Between rock and a hard place meaning

Greek origin Many cultures have their own version of this story. But one of the most famous is the Greek story of Scylla and Charybdis. They terrorized ships that tried to travel the Strait of Messina, a narrow waterway between Sicily and the Italian mainland. Scylla is the personification -- the human representation of a non-human thing -- of sharp rocks and other objects along the coast.

Scylla destroyed ships that came too close. Charybdis is the personification of a whirlpool, a dangerous water formation in seas and oceans. Charybdis also destroyed ships that came too close but in a very different way. But both could kill you! And they were located so close to each other that they gave sailors an almost impossible choice.

Avoiding Charybdis meant passing too close to Scylla and vice versa. You are in an impossibly difficult situation with no good choices. So really, you must choose between the lesser of two evils. A woman is planning a birthday party for her son. And a friend who offers to help finds himself in a dilemma, a real pickle — you know a difficult situation!

He has a hard decision to make. Can I help with the birthday party? Oh yes! Thank you so much! Of course! Well, I need to take my dog to the vet later today. But I also promised my son that I would take him and his friends out for ice cream after the party. So, can you either take the dog or the kids? Ah … how many kids? No wait. And they will probably all be ready for a nap.

That sounds terrible. Is she good in the car? She hates it! This phrase originated in the USA in the early part of the 20th century. It is the American manifestation of a phrase that exists in several forms in other cultures. The dilemma of being in a position where one is faced with two equally unwelcome options appears to lie deep in the human psyche.

Language always reflects people's preoccupations and there are several phrases that express this predicament. The first of these quite literally conveys the uncomfortable nature of the choice between two lemmas propositions , that is, 'on the horns of a dilemma'. Other phrases that compare two less than desirable alternatives are 'the lesser of two evils', ' between the devil and the deep blue sea ', 'between Scylla and Charybdis', ' an offer you can't refuse ' and ' Hobson's choice '.

The earliest known printed citation of 'between a rock and a hard place' is in the American Dialect Society's publication Dialect Notes V, "To be between a rock and a hard place, Common in Arizona in recent panics; sporadic in California. This financial crisis was especially damaging to the mining and railroad industries of the western states.

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