He never married

"He never married" was a phrase commonly used by obituary writers in the United Kingdom as a euphemism for the deceased having been homosexual.

Usage

The phrase was a staple euphemism of obituary writers used to imply that the subject was homosexual.[1][2] Nigel Rees dates its use to the second half of the twentieth century and notes that it can also be used without any implication of homosexuality, and that it also served the purpose of avoiding the use of the word gay for subjects who were open about their homosexuality but disliked the word "gay".[3] As recently as 2007, The Daily Telegraph concluded its obituary of Count Gottfried von Bismarck with the words.[4]

A similar euphemism was "confirmed bachelor", which was used in the second half of the twentieth century by the satirical magazine Private Eye. Rose Wild, in The Times, however, reported in May 2016 that she could find only around a dozen examples of the phrase in the paper's obituaries, some of which were of a non-coded form, causing her to wonder whether the phrase existed much outside the imagination of the writers of Private Eye.[2]

References

  1. ↑ "Death is the new black" The Observer, 28 April 2002. Retrieved 3 May 2016.
  2. 1 2 "Lives remembered with a loaded phrase or two", Rose Wild, The Times, 21 May 2016, p. 27.
  3. ↑ Rees, Nigel. (2006) A man about a dog: Euphemisms & other examples of verbal squeamishness. London: Collins. p. 274. ISBN 9780007214532
  4. ↑ Count Gottfried von Bismarck. The Telegraph, 4 July 2007. Retrieved 3 May 2016.
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