Idioms: Jack The Renaissance Man?
| This entry is part of the Complaining in English series. You can find more vocabulary there. This entry is available as a Adobe Acrobat file for printing or use in a class.This entry is spoken, so that you can listen to it while you read. (MP3) |
|
 |
|
My grandfather was an amazing person. He could do just about anything. He was a skilled woodworker—that means, he could make things out of wood—and he could fix almost anything that broke in a house, from electrical wiring to plumbing. He made the dining room table in my parents’ house, and did a lot of the electrical wiring there, too! He was a real jack of all trades.
We say that a person who has a lot of different skills is a jack of all trades. A ‘trade’ is an older word for a job, normally a job you do with your hands. If you have many different jobs in the office—maybe your real job is to answer the phones, but you help your colleagues with their computers and are the person that they come to with questions—you can say you’re a jack of all trades. It just means you do a little bit of everything.
Sometimes, people will expand the phrase. Often you’ll hear “I’m a jack of all trades, but master of none.” A ‘master’ of a trade is someone who’s very good at it. In some trades, you have to pass a test to be considered a ‘master’ of your trade. When you say “I’m a jack of all trades, but master of none” you’re saying you can do a little bit of everything. . . but there’s nothing you’re very, very good at.
A related phrase is a renaissance man. A renaissance man is something of an academic—or artisic—jack of all trades. The ‘renaissance’ is the name for a period in history (Michaelangelo and Raphael are famous artists from the renaissance) and, during the renaissance, it was common for an artist to not only paint, but also to play a musical instrument and maybe write. It was normal to do a little bit of everything.
Today, when we say someone is a renaissance man—or woman—we’re saying that he has many different interests and talents. A person who studies history and music and art might be considered a renaissance man.
So, how is a renaissance man different from a jack of all trades? Both of them have a lot of different interests and abilities, but a jack of all trades focuses on ‘practical’ skills and a renaissance man focuses more on academic or artistic skills.
One day, I hope to be both a renaissance man and a jack of all trades. It’s important to me that I can fix small things that break in my apartment and do some basic mechanical work on my car. But, I’m also interested in. . . well, everything. Are you a jack of all trades? A renaissance man? Or a renaissance woman? What are the different skills you have?
