In lots of old books I’ve read, calling somebody a scoundrel was a grave insult. The meaning seems to have softened slightly over the years, and is now on a par with being called a thug or hooligan. (Not that it’s good to be called those things even now.)
Agreed, I typically see “apace” following the word “proceed”: “Proceed apace to the governer’s office.”
Likewise, this is a scenario where I’ve typically seen the word “abreast” used.
ETA: Or simply “pace”, without the “a-” prefix: “we need to keep pace with the technology”.
In my hometown, “apace” was how much pie you would get after supper.
[paranoid, solipsistic git]
Which, pronounced PAY-see, PAW-chay, or PAW-kay, is also a preposition meaning “contrary to the opinion of (used with deference).” As I never encountered this word before 1991, I am of the firm opinion it was coined during my junior year in college simply to fuck with my head, and that the OED and other such resources were fiddled with to maintain the illusion. See also flammable, postpositive, and Merovingian.
[/paranoid solipsistic git]
I’d say it’s on the border between outdated and archaic. These days, it’s more likely that someone would be amused by your Ye Olde Timey choice of insults, than that they would be offended by it.
In “Requiem for a Heavyweight,” Mickey Rooney levels an angry blast at Maish, calling him in the most contemptuous way possible, a “fink.” In a more recent film, we might expect to hear SOB or MF, but I guess that’s the best they could get away with in those days.
Yeah, and scoundrel these days has a connotation of charm about it. We expect the speaker to smile indulgently while referring to the scoundrel.
Like that great romp flick “Dirty, Rotten, Scoundrels.” A personal favorite.
Have you found your penis yet?
ETA: By the way, you were my inspiration for my user name.
Way to hurt a guy, EP.
In L. M. Montgomery’s Anne of the Island (the second sequel to* Anne of Green Gables)* Anne goes to college. The author refers to freshmen (a word she uses sparingly) as “freshies” (male) and “freshettes” (female).
That might just be Canadian rather than old-timey; I heard the word “freshies” used to refer to freshmen circa 1990, for instance.
I said months down the road. It’s something I’ll just have to run across when looking through stories.
Another jarring term (for me): the word “lover” used to mean something like “suitor” or “wooer” or even “fiancé”.
Which reminds me - does anybody use the word “frosh” any more to refer to a freshman?
Yes. First week in most Canadian universities is known as ‘Frosh Week’.
At my alma mater (New Mexico State University, late 1980s & early 1990s), “frosh” was used by the school newspaper as an abbreviation. Usually plural.
I always got weird looks when I used it. At my school the culture was to say first year anyway.
Another thing from the Anne of Green Gables books (that I bet isn’t just a Canadian thing, at least not anymore) is that adult married women, with the exception of family members and extremely close friends, are referred to as “Mrs. Harmon Andrews”, “Mrs. Eben Wright”, etc. That is, by their husbands’ names. Not just formally in writing, but in conversation. “Mrs. Eben Wright told me…” etc.
Back to “apace”, I just coincidentally came across this in a history of Sumeria, published in, I think, 1963:
“With this new insight into the Babylonian script, the decipherment could go on apace.”
The context is that figuring out how Sumerian writing worked had been going very slowly, until some discoveries about how Babylonian writing worked provided insight into how the Sumerian worked. After that, figuring out Sumerian went more quickly, or “apace”.
Both of these are in regular use in English English. Indeed, I’ve never heard of apace meaning “walking together.”