Does anybody have, or know anybody who has, an intensely squicky feeling regarding seashells? I ask because I just came across a passage in the book I’m reading, in which the protagonist has just that feeling. To paraphrase, he hates shells, as he can’t look at them without being reminded of the “blobby hungry sluggy creatures” that live in them, with hearts and anuses and feeble eyes, and in a cold world half way to death.
Way to go, Updike, I may never be able to order anything on the halfshell again!
I don’t have a problem with shells, but chicken bones (other than wings) creep the ever loving hell out of me.
I like shellses.
Now this:
“with hearts and anuses and feeble eyes”
That’s a great passage. So many possiblilities for use elsewhere.
A romantic poem:
My darling dearest, I love you endlessly
With all my heart, my anus, and my feeble eyes…
Or an episode of MacGyver:
"I escaped by constructing a rudimentary lathe out of hearts, anuses and feeble eyes.
So…many…possibilities…
If it’s a fear of the shell itself, it’s more likely to be called ostrakophobia. If it’s a fear of the “blobby hungry sluggy creatures” that dwell within - I dunno, maybe malakophobia.
Damn!!, I should have known that, for I know the etymology of ostracize. I’d say the character in the book had malakophobia.
I think it’s a law firm: Hearts, Anuses and Feeble-Eyes, Barristers and Solicitors.
Can any of our resident Latinists give the plural of ‘anus’? Because there has to be a better word than ‘anuses’. Is it anera, ani, or something else?