| 单词 | 正如 |
| 释义 | 〔fun〕The day may come when this usage is entirely unremarkable,just as the wordtalkative has lost all taint of its originally jocular formation from the attachment of a Latinate suffix to a native Anglo-Saxon root. At present, however, the attributive use offun may still raise eyebrows, and writers who want to stay on the safe side are advised to avoid it in contexts in which a light tone would not be appropriate.也许总有一天，这一用法会变得完全不引人注意了，正如单词talkative 在其拉丁语后缀与盎格鲁-撒克逊语词根组成词时该词有打趣的意味，但现在已失去其所具有的本义了。 然而，现在使用fun 做定语仍有可能导致误解， 而为保险起见的作家也都会避免在与轻松的语调显得不太协调的行文中使用该词〔twig〕"As Europe is now twigging, the best breeding ground for innovators who know how to do business is often big, competitive companies"(Economist)“正如欧洲现在明白的，培养懂得怎么做生意的革新者的最好土壤是竞争性的大公司”(经济学家)〔detective〕The first detective may have come into existence before the word itself.C. Auguste Dupin, Edgar Allan Poe's hero in "The Murders in the Rue Morgue,” which is considered the world's first real detective story,was introduced to the world in 1841.Nine years later we find the first recorded instance of the worddetective, although the phrases detective police and detective policeman, from which it was shortened, are recorded first in 1843. Hence, Dupin precedes all recorded instances ofdetective, just as he precedes all other detectives.第一个侦探在“侦探“这个词出现以前就出现了。C·奥古斯·杜平，埃德加·爱波·伦的小说《莫格街谋杀案》（这本书被认为是世界上第一本真正的侦探小说）中的主人公，在1841年被介绍给全世界。虽然词条detective police 和 detective policeman (detective就是这两者的缩写）首次被记载是在1843年，但九年后，我们才找到对 detective 这个词的第一次记载。 迄今为止，杜平最早记载detective ， 正如他就是最早的侦探一样〔decay〕wood that had rotted), but it often, likeputrefy, stresses a stage of deterioration marked by offensiveness to the sense of smell: 已经腐烂了的木头)， 但正如putrefy， 该词经常强调恶化的阶段，伴有显著的令人作呕的气味： 〔literally〕The practice does not stem from a change in the meaning ofliterally itself—if it did, the word would long since have come to mean "virtually" or "figuratively"—but from a natural tendency to use the word as a general intensive meaning "without exaggeration,”as inThey had literally no help from the government on the project, where no contrast with the figurative sense of the words is intended.This looser use of the wordliterally does not usually create problems, but it can lead to an inadvertently comic effect when the word is used together with an idiomatic expression that has its source in a frozen figure of speech,such as inI literally died laughing. 这一用法并不根源于literally 本身意义的演变——如果是这样的话， 这个词早就会有“几乎”或“比喻地”的意思——而是来源于把这个词用作一个一般的加强词表示“毫不夸张”这样一个自然趋势，正如在事实上他们没有获得政府对这一计划的帮助 中， 并没有与句子的喻意形成任何对比。literally 的这一不精确的用法通常并不会产生什么问题， 但当它与一个源于固定修饰的俗语连用时，会偶尔产生喜剧性效果，如我真的笑死了 〔appendicitis〕Even though the wordappendicitis was in use in 1885, the year in which theOxford English Dictionary published the section "Anta-Battening" that would have contained the word, the editor, James Murray, omitted this "crack-jaw medical and surgical word" on the advice of Oxford's Regius Professor of Medicine, Sir Henry Wentworth Acland.As K.M. Elisabeth Murray, the granddaughter and biographer of James Murray, points out,"The problem of what scientific words to include was a continuing one, and James Murray was always under pressure—from his advisers . . . who thought the emphasis should be on words from good literature and from those in the [Oxford University] Press who wanted to save cost and time—not to include scientific words of recent origin.”In 1902 no less a person than Edward VII had his appendix removed,and his coronation was postponed because of the operation.Appendicitis hence came into widespread use and has remained so, thereby pointing up the lexicographer's difficult task of selecting the new words that people will look for in their dictionaries.尽管appendicitis 这个词于1885年就已使用， 在这一年出版的牛津英语词典 的“安塔族-增长论”这一分册应包括有这个词， 但在牛津皇家医学院教授亨利·温特华斯·阿克兰的建议下，主编詹姆斯·莫雷删掉了这个“拗口的医学和外科用词”。正如詹姆斯·莫雷的孙女和传记作者K·M·伊莉莎白·莫雷指出的那样， “应包括什么科学用语是一个长期以来的问题，詹姆斯·莫雷经常遇到来自他的顾问的压力…他们认为重点应放到从好文学作品中收来的词汇上，还受到来自出版社的压力，他们为了节约成本和时间而不愿收录新近的科学词汇”。1902年恰恰正是爱德华七世割除了阑尾，他的加冕典礼也因为这次手术而延迟。Appendicitis 一词因此得到了普遍的使用并保持至今， 这也表明了词典编纂者在选择人们要查找的新单词时所面临的艰难任务〔fun〕The use offun as an attributive adjective, as ina fun time, a fun place, most likely originated in a playful reanalysis of the use of the word in sentencessuch asIt is fun to ski, wherefun behaves syntactically like an adjective such as amusing or swell. The usage became popular in the 1950's and 1960's, though there is some evidence to suggest that it has 19th-century antecedents.Certainly the sense of this word makes it particularly susceptible to jocular treatment.But as with other such reanalyses (for example, in the expressiona whole 'nother ), the usage appears to have persisted after the original flavor had been lost.Thus there is no intimation of humorous intent in a press release that announces: fun 作为定语形容词使用， 如一段愉快的时光，一个娱乐场所， 极有可能源于对此词在某些句中用法的玩笑性再分析，如滑雪真好玩 从句法功能来讲， fun 在这里的用法象 amusing 或 swell 之类的形容词。 