[Ads-l] "could care less" / "couldn't care less" antedatings

Wed Mar 10 18:33:29 UTC 2021

Wow—all these new sightings are terrific. Thanks to everybody who responded. We'll be updating (or "downdating"?) our post again to add these  contributions. 

Pat O’Conner (PS to Fred: Can’t wait to order the new TYBQ)

> 
> Date:    Tue, 9 Mar 2021 12:38:59 -0500
> From:    Mailbox <mailbox at GRAMMARPHOBIA.COM>
> Subject: antedating OED on "could care less"
> 
> The OED's earliest sighting of "could care less" is from 1966, and it's labeled "U.S. colloquial phrase." But my husband and I have found evidence of it in Australia in 1949, clearly used in the modern sense of "could not care less." We found interdatings from earlier in the 60s as well, in editing writing.   
> 
> We report this in an updated post on our blog: https://www.grammarphobia.com/blog/2012/12/more-about-caring-less.html <https://www.grammarphobia.com/blog/2012/12/more-about-caring-less.html>
> 
> A letter written in 1949, and entered into testimony in a divorce court in Perth in 1950, has at least five examples of "I could care less." The letter was excerpted two years later in a news article about the divorce (The Mirror, Perth, June 28, 1952). 
> 
> We didn't include the link to the article, so here it is:  
> 
> https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/75777641?searchTerm=%22could+care+less%22 <https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/75777641?searchTerm=%22could+care+less%22>
> 
> Some of the excerpts we quote:
> 
> "I did love you with all the passion and love that is possible of a man (if you can call me a man in your idea) and now I could care less."  … "But at the present time I could care less." … "I don't care how you take it, I could care less." … "I'm writing how I feel and I could car [sic] less. Goodnight Zoe and goodbye if you wish it—I could care less."
> 
> We've also found "could not care less" from 1892 (OED has only the contracted form, from 1946). 
> 
> Our post ventures to speculate about the development of "could care less." Rather than being ironic, it could be a natural extension of a literal construction in which a negative element ("no one," "none," "few," "nobody,” conditional “if," etc.) appears before “could care less." We give examples, beginning in the 1860s, for British and American uses of this construction: "few men … could care less," "no man could care less," "no one could care less," "nobody could care less," "neither of them could care less," "I don’t believe they could care less," and so on. 
> 
> As we note, it's not much of a jump from "nobody could care less" to "they could care less."
> 
> Pat O’Conner
> 
> ------------------------------
> 
> Date:    Tue, 9 Mar 2021 13:09:50 -0500
> From:    Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject: Re: antedating OED on "could care less"
> 
> Great stuff from Pat and Stewart -- the 1949 Australian letter is terrific
> evidence of "could care less." I looked into this back in 2005 and found
> "could care less" from 1955 and "couldn't care less" from 1944 (the OED
> entry for "care" clearly hasn't been updated for a while):
> 
> http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/002063.html
> https://www.visualthesaurus.com/cm/wordroutes/do-we-care-less-about-could-care-less/
> 
> Looking again now, I've found "could care less" from 1948 from a Canadian
> source:
> 
> ---
> https://www.newspapers.com/clip/73048493/i-could-care-less/
> Ottawa Evening Citizen, July 20, 1948, p. 3, col. 6
> "Novel Race Between Citron and the Frost" by W.T. Larmour
> The idea is that because their frost comes earlier (if it does) the
> Gatineau goers are. a more rugged, tougher breed than people who stick
> around in Ottawa. I could care less!
> ---
> 
> I would say the 1892 example of "could not care less" mentioned by Pat
> isn't quite the modern idiom, as it's in the form "You could not care less
> for him if he were a dog." Looking again for idiomatic "couldn't care
> less," the earliest I find is from 1942.
> 
> ---
> https://www.newspapers.com/clip/73048310/couldnt-care-less/
> Kansas City (Mo.) Star, Jan. 25, 1942, p. 4C, col. 6
> "The Coup of Mr. Marsland Faille," by Marcel Wallenstein
> "Why, Mr. Pennington, I think you're funny."
> "I mean it. You see, I've lost."
> "Have you?" she said, and poured herself another drink.
> "Yes, I have."
> "I couldn't care less," responded Miss Mond lightly.
> ---
> 
> —bgz
> 
> ------------------------------
> 
> Date:    Tue, 9 Mar 2021 13:10:11 -0500
> From:    ADSGarson O'Toole <adsgarsonotoole at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject: Re: antedating OED on "could care less"
> 
> Thanks for sharing an excellent citation, Pat, and a thoughtful
> analysis of the possible evolution of the construct.
> 
> Back in 2018 Ben Zimmer antedated the OED when he posted a message
> with citations in September 1955 and January 1954.
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ads-l/2018-March/151357.html
> 
> Below is an instance of "I could care less" with the desired sense (I
> think) in Ottawa, Canada in July 1948.
> https://www.newspapers.com/clip/73049274/couldcareless/
> 
> Date: July 20, 1948
