Fun with phrases: "high-voltage thriller"
Jonathan Lighter
wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM
Wed Mar 20 01:15:23 UTC 2013
As close as you can get without winning the cigar:
1914 _San Jose Mercury Herald_ (July 7) 5: The Redmond Company Presents
"Madame X" A Tense Melodrama of the High Voltage, "Thriller" Variety.
But it's still the earliest fig. ex. of "high-voltage."
JL
On Sat, Mar 16, 2013 at 3:17 PM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>wrote:
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> Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster: Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject: Fun with phrases: "high-voltage thriller"
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>
> 1927 _Lima [O.] News_ (Feb. 28) [unp.] (NewspArch]: This game should be the
> high-voltage thriller of a season that has been replete with thrills.
>
> Then nothing till 1939, 1948, 1953, a couple more in the '50s, and
> regularly after 1980.
>
> BTW...OED has no entry for _high-voltage_.
>
> JL
>
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> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
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