‘grasping at straws’ vs. ‘clutching at straws’
Some sustain that the phrase “grasping at straws” has overtaken that of “clutching at straws”. I read that the former is American while the latter is British.
The American English definition is
trying to find some way to succeed when nothing you choose is likely to work
while the British definition is slightly different
to be willing to try anything to improve a difficult or unsatisfactory situation, even if it has little chance of success
Oxford Living Dictionaries offer a more apocalyptic interpretation
clutch (or grasp or catch) at straws
Be in such a desperate situation as to resort to even the most unlikely means of salvation.
“catchest a stick”
The phrase is attributed to Sir Thomas More who used the metaphor in A Dialogue of Comfort Against Tribulation, 1534
A man in peril of drowning catchest whatsoever cometh next to hand… be it never so simple a stick.
“catch at every straw”
The version with straw surfaced some fifty years later in John Prime's Fruitful and Brief Discourse
We do not as men redie to be drowned, catch at euery straw
The straw version was used throughout the 18th and 19th century, and both American and British writers (and speakers) continued to use the dramatic metaphor of a drowning man fighting for his life. The following citations are taken from the Early American Proverbs and Proverbial Phrases (1977)
1733 Belcher Papers 1.496:
I see the party are still willing (as drowning men) to catch at straws or firebrands.
1758 Franklin Papers 8.75:
This seems like a drowning Man catching at a Straw.
1771 New York Journal in Newspaper Extracts (I) 8.401:
…like a drowning Man, willing to catch at a Straw.
1802 Chester Federalism 19:
The adage of “a drowning man's catching at straws.”
The British author Samuel Richardson in 1748 wrote
A drowning man will catch at a straw, the proverb well says
The phrase appears in Charles Dickens' Household Words – Volume 9, page 529, 1853, who quotes
“The drowning man catches at the straw. With no disrespect for your judgment, and with no doubt of your sincerity, excuse my saying that I cling to the belief that there is yet hope that I am not condemned to perpetual exile from that lady's presence.”
The English novelist, Mrs. Henry Wood, in her 1863 The Shadow of Ashlydyat, used the metaphor to great effect
“I am engaged,” replied George, catching at the excuse like a drowning man catching at a straw. “That is” — taking out his watch — “I have not time now to see him. Tell Lord Averil I am particularly engaged.”
[…]
Did he think Lord Averil would never favour Prior's Ash with his presence again? It is hard to say what foolish thing he thought. A man, drowning by water, does catch at straws: and a man, drowning by evil fortunes, catches at fantasies equally frail and hopeless.
As can be seen above, American and British English both used the verb "catch" in the metaphor of a drowning man. But at some point in the late 19th century or early 20th century, the man stopped drowning, and the verb “catch” was replaced with “clutch” in the UK, while “grasp” was preferred in the US.
Questions
- When did this division, more or less, occur?
- Why was/is “grasped” preferred in the US? Does the BrEng verb “clutch” have different connotations or meaning?
- When did the drowning stop? In other words, in which year was the phrase first shortened?
Related: What does "clutching at straws" mean?
word or phrase for pursuing a losing argument in a certain manner
Best Answer
OED suggests an evolving meaning of the word "catch." Particularly, we can zoom in on the sense related to catching an object in the air (sense 24).
The sense's earliest attestation is from 1589, but it is still in common use today.
Compare this sense of the word catch with sense 23:
"To catch at" in this sense seems to be the use that was originally applied to straws, prior to the split between "clutch" (BrE) and "grasp" (AmE). Unlike catching an object out of the air, which is still in modern use, the "catch at" sense is attested most recently in 1782. Though it's not marked as "obsolete" by OED, and the construction certainly persisted in the form of this expression, it seems to be antiquated.
Judging by the antiquation of the "catching at" construction, it seems to make sense that the idiom would adjust in wording to adapt to the tongues of contemporary speakers. Searching for early uses of the various forms, I came upon several uses of the "catch" construction that use the word "grasp" to emphasize, and possibly to modernize or explain, the expression. This seems relevant to the eventual evolution to "grasping at straws."
The earliest direct use of "grasping at straws" that I could find was from around this period, in 1811, and placed the word "grasping" in italics, suggesting perhaps that the writer was aware of the unusual use of the word in a proverbial construction that usually used the word "caught," "catch," or "catching."
This explanation so far focuses only on the American structure, "grasping at straws," but I believe the combination of dating evidence in OED regarding the construction "to catch at," in combination with the appearance of "grasping at straws" decades after the latest attestation of "to catch at" suggests to me that the replacement of "catching" with "grasping" likely occurred to replace an antiquated construction. For whatever reason, "clutching" or "grasping" became more appropriate contemporary words for "attempting to hold on to something," while "catching" was increasingly associated with catching a ball (or anything in mid-air).
Clutching vs. Grasping
NGram searches, if we're to believe them, seem to confirm the suggestion that "clutch at straws" rose to greater prominence in British English, whereas "grasp at straws" flourished in the United States.
American English with "grasp at straws" ahead
British English with "clutch at straws" narrowly ahead
There could be many explanations for this difference, so I can only speculate. My best hypothesis is that the construction "clutch at" meaning " to make an eager effort to seize" might have been a uniquely British sense of the word "clutch" in the 19th century, around the time that "catch at" was fading out of use apart from the uses in this expression.
OED defines this as sense 6 of clutch.
It is attested in 1834, 1860, and 1868, all in British publications. Apart from OED's attestations of the "clutch at" construction in British sources, I can't find much evidence pointing to a correlation for the phrase "clutch at" without the full expression, "clutch at straws."
Still, perhaps this sense of "clutch" was in fact often used in BrE, and took over for "catch" in England while "grasp" took its place in the U.S.