Discussions about eggcorns and related topics
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Chris -- 2025-05-10
At supper tonight my wife, talking about religious prejudices between two denominations in her home town, said that one group thought the other was “outside the pail.â€
I corrected her. “That’s ‘beyond the pale.’ The pale was a fence outside Dublin….â€
“No,†she interrupted. “Outside the pail. Not in the same pail.â€
Uh-oh, I thought, trouble. In an earlier post I discussed “b-line,†Arnold Zwicky’s principal example of what he calls a “pail.†(http://eggcorns.lascribe.net/forum/view … hp?id=3029). I found some evidence that “b-line†was an eggcorn and not a pail. But I assumed that “pail†itself, borrowed from the phrase “beyond the pail,†was still its own best example. Now I wonder. Could many of those who write “beyond the pail†be using it in the sense of “outside the bucket†and thus eggcorning the word “pale?â€
Houston, we have a problem.
Last edited by kem (2009-02-03 19:18:46)
Hatching new language, one eggcorn at a time.
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