Saying: Shiver looking for a spine to run up (alternative shudder)

Fri Oct 11 21:08:07 UTC 2013

Victor mentioned the phrase: Shiver looking for a spine to run up.

Here is the earliest direct evidence I have located of this comically
figurative language in 1966. The word "shudder" was employed instead
of "shiver" in this instance.

[ref] 1966 April 7, New York Times, "Lisbon Insists on Open-Door
Policy in Mozambique Despite Embargo on Oil for Rhodesia", (Special to
The New York Times), Quote Page 21, New York. (ProQuest)

[Begin excerpt]
A right-wing Labor Member of Parliament, Desmond Donnelly, expressed
similar emotions
...
"What is needed Is the will. At present, there appears to be a shudder
chasing around Whitehall looking for a spine to run up and down."
[End excerpt]

The Penguin Modern Q claims that an earlier citation circa 1943
exists. I have not verified this and would like to do so.

[ref] 1980, The Penguin Dictionary of Modern Quotations, Edited by J.
M. Cohen and M. J. Cohen, Second edition, [Reprint dated 1983],
Section Oliver Brown, Page 55, Penguin Books, New York. (Verified on
paper) [/ref]

[Begin excerpt]
A shiver ran through the Scottish MPs, frantically looking for a spine
to run up. [The Extended Tongue]
[End excerpt]

According to WorldCat an edition of The Extended Tongue was published
circa 1943. This would be considerably earlier than other known
citations

Here is information from the National Library of Scotland. Can any
list members gain access to "The extended tongue" by Oliver Brown?

Title: The extended tongue
Author: Oliver Brown
Publisher: Glasgow : Scottish Secretariat, [ca. 1946]
National Library of Scotland  NLS
Edinburgh, Scotland, EH1 1EW United Kingdom

Garson

On Tue, Oct 8, 2013 at 3:22 PM, Victor Steinbok <aardvark66 at gmail.com> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Victor Steinbok <aardvark66 at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: SLITHER, n.--another word with two (or 1.5) mommies?
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Ever since George Galloway had echoed Harold Wilson (30 years earlier,
> in mocking Edward Heath) in describing the Bush administration as "a
> shiver looking for a spine to run up", I can't look at "shiver" the same
> way. Oddly enough, most online quote collections ascribe the line to
> Paul Keating--wrong country, wrong time period.
>
> It seems one source got it right--and that was a year before Galloway's
> memorable speech (also marked by repeated use of "complete cock-up",
> which was a novelty in US at the time).
>
> http://goo.gl/OVzfTa
>
> Now, I don't know who coined it first, but I know it wasn't Galloway or
> Keating. It's possible it started with Wilson. It's more likely some
> other pol said it and it was retold by Wilson. Or it's been around even
> longer.
>
> VS-)
>
> On 10/8/2013 8:44 AM, Laurence Horn wrote:
>> On Oct 7, 2013, at 3:04 PM, Brenda Lester wrote:
>>
>>> sliver:
>>> splinter; shiver, slice
>>>
>> Oh, right, I forgot about "shiver", n.  That's another culprit in the multiple-causation game, but more for glass than for ginger.
>>
>> LH
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> ________________________________
>>> From: Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
>>> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>>> Sent: Monday, October 7, 2013 1:45 PM
>>> Subject: SLITHER, n.--another word with two (or 1.5) mommies?
>>>
>>>
>>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
>>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>> Poster:       Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
>>> Subject:      SLITHER, n.--another word with two (or 1.5) mommies?
>>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>
>>>  From an online recipe (see antepenultimate recipe at http://www.loverofcreatingflavours.co.uk/tag/fish/page/2/):
>>>
>>> Ingredients
>>> …
>>> 1 inch fresh ginger, grated or sliced into thin slithers
>>> …
>>>
>>> [+ Many other hits for "into (thin) slithers" from other recipes]
>>>
>>>
>>> I thought this might be a reanalysis of one type or another ("sliver" under influence of snakes), but if so it seems to have happened awhile ago, back to old Ezra.  Here's the OED entry for SLITHER, n., 4b):
>>>
>>> Something smooth and slippery; a smoothly sliding mass; = SLIVER n.1 1.
>>>
>>> 1919   E. Pound Quia Pauper Amavi 40   If she goes in a gleam of Cos, in a slither of dyed stuff, There is a volume in the matter.
>>> 1955   N. Nicholson Lakers xi. 188   Only after rain, when..the rocks are hung with slithers of water like lace curtains against the black slate.
>>> 1966   G. Greene Comedians i. v. 153   Little fenced saucers of earth where a few palm-trees grew and slithers of water gleamed between.
>>> 1981   Daily Tel. 27 May 15/1   Calvin Klein's newest dress is a slither of silk shaped simply like an overgrown T-shirt.
>>>
>>> None of these are quite the same as the slither of ginger, and I certainly couldn't imagine referring to a "sliver" of water.  "Slithers" of dyed stuff or slippery silk might be nonce nominalizations from the verb or adjective (many hits for "slithery silk").  But "slither of ginger"?  Maybe I've just led a sheltered life (as has the AHD, which only has "slithery movement or gait" for SLITHER, n.).
>>>
>>> Or perhaps the vector is the slither of eel, as in:
>>>
>>> The same goes for the unagi, which contains delicately marinated slithers of eel.
>>> or
>>> Smoked eel, carrot and camomile – laid upon a sweet smear of carrot are slithers of eel that are succulent, smoky and a little peppery.
>>>
>>>
>>> LH
>>>
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>>
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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