Faire un tabac
Meaning: To be a huge success.
Language: French
Literally: To make a tobacco
Category: Daily Life
Origin: Attested from 1870, and there is no tobacco in it anywhere. The root is Occitan tabassa or tabasta — to strike hard, to hit, and also to make a racket — which is the same root behind tabasser, to beat someone up. The tabas it produced was crossed with its homophone tabac and never escaped. Once that is clear the sense falls out, and what it falls out of is noise: thunder rolls, and so does a room full of people applauding, applause being a long rapid series of blows delivered by hand. The theater backs it up. A claque was a body of claqueurs, people paid to applaud, and a clap is a slap; enthusiasts stamped as well, to raise the volume. Early 20th-century actors who went down well were said to avoir le gros tabac. There is also en faire tout un tabac, to make a great fuss about something, but that is another story.
More idioms — Daily Life
- Passer à tabac — To be given a severe beating, especially in police custody.
- Pédaler dans la semoule — To be confused and getting nowhere.
- Avoir d'autres chats à fouetter — To have more important things to do.
- Avoir le cul entre deux chaises — To be indecisive, caught between two options.
- Les carottes sont cuites — It's too late, nothing can be done.
- Ich verstehe nur Bahnhof — I don't understand anything at all.
More French idioms
- Un coup de tabac — A sudden violent squall at sea; by extension, a brutal turn of events.
- Ça ne casse pas trois pattes à un canard — It's nothing special or impressive.
- C'est comme pisser dans un violon — A completely pointless effort.
- Avoir le cafard — To feel depressed or down.
- Poser un lapin — To stand someone up on a date.
- Tomber dans les pommes — Suddenly losing consciousness — possibly derived from the older expression 'être dans les…
From our compliments & insults
- Espèce de patate — You dim bulb — a potato being the very picture of inert, unthinking stodginess.
- Quel râleur / quelle râleuse — You never stop moaning — everything is a complaint, nothing is ever good enough.
- Peau de vache — A mean, difficult, and unpleasant person — tough and unyielding like tanned hide.
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