Wake me when it’s over

Dear Word Detective: Where does the word “lackadaisical” come from? — Joe.

Ah, a short question, but one that opens a window into a world of weirdness. That’s what I love about the English language — every word bears the fingerprints of our ancestors, many of whom were seriously strange. The poet John Ciardi used to say that our words are miniature fossilized poems written by the human race, which is true, but sometimes they seem more like miniature fossilized psychiatric case reports.

Today we use “lackadaisical” to mean “lacking interest, energy or initiative; lacking spirit.” A person with a “lackadaisical” attitude is apathetic and uninterested in much of anything, and a lackadaisical employee usually produces shoddy and substandard work. In fact, a lackadaisical approach to anything rarely results in the desired outcome, as US Senator Fred Thompson recently proved in his famously torpid and now-defunct run for the Republican presidential nomination. According to the New York Daily News, “Thompson’s candidacy was widely ridiculed by party professionals for its lackadaisical quality. ‘How are you supposed to tell?’ one of them remarked yesterday after Thompson’s exit.”

Given the laid-back attitude of the truly “lackadaisical,” it’s a bit surprising that the word itself arose as a exclamation of agitated anguish, which would seem to require at least a smidgen of adrenaline to produce. Back in the 16th century, if you were faced with an alarming reversal or personal disaster, you were more than likely to express your distress with a cry of “Alack the day!” or “Alack a day!” (meaning “curse this day” or “woe this day”). Shakespeare used the phrase in Romeo & Juliet to announce Juliet’s demise (“Shee’s dead, deceast, shee’s dead: alacke the day!”). This “alack” is the same found in the phrase “alas and alack,” and comes from an old use of “lack” to mean “failure or shame.”

By the 17th century, the expression had been clipped to “lack-a-day,” and by the 18th, it had mutated, oddly, to “lackadaisy.” During this evolution, however, its connotation shifted from a serious expression of grief to a fatalistic lament, more apathetic and self-pitying than agonized, and roughly synonymous with “what the heck” or “that’s the way it goes.” Naturally, persons given to expressing what was considered such “vapid sentimentality” at every opportunity (and doing little else) were called “lackadaisical.”

Of the firm Vole, Vermin and Bungalow?

Dear Word Detective: I am directing an Agatha Christie play, “Witness for the Prosecution” and have come across some words that we would like to print the definitions for in our playbill. One is “eggbeater,” which someone told me is British slang for an automobile. The other is “bands,” which I believe is the name of the neckties British judges and barristers wear. — Cathy Van Lopik.

Good questions. I’ve never read (or seen) the play “Witness for the Prosecution,” but the movie version, made in 1957, is one of my all-time favorites. It stars Charles Laughton as Sir Wilfrid Robarts, a barrister in precarious health, Elsa Lanchester as his nurse Miss Plimsoll, Tyrone Power as Leonard Vole, accused of murdering an elderly woman for her money, and Marlene Dietrich as Christine, Vole’s duplicitous (to put it mildly) German wife. I’ve seen the film at least six times, but I’d gladly watch it again just for the remarkable cast and the cleverness of the story.

The slang of any culture can pose puzzles for an outsider, and I’m not an expert in that of Britain, but your question about “eggbeater” raises two possibilities. Literally, of course, an “eggbeater” is a handheld kitchen implement used for beating, mixing or whipping, usually involving a crank turning rotating blades. As slang, “eggbeater” has most often, since about 1930, been applied to either a helicopter or an autogiro (an early form of helicopter using a standard aircraft propeller for forward movement). According to Eric Partridge’s Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English, “eggbeater” has also been used to mean an old car, perhaps one that rattles like an eggbeater, but the usage seems fairly rare.

However, I’m wondering exactly where in the play (to which I do not have access) the use of “eggbeater” that puzzles you occurs. Early on, Leonard Vole (wonderful name, isn’t it?) explains to Robarts, et al., that he fancies himself an inventor and has just developed a revolutionary new eggbeater. If that’s the instance of “eggbeater” in question, Vole definitely means the kitchen implement. If there is a later reference, I suppose it could be coy use of the slang term for “car,” helicopters being notable in the play by their absence.

As for “bands,” you’re right on the money. Sometimes called “barrister bands,” they are the two hanging strips of white fabric worn as neckwear in court by British barristers and judges. These “bands” evolved from the simple neckbands worn under formal “ruffs” in the 16th century, and represent a stage in the development of male fashion, long abandoned outside the courtroom, that eventually produced the modern necktie.