This had me smirking because everyone knows that a matinée is an afternoon performance so a morning matinée is, like military intelligence, an oxymoron*. The funny thing is that matin being French for morning, the English usage of the word matinée is in itself a solecism, if you happen to be a Frenchman (perish the thought).
While I had my OED Concise to hand I looked up the word oxymoron to find it's derived from the Greek words oxy (sharp) and moros (dull) so the word oxymoron is itself an oxymoron, which will hardly be a coincidence.
From the numerous lists of oxymorons online I culled a few that, while not necessarily accurate, made me smile:
- accordion music
- active retirement
- airline food
- French resistance
- German humour
- American culture
- adult male (courtesy of Mrs Apus)
* Confession: With my brain softened from inactivity I couldn’t bring the word oxymoron to mind. Fortunately JD’s younger, more agile mind was only a phone call away.
