"Masher"
Dylan Bryan-Dolman
him, she thought he was kind of a "masher", which he had to asked me what it
meant. Now, for me the word has a British-working-class, laddish sound, but
the OED tells me that it was used for Victorian fops, and was originally an
import from the US. What I'm curious about now is whether or not it was
used continuously in America from the nineteenth century, or whether it was
forgotten here after being sent to England, and then reimported.
I think I remember Bugs-Bunny-in-drag crying out "You masher! You brute!"
at an amorous pursuer, and using a tony, movie-Duchess voice to do it, but I
can't decide what this means.
So--native US idiom or double transplant?
Mike Oliver
> I think I remember Bugs-Bunny-in-drag crying out "You masher! You brute!"
> at an amorous pursuer, and using a tony, movie-Duchess voice to do it, but I
> can't decide what this means.
>
> So--native US idiom or double transplant?
I had always assumed that the word referred to the sort of gent
who without invitation would "mash" various soft protruberances
of a female companion. I have no input to give on the historical
or pondian questions.
Pat Durkin
"Dylan Bryan-Dolman" <DylanBD*SPAM*B*GONE*@earthlink.net> wrote in
message news:SCH29.9853$cI.7...@newsread2.prod.itd.earthlink.net...
Boy, I can't recall when I last heard either masher or wolf as a current
slang word. Makes me wonder about the background of the American girl
in your story.
Dena Jo
> Boy, I can't recall when I last heard either masher or wolf as a current
> slang word. Makes me wonder about the background of the American girl
> in your story.
The only time I can recall hearing the word masher spoken out loud is in The
Music Man, which takes place in the 1910s, in one of the songs: "Now, do
you think that I'd allow a common masher, now, really, Momma! I have my
standards where men are concerned." When I was a child, that line sent me
running to the dictionary.
--
Dena Jo
Prole
masher: a man who makes amorous advances to a strange woman. A wolf; a
flirt. --Webster's Third New Int'l Dictionary
francis muir
7aafca3a.02080...@posting.google.com, "Prole"
<brar...@yahoo.com> wrote:
From Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)
Masher \Mash"er\, n.
2. A charmer of women. [Slang] --London Punch.
Dylan Bryan-Dolman
> woman. A wolf; a flirt. --Webster's Third New Int'l Dictionary
To clarify: know what it means, want to know when and where it means. So
far the most useful information has been about the music man (American,
written 1957, set turn of 20th). However, they still might be using British
slang to make Marian the Librarian sound affected. Hm.
Secondary question: If you're not going to say "masher", what are you going
to use instead? It has to really convey the same tone, so for example
"playa" or "flirt" are no good since they're half-admiring, and "sleazeball"
is no good since it's too insulting. If the word's archaic, what do we say
now? I'm sure a modern equivalent exists, but so far the best I've come up
with is "skirt chaser" which is also out of date and suggests a different
context.
Dena Jo
> Secondary question: If you're not going to say "masher", what are you
going
> to use instead?
I probably would have said womanizer.
--
Dena Jo
Spehro Pefhany
> Secondary question: If you're not going to say "masher", what are you going
> to use instead? It has to really convey the same tone, so for example
> "playa" or "flirt" are no good since they're half-admiring, and "sleazeball"
> is no good since it's too insulting. If the word's archaic, what do we say
> now? I'm sure a modern equivalent exists, but so far the best I've come up
> with is "skirt chaser" which is also out of date and suggests a different
> context.
Sticking "womanizer" into Roget's II at bartleby.com, I get:
womanizer
NOUN: A man who philanders: Casanova, Don Juan, lady's man, philanderer.
Slang : lady-killer, wolf. Idioms: man on the make, skirt chaser. See
SEX.
Best regards,
Spehro Pefhany
--
"it's the network..." "The Journey is the reward"
sp...@interlog.com Info for manufacturers: http://www.trexon.com
Embedded software/hardware/analog Info for designers: http://www.speff.com
9-11 United we Stand
Don Tuite
Contexts change. Yesterday's masher is today's stalker or sexual
harasser..