尽管有证据表明19世纪就出现这种用法了，但开始变得流行却在19世纪50,60年代。当然，此词的这层含义尤令人怀疑对方是否在打趣。但正如其他这类再分析词（例如，在句子a whole 'nother 中一样）， 此用法在最初的含义都失去之后，还一直坚持使用下来。因此当报界发布以下消息时就从中找不出任何滑稽意味了： 〔even〕It was even as he said: the jewel was gone.正如他所说的，珠宝不翼而飞了〔shakedown〕In 1969 a majority of the members of theAmerican Heritage Dictionary Usage Panel felt that the noun shakedown in the sense "extortion" and the related phrasal verb shake down were acceptable in writing, though both are now labeledslang. It would seem that certain usages take a while to attain respectability because of the company they keep.Shake and the verb phrase shake out of already meant "to steal" in Middle English. This usage ofshake is still found in the 19th and 20th centuries. Bothshake and shake out of in the sense "to steal" are clearly related to shake down, which is first recorded in 1872, shake down being glossed "to extort money from individuals.” This is a slang usage,probably occurring, as had the verbshake, largely in contexts having to do with criminal or corrupt behavior. As our Panel realized,the verb and the later nounshakedown (first recorded in 1902 in the United States) have now moved from the lingo of criminals, loan sharks, and politicians into wider currency. 1969年，大多数美国经典辞书 用法研究小组的成员认为名词 shakedown （意为“敲诈”）及相关的短语动词 shake down 在写作中是可接受的， 虽然现在两者均被标以俚语。 与之有关的意义似乎有些用法需要一些时间来获得社会的承认。在中世纪英语中，Shake 和 shake out of 已经意味着“偷盗” 。 shake 的这种用法仍见于19世纪和20世纪。 Shake 及 shake out of （意为“偷盗”）明显与 shake down （首次记载于1872年）有所联系。 shake down 被解释为“从个人处敲诈金钱”。 这是俚语用法，很可能如动词shake 一样，大量用于与犯罪或腐败行为有关的语境中。 正如我们的用法研究小组所意识到的，该动词及后来的名词shakedown （在美国最早记载于1902年）已从罪犯、高利贷者及政客的语汇发展到更广泛的使用领域 〔bylaw〕A casual glance at the wordbylaw might make one think that the element by- means "secondary, subsidiary,” especially sincebylaw can mean "a secondary law.” It is possible thatby-, as in byway, has influencedbylaw in the sense "secondary law"; however,bylaw existed long before the sense in question. The word is first recorded in 1283 with the meaning "a body of customs or regulations, as of a village, manor, religious organization, or sect.”By- in this word comes from Old Norse, as may the wordbylaw, and is related to if not identical with the element -by in the names of many places, such as Whitby, where Scandinavians settled when they invaded England during the early Middle Ages.We get the sense of this-by if we compare the related word entered as bær, b÷r, bȳr, in the standard dictionary of Old Icelandic, meaning "a town or village" in Norway, Sweden, and Denmark and "a farm or landed estate" in Iceland. We thus see whybylaw would mean "a body of customs of a village or manor" and why we use the word to mean "a law or rule governing the internal affairs of an organization.”随意瞟一眼单词bylaw 可能会使人想起前缀 by- ，意为“第二位的，次要的”， 因为bylaw 意为“附属的法规”。 可能因为前缀by- 位于 byway 中， 它影响了bylaw “附属法规”这一意义； 然而bylaw 一词在上述意义产生之前早已存在。 该词最初是在1283年以“一种习俗或规章体系，如村庄、县邑、宗教组织或派系之中”这种含义记载的。前缀By- 来自古斯堪的纳维亚语中， 正如bylaw 一词在许多地名之中与后缀 -by 若不是完全一致，就是彼此相关， 如惠特比，这是斯堪的纳维亚人在中世纪早期侵入英格兰之后的定居地。如果我们将古冰岛标准字典中的相关词bær, b÷r, bȳr （在挪威、瑞典和丹麦这些国家中意为“城镇或村庄”而在冰岛意为“农场或庄园”）加以比较，就会得出后缀 -by 的含义。 我们因而可以明白为什么bylaw 一词意为“村庄或县邑的习俗体系” 以及我们为什么使用其“一种法规或规则，用于管理一个组织的内部事务”这一意义〔break〕 Break is the most general and like the other members of the setimplies either the sudden application of force or the build-up of internal stress: Break 最普通，正如这组动词中其它词一样，含有突然用力或内部压力的聚积的意思： 〔ax〕To understand the origin of the idiomax to grind, we need to know thatgrind means "to sharpen.” This phrase is said to have come from a story by the 19th-century journalist Charles Miner (alias Poor Robert) about a seemingly friendly manwho was able by flattery to persuade a young boy to turn a grindstone for him.The tale first appeared in the Luzerne, Pennsylvania,Federalist on September 7, 1810, under the title "Who'll Turn Grindstones?” and later in an 1815 book entitledEssays from the Desk of Poor Robert the Scribe. Because "Poor Robert" was confused with "Poor Richard,”the story has often been erroneously attributed to Benjamin Franklin.The idiom itself is an Americanism—a word or expression originating in the United States.It was at first restricted to political contexts,but quotations from James Joyce ("Skin-the-Goat . . . evidently with an axe to grind, was airing his grievances")and George Bernard Shaw ("distinguished statesmen of different nations . . . each with a national axe to grind") attest that the phrase has traveled abroad and,as we know only too well, is no longer found only in political contexts.为了理解成语ax to grind 的出处， 我们需要知道grind 意思是“磨尖”。 这个短语据说出自19世纪旅行家查尔斯·麦纳（别名穷罗伯特）所写的关于一个似乎很友善的人的故事，他能够奉承地劝说一名男孩为他翻过一块磨光石。这个传说第一次出现在1810年9月7日宾夕法尼亚州的卢泽恩，在1810年9月7日题为“谁将推翻磨石”的联邦制拥护者 中提到， 之后1815年又在名为作家穷·罗伯特文集 一书中提到。 因为"poor Robert和"poor Richard"易被弄混淆，这个故事经常被错误地认为是本杰明·弗兰克林创作的。这个成语本身是美国式的词或表达源于美国。