# Every vertebra a little Cabot.



## AlexanderIII

Dear all,
this is from the story by Dorothy Parker '_You Were Perfectly Fine_'.

<-----Excess quote removed by moderator (Florentia52)----->._ She only got a little tiny bit annoyed just once, when you poured the clam-juice down her back.” “My God,” he said. “Clam-juice down that back. And every vertebra a little __Cabot_. <…>”

Could you please explain what is _Cabot _here?


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## Bondstreet

.
I had no idea, but a little searching seems to suggest that it was something to do with her high social class:

www.ask.metafilter.com/38919/Clamback


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## AlexanderIII

Thank you very much, Bondstreet. And for a precious link too !


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## Thomas Tompion

I'm inclined to the theory of the _cabo_ (a cape (in the geographical sense - a piece of land extending into the sea)) in Spanish.  Dorothy Parker was very interested in Spain, and went there several times.

I think the suggestion is that the young man turned the girl's back into land adjoining the sea, and the vertebrae formed individual capes.

Against this is the spelling, but that might be the editor's fault - they make many.

Click on the map of Cuba and it enlarges most gratifyingly.  You can read _Cabo + a name_  for most of the substantial promontories if you enlarge the page.

The young man in his dozy state may well lapse into using an affected Spanish word to embellish his mental picture of the girl's soaking back.


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## JamesM

I don't think it's cabo.  Cabot is quite an upper crust name in the U.S., much like Rockefeller.   I agree with Bondstreet. I think he has insulted an upper-class woman by pouring clam juice down her back.  That's how I read it.


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## entangledbank

This has been anthologized so many times that I don't think they can all be repeating a printer's error. I don't understand the allusion myself, but I'd assume it's either the aristocratic Cabots and Lowells of Boston, or the early explorers Cabot if you want liquid in it. Probably the aristocrats.


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## AlexanderIII

Interesting. Thank you Thomas.


Thomas Tompion said:


> I think the suggestion is that the young man turned the girl's back into land adjoining the sea, and the vertebrae formed individual capes.


If I were in his shoes I'd compare the vertebrae with individual mountinous islands.

Thank you JamesM and Entangledbank !


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## Thomas Tompion

JamesM said:


> I don't think it's cabo.  Cabot is quite an upper crust name in the U.S., much like Rockefeller.   I agree with Bondstreet. I think he has insulted an upper-class woman by pouring clam juice down her back.  That's how I read it.


Well yes, I can see the attraction of this view, but don't you grant the other explanation the merit of making a good image out of the vertebrae?

I don't see why the vertebrae should each be a little aristocratic person, though I know you might use an expression like_ She's a Cabot to her fingertips_.

I'm not at all _parti pris_ about this, and bow to your knowledge of the American aristocracy, but there's nothing else in the story - that I can see - to indicate that this was a society gathering.


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## Thomas Tompion

entangledbank said:


> This has been anthologized so many times that I don't think they can all be repeating a printer's error. I don't understand the allusion myself, but I'd assume it's either the aristocratic Cabots and Lowells of Boston, or the early explorers Cabot if you want liquid in it. Probably the aristocrats.


But Dorothy Parker was writing about New York - I know it's not far away, but still.

And if the  editor didn't understand the allusion either, the mistake could easily be made and then perpetuated.

I wonder if she uses Spanish expressions elsewhere in her writing.  Maybe Alexander knows.


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## JamesM

I don't think the editor would both misspell it _and_ mis-capitalize it, but it's a nice image, I'll grant you that.  You might as well say he lapsed into French and was calling the woman a mutt.  



			
				Thomas Tompion said:
			
		

> ...there's nothing else in the story - that I can see - to indicate that this was a society gathering.



To an American ear there's quite a bit.  The banter is definitely more high society than man on the street: "Corking, I am." "Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear."  "“I bet I was comical. Society’s Pet, I must have been."   These are not expressions a middle-class American man in Dorothy Parker's time would use.  The fact that the restaurant had a maitre d' would distinguish it from the average restaurant of the time (or now).


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## PaulQ

AlexanderIII said:


> _And every vertebra a little __Cabot_.


I would take it to mean, "She was upper-class to the bone/through and through."


