Other Names
Other countries have comparable periods, for example the Sommerloch ("summer hole") in Germany; French has la morte-saison ("the dead season" or "the dull season"), and Swedish has nyhetstorka ("news drought").
In many languages, the name for the silly season references cucumbers (more precisely: gherkins or pickled cucumbers). Komkommertijd in Dutch, Danish agurketid, Icelandic gúrkutíð, Norwegian agurktid, Czech okurková sezóna, Slovak uhorková sezóna, Polish Sezon ogórkowy, Hungarian uborkaszezon, Hebrew עונת המלפפונים (Onat Ha'melafefonim) and Estonian hapukurgihooaeg all mean "cucumber time" or "cucumber season". The corresponding German term is Sauregurkenzeit ("pickled cucumber season"); the same term is also used in Slovene as čas kislih kumaric.
The term "cucumber time" was also used in England in the 1800s to denote the slow season for tailors.
A silly season news item is called rötmånadshistoria in Sweden and mätäkuun juttu in Finland, both literally meaning "rotting-month story".
In Spain the term serpiente de verano ("summer snake") is often used, not for the season, but for the news.
Read more about this topic: Silly Season
Famous quotes containing the word names:
““Well then, it’s Granny speaking: ‘I dunnow!
Mebbe I’m wrong to take it as I do.
There ain’t no names quite like the old ones, though,
Nor never will be to my way of thinking.
One mustn’t bear too hard on the newcomers,
But there’s a dite too many of them for comfort....’””
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)
“When the Day of Judgement dawns and the great conquerors and lawyers and statesmen come to receive their rewards—their crowns, their laurels, their names carved indelibly upon imperishable marble—the Almighty will turn to Peter and will say, not without a certain envy when he sees us coming with our books under our arms, “Look, these need no reward. We have nothing to give them here. They have loved reading.””
—Virginia Woolf (1882–1941)