[Death by Mirrors]

Originally Posted by Lee

A Word By Any Other Name

1. What does the phrase 'get thee to a nunnery' imply?

Depends on who you ask. Nowadays I've heard people use it as a more sophisticated version of get the fuck off, but old Shakespeare would know it suggests a woman (Ophelia in his famous play Hamlet) should go join a convent instead of bringing children into this world. I probably don't have to tell how Shakespeare appreciated lewd humor - nunnery also used to be an euphemism for a brothel in Elizabethan times, which makes it a very deliberate double entendre.