Discussion Forum | A Way with Words

lynnmelo on Origin of "I'm rubber, you're glue"?

Sun, 14 Mar 2010 19:01:51 +0000

Thanks, dilettante! My husband was born in 1949, so that 1948 date will do the trick.

Thanks, again!

dilettante on Origin of "I'm rubber, you're glue"?

Sat, 13 Mar 2010 22:19:09 +0000

Will 60 years back do?

Google Books turns the phrase up in the Atlantic Monthly in 1948 (although sometimes periodical dates in Google Books may be suspect, this one can be verified by a search of the Atlantic archives, as this link demonstrates).

lynnmelo on Origin of "I'm rubber, you're glue"?

Sat, 13 Mar 2010 12:37:44 +0000

I'm well aware that a semicolon could be used, but I still think it is too much of a pause for how that is supposed to be read.

Anyway, to get back to the original question . . .

EmmettRedd on Origin of "I'm rubber, you're glue"?

Fri, 12 Mar 2010 22:25:39 +0000

(By the way, sorry for the run-on in the phrsae, but it just wouldn't read correctly if I put a period between "rubber" and "glue").

That is what the semicolon is for, "I'm rubber; you're glue."

Emmett

lynnmelo on Origin of "I'm rubber, you're glue"?

Fri, 12 Mar 2010 19:11:12 +0000

I'm sure you've all heard this children's riposte, but just in case, here's the full phrase (as I heard/said it): "I'm rubber, you're glue. Whatever you say bounces off me and sticks to you." (By the way, sorry for the run-on in the phrsae, but it just wouldn't read correctly if I put a period between "rubber" and "glue").

I've been married more than twenty years, and my husband has always insisted that he "invented" that line when he was a child. He's half kidding, half serious. He said he distinctly remembers coming up with it on the spot in response to his cousin's teasing. I would really like to find out that it goes back a hundred years or more. In other words, I'm hoping to prove him wrong once and for all.

All help is appreciated.