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a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word
a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down, but we will also tell you about its etymology, its characteristics and you will know how to say
a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down in singular and plural. Everything you need to know about the word
a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down you have here. The definition of the word
a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down will help you to be more precise and correct when speaking or writing your texts. Knowing the definition of
a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down, as well as those of other words, enriches your vocabulary and provides you with more and better linguistic resources.
English
Etymology
From the Sherman Brothers' 1964 song "A Spoonful of Sugar".
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /ə ˈspuːnfəl əv ˈʃʊɡə(ɹ) ˌhɛlps ðə ˈmɛdɪsɪn ɡoʊ ˌdaʊn/
Proverb
a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down
- An otherwise unpleasant situation can be pleasant when a pleasant aspect is deliberately introduced.
1999, Eli Yassif, The Hebrew Folktale: History, Genre, Meaning, Indiana University Press, →ISBN, page 372:One is known as the "sweetening parable," that is to say a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down. Thus, when the aim is to preach to the people, to guide them along the "bitter," arduous path of upholding burdensome precepts and prohibitions, a tale can lighten the load, make the "medicine" easier "to swallow."
2001, Maureen Reagan, First Father, First Daughter: A Memoir, Little, Brown, →ISBN, page 319:It put some fun into the tedious business of preparing for a presidential debate. A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down, right?
- 2004, John Hoover, How to Work for an Idiot: Survive & Thrive... Without Killing Your Boss, Career Press, →ISBN, page 11,
- If a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down, a barrel of laughs can wash down the big pills you might need to swallow.
Translations
An otherwise unpleasant situation can be pleasant.