[Ads-l] Slight Antedating of "PIzzazz"

Tue Sep 13 00:40:48 UTC 2022

Sigh. I was excited (municipalotic?) to read Fred's cite for "pizzazz" in
the Yale Daily News, but now it appears that New Haven can claim pride of
place for neither the (American-style) pizza nor the pizzazz.

LH

On Mon, Sep 12, 2022 at 5:16 PM Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Chew upon these antecedents. More to come:
>
> 1904  _The [Cincinnati] Post_ (July 15) 6: And "Cy" Seymour, with a merry
> ha, ha, grinned at Wiltse in the eighth, caught one of his easy ones right
> on the pazazz, and consigned it to deep center.
>
> 1904 _The [Cincinnati] Post_ (Aug. 31) 6: A jolt that knocked fond hope
> right on the pazazz.
>
> 1908 _Morning Journal-Courier_ (Hartford, Conn.) (March 14) 5: "The
> comedians were a couple of Morgues,' the Chorus Lady tells her people in
> her description of the play that was all to the "pazazz."
>
> 1908 _The [NYC] Sun_ (May 10) (Sec. II) 8:  I was on the pazazz so bad that
> time that the eats looked as unreal as a circus poster to me.
>
> 1908 _Evening World_ (NYC) (Aug. 5) 3: Mr. Charles Williams...put the whole
> place on the scrambled pazazz.
>
> 1908 _Columbus [O.] Dispatch_ (Oct. 12) The burlesque show "has gone on the
> pazazz," as she puts it.
>
> 1912 _Erie [Pa.] Daily Times_ (May 17) 23: Say, when does old Pazazz
> appear? His name ain't on the program here.
>
> JL
>
> On Mon, Sep 12, 2022 at 4:17 PM Dan Goncharoff <thegonch at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > It strikes me that pizzazz went from fritz to glitz.
> >
> > I wonder what vaudevillians we're doing with these words in their
> routines.
> >
> > On Mon, Sep 12, 2022, 12:03 PM Peter Reitan <pjreitan at hotmail.com>
> wrote:
> >
> > > A clothing in the Indianapolis Star of March 3, 1937, page 6, mentinos
> > > that a certain coat has “that indefinable dynamic quality which the
> > Harvard
> > > Lampoon calls ‘pizazz.’”
> > >
> > > A magician in the late-1890s had an assistant he called “Pizzazzes.”
> St.
> > > Paul Globe, Janury 17, 1898, page 4.
> > >
> > > Also, the word “pazaza” had a long run, beginning in the early 1900s.
> > > Used in a variety of ways, sometimes a fake name of a fake thing,
> > sometimes
> > > a placeholder name for something funny, sometimes the name of an exotic
> > > location, sometimes the name of a club.  It still appeared into the
> > 1930s.
> > >
> > > “On the pazzaz” seems to have meant the same as “on the blink”, from as
> > > early as 1907.
> > >
> > > Sent from Mail<https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=550986> for
> > Windows
> > >
> > > From: Ben Zimmer<mailto:bgzimmer at GMAIL.COM>
> > > Sent: Monday, September 12, 2022 12:34 AM
> > > To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU<mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > > Subject: Re: Slight Antedating of "PIzzazz"
> > >
> > > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > > -----------------------
> > > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > > Poster:       Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at GMAIL.COM>
> > > Subject:      Re: Slight Antedating of "PIzzazz"
> > >
> > >
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > >
> > > An item in the March 1937 issue of Harper's Bazaar titled "This Thing
> > > Called Pizazz" (pp. 116-7) appears to have inspired ad copy in the New
> > York
> > > Times and elsewhere in late February. (The 2/26/37 NYT ad from The
> > Tailored
> > > Woman and a 2/28/37 ad in the New York Herald Tribune from Bonwit
> Teller
> > > both credit HB for "pizazz.") It's fair to assume the March issue was
> > > circulating by the end of February, as is typical in fashion magazine
> > > publishing. Vogue's famous "September issue," for instance, hits
> > > newsstands in mid-August.
> > >
> > > I see the OED2 "pizzazz" entry used the HB item for its first cite:
> > >
> > > ---
> > > https://www.oed.com/oed2/00180470
> > > 1937 Harper's Bazaar Mar. 116/2 Pizazz, to quote the editor of the
> > Harvard
> > > Lampoon, is an indefinable dynamic quality, the je ne sais quoi of
> > > function; as for instance, adding Scotch puts pizazz into a drink.
> > Certain
> > > clothes have it, too.=E2=80=A5 There's pizazz in this rust evening
> coat.
> > > ---
> > >
> > > In the OED3 entry, this cite has been removed and replaced with the
> > 2/26/37
> > > NYT ad, which Fred first shared here in 2010:
> > >
> > >
> > >
> >
> https://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ads-l/2010-September/102735.htm=
> > > l
> > >
> > > Given that the NYT ad uses the same heading as the Mar. '37 HB item
> > ("This
> > > Thing Called Pizazz"), it would make sense to credit HB as the earlier
> > > cite, on the assumption that the actual publication date preceded the
> > cover
> > > date. But this is somewhat of a moot point now that Fred has located
> the
> > > 2/23/37 YDN cite that doesn't rely on Harper's Bazaar at all,
> suggesting
> > it
> > > was already Ivy League slang. A search of the Harvard Lampoon archive
> may
> > > still trump the Yalies, however.
> > >
> > > As we've discussed in the past, "pizzazz" had a number of earlier
> > variants.
> > > One of these is "pazzazza" (or "pazazza"), which appears in the
> databases
> > > with various slang meanings going back to c1902. (There was a musical
> > > recording called "The Pazzazza Promenade" in 1910.) This example from
> > 1932
> > > indicates that "pazzazza" could be used with the same "peppy" meaning
> > later
> > > associated with "pizzazz."
> > >
> > > ---
> > > https://www.newspapers.com/clip/109405124/pazzazza/
> > > Evening News (Harrisburg, Pa.), Oct. 26, 1932, p. 10, col. 2
> > > "The Once Over" by H.I. Phillips [NY Sun column syndicated by
> Associated
> > > Newspapers]
> > > The presidential campaign is boring people. It lacks hot-cha. ... The
> > > campaign has had no pace, no pep, no pazzazza.
> > > ---
> > >
> > > Perhaps worth a bracketed cite in the OED entry.
> > >
> > > --bgz
> > >
> > > On Sun, Sep 11, 2022 at 9:36 PM Shapiro, Fred <fred.shapiro at yale.edu>
> > > wrote=
> > > :
> > >
> > > > The origins of the word "pizzazz" are a bit mysterious.  The OED's
> > first
> > > > citation is from the New York Times, Feb. 26, 1937, and the Times
> > > > attributed the term to the Harvard Lampoon and Harper's Bazaar.  But
> no
> > > o=
> > > ne
> > > > has found prior citations in the Lampoon or HB.
> > > >
> > > > A slightly earlier citation points to a different Ivy League school:
> > > >
> > > > 1937 _Yale Daily News_ 23 Feb. 4/3 (Yale Daily News Historical
> Archive)
> > > > That the Blues were potentially better skaters cannot be doubted, but
> > > > somehow they lacked the old pizzazz down on the Arena ice last night.
> > > >
> > >
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> > >
> > >
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> >
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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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