Grand allusions
Subtitle: a lively guide to those expressions, terms, and references you ought to know but might not
By: by Elizabeth Webber and Mike Feinsilber.
Contributors: Feinsilber, Mike.
Publisher: Farragut Pub. Co.; Farragut Pub Co
Published: 1990
Place of publication: Washington, D.C
Language: eng
Number of pages: 385
Subjects: English language -- Etymology -- Dictionaries; English language -- Terms and phrases; Allusions -- Dictionaries
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. 1 (3rd group)).

CONTENTS:

Achilles’ heel -- Acton, Lord -- Ad hominem -- Agitprop -- Al fresco -- Alarums and excursions -- Alger, Horatio (see Horatio Alger) -- Alphonse and Gaston -- American century -- A modest proposal -- Amour-propre -- Ancien régime -- Angst -- Anschluss -- Antebellum -- Antichrist -- Antihero -- Aperçu -- Apparatchik -- Aquarius, age of Aquarian -- Ark of the Covenant -- Armageddon -- Arriviste -- Art deco -- Art nouveau -- Artful Dodger -- Au courant -- Augean stables -- Auslander -- Auto-da-fé -- Avatar -- Axis -- 

Babel -- Babbitt -- Bacchanal -- Bad seed -- Balkanize, Balkanization -- Banquo’s ghost -- Barbie and Ken -- Bardic -- Baroque -- Bauhaus -- Beau Geste -- Beggar-thy-neighbor -- Bell, book and candle -- Belle époque -- Belles-lettres -- Belling the cat -- Bellwether -- Below the salt -- Beltway, the; beltway bandits -- Bertie Wooster -- Best and brightest -- Bête noire -- Beyond the pale -- Big bang -- Billingsgate -- Bimbo -- Bitch goddess -- Black hole -- Bligh -- Blimp, Colonel -- Bloody shirt (see waving the bloody shirt) -- Bloomingdale’s -- Bloomsbury -- Boilerplate -- Bon mot -- Borscht belt -- Boswell -- Bowdlerize -- Brahmin -- Brave new world -- Bread and circuses -- Brobdingnagian -- Bully pulpit -- Bunker mentality -- Burkean -- Byronic -- Byzantine 

Cain, mark of (see mark of Cain)  -- Canute -- Captain Queeg (see Queeg, captain) -- Cartesian -- Cassandra -- Casus belli -- Catch-22 -- Caveat emptor -- Center cannot hold, the -- Cerberus (see sop to Cerberus) -- Checkers speech -- Chernobyl -- Cheshire cat -- Chiaroscuro -- Children’s crusade -- Chimera or chimaera -- Chinese wall -- Chutzpah -- Cinema vérité -- City on a hill -- Cloud-cuckoo-land -- Cloud like a man’s hand, a -- Cognoscenti -- Colonel Blimp (see Blimp, colonel) -- Colossus of the north -- Comedie humaine -- Comstockery -- Consent decree -- Conspicuous consumption -- Cordon sanitaire -- Cotton Mather (see Mather, Cotton) -- Coxey’s army -- Cri de coeur -- Critical mass -- Crypto- -- Cult of personality -- -Cum-

 Dada -- Damascus, road to (see road to Damascus) -- Damon and Pythias -- Damon Runyon (see Runyon, Damon) -- Dantesque -- De facto -- Defarge, Madame -- Defenestration -- Déjà vu -- De jure -- Delphic -- Dernier cri -- Deus ex machina -- Deutschland uber alles -- Diaspora -- Dickensian -- Die is cast, the -- Dienbienphu -- Dionysian (Bacchic) -- Disinformation -- Disraeli, Benjamin -- DNA -- Doctors’ plot -- Dog in the manger -- Dooley, Mr. (see Mr. Dooley) -- Don Quixote (see Quixote) -- Doppelganger -- Dorian Gray -- Double helix -- Doublespeak -- Doyen, doyenne -- Draconian -- Dreyfus, Dreyfus affair -- Droit du seigneur -- Dunkirk -- Dybbuk -- 

