Discussions about eggcorns and related topics
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Chris -- 2018-04-11
The following is from The Australian 8 January 2007:
Hewitt’s manager Justin Cohen confirmed that long-time friend Draper had been appointed to a “coaching and support role” in the wake of Roger Rasheed’s sudden resignation last Friday after three-and-a-half years guiding Australia’s former world No.1.
While Cohen described the arrangement as “open-ended”, Draper told Channel Nine he wasn’t considering coaching Hewitt beyond the Australian Open at this stage.
“I don’t think it’s a poisoned challenge by any stretch of the imagination,” Draper said of his new role.
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Another one:
As a faithful servant of Waterford hurling over a good number of years, Hartley is to be commended for his courage – or was it foolhardiness – in accepting this poisoned challenge.
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And from DIFFICULT BUT NECESSARY:
A TRANSATLANTIC STRATEGY FOR THE
GREATER MIDDLE EAST
Paper prepared for the GMF conference, June 25th 2003, Washington DC:
Managing post-Saddam Iraq is a real poisoned challenge for the US: if they stay long and embark on a deep transformation project – as the neo-conservatives demand – then accusations that America is overstaying its welcome and has embarked on an imperial project will surely grow.
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If you Google “poisoned challenge” (with the quotation marks), you get a total of 43 usages. My guess is that these are all eggcorns because one would probably not have juxtaposed those two words unless he had previous heard—and now misquoted—the term “poisoned chalice.”
Here are a few more (from that search)...
Tennis News – Inbox RobotDraper, who had switched to a career in golf following 14 years in tennis, told Channel Nine: “I don’t think it’s a poisoned challenge by any stretch of the …
www.inboxrobot.com/news/tennis&show_related=all – Similar pages
An Fear Rua – The GAA Unplugged… Hartley is to be commended for his courage – or was it foolhardiness – in accepting this poisoned challenge. The real criticism must be reserved for the …
www.anfearrua.com/ViewSectionDetail.asp?docid=1693 – 30k – Cached – Similar pages
The Cultures of Computing – Google Books Resultby Susan Leigh Star – 1995 – 282 pages
This is something of a poisoned challenge because, owing to capacity constraints, these local, business-led, standard-system installations must be faster …
books.google.com/books?isbn=0631192824…
Ego – Features – The Oxford Student – Official Student NewspaperLooked at coolly, the Revue is no poisoned challenge. Each year, new people take it on, and produce what they want. There’s something good about that. ...
www.oxfordstudent.com/ht2003wk6/Features/ego_ – 11k – Cached – Similar pages
Last edited by jorkel (2007-01-12 10:20:21)
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I agree with Jorkel that “poisoned chalice” is definitely exerting influence on this weird phrase. But I’m not sure it’s an eggcorn. An eggcorn should have more or less the same meaning as the original, but these two phrases seem to be applied to different situations. “Poisoned chalice” usually means something along the lines of “an offer that looked like a pleasure at first but turned out to be much more disagreeable, even harmful.” From the cited excerpts, it looks like “poisoned challenge” means “a particularly unpleasant, even harmful challenge.”
I like “poisoned chalice”—it’s vivid and dramatic, and the two words strain against each other. Shakespeare had the knack. “Poisoned challenge,” by contrast, seems rather less engaging. For one thing, it’s a bit redundant—all challenges are “poisoned” in the sense that there’s some obstacle to overcome. If the prospect isn’t daunting in some way, then it isn’t a challenge to begin with. “Poisoned” here just seems to be functioning as an intensifier.
But even if it’s a tepid dilution of the Shakespearean phrase, it’s still a really interesting find from an eggcornish perspective.
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