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hobble
Posted: Sun Sep 22, 2013 9:56 pm
by drsved
Derivation?
Re: hobble
Posted: Mon Sep 23, 2013 9:03 am
by Slava
c.1300, hoblen "to rock back and forth, toss up and down," probably related to its Du. cognate hobbelen. Transitive sense of "tie the legs of an animal" first recorded 1831, probably an alteration of 16c. hopple, cognate with Flem. hoppelen "to rock, jump," related to Du. hobbelen. Sense of "hamper, hinder" is c.1870.
Re: hobble
Posted: Sun Sep 29, 2013 12:24 am
by Philip Hudson
"I can't look at hobbles
And I can't stand fences.
Don't fence me in."
Re: Don't Fence me in
Posted: Tue Oct 15, 2013 2:41 pm
by Dr. Goodword
Do you know who wrote this song? You'll be surprised as I was.
Re: hobble
Posted: Tue Oct 15, 2013 7:13 pm
by Slava
In the 1990 movie "Misery", didn't Kathy Bates' character hobble James Caan's? A vicious use of the word, but that is what I remember it being called.
Re: hobble
Posted: Tue Oct 15, 2013 11:33 pm
by Perry Lassiter
YouTube has a very bad version of the song sung by Abba who are reading it from sheet music. I'd rather hear Roy Rogers do it. Cole Porter, by the way, is the composer.
Re: hobble
Posted: Mon Nov 04, 2013 9:49 am
by eberntson
It brought to my mind the Iliad and what was common practice to hobble prisoners by cutting their achilles tendon, if I remember correctly. You can apparently still hobble around and work but can't run away. It was a practice used often on slaves throughout history to keep a troublesome runaway in check, even in our own USofA history; shame, shame!
I think in a Sherlock Holmes adventure there is a story of lame sheep and a attempt to hobble a racehorse.
E
Re: hobble
Posted: Mon Nov 04, 2013 10:32 pm
by gailr
Variations of the
hobble skirt have gone in and out of fashion, starting
ca1910. The entire purpose of the hobble skirt is to restrict the stride to tiny, mincing steps.
A very theatrical version appears from ~3:27-3:47 in Soomo Publishing's
Bad Romance: Women's Suffrage, a dramatization of the women's suffrage movement reinterpreting the music, movements, and costumes from one of Lady Gaga's videos, with great effect. The actresses (and historical figures) were definitely
not wearing hobble skirts when they marched and finally entered the voting booths!
(An earlier video from Soomo is
Too Late to Apologize: A Declaration and I'd also recommend it people who like history & theater.)
Re: hobble
Posted: Mon Nov 04, 2013 10:54 pm
by Slava
I have never come across the term hobble skirt, but I now realize I see them often in summer months. I do not expect they are meant to be hobble skirts, but the end result is similar.
How many times in this season do we see young (mostly) women wearing short short skirts stopping every few feet to tug them back down? A form of hobbling I never thought of.
Re: hobble
Posted: Mon Nov 04, 2013 11:16 pm
by eberntson
Hobble skirt must be what Carol Burnette's secretary character wears, a comedic and absurd version yet probably accurate.
Thx Gailr!
It was Oscar Wilde that said, "Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months."
E