Jack Robinson

noun

before you could say Jack Robinson or before you can say Jack Robinson
extremely quickly or suddenly

Here am I, started two days after you, tripping up your heels in less time than it takes to say Jack Robinson!

He ran out the front door of the doll house, and over the piazza, and down the steps before you could say "Jack Robinson."

He and Bridget packed them off before they could say Jack Robinson.

Into the Mortons' gate he slipped, and before anyone could say "Jack Robinson" he had crept under the steps of the side entrance.

"Before you could say Jack Robinson" is a phrase, still current, derived from this highly droll song.

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

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