Might is left-handed Wait for Mr Left to come along The divine left of Kings
His heart is in the left place He's not in his left mind It will all come left in the end
Sayings where the word "right" does not fit
Right in the lurch He was right at the post The right luggage office
Nothing but cold right-overs A right-handed compliment A man with two right feet
Positive references to left-handed
"Out of left field" (a baseball expression?) means unexpected and often novel, but it isn't definitely positive
"The only positive use of "left" I know of is that "aristocrat" has the Greek word for "left" in its root, but then Greece was the birthplace of democracy – they may not have meant "aristocrat" to be complimentary either."
Unfortunately, even this 'positive' is flawed: -
"Aristocrat is from aristo- meaning "best" and krat- meaning "rule". Aristeros does mean left, but it's not the root here."
More on this from Catherine at UCLA...
I was intrigued by your claim in this month's LHC Newsletter that "aristocracy" has a root meaning "left", but I am not sure you are right. "Aristos" means "best" (the superlative of "agathos" meaning "good") and "kratia" is "rule, mastery", and I think you may have confused "aristos" with "aristeros", which means "left"; but, interestingly, "aristeros" is a euphemism (the Greeks were fond of these—thus the Furies were called "the kindly ones", "Eumenides"). Since something on the left (e.g. a portent) was unlucky (!), one didn't refer to it as such, but as "aristeros"—that is, using a fake comparative of "aristos": roughly, "bester". "Euônumos" meaning "of good name, honoured, fortunate" was also used. So I'm afraid the ancient Greeks were as leftist as everyone else seems to be.
Have you heard anything about the Russian writer Leskov and his The Tale of Cross-eyed Lefty from Tula and the Steel Flea? You can find some information in English following this wikipedia link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Levsha
What I can add to this is that Leskov was a lefty himself. In that time when he wrote his story about the Levsha (Lefty) the word "levsha" (Rus. left-handed, lefty) was used in reference to a bad, unskillful and poor craftsman and one of the implications of the tale was that even a bad Russian craftsman was better that an English one.
But, lefty Leskov played some kind of a trick with the word "levsha" because very soon after the tale had been published and read, the word "levsha" changed its meaning absolutely radically!!!! Ever since then, it has meant a skillful, artful, experienced, trustful craftsman. Nowadays a lot of workshops are called Levsha (Lefty) to attract more customers/clients because it means that very professional guys work there! :)
So, at least we have some positive meaning of the word "lefty" thanks to Nikolai Leskov.
His heart is in the left place He's not in his left mind It will all come left in the end
Sayings where the word "right" does not fit
Right in the lurch He was right at the post The right luggage office
Nothing but cold right-overs A right-handed compliment A man with two right feet
Positive references to left-handed
"Out of left field" (a baseball expression?) means unexpected and often novel, but it isn't definitely positive
"The only positive use of "left" I know of is that "aristocrat" has the Greek word for "left" in its root, but then Greece was the birthplace of democracy – they may not have meant "aristocrat" to be complimentary either."
Unfortunately, even this 'positive' is flawed: -
"Aristocrat is from aristo- meaning "best" and krat- meaning "rule". Aristeros does mean left, but it's not the root here."
More on this from Catherine at UCLA...
I was intrigued by your claim in this month's LHC Newsletter that "aristocracy" has a root meaning "left", but I am not sure you are right. "Aristos" means "best" (the superlative of "agathos" meaning "good") and "kratia" is "rule, mastery", and I think you may have confused "aristos" with "aristeros", which means "left"; but, interestingly, "aristeros" is a euphemism (the Greeks were fond of these—thus the Furies were called "the kindly ones", "Eumenides"). Since something on the left (e.g. a portent) was unlucky (!), one didn't refer to it as such, but as "aristeros"—that is, using a fake comparative of "aristos": roughly, "bester". "Euônumos" meaning "of good name, honoured, fortunate" was also used. So I'm afraid the ancient Greeks were as leftist as everyone else seems to be.
Have you heard anything about the Russian writer Leskov and his The Tale of Cross-eyed Lefty from Tula and the Steel Flea? You can find some information in English following this wikipedia link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Levsha
What I can add to this is that Leskov was a lefty himself. In that time when he wrote his story about the Levsha (Lefty) the word "levsha" (Rus. left-handed, lefty) was used in reference to a bad, unskillful and poor craftsman and one of the implications of the tale was that even a bad Russian craftsman was better that an English one.
But, lefty Leskov played some kind of a trick with the word "levsha" because very soon after the tale had been published and read, the word "levsha" changed its meaning absolutely radically!!!! Ever since then, it has meant a skillful, artful, experienced, trustful craftsman. Nowadays a lot of workshops are called Levsha (Lefty) to attract more customers/clients because it means that very professional guys work there! :)
So, at least we have some positive meaning of the word "lefty" thanks to Nikolai Leskov.
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