> Newspaper: The Evening Citizen (The Ottawa Citizen)
> Newspaper Location: Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
> Article: Novel Race Between Citron and The Frost
> Author: W. T. Larmour (Evening Citizen Writer)
> Quote Page 3, Column 6
> Database: Newspapers.com
> 
> [Begin excerpt]
> The idea is that because their frost comes earlier (if it does) the
> Gatineau goers are a more rugged, tougher breed than people who stick
> around in Ottawa. I could care less!
> [End excerpt]
> 
> Garson O'Toole
> 
> ------------------------------
> 
> Date:    Tue, 9 Mar 2021 14:13:20 -0500
> From:    Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
> Subject: Re: antedating OED on "could care less"
> 
> Thanks to all for the interesting data antedating “could care less” to the 1940s.  It’s clear that these are the Real McCoy (unlike the 1892 example, which I don’t think is).  As for the proposed derivation, color me skeptical.  You write 'it's not much of a jump from "nobody could care less" to "they could care less.”’  On the contrary, I think of that as a large leap, facilitated only by the fact that we know the jump finished successfully in this (“could care less”) particular competition.  Elsewhere, it’s far less likely.  Is it not much of a jump from “Nobody could solve that problem” to “They could solve that problem”, or from “Few people can speak Basque” to “I can speak Basque”?  And then there’s the relation to squatitives (“They know squat about me” = “They don’t know squat about me”) and other examples in which the presence or absence of negation doesn’t affect the message, including those in which sarcasm clearly plays—or at least played—a role (“That’ll teach you to mess with me” = “That’ll teach you not to mess with me”) and those in which it doesn’t (the case of negative parentheticals, …”I don’t think” = “I think”).  And that’s without getting into this brain injuries that are too trivial to ignore...
> 
> Whether or not we buy the sarcasm theory of Pinker and others on “could care less", it’s more complicated than replacing a negative subject with a non-negative one while keeping the meaning constant.  I still mostly go with frozen (dead) sarcasm < “Like/As if I could care less”, but it’s not clear that any one proposed source is entirely convincing.  There’s been a lot of intriguing speculation, though, including by other ADS-listers.  A partial list:
> 
> Arnold Zwicky, 2004: http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/%7Emyl/languagelog/archives/001256.html
> Mark Liberman, 2005: http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/002253.html
> Ben Zimmer, 2009: https://www.visualthesaurus.com/cm/wordroutes/do-we-care-less-about-could-care-less/
> Arika Okrent, 2014: https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/55388/4-good-reasons-why-people-say-i-could-care-less
> 
> The truth is out there, but we may not get there from here, whether or not we could care less.  
> 
> LH
> -----------------------------------------------------------
> Date:    Tue, 9 Mar 2021 20:05:32 -0500
> From:    ADSGarson O'Toole <adsgarsonotoole at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject: Re: antedating OED on "could care less"
> 
> 
> Congratulations, Ben
> 
> Here is a pertinent citation in 1925 containing "young people . . .
> could care less". This seems to fit the modern sense. (See the final
> sentence.) An extended excerpt is included to show the context. On the
> other hand, the crucial sentence could be repaired by replacing
> "could" with "would". Perhaps this is simply an error. On the third
> hand, an error may facilitate the emergence of a new usage.
> 
> Date: May 21, 1925
> Newspaper: Aberdeen Press and Journal
> Newspaper Location:
> Article: SCOTS HEROINE MEMORIAL - Balmoral Stone for U.S. College
> News Service: Reuter
> Quote Page 7, Column 7
> Database: British Newspaper Archive
> 
> [Begin excerpt]
> Sir Esme Howard, the British Ambassador, made a speech at the laying
> of the corner stone the Flora Macdonald College here this afternoon.
> The stone is the gift of the Stuart Association of Scotland, and was
> cut, with the permission of King George, from the Royal quarries at
> Balmoral.
> 
> Referring to the strange fact that Flora, when dwelling in North
> Carolina at the outbreak of the American Revolution, declared herself
> for the British monarch, although he could not be the true monarch of
> her heart, and later returned to the land of her birth, the Ambassador
> said that she must stand as a sort of patron saint of all lost causes.
> 
> He predicted that the young people growing up in that college under
> the shadow of her name could care less for what the world called
> success, and more for honour, loyalty, and chivalry.—Reuter.
> [End excerpt]
> 
> Garson O'Toole
> 
> 
> ------------------------------
> 
> Date:    Wed, 10 Mar 2021 03:04:38 +0000
> From:    Peter Reitan <pjreitan at HOTMAIL.COM>
> Subject: Re: antedating OED on "could care less"
> 
> A vestige of the "I should worry" craze of the 1910s, which also doesn't mean what it literally says?
> ________________________________

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