pocket-book
(ˈpɒkɪtbʊk)
Also pocket book, pocketbook.
1. A small book, adapted to be conveniently carried in the pocket. In recent U.S. use, also a cheap edition, esp. paper-bound. Also attrib.
| 1617 Janua Ling. Advt., To render the volume as portable..and if not as a manuall or pocket-booke, yet a pectorall or bosome-booke, to be carried twixt ierkin and doublet. 1648 A. Rowley (title) The Scholler's Companion, or a Little Library, containing all the Interpretations of the Hebrew and Greek Bible,..brought into a Pocket Book. 1658 A. Fox tr. Würtz' Surg. ii. Introd. 45 A small Enchiridium and pocket book, easily to be carried about one. 1678 Aubrey in Ray's Corr. (1848) 129 A little pocket-book, which may be of use where the larger tables cannot be had. 1882 Saintsbury in Encycl. Brit. XIV. 318/2 La Rochefoucauld ranks among the scanty number of pocket-books to be read and re-read with ever new admiration, instruction, and delight. 1953 Amer. Scholar XXIII. 10 The Galaxy serial ‘Gravy Planet’ (recently republished in a pocket book as The Space Merchants). 1959 N. Mailer Advts. for Myself (1961) 280 Anyone looking for a fairly close portrait of that outfit is invited to read The Day the Century Ended—in pocket-book called Between Heaven and Hell. 1962 A. Buchwald How much is that in Dollars? 167 Always try to get a large advance on pocket-books. 1979 Maledicta III. 15, I was paid $50,000 by New American Library in 1968 for the U.S. pocketbook rights of my last novel, The Man Who Loved Women. |
2. A book for notes, memoranda, etc., intended to be carried in the pocket; a note-book. Also, a book-like case of leather or the like, having compartments for papers, bank-notes, bills, etc.; a woman's hand-bag or other container for bank-notes or coins. Also fig. Now chiefly U.S.
| 1685 Lond. Gaz. No. 2001/4 Lost.., a Pocket-Book, having an Old Almanack in it of the Date of the Year 80 or 81. 1722 De Foe Col. Jack (1840) 130 A merchant's pocket-book, or letter-case. 1797 Holcroft Stolberg's Trav. (ed. 2) II. lvii. 325 A lady..makes a memorandum..in her pocket-book. 1816 Niles' Reg. X. 216/1 Two methodist preachers were lately robbed of their pocket-books, containing very considerable sums in bank notes. 1862 O. L. Jackson in Colonel's Diary (1922) v. 67, I..thought it best to take my pocket-book out of my pocket and put it under my head. 1867 Trollope Chron. Barset I. i. 4 A cheque..said to have been stolen out of a pocket-book. 1897 Sears, Roebuck Catal. 223/1 At 50c. Our price poultice for tired..pocket books. 1907 St. Nicholas Sept. 1007/2 In her pretty pocket-book..she had found a crisp one-dollar bill. 1936 C. Sandburg People, Yes 111 So dumb he spent his last dollar buying a pocketbook to put it in. 1960 A. Sexton To Bedlam & Part Way Back 13 You guided past groups of robbers..clutching your pocketbook. 1976 National Observer (U.S.) 13 Mar. 18/4 Why should women whose pocketbooks are flatter have to jeopardize their lives..by patronizing sleazy, unqualified nonprofessionals. |
3. attrib. and Comb.
| 1819 P.O. Lond. Direct. 365 Wells, T., Pocket-book-maker. a 1860 Tricks & Traps N. York 24 (Bartlett), No man, boy, or greenhorn was ever yet victimized by the Pocket-book Droppers..who didn't have so strong a spice of the scamp in his own composition, as to think he was coming a sure and profitable swindle upon some one. Ibid., Pocket-book Dropping may almost be considered as one of the by-gones. 1894 H. H. Furness Address 4 Our ideal Provost must know the exact location in every rich man's body of the pocket-book nerve. |
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Sense 3 in Dict. becomes 4. Add: 3. The female pudenda. U.S. slang.
| 1942 Z. N. Hurston in Amer. Mercury July 92 ‘Trying to snatch my pocketbook, eh?’ she blazed. 1969 M. Angelou I know why Caged Bird Sings xi. 71 Momma had drilled into my head: ‘Keep your legs closed, and don't let nobody see your pocketbook.’ 1983 Maledicta 1982 VI. 124 Almost half the women..said they had no name for their genitals until the age of 15, and used many odd euphemisms (..pocketbook for vagina,..etc.). |