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Words It, pron.

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From: The Independent - London
Date: 20000427
Author:CHRISTOPHER HAWTREE

It, pron.

YESTERDAY'S NEWSPAPER asserted that Nancy Mitford was "the socialite for whom the phrase `It Girl' was coined in the 1930s" rather than Clara Bow a decade earlier, in the 1927 movie, It, from Elinor Glyn's unreadable romantic novel.

While the copulatory sense is 17th century, this one of allure is - yes! - Kipling in 1904: "Tisn't beauty, so to speak, nor good talk necessarily. It's just It. Some women'll stay in a man's memory if they once walk down a street." Nancy Mitford's charm was her talk; Clara Bow ended up in an asylum.

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