"home" = "sharpen"

[Joel S. Berson]

Since the text was "Home his message", without "in on", I suppose
it's also possible it was simply a typo.  But is there something
improper about the simple transitive "hone his message"?

Joel

At 4/10/2012 10:17 PM, Ben Zimmer wrote:
>On Tue, Apr 10, 2012 at 9:52 PM, Herb Stahlke wrote:
> >
> > On Tue, Apr 10, 2012 at 8:55 PM, Ben Zimmer wrote:
> >>
> >> On Tue, Apr 10, 2012 at 8:02 PM, Joel S. Berson wrote:
> >>>
> >>> In commenting this evening on Romney's predicted reorientation after
> >>> Santorum's "suspension" of his campaign, WCVB Boston (channel 5) news
> >>> put up (and discussed) a slide with four things he was expected to
> >>> do.  For example, "Raise money."  But one was "Home his message."
> >>>
> >>> I leave it to others better equipped than I to develop pertinent puns>
> >>
> >> I suppose this is a type of hypercorrection, based on anxieties over
> >> the propriety of "hone in on."
> >
> > While I've often heard "hone in on" from my students and on TV, I've
> > never noticed any anxiety on the part of its users.  On the contrary,
> > they are surprised when it's pointed out that this is a relatively
> > recent modification of "home in on," and some users have insisted the
> > "hone in on" is the more correct of the two.
>
>Someone writing copy for a TV news program might be more aware of the
>proscription against "hone in on," and more likely to make a quick
>(mis)correction.
>
>As for whether "hone in on" is a "relatively recent modification,"
>MWDEU dates it to 1965, in George Plimpton's _Paper Lion_. But with
>some help from Google Book Search we can go back another two decades.
>The passage below appears in Meridel Le Sueur's short story "O Prairie
>Girl, Be Lonely", first published in _New Caravan_ (1945). Google
>doesn't have the original publication, but it does have it
>anthologized in two books:
>
>_Cross Section 1947_, Edwin Seaver, ed.
>http://books.google.com/books?id=SOpZAAAAMAAJ
>http://books.google.com/books?id=fLwSAAAAIAAJ
>
>_Ripening_ (1982, 1990), Elaine Hedges, ed.
>http://books.google.com/books?id=1RhbAAAAMAAJ
>http://books.google.com/books?id=9WLJ015CZ-0C
>
>---
>We got to do it quick and easy, see? Everything depends on it like
>Hitler does it. Know how Hitler does it? Surprise, that's his racket,
>that's the thing Hitler's got, surprises . . . the poor rubes don't
>know what's up and don't believe anything's going to happen and before
>they know it he's over the hurdles with the dough in his jeans pretty
>as a picture.
>Yeah, Hone says, that baby's smart.
>Plenty, Ganz says. I'd like to hone in on his racket. What we need in
>this country is somebody like Hitler, that's what we need.
>---
>
>This is complicated by the fact that one of the characters in the
>story is named Hone. So perhaps it was meant as a pun, possibly on
>"horn in on" (which would fit the context better).
>
>(A version also appeared embedded in the novel _The Girl_, completed
>in 1939 but not published until 1978.)
>
>And I believe the earliest we have for "home in on" is from 1944 in
>the Chicago Tribune.
>
>--bgz
>
>--
>Ben Zimmer
>http://benzimmer.com/
>
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>The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org