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What does "lerve" mean?

English Language Learners Asked by DRF on November 17, 2021

I’ve been reading Busman’s Honeymoon again and came across the sentence:

I put it down first of all to the effect of gold lamé, but, on consideration, I think it was probably due to “lerve“.

Where a don of the female college Harriet Vane went to is talking about her “looking like she stepped out of a Renaissance portrait”. What does the word lerve mean here?

2 Answers

Lerve is a word used to describe a love about which the word "love" is not adequate. An overpowering and overwhelming sort of love such as one may experience with a true soul-mate

Answered by Susan Malkin on November 17, 2021

It's a slang form of 'love'. Sometimes also spelled 'lurve'. Usually spoken in a humorous parody of a romantic slurred voice. Today, I learned it was used as far back as 1936!

1936 Daily Mirror 1 Oct. 27/4 Which means..that (a) you're in Lurve, but (b) you're not sure he's in Lurve with you. 1937 D. L. Sayers Busman's Honeymoon Prothalamion 23, I put it down first of all to the effect of gold lamé, but, on consideration, I think it was probably due to ‘lerve’. - See more at: http://findwords.info/term/lurve#sthash.EhtfV5g5.dpuf

I thought it was interesting that your specific quote is in the Oxford English Dictionary as an example of another spelling of the slang 'lurve'. Source

Answered by hotshotjosh on November 17, 2021

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