“I Can’t Get No Satisfaction”
In this catchy song, the Rolling Stones committed the “double negative” crime of combining can’t and no, which an editor would absolutely say no to, correcting it into “I can’t get any satisfaction.”
But Curzan defends the Rolling Stones, pointing out that double negatives have a long history in English. “I also find it hard to believe anyone is confused by this lyric. Is Mick Jagger satisfied? Clearly not! Do those negatives cancel each other out? No.”
Zanuttini also adds to the defense, explaining that there are plenty of other languages that combine two negatives. In Italian, you’d express “I haven’t seen anyone” by saying “Non ho visto nessuno,” which translates to “not have seen no one,” she says.
