early "gay" cite

Thu Sep 22 13:49:01 UTC 2011

The following post was intended for everyone, but the magic of automatic
addressing sent it to Ron only:

My post was intended for Joel, but the magic of automatic addressing sent it
> to everyone.
> Which is fine with me.
>
> I'm not surprised that the mere appearance of the word "gay" in a gay novel
> should excite attention; hence my cautionary "worth checking...however."
>
> Grant was unlikely to be thinking of "gay follies" and scantily-clad girls.
> First of all, he was hardly scantily clad in the scene, which makes the
> association _prima facie_ unlikely.
>
> Furthermore,  GB turns up few exx. of"gay follies" before 1950; only two or
> three refer specifically to a stage show (at Cambridge in the mid '40s,
> though Folies Bergere dancers are called, in passing, "gay" in one 1935
> source); none seem to refer to scantily-clad people (the Folies girls are
> having supper); and Grant could not have expected anybody to have caught
> such an obscure allusion, had he intended it.
>
> GB searches for "gay _folies_," "gaies folies," "folies gaies," in
> anglophone sources are equally futile, and nearly as futile in French ones.
>
> NewspaperArchive reveals a racehorse named "Gay Follies," active in Texas
> in the mid- '30s. Relevance: none.
>
> In any event, why so many people should want to believe that Cary Grant was
> sending them a coded message in 1938 is a question I'm not ready to answer.
>
> JL
>
>
>
> On Thu, Sep 22, 2011 at 8:56 AM, Ron Butters <ronbutters at aol.com> wrote:
>
>> As JK knows, I PUBLISHED an article in Dictionaries a number of years ago
>> that says everything that he says here, except that I also question that the
>> deeply closeted Cary Grant would have made such a slip of the tongue--except
>> that I point out that "gay" as Grant's character is using it is most likely
>> just a reference to the then-current sense of a "gay folies" performance
>> having to do with scantily clad female dancers. The ad lib sarcastically
>> explains why  Grant is wearing Hepburn's sexy dressing gown; homosexuality
>> has nothing to do with it. As for SCARLET PANSY, the term is indeed in a
>> novel about the gay subculture, but the word "gay" is not used in a way
>> there that is markedly different from the way it is used in the general
>> population's slang in the 1930s, as I have noted here before.  Just because
>> a gay novelist uses the word "gay" that does not mean that a pun on
>> 'homosexual' was intended.
>>
>> The 1941 cite that JL mentions is the earliest clear reference.
>>
>> This has all been discussed on ADS-L many times, by the way.
>> Sent from my Droid Charge on Verizon 4GLTE
>>
>> ------Original Message------
>> From: Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
>> To: <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Date: Wednesday, September 21, 2011 10:00:56 PM GMT-0400
>> Subject: Re: [ADS-L] early "gay" cite
>>
>> Joel,
>>
>> HDAS has a seemingly unequivocal "gay" from 1933 and an absolutely
>> unequivocal one from 1941. The 1933 source is a sub rosa gay novel. (If
>> the
>> word had been used more than once at so early a date, I think I would have
>> noted that.)
>>
>> Thus no brackets around the Grant quote seemed necessary to ye HDAS
>> editor,
>> who was reluctant to accept it as a genuine ex., until he and several
>> other
>> natural-born skeptics (incl. Jesse Sheidlower) could think of no other
>> convincing explanation.
>>
>> Of course, HDAS I appeared seventeen years ago, which means it may as well
>> never have  existed as far as today's scholars are concerned.
>>
>> The Hollywood censors obviously never thought twice about the word, and of
>> course the meaning didn't become universally familiar till the '60s. The
>> possibility, no matter how remote, that the censors *would* have caught
>> it,
>> is one reason to doubt that Grant intended it that way. But if the quip
>> was
>> truly spontaneous, he may not have had time to catch himself. The fact
>> that
>> the director didn't yell "Cut!" indicates just how arcane the usage must
>> have been.
>>
>> Regardless, I don't think Grant could have "intended it for those in the
>> know," though that seems to be a popular assumption. The censors might
>> been
>> "in the know," and that might have caused problems for him in 1938.  More
>> to