一开始被限于在政治性言词的情况中使用，但是从以下的引文表明这个短语已广泛地传播，一个是引于詹姆斯·琼斯（“这个显然别有企图的披着人皮的狼，正在诉苦”），另一个引自乔治·萧伯纳（“辨认出不同国家的人…每个国家都有自己国家的打算”），正如我们所熟知的，它不会只在政治性言论的上下文间才可以找到的〔mix〕"He diffuses a tone and spirit of unity, that blends, and (as it were) fuses, each into each" (Samuel Taylor Coleridge).“他创造了一种团结的气氛和精神，他们相互合并交融（正如它原本应该的情况） （塞缪尔·泰勒·柯尔律治）〔same〕The expressionssame and the same are sometimes used in place of pronouns such as it or one, as inWhen you have filled out the form, please remit same to this office. As this example suggests, the usage is associated chiefly with commercial and legal language,and some critics have suggested that it should be reserved for such contexts.But though the usage often does sound stilted,it occurs with some frequency in informal writing, particularly in the phraselack of same, as inIt is a question of money, or lack of same. And blind conformity to the critical injunction would have deprived us of the famously laconic radio message sent by a U.S. Navy officer during World War II: Same 和 the same 这两个表达法有时用作代词以替代 it 或 one， 如句子When you have filled out the form，please remit same to the office（填完表格后请提交给办公室）。 正如这个例子所表示的，这种用法主要出现于商业和法律用语，有些评论家认为应当把这种用法限制于此。尽管这种用法常听起来不太自然，但它有时也会出现在非正式的书面语中，特别是在短语lack of the same 中， 如句子It's a question of money，or lack of same。 并且，如果盲目地遵从评论家的禁令，我们将不会听到二次世界大战期间以简洁著称的美国海军军官的无线电口令： 〔lonely〕Henry Bradley, one of the four editors of theOxford English Dictionary, said "It is a truth often overlooked, but not unimportant, that every addition to the resources of a language must in the first instance have been due to an act (though not necessarily to a voluntary or conscious act) of some one person.”In many casesthis one person may have been an author,since the first recorded instance of a word is often found in an author's work.Of course, as Bradley warns,this is the firstrecorded instance; it is possible that a given author picked up the word or sense somewhere elseor that these reside undiscovered in an earlier work.In any caseit might be a minor relief of our condition the next time we feel lonely to know that the first recorded instance of the wordlonely occurs in the works of Shakespeare. The passage appears inCoriolanus (1607-1608) in a speech by Coriolanus to his mother Volumnia:"My mother, you wot [know] well/My hazards still have been your solace, and/Believe't not lightly—though I go alone,/Like to alonely dragon, that his fen/Makes fear'd and talk'd of more than seen—your son/Will or exceed the common or be caught/With cautelous [crafty] baits and practice.” Lonely here, of course, has the sense "solitary.” The dragon does not feel dejected,or if he does,he does not seem to know how to reach out to others effectively.牛津英语词典 的四位编纂者之一亨利·布莱德雷说： “人们经常忽视这样一个现实，但它并非不重要，那就是对某种语言词汇的每一次添加都首先是由于某一个人的行为（尽管不一定是自愿的或有意识的行为）”。许多时候，这一个人可能是个作者，因为一个词有记载的首次使用往往出自一位作者的作品。当然，正如布莱德雷所提醒人们的，这是首次有记载的 的例子； 某个作者可能是从别处学到这个词或这个意思，或是这个词或意思在更早的作品中已经出现，只是未被人们发现。不管怎样，当我们知道lonely 这个词的有记载的首次使用出现在莎士比亚的作品中时，这些都不大能减轻我们的沮丧心情。 在卡里奥拉纳斯 （1607-1608年）中， 卡里奥拉纳斯对他母亲弗罗姆尼娅讲的一段话中有这样的文字：“我的母亲，你清楚地知道／我的冒险一直是你的安慰，而且／不要轻信——尽管我要只身前往，／就象去面对一条孤单的 龙，他的沼泽／令人谈而色变，尽管并未亲见——你的儿子／决意或是胜过凡人或是被狡猾的圈套和手段擒捉”。 Lonely 在这里的意思当然是“孤单的”。 龙不会感到沮丧，即便它感到沮丧，他也不太可能知道如何让别人体会到它的感情〔Hoosier〕As the fame of Indiana basketball grows ever greater,perhaps a larger number of people have become curious about the origins of the wordHoosier, the nickname for a native or resident of Indiana. As more than one of the curious has discovered,the origins are rather opaque.The most likely possibility is thatHoosier is an alteration of hoozer, an English dialect word recorded in Cumberland,a former county of northwest England, in the late 19th century and used to refer to anything unusually large.The transition betweenhoozer and Hoosier is not clear. The first recorded instance ofHoosier meaning "Indiana resident" is dated 1826; however, it seems possible that senses of the word recorded later in theDictionary of Americanisms, including "a big, burly, uncouth specimen or individual; a frontiersman, countryman, rustic,”reflect the kind of use this word had before it settled down in Indiana.随着印第安纳州篮球的名声越来越响，也许很多人对Hoosier， 印第安纳州人或定居者的别称这个词的来源感到好奇。 正如若干好奇者所发现的那样，其来源非常隐晦。最大的可能性是Hoosier 是 hoozer 的变体， 这是记录于坎伯兰的英格兰方言，19世纪后期英格兰西北部以前的一个郡，用来指特别巨大的东西。Hoozer 和 Hoosier 之间的过渡并不清楚。 