Mary Judy in Stevens Point, Wisconsin, says when her mom was particularly frazzled or disheveled, she’d say she felt as if she’d been pulled through a knothole backwards. The expression goes back to the early 19th century. Variants include dragged through forty knotholes and pulled down a knothole and the knothole pulled in after. Similar phrases include drawn through a hedge backward or drawn through a keyhole backwards. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Pulled Through a Knothole Backwards”
Hello, you have A Way with Words.
Hi, this is Mary Judy in Stevens Point, Wisconsin.
Hi, Mary. Welcome to the show.
Well, when I was a girl in South Central Indiana, when my mother felt frazzled, she would say, I feel as if I’ve been pulled through and not hold backwards. I was wondering if you had any information on that.
Pulled through and not hold backwards. And so I imagine super frazzled, just kind of not very well collected, maybe a bit disheveled.
Mostly, yes. She had three daughters.
Well, I have three sisters, so I understand that. And Mary, you know what a knothole is, right?
Absolutely. Yes, we have had naughty pine in our houses from time to time.
Right, right. It’s a naturally occurring hole in a piece of pine wood. And if you are dragged through that, you’re going to come out the other end looking pretty disheveled and in pain, frazzled, like you said.
It’s an old expression that goes back at least until the early to mid-19th century. And there are lots of different versions of this.
You can be dragged through 40 knot holes, for example, which would be pretty bad. You might be pulled down a knot hole and the knot hole pulled in after, which would be even worse.
And there have been other variations of this phrase like drawn through a hedge backward or drawn through a keyhole backwards. I remember reading a story from a 19th century newspaper that was talking about these policemen who had failed to catch a swindler.
And they ended up crawling through knotholes backwards and forwards after they found out. They were kicking themselves, in other words.
Yeah. So she was using a very evocative phrase. Do you use it yourself?
I don’t. But when my son was doing work study at Indiana University in Bloomington, he did tell me that some of his co-workers used that phrase, dragged through a knuckle backwards.
It’s going to press the memory button for a lot of people because it’s such a vivid phrase, and we thank you for sharing it with us.
Oh, well, it was my pleasure. I really enjoy your show.
Thank you very much, Mary. Take care.
Okay, you too. Bye-bye.
Bye-bye. Draw yourself through the microphone hole and give us a call, 877-929-9673. That’s toll-free in the United States and Canada.
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