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A New Dictionary of Eponyms

A New Dictionary of Eponyms

Paperback

Series: Oxford Paperback Reference

Dictionaries & EncyclopediasEtymology

ISBN10: 0195093542
ISBN13: 9780195093544
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: Dec 18 1997
Pages: 304
Weight: 0.83
Height: 0.83 Width: 5.51 Depth: 8.48
Language: English
Do you approve of censoring the works of great writers? Some might contend that to bowdlerize a great writer's work would be to diminish its overall quality. Others, like Thomas Bowdler, whose eraser danced over every Shakespeare play, would argue that all modest people should be able to read a great work without blushing. For attacking the classics, Mr. Bowdler has been immortalized as the world's best-known, self-appointed literary censor. And because of his efforts the term bowdlerize has become eponymous with his name. Alternatively, the word bikini--defined as a two-piece bathing suit for women--has been a linguistic mystery since 1947 when these suits were first seen on the beaches of the French Riviera, a year after the United States began testing atom bombs on the Bikini atoll of the Marshall Islands. Some shocked people said that the impact of the scanty swimsuit on male beach loungers was like the devastating effect of the atomic bomb. Whoosh! A simpler and more credible notion is that the daring swimsuits resembled the attire worn by women on the Bikini atoll.

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Dictionaries & Encyclopedias