From: bilh@pd.jaring.my   
      
   On Thursday, August 11, 2016 at 3:01:39 PM UTC, Bil wrote:   
   > On Wednesday, August 10, 2016 at 12:24:01 PM UTC, Piper wrote:   
   > > What does this mean "eat my starch"?   
   > >    
   > > Someone enlighten me, please.   
   >    
   > Zappa is the one who added "join the march" to a long pre-existing "eat my   
   starch" phrase. FZ did that to match the rhyme and rhythm.   
   >    
   > "Eat my starch" is a phrase etched into the minds of American kiddies of a   
   certain generation or two.   
   >    
   > Apparently comes from a playscript, written for kiddies, from 1946. And that   
   play in turn was based on a story for kiddies (a 'fairy tale', as they are   
   called in some cultures; a 'morality tale' or 'moral tale' as they are called   
   in others) from 1935.   
   >    
   > The 1935 morality tale has as characters an elderly dame, a wood cutter, and   
   a sparrow. To cut a long story short, the wood cutter goes out to chop wood   
   during daylight hours. The dame does domestic chores. And she interacts with   
   the sparrow. One day    
   she is doing a chore with starch (I take it to be commercially retailed starch   
   flakes, the stuff bought at a store to make up a solution to stiffen cotton   
   clothes; note the importance of the Great Depression, which focused the   
   attention of people on    
   their pocketbook when it came to paying for the necessities of life). And the   
   sparrow cannot resist eating some flakes of starch. The old dame says: '"From   
   now on you shall never be able to eat my starch again!" And she drew out her   
   sewing scissors and    
   quickly clipped the bird's tongue. The bird swiftly flew out of the house, and   
   into the depths of the forest, fearful of his life.'   
      
   Wikipedia traces the story of the Old Woman, the Woodcutter, and the Sparrow   
   (that ate the starch) to a Japanese story "Shita-kiri Suzume" [The tongue-cut   
   sparrow].   
      
   See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shita-kiri_Suzume   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)