Chrysti The Wordsmith: Break a Leg

Greetings verb of horrors. This is Christy the wordsmith. It's traditionally considered bad luck to wish an actor good luck. Instead the proper sentiment is break a leg. The origin of this traditional salutation is on clear. But there are plenty of folk explanations. One has the expression coming from the 1865 assassination of Abraham Lincoln the perpetrator sometime actor John Wilkes Booth broke his leg when he leapt to the stage of Ford's Theater while trying to escape the building. In this scenario good fortune is somehow thought to be conjured by wishing a performer the same fate that befell the assassin in another speculation. Actors who performed with great skill were said to break a leg or actually bend a leg in a deep bow as the audience applauded enthusiastically to break a leg in this context then would be to wish an actor a performance worthy of positive audience response. But most word watchers

agree that the expression arose from the ancient superstition that wishing luck invites calamity and wishing calamity brings the opposite. So here it seems that the antithesis of a broken leg is a good performance. The Germans hope to cover all their bases. Their expression for Loch hos and mine broke means break your neck and leg. I'm Christi the wordsmith. Good day for bores. CHRISTIE The wordsmith is sponsored by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and Zoot enterprises a high tech firm in Bozeman Montana offering challenging careers and innovative solutions for the financial services industry sued web dot com.