European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - March 29, 1992, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Words and wit scratching the meaning of the seven year itch William Safire cd on language at my in Laws 40th wedding anniversary party recently someone asked about the origin of the phrase the seven year itch. Do you know its provenance Why seven years a this note comes from the office of the vice president signed Quot William Kristol chief of staff happily married for 16 years Quot on language is not an advice to the lovelorn column. Lovelorn a Beautiful word seems to survive Only in that hyphenated phrase. Unrequited love now results in feeling depressed a quasi clinical term its dispiriting but lovers Are no longer lovelorn and not even babies Are sweetly melancholy however its possible that Dan Quayle could make it All the Way and Kristol will be a White House big shot and i will be Able to get an Advance text of Quay cd a first inaugural address on the basis of having provided the provenance of seven year itch. So Henry David Thoreau different drumming along to Walden Pond in 1854, wrote Quot these May be but the Spring months in the life of the race. If we have had the seven years itch we have not seen the Sev canteen year Locust yet in  he did not explain what the seven years itch was a a physical ailment or a marital wanderlust a nor did he explain Why year was plural for the itch and singular for the Locust called the Cicada and not due Back to my Washington Lawn until 2004. The poet Carl Sandburg in his 1936 the people yes caught the cadence of american dialect by using the phrase in what seems to be a physical annoyance sense a a a May you have the seven year itch a was answered a i Hope your wife eats crackers in  a no doubt that the phrase had a sense of irritation a what Are you always tagging after me for a dialect notes noted in a 1907 new Hampshire usage Quot you re worse than the seven years  the question is where did the current sense come from tie phrase is now almost exclusively used to mean a the desire of a married person to stray from his or her spouse after seven years of  there is no doubt As to the source of its popularization. The seven year itch no Hyphen although seven year really forms a compound modifying itch As in 17-year Locust was the title of a 1952 Broadway play by George Axelrod which was made into a movie three years later starring Marilyn Monroe and Tom Ewell. I reached Axelrod in los Angeles to find out what the phrase meant when he titled his comedy. A at the time of the play it was a kind of non Mcd ical term for a skin disease a he replied a not perhaps unlike the chinese zing and had never been used in to use your phrase a a marital wanderlust  How did he come across this americanism a i was writing jokes for a hillbilly comedian called Rod Brassfield a recalled Axelrod a who starred with Minnie Pearl on the grand Ole opry radio  Brassfield liked cow jokes. Said Axelrod a i probably know More cow jokes than any living human being. Why did the cow jump Over the Moon the Farmer had such cold hands. That kind of thing. I tried to write a few of my own did you hear about the cow that swallowed a bottle of Blue Ink and mood indigo but Rod Felt that was too Uptown for his  the hillbilly comedian also used ugly girl jokes. A one of his favorite lines was a i know she a Over 21 Dan Quayle could make a presidential pitch. Because she a had the seven year itch four times a that hideous line a said Axelrod now 69, a was running through my head when i was desperately seeking a title for the play i had just finished that was free from cow jokes forever. Thus is dialect etymology served. The phrase is current As Kristola a letter demonstrates. Variants Are proof that the phrase is in the language a recent Issue of variety writing about a movie producer who tries to keep budgets Down in the seven figure Range headlines a for Mer studio chief has the $7 million  Why seven years not six or eight because seven years has a historical basis in genesis Joseph interprets pharaohs dream of a seven years of great plenty followed by a seven years of  Farmers who hate hillbilly jokes know about the seven years Apple and seven years bean military historians refer to the third silesian War of 1756-63, which confirmed Prussia As a major Power As the seven years War. Get cracking on that inaugural Kristol the presidential itch has no numerical limitation. The new York tlme3hey, what about terminator 2�?T and the commitments Tony Kornheiser on monday in Hollywood comes everybody a favorite night at the movies. Its