意思是“印第安那州居住者”的Hoosier 的首次记载是在1826年； 但是可能该词的解释后来收录于美国俗语词典 中， 包括“一个庞大的、粗壮的、野蛮的种类或个体；拓荒者，乡巴佬，庄稼人，”可能反映了它在落户印第安那之前所有的用法〔nerd〕The wordnerd and a nerd, undefined but illustrated, first appeared in 1950 in Dr. Seuss'sIf I Ran the Zoo : "And then, just to show them,I'll sail to Ka-Troo And Bring Back an It-Kutch a Preep and a Proo a Nerkle a Nerd and a Seersucker, too!” (The nerd itself is a small humanoid creature looking comically angry,like a thin, cross Chester A. Arthur.)Nerd next appears, with a gloss, in the February 10, 1957, issue of the Glasgow, Scotland, Sunday Mail in a regular column entitled "ABC for SQUARES": "Nerd—a square, any explanation needed?”Many of the terms defined in this "ABC" are unmistakable Americanisms,such ashep, ick, and jazzy, as is the gloss "square,” the current meaning ofnerd. The third appearance ofnerd in print is back in the United States in 1970 in Current Slang : “Nurd [sic], someone with objectionable habits or traits. . . . An uninteresting person, a ‘dud.’” Authorities disagree on whether the two nerds—Dr. Seuss's small creature and the teenage slang term in theGlasgow Sunday Mail —are the same word. Some experts claim there is no semantic connectionand the identity of the words is fortuitous.Others maintain that Dr. Seuss is the true originator ofnerd and that the wordnerd ("comically unpleasant creature") was picked up by the five- and six-year-olds of 1950 and passed on to their older siblings, who by 1957, as teenagers,had restricted and specified the meaning to the most comically obnoxious creature of their own class,a "square.”单词nerd 和 a nerd，无定义但有说明， 第一次出现于1950年瑟斯博士写的要是我管动物园 中： “然后，仅仅是为了给他们看，我将航行到Ka-Troo，并带回It-Kutch a Preep和a Proo a Nerkle a Nerd ，还有一件印度泡泡纱！”（蠢货本身是一个具有人类特点的小动物，一副好笑发怒的样子，像瘦小很生气的切斯特·A阿瑟）。Nerd 接着在1957年2月10日苏格兰格拉斯哥人一期杂志上再次出现，还有一个解释。 星期日邮报 在一常设栏目中出了题为“古板之人ABC"的文章： "Nerd——古板之人，还需要任何解释吗?”许多在这个"ABC"中定义的术语是明显的美国特有词，如hep,ick 和 jazzy ， 正如nerd 的现行意思“古板之人”一样， nerd 第三次出现于印刷品中又回到了1970年美国的 最新俚语 中： “Nurd ［原文如此］带有令人不快的习惯或品质的人…一个没趣的人，一个‘饭桶。’” 权威们对这两个蠢货--瑟斯博士所指的小动物和格拉斯奇星期日邮报 上的青少年俚语是否是同一个词持不同意见。 有些专家宣称此处无语义联系，两个词的相似属偶然。其他人则坚持瑟斯博士是nerd 一词的始创者， 且nerd 一词（意为“令人不快的滑稽小动物”）让1950年时五、六岁的孩子们学会并传给了比他们大些的兄姐。 到1957年，作为青少年，他们把意思限定和专指他们当中最滑稽讨厌的家伙，即“古板守旧”的人〔neither〕Just as you would not, so neither would they.正如你们不愿意一样，他们也不会答应的〔medium〕The etymologically plural formmedia is often used as a singular to refer to a particular means of communication,as inThis is the most exciting new media since television. This usage is widely regarded as incorrect;medium is preferred. A stronger case can be made in defense of the use ofmedia as a collective term, as inThe media has not shown much interest in covering the issue. As with the analogous wordsdata and agenda, the originally plural form has begun to acquire a sense that departs from that of the singular: used as a collective term,media denotes an industry or community. Thus the example sentence given here would not be appropriately paraphrased asNo medium has shown much interest in covering the issue, which suggests that the disinclination abides in the means of communication itselfrather than in its practitioners.Ifmedia follows the pattern of data and agenda, this singular use may become entirely acceptable someday.But despite its utility,many people still regard it as a grammatical error.语源复数形式media 常用作单数， 用来指传播手段中的某一种，例如在下面这是自电视出现以来最激动人心的新式传媒 的句子中。 许多人都认为这一用法是不正确的；他们还是喜欢用medium 这一单数形式。 我们能提出更为有力的例子来为media 作为集合名词的用法进行辩护， 如下面的句子：大众传媒对于报道这一事件没有表现出多大兴趣 。 正如类似于原为复数形式的其他两个词data 和 agenda 已经开始具有其单数形式的含义： 用作集合名词的media 现在则可以指传播工业或共同体。 这样的话，我们刚才给出的例句就不能改成如下形式：没有传媒对报道这一事件表现出很大兴趣 ， 因为这样改动后，这句话所表示的是传播工具本身的不愿意，而不是业者的不愿意。如果media 也象 data 和 agenda 那样， 那么它作为单数形式的用法总有一天会被完全接受的。但是不管它的实用性大小，许多人仍将其视为一个语法错误〔equivalent〕"Prejudicing vital foreign policy considerations in order to rescue individuals finds its domestic equivalent in the inflated awards paid to . . . accident and malpractice victims"(Moorhead Kennedy)“为了挽救个人而对重要外交政策的考虑产生偏见，正如国内相应的对于事故和医疗误诊的受害者加以巨额补偿一样”(穆尔黑德·肯尼迪)〔now〕In these circumstances; as things are:在这些情况中；正如事情是：〔blond〕It is usual in English to treatblond as if it required gender marking, as in French, spelling itblonde when referring to women and blond elsewhere. But this practice is in fact a relatively recent innovation,and some have suggested that it has sexist implicationsand that the formblond should be used for both sexes. There is certainly a measure of justice to the claim that the two forms are not used symmetrically.Since English does not normally mark adjectives according to the gender of the nouns they modify,it is natural to interpret the final-e as expressing some additional meaning, perhaps because it implies that hair color provides a primary category of classification for women but not men.This association of hair color and a particular perception of feminine identity is suggested in phrasessuch asdumb blonde and Is it true blondes have more fun? or in Susan Brownmiller's depiction of Hollywood's "pantheon of celebrated blondes who have fed the fantasies of men and fueled the aspirations of women.” The corresponding masculine formblond, by contrast, is not ordinarily used to refer to men in contexts in which hair color is not specifically at issue; there is something arch in a reference toLeslie Howard, Robert Redford, and other celebrated blonds. See Usage Note at brunette 在英语中，通常在使用blond 时似乎认为这个词需要性别标志。 正如在法语中，指女性时拼作blonde ，指其他时拼作 blond 。 