PM, Garson O'Toole
<adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com> wrote:
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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Garson O'Toole <adsgarsonotoole at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: "Living Large"
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Wilson Gray wrote:
>> I'm persuaded. Certainly, the phrase is *much* older than 1991. But is
>> the question solely WRT to the documented, oldest-known occurrence of
>> the phrase or WRT its more-recent revival as something that's "fresh"?
>> I, perhaps in error, assumed the latter.
>
> There is a large gap in time from 1834 to 1975 to reach the second
> cite given in the OED.
>
> 1975    D. Pendleton St. Louis Showdown 32   If that's what you call
> living large, Sergeant Bolan, then it's been nothing but small for me.
>
> Garson
>
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