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## AlexanderIII

Thomas Tompion said:


> I wonder if she uses Spanish expressions elsewhere in her writing.  Maybe Alexander knows.


Well, no, not to my knowledge. There is the story "Soldiers of the Republic", the scene is Spain during the Civil War. Naturally DP uses geographical names there. There is "espadrilles" in "The Cradle of Civilization". I don't know where else there are Spanish words.


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## Thomas Tompion

Thank you both, very interesting.

James, are you sure it's an aristocratic gathering, rather than DP's usual rich socialites?  Is there anything to suggest style rather than pelf?

She was very interested in the Spanish Civil War, and upset by it.  She took a violent anti-fascist line, as can be imagined.


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## JamesM

No, I'm not saying it's an aristocratic gathering at all.  I'm saying that the particular woman he chose to douse with clam juice was from an upper crust family.  For all I know she might have been simply slumming (by her standards) with the Manhattan literati.


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## Thomas Tompion

Sorry to go on, but is there evidence besides one reading of the Cabot reference for thinking she's aristocratic, anything else in the story?

Was Cabot Lodge a Cabot?  I'm interested in the pronunciation.  I called him *Ca* as in _cab_ followed by *But*  as in _butter_, with a strong accent on the first syllable and the _but_ almost swallowed.  Is that right?

If it's pronounced like that, then the story would read differently aloud at that point, under our different theories.


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## JamesM

Thomas Tompion said:


> Sorry to go on, but is there evidence besides one reading of the Cabot reference for thinking she's aristocratic, anything else in the story?



No, but there's even less evidence that the man in the story would lapse into Spanish.   It's clear from the story that each new humiliation is bringing him lower as the woman recounts the evening.  His expression, to me, means that it was bad enough that he poured clam juice down anyone's back, much less a woman of high society.



> Was Cabot Lodge a Cabot?



If you mean Henry Cabot Lodge, yes, he was from the upper crust Cabot family of Massachusetts.  His mother was a Cabot.  He went to Harvard.  He was pals with Roosevelt.  His great(?)-grandfather on his mother's side was pals with George Washington, was one of the first American senators and also attended Harvard.  He is the very model of an upper crust American. 



> I'm interested in the pronunciation.  I called him *Ca* as in _cab_ followed by *But*  as in _butter_, with a strong accent on the first syllable and the _but_ almost swallowed.  Is that right?
> 
> If it's pronounced like that, then the story would read differently aloud at that point, under our different theories.



Yes, that's how I pronounce the name Cabot.


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## RM1(SS)

entangledbank said:


> the aristocratic Cabots and Lowells of Boston


And this is good old Boston,
The home of the bean and the cod,
Where the Lowells talk only to Cabots,
And the Cabots talk only to God.


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## morior_invictus

JamesM said:


> I think he has insulted an *upper-class woman* by pouring clam juice down her back.


I would agree though I take it to mean that he insulted the whole family, not only her.

When he poured the clam-juice down her back, and if every vertebra was a "little Cabot" then he, figuratively, poured the clam-juice on Cabots (= he insulted an *upper-class *Cabot* family*).


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## exgerman

A similar, grammatically equivalent, phrase is used by Shakespeare's King Lear, when he describes himself as _every inch a king_.


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## Thomas Tompion

RM1(SS) said:


> And this is good old Boston,
> The home of the bean and the cod,
> Where the Lowells talk only to Cabots,
> And the Cabots talk only to God.


The verse is already quoted in the link in post #2.

I'm glad that this thread represents at least two of the explanations which people have given for this reference.

I think both theories have their obvious weaknesses.


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## ewie

Thomas Tompion said:


> I think both theories have their obvious weaknesses.


I hate to say it, Mr T, as I generally think you're the Mutt's Nuts when it comes to Interpretation, but I don't see the weakness in the Cabot = 'Boston grandees' theory at all


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## Barque

Anyone used to read Archie Comics? (Or still do?) Archie Andrews – Archie Comics

There were a couple of very rich teenagers in them called Alexander and Alexandra Cabot. Archie's girlfriend, also very wealthy, was Veronica Lodge. 