但这实际上是较新的一种用法，一些人就曾认为这个词本身就带有性别的含义，而且blond 可同时用于两种性别。 两种形式并没有相应地使用的说法是有几分道理。因为英语中通常并不根据形容词修饰的名词的性而加以标明，很自然地就词尾的-e 看作附加的意思的表示， 这也许是由于它暗示头发的颜色是女性而不是男性提供了一个鉴别的首要类型。这种把头发颜色和女性鉴别的特殊方法联系在一起的作法，在如下的一些句子中有所体现，dump blonde（愚蠢的女人） 和 Is it true blondes have more fun?（金发女人真的更有情趣吗?） 或苏珊·布朗米勒的《好莱坞》中的描写的 "pantheon of celebrated blondes who have fed the fantasies of men and fueled the aspirations of women"（一些曾满足男人的幻想和勾起女人的野心的显赫女明星）。 不同的是相对应的男性的强调形式blond, 在行文中没有特别头发颜色的情况下通常并不专指男性； 如这句说法有调侃的意味的例句Leslie Howard, Robert Redford, and other celebrated blonds（莱斯利·霍华德，罗伯特·莱德佛拉和其他著名的金发明星中） 参见 brunette〔parallel〕In its mathematical usageparallel is an absolute term— two lines either do or do not intersect—and as such does not admit of qualification as to degree.Some grammarians have arguedthat this restriction should apply as well to nontechnical uses of the word.According to this logic,one may not sayThe two roads have been made more parallel, except perhaps as a loose way of saying what is rendered more precisely by expressions such asmore nearly parallel. Like the analogous objection that has been made to the comparison ofequal, the point betrays a misconception about the relation between mathematical concepts and their ordinary-language equivalents.Applied to objects in the world,parallel can only denote a rough approximation to a geometric ideal. A pair of rails or parked cars cannot be truly parallel in the mathematician's sense of the termbut only more or less so,just as a road or shelf cannot be truly straight in the geometric sensebut nonetheless may be described as very straight or relatively straight.The grammarians' compunctions make even less sense when applied to metaphorical uses ofparallel, as inThe difficulties faced by the Republicans are quite parallel to those that confronted the Democrats four years ago, in which the intended meaning has nothing to do with the possibility of intersectionbut instead suggests the structural correspondence of two distinct situations.In this sense, parallelism is clearly a matter of degreeand the wordparallel can be modified accordingly. See Usage Note at equal ,perfect ,unique 在数学用法中，parallel 是一个绝对的表达法—— 两条线要么相交，要么就不相交——它既没有限定性也没有程度差别。一些语法学家曾提出，这种限制也应该适用于该词在非科技方面的用法，按照这种逻辑，人们不能说这两条路已被修得更加平行了， 除非作为用例如更接近于平行 这样的表达方法更精确地表示的东西的不够精确的说出方法。 象对equal 的比较所做的类似反对一样， 这个观点使数学概念与普通用语中等价词之间的关系引起误解。当运用到世间的实物时，parellel 仅能指与几何理想状态大致接近的状况。 一对铁轨或停放的车辆不可能按数学家对于这个术语的理解来真正地相互并行，而不过是大致平行而已，正如公路和架子不可能是真正几何意义上的笔直，但仍可被描绘成很直的或相对而言的笔直。在用到parallel 的比喻用法时，语法学家的不安就更显得意义不大了， 例如：共和党人所面临的重重困难与四年前民主党人遇到的困难十分相似， 在这句话中，该词的引申意义与相交的可能性毫无关系，然而它暗指了两种不同情况结构上的一致。在此意义上，相似性明显是程度的问题，相应地，parallel 一词也能被其它词限定修饰了。 参见 equal,perfect,unique〔exactly〕As you say. Used to indicate agreement.正，恰恰：正如你所言。用来表示赞同〔allude〕Allude and allusion are often used where the more general terms refer and reference would be preferable. Allude and allusion apply to indirect references in which the source is not specifically identified: "Well, we'll always have Paris,” he told the travel agent, in an allusion to Casablanca. Refer and reference, unless qualified, usually imply specific mention of a source: I will refer to Hamlet for my conclusion: As Polonius says, "Though this be madness, yet there is method in't.” See Usage Note at refer Allude 和 allusion 在使用时经常可以被更普遍的词 refer 和 reference 所代替。 Allude 和 allusion 用在来源没有特别指明的间接引用语中： “对，我们将永远拥有巴黎，”他对旅行社服务员说。这句话引自卡萨布兰卡。 Refer 和 reference 通常指明确提到出处，除非有所限制： 我将引用 哈姆雷特 里的话作为我的结论： 正如波洛涅斯所说，“尽管这是发疯，但其中颇有理性。” 参见 refer〔helicopter〕The origin of the wordhelicopter is apparent only upon due recognition of its Greek ancestors. Helicopter was borrowed from the French word hélicoptère, a word constructed from Greekheliko- and pteron, "wing.” Heliko- is a form of helix, "spiral,” that combines with other words and word forms to create new words.The consonant clusterpt in pteron begins many Greek words but relatively few English words,so English speakers who are unfamiliar with Greek do not think of the word's elements ashelico-pter. At least some English speakers have analyzed the word into the elementsheli-copter, as is shown by the clipped formcopter. Helicopter 一词的来源正好可以明显地在希腊语的古代词汇中找到相对应的词。 Helicopter 一词是从法语中的 helicoptere 借用过来的， 这个词义是由希腊词heliko 和 pteron （翅膀之意）组成的， 而Heliko 正好是 helix （螺旋）的另一种形式， 用于与其它单词相拼合而产生新的词汇。Pteron 中的辅音群 pt 作为字首在希腊语中是很多的， 但在英语词汇中就相对少得多，所以，那些不熟悉希腊语的英语使用者就不会把该词的成分看作是helico-pter 。 至少有的英语使用者已经把该词分析成了heli-copter ， 正如缩写形式copter 所示那样 〔circumstance〕Use of the idiomunder the circumstances is justified by both logic and reputable precedent,and objections to it must be accounted at best overfussy if not also,as H.W. Fowler put it, "puerile.”