Ask Sue-belinda
THANK you Georgia for your email! Georgia had noticed it was nigh on impossible to avoid the fact that New York was excited to welcome celebrities to the Met Gala, the annual fundraiser for the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
She was also quick to note that the ‘red carpet’ photographs were taken mainly on a beige carpet and asked why it was even called a red carpet. Great question and to answer it we have to roll back in time to a play called ‘Agamemnon’ written by Aeschylus in around 458BC.
In a very dramatic scene, the title character returns from the Battle of Troy only to be greeted by his vile and vengeful wife Clytemnestra who has prepared a carpet of red cloth for him to walk down – “Now my beloved, step down from your chariot, and let not your foot, my lord, touch the Earth. Servants, let there be spread before the house he never expected to see, where Justice leads him in, a crimson path.”
Agamemnon is a smart fellow and knows that only the gods are privileged to walk in such luxury – “I am a mortal, a man; I cannot trample upon these tinted splendours without fear thrown in my path.”
This tradition of red carpet preserved for only the most special and important, continued through time and was adopted by many cultures. Many Renaissance paintings show red carpets and rugs laid before the thrones of kings and emperors.
In 1902 the New York Central Railroad brought the luxury of plush crimson carpets to the new rail service, the ‘20th Century Limited’ and as a stroke of genius, laid out red carpet runners to direct passengers to their boarding platforms. They promised full ‘red carpet treatment’ and this is thought to be the origin of the phrase.
There are in fact many expressions which relate to achievement, recognition of achievement and completion of something significant.
Most of us are familiar with the expression ‘runs on the board’.
This expression comes from cricket and the way in which the scores and statistics were recorded on large boards against the teams or in some cases, against individual players. If you had scored highly when you were up to bat, you were said to have ‘runs on the board’, it was only time before this common cricket expression migrated into daily use. When I was younger, my grandparents would often recognise my efforts by telling me that my achievement was a ‘feather in my cap’.
While the expression may not be so common in the 21st century, it is still being used broadly. In fact, it seems to have developed concurrently and independently in a range of cultures.
In 1599 an English traveller and writer produced a 16th century version of the ‘hitch hikers’ guide’ in his ‘Description of Hungary’ noting: “It hath been an antient custom among them [Hungarians] that none should wear a fether but he who had killed a Turk, to whom onlie yt was lawful to shew the number of his slaine enemys by the number of fethers in his cappe.” (Note to self – avoid men wearing heavily feathered hats.) American Indians are entitled to add a feather to their headdress when they have undertaken an act of bravery. While in 1734 the then Duchess of Portland wrote to a Miss Collingwood stating, ‘My Lord esteems it a feather in his hat that …’ When I first began my voluntary spot on radio, I was very nervous – what if I can’t think of the answer, what if I speak too slowly or too fast, what if I sound like a complete dill?’ After the first show, the host gave me a big smile and told me that now I had this first one ‘under my belt’, it would be as easy as breathing.
Well breathing is pretty easy and I’ve been doing it all my life, so I’m here to tell you radio is certainly not that easy, however, the expression really got me thinking – if it’s ‘under my belt’ have I digested it?
Well, yes, I have figuratively digested the experiences and now, they are part of me and as they become more a part of me, they will worry me no more than the freckles on the back of my hand.
There are loads of expressions similar to this notion of ‘successful consumption’ – we feast on a wonderful idea or intellectual/ physical challenge; we chew over ideas; we digest thoughts; and we even eat up the pages of a scintillating book.
Just as consuming food, we are what we eat and when we chew up knowledge, thoughts, experiences, ideas, we become a more knowledgeable person.
Sometimes things take some time to digest and we may find the completion of something quite arduous and its completion a triumph.
This is true of Richard Wagner’s opera ‘Götterdämmerung’, which is actually the fourth opera in the series we know as ‘The Ring Cycle’. This is a mammoth 15 hours of performance – yes, that’s right 15 hours! In ‘Götterdämmerung’ the female lead is Brunhilde and in classic German fashion, she is a wellrounded lady who delivers a fabulous 10 minute solo to conclude the 15 hours of proceedings.
The expression associated with this achievement and making it through the complete opera is known as ‘It ain’t over ‘til the fat lady sings’. The expression may be neither kind nor elegant, but we get the idea!
Not all achievements can be good or even great and sometimes people come first, as my Dad would say, ‘at the wrong end’, that is to say, last. On such an occasion they may be described as ‘wooden spooners’, but why?
Well, at Cambridge University in the United Kingdom, the lowest passing mark, which still entitles the recipient to earn a Third Class Degree (a Junior Optime) in the Mathematical Tripos is given an unusual award.
This course is taught by the Faculty of Mathematics at Cambridge in the oldest Mathematics course in the UK. The student who gained the lowest marks for their third class degree qualification was given a large (more than six foot) wooden spoon with which to ‘stir him up’ to point out that this is the point at which luck ends and hard work must start. Nowadays, teams trailing in the competition are known as wooden spooners.
They are coming last. I would hope that someone explains the second part of the origin, the point at which hard work can turn everything around.