As a nonce word, I think "masher" gave way to "wolf" along about the
'40s. The concept was made obsolete in the late '60s and early '70s,
by the sexual revolution, although "swinger" retained some of the
flavor. The atmosphere of the current sexual counter-reformation
leaves no room for a word that does not carry opprobrium.
Don
Raymond S. Wise
"francis muir" <fra...@stanford.edu> wrote in message
news:B9712238.4055%fra...@stanford.edu...
From *The Century Dictionary,* an American dictionary of 1895:
[quote]
masher [...] --3. One whose
dress or manners are such as to impress strong-
ly the fancy or elicit the admiration of suscep-
tible young women ; a fop ; a "dude" ; a "lady-
killer." [Recent slang.]
Of late years Mr. Du Maurier has perhaps been a little
too docile to the muse of elegance ; the idiosyncrasies of
the _masher_ and the high girl with elbows have beguiled
him into occasional inattention to the doings of the short
and shabby. _H. James, Jr.,_ in Harper's Mag., LXXIX. 63.
[end quote]
--
Raymond S. Wise
Minneapolis, Minnesota USA
E-mail: mplsray @ yahoo . com
Dylan Bryan-Dolman
> The atmosphere of the current sexual counter-reformation
> leaves no room for a word that does not carry opprobrium.
Playa, as I've already said. Don't be such a grump.
Dylan Bryan-Dolman
> From *The Century Dictionary,*
> an American dictionary of 1895:
>
Perfect. So it was alive in American speech thirteen years after the
reference the OED gives for its appearance in England -- probably existed
parallel in both places until dying out in both. How my roommate's girl
came up with it remains mysterious; perhaps she was once in the Music Man.
Unfortunately my original sense of the word as British working class seems
to be completely wrong. Any Brits want to chime in on contemporary use of
the word over there?
Pat Durkin
Do you mean "player"?
OK, I suppose that has the meaning, but I think it adds the other
meanings, like heavy drinker, doper, gambler.
Lech (or letch) has been used in spots in the US, but I don't think it
has become a common term.
And we are long past the terms "fresh" and "fast". I think that,
despite the fact that many of our young women are still remarkably naive
and easily seduced, there appears to be little in the way of societal
warnings about assertive male behavior. Why? I think we accept the
"live and learn" era. And many of the young and innocent females are
rather assertive as well.
John Hall
years ago entitled "The Masher", but I can't remember who it was by,
except that I've an idea it was an Australian and that the word may have
begun life as Australian slang.
[Added later]
Found it!
http://www.bartleby.com/100/525.html
The poem in question was by Charles Godfrey Leland (1824-1903). From
http://www.bartleby.com/227/0204.html
I learn that he was "a native of Philadelphia". So I was wrong about the
Australian bit.
See also:
http://www.millersville.edu/~archives/archweb/manuscripts/manus088.htm
http://www.controverscial.com/Charles%20Godfrey%20Leland.htm
His "The Breitmann Ballads" are available from Project Gutenberg:
ftp://ftp.informika.ru/pub/web/books/gutenb/etext96/britm10.zip
--
John Hall
"Banking was conceived in iniquity and born in sin"
Sir Josiah Stamp, a former president of the Bank of England
Joe Fineman
> Secondary question: If you're not going to say "masher", what are
> you going to use instead? It has to really convey the same tone, so
> for example "playa" or "flirt" are no good since they're
> half-admiring, and "sleazeball" is no good since it's too insulting.
> If the word's archaic, what do we say now? I'm sure a modern
> equivalent exists, but so far the best I've come up with is "skirt
> chaser" which is also out of date and suggests a different context.
Descending a bit further into vulgarity, there is "tail chaser", which
has also been around for quite a while (early 20th century, anyway)
but I suspect will be perfectly intelligible to Americans.
I heard the word "masher" used casually & with no hint of archaism so
recently as the 1970s. A friend of mine, who might have been 30, used
it of a man who habitually made sexual advances to women in somewhat
insecure situations & with no regard for honesty. My friend clearly
meant it to be pejorative & to help him in his effort to persuade me
to dislike the person so described.
