undertoad

Meaning

Noun

• An underlying threat of disaster beneath the surface of everyday life.
• A mythical monster that lurks underwater to catch unwary swimmers; a personification of an undertow.

Origin

• From John Irving's 1978 novel The World According to Garp, in which the title character's son Walt mishears warnings about the undertow at the beach as warnings about an "under toad", causing the title character to subsequently use the phrase "under toad" to refer to the omnipresent threat of disaster that lies beneath the surface of everyday life.