习语under the circumstances 的使用， 由逻辑和规范的先例两者来证明为正确，否则对于此点的反对至少会被看作过于咬文嚼字，正如福勒所评价的“幼稚”〔trashed〕Expressions for intoxication are among those that best showcase the creativity of slang. The boundless inventiveness in expressing the ordinary in not-so-ordinary ways led Walt Whitman to describe slang as"an attempt of common humanity to escape from bald literalism, and express itself illimitably.” Colloquial and slang expressions meaning "intoxicated" can fill several pages in slang thesauruses. Most fall into a few general groups. Common are expressions that originally meant "damaged, badly affected by something,” such as trashed, smashed, crocked, blitzed, hammered, wasted, messed up, and blasted. Cooking terms are also common, such as baked, fried, and boiled (said to have been coined at Princeton University in the 1920s). Terms relating to liquids or being filled are a natural source of metaphors for filling oneself up with drink or drugs: sloshed, oiled, tanked, and loaded are but a few. Some terms are not easily classified or have origins that are not fully clear, such as tight (first appearing in the 1830s), plastered (first appearing around 1912), blotto (perhaps from blot, first appearing in 1917), and stoned (apparently taken from such expressions as stone-drunk, stone-cold, and first appearing as stone in 1945). Most current terms for "intoxicated" are not very old, as one expects of slang terms generally; of those in the lists above, blotto, crocked, fried, loaded, plastered, tanked, tight, and oiled are recorded in the first half of the 20th century, and of these only tight and oiled are known to have existed before then. 表示喝醉的词语充分体现了俚语的创造性。用非同寻常的方式创造极为寻常的俚语，其间蕴藏了无限创造空间，华尔特·惠特曼将俚语描述为“让平常心从文字束缚中逃离，并随性表达出来” 。表示“喝醉的，酒醉的”的口语以及俚语的表达方式，可以填满俚语同义词的数页空间。大多数俚语可归入几个分类。许多常见俚语的原意为“被破坏的，受某物负面影响”，如 trashed、smashed、crocked、blitzed、hammered、wasted、messed up 以及 blasted 。烹饪词汇也很普遍，如 baked、fried 和 boiled （据说由普林斯顿大学于20世纪20年代创造）。与液体或注入有关的词语是隐喻表示过多饮酒或吸毒而形成的自然来源： sloshed、oiled、tanked 和 loaded 只是其中少数例子。有些词语不易界定其类别或其原意较不清楚，如 tight （首次出现于19世纪30年代）、 plastered （首次出现于1912年）、 blotto （可能源自 blot ，首次出现于1917年）以及 stoned （显然来自词语 stone-drunk和stone-cold ，并于1945年首次以 stone 的形式出现）。正如大家对俚语的普遍看法，大多数表示“喝醉的，酒醉的”的现行词语都较新；在如上所列词汇中， blotto、crocked、fried、loaded、plastered、tanked、tight 和 oiled 首次见载于19世纪中叶，只有 tight 和 oiled 是所知早于那个时期 〔doubtless〕as you doubtless already know.正如你很可能早已知道的那样〔close〕Strictly speaking,the phraseclose proximity says nothing that is not said by proximity itself. Like other common redundancies, however (old adage, mental telepathy ), this usage is too widespread and too innocuous to be worth objecting to.See Usage Note at redundancy 严格地说，close proximity 短语一点不表示 proximity 本身的意思。 但正如其它的冗长词，（old adage, mental telepathy ）， 这种用法极为普遍且无关痛痒，不值得提出反对 参见 redundancy〔damned〕There are many regional variants, mostly euphemisms, fordamned, both as an oath and as a mild intensive. Southern exclamations and intensives tend to begin withdad-, a euphemism for "god"—hencedadblamed, dadblasted, dadburn, and dadgum. Dadgum can be combined withit in the interjection dadgummit. Another such euphemism is the better knowndoggone, probably originally Southern but now widespread.Likedadgum, doggone is used as a mild intensive: "The best doggone deals in Alabama" (billboard in Montgomery). Doggone likewise appears in phrasal interjections: Doggonit, I dropped my hammer. A common regional variant ofdamned is durn, also euphemistic and relatively mild,as in this snatch of Baltimore dialogue: "If that's not just the weirdest durn thing I ever laid eyes on" (Anne Tyler).作为诅咒和轻度的加强语气词，damned 有许多宗教上的替换形式，其中大多为委婉语。 南方人的感叹词和加强语气词倾向于以dad- 作为开始， “上帝”的一种委婉说法——因而出现dadblamed，dadblasted，dadburn 和 dadgum。 Dadgum 在感叹词dadgummit 中，可与 it 结合在一起。 另一个这样的委婉词比doggone 知道的人更多， 可能最初为南方人使用而现在已普遍应用了。象dadgum，daggone 被用作轻度的加强语气词： “亚拉巴马最好的交易” （蒙哥马利的大型广告牌）。 Daggone 同样也出现在短语感叹词： 他妈的，我弄掉了锤子。 dammed 是 durn 的一个常见局部性的变体， 它也是一个委婉语且相对较轻，正如巴尔的摩的几句对话中出现的： 如果那不是最奇特的东西，我绝不会看一眼的 （安妮·泰勒）〔aggravate〕It is sometimes claimed thataggravate should be used only to mean "to make worse" and not "to irritate.” Based on this view it would be appropriate to sayThe endless wait for luggage aggravates the misery of modern air travel, but not It's the endless wait for luggage that aggravates me the most. But the latter use dates back as far as the 17th century and is accepted by 68 percent of the Usage Panel. As H.W. Fowler wrote, "the extension from aggravating a person's temper to aggravating the person himself is slight and natural,and when we are told that Wackford Squeers [in Dickens'sNicholas Nickleby ] pinched the boys in aggravating places we may reasonably infer that his choice of places aggravated both the pinches and the boys.”有时认为aggravate 应当只被用来表示“加重；使恶化”的意思而不表示“使恼火；激怒”。 根据这种观点，The endless wait for luggage aggravates the misery of modern air travel（无休止地等待行李加重了现代飞机旅行的困难） 这个句子是正确的，而 It's the endless wait for luggage that aggravates me the most（无休止地等待行李最为令我恼火） 这一句则不正确。 但是后一种用法可以追溯到17世纪，并且被百分之六十八的用法使用小组成员所接受。正如H·W·福勒写道，“从使一个人的脾气变得更坏到使一个人恼火的延伸是微小和自然的，当我们看到威克福特·斯贵尔斯［出自狄更斯的小说尼古拉斯·尼克尔贝 ］往令人恼火的地方拧孩子们时， 我们可以合理地推断出他所选择的地方既加剧了拧的疼痛又令孩子们大为恼火。”