the.com/cliche
An idea so true it died from overuse, then got resurrected as filler.
means An overused phrase or idea that has lost its original force through endless repetition.
from Borrowed directly from French, where 'cliché' was printers' jargon for a stereotype block — a metal plate cast to print a common phrase or image over and over without resetting the type. The clicking sound the mold made when stamped was reportedly where the word came from (echoic of 'clicher,' to click). So a cliché was literally a pre-fabricated piece of text, mass-produced by machine — the metaphor of 'worn-out phrase' followed naturally from the printer's worn-out plate.
- origin
- French word for a printing stereotype plate
- irony
- calling something a cliche is itself a cliche
- paradox
- became famous by being too useful to retire
- writers rule
- avoid like the plague, say writers, cliche-free