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Discussion Groups / English Usage / January 2007all the rage
Hi. Recently, I read on a newspaper that Roger Federer was 'all the rage' to win the Australian open. I thought that 'all the rage' meant only 'extremely popular' or 'very fashionable' and not 'the favorite' as seems implied here. Is this usage legitimate and idiomatic? Perhaps even common? Thanks in advance for any replies > Hi. Recently, I read on a newspaper that Roger Federer was 'all the > rage' to win the Australian open. I thought that 'all the rage' meant > only 'extremely popular' or 'very fashionable' and not 'the favorite' > as seems implied here. Is this usage legitimate and idiomatic? > Perhaps even common? Thanks in advance for any replies You're quite right about the meaning, but sports reporters often mangle the language. Just be grateful that you don't have to listen to Australian sports reporters who would have said that he "has the favouritism".  SignaturePeter Moylan http://www.pmoylan.org Please note the changed e-mail and web addresses. The domain eepjm.newcastle.edu.au no longer exists, and I can no longer receive mail at my newcastle.edu.au addresses. The optusnet address could disappear at any time. >> Hi. Recently, I read on a newspaper that Roger Federer was 'all the >> rage' to win the Australian open. I thought that 'all the rage' [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] > to Australian sports reporters who would have said that he "has the > favouritism". Followup: after Federer won, with no sign of bias in the judging that I could detect, I decided to see whether this strange sports reporters' version of "favouritism" could be found in any dictionary. I didn't find any such evidence, but I did get a strange result from Wikipaedia: Elitism From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (Redirected from Favouritism) That "redirected from" is the only place in the page where the word "favouritism" occurs. SignaturePeter Moylan http://www.pmoylan.org Please note the changed e-mail and web addresses. The domain eepjm.newcastle.edu.au no longer exists, and I can no longer receive mail at my newcastle.edu.au addresses. The optusnet address could disappear at any time. >> Hi. Recently, I read on a newspaper that Roger Federer was 'all the >> rage' to win the Australian open. I thought that 'all the rage' meant [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] > Australian sports reporters who would have said that he "has the > favouritism". What I have enjoyed during the Australian Open is the commentators' pronunciation of the players' names. They do quite well with the French ones, but it seems that every Russian woman whose name ends in -ova or -eva, gets a stressed o. OK, I know that Sharapova has accepted that stress on her name, but she's lived more than half of her life in America, but "KuznetSOVa" sounds so weird. SignatureRob Bannister > What I have enjoyed during the Australian Open is the commentators' > pronunciation of the players' names. They do quite well with the > French ones, but it seems that every Russian woman whose name ends in > -ova or -eva, gets a stressed o. OK, I know that Sharapova has > accepted that stress on her name, but she's lived more than half of > her life in America, but "KuznetSOVa" sounds so weird. All foreign languages have the stress on the penultimate syllable. That's what makes them foreign. Italian does it, for example. Q.E.D. I see that the tennis commentators are rejoicing at the news of the divorce of Justine Hénin-Ardennes. They believe, rightly or wrongly, that this will make her name easier to pronounce. Australians always did have trouble with that French "u", although young girls faced with something disgusting seem to get a very close approximant. SignaturePeter Moylan http://www.pmoylan.org Please note the changed e-mail and web addresses. The domain eepjm.newcastle.edu.au no longer exists, and I can no longer receive mail at my newcastle.edu.au addresses. The optusnet address could disappear at any time. On Jan 28, 5:52 pm, Peter Moylan [snip] > I see that the tennis commentators are rejoicing at the news of the > divorce of Justine Hénin-Ardennes. They believe, rightly or wrongly, > that this will make her name easier to pronounce. Australians always did > have trouble with that French "u", [snip] I submit "wrongly" -- because her first name will still require that French "u," and because they always got Hénin wrong before she married (never was it "Ay-naa," with the first /a/ sound as in "today" and the second /a/ sound (for /i/) as in "bat." Aloha ~~~ Ozzie Maland ~~~ San Diego >On Jan 28, 5:52 pm, Peter Moylan >[snip] [quoted text clipped - 7 lines] >(never was it "Ay-naa," with the first /a/ sound as in "today" and the >second /a/ sound (for /i/) as in "bat." I don't watch tennis on TV, much less in English, so how do the new millennium's answers to Messrs Weekes, Carpentator and West deal with "Moyà" -- do they make an effort to get it right or get the stress wrong (as usually happens with such Catalan surnames in English)? SignatureArchie Valparaiso Tunbridge Wells borough residents are the second best recyclers in Kent. > Hi. Recently, I read on a newspaper that Roger Federer was 'all the rage' > to win the Australian open. I thought that 'all the rage' meant only > 'extremely popular' or 'very fashionable' and not 'the favorite' as seems > implied here. Is this usage legitimate and idiomatic? Perhaps even common? > Thanks in advance for any replies I've never seen it used to mean "favored to win," only "the latest fashion or fad." However, I'm curious if anyone has any solid history on this phrase. OED? It doesn't turn up in my slang dictionaries, although plain "rage" is there with several meanings. What I associate it with is Georgette Heyer Regency romances, written mid-20th century and set in the early 1800s. Heyer was reasonably careful to use the language of the day in her stories -- but not always. She specifically said (reported in a biography) that she used some slang terms *not* from that era, and saw them being copied by her imitators. Sort of like copyright traps on maps. She didn't name what they were. I'm quite sure "all the rage" was not generally used in the 20th c. US, although my impression is it showed up near the end. What pattern of use it had in the UK is my biggest unknown. Because I was big Georgette Heyer fan in my youth, I had to stop myself from saying several phrases common in her books that would have sounded strange in modern America. "All the rage" was one, and "foxed" (drunk) was another. SignatureBest -- Donna Richoux [snip] > However, I'm curious if anyone has any solid history on this phrase. > OED? It doesn't turn up in my slang dictionaries, although plain "rage" > is there with several meanings. [snip] OED2 doesn't support the "favored to win" sense; excerpt: b. (all) the rage: said of the object of a widespread and usually temporary enthusiasm. 1785 Europ. Mag. VIII. 473 The favourite phrases..The Rage, the Thing, the Twaddle, and the Bore. 1802 Monthly Mag. 1 Oct. 253/1 The rage for the dotting style of engraving..is on the decline. 1811 Byron Let. 15 Dec. (1973) II. 149 Tomorrow, I dine with Rogers & am to hear Colridge, who is a kind of rage at present. 1834 Lytton Last Days of Pompeii I. i. 173 Sylla is said to have transported to Italy the worship of the Egyptian Isis. It soon became 'the rage'-and was peculiarly in vogue with the Roman ladies. 1836 T. Hook G. Gurney I. 52 At that period it was the rage to parodize tragedies. 1837 Marryat Perc. Keene ii, In a short time my mother became quite the rage. 1861 K. Stone Jrnl. 28 Aug. in Brokenburn (1955) 48 Plaiting palmetto for baskets has been the rage for several days. 1870 Ld. Malmesbury in Athenæum 4 June 734 In 1776, the game of 'Commerce'+was 'all the rage'. ..1940 Graves & Hodge Long Week-End iii. 38 After the war the new fantastic development of Jazz music and the steps that went with it, became, in the comtemporary phrase, 'all the rage'. .. |
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