Month: September 2022

“One fell swoop”

DARREN: One fell swoop, interesting phrase … Origin?

JACK: It was coined in Macbeth and derives from Middle English.

At one fell swoop means “suddenly, in a single action”. The fell part is an archaic word dating to the 13th century meaning “fierce, savage, cruel, ruthless”; it’s the root of the word felon and has gone out of use except for this one instance.

The phrase was first used, and most probably invented, by William Shakespeare, in his play Macbeth, previously discussed. In the play, it is said by Macduff when he hears that all his family and household have been killed:

All my pretty ones?
Did you say all? O hell-kite! All?
What, all my pretty chickens and their dam
At one fell swoop?

The “kite” that Macduff refers to is the bird of prey, commonly used as a hunting bird in Tudor England. You can see that the “fell swoop” is the swoop of the kite as it quickly descends to catch its prey.

Somehow “at one fell swoop” went from meaning something terrible happening all at once, to just anything happening all at once. Darren uses it to mean good thing happening all at once, but I am unable to disassociate it from its original context, and to me it still suggests some fearsome unexpected blow from above. Maybe I read too much Shakespeare!

Jack’s answer is actually pretty inadequate, or even misleading. It’s not certain that Shakespeare coined it, although it’s likely – he should have said that it first appeared in Macbeth, and that Shakespeare has been credited with coining it. The phrase itself is not Middle English, and presumably he means that the word fell in this example goes back to Middle English.

“It might even be to Rory’s benefit”

DARREN: In fact, it’s refreshing [that Lorelai doesn’t have an academic background]. It might even be to Rory’s benefit. Good things didn’t come to your family in one fell swoop, you struggled for it.

Darren is suggesting that Rory’s background might be enough to make her stand out from the crowd in the college application process, to make it seem as if she had to struggle for everything she’s attained (it’s really more that Lorelai has had to struggle for most of what Rory’s attained). Lorelai and Rory are carefully leaving Richard and Emily out of the narrative, and not mentioning the financial assistance Rory has had to attend Chilton (a good thing which came in one fell swoop).

You can see that this is the angle Darren himself is probably planning to use in his chat with a Harvard admissions officer – he’ll be putting in a good word for a girl from a middle-class single-parent family in a small town, with a mother who had become pregnant in high school, had to work hard to support them both, and doesn’t have an academic background. Again, the fact that Lorelai went to private school and is from a wealthy upper-middle class family where both parents attended Ivy League universities is not going to be mentioned!

AA Degree

RORY: But [Mom] took night classes and graduated last year. She has an AA degree in Business.

An AA degree is an associate degree, an undergraduate degree awarded after a course of post-secondary study lasting two to three years. It is a level of qualification above a high school diploma, and below a bachelor’s degree.

Associate degrees first began in the US in 1898, and there, completing an associate degree can allow the graduate to transfer to the third year of a bachelor’s degree – you’ll remember that Lorelai’s former classmates Liza and Zach were going to continue their studies at universities after graduating from business class at community college.

Lorelai’s degree is most likely an Associate of Applied Business (AAB).

Alma Mater

DARREN: So, Lorelai, what’s your alma mater?

Alma mater, a Latin phrase used to identify a school, college, or university that one has attended or graduated from. It literally means “nourishing mother”, as if the student has gained intellectual nourishment from their school. It is related to the word alumnus, previously discussed – alumnus literally means “one who is nourished”.

The Latin phrase was originally a title for mother goddesses such as Ceres and Cybele, later given as a title to the Virgin Mary. It was first used academically in the English-speaking world in 1600, referring to Cambridge University, as part of the emblem for Cambridge University Press. You can see in the picture it was portrayed quite literally, with milk pouring out from the breasts of Cambridge – the milk of knowledge, I suppose.

“Leave to take a shower together”

LORELAI: Did they just leave to take a shower together? .. They bounced in together, they bounced out together.

Has Lorelai ever heard of a house having two showers? Well, yes – her own house has two bathrooms, so she must be aware that two people can shower independently. This is a breathtakingly rude and creepy comment to make while your hosts are just out of the room – cooking you a roast chicken lunch, no less, and trying to help your kid get into Harvard.

Yearbooks

DARREN: Here’s some of my Harvard yearbooks, peruse them if you like.

Yearbooks are published annually to commemorate the past year of a school, college, or university. They came out of the personal scrapbooks students put together in the 18th century, and the first formal yearbook was produced in 1806, at Yale.

The picture is for the 1974 Harvard yearbook, the year that Darren graduated, meaning he was born around 1952 and is about fifty years old in this episode. Notice that it is actually for both Harvard and Radcliffe – Radcliffe College was a women’s college founded in 1879, designed to be an all-female counterpart to the all-male Harvard. Harvard became fully co-educational in 1970, and in 1999, Radcliffe merged with Harvard.

PalmPilot

JENNIFER: Uh, do you wanna pick a time [to talk] now or later . . . ?

RORY: Later’s fine.

JENNIFER: I’ll make a note in my PalmPilot.

Palm was a line of personal digital assistants (PDAs) and mobile phones developed by California-based Palm, Inc., originally called Palm Computing, Inc. Palm devices were the first popular handheld computers, helping to pave the way for smartphones. The first Palm device, the PalmPilot 1000, was released in 1996. The most recent one, the m505, had been released in January 2002, and cost around $300-400.

Jack and Jennifer

DARREN: Jack’s pre-med at Princeton and Jennifer is bound for Harvard, like you Rory.

Jack is in a pre-medical program, an educational track that undergraduate students pursue before they go to medical school and study to become doctors. Their undergraduate studies typically focus on subjects such as biology, chemistry, physics, neuroscience, and behavioural sciences. He is attending the same university that Christopher was supposed to attend.

Jennifer can’t really be bound for Harvard at this point – notifications to applications haven’t been sent out yet. She has already applied, or will apply very soon, and Darren is obviously confident she will get in. He seems very confident Rory will as well, unless he’s just being polite – he hasn’t even seen her transcript yet.

Jack and Jennifer are played by Matt Newton and Jeanette Brox – they had both been in Judging Amy and Family Law, although not in the same episodes. Granville Van Deusen, who plays their father Darren, was also in Judging Amy, and like Jeanette, had been in General Hospital spin-off, Port Charles.

Harvard Paraphernalia

DARREN: I collect memorabilia, too. I’ve got each year’s Harvard team pennant going back to 1927 … It’s all over the walls at the rec room.

LORELAI: See, see, lots of paraphernalia.

Lorelai is crowing because Rory felt upset when she was told that having Harvard paraphernalia on her walls was a sign of being immature and desperate. Now she can see that Darren, a real Harvard graduate, has masses of Harvard memorabilia all over the walls of his recreation room. She had the real Harvard spirit all along!

Of course, Darren waited to graduate before he started collecting Harvard memorabilia – Rory has been putting it on her bedroom walls since she was a young girl. I’m not sure you can say she and Darren are exactly the same, although he is clearly a bit of a Harvard tragic as well.