neither fish nor fowl—(also: neither fish nor flesh) neither one thing nor the other (said of smth. difficult to identify):
- He’s neither fish nor fowl right now … he is not a child, yet he is not a teenager.
Cf.: make fish of one and fowl of the other—treat people, organizations, etc. differently:
- Why make fish of one and fowl of the other? They were both McKayes now, in the sight of the law, and … they were full brothers!
neither man nor mouse—nobody; not a single creature:
- Does he expect to become a god in maintaining a principle that neither man nor mouse in all God’s creation opposes?
Note: Neither expression correlates in meaning with the phrase neither sugar nor salt—used by smb. not worried by wet weather or as a reproof to a person reluctant to go out into rain:
- I told her again to go on home, as it was raining. She said she was neither sugar nor salt.