Salad days


"Salad days" is a Shakespearean idiomatic expression meaning a youthful time, accompanied by the inexperience, enthusiasm, idealism, innocence, or indiscretion that one associates with a young person. A more modern use, especially in the United States, refers to a heyday, a period when somebody was at the peak of their abilities—not necessarily in that person's youth. The quote "salad days" is from the Shakespearean play Antony and Cleopatra and is spoken in Act 1, Scene 5, by Cleopatra.

History

The phrase was coined in Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra in 1606. In the speech at the end of Act One in which Cleopatra is regretting her youthful dalliances with Julius Caesar she says:
...My salad days, / When I was green in judgment, cold in blood/To say as I said then!

The phrase became popular only from the middle of the 19th century, coming to mean “a period of youthful inexperience or indiscretion." The metaphor comes from Cleopatra's use of the word 'green' — presumably meaning someone youthful, inexperienced, or immature. Her references to "green" and "cold" both suggest qualities of salads.
Fowler's Dictionary of Modern English Usage summarizes several other possible meanings of the metaphor:
Whether the point is that youth, like salad, is raw, or that salad is highly flavoured and youth loves high flavours, or that innocent herbs are youth's food as milk is babes' and meat is men's, few of those who use the phrase could perhaps tell us; if so, it is fitter for parrots' than for human speech.

Usage

during her Silver Jubilee Royal Address, referring to her vow to God and her people when she made her 21st birthday broadcast: "Although that vow was made in my salad days, when I was green in judgment, I do not regret nor retract one word of it."
The phrase has been used as the title of several books, including the novels Salad Days by Francoise Sagan and by Charles Romalotti, the autobiography The Salad Days by Douglas Fairbanks Jr., and numerous cookbooks.
Paul Greenberg, "Tuna's End," New York Times Magazine article: "Aboard one Zodiac, Frank Hewetson, a 20-year Greenpeace veteran who in his salad days as a protester scaled the first BP deepwater oil rigs off Scotland, tried to direct his pilot toward the net so that he could throw a daisy chain of sandbags over its floating edge and allow the bluefin to escape."

In film, television, and modern theatre

Salad Days is a British musical with music by Julian Slade and lyrics by Dorothy Reynolds and Julian Slade. It premiered in the UK at the Theatre Royal, Bristol, in June 1954, and transferred to the Vaudeville Theatre in London on 5 August 1954. One of its songs, "The Time of My Life", includes the lyrics, We're young and we're green as the leaf on the tree / For these are our salad days.
The 1964 Andy Griffith Show Season 5 episode 19 Andy ask Barney how he can burn the candle at both ends. Barney responds, " well these are my salad days"
In the 1987 Joel and Ethan Coen film Raising Arizona, Nicolas Cage as H.I. “Hi” McDunnough uses the expression twice in the first few minutes of the film. Speaking as the background voiceover rather than as a character, he first says, “These were the happy days, the salad days as they say, and Ed felt that having a critter was the next logical step. It was all she thought about." A few moments later, again as the voiceover, he says, "Our love for each other was stronger than ever, but I preminisced no return of the salad days."
In a 1990 episode of the television series The Simpsons, Mr. Burns explains his reasons for not firing Homer after he was caught claiming hair restorer on the company health plan. "You may find this hard to believe, but in my salad days, my crowning glory was a bright shock of strawberry blonde curls." Mr. Burns goes on to say that he can empathise with Homer's experience with male pattern baldness.
In a season 3 episode of Red vs. Blue a zealot delivers a diatribe for his team's lost flag, claiming that the "days of salad and glory" are over.
The 1996 film Independence Day contains the line "Are the salad days over for President Whitmore?"
Episode 33 of the television series Monty Python's Flying Circus is called "Salad Days", and features a grotesque parody of Slade's musical as interpreted by Sam Peckinpah.
Salad Days is the name of a documentary film released in 2014 about the evolving punk and hardcore scene in Washington DC during the 1980s and 1990s. The choice of name hints at the 1985 Salad Days by the Washington DC band Minor Threat.
In the television series Frasier, season 10, episode 20, Frasier sarcastically tells the cafe owner, "Perhaps you two used to gig together in your salad days."
In the television series Californication, season 1, episode 2, Hank Moody refers to the period when he was writing the original film adaptation of his novel God Hates Us All as his "salad days." A subsequent reference is made in season 1, episode 10, by Hank's agent Charlie Runkle as the two commiserate while drinking.
Used in the 2010 Taiwanese drama Gloomy Salad Days.

