My favourite use of "attaboy" is in a short verse apparently by Ard Slok, in Verse and Worse (Faber):
Helen of Troy,
See the heroes deploy!
'Ship Ahoy! Attaboy!'
Shout the low hoi polloi

nice contribution


WELCOME DAVIDG

>Shout the low hoi polloi

what do the knee-jerk prescriptivists say about using 'the' with hoi polloi when there's an intervening adjective?

cf. the "hoi polloi" debate

Oh, yay, another person from Scotland! [waving hand madly e]
I've never heard of this Ard Slok feller, and I am just a tad suspicious: Slok, Ard --> slackard?

just a wee tad suspicious?

Slok? Slok? Slok means swig or gulp and Ard ???? As far as I could see 'Verse and Worse' is written by one Arnold Silcock (Faber).
Has Arnold been reduced to Ard and Silcock to Slok?
No Ard Slok as such is to be found on the net.

According to your link they say it's been done before and elsewhere. *|*

what do the knee-jerk prescriptivists say about using 'the' with hoi polloi when there's an intervening adjective?

Doesn't bother moi, but then I guess I don't fall easily into the prescriptivist bag. After all, it's not like the construction is Greek anymore, and it's stuck in medias English.

oh jheem, I know you ain't one of them. and I was really hoping that we had one of them lurking about to explain how this variation fits in to the template.

Postprescriptivism.