in the pudding club
I first heard this British expression in Harold Pinter's absurdist play "The
Birthday Party":
Goldberg: How did you kill her?
McCann: You throttled her.
Goldberg: With arsenic.
McCann: There's your man!
Goldberg: Where's your old mum?
Stanley: In the sanatorium.
McCann: Yes!
Goldberg: Why did you never get married?
McCann: She was waiting at the porch.
Goldberg: You skedaddled from the wedding.
McCann: He left her in the lurch.
Goldberg: You left her in the pudding club.
McCann: She was waiting at the church.
At first, I thought the pudding club might be as meaningless and non-sequitor-y
as throttling someone with arsenic, but I was pleased to learn the pudding club
was the preggo club and has been since 1936. ("In the club" has the
same meaning). If pregnancy and pudding seem like odd dance partners to you,
there's a less-popular variation of "bun in the oven" that
might be the missing link: "pudding in the oven."
fell
Since 1722, "fell" — sometimes lengthened to "fell
with child" — has carried Biblical implications that are about
as subtle as a two by four to the melon. The OED quotes a 1957 citation, "We
had been married eight months before I fell," Since 1722, "fell" has carried Biblical implications that are about
as subtle as a two by four to the melon.to which I have two reactions:
1) Ouch. 2) How Lucifer-like can you get? From the connotation, denotation,
and stench of some of these terms, I almost get the sense that not everyone
in the English-speaking world has always had an enlightened attitude towards
women, sex and pregnancy.
And here's a non-euphemism that may prove helpful to any pregnant woman
in a bind: clergy of belly. To explain this obscurity requires explaining another:
the expression "benefit of the clergy" meant that holy folks were
given the benefit of the doubt — and a free pass in secular courts — for
God-related reasons. This expression was well-established from about 1300-1800
and common enough to spawn this most pregcellent variation: A pregnant woman
in trouble could claim the "clergy of her belly" as a general get-out-of-jail-free
card.
That must have been a nice option when life got interesting.
©2007 Nerve Media
