Talk:Sour Grapes

Latest comment: 5 years ago by B dash in topic Requested move 14 February 2019
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Sour Grapes in the Bible edit

The expression "sour grapes" is also in the Bible, as part of a proverb concerning the land of Israel: "The fathers eat sour grapes, and the children's teeth are set on edge" (Ezekiel 18:2). Although probably unrelated, it does predate the Aesop fable by more than two centuries.

The same phrase appears in Jeremiah 31:30. But both Ezekiel and Jeremiah were approximate contemporaries of Aesop (620-560 BC), so I don't know where you get the two centuries from. In any case, neither prophet was using the term in the modern sense introduced by Aesop. --RichardVeryard (talk) 19:00, 27 December 2008 (UTC)Reply
That's presumptuous to say that Aesop "introduced" the alleged modern sense of the phrase "sour grapes". If Aesop actually existed, that is. Fables attributed to Aesop first appeared in writing about two centuries after Aesop's apparent lifetime. Continuing to presume Aesop to be a contemporary of Aesop, it's possible that the Greek-derived metaphoric meaning of the phrase was around even among the Hebrews and other peoples of the Levant.
71.173.7.100 (talk) 01:19, 10 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
No one said that Aesop created the concept of grapes being sour. (assuming Aesop actually is the author of all the fables attributed to him, it really makes no difference) Grapes have been sweet and grapes have been sour for untold ages. Aesop's audience would have understood that grapes could be sweet and grapes could be sour and that sour grapes were not very desirable. What he created was this context for sour grapes, judging them sour not because they were sour, but because it allowed the fox to think he didn't really want them anyway. The story doesn't give any indication whether the grapes were sweet or sour, the fox could't know this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by RLent (talkcontribs) 20:59, 19 June 2013 (UTC)Reply

Merger (2007) Sour grapes -> The Fox and the Grapes edit

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Can't this page just be a section of the Fox and the Grapes fable?

--Jeffnewfeld 19:33, 25 September 2007 (UTC)I think that it reads better to have a sep article for Sour Grapes, linked to the Fox and Grapes fable as the source of the expression. Otherwise we'd have to massage the Fox and Grapes article to bring the Sour Grapes definition more obviouly to the front of the article. It will still be more confusing to have one article than two.Reply


---I agree, the two pages are suitable. Swisspass 09:40, 23 October 2007 (UTC)Reply

Somebody do it then?--219.78.6.104 18:43, 24 October 2007 (UTC)Reply

This article merged into The Fox and the Grapes edit

This page will now be a dab page, since there were a couple of other references.

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Auntof6 (talkcontribs) 03:40, 23 September 2008 (UTC)Reply


The above discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Sweet Lemons edit

A friend of mine came up with the inverse: sweet lemons. (Because you have something, you want to believe it's of good quality.) (Hi, Judi. Long time no see!) Kostaki mou 02:33, 27 October 2007 (UTC)Reply

How old is your friend? I've been hearing "sweet lemons" as an expression for close to forty years. Zephyrad (talk) 06:06, 19 September 2008 (UTC)Reply
Just under sixty. She told me about it about forty years ago. People think up things like that independently, of course. Kostaki mou (talk) 21:29, 19 September 2008 (UTC)Reply

Explanation edit

For definite, this page should be merged with the other page, on the fact that this article only explains what Sour Grapes means. That's what Wiktionary's for, isn't it? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tool-apc (talkcontribs) 23:28, 10 May 2008 (UTC)Reply

Bruised edit

I read on another website that sour grapes could also mean bruised testicles —Preceding unsigned comment added by 131.204.254.65 (talk) 19:24, 26 August 2009 (UTC)Reply

Requested move 14 February 2019 edit

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: Moved. (closed by non-admin page mover) B dash (talk) 09:18, 21 February 2019 (UTC)Reply



Sour grapesSour Grapes – I propose that the primary topic of the phrase "sour grapes" is the reference to the phrase (and the sentiment) described in the article, The Fox and the Grapes. All of the senses other than the sentiment itself are distinguishable as being fully capitalized; move the disambiguation page to the fully capitalized title and redirect the lowercase title to The Fox and the Grapes, and readers who link or search for the phrase will be more likely to find what they want. bd2412 T 12:50, 14 February 2019 (UTC)Reply


The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.