East Lynne -- Echt -- Eddie Haskell -- Edwardian -- Élan -- Elmer Gantry -- Eminence grise -- Emperor’s new clothes, the -- Enfant terrible -- Enlightenment, the -- Epicenter -- Epiphany -- Eton, playing fields of (see playing fields of Eton) -- Et tu, Brute? -- Everyman -- Ex cathedra -- 

Fabulous invalid -- Fall on one’s sword -- Falstaff, Falstaffian -- Faulknerian -- Faustian bargain -- Fawkes, Guy (see Guy Fawkes) -- Feet of clay -- Felliniesque -- Fifth column -- Film noir -- Fin de siècle -- Final solution -- Fire and brimstone -- Fire when ready, Gridley -- Fleet Street -- Flotsam and jetsam -- Foggy Bottom -- For whom the bell tolls -- Force majeure -- Four horsemen of the apocalypse -- Fragging -- Full court press -- Future shock --

Gang of four -- Gantry Elmer (see Elmer Gantry) -- Gatsby -- Gemütlichkejt -- Genius loci -- Glick, Sammy (see Sammy Click) -- Global village -- Goldberg, Rube (see Rube Goldberg) -- Golden parachute -- Gonzo -- Gordian knot -- Gothic -- Gotterdammerung -- Grand guignol -- Gray, Dorian (see Dorian Gray) -- Great leap forward -- Great white fleet -- Great white hope -- Greek chorus -- Greenhouse effect -- Gresham’s law -- Gridley (see fire when ready, Gridley) -- Grub Streeter -- Gulag -- Guy Fawkes --

Habeas corpus -- Haiku -- Half-life -- Hamlet -- Hardball -- Harpy -- Haskell, Eddie (see Eddie Haskell) -- Hastings, battle of -- Hat trick -- Heart of darkness -- Hearts and minds -- Hegemony -- Hegira -- Heisenberg uncertainty principle -- Hemlock, to drink -- Herodotus -- Hindenburg -- Hit the wall -- Hobson’s choice -- Hoi polloi -- Hoist with one’s own petard -- Holy Grail -- Homeric -- Horatio Alger -- Horatius at the bridge -- Hors de combat -- Hot stove league -- Hubris --

Iago -- Icon -- Id -- Idée fixe -- Idiot savant -- Immaculate Conception -- In flagrante delicto -- Invisible hand -- Iron lady -- Iron triangle -- J’accuse -- Jacobean -- Jacobins -- Jihad -- Jingoism -- Kafkaesque -- Karma -- Kitsch -- Know-nothings -- Kristallnacht -- Kulturkampf -- 

Last hurrah -- Lazarus -- Lebensraum -- Leitmotiv -- Lêse-majesté -- Let a hundred flowers bloom -- L’etat, c’est moi -- Level playing field -- Leveraged buyout -- Leviathan -- Libido -- Lilliputian -- Lingua franca -- Literati -- Loaves and fishes -- Lochinvar -- Loman, Willy (see Willy Loman) -- Long march -- Loose cannon -- Lord Acton (see Acton, Lord) -- Lounge lizard -- Loyal opposition -- Luddites -- Lumpenproletariat --

Machiavellian -- Madame Defarge (see Defarge, Madame) -- Magic bullet -- Maginot line -- Main Street -- Major-domo -- Malthusian -- Mandarin -- Man for all seasons -- Manichean or Manichaean -- Manifest destiny -- Man on horseback -- Mano a mano -- Manqué -- Mantra -- Mark of Cain -- Mather, Cotton -- Mau-Mau -- Maven -- Mc -- Mea Culpa  -- Medium is the message, the -- Meltdown -- Ménage a trois -- Mensh -- Mephistophelean -- Mess of pottage, to sell one’s birthright for a -- Micawberesque -- Mickey Finn -- Mirabile dictu -- Miranda, Mirandize -- Mise en scene -- Mitty, Walter (see Walter Mitty) -- Möbius strip -- Moby Dick -- Modus operandi -- Modus vivendi -- Mr. Dooley  -- Mullah -- Munchkin -- Munich --

