rhubarb
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˈɹuːbɑːb/
ipa: /ˈɹuˌbɑɹb/
note: Ottawa Valley
ipa: [ˈɹuːbaɹb]
note: Ottawa Valley
ipa: [ɹɪu̯-]
Forms: form: rhubarbs
form: rhubarbing
form: rhubarbed
form: rhubarbed
Etymology: Attributed to the circa 1852 practice by the theatre company of English actor Charles Kean (1811–1868) at the Princess’s Theatre, London, of actors saying the word rhubarb repetitively to mimic the sound of indistinct conversation, the word having been chosen because it does not have harsh-sounding consonants or clear vowels.
The baseball senses are said to have been coined by the American sports writer Garry Schumacher and popularized by the American baseball commentator Red Barber (1908–1992). Barber also claimed to have started using the word in the 1940s, based on the practice in “early radio dramas” (presumably in the US, circa 1930) of actors repetitively voicing rhubarb. However, unlike the UK usage, he felt the practice applied to muttering by an angry mob, and so applied the word to arguments on the baseball field where he could not distinguish the words.
Senses: examples: text: At Rick's side our local Liberal Party Chairman is smacking his yeoman's paws together and rhubarbing ecstatically in Rick's ear.
ref: 1986, John le Carré [pseudonym; David John Moore Cornwell], chapter 11, in A Perfect Spy, London: Hodder & Stoughton, →ISBN; 1st Pocket Books trade paperback edition, New York, N.Y.: Pocket Books, January 2003, →ISBN, page 349:
text: I suspect it's these pictures that —— and his cronies have in mind when they rhubarb on about iconicity and retro imagery and the 'solid, uncomplicated, talismanic Englishness' (that is, counterfeit Americanness) of the immediate post-war years that I'm supposed to represent.
ref: 1991, Gordon Burn, chapter 5, in Alma Cogan, London: Vintage Books, →ISBN; republished London: Faber and Faber, 2004, →ISBN:
text: They gathered under the giant chandelier, elegant little women with scraped-back hair, feet in the turned-out position, arms in the first or, for those with handbags, in the third, and one or two sur le cou-de-pied, for all the world as if they were rhubarbing in a crowd scene twenty-five years before.
ref: 2008, John Mole, “Mixed Feelings about the Tutu”, in I Was a Potato Oligarch: Travels and Travails in the New Russia, London; Boston, Mass.: Nicholas Brealey Publishing, →ISBN, page 96:
text: Experienced spielers know that, if they keep rhubarbing away in an unrelenting monotone, their audience will soon become hypnotised by the sound of the words and lose grasp of their meaning.
ref: 2013, Michael O'Donnell, “Medical Committeespiel”, in The Barefaced Doctor: A Mischievous Medical Companion, Kibworth Beauchamp, Leicestershire: Matador, →ISBN, page 232:
text: They pick up massive folders of paper and leave, rhubarbing as they go.
ref: 2014, Jon Brittain, Matt Tedford, Margaret Thatcher Queen of Soho, London; New York, N.Y.: Bloomsbury Methuen Drama, →ISBN, page 17:
text: Doors opened, food prep clattered, and the crowd rhubarbed as everyone hurried in to get their money's worth. The expected smells competed with each other to dominate the room: cheese, pasta, meat … dairy, doughy, dead. And presumably delicious.
ref: 2015 September, Gordon Edgar, “Mac and Cheese, Class War, and the Many Meanings of Cheddar”, in Cheddar: A Journey to the Heart of America’s Most Iconic Cheese, White River Junction, Vt.: Chelsea Green Publishing, →ISBN, page 1:
glosses: Of an actor in a film, stage play, etc.: to repeat the word rhubarb to create the sound of indistinct conversation; hence, to converse indistinctly, to mumble.
examples: text: Ordinarily this group of egos rhubarbed about matters as trivial as whose turn it was to order the next round, but tonight they were united in their project, and while men were killing one another all over the world, a strange peace had broken out among America's swim coaches.
ref: 2015, Julie Checkoway, “A Season of Flame”, in The Three-year Swim Club: The Untold Story of Maui’s Sugar Ditch Kids and Their Quest for Olympic Glory, New York, N.Y.: Grand Central Publishing, →ISBN:
glosses: To articulate indistinctly or mumble (words or phrases); to say inconsequential or vague things because one does not know what to say, or to stall for time.