on to nobody actually goes to the movies anymore. Nobody can afford to. Counting parking baby Sitters the Price of tickets and $17 for a Box of dots going to the movies costs so much that if a family of four wants to go it has to rent out its Home for the evening. But everyone watches the Academy awards because they be become a shoppers guide. Winning an Oscar gives you entry to the rental Market. That a the Way most americans see movies now a at Home on to. I took my kids to see Hook at a theatre and my 5-year-old asked Quot where a they get such a big to a by the Way Hook Wasny to nominated for anything consequential. Neither was another overblown bag of Gas Robin Hood. I thought Dustin Hoffman or Alan Rickman might be nominated for being campy villains. Apparently they weren to psycho enough. Psycho killers dominate the nominations. Next year Disney will re release Cinderella and when the coach turns into a pumpkin Robert de Niro will Hack it to pieces. Best picture i Haven to seen Beauty and the beast yet. I have nothing against animated films but i have two Small children which Means when it comes out on video like millions of other fathers in a going to have to sit through it 67,000 times like the Little Mermaid. What a the Rush Prince of tides is the kind of schmaltzy epic that has won before but that might give Babs a Chance to make an acceptance speech and people in Hollywood would rather eat poached weasel than listen to her. That leaves a movie about a psycho killer who wanted to make the world Safe for Slot machines bugs film about two psycho killers a one with an eating disorder and the other an aspiring seamstress silence of the lambs a and a film about a conspiracy of psycho killers to assassinate the president Juk. For these they left out terminator 2? Best actor will bugs Hannibal the Cannibal and Travis Bickel split the psycho killer vote and cancel each other out oops Bickel was de Niros psycho killer role in taxi Driver not Cape fear. The favorite is Nick Nolte who Drew raves for sobbing in Prince of tides a probably from being scratched by Babsy nails. Nolter a principal acting accomplishment to this Point was having Good hair. Suddenly he a Spencer Tracy the other nominee is the tiresome Robin Williams who plays a loveable homeless person following roles As a loveable disc jockey loveable High school teacher loveable doctor and Popeye the Sailor Man. Just paint on a Happy face and wind him up. In a for Beatty who a so convincing As an actor he kept Annette Bening even after they stopped filming. Best actress Bette Midler give me a break. For the boys for the Birds. Put some wind beneath better swings and blow her out of Here. The rest is psycho City Jodie Foster chased a psycho killer Geena Davis and Susan Sarandon were driven by psycho men to become killers and psycho suicides in Thelma amp Louise which was Midnight run with babes. And Laura dem was a nympho housekeeper. Foster won a couple of years ago so she a out. In a the Only person in America who saw rambling Rose so demos out. Nobody remembers which was Thelma and which was Louise so Davis and Sarandon Are out. As always meryl Streep will win. Of she Wasny to nominated. So what supporting actor Ben Kingsley goes from Gandhi to gangster. Harvey Keitel goes from chasing Thelma and Louise to Chau Feuring bugs Tommy Lee Jones goes from a hero in lonesome Dove to a Snake in Juk and Jack Palance goes on a cattle drive in City slickers where he plays his own face. That a it a face. Excuse me occasionally the face has a cigarette. If this is an Oscar winning performance so is a the Camel billboard in Manhattan. My favorite is Michael Lerner As the Sleazy studio Mogul in Barton Fink. World War ii has broken out and Lerner is wearing an army uniform a implying head just enlisted and he crows to Fink a you like it i had wardrobe make it up Quot special achievement award Best line Hannibal the Cannibal Quot in a having an old Friend for  supporting actress who cares in a at a disadvantage Here not having seen the Fisher King Mercedes Rueh Cape fear Juliette Lewis or Fried Green tomatoes Jessica tand which was described to me As a a Thelma amp Louise with  i saw Prince of tides. Was Kate Nelligan the Mother the wife or the sister i remember Diane Ladd from rambling Rose. She played the Mother who hired Laura Dern As a housekeeper. In real life Ladd is Dernus Mother and dem probably has her own housekeeper. You can see Why this category confuses everyone. They should dump it and add most enjoyable movie and give it to the comm of mints. Creators Syndicate Page 20 b sunday March 29, 1992