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Jim Ward - 14 Jan 2004 06:25 GMT

In an article about the FCC and profanity:

During the January Golden Globes Awards broadcast on NBC, Bono -- frontman
for the Irish rock group U2 -- received an award and exclaimed, "This is
really, really [expletive] brilliant!" using the profanity frequently used
to describe sexual intercourse.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A14369-2004Jan13.html

What profanity did Bono use? Concupiscently?

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Jim Ward - 14 Jan 2004 17:42 GMT

I came across concupiscent in Wallace Stevens' "The Emperor of Ice-Cream",
which I plan to declaim the next time my local Baskin-Robbins-Gioia has a
poetry slam.

http://users.crocker.com/~lwm/emperor.html

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Ray Heindl - 14 Jan 2004 21:37 GMT

> I came across concupiscent in Wallace Stevens' "The Emperor of
> Ice-Cream", which I plan to declaim the next time my local
> Baskin-Robbins-Gioia has a poetry slam.
>
> http://users.crocker.com/~lwm/emperor.html

The first (and only) place I've seen it in the wild was in a book by
Rex Stout. I think he actually used the noun form, "concupiscence".

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Ray Heindl
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Joe Fineman - 14 Jan 2004 22:36 GMT

> I came across concupiscent in Wallace Stevens' "The Emperor of
> Ice-Cream", which I plan to declaim the next time my local
> Baskin-Robbins-Gioia has a poetry slam.

I have seen it here & there in poetry (I think Auden likes it), but I
was disappointed, on looking it up, to find that it is a mere synonym
for "lustful". I had imagined that, with that "con-" on it, it was
meant to emphasize the conspiratorial side of sexual pleasure. It
would be a more useful word if it had that connotation.

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--- Joe Fineman jcf@TheWorld.com

||: 10% of the cost of freedom is defending it. The other 90% :||
||: is putting up with it. :||

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Gary G. Taylor - 15 Jan 2004 04:16 GMT

>> I came across concupiscent in Wallace Stevens' "The Emperor of
>> Ice-Cream", which I plan to declaim the next time my local
[quoted text clipped - 5 lines]
> meant to emphasize the conspiratorial side of sexual pleasure. It
> would be a more useful word if it had that connotation.

One can imply that in the surrounding sentences.

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Gary G. Taylor * Rialto, CA
gary at donavan dot org / http:// geetee dot donavan dot org
"The two most abundant things in the universe
are hydrogen and stupidity." --Harlan Ellison

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DE781 - 14 Jan 2004 19:56 GMT

Ward:

>What profanity did Bono use? Concupiscently?

LOL! Look like your program needs more info.

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Robert Lieblich - 15 Jan 2004 01:48 GMT

> In an article about the FCC and profanity:
>
[quoted text clipped - 6 lines]
>
> What profanity did Bono use? Concupiscently?

No disrespect, Jim, but I posted about the same thing (much less
wittily[1]) a few days ago.

The article as a whole is about the FCC's planned reconsideration of
its original ruling. No surprise there. Dubya must have been fuckin
furious.

There was also a short item about this on a PBS show this evening.
They were very coy about not using the word while making absolutely
clear what it was.

[1] What? You can't add "ly" to "witty"? Why not?

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Bob Lieblich
Half-wittily

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Ross Howard - 15 Jan 2004 01:52 GMT

>> In an article about the FCC and profanity:
>>
[quoted text clipped - 19 lines]
>
>[1] What? You can't add "ly" to "witty"? Why not?

Huh? Who said you can't? It gets 27,000 Google hits, the first few of
which include dictionary entries and one from the Washington Post.

Were you perhaps thinking of "sillily" (also perfectlily fine) or
something?

--
Ross Howard

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Robert Lieblich - 15 Jan 2004 02:22 GMT

[ ... [

> >[1] What? You can't add "ly" to "witty"? Why not?
>
[quoted text clipped - 3 lines]
> Were you perhaps thinking of "sillily" (also perfectlily fine) or
> something?

The best defense is a good offense. (UK: The best defence is a good
offence.)

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Bob Lieblich
Very offensive

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Discussion Groups / English Usage / January 2004

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