strange bedfellows

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English[edit]

Etymology[edit]

1610, from Shakespeare's The Tempest.[1]

Pronunciation[edit]

  • Audio (AU)(file)

Noun[edit]

strange bedfellows pl (normally plural, singular strange bedfellow)

  1. (idiomatic) An unusual combination or political alliance.
    • 1996, Tony Downey, Nigel Smith, Russia and the USSR, 1900-1995, Oxford University Press, USA, →ISBN, page 66:
      The USA and the USSR were strange bedfellows. They were united only in their opposition to Hitler and Fascism.
    • 2002, Teresa Brennan, Between Feminism and Psychoanalysis, Routledge, →ISBN:
      Lacan and feminism: strange bedfellows? There never was an alliance between the person Lacan and feminism.

Translations[edit]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^
    1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene ii], page 9:
    Alas, the storm is come again! My best way is to creep under his gaberdine; there is no other shelter hereabout: misery acquaints a man with strange bed-fellows.
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