Seven Castles

Deep Throat

                                      

September 28, 2006

 

The expression "Deep Throat" (spelled with capital D and T) refers to a secret informer, especially one who reveals detailed inside information about a scandal or the like to a journalist.

 

The pseudonym was given to a secret source that leaked information about the involvement of U.S. President Richard Nixon's administration in the Watergate first break-in and subsequent events that came to be known as the Watergate scandal. "Deep Throat" was an important source for Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, who together wrote a series of articles on the scandal that played a decisive role in exposing the misdeeds of the Nixon administration. The scandal would eventually lead to the resignation of President Nixon as well as prison terms for his top aides.

 

The nickname was suggested by Howard Simons, managing editor of the Washington Post, based on "Deep Throat", a very popular pornographic film from 1972, with reference to "deep background", meaning that the source would never be identified or even quoted. In the film, "deep throat" refers to the act of taking the penis deep into the mouth during fellatio; the phrase is still used in this sense and in the verb sense "to perform this act". "Deep Throat" came to public attention when Woodward and Bernstein wrote "All The President's Men" (1974), a book also made into an Academy Award-winning movie. In 2005 W. Mark Felt, a former Associate Director of the US Federal Bureau of Investigation confirmed that he was "Deep Throat".

 

Despite the pornographic origin of the phrase, and the still current use of the phrase in a sexual sense, it is not considered vulgar when used in the "secret informer" sense.

 

【作者: zhangliping】【访问统计:】【2006年09月28日 星期四 07:14】【 加入博采】【打印】