I remember hearing of Henry Cabot Lodge a few years ago and thinking it was a coincidence that he had the same names as two wealthy families in those comics.


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## Thomas Tompion

ewie said:


> I hate to say it, Mr T, as I generally think you're the Mutt's Nuts when it comes to Interpretation, but I don't see the weakness in the Cabot = 'Boston grandees' theory at all


Thank you, Mr E.  It's good to hear from the crow's ankle of Analysis.

Plenty of people do see that vertebrae don't naturally become individual people.  Look at the famous link in post #2.

Also DP didn't deal much with the aristocracy.

Interpretation of this remark has been occupying interested people for ninety years.  We aren't likely to have a Damascene flash here, even though you are in your old raincoat.


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## ewie

Thomas Tompion said:


> Plenty of people do see that vertebrae don't naturally become individual people.  Look at the famous link in post #2.
> *
> Also DP didn't deal much with the aristocracy.


Well, yes, it is quite an odd thing to say, I'll grant that.  But, odd though it is, I don't see what else 'Cabot' could possibly refer to, and the reference would've been immediately clear to DP's readers in 1929 ...
*
... aristocracy? what aristocracy? I completely agree with James [#10] that both characters have a somewhat hoity-toity manner of speaking (think Grace Kelly in _High Society_ or anything else): referring to a nobby Boston family wouldn't be at all out-of-place.
So, I'm sorry again, Mr T, but your Spanish thing holds absolutely no water as far as I'm concerned.  (Particularly as it's very definitely *Cabot*, not *cabo*.)


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## Thomas Tompion

Well Mr E, though many Americans would agree with you, many would not.  The point is moot.

The *Cabot* point could easily be explained by an initial editor who didn't realize what DP was on about.  As one who has had several of his more obscure references edited out of existence, I find that easy to believe.

I think  you should go to bed with a hot toddy and have a further think about this.


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## Loob

Here's another vote for the 'Boston Brahmin' interpretation.



(Please don't tell me to drink a hot toddy, TT - I hate 'em.)


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## Thomas Tompion

I'm not completely certain that Ewie is distinguishing between nobbiness and being a typical visitor to the Algonquin.


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## velisarius

I would go for the upper-crust Cabot family explanation too._ My God... Clam juice down __that back._ (My underlining) There seems to be something special about that back, and it may well be that it's much more of a horrendous faux pas to have spilled the soup down that particular back than down any other, more plebeian, back belonging to any another lady in the room.


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## Thomas Tompion

velisarius said:


> it's much more of a horrendous faux pas to have spilled the soup down that particular back


Soup, forsooth!  I've always imagined the clam juice was part of a cocktail.

Don't think these people partook of anything so flamboyantly demotic as soup.


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## velisarius

Sorry for my mistake. The liquid in question is what I meant. I somehow thought it was clam chowder (whatever that is).


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## ewie

Thomas Tompion said:


> I'm not completely certain that Ewie is distinguishing between nobbiness and being a typical visitor to the Algonquin.


Huh? who mentioned the Algonquin? ~ I'm not entirely sure you're distinguishing between fictional characters and their creator, Mr T.
I've never had a hot toddy ... I'm not even sure what it is


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## Thomas Tompion

ewie said:


> Huh? who mentioned the Algonquin? ~ I'm not entirely sure you're distinguishing between fictional characters and their creator, Mr T.
> I've never had a hot toddy ... I'm not even sure what it is


I'm not at all surprised to hear this, Mr E.

Like many writers, Mrs P wrote about, and parodied, people she knew.

I think we could be dealing with her teasing someone by using a verbal tic of some kind, maybe inserting Spanish phrases into the conversation to bemuse editors.


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## velisarius

But why would the vertebrae suggest little_ cabos_? We aren't told that the possessor of them was in such a decrepit state that they were sticking out like those projections along the coast of Cuba. The liquid would have just trickled straight down her spine I suppose, unless she were like a skeleton, poor thing.


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## srk

ewie said:


> referring to a nobby Boston family wouldn't be at all out-of-place.


Do you mean "nobby" as in "smart," or did you mean to write "knobby" as in vertebrae?  Perhaps a Freudian slop (as in clam juice), supporting TT's analysis.


