A plaque remaining from the Big Apple Night Club at West 135th Street and Seventh Avenue in Harlem.

Above, a 1934 plaque from the Big Apple Night Club at West 135th Street and Seventh Avenue in Harlem. Discarded as trash in 2006. Now a Popeyes fast food restaurant on Google Maps.

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Entry from September 29, 2016
“Karma is a bitch”

“Karma is a bitch” probably relates to the sayings “life is a bitch” and “payback is a bitch.” The “karma” in the saying is a combination of “life” and “payback.”
 
“Karma’s a bitch, it really is” was cited in the Philadelphia (PA) Daily News on September 17, 1992. The saying became popular by the late 1990s.
 
   
17 September 1992, Philadelphia (PA) Daily News, “Sweet revenge: Annette DeBella tells of split with John” by Stu Bykofsky, pg. 39, col. 2:
“Karma’s a bitch, it really is,” said Annette, “and I truly believe in karma.”
     
OCLC WorldCat record
Karma’s a bitch : a novel
Author: J Gail
Publisher: Brookhaven, PA : Truth Hurts Publications, 2007, ©2006.
Edition/Format:   Print book : Fiction : English : 2nd edView all editions and formats
Database: WorldCat
Summary:
Tony Jackson things nothing of having other women in his girlfriend’s bed, robbing and stealing. When will Tony figure out that you can’t hold onto money when you get it the wrong way?
 
OCLC WorldCat record
Karma’s a bitch : a novel
Author: Shannon Esposito
Publisher: [Florida] : Misterio Press, [2011] ©2011
Series: A Pet psychic mystery, [1]
Edition/Format:   Print book : Fiction : English
 
Google Books
Karma’s a Bitch: The Sergio Pages Story
Nikki Sinclair
CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, Oct 21, 2011 - Fiction - 232 pages
 
OCLC WorldCat record
Karma is a Bitch
Author: Katrin Knecht
Publisher: Norderstedt Books on Demand 2014
Edition/Format:   Print book : German : 1. Aufl
 
Google Books
Karma Is a Bitch
Angela Hairston
Highland Park Publishing, Jun 7, 2015 - 200 pages
 
Stack Exchnge—English Language & Usage
Why is karma a bitch?
(...)
Charles Doyle, Wolfgang Mieder & Fred Shapiro, The [Yale] Dictionary of Modern Proverbs (2012) gives a first occurrence date for “Karma is a bitch” of 1995, suggesting that this saying is very young:
 
Karma is a bitch.
1995 Hollywood Reporter 7 Aug.: “Hello? Hello? HELLO? Nobody answers ... Did somebody say Tommy on line 2? Karma is a bitch” (ellipsis dots and capitalization as shown). ... Cf. “PAYBACK is a bitch” and “LIFE is a bitch.”

 
In the Dictionary of Modern Proverbs, “Payback is a bitch” has a first cited occurrence from 1970, and “Life is a bitch” has a first cited occurrence from 1940 (and subsequent variations “Life is a bitch and then you die” [1982] and “Life is a bitch and then you marry one” [1987]). It’s unclear whether “Payback is a bitch” is an outgrowth of “Life is a bitch,” but I think it’s likely, given the similarity in their focus on retribution, that “Karma is a bitch” is a mutation of “Payback is a bitch.”
 
answered Jul 25 ‘15 at 21:10
Sven Yargs
 
Google Books
Karma Is A Bitch: ( And So Am I )
Candace Mumford
A.N.C. Media Publishing, Apr 3, 2016 - Fiction - 20 pages

Posted by Barry Popik
New York CityWork/Businesses • Thursday, September 29, 2016 • Permalink


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