After The X, The Y

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This has been bothering me for a while. It seems to be a pretty popular formula for headlines, eg 'After the calm, the storm', 'After the fight, the fallout'. This morning I saw it in Spanish on the BBC Mundo site, 'Brasil: tras los ataques, motines' (Brazil: after the attacks, riots).

Where did this come from, as a rhetorical cliche? Is there a famous saying that it is based on? And, classic or dud?

― Cathy (Cathy), Sunday, 14 May 2006 10:04 (nineteen years ago)

Après moi, le deluge.

― Alba (Alba), Sunday, 14 May 2006 10:08 (nineteen years ago)

The Expression “Après moi le déluge”, and its Classical Antecedents

― Alba (Alba), Sunday, 14 May 2006 10:11 (nineteen years ago)

So it's all Madame de Pompadour's fault?

― Cathy (Cathy), Sunday, 14 May 2006 10:18 (nineteen years ago)

I wasn't expecting my curiousity to be satisfied so quickly. Well done Alba.

― Cathy (Cathy), Sunday, 14 May 2006 10:20 (nineteen years ago)

It's only a guess. It would seem unlikely that no one had ever said "after x, y" before that. And I doubt many people who use it now are deliberately riffing on "après moi, le deluge".

I don't know, it just seems a kind of ideal formulation. I say classic(al).

― Alba (Alba), Sunday, 14 May 2006 10:26 (nineteen years ago)

I like it more now than I did thirty minutes ago.

― Cathy (Cathy), Sunday, 14 May 2006 10:33 (nineteen years ago)

After the thread, the responses.

After the explosion of cheeks in frustration, the wiping up of the spittle on the desk.

― Mr Jones (Mr Jones), Sunday, 14 May 2006 10:33 (nineteen years ago)

but dr who introduced this phrase to Madame de Pompadour and he got it from the BBC!

― ken c (ken c), Sunday, 14 May 2006 10:41 (nineteen years ago)

After the Sheepfuxors, the Wolfmongrels.

Not that I have any idea what I just said.

― slugbuggy (slugbuggy), Monday, 15 May 2006 07:04 (nineteen years ago)

was it from that hymn?

After the sun, the rain. After the rain, the sun.

all that.

― mark grout (mark grout), Monday, 15 May 2006 07:09 (nineteen years ago)

A Blog dedicated to the Classical Tradition (influence of Greek and Roman culture on the modern Western world): notes, examples, commentaries, discussions.

this is just great! like I needed to feel any smaller...and I was beginning to feel well-pleased with myself for giving up the porn for the mp3s

― nicky lo-fi (nicky lo-fi), Monday, 15 May 2006 07:44 (nineteen years ago)

I love this blog now. I just read the article about the origin of days of the week, and how in Spanish they use Roman gods for the weekdays (lunes = Diana the moon goddess, martes = Mars, miércoles = Mercury, jueves = Jove/Jupiter, viernes = Venus), and they used to use Saturn and Apollo for Saturday and Sunday (like we do in English) but in the Middle Ages they changed them to Judeo-Christian names, sábado (the sabbath) and domingo (dominicus = the Lord). What's actually crazy though is that in modern Portuguese, they dispense with this god-days thing altogether and call their weekdays segunda-feira, terça-feira, quarta-feira etc, so they call Monday "second-day", Tuesday "third day" (I don't understand this weird order)...but they still use sábado and domingo for the weekend.

Yeah, my original question didn't have much mileage so I'm changing the subject.

― Cathy (Cathy), Monday, 15 May 2006 08:17 (nineteen years ago)

"After the Rain," (the) Nelson(s)

― slugbuggy (slugbuggy), Tuesday, 16 May 2006 18:05 (nineteen years ago)

one month passes...

After the Fire, "Der Kommissar"

That one would have worked better.

― slugbuggy (slugbuggy), Friday, 7 July 2006 03:46 (nineteen years ago)

Todos los fuegos el fuego.

― The Player In The Redd Cap (Two-Headed Doge) (Ken L), Friday, 7 July 2006 04:47 (nineteen years ago)

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