>> the point, I doubt that Grant was trying to send a  wink-wink nudge-nudge
>> signal to anybody through the dubious means of a spontaneous quip in the
>> middle of screen dialogue ("coming out of the closet," so to speak, in
>> front
>> of ten million filmgoers). I assume it just slipped out because it seemed
>> so
>> aptly funny to him.
>>
>> But there's no way to know, is there?
>>
>> Jon
>>
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Sep 21, 2011 at 7:35 PM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:
>>
>> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> > -----------------------
>> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> > Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
>> > Subject:      Re: early "gay" cite
>> >
>> >
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> >
>> > Jon,
>> >
>> > If this from 1932/1933/1937 can be confirmed as really referring to
>> > homosexuality, will you consent to removing the square brackets
>> > surrounding the OED's 1938 quotation from "Bringing Up Baby"?   :-)
>> >
>> > And perhaps they could be removed from some of the other 1922 to 1941
>> > OED quotations as well.  (I don't have HDAS on line or shelf.)
>> >
>> > (I note that Ron Butters once wrote "1. The remark was an ad lib,
>> > made up by Grant himself." and "3. Thus the audience in the late
>> > 1930s would certainly not have known GAY = 'homosexual' (except maybe
>> > some gay people themselves, who at the time preferred QUEER or THAT
>> > WAY as terms of self-reference."
>> >
>> > (What the audience would not know is not evidence of Grant's intended
>> > meaning, *particularly* if it was an ad lib.  And it does not have to
>> > be a pun; it could be simply intended for those in the know.)
>> >
>> > Joel
>> >
>> > At 9/21/2011 05:50 PM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
>> > >Worth checking. HDAS quotes earlier McAlmon writings, however, none of
>> > which
>> > >appeared to me to use the word in the given sense.
>> > >
>> > >The word he preferred in _A Companion Volume_ (1923) was "queer."
>> > >
>> > >
>> > >JL
>> > >
>> > >On Wed, Sep 21, 2011 at 4:22 PM, Mullins, Bill AMRDEC <
>> > >Bill.Mullins at us.army.mil> wrote:
>> > >
>> > > > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> > > > -----------------------
>> > > > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> > > > Poster:       "Mullins, Bill AMRDEC" <Bill.Mullins at US.ARMY.MIL>
>> > > > Subject:      early "gay" cite (UNCLASSIFIED)
>> > > >
>> > > >
>> > >
>> >
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> > > >
>> > > > Classification: UNCLASSIFIED
>> > > > Caveats: NONE
>> > > >
>> > > > Natalie Galustian's "Catalogue of Early Gay Fiction"
>> > > > http://www.nataliegalustian.com/theyWereWhatTheyWere.pdf
>> > > > includes four editions of "Scarlet Pansy" by Robert Scully (probably
>> a
>> > > > pseud. for Robert McAlmon), published as far back as 1932.
>> > > >
>> > > > The catalogue quotes Hugh Hagius as saying "McAlmon is, I believe,
>> the
>> > > > first writer to use 'gay' in the sense of same-sex orientation."
>>  And
>> > > > Fred Shapiro in a Jul 15 2003 ADS-L posts quotes part of a Gary
>> Simes
>> > > > article which has citations from "Scarlet Pansy" which support this.
>> > > >
>> > > > The citations are not given any significant context by Simes, and
>> the
>> > > > auction catalogue doesn't elaborate either, but it is clear that the
>> > > > book is full of gay content.
>> > > > Classification: UNCLASSIFIED
>> > > > Caveats: NONE
>> > > >
>> > > > ------------------------------------------------------------
>> > > > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>> > > >
>> > >
>> > >
>> > >
>> > >--
>> > >"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the
>> > truth."
>> > >
>> > >------------------------------------------------------------
>> > >The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>> >
>> > ------------------------------------------------------------
>> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>> >
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the
>> truth."
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>
>>
>
>
> --
> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
>

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

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