is two guys collaborating to write on writing and collaboration.
Tuesday
Jan 10, 2006
Re: what's a Spitball? posted by Martin
I too learned this term from William Goldman, but I didn’t think the term originated with him. After a handy search of the online OED (thanks SPL!), my suspicions were confirmed.
And actually, the use of the term to mean a transfer of information pre-date use as a baseball term by quite a few years. In 1888, the OED attributes the following to Judge 10 Nov. 68/1 “All statements to the opposite are spit-balls at the moon.” The baseball use starts in 1905, in J.J. McGraw’s Official Baseball Guide.
The OED winds up the definition page with our current use: Spitball: “To throw out suggestions for discussion”
The first reference to the movie industry is from 1955, attributed to H. Kurnitz, from his Invasion of Privacy. “I’m just thinking out loud… Spitballing we call it in the movie business.” So, it sounds as if it’s an old Hollywood term.
Other good quotes included C. Larson, in 1976’s Muir’s Blood “‘Are you serious?’ Blixen asked. ‘I’m spitballing,’ Schreiber replied.’” Most curiously, though, we find a quote in the New Yorker from May 1977: “The spitballer won’t grow into his father’s jacket.”
Please note that none of the following have included a mandatory exclamation point with the term, thus leaving us to break what small new ground we can.
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