If Deirdre mentioned the eyelet lace on her wedding veil one more time, Sam would go spare.He really would.
If you go spare, you lose your temper completely.
Use: 'She's the utter end,' said Diana, 'she bores me to tears; all she can talk about is herself and clothes. Well, I like clothes too, but not all day every day. Sam will go spare once they're married.'
Maybe 'fly off the handle' or 'go bananas' are fine synonyms but 'go spare' so perfectly comprises a dignified RBD temper (imploding on itself in an infinitesimal nuclear event) that any mention of bananas seems unseemly. Epic win Brit-speak.
Chambers (the Brit dictionary I use simply because it's what's loaded on my computer) defines "go spare" as "to become furious or frenzied" -- now, I can see an REW becoming furious, but I really can't imagine any Neels hero becoming frenzied.
ReplyDeleteI am going to ponder "go spare" as I have a lie-in and await my tea and crumpets. I told Jim that if he had to get an overseas job that I'd like rowdy ol' London or such. The words are familiar but the meaning is, oh, so much better!
ReplyDeleteI would have never got that from 'Sam will go spare once they're married.'
ReplyDeleteI was guessing that he'd go places without her. Like the spare tire in the trunk or the spare bowling ball that hardly ever gets picked up.
How could that possibly mean furious or frenzied. Especially as it's a British colloquialism. Can they even do that? BettyMagdalen, you'd have the best dope on the the RBP or CBP or perhaps PBP(Rich,Comfortable, or Poor British Professor}. Enlighten us, please.
Betty Barbara here--
ReplyDeleteI just interpreted 'go spare' as a version of 'go crazy' or maybe 'lose his mind'.
Frenzy, not so much.
Betty Mary - According to the Internet (which I am reduced to consulting because the phrase "go spare" isn't in Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable and I can't be bothered to go downstairs to Betty Ross's extensive collection of reference tomes), the expression "to go spare" comes from the concept of being let go or made redundant. At some point in the 1950s, its meaning expanded to mean the fury one would feel at being let go or made redundant.
ReplyDeletePersonally, I don't think a REW (Rich English Whatever -- all her Dutch/Fries heroes are doctors but her English heroes had a slightly wider range of professions, but they are, to a man, rich!) would have the outward show of temper implied by "go spare."
But keep in mind that this isn't something Sam Gervis says about himself. This is Diana's colorful idiom, and thus suggestive of the kind of casual overstatement that a young woman might use about her brother. A sort of hyperbole; the American equivalent might be to say of someone very staid that he'll go postal...
I think I'll go spare if that's the best shot of Hugh Jackman we can have....
ReplyDeleteFor Betty JoDee -- because sometimes I'm mean to her -- here's a webpage you might like. (Be sure to scroll ALL the way down!)
ReplyDeleteYum, Betty Magdalen. Yum. Alas, Betty JoDee, while he looked delish in those I can't say he looked like he was going spare.
ReplyDeleteOkay, so I asked Betty Henry (whom we saw in Philly on the occasion of Betty Ross becoming a US citizen!) (yes, that means that for the first time in my life, I'm married to an American) about going spare.
ReplyDeleteHis understanding is that it's used as hyperbole. His example was this: "My boss goes spare every time I correct her grammar." Obviously, we can imagine the reaction of the boss (even sympathize with it) and it's annoyance that's been exaggerated to the level of fury.
Ooh, and here's a new one: Horlicks, that infamous malted milk drink served in hospitals because of its soporific quality, has come to be used to mean a snafu or in place of "bollocks" meaning a mess. Supposedly some politician said of the opposition, "He made a fair Horlicks of that," or whatever. Presumably taking a trade name in vain is better than referring to male genitalia . . . or worse.
Thanks, Betty Magdalen! I can't write anymore fanning face until I've recovered....
ReplyDeleteIn "From Poland With Love" Isobel thinks that if she dared tidy up his desk, "the doctor would probably go spare." But he just tells her he knows what she's thinking and she'd better not try it.
ReplyDeleteB. Baersma