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Chris -- 2018-04-11
“All hell broke loose” is an image due to Milton, from Paradise Lost, that comes up during a chat between Gabriel and Satan. I like the revisualized picture of all that was held suddenly breaking loose.
High school reunion:
Lava Intl started their round with a barage of hip hop tunes which were ok for a minute , but you could tell the girls wanted some harcore dancehall. Things were going ok, until Tony Matterhorn’s “Dutty Whine was played and all held broke loose. Girls were simply out of their minds.
(http://www.detroitreggae.com/Headline2.php?id=173)
Vietnam atrocities:
percy had to put his plan of action together, he would pour a five gallon can of gas in the pond and light it on fire, Not knowing how large the pond was spread out Percy lit the pond with a match, then all held broke loose, the entire location was lit up like las vegas
(http://www.ndqsa.com/talkshop/messages/662.html)
Train scheduling:
All held broke loose on the Monday as some steam passengers missed their connections.
(http://www.sixbellsjunction.co.uk/80s/800322ht.htm)
Political blog:
Back around 1775(?) when the hardworking taxpayers in Boston were being robbed without proper representation, all held broke loose...and the Bostonians did not pay that many taxes without getting some half-answers.
(http://johnkbennett.blogspot.com/2008/1 … ns_10.html)
Police blotter:
Police are investigating a shootout Monday in which two gun-toting men were killed just minutes after they walked to the door of a home and then “all held broke loose.”
(http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=7 … 81,1126781)
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This eggcorn works for me.
The OED cites two pre-Milton examples of hell breaking loose. Perhaps Milton was using an established idiom.
Milton may not have originated this phrase, but he was no small inventor of English expressions. Some words we owe to the blind singer: http://www.christs.cam.ac.uk/milton400/ … m#language
Hatching new language, one eggcorn at a time.
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It works very well for me too: the picture of suddenly unleashed chaos has a forcefulness that almost rivals the original.
.
Years ago one might have had to consider the possibility of euphemism fairly seriously, but nowadays, and with there being a number of them, it doesn’t seem likely to be a major factor.
Last edited by DavidTuggy (2009-04-28 07:32:59)
*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .
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