Proverbs and sayings reflect the wisdom of the people. One way or another, we encounter them every day from early childhood: we hear winged expressions from the lips of our grandparents, proverbs are often found in folk tales, lullabies, jokes. Thus, we absorb part of the mentality, part of the folk culture. That is how, through the native language, national self-consciousness begins to take shape, therefore one cannot but pay attention to such an important component as proverbs and sayings.
Usually, different sayings adorn the speech of the older generation: they somehow know where to insert the red word, as they say, they wonât get into the pocket of the word (look, this is a stable expression). But in vain do many think that the proverbs become obsolete and their use is the lot of village old people and grannies. Sometimes, by the way, a proverb inserted into a conversation can revive it, make the conversation more interesting, and you will be recognized as a witty and eloquent speaker. Moreover, the theme of folk tales is so wide that without a doubt one can say: there is a good expression on any topic.
However, in order not to look silly, you need to know the meaning of a proverb that you use in speech. Otherwise, you risk being the hero of the saying about fools.
It is about them that we will talk now.
Who is a fool?
A fool is a word that is now negative, even abusive. Using it, we want to insult someone, call them a stupid, narrow-minded person. And this is consistent with the main meaning in the modern explanatory dictionary. However, this was not always the case. Previously, court jesters were called fools; rather, the word had a positive meaning, because in order to become such a jester, one had to have a number of personality traits: a fool had to be witty, eloquent, and have an excellent sense of humor. Now it seems to us not just ridiculous, but even absurd! Try to call someone a fool and prove to him that this is a compliment to his intellectual abilities. Most likely, you yourself will be considered crazy or, even worse, they will decide that you just decided to mock the person you are talking to. It is understandable, because now a fool is a more expressive, even colloquial and swearing synonym for the word "fool".
Origin of the word
The etymological dictionary of the domestic linguist Shansky says that the word "fool" is derived from a fool, that is, a stupid one. The original dĂčrti meant "hit, stab, sting." Thus, the fool was originally âstung, bitten,â and only then âcrazy,â the one who was bitten.
Why are there so many fools?
Proverbs and sayings about fools appeared almost at the same time as the word itself. As we understand, a very, very long time. Over the years, their number has grown so much that all the sayings about fools are almost impossible to calculate, although research in this area has been conducted for more than a dozen years. Is there really so many stupid people in our country? The fact is that a fool is a very popular character, remember the same tales where the main character was Ivan the Fool. A fool is popular not only among Russians. There are many Ukrainian sayings about fools (âa fool gets richer with a thoughtâ), Kazakh (âa clever law, a fool is a stickâ), proverbs about fools are known in distant Japan (âeven a fool can have talentâ). As we see, everywhere there are enough of their fools.
Where to find?
How to learn modern man sayings about fools? In addition to listening to someone else's speech and memorizing your favorite phrases, you can look into a special dictionary of winged expressions or a dictionary of proverbs and sayings.
The most famous and most complete at the moment are the books âProverbs and sayings of the Russian peopleâ by Vladimir Dahl and âDictionary of Russian proverbs and sayingsâ by Vlas Zhukov. In the first, all the proverbs (and their dictionary author for his whole life has collected more than forty thousand) are grouped by topic. So, sayings about fools and smarts should be looked for in a thematic group called "Mind is stupidity." Zhukovâs dictionary contains about one and a half thousand sayings, which are most often used in Russian, both spoken and written. This book is also valuable for the fact that the dictionary entries reflect not only the meaning of an expression, but there is also a stylistic mark reflecting the peculiarities of using a proverb, options for its use and even its origin. Dictionary construction alphabetical.
Russian proverbs and their meaning
As mentioned earlier, in order to correctly and appropriately use proverbs, you need to know their meaning. Well, on concrete examples of Russian sayings about fools, we consider the meaning of some of them.
"To teach a fool - what to treat the dead." If you want to say about the futility of teaching someone, then safely use this proverb, its meaning is completely transparent and based on comparison, so that any fool will understand - this is another expression about fools, more precisely, using this image, because we are talking about something elementary and so simple that even the most stupid person will guess what, in fact, is the matter.
By the way, people often talk about the fact that pedagogical efforts are futile in relation to fools. There are a lot of proverbs with a similar meaning (the futility of learning) in the Russian language. Here are a few of them.
- "No matter how you cook a fool, everything smells foolish of him."
- "To teach a fool to pour water into a tub without a bottom, to mold peas in a wall."
- "Leaky fur cannot be fooled, and crazy cannot be taught."
Well, the conclusion from this can also be made with the catch phrase: âyou canât retrain all fools in the worldâ (there is a variation with âyou canât count itâ means âyou canât count itâ). That is, there are so many stupid people in the world that no matter how you teach them, no matter how you try to make them smart, no matter how you explain common truths, you wonât get rid of fools. "Still, the light is worth the fools" (used if someone's stupidity saved some situation).
Unpredictable and dangerous
âYou canât count all the fools in the worldâ, âthey donât plow fools (in other cases they scream - the same as plow, but obsolete), they donât sow, theyâll be born themselvesâ - based on these proverbs, you can understand that fools in the world a dime a dozen. However, this is not the worst trouble. It is dangerous that you donât know what to expect from such people. There are many expressions about the unpredictability of fools. For example, "fear the goat in front, the horse in the back, and the fool from all sides"; "make a fool pray to God, he will break his forehead"; "fool the cross, and he shake his foot" and others.
Even a fool seeking to help, and he is not good. This is proved by the saying about the helpful fool of authorship of the famous Russian fabulist, the sharp-tongued master Ivan Andreevich Krylov: âA helpful fool is more dangerous than the enemy,â the writer says.
Do not mess with fools!
Many Russian proverbs say this: "contact a fool, you yourself will be a fool"; "smart teach, fool bored"; "a fool will throw a stone into the water, but ten smart ones will not be taken out"; "You will send a fool, you will follow him yourself."
Itâs better not to argue with fools either. For example, Emmanuel Adolf Essar wrote that if you argue with a fool, then there are already two fools. Here are a few sayings about a dispute with a fool, if you have not yet been convinced that this is a stupid occupation. "A word to a fool, and he is ten to you" - fools often fall into verbiage, therefore, to argue with them is useless and long. An Indonesian proverb says: âYou canât argue with a fool,â apparently in any part of the world, even in faraway Indonesia, arguing with a fool is considered a matter for which you should not waste your time. In the end, "argue with a fool - do not respect yourself." Here is another common phrase about disputes with fools.
Found a fool!
But what if the saying about fools is used against you? Firstly, if you understand the meaning of the proverb, then calm down - you're not so stupid, then!
Secondly, you can always fend off another saying in response. âThe fool will tell himselfâ - in the sense that since your interlocutor spoke about fools, it means that he himself is. The proverb has the same meaning.
"Look for another fool! Found a fool!" - all these are winged expressions that are used to defend oneself when someone else wants to leave you in the cold, that is, to profit from your stupidity.
Are there any pluses to being a fool?
In general, there are positive winged expressions about stupid people. So even if you were called a fool, remember that "a fool is happy, but God will give a clever one" (that is, a refusal).
Proverbs give a positive assessment to fools:
- "In Russia, fools are held in high esteem."
- "Fools are lucky."
- "The fool is sleeping, and happiness lies in the minds."
Be that as it may, you can scold fools, you can praise, you can get mad at them or be touched. But do not forget that "for each of his foolish enough", and "boring without fools."