Today's phrase is
"all the world and his aunt"
I found this gem in an English crime novel I'm currently reading and immediately put my bookmark on the page so that I would be able to find it again for Language Love.
What does it mean?
In the novel, it was used in the sense of "everyone" or "a whole lot of people". Furthermore, it seemed that this phrase included both important and not so important people. One source gives "a large group of people of various kinds" as explanation.
Where does it come from?
Unfortunately, I have not been able to pin this idiom down, neither in time, nor in place. However, I found that the original idiom seems to be "all the world and his wife", as opposed to using "aunt".
My two cents:
I have to admit that I like the version with "aunt" much better. When I read this idiom in my crime novel, it immediately made me smile, and I had the feeling I knew exactly what the person using it was feeling about the event in question (the one where all the world and his aunt would be present). Definitely a keeper!
Language ... the bridge of communication, the magic creator of worlds, the brush and paint of authors. Language is magic. It gives us power. It is something you just have to love.
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