Monday, July 25, 2011

Tall tales

'Tall stories', 'tall tales' and other variants, like 'tall talk' and 'tall writing', were in use in the 19th century. Examples of these are:

- Routledge's Every Boy's Annual, 1869: "Tall stories - What the Yankees call 'tall talk'."
- The playground of Europe, Sir Leslie Stephen, 1871: "Tall talk is luckily an object of suspicion to Englishmen."

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