--
--- Joe Fineman j...@TheWorld.com
||: If you never do anything stupid, you're not as smart as you :||
||: think. :||
halcombe
On the BrE usage, 'masher' was, I think, one of those terms with a
pretty short shelf-life, I think. (Like 'Teddy boys', say).
My (mere!) SOED dates the term at 1882.
Yet there is a song (dating, apparently, from 1898 [1]) 'Percy from
Pimlico', the lyrics of which include the phrase (talking about the
singer)
'the up-to-date masher'
On one reading, this implies that 'masher' was by that time no longer
in use in the 1882 meaning. Or, at least, that the term was out of
fashion by that time.
(The song is sung in an acoustic recording by Tom Leamore heard -
verses and all - in the 60s film on the London music-hall 'A Little of
What You Fancy'.)
Evidently, the 'masher' was the sort of chap also described as a
'stage-door Johnny' (whether before or after the hey-day of 'masher',
I couldn't say). The period around the turn of the century was also
that of the George Edwardes' Gaiety Girls [2] - several of whom, I
believe, secured marriages with 'mashers'. (But, perhaps, never used
the word to describe the gentlemen in question!)
[1] http://216.239.37.100/search?q=cache:lmby8WhIZqoC:www.dem.de/entertainment/musik/klassik/titanic_tunes_m.html+%22percy+%2Bfrom+pimlico%22&hl=en&ie=UTF-8
[2] http://www.lily-elsie.com/people.htm
meirman
Bryan-Dolman" <DylanBD*SPAM*B*GONE*@earthlink.net> posted:
I thought it meant someone who flirted with a girl or woman even when
she didn't want him to. I probably remember that Bugs Bunny cartoon
too, but Im sure I heard it other timess as well. Unfortunately now
they have been upstaged by rapists..
My guess it was continuous in the US. Unless GI's brought it back
after WWII, we didn't know nothin' about what they said in Britain
unless Basil Rathbone said it. Hmmm. I guess there was plenty of
opportunity for GI's to be mashers during WWII. (I guess other
posters say that is not it.)
>So--native US idiom or double transplant?
>
s/ meirman If you are emailing me please
say if you are posting the same response.
Born west of Pittsburgh Pa. 10 years
Indianapolis, 7 years
Chicago, 6 years
Brooklyn NY 12 years
Baltimore 17 years
Steve Hayes
>From Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)
>
> Masher \Mash"er\, n.
>
> 2. A charmer of women. [Slang] --London Punch.
And probably a bounder and a cad to boot.
--
Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/7734/steve.htm
E-mail - see web page, or parse: shayes at dunelm full stop org full stop uk
John Holmes
"John Hall" <news_...@jhall.co.uk> wrote in message
news:AKGJaEB6...@jhall.demon.co.uk...
> >
> >
> ISTR that there was a well-known humorous poem written over a hundred
> years ago entitled "The Masher", but I can't remember who it was by,
> except that I've an idea it was an Australian and that the word may
have
> begun life as Australian slang.
>
> [Added later]
>
> Found it!
>
> http://www.bartleby.com/100/525.html
>
> The poem in question was by Charles Godfrey Leland (1824-1903). From
>
> http://www.bartleby.com/227/0204.html
>
> I learn that he was "a native of Philadelphia". So I was wrong about
the
> Australian bit.
I found a reference to "mashed", meaning "in love" in Australian slang
from the 1920s, but I've no idea where or when it might have originated.
It isn't AFAIK in current usage.
Websters International (1890s) has an undated reference for "masher" =
"charmer of women" from London Punch (which commenced publication in
1841).
--
Regards
John
Brian
DylanBD*SPAM*B*GONE*@earthlink.net says...
I'd have to agree that 'Playa' (comes from player, but sounds the way it's
spelled) is the closest equivalent in current slang. 'Playa' contains a bit of
admiration for demonstrated skill -- 'Masher' would seem to do the same.