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## JamesM

Thomas Tompion said:


> I think we could be dealing with her teasing someone by using a verbal tic of some kind, maybe inserting Spanish phrases into the conversation to bemuse editors.



You have a vivid imagination, TT, I'll give you that. 



> Well Mr E, though many Americans would agree with you, many would not.



I don't think you've found a single American on this thread who agrees with you yet.


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## Thomas Tompion

JamesM said:


> I don't think you've found a single American on this thread who agrees with you yet.


You've forgotten the excellent Flyingrock.  That's a serious oversight.

I don't think any cause is truly lost, James, until I've espoused it.  My genius lies in persuading people to believe the opposite of what I'm arguing.


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## JamesM

Flyingrock?  Who is that?


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## srk

JamesM said:


> Flyingrock? Who is that?


See the link in post #2.


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## Loob

Thomas Tompion said:


> ...I don't think any cause is truly lost, James, until I've espoused it.  My genius lies in persuading people to believe the opposite of what I'm arguing.


Too much humility, TT!

I normally agree with you....


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## JamesM

> See the link in post #2.



1) That's another thread on a completely different board.
2) Do you know that Flyingrock is American?


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## Loob

James, TT has accepted that he's outvoted.

He may even have accepted that he's _wrong_ not right.


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## JamesM

The first I can believe.  The second.... 

I was going to say if his talent for convincing people of the opposite was true I'd pay him to come stump for Trump.


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## Loob




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## ewie

srk said:


> Do you mean "nobby" as in "smart," or did you mean to write "knobby" as in vertebrae?  Perhaps a Freudian slop (as in clam juice), supporting TT's analysis.


Sorry - I meant nobby as in 'nobs/nobility/posh folk/snobs'.  Did you mean smart as in nobby, chic, clever,
 or full-of-mindblowingly-ingenious-technology-that-you'll-never-use (i.e. as in so-called smartphone)?


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## exgerman

JamesM said:


> I was going to say if his talent for convincing people of the opposite was true I'd pay him to come stump for Trump.



Would that mean sending those _cabos_ back to Mexico where they came from?


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## Thomas Tompion

Loob said:


> James, TT has accepted that he's outvoted.
> 
> He may even have accepted that he's _wrong_ not right.


Two elementary technical points and one act of generosity, since you've forced me out of hibernation.

1.  We don't do votes here.  Some members' votes would count as negatives if we did.
2.  The only thing I may be wrong about is whether or not the issue is settled.  I've been arguing that it isn't.  Various people have misunderstood my position, and that may partly be my fault, as well as largely theirs - after all I have explicitly said that the point is moot.
3.  I forgive James for not looking at the evidence.


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## srk

ewie said:


> Sorry - I meant nobby as in 'nobs/nobility/posh folk/snobs'. Did you mean smart as in nobby, chic, clever


I thought _you_ meant "smart" as in "chic", because it was the only meaning for "nobby" I could find online that I thought fit the case.  If I had thought of "nobility" I would have rejected it because of your post #24:


ewie said:


> ... aristocracy? what aristocracy?



I remember the short story "You Were Perfectly Fine" from freshman English.  The story was distributed to us on ditto paper, probably so the instructor could claim the analysis for "every vertebra a little Cabot" to himself rather than credit an exposition that might have accompanied the source.  Anyway, for me the "upper crust" interpretation has always carried an official endorsement, and I've come to believe in it as well.


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## JamesM

Thomas Tompion said:


> 3.  I forgive James for not looking at the evidence.



As soon as you present it I'll be happy to look at it. So far, just theory.


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## ewie

srk said:


> I thought _you_ meant "smart" as in "chic", because it was the only meaning for "nobby" I could find online that I thought fit the case.  If I had thought of "nobility" I would have rejected it because of your post #24:
> *
> I remember the short story "You Were Perfectly Fine" from freshman English.


Ah I see.  To me _nobby_ and _aristocratic_ have very different connotations, SRK.  In fact for me the meaning of _nobby_ is far closer to 'snobbish' than it is to 'of noble blood'
*
I remember the story from a fortnight ago, which is when I last read it.  Unfortunately I didn't remember the Cabot thing: I obviously just 'read through it'.


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