The Facts on File Dictionary of Allusions - Green Valley High School

gild the lily To add more than is necessary to
something that is already beautiful or otherwise
satisfactory. <strong>The</strong> expression comes from William
Shakespeare’s play King John (1595): “To gild
refi ned gold, to paint the lily, / To throw perfume
on the violet, / To smooth the ice, or add another
hue / Unto the rainbow, or with taper- light / To
seek the beauteous eye of heaven to garnish, / Is
wasteful, and ridiculous excess.” Offering shareholders
an extra dividend on top of the huge profi ts they had
already made was just gilding the lily.
Gilead, balm in See balm in gilead.
Ginger Rogers See fred astaire.
Gin Lane A place or situation in which heavy
drinking and the problems associated with it are
rife. <strong>The</strong> allusion is to a 1751 print by the British
artist William Hogarth (1697–1764), in which he
depicted the social ills resulting from habitual
drunkenness in contemporary London. Hogarth’s
model for his picture was the parish of St. Giles in
London, where a quarter of all the residences
were operating as gin shops by 1750. <strong>The</strong> second
duke, legend has it, took a stroll up Gin Lane as a young
man and never returned. See also hogarthian.
Ginnungagap (ginbngbgap) A great void or abyss.
In Norse mythology, Ginnungagap is the name
given to the endless void that is said to separate
nifl heim, a region of intense cold, and Muspelheim,
a region of intense heat. Having no beginning
or end and no day or night, it was said to have
existed long before the appearance of heaven and
earth. Into this purgatory, this spiritual Ginnungagap,
vanished all his ideals and hopes for the future.
Gioconda smile See mona lisa smile.
Giovanni, Don See don juan.
Gipper, win one for the See win one for the
gipper.
girdle of Venus See aphrodite.
give up the ghost
gird up thy loins To get ready for action; to prepare
to apply oneself to a diffi cult task or to make
a journey. <strong>The</strong> phrase appears several times in the
Bible, such as in 1 Kings 18:46, where Elijah gathers
up his long fl owing robes and fastens (“girds”)
them with his belt (“girdle”) in order to run freely:
“And the hand of the LORD was on Elijah; and he
girded up his loins, and ran before Ahab to the
entrance of Jezreel.” “ ‘Yet,’ said the Rabbi, ‘take
courage, for this grief availeth nothing. Gird up
thy loins, and seek out this Wilfred, the son of
Cedric’ ” (Sir Walter Scott, Ivanhoe, 1819).
Girl Friday A woman who takes on a range of
duties, from house work to acting as a personal
assistant. <strong>The</strong> expression represents a female
equivalent of man friday, which was itself taken
from the name of a character in Daniel Defoe’s
novel Robinson Crusoe (1719). <strong>The</strong> phrase furnished
the title of the 1940 Cary Grant movie His Girl
Friday, but has largely fallen into disfavor in recent
years on the grounds of po liti cal incorrectness.
“You were just a ju nior, a sort of Girl Friday with
no qualifi cations, hoping to learn the ropes” (Jane
Bauling, Ransacked Heart, 1993).
git thar fustest with the mostest See fi rstest
with the mostest.
give up the ghost To die; to give in; to cease
working. <strong>The</strong> phrase appears in various forms at
several places in the Bible, as in Genesis 25:8,
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