"go figure"

[Jonathan Lighter]

Regardless, I first encountered "Go figure!" in the _National Lampoon_
about 1980.  That was after about a dozen years of obsessing about informal
neologisms.

It didn't get into HDAS because it didn't seem sufficiently slangy. A
judgment call. (By way of contrast, "Who'd 'a' thunk it?" was on the list
for the final volume.)

JL

On Mon, Apr 30, 2012 at 5:11 AM, J P Maher <devilsbit06 at yahoo.com> wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       J P Maher <devilsbit06 at YAHOO.COM>
> Subject:      Re: "go figure"
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> It's sophistry to delete elements from the source citation.=A0 There is no
> =
> "Go, figure!" in your=A0citations.=A0 "Go figure!": the verb is=A0in the
> im=
> perative mood. The phrase is=A0used "absolutely", i.e. with no links to
> adj=
> acent text. This is the same game as=A0the=A0old wheeze about proving
> bibli=
> cal authority for atheism by leaving outthe first 6 words from "The fool
> sa=
> ys in his heart 'there is no God'. "
>
>
>
>
> =A0
> =A0
>
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