Brian
tejas
--
Ted Samsel
tbsa...@infi.net
http://home.infi.net/~tbsamsel
Joe Fineman
> I found a reference to "mashed", meaning "in love" in Australian
> slang from the 1920s, but I've no idea where or when it might have
> originated. It isn't AFAIK in current usage.
"Get mashed on" = fall in love with is current U.S. slang -- or at
least, I still use it. I doubt if it has any connection with
"masher".
--
--- Joe Fineman j...@TheWorld.com
||: Some men want a spectacle, and some a receptacle. :||
Steve Hayes
Is the Volkswagen brand naming directed at such people?
Molly
John Hall (John Hall <news_...@jhall.co.uk>) wrote
>ISTR that there was a well-known humorous poem written over a hundred
>years ago entitled "The Masher", but I can't remember who it was by,
>except that I've an idea it was an Australian and that the word may have
>begun life as Australian slang.
>
>[Added later]
>
>Found it!
>
>http://www.bartleby.com/100/525.html
>
>The poem in question was by Charles Godfrey Leland (1824-1903). From
>
>http://www.bartleby.com/227/0204.html
>
>I learn that he was "a native of Philadelphia". So I was wrong about the
>Australian bit.
Didn't Leland write poems in Australian dialect, though? I seem to
remember (from thirty or more years ago) one which began "Her name's
Doreen - well, spare me bloomin' days!", which doesn't sound awfully
Philadelphian.
I only remember it because I knew someone called Doreen when I read it,
and intended to quote it to annoy her, although I never got round to it.
--
Molly
If I'd known I'd be this thirsty this morning, I'd have drunk more last night.
John Hall
Molly <nos...@mockfords.clara.co.uk> writes:
>Didn't Leland write poems in Australian dialect, though? I seem to
>remember (from thirty or more years ago) one which began "Her name's
>Doreen - well, spare me bloomin' days!", which doesn't sound awfully
>Philadelphian.
>
>I only remember it because I knew someone called Doreen when I read it,
>and intended to quote it to annoy her, although I never got round to it.
The poem seems to be called "A Sentimental Bloke", judging by my search
for "Her name's Dooren", which threw up:
http://www.screensound.gov.au/pdf/photoplayartiste_reel5.pdf
Searching on that title yielded:
http://www.bookworm.com.au/cgi-bin/bookmall/bookworm/returndetail.tam?&i
tem.ctx=UNSW0199
So it seems to have been by the Australian CJ Dennis, written in or
shortly before 1915, and not by Leland.
--
John Hall "Across the wires the electric message came:
"He is no better, he is much the same."
["On the Illness of the Prince of Wales",
attr. Alfred Austin (1835-1913) ]
Kater Moggin
> From *The Century Dictionary,* an American dictionary of 1895:
> [quote]
> masher [...] --3. One whose
> dress or manners are such as to impress strong-
> ly the fancy or elicit the admiration of suscep-
> tible young women ; a fop ; a "dude" ; a "lady-
> killer." [Recent slang.]
> Of late years Mr. Du Maurier has perhaps been a little
> too docile to the muse of elegance ; the idiosyncrasies of
> the _masher_ and the high girl with elbows have beguiled
> him into occasional inattention to the doings of the short
> and shabby. _H. James, Jr.,_ in Harper's Mag., LXXIX. 63.
> [end quote]
O.k., that explains "masher" pretty well. Now can anybody
says what's a high girl with elbows?
-- Moggin
to e-mail, remove the thorn
Michael Quinion
Subscribers to my World Wide Words newsletter may like to know that a
piece on 'mash note', which also covers 'mash' and 'masher', will
appear in the issue of 17 August. The rest of you can read it on the
Web site the week after.
The consensus among the experts is that 'mash' in this sense comes
from a Romany word meaning 'allure'. It moved into English somewhere
in the USA, probably from a Gypsy band or similar act in vaudeville,
and was initially used by theatre folk. It travelled to Britain in the
early 1880s, where the 'masher' form was created.
Michael Quinion
Editor, World Wide Words
TheE...@worldwidewords.org
http://www.worldwidewords.org
francis muir
"Michael Quinion" <TheE...@worldwidewords.org> wrote:
Beautifully plausible.