Nigel Rees - A Word In Your Shell-Like стр 15.

all we want is the facts, maam (or just the facts, maam). From the American TV series Dragnet (19518, revived 19679). Sgt Joe Friday (played by Jack Webb) had a staccato style of questioning. These were probably the first big phrases to catch on in Britain after the start of commercial TV in 1955. The phrase all we want is the facts was, however, already a cliché when importunate journalists were represented in theatrical sketches. In Long-Distance Divorce, a revue sketch from Nine Sharp (1938), Herbert Farjeon

put the phrase in the mouth of a British reporter interviewing a Hollywood star.

all women look the same in the dark Contemptuous male view of women as sexual objects sometimes, they all the look the same in the dark. An established view by the mid-20th century at least. The least politically correct phrase in this book. Compare the similar expression you dont look at the mantelpiece when youre poking the fire (an old joke revived by John Osborne in The Entertainer, 1957); Ovids more felicitous and diplomatic version in his Ars Amatoria (circa 2 BC); The dark makes every woman beautiful; and the English proverb (known by 1546), All cats are grey in the dark. Robert Herrick appeared to say much the same in No Difference i th Dark (1648): Night makes no difference twixt the Priest and the Clerk; / Joan as my Lady is as good i th dark.

(the) almighty dollar An early indication of the currencys all-powerful role in American life. The almighty dollar is the only object of worship Philadelphia Public Ledger (2 December 1836). In fact, this possible first use of the term almighty dollar had just been preceded by Washington Irvings statement in Knickerbocker Magazine (12 November 1836): The almighty dollar, that great object of universal devotion throughout our land. Mark Twain took up the theme in his Notebooks (1935): We Americans worship the almighty dollar! Well, it is a worthier god than Hereditary Privilege. Earlier, Ben Jonson in his poem Epistle to Elizabeth, Countess of Rutland from The Forest (1616) wrote of almighty gold.

almost a gentleman Bill matter (i.e. the descriptive line that appeared on posters) of the British music-hall comedian Billy Bennett (18871942). John Osborne took it as the title of his second volume of memoirs (1991). Compare Daisy Ashford, The Young Visiters, Chap. 1 (1919): I am not quite a gentleman but you would hardly notice it but cant be helped anyhow.

along came a spider The title of a cop film (US 2001) starring Morgan Freeman is taken from the nursery rhyme Little Miss Muffet, known since 1805 and containing the lines (properly), There came a big spider / Who sat down beside her / And frightened Miss Muffet away. Along came a spider is the more usual American version, however. People like to think that Miss Muffet was Patience, the daughter of Dr Thomas Muffet, an entomologist who died in 1604. If he had been an arachnologist, that would have been even neater.

altered See CASE IS.

altered states Where drugs take you to. Altered States is the title of a novel (1979; film US 1980) by Paddy Chayevsky (screen credit as Sidney Aaron). This is a sci-fi thriller about genetic experimentation or, as one of the film guides puts it, about a psychophysiologist who hallucinates himself back into primitive states of human evolution, in which guise he emerges to kill. Might there be a connection with what Dr Albert Hofmann observed of his discovery, the psychedelic drug LSD? He noted in his diary for 1943: An intense stimulation of the imagination and an altered state of awareness of the world.

although I says it as shouldnt Phrase of excuse before uttering an indiscretion. Since the 17th century.

always leave them wanting more Proverbial expression in the world of entertainment. From The Independent (8 May 1996): Franz Welser-Möst will doubtless have seen the irony in stepping down as music director of the London Philharmonic with a RequiemBut there is an old theatrical adage that says Always leave them wanting more. And surprise, surprise I do believe he has.

always merry and bright The British comedian Alfred Lester (18721925) is principally associated with this phrase, although it crops up in all sorts of other places. As Peter Doody, a lugubrious jockey in the Lionel Monckton/Howard Talbot/Arthur Wimperis musical comedy The Arcadians (1909), he had it as his motto in a song, My Motter. Punch quoted the phrase on 26 October 1910. Somerset Maugham in a letter to a friend (1915) wrote: I am back on a fortnights leave, very merry and bright, but frantically busy I wish it were all over. An edition of The Magnet from 1920 carried an ad for Merry and Bright a comic paper. P. G. Wodehouse used the phrase in The Indiscretions of Archie (1921). Larry Grayson

suggested that it was used as the billing for Billy Danvers (18841964), the British variety entertainer, and so it was, but he may also have used Cheeky, Cheery and Chubby.

always partridge See SEMPER PERDRIX.

always steer towards the gunfire Tackle matters head on. Originally from naval warfare. Or is it head towards?