[NEohioPAL]The story behind "Break a leg"?

[Douglas Anderson]

There are several theories about this phrase.

One is that it may derive (through Yiddish) from a German expression wishing luck, "Hals und Beinbruch" (which, as Sally in Cabaret says, "means neck and leg break.  It's supposed to stop it happening, though I doubt it does.")  This theory is the one favored by the Facts On File Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins (published by Facts On File in 1987) and by the Bloomsbury Dictionary of Phrase & Allusion (Bloomsbury, 1991):   http://listserv.dom.edu/cgi-bin/wa.exe?A2=ind0101&L=STUMPERS-L&P=R19410

However, according to the 16th edition of Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable (HarperResource, 1999):  "The expression is said to relate to the assassination of Abraham Lincoln in his private box at Ford's Theatre, Washington, D.C., on 14 April 1865.  The murderer, John Wilkes Booth, a Shakespearean actor of some repute, made good his escape after firing the shot by leaping down onto the stage, breaking his leg.  'Break a leg' subsequently arose as an example of black humour."

There's a school of thought that says it's merely a humorous extension of the meaning of "break" as in "Well, that was a lucky break."

I also remember seeing a convoluted explanation once (I forget where) deriving the use of the phrase from the 17th-century slang meaning of "to break a leg" as "to give birth to a bastard" -- but for the life of me, I can't see any path from one meaning to the other.

So take your pick!

-- Doug Anderson, Reference Librarian, amateur actor/director/playwright, and armchair philologist
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