[Cecil Terwilliger]

Inspired by this little gem from the UN thread I thought I'd create a thread for people to vent about constant misquotations.

Originally Posted by I_am_Beast

I think thus protest too much.

The real quote is

The lady doth protest too much, methinks

But even the context in which it is usually used is totally wrong. Explained:

Almost always misquoted as "Methinks the lady doth protest too much," Queen Gertrude's line is both drier than the misquotation (thanks to the delayed "methinks") and much more ironic. Prince Hamlet's question is intended to smoke out his mother, to whom, as he intended, this Player Queen bears some striking resemblances [see THE PLAY'S THE THING]. The queen in the play, like Gertrude, seems too deeply attached to her first husband to ever even consider remarrying; Gertrude, however, after the death of Hamlet's father, has remarried. We don't know whether Gertrude ever made the same sorts of promises to Hamlet's father that the Player Queen makes to the Player King (who will soon be murdered)—but the irony of her response should be clear.

By "protest," Gertrude doesn't mean "object" or "deny"—these meanings postdate Hamlet. The principal meaning of "protest" in Shakespeare's day was "vow" or "declare solemnly," a meaning preserved in our use of "protestation." When we smugly declare that "the lady doth protest too much," we almost always mean that the lady objects so much as to lose credibility. Gertrude says that Player Queen affirms so much as to lose credibility. Her vows are too elaborate, too artful, too insistent. More cynically, the queen may also imply that such vows are silly in the first place, and thus may indirectly defend her own remarriage.

I studied Hamlet in HS and I don't remember being told this. Although that was almost a decade ago.


The other one is "for all intensive purposes". That is not a real phrase. It is actually "for all intents and purposes". Just for fun a few Urban Dictionary definitions of "for all intensive purposes".

Taken literally, the phrase means "for purposes which are intense. All purposes which are not intense are not included." This is almost completely opposite to what is meant by most people, and is why it is imperitive that persons use the proper phrase.

Frequently spoken by a complete ####ing ######, usually from Alabama, who intends to say "For all intents and purposes".

Thing is, if no one ever uses it in the correct form does that mean that the incorrect form becomes the real meaning because of the evolution of language?

What other sayings piss you guys off? Irregardless? Could care less? unthaw?

Any other incorrect famous phrases?