big sleep
English
Etymology
Apparently coined by novelist Raymond Chandler, author of The Big Sleep (1939).
Noun
- (idiomatic, euphemistic, almost always preceded by the) Death. [from 1930s]
- 1939, Raymond Chandler, The Big Sleep, Penguin, published 2011, page 250:
- What did it matter where you lay once you were dead? In a dirty sump or in a marble tower on top of a high hill? You were dead, you were sleeping the big sleep, you were not bothered by things like that.
- 1967, “When the Music’s Over”, in Strange Days, performed by The Doors:
- Before I sink into the big sleep / I want to hear / The scream of the butterfly
Translations
type of sleep used as euphemism for death
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Further reading
- “big sleep”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
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