FauxItAll Synonyms and a Meaningful Etymology
4th September 2010
Consider this FauxItAll synonym: Ultracrepidarian.
The fabulous English essayist, William Hazlitt, coined up Ultracrepidarian in an impassioned counterattack essay he wrote defending his honor against his tormentor, William Gifford. Gifford hated Hazlitt largely for political reasons which led Gifford to make nasty accusations that were both ignorant and stupid, but pleasing to Gifford’s philosophical allies. Hazlitt spotlighted Gifford’s foolishness in a long, detailed reply artfully compressed in one word: Ultracrepidarian.
According to the ever reliable Wikipedia, the derivation for Ultracrepidarian resides in the Ancient Roman writer, Pliny, who recounted a perfect and thus probably apocryphal tale about an even more Ancient Greek artist, Apelles, and his unnamed shoemaker over the quality of the artist’s work that terminates with the punch line: “Ne sutor ultra crepidam”
Unfortunately, I did not take Latin in high school and worse still, Google Translator does not offer Latin as one of its dozens of language options (how is this possible, Google?), thus, I must rely on the Wikipedia writer who asserts the English translation to our punch line as:
A shoemaker ought not to judge beyond his own soles.
Which is a delightful way of describing someone who says more than he knows.
P.S. If you’ve never read Hazlitt, give him a look. He’s as great a critic as Samuel Johnson and Hazlitt’s insights into Shakespeare are bright, unique, and thoughtful. Plus, Hazlitt helped invent the role of “public intellectual” with all its beauty and blemish. Check Hazlitt’s work at Gutenberg or the Internet Archive, particularly Table Talk and Round Table.
P.P.S. Hazlitt fought FauxItAlls his entire life – isn’t that the War for All Public Intellectuals – and also employed another FauxItAll synonym. How about this one: Sciolist? The Free Dictionary offers . . . ” A pretentious attitude of scholarship; superficial knowledgeability” as a definition.