Nabob -- Ne Plus ultra  -- Night of the long knives -- NIMBY -- Ninety-five theses -- Noblesse oblige -- Nom de guerre -- Normalcy -- Nostalgie de la boue -- Nouveau riche -- Number-crunching -- Nuremburg defense -- 
October surprise -- Oedipal -- Offending Adam (see whip the offending Adam) -- Old guard -- Orwellian -- Outré -- Ozymandias, Ozymandian -- 

Pale, beyond the (see beyond the pale) -- Panglossian -- Papal bull -- Parkinson’s law -- Parvenu -- Pas de deux -- Patois -- Pavlovian -- Pax Americana -- Peck’s bad boy -- Pecksniff, Pecksniffian -- Persona non grata -- Peter Principle -- Peyton Place -- Pharisees -- Philistine -- Phillipics -- Phoenix rising from the ashes -- Photo opportunity -- Pickett’s charge -- Pilgrim’s progress -- Plato’s cave -- Play in Peoria -- Playing fields of Eton -- Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose -- Pogrom -- Poison pill -- Polonius -- Pooh-bah -- Portmanteau word -- Potemkin village -- Pour encourager les autres -- Praetorian Guard -- Preux chevalier -- Pro bono -- Procrustean -- Promethean -- Protean -- Proust, Proustian -- Ptolemaic universe -- Pumpkin papers -- Putsch -- Pygmalion -- Pyrrhic victory --

Quantum leap or quantum jump -- Queeg, captain -- Queen of hearts -- Quisling -- Quixote, quixotic -- 
Rabbi -- Radical chic -- Raison d’etre -- Rara avis -- Rashomon -- Realpolitik -- Red queen -- Reductio ad absurdum -- Redux -- Regency -- Road to Damascus -- Robber barons -- Robespierre -- Rogers, Will (see Will Rogers) -- Roman a clef -- Rosetta stone -- Round up the usual suspects -- Rube Goldberg -- Rubicon, to cross the -- Runyon, Damon; also Runyonesque, Runyonese -- 

Salad days -- Samizdat -- Sammy Click -- Sang-froid -- Sans-culottes -- Sarajevo -- Savile row -- Savonarola -- Scarlet pimpernel -- Schadenfreude -- Sclerosis, sclerotic -- Scorched earth policy -- Scylla and Charybdis -- Sea change -- Second coming -- Secular humanism -- Segue -- Shanghai -- Shangri-la -- Shermanesque -- Sherpa -- Shot heard round the world -- Shtik or shtick -- Sick man of Europe -- Silent spring -- Sine qua non -- Sinister force -- Sisyphean -- Situation ethics -- Skunkworks -- Slam dunk -- Slouching toward Bethlehem -- Slough of despond -- Sobriquet -- Social Darwinism -- Sodom and Gomorrah -- Solon -- Sop to Cerberus -- Sotto voce -- South Sea bubble -- -speak -- Spear carrier -- Spin control -- Star Chamber -- Stockholm syndrome -- Sturm und drang -- Sui generis -- Sulk like Achilles in his tent -- Svengali -- Sword of Damocles --

Take to the woodshed (see woodshed, take to the) -- Talmudic, Talmudistic -- Tammany, Tammany Hall -- Tar baby -- Teapot Dome -- Tectonic plates -- Tet, Tet offensive -- Theater of the absurd -- Thermopylae -- Thin red line -- Through a glass, darkly -- Tilting at windmills -- Titanic -- Torquemada, Tomas de -- Troglodyte -- Trojan horse -- Trompe l’oeil -- Trouble in river city -- Tumbrel or tumbril -- Tweedledum and Tweedledee -- Twist slowly in the wind -- Type A -- 

Uber -- Ugly American -- Ur -- Valhalla -- Vast wasteland -- Vet -- Volte-face -- Wagnerian -- Waiter Mitty -- Waterloo -- Waving the bloody shirt -- Weltanschauung -- Whip the offending Adam -- White-bread -- White man’s burden -- White noise -- Whitehall -- Will Rogers -- Willy Loman -- Witches’ Sabbath -- Witching hour -- Woodshed, take to the -- Wooster, Bertie (see Bertie Wooster) -- Wunderkind -- Xanadu -- Yalta -- Yellow journalism -- Yin and Yang -- Young Turks -- Zaftig -- Zeitgeist -- Zen -- Zero-sum game -- Zut alors!