〔sanguine〕Perhaps one has wondered what the connection betweensanguinary, "bloodthirsty,” and sanguine, "cheerfully optimistic,” could be. The connection can be found in medieval physiology with its notion of the four humors (blood, bile, phlegm, and black bile).These four body fluids were thought to determine a person's temperament,or distinguishing mental and physical characteristics.Thus, if blood was the predominant humor, one had a ruddy face and a disposition marked by courage, hope, and a readiness to fall in love.Such a temperament was calledsanguine, the Middle English ancestor of our wordsanguine. The sources of the Middle English word were Old Frenchsanguin and Latin sanguineus, the source of the French word. Both the Old French and Latin words meant "bloody,” "blood-colored,”Old Frenchsanguin having the sense "sanguine in temperament" as well. Latinsanguineus in turn was derived from sanguīs, "blood,” just as English sanguinary is. The English adjectivesanguine, first recorded in Middle English before 1350, went on to refer simply to the cheerfulness and optimism that accompanied a sanguine temperament,no longer having any direct reference to medieval physiology.也许有人对sanguinary （“嗜血的”）和 sanguine （“愉快乐观的”）两词之间的联系感到不解。 这种联系可以追溯到中世纪生理学中四种体液的概念（多血质型、胆汁型、黏液型和抑郁型）。这四种体液被认为可决定人的性格，或者能区分出精神和肉体上的特征。因此，如果血液是最主要的体液，一个人就应有红润的脸庞和以勇敢、充满希望、易于陷入情网为特征的性情。这种性情被称为sanguine ， 也就是我们sanguine 一词的中世纪英语的原形。 中世纪英语中该词源于古法语sanguin 一词和拉丁文 sanguineus （法语词的来源）。 在古法语和拉丁文中，该词意思都是“流血的”、“血色的”，古法语sanguin 还含有“生性乐天派的”之意。 拉丁文的sanguineus 也是由 sanguis （“血的”）而来，正如英语中的 sanguinary 一词。 英语形容词sanguine 最初记载于1350年以前的中古英语中， 演化为仅指伴随乐天派性情而具有的愉快和乐观之义，与中世纪生理学没有直接联系〔break〕Shiver is a term rarely encountered outside literary contexts;likeshatter, it indicates sudden force that causes fragmentation: Shiver 很少用于文学作品之外；正如shatter, 表示使成为碎片的突发力量： 〔telephone〕When one telephones someone else,one never gives a second thought to the linguistic and etymological processes illustrated by the wordtelephone. To begin with,the nountelephone is one of a class of technological and scientific words that are made up of combining forms, in this casetele- and -phone. These forms are derived from classical languages:tele- is from the Greek combining form tēle- or tēl-, a form of tēle, meaning "afar, far off,” while-phone is from Greek phōnē, "sound, voice.” Such words derived from classical languages can be put together in French or German,for example, as well as in English.Which language actually gave birth to them cannot always be determined.In this case Frenchtelephone (about 1830) seems to have priority. The word was used for an acoustic apparatus, as it originally was in English (1844).Alexander Graham Bell appropriated the word for his invention in 1876,and in 1877 we have the first instance of the verbtelephone meaning "to speak to by telephone.” The verb is an example of a linguistic process called functional shift.This occurs when we use a noun as a verb,an adjective as a noun, or a noun as an adjective.Thus, we are changing the syntactic function of the word,just as we do when wetelephone a friend. 当某人打电话给别人时，他决不会再想一想单词Telephone 所说明的语言学的和词源学的发展历程。 开始时，名词telephone 是由复合形式构成的一类技术和科学术语中的一个， 在这个例子中是tele- 和 -phone 。 这些形式来自于古典语言：tele- 来自于希腊语的复合形式 tele- 或 tel- （ tele 的形式，意为“在远处，遥远地”）， 而-phone 则来自希腊语 phone （“声音，嗓音”）。 这些来自古典语言的词可以在法语或德语中放在一起，例如，同英语一样。这些词到底诞生于哪一种语言通常无法确认。在这个例子中，法语telephone （大约于1830年）看起来出现较早。 这个单词正如它最初出现在英语中(1844年）的意思一样，在法语中它用于指声音设备。亚历山大·格雷厄姆·贝尔在1876年用这个词指代他的发明物，1877年我们有了第一个意为“用电话与…交谈”的动词telephone 的实例。 这个动词是称为功能转移的语言学进程的一个例子。这种情况在我们将名词作为动词，将形容词作为名词或将名词作为形容词使用时就发生。这样，我们正在改变单词的句法功能，正如在我们打电话给 一位朋友时所做的一样 〔antiquated〕"The antiquated Earth, as one might say,/Beat like the heart of Man"(William Wordsworth)“正如有人说的那样，古老的地球，象人类的心脏在跳动”(威廉·华兹华斯)〔mill〕Industrial mill towns are a far cry from the small water mill grinding grain near an Anglo-Saxon settlement,but the same wordmill is used in both contexts, showing how the meaning of a word can be generalized.The Old English wordmylen, "water mill for grinding grain,” is itself adopted from Late Latinmolīna or molīnum, "mill,” just as the Germanic peoples, such as the Anglo-Saxons, adopted the water mill from the Romans.In Middle Englishmilne, the descendant of the Old English word, was generalized to refer to a windmill, any power-driven mill for grinding grain, and a fulling mill.But it was left for the postmedieval,increasingly industrialized world really to generalize the meaning ofmill, applying it to machines such as pepper mills and cider millsand buildings such as textile mills and steel mills.Mill town is first recorded in 1847. 工业化的制造区与原来盎格鲁-撒克逊人居住地附近那种靠水力推动来磨谷物的小型磨臼大不相同，但mill 这个词对这两种情况都适用， 这可以体现出某一词汇的意思是可以有概括性的。古英语中mylen 一词有“磨谷物的水磨”的意思， 这个词由后期拉丁语中的molina 或 molinum 而来，意为“磨臼”， 正如日尔曼民族中的盎格鲁-撒克逊人从罗马人那里引进了水磨。