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Carpal Tunnel
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I'm having great fun this week with the scribblings of Thomas Nashe; I am however puzzled by some of the following screed: I utterly despair of them, or not so much despair of them as
count them a pair of poor idiots, being not only but also two
brothers, two blockheads, two blunderkins, having their
brains stuffed with nought but balderdash, but that they are
the very botts & the glanders to the gentle readers, the dead
palsy and apoplexy of the press, the serpigo and the sciatica
of the 7 liberal sciences, the surfeiting vomit of Lady Vanity,
the sworn bawds to one another's vainglory, &, to conclude,
the most contemptible Monsieur Ajaxes of excremental
conceits and stinking kennel-raked-up invention that this or
any age ever afforded. I assume that Monsieur Ajax is a literary allusion of some sort? but surely not Toby Tyler, which came about 400 yrs. *after Nashe. meanwhile, I shall see what I can find of the very botts & the glanders.. and I thought serpigo was a bad cop gone good.  edit: botts, glanders, palsy, apoplexy, serpigo, sciatica - all afflictions you wouldn't wish on your worst.. horse.
Last edited by tsuwm; 12/16/2005 2:35 AM.
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Carpal Tunnel
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It's possible you may be able to glean more from here, m; I did a couple of links, then started getting error messages. Nashe (Be ready for the music.)
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Carpal Tunnel
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Let me be your privy counsellor... My first line of thought was to do with the obvious possible reference to the Illyrian plainsman. But then I realised the true connection. It’s a pun. It must have been prompted by Sir John Harington's recently published A New Discourse upon a Stale Subject which appeared in 1596. Harrington’s godmother was Queen Elizabeth, a royal favour shown in recognition for the loyalty of the Harringtons at the time of Mary’s supremacy – they were imprisoned with Elizabeth in the Tower of London. The point of Harrington’s book was a detailed and well-illustrated exposition of his new invention – the water closet (hence the ‘stale’ in the title). He nearly found himself in, er, trouble with the Star Chamber over some of his sideswipes at one or more of Elizabeth’s favourite courtiers. Be that as it may, the book’s sub-title was The Metamorphosis of Ajax. Ajax is not a classical allusion here: it is a play on words for a jakes, being the Elizabethan term for a privy. A Harrington water closet was installed at Betsy's Richmond Palace within a couple of years.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Ajax is not a classical allusion here: it is a play on words for a jakes, being the Elizabethan term for a privy.
That being so, is this the origin of our modern-day "john"? Via jakes ==> jack ==> john ?
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Be-careful-what-you-wish-for-you-might-get-it Department:
"They" tell the story around Brown University of the undergraduates calling the John D. Rockefeller Library "the Rock," as in "I'll meet you at the Rock after class." This found disfavor with the Administration - too familiar; too disrespectful. The Word came down that the Library should no longer be referred to as the Rock, thank you very much.
Which found disfavor with the student body, who adopted the tactic of strict compliance BUT, and started referring to it instead as [of course!] "the John" ...
The Administration relented promptly.
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Quote:
It’s a pun.
… Ajax is not a classical allusion here: it is a play on words for a jakes, being the Elizabethan term for a privy.
Thus proving that the bad pun is not a modern invention.
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I'm with him on this one; but thanks anyway, mav.
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No prob, tsuwm - and yes, it's a crap pun
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