Language: en
Meaning: Of aprojectile:missingthetarget.1920, Arthur M. Winfield [pseudonym;Edward Stratemeyer], “At Tony Duval’s Camp”, inThe Rover Boys on a Hunt: Or The Mysterious House in the Woods(The Second Rover Boys Series for Young Americans; 4), New York, N.Y.:Grosset & Dunlap Publishers,→OCLC,page228:Each had a gun, and the three had been shooting at a number of rabbits. Only Werner had been successful, the others shootingwide of the mark.1963, Ralph K. Andrist, “Frontier Hothead”, inAndrew Jackson: Soldier and Statesman(American Heritage Junior Library), New York, N.Y.:American Heritage Publishing Co.,→OCLC,page42, column 1:In most duels, both men usually felt that honor was satisfied even when their shots wentwide of the mark, and very often both duelists purposely shot into the air or the ground. But this time both men [Andrew JacksonandCharles Dickinson] meant to shoot to kill.; (idiomatic)(Very)inaccurate.Well, I suppose you could say the weatherman waswide of the markagain then!1726,John Stevens, “Pédro”, inA New Dictionary, Spanish and English, and English and Spanish, Much More Copious than Any Other hitherto Extant. Laying down the True Etymology of Words, with Their Various Significations; Terms of Arts and Sciences, Proper Names of Men and Women, Surnames of Families, Titles of Honour, the Geography of Spain and the West Indies, and Principal Plants Growing in those Parts. To which are Added, Vast Numbers of Proverbs, Phrases, and Difficult Expressions, All Literally Explained, with Their Equivalents.[And a parallel title in Spanish.], London: Printed forJ[ohn] Darby[et al.],→OCLC, column 1:Prov[erb].Acertadole ha Pédro a la cogujada, que el rabo lleva tuérto:Peterhas hit the lark, for her tail is awry. An expreſſion in deriſion, when a man iswide of the mark.1776February, “a Lady”, “A Sentimental Journey”, inThe Lady's Magazine; or Entertaining Companion for the Fair Sex, Appropriated Solely to their Use and Enjoyment, London: Printed for G. Robinson, No. 25,Paternoster-Row,→OCLC,page 62, column 2:[O]ur conjectures were like arrows ſhot in the dark—they werewide of the mark—till an old gentleman came into the room, who after affixing his ſpectacles on the ſuperior part of an aquiline noſe, told us—"he ſmelt a rat!"1966,Michael J[ohn] Arlen, “Living-room War”, inThe New Yorker; republished inLiving-room War(Television Series), Syracuse, N.Y.:Syracuse University Press,1997,→ISBN,pages7–8:I do know, though, that the cumulative effect of all these three- and five-minute film clips, with their almost unvarying implicit deference to the importance of purely military solutions (despite a few commentators' disclaimers to the contrary), and with their catering (in part unavoidably) to a popular democracy's insistent desire to view even as unbelievably complicated a war as this one in emotional terms (our guys against their guys), is surelywide of the mark, and is bound to provide these millions of people with an excessively simple, emotional and military-oriented view of what is, at best, a mighty unsimple situation.
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