He decides to become the guardian of families and their offspring who are close to the queen and are in danger. When the gargoyle narrates at the beginning, explaining his entrance into a world of humans, it's poetic and intriguing. Louisa Parr used it in Adam and Eve (1880).This fantasy begins with such a delightful fairy tale feel but lacks careful, detailed storytelling to sustain it. A newer version is before you know it, meaning so soon that you don't have time to become aware of it (as in He'll be gone before you know it).īefore you can say “knife” This colloquial British expression is equivalent to before you can say “Jack Robinson.” Mrs. Grose's Classical Dictionary (1785) said he was a man who paid such brief visits to acquaintances that there was scarcely time to announce his arrival before he had departed, but it gives no further documentation. This expression originated in the 1700s, but the identity of Jack Robinson has been lost. Usage notes: Often the word or phrase that follows before you can say is related to the situation you are talking about: In summer, food goes bad before you can say heat waveģ) Where the Idiom with "Jack Robinson" came from: Though if you use an other words than "knife" or "Jack Robinson" the meaning of the original Idiom may be misunderstood.
You can coin as many words as you want to create your own version of " Before you can say Jack Robinson" You might use that to talk about a character or object that appears in the book to give it a personal touch. I guess “Dow-Jones Index” here is Archer’s version of “before you can say knife (or Jack Robinson),” but I’m curious to know ġ) Can we coin and use as many variation of “before you can say X” in our conversation as Archer did?Ģ) Is there a standard or best received pattern of “before you can say X”? Is it “before you can say knife”?ģ) What is the origin of “before you can say knife”? Why it should be the “knife,” not gun, sword, Tom, Jon, any other words that represent for brevity?ġ) Theoretical answer is yes. They have it all stashed away all over the world before you can say Dow-Jones Index. “I’m sorry to say that we can hardly ever recover the money, even if we produce enough evidence to nail the villains.
Scotland Yard’s Fraud Squad Detective Inspector, Clifford Smith tells young Oxford's visiting Mathematics professor, Stephen Bradley who fell a victim to a large scale investment fraud, being coaxed by his Harvard school mate: I saw the phrase, ‘ before you can say Dow-Jones Index’ in the following sentence of JefferyArcher’s novel, “Not a penny more, Not a penny less.”
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