WEASEL WORDS

DOWN MEMORY LANE




They swallowed each other up


An uncle of mine, Balraj, who lived in England, visited us once in two years or so. Once while he was visiting us, another uncle from Palamcottah (Palayamkottai) also happened to come for a week’s stay. This uncle was called Peria Thambi by his elders. His younger brother was Chinna Thambi. My aunts called them Big Anna and Chinnanna.

A weasel in the morning

Big Thambi had the habit of eating two raw eggs every morning. He tapped the egg with a spoon till a small opening formed. Then he lifted his face, took the egg close to his mouth, and tossed the contents down his throat. Uncle Balraj who was watching this one morning said “A weasel !”. I didn’t know what a weasel was and so couldn’t understand why everyone was laughing. Later the word was explained to me. Weasel is a small animal of the stoat family that sucked eggs through a small opening it made in the shells. Shakespeare makes a reference to weasels in ‘As You Like It’. Jacques says “I can suck melancholy out of a song, as a weasel sucks eggs”.

Later, I came across the term ‘weasel words’. The expression referred to words of convenient and deliberate ambiguity. This expression first became well known after Theodore Roosevelt used it in a speech criticising President Wilson. “The words universal voluntary have exactly the same effect an acid has on an alkali – a neutralizing effect. One of our defects as a nation is a tendency to use what have been called ‘weasel words’. When a weasel sucks eggs, the meat is sucked out of the egg. If you use a weasel word after another there is nothing left of the other. Now, you can have universal training, or you can have voluntary training, but when you use the word ‘voluntary’ to qualify the word ‘universal, you are using a weasel word; it has sucked all the meaning out of ‘universal’. The two words flatly contradict each other.”

Light as a feather

It is probable that Roosevelt got the idea of weasel words from a story by Stewart Chaplin, ‘Stained Glass Political Platform’. “Weasel words are words that suck the life out of the words next to them, just as a weasel sucks an egg and leaves the shell. If you lift the egg afterwards, it is as light as a feather, and not very filling when you are hungry, but a basketful of them would make quite a show, and would bamboozle the unwary. I know them well, and mighty useful they are, too. Although the gentleman couldn’t write much of a platform, he is an expert in weaseling. I have seen him take his pen and go through a proposed plank or resolution and weasel every flatfooted word in it.”

Nearer home we have voluble politicians who talk a great deal but say very little. They add words for the sound rather than the meaning. So they speak in jingling rhymes or high-flown rhetoric which is a lot of sound and fury signifying nothing.

These orators have their fans too, who cheer and applaud every rhyme whether it had reason or not. And these empty rhetorical devices won them votes and posts. In oratory here nothing succeeds like excess.

A person who indulges in political fence-straddling is said to be weaselling. Our country surely has enough weaselling, like the politician going to the press the next day declaring, “That is not what I meant ……” Experts in weaselling always have their escape hatches open and ready.

That is what keeps them going.



J.VASANTHAN


© Copyright 2000 - 2008 The Hindu

HONORARY TITLES BESTOWED ON FILM STARS

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DOWN MEMORY LANE






Here in Tamil Nadu we are accustomed to seeing film stars decorated with honorary titles, like ‘Puratchi Nadigar’, ‘Latchiya Nadigar’, ‘Kaadhal Mannan’, ‘Nadigar Thilakam’ etc. Not all these titles were justifiable. They were bestowed on these actors in a gesture of gratitude for some hours of entertainment.

Many of us didn’t know that such titles were given as a mark of respect in Hollywood too. In my younger days a theatre in Madurai used to show old Hollywood films. From these we came to know that some Hollywood actors and actresses had such honorifics.

John Barrymore was known as ‘The Great Profile’. He had classic features and the cameramen made the best use of his looks. Barrymore was also known as ‘The Great Lover’. The Barrymore family had made quite an impact on stage and screen. John’s brother, Lionel, and his sister, Ethel, played stagey characters even on screen. They were not as popular as John. John made a great name for himself in Hollywood. He talked about his fame in tongue-in-cheek statements like, “I like to be introduced as America’s foremost actor. It saves the necessity of further effort.”

He and Greta Garbo (arguably the greatest star ever) made a great pair in films like ‘Grand Hotel’ (l932). He came to be known also as ‘he Greatest Lover of the Screen’. During the peak of his career he became an alcoholic and had to take intensive treatment. His health quickly deteriorated, and he passed away in 1942 at the age of 60.

The ‘It’ girl

Some actresses too had honorary titles. Clara Bow with her big-eyed look and her sexy jiggle shook up cinema audiences everywhere. She was jolly and vivacious with a zest for life — a new emancipated woman. Her side glances and inviting looks seemed to end in a message: “Come and get me”. She was as vulgar as the age she lived in. An eminent literary lady, Elinor Glyn, discovered in Clara bow the epitome of ‘It’. Among her numerous definitions of ‘It’ was this: “A strange magnetism which attracts both sexes....there must be a physical attraction, but beauty is unnecessary”. Clara Bow became the ‘It’ Girl. And a film of hers was named ‘It’. It was a hit, and all young girls started imitating Clara Bow’s make-up and mannerisms. But after that Bow’s career went on a downslide and she faded away. A film historian said: “Hollywood owes much to personalities like Clara Bow, who helped to create the glamour it has never entirely lost. She passed away at the age of sixty in 1965.”

The ‘Oomph’ girl

Ann Sheridan was not a great actress, but was good in making wisecracks, and verbally overwhelming tough heroes like James Cagney and Zachary Scott. Warner Brothers christened her ‘The Oomph Girl’, and the name stuck. From then on writers were thinking up films that had scope for her rich contralto singing voice and her sex appeal (Oomph). Oomph is supposed to be the sound our breath makes when her sex appeal hits us hard. She had a moderately successful career until her death at 52.

Clark Gable who came to be known as ‘The King of Hollywood ‘ after his performance in ‘Gone With the Wind’ had a squarish face with huge ears. As Howard Hughes said, “Clark Gable’s ears make him look like a taxi cab with the doors open”. Despite the ears he became a heartthrob and the top star of Hollywood. Gable didn’t attach much importance to his own stardom. He was once seen removing his false teeth and washing them under a tap in a park. When people stopped to gape at him, he said with an exaggerated lisp “Look, America’s thweetheart.” But in spite of these antics his titles, ‘America’s Sweetheart’ and ‘The King of Hollywood’ stuck to him and he was considered the epitome of male charm.

Whatever the merits of these titles may be, there is no doubt that these stars were great entertainers.




J.VASANTHAN


© Copyright 2000 - 2008 The Hindu