sad sack

See also: sadsack

English

Alternative forms

• sadsack

Etymology

US 1920s. Popularized by Sad Sack, a cartoon character and eponymous comic strip published originally June 1942 in Yank, the Army Weekly, a US Army publication for soldiers, and later syndicated in the US 1940s and 1950s. Presumably from vulgar “sad sack of shit” as cartoonist Sgt. George Baker said he took it from a “longer phrase, of a derogatory nature”. The term originally referred to a well-meaning but inept soldier.

Pronunciation

• Audio (General Australian):

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Noun

sad sack (plural sad sacks) (chiefly US)

1. An incompetent or inept person.
   • 2007 June 3, Cara Buckley, William K. Rashbaum, “4 Men Accused of Plot to Blow Up Kennedy Airport Terminals and Fuel Lines”, in New York Times, retrieved 5 April 2015:

     One law enforcement official played down Mr. Defreitas’s ability to carry out an attack, calling him “a sad sack” and “not a Grade A terrorist.”

2. A perennial failure or victim of misfortune.

   Synonyms: defeatist, loser

   • 2010 July 26, Michiko Kakutani, “Love Found Amid Ruins of Empire”, in The New York Times‎^[1], →ISSN:

     “Super Sad” takes as its Romeo and Juliet, its Tristan and Iseult, a middle-aged sad sack named Lenny Abramov and a much younger beauty named Eunice Park.

   • 2013 April 27, “Movie capsules: Arthur Newman”, in Boston Globe, retrieved 5 April 2015:

     Weary of his drab life with its nowhere job, failed marriage, boring girlfriend, and estranged teenage son, a middle-aged sad sack fakes his death, changes his identity, and hits the road.

   • 2014 March 29, Zach Schonfeld, “Film Review: Jason Schwartzman Is Charmingly Inept in 7 Chinese Brothers”, in Newsweek, retrieved 5 April 2015:

     We meet him as he's on his way out, taking the news with equal parts tantrum and sad-sack acceptance.

   • 2024 May 20, Alissa Wilkinson, “What We Lose When ChatGPT Sounds Like Scarlett Johansson”, in The New York Times‎^[2], →ISSN:

     So Samantha, the A.I. assistant with whom the sad-sack divorcé Theodore Twombly (Joaquin Phoenix) fell in love in “Her,” felt like a futuristic revelation.

See also

• sack of shit, shitbag

Further reading

• “sad sack”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.