Salad days

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Template:Short description {{#invoke:other uses|otheruses}} Template:Use mdy dates "Salad days" is a Shakespearean idiom referring to a period of carefree innocence, idealism, and pleasure associated with youth. The modern use describes a heyday, when a person is/was at the peak of their abilities, while not necessarily a youth.

History

The phrase is attributed to William Shakespeare, who made the first known use of it in the 1606 play Antony and Cleopatra.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> In the speech at the end of act one in which Cleopatra is regretting her youthful dalliances with Julius Caesar she says,

"... My salad days,
When I was green in judgment, cold in blood
To say as I said then!"<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

The phrase became popular only from the middle of the 19th century, coming to mean "a period of youthful inexperience or indiscretion." The metaphor comes from Cleopatra's use of the word 'green' — presumably meaning someone youthful, inexperienced, or immature. Her references to "green" and "cold" both suggest qualities of salads.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

Fowler's Dictionary of Modern English Usage summarizes several other possible meanings of the metaphor:

Whether the point is that youth, like salad, is raw, or that salad is highly flavoured and youth loves high flavours, or that innocent herbs are youth's food as milk is babes', and meat is men's, few of those who use the phrase could perhaps tell us; if so, it is fitter for parrots' than for human speech.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

Use

Queen Elizabeth II used the phrase during her silver jubilee royal address in 1977, referring to her vow to God and her people when she made her 21st birthday broadcast: "Although that vow was made in my salad days, when I was green in judgment, I do not regret nor retract one word of it."<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

The phrase has been used as the title of several books, including novels by Theodora Benson,<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> Françoise Sagan,<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> and Charles Romalotti;<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Douglas Fairbanks Jr.'s autobiography The Salad Days;<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> and numerous cookbooks.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

In film, television, and modern theatre

|CitationClass=web }}</ref> in June 1954, and transferred to the Vaudeville Theatre, London, on 5 August 1954. One of its songs, "The Time of My Life", includes the lyrics, "We're young and we're green as the leaf on the tree / For these are our salad days."<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

  • A sketch from Monty Python's Flying Circus is called "Salad Days," and features a parody of Slade's musical as interpreted by Sam Peckinpah.
  • The phrase was used by H.I. McDonough (played by Nicolas Cage) in the Coen Brother's film Raising Arizona. H.I. states that "These were happy days, the salad days as they say" when he and his wife Ed (played by Holly Hunter) were newlyweds. Later in the film, upon discovering Ed could not bear children, H.I. states "But I preminisced no return of the salad days".
  • Salad Days is the title of a documentary film released in 2014 about the evolving punk and hardcore scene in Washington, D.C. during the 1980s and 1990s. Its title derives from the 1985 Salad Days (EP) by the Washington, D.C. band Minor Threat.
  • The 2010 Taiwanese drama Gloomy Salad Days is named after the expression.

In literature

In Katherine Applegate's Animorphs series, Marco says his dad Peter referred to the time before losing Eva (Marco's mom) as the "salad days", though Marco doesn't understand the reference.

In music

Album and song titles

In song lyrics

  • The phrase is used in the Spandau Ballet song "Gold": "These are my salad days, slowly being eaten away."
  • The idiom is used again in the opening line of the track "Lovers Who Uncover" by The Little Ones: "Where do all the lovers meet with one another, in an effort to uncover what has happened to their salad days?"
  • The phrase is also used in the track "Spotlight (Oh Nostalgia)" from Patrick Stump's Truant Wave EP: "Oh, nostalgia I don't need you anymore / 'Cause the salad days are over and the meat is at my door."
  • Frank Zappa's song "Electric Aunt Jemima" contains the phrase as well: "Holiday and salad days, and days of moldy mayonnaise."
  • Dave Carter and Tracy Grammer use the phrase in the song "Frank to Valentino," on the album When I Go.
  • Talib Kweli's song "Friends & Family" on his album Gutter Rainbows uses the phrase in reference to his early career: "Rhyming in Greenwich Village circa 1993 / Yeah those were the salad days, my career's appetizer." His song "Ms. Hill" on his album Right About Now uses the phrase, saying, "We used to kick it in the salad days, but she look at me like she don't know me when she see me nowadays."
  • The Manhattan Transfer uses the phrase in their song, "Zoo Blues" which is featured on their 1987 album Brasil.
  • The phrase is also used in the chorus of the track "Vince The Loveable Stoner" from The Fratellis's Costello Music album: "And I haven't seen a pupil in his eyes for 16 days, the Catholic girls love him in a hundred million different ways, and he's been up for days, in a thick malaise, he's only listened to the salad days."<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

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  • In Modest Mouse's song "Guilty Cocker Spaniels," Isaac Brock sings: "Salad days add up to daily shit".
  • The song "What Would Jimi Do?" on bassist Tony Levin's album Resonator begins with the lyric "Lately, I've been thinking back, back into my salad days."
  • Cursive uses the phrase on the last song of their 2006 release Happy Hollow.
  • Geddy Lee refers to the phrase in Rush's 2010 documentary called Beyond the Lighted Stage.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

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References

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