Thus it seems more likely that the phrase is rack your brains instead of wrack. There is some disagreement, but more sources say it should be rack. However, rack your brains is correct and more common: That being said, there is some use of wrack your brains (blue line) as shown by this Google NGram. The Grammarist agrees it should be rack as well. If things are wrecked, they go to “wrack and ruin.” “Wrack” has to do with ruinous accidents, so if the stock market is wracked by rumors of imminent recession, it’s wrecked. You rack your brains when you stretch them vigorously to search out the truth like a torturer. ('Rack' is considered the more correct spelling, though 'wrack' has become acceptable through common usage. What does I wrack my brain expression mean Definitions by the largest Idiom Dictionary. If you are racked with pain or you feel nerve-racked, you are feeling as if you were being stretched on that Medieval instrument of torture, the rack. Definition of I wrack my brain in the Idioms Dictionary. Shakespeare was one of many authors who used this.įurther, this book on common English errors says it should be rack: It isn't surprising that 'rack' was adopted as a verb meaning to cause pain and anguish.
#Rack my brain wrack my brain drivers
Bob was wracking his brain, trying to think where he had seen the drivers before. (Rack is considered the more correct spelling, though wrack has become acceptable through common. Note: The old-fashioned spelling wrack is occasionally used instead of rack in this expression. To struggle very hard to recall or think of something. What does I rack my brain expression mean Definitions by the largest Idiom Dictionary. The crude but, one presumes, effective racks often tore the victim's limbs from their bodies. Definition of I rack my brain in the Idioms Dictionary. bane blain brain cain cane chain crane dane deign drain. The PhraseFinder agrees that the phrase is rack your brains, adding: Silo is based on the 2011 novel Wool by self-publishing star Hugh Howey. Example: I have been racking my brain all day. with rack (1) in the verb sense of "to torture on the rack " to wrack one's brains is thus erroneous. thinking about something vigorously thus stretching ones brains struggling hard trying to remember something. The verb meaning "to ruin or wreck" (originally of ships) is recorded from 1560s, from earlier intrans. This might sort of make sense in some figurative uses, but rack is the standard spelling where the phrase means to think very hard. To wrack one’s brain would be to wreck it.
But the variant wracking my brain has become so well established by now that only strict traditionalists consider it a mistake. Advertisement To rack one’s brain is to torture it or to stretch it by thinking very hard. The correct and original spelling is racking my brain. However, according to this entry for wrack in EtymOnline, the term should be rack: There’s one other common phrase that causes the same level of confusion: racking (one’s) brain. Figurative senses of the verb, deriving from the type of torture in which someone is stretched on a rack, can, however, be spelled either rack or wrack: thus racked with guilt or wracked with guilt rack your brains or wrack your brains. In the phrase rack something up the word is also always spelled rack. The most common noun sense of rack, ‘a framework for holding and storing things’, is always spelled rack, never wrack. The relationship between the forms rack and wrack is complicated. Says that the phrase could use either wrack or rack. "Lud had been going to wrack and ruin for centuries.The Oxford Dictionary Online (now Oxford Languages)."But having to be present for merchandise deliveries that Eunice ordered online or on the phone was nerve- racking." (Joseph Wambaugh, Hollywood Moon, 2009).The baby's cry is becoming nerve- wracking." (Paddy Chayefsky, The Goddess, 1958) "There is a half-filled baby bottle on the cupboard shelf.His face was strained." (Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings, The Yearling, 1938) Im wracking my brain How does the joker health bonus scale with Anarchist deck Brian Bakst on Twitter: I WebThis is the original take of the Ringo Starr. "Penny was wracked with sorrow for his friends."I have sometimes been wildly, despairingly, acutely miserable, racked with sorrow, but through it all, I still know quite certainly that just to be alive is a grand thing." (Agatha Christie, An Autobiography, 1977)."To delight in seeing men stabbed, poisoned, racked, or impaled is certainly the sign of a cruel temper." (Joseph Addison, The Spectator, April 20, 1711)."One bicycle, rusted as if it had been there for years, leaned in the rack, its fenders supporting crescents of white." (John Updike, "Flight." The Early Stories: 1953-1975.
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