[Idiom] put the harps back in the closet

Status
Not open for further replies.

thomaskochi

New member
Joined
Jan 29, 2010
Member Type
Other
Native Language
Malayalam
Home Country
India
Current Location
Kuwait
Excerpt from Reuters news:
Former
President George H.W. Bushremained in the intensive care unit of a Houston hospital on Thursday, but his longtime chief of staff issued a reassuring message, urging the media and the public to "put the harps back in the closet."

Query:What is meant by "
put the harps back in the closet."
 

JMurray

Key Member
Joined
Nov 17, 2010
Member Type
Interested in Language
Native Language
English
Home Country
New Zealand
Current Location
Australia
I think this is a joking reference to the harps that angels might play as someone ascends to heaven.
 

emsr2d2

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Jul 28, 2009
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
British English
Home Country
UK
Current Location
UK
Some newspapers and members of the public will have assumed that George Bush Snr was about to die. The media were probably preparing obituaries etc. However, as he appears to be recovering, they will all need to hold fire and not get carried away. As JMurray said, angels carry harps and, in religious circles (Christianity at least), angels with harps appear when someone dies and the angels accompany them to heaven. It's not yet time to use those harps so they should be put back in the (metaphorical) storage cupboard where they are kept.
 

BobK

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Jul 29, 2006
Location
Spencers Wood, near Reading, UK
Member Type
Retired English Teacher
Native Language
English
Home Country
UK
Current Location
UK
PS - it's a one-off usage - not (in the language I use) idomatic. (Incidentally, it seems to me rather poorly thought through: do the metaphorical angels keep their harps - unused - in journalists' actual closets? Perhaps the metaphorical angels live in metaphorical closets, waiting to be dusted off harps and all at the first whiff of an obituary? ;-))

b
 

JMurray

Key Member
Joined
Nov 17, 2010
Member Type
Interested in Language
Native Language
English
Home Country
New Zealand
Current Location
Australia
It has been reported that Der Spiegel mistakenly published an obituary for George H.W. Bush on its website for a few minutes on Sunday. So perhaps some angels had indeed taken their harps out the closet prematurely, the German-speaking ones anyway.

Magazine mistakenly publishes Bush obit
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top