Birds fascinated my father. I could never quite understand why. Not until he died.
My mother dumped his bird-watching books on me. I knew then what the scientist in him saw when he watched birds in their natural habitat: great variety, environmental adaptations, the living proof of Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution, at least among finches. So, I began to observe these ubiquitous creatures more closely, particularly crows and ravens.
I also observed a tendency to label birds idiomatically with specific traits and behavior. “Bird brain,” an overused idiom, apparently does not apply to these highly intelligent animals, some of whom come close to certain apes in intellectual aptitude.
“Birds of a feather, flock together.” The words of this idiom popped into my mind recently, renewing my fascination with the amazing richness of the English language. In a way, I think, English is somewhat like a raven, or maybe I’m thinking of a magpie, curious, willing to eat just about anything to feed itself, to stay alive and strong.
How do phrases such as this become part of English? Or any other language, for that matter? How can writers use these, without resorting too much to clichés?
Although the title of this article includes the word Proverbs, we’ll be looking at idioms more than not.
DEFINITIONS FIRST
First, some simple definitions for some things that are anything but simple:
Proverb: A short, well-known pithy saying, stating a general truth or piece of advice.
Idiom: A group of words established by usage as having a meaning not deducible from those of the individual words (e.g., over the moon, see the light).
I turned to a few books on my shelves to explore this fascinating tendency of language to reflect wisdom via short, terse, pithy phrases. The title of a book I’ve owned for years―Jag Bhalla’s tiny tome, I’m Not Hanging Noodles on Your Ears―means the same as “I’m not pulling your leg” in English. Another, similar book came home with me a while ago, a prize gleaned from the last day of a spectacular book sale, what remained of 500,000 books at the local, bi-annual Friends of the Library Book Sale. Rummaging around in the wreckage left by thousands of pawing hands, I pulled out Suzanne Brock’s gem, Idiom’s Delight: Fascinating Phrases and Linguistic Eccentricities―Spanish, French, Italian, Latin. For a thin dime, I walked away with a book of wisdom reaching past the confines of English and showing that, at root, we humans describe our world pretty much the same, regardless of culture and even language—so much information packed into just a few words.
Really.
A LITTLE BIT OF HISTORY
In the case of “Birds flock together,” received wisdom has it that in 1543, Wyllyam Turner―Anglican and antipapist―included a variation of it in a satirical work, The Huntying and Findyng Out of The Romish Fox, “Byrdes of on kynde and color flok and flye together.”
Or what about this one: Semper graculus assidet graculo. (A blackbird always sits close to a blackbird), or, again in English, “Birds of a feather sit (flock) together.” Plato might be credited with one of the earliest usages of this bit of wisdom in The Republic, part 3. “Cephalus: I will tell you, Socrates, what my own feeling is. Men of my age flock together; we are birds of a feather, as the old proverb says….”
TIMELESSNESS OF IDIOMS AND PROVERBS
Timeless, this tendency of human nature, no? People with similar goals, agendas, and interests stick together, right?
Another fun similarity: No necesita abuela (He doesn’t need a grandmother), or, in the English sense, “He toots his own horn.”
Proverbs and idioms often can provide writers with unique material. Put some of these pithy sayings into your characters’ mouths and see what happens.
My father would love these, for his wit always made me laugh until I cried!
For Further Reading:
Bhalla, Jag. I’m Not Hanging Noodles on Your Ears and Other Intriguing Idioms from Around the World. Washington, DC: National Geographic Books, 2009.
Brock, Suzanne. Idiom’s Delight: Fascinating Phrases and Linguistic Eccentricities―Spanish, French, Italian, Latin. New York: Vintage, 1991.
Plato. The Republic. Jowett, B., trans. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1848.
Strauss, Emmanuel. Concise Dictionary of European Proverbs. Abingdon: Routledge, 2016.
Turnbull, Wally. Hidden Meanings: Truth and Secret in Haiti’s Creole Proverbs. Durham, NC: Torchflame Books, 2019.
Turner, Wyllyam. The Huntying and Findyng Out of the Romish Fox. London: John W. Parker, 1543.
[Editor’s note: WAG would love to see articles on any and all topics of interest to writers. Please send your ideas or finished pieces to Cynthia D. Bertelsen at BlogEditor@writersalliance.org for consideration. Remember: these posts are more than just posts, for they are actual articles and can be cited in your CV/résumé in the same way you would a short story, essay, or any other writing credit you may possess.]
Susie Baxter
Thanks for another interesting article. My favorite French saying is “Avoir un poil dans la main.” No doubt you’ve heard it — referring to a person so lazy that a hair grows in the palm of his/her hand.