中古英语中milne 一词由古英语词而来， 它的词义已扩大，可指风车、任何靠动力驱动来磨谷物的磨以及缩洗机。不过在中世纪晚期，不断发展的工业化世界真正使mill 这个词在意义上有所扩大， 它可以指胡椒研磨机或苹果榨汁机等机器，也可以指纺织厂或钢铁厂等工厂。Mill town 这个词最早见载于1847年 〔brunette〕Brunette was for a long time used to denote a woman having a dark complexion; now it is used chiefly in reference to hair color.The general practice is to use the formbrunette to refer only to women, withbrunet as a less frequently used variant that can be applied as well to men and mixed groups. The distinction, like the one betweenblonde and blond, has been regarded as carrying sexist implications.In this case, however, it is difficult to see how the problem can be easily resolved.It is unlikely thatbrunette could be pressed into service as a neutral term, since the suffix-ette is too closely associated with marked feminine gender. Brunet is theoretically available for both sexes but is rarely applied to men, whose corresponding coloration is typically described simply as "brown.”It would, of course, be possible to usebrown for the hair color of both sexes, if only that word could be redeemed from the associations of drabnessthat led to the adoption of the substitutebrunette in the first place. See Usage Note at blond ,-ette Brunette 过去很长一段时间用来指肤色黝黑的女人； 现今多用于指头发的颜色。通常brunette 只指女人， 而不如其常用的变体brunet 可用于指男人和男女都有的群体。 两词的区别正如blonde 和 blond 的区别， 被看成带有性别的含意。即使如此也很难看出如何轻易地解决两词之间区别的这一难题。brunette 不可能被看成一个中性词， 因为后缀-ette 与女性紧密联系。 Brunet 从道理上来说适用于男人和女人，但很少用于指男人。 男人相应的肤色仅用brown表述即可。当然，brown 也可适用于指男女两性的头发颜色， 只要此词不再与卖淫联系在一起。正是由于这一联系brunette 才首先被用作替代词 参见 blond,-ette〔janitor〕A holiday for janitors ought to take place in January,for both words are linked.In Latiniānus was the word for "archway, gateway, or covered passage" and also for the god of gates, doorways, and beginnings in general.As many schoolchildren know,our month January—a month of beginnings—is named for the god.Latiniānitor, the source of our word janitor and ultimately also fromiānus, meant "doorkeeper or gatekeeper.”Probably becauseiānitor was common in Latin records and documents, it was adopted into English,first being recorded in the sense "doorkeeper" around 1567 in a Scots text.In an early quotation Saint Peter is called "the Janitor of heaven.”The term can still mean "doorkeeper,”but in Scots usagejanitor also referred to a minor school official. Apparently this position at times involved maintenance duties and doorkeeping,and the maintenance duties took over the more exalted tasks,giving us the position of janitor as we know it today.看门人的假日应该放在一月，因为以下两个词都同一月有联系。拉丁文中的ianus 表示的是“拱门、道路或走廊”， 也是通常所说的门神、门口和开始。正如许多小学生知道的那样，我们的一月——最初的一个月——是以神的名字命名的。拉丁文ianitor 是单词 janitor 的来源， 追根溯源它也来自ianus， 意思是“看门人或管门人”。也许因为ianitor 这个词在拉丁文记录和文件中很普遍， 它才被英语所采用，最早被记录为“看门人”之意时大约在1567年的一篇苏格兰文章中。圣彼得在早期的引文中被称为“天堂守护神”。这个词仍然是“看门人”的意思，但在苏格兰用法中janitor 也指代低层的学校公务员。 显然这个职位时不时地也包含着维护的责任和守门的义务，这种维护的责任吸取了更为崇高的任务，于是就有了正如我们今天所知道的看门人这个职务〔pant〕It would seem unlikely that the name of a 4th-century Roman Catholic saint should be the ultimate source of a word for a modern article of clothing commonly worn by both men and women.Pants, however, can be traced back to Pantaleon, the patron saint of Venice. He became so closely associated with the inhabitants of that citythat the Venetians became popularly known asPantaloni. Consequently, among the commedia dell'arte's stock characters the representative Venetian (a stereotypically wealthy but miserly merchant) was calledPantalone. His name in French,Pantalon, was borrowed into English (first recorded around 1590). During the middle of the 17th centurythe French came to identify him with one particular style of trousers,and this same style became known aspantaloons in English. Pantaloons was later applied to another style of trousers that came into fashion toward the end of the 18th century, tight-fitting garments that had begun to replace knee breeches.After thatpantaloons was used to refer to trousers in general. The last step in the development of the wordpants met with some resistance. This abbreviation ofpantaloon was considered vulgar and, as Oliver Wendell Holmes put it,"a word not made for gentlemen, but ‘gents.’”First found in the writings of Edgar Allan Poe in 1840,pants has replaced the "gentleman's word" in English and has lost all obvious connection to Saint Pantaleon.看起来一位公元4世纪的罗马天主教徒的名字似乎不可能是这个做为男人和女人平常都穿的布做的现代物品的根本词源。Pants 但可以追溯到奥塔莱昂，威尼斯的庇护神。 他变得与这座城市里的居民联系得这样紧密，以至于威尼斯人也通俗的被称为Pantaloni 。 结果，在即兴喜剧的角色中那个有代表性的威尼斯人（一个愚富而吝啬的商人）被称作Pantalone。 他的法语名字Panlalon 被借用到英语中（初次记录大约在1590年）。 在17世纪中期，法国人开始把它与一种特殊类型的裤子等同起来，同一种类型的裤子在英语中是pantaloons 。 Pantaloons 后来被用作另一种类型的裤子并在18世纪末日渐流行， 紧身衣服已经开始取代齐膝马裤。在那以后，pantaloons 被用来泛指裤子。 在pants 一词发展的最后遇到了一些阻力。 Pantaloon 的缩写被认为是粗俗的， 并且正如奥立弗·温德尔·霍姆斯所说，“并不是为绅士而造的词，而是为‘家伙们所造’”。最早在1840年发现于艾德加·爱伦·坡的作品中，pants 在英语中已经替代了那个“绅士的语言”， 而且显然已失去了和圣奥塔莱昂的一切联系 |
| 随便看 |
|
英汉汉英双解词典收录301015条英汉双解翻译词条，可根据汉字查询相应的英文词汇，基本涵盖了全部常用汉字的英文读音、翻译及用法，是英语学习及翻译工作的有利工具。