Discussions about eggcorns and related topics
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Chris -- 2018-04-11
After reading Mark Peters’ essay in Chronicle of Higher Ed on “Like a Bowl in a China Shop,” I immediately thought of two likely candidates and one shaky one for the list:
“dull drums” as he, “he was really down in the dull drums”
“aquatint” as in, “he was aquatinted with grief”
“melon collie” as in, “when his dog died, he was melon collie.”
What are your thoughts on these?
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THE DULL DRUMS is fantastic! Did you google it?
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I just ran across aquatinted (again—I first have it dated from 2000) and was going to report it, but found it here. Surely it is a “cupertino†(=spellchecker-produced malapropism), though? Some spell-checker fails to guess that aquainted (a common mispelling with ghits in the millions) is almost certain to be intended as acquainted.
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It’s such a common missspelling that even when it shows up repeatedly in a document (a situation I can document), that probably is a repeated cupertino rather than evidence that the cupertinized version ( aquatinted ) has become standard for the particular writer. In any case, it makes little or no sense, so is not a good eggcorn (though it is an entertaining malapropism.)
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Sara, if you’re out there—have you found any others? To come up with three just like that and then not post again, is a pity.
*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .
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On the plain in Spain where it mainly rains.
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