THE HENRY HOLT ENCYCLOPEDIA OF WORD AND PHRASE ORIGINS <i> by Robert Hendrickson (Henry Holt: $22.50) </i>

This agreeable, if not particularly scholarly, lexicon offers interesting accounts of the origins of some slang phrases and terms, including a few four-letter ones. How many people who put quarters in jukeboxes know the name is derived from juke, a house of ill repute, which comes (via Gullah) from the Wolof West Africa word dzug , to misconduct oneself? The etymologies of common words are more mundane and lack proper citations. Still, it’s fun to discover that the term intestinal fortitude was coined as a euphemism for guts by Ohio State football coach John Wilce to counter the rugged language he heard in the locker room. If he considered “guts” improper, the good coach probably would have a heart attack if he overheard the conversations in a modern locker room.