In the office this afternoon: a young lady saying to my neighbour,
“I think I’ll need some dutch courage before tonight.”
(What *was* she going to be doing? And why was I left thinking about a girl fortifying herself with a swig of vodka in the dorm before her pyjama-clad walk to her appointment with the Housemaster? And of what might have happened had he realised?)
And now, on the train, just behind me. Four loud ex-public school friends; one’s just observed:
“It was enough to get me sent to the Headmaster”
(Flicking rubber bands, apparently. At whom, I haven’t been able to establish. But they’re posh enough and of the right age for me to guess the consequences…)
Dutch courage, is that an idiom or something?
I have often swigged from a small bottle of spirit (mostly vodka) when on my way to a nasty punishment. The benefit of vodka being that it doesn’t make your breath smell of booze – and if you are already facing an irate headmaster, that’s not a good idea.
I even have a specially adapted pocket in my satchel to carry it!
I prefer wine for that purpose – since my husband doesn’t mind that sort of thing. I think vodka stayed forever back in my teenage years in the former USSR – it tastes horrible and the only benefit I saw is that you could get drunk fast and with little consumed, making it cheaper than beer and acting faster than wine (which was also terrible back in the day).
Amber: Dutch courage is slang for drinking alcohol to fortify oneself. Soviet wine would doubtless do fine!
Writes he, wondering what would happen to Rapunzel if her vodka stash were discovered…
Where are you from, Rampunzel? Hard to believe that English ladies would drink vodka like that, carrying it around in a stash. Or are my cultural prejudices all wrong?
Abel – thank you for the explanation. Soviet wine, at least from my native grape growing republic, was still really bad – fantastic grapes, terrible wine. J and I make better wine in the Northern US, really.
By the way, it’s gotta be an English expression, since neither J nor I have never heard it before, and J, you know, he reads.
Wondering what us Dutch people did to deserve an expression like that… And it’s not fair at all! I am far more into spanking than alcohol!
The American version of that phrase is ‘liquid courage’ or sometimes ‘Irish courage’.
I think it’s b/c we have a much larger Irish population than Dutch.
Kate, it appears that the phrase originates from the time when the Dutch East India Company was Britain’s main trading rival in the orient. Therefore “Dutch” was an insulting term. I’m glad things have moved on! (And I doubt the Americans mean to insult the Irish with the phrase, Emily?)
Irish courage – that I understand
Close to home.
Dutch, Irish or liquid courage, I think Abel is right to hint that taking the risk is unlikely to be worth the potential consequences! Furthermore, it’s a myth that vodka is odourless on the breath, Rapunzel….one of these days I’m sure you’ll find that out
That’s what I was gonna say – vodka breath is not odorless at all! My dad used to abuse vodka consumption, so I know!
Abel–nah, it’s not meant as an insult at all.
The word ‘Irish’ is frequently used to describe anything with alcohol in it. So a coffee and whiskey is listed on the drink menu as an ‘Irish coffee’, or if someone wanted a stronger drink they might say, “Put a little Irish in it,” to the bartender.
You know, I never thought about whether or not it’s an insulting term. It’s such an accepted colloquialism in
American culture, and I’ve never heard of anyone of Irish descent taking offense. But the sayings obviously play up on stereotypes of big-drinking Irishmen.
Hmmm, I guess I’ll have to research the subject now.