LIBR150 Information Services

1
LIBR150 Information Services

• Reference Book Analysis
• Dewey 400's
• Kathryn Gibbs
• Winter Quarter - 2004

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A Hog On IceAnd Other Curious Expressions
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• By Charles Earle Funk, Litt.D
• With Illustrations by Tom Funk
• Harper Colophon Books

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Bibliographic Citation

• Funk, Charles Earle, 1881-1957.
• A hog on ice and other curious expressions/
  Charles Earle Funk with illustrations by Tom
  Funk.
• 1st Harper colophon ed.
• New York Harper Row, 1985, c1948
• 214 p. ill. 21 cm.
• Includes index
• 1. English language -- Terms and phrases.
• 2. English language -- Etymology.

4
Arrangement and Indexing

• There doesn't appear to be any rhyme or reason to
  the arrangement of the selections in this book.
  Not alphabetical, by subject or, as far as I can
  tell, chronologically.
• There is an alphabetical index by subject.

5
Scope

• As independent as a hog on ice wild-goose
  chase let the cat out of the bag.
• Dr. Funk has taken these and over four hundred
  other curious expressions and sayings that,
  without thought, we use in our daily speech. He
  has traced them back through the years or
  centuries in an effort to determine their
  sources, to find out what the original allusions
  were, or to give us his expert opinion when facts
  cannot be traced. (excerpted from back cover)

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Reviews and Authority

• Writing as a vaudevillian used to play the
  fiddle, for his own amazement, Dr. Funk has set
  down with humor and scholarship the best and most
  plausible explanations he could pry out of past
  records and living persons.- New York Times
• Charles Earl Funk was editor-in-chief of the
  Funk Wagnalls Standard Dictionary Series. He
  wrote several other books on word and phrase
  origins, including Thereby Hangs a Tale.

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Internet Searching Reference

• I was able to find the etymology of several of
  these expressions on a simple Google search. It
  was interesting to have so many phrases in one
  book, however, as there are many that I wouldn't
  have thought to search.
• What does it mean to go haywire?
• What is meant by the phrase 'the ghost walks'?