Sunday Classics: Flibbertigibbet
Do you happen to know a Maria from ‘The Sound of Music’?
Published 21.11.21, 12:12 AM
We’ve all encountered such people at least once in our lives – the flighty kind. The ones who can go on endlessly, drawing inspiration from their seemingly endless repertoire of gossip. And thanks to social media, while it is easier to procure and trade gossip these days, it turns out that such ‘flibbertigibbets’ have been around for quite some time.
You might think that the 1965 film, The Sound of Music made the songs popular, but the broadway musical reportedly sold $2 million in tickets even before the show opened on November 16, 1959. Of course the names Rodgers and Hammerstein’s had something to do with it! Their songs do have a way of staying with you, don’t they? In fact, it is the song Maria, sung by the nuns in the abbey, that made the word “flibbertigibbet” fashionable again.
“How do you solve a problem like Maria?
How do you catch a cloud and pin it down?
How do you find a word that means Maria?
A flibbertigibbet! A will-o'-the wisp! A clown!”
The term is one of the many forms of the Middle English word ‘flepergebet’, which was used to refer to a gossip or a “chatterer”. “Flibbertigibbet” is a classic example of an onomatopoeic word – one that is derived from sounds associated with it. The word therefore, is a concoction of the many meaningless sounds that represent mindless prattling, and is used to refer to a person who engages in such a behaviour (repeatedly).
This Sunday, make sure you steer clear of those flibbertigibbets, and on the off chance that you do cross paths with one, keep those excuses handy so that you can slither away just in time!
- Upasya Bhowal
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