mystical magical Negro
n.— «Addressing issues ranging from Quentin Tarantino’s gratuitous use of racial epithets to the stereotype of the “mystical magical Negro” who appears in such films as “The Green Mile” and “The Legend of Bagger Vance,” Lee kept the house in stitches. Referring to the character of Bagger Vance, Lee commented, “They were hanging ’em high in Georgia then. If Bagger Vance really did have magical powers, wouldn’t he help out his brothers? Do you really think his number-one concern would be helping Matt Damon with his golf swing?”» —“FESTIVALS: 11th Cinequest Makes Digital Official; Leacock and Spike Lee Tell It Like It Is” by Cynthia Gentry indieWire Mar. 13, 2001. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
A Navy veteran recalls hearing the Southern expression fat lighter from his wife’s family in Troy, Alabama. It denotes an old, resin-rich pine wood that becomes highly flammable as it ages. Fat lighter is prized as kindling and often called fat...
A profile in The New Yorker of writer Patricia Lockwood, author of Will There Ever Be Another You (Bookshop|Amazon) opens by saying she has “the impish verve and provocative guilelessness of a peeing cupid,” a description the quirky author herself...