In music

has a song on their eponymous debut album entitled "Salad Days ".
The phrase is used in the Spandau Ballet song "Gold": "These are my salad days, slowly being eaten away".
The idiom is used again in the opening line of the track "Lovers Who Uncover" by the Little Ones: "Where do all the lovers meet with one another, in an effort to uncover what has happened to their salad days?"
In 1985, Washington, D.C., hardcore punk band Minor Threat released the song "Salad Days", reflecting on days of spirited youth in contrast to a time of adult disillusionment.
The phrase is also used in the track "Spotlight " from Patrick Stump's Truant Wave EP: "Oh, nostalgia I don't need you anymore. 'Cause the salad days are over and the meat is at my door."
Frank Zappa's song "Electric Aunt Jemima" contains the phrase as well: "Holiday and salad days, and days of moldy mayonnaise".
Dave Carter and Tracy Grammer use the phrase in the song "Frank to Valentino," on the album When I Go.
Cursive uses the phrase on the last song of their 2006 release Happy Hollow.
Talib Kweli's song "Friends & Family" on his album Gutter Rainbows uses the phrase in reference to his early career: "Rhyming in Greenwich Village circa 1993. Yeah those were the salad days, my career's appetizer."
Talib Kweli's song "Ms. Hill" on his album Right About Now uses the phrase, saying, "We used to kick it in the salad days, but she look at me like she don't know me when she see me nowadays."
"Salad Days" is a song by the Cardiff post-punk band Young Marble Giants. The lyrics are "Think of salad days, they were folly and fun, they were good, they were young".
The phrase is also used in the chorus of the track "Vince The Loveable Stoner" from The Fratellis's Costello Music album: "And I haven't seen a pupil in his eyes for 16 days, the catholic girls love him in a hundred million different ways, and he's been up for days, in a thick malaise, he's only listened to the salad days."
Adrian Belew's 1999 album, Salad Days, consists of acoustic recordings of solo work as well as songs from his King Crimson era.
In Modest Mouse's song "Guilty Cocker Spaniels", Isaac Brock sings this: "Salad days add up to daily shit".
The song "What Would Jimi Do?", on bassist Tony Levin's album Resonator begins with the lyric "Lately, I've been thinking back, back into my salad days"
The pop-punk/emo band Misser has a song called "Goddamn, Salad Days" from their 2013 EP Distancing.
Canadian musician Mac DeMarco's third album, released in 2014, is titled Salad Days.
Geddy Lee refers to the phrase in Rush's 2010 documentary called Beyond the Lighted Stage.
Green Day's song "¡Viva la Gloria!" uses the phrase: "You made your bed in salad days amongst the ruins".
The Finn Brothers song "Edible Flowers" from 2004's Everyone Is Here album features the line "Taste the edible flowers scattered in the salad days".
Desaparecidos' song "City on the Hill" from their 2015 record Payola includes the lyric: "All the stolen melodies they played in the hit parade / all the borrowed spirituals they fade in the salad days."
Stone Temple Pilots' song "Trippin On A Hole " from their 1996 record Tiny Music... Songs from the Vatican Gift Shop includes the lyric: "so keep your bankroll lottery eat your salad day deathbed motorcade"
Brand New's song "Waste" from their 2017 record Science Fiction includes the lyric: "You and I were stuck in the waste / Talking about our salad days / What a damn lie"
The Manhattan Transfer uses the phrase in their song, "Zoo Blues" which is featured on their 1987 album Brasil.