时间:2019-02-17 作者:英语课 分类:美国习惯用语


英语课

我们今天要讲的习惯用语都有这个词: story。也许很多人都知道这个词。它通常解释为“故事”,也可以是新闻报导的意思。我们要学的第一个习惯用语是: cock and bull story。我们知道cock是公鸡,bull是公牛。那么cock and bull story岂不就是公鸡和公牛的故事吗?这个习惯用语也确实起源于十七世纪初流行的这样一个童话故事。故事里主角,公鸡和公牛都通晓人类的语言,能说人话来相互交谈。当然连小孩都明白这是不可能发生的虚构的故事。于是就产生了cock and bull story这个习惯用语。那么它究竟表示什么意思呢? 让我们通过一个例子来琢磨它的含义。这段话讲的是一个叫Bill的男子对自己的妻子不忠,有外遇。我们来听听他为了蒙混妻子,编造了怎样一个cock and bull story。


例句-1:After Bill didn't come home for three days he told his wife he was away on a secret mission for the government. But that's just a cock and bull story: he was actually off with some woman.


他说:Bill三天没回家。事后他对妻子编了个令人难以置信的故事说他外出为政府执行秘密使命去了。其实他是在外面和别的女人鬼混。


由此可见cock and bull story就是虚构不实而且近乎荒谬的托词。


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好,我们来学下一个习惯用语: cover story。Cover通常的意思是盖子或者封面,总之是能够遮盖住什么的东西。杂志的封面叫cover,封面上通常有图片或者照片,往往是这期杂志里最重要的报导中的精彩镜头,于是这篇报导就称为cover story,就是以封面图片为题材的报导。然而cover还可以指用来隐藏遮盖事实真相的幌子。这样cover story就另有其它的意思了。让我们通过一个例子来体会它的含意。这段话是在讲柏林墙倒塌前东德一名秘密警察的事情。东德秘密警察的情报工作的无孔不入是举世闻名的,为了侦察敌情他们使尽了千方百计。


例句-2:In East Germany this secret agent married a woman anti-communist just to get close enough to watch her and her friends. The cover story he told her was that he was a newspaper reporter.


大家都听清楚这段话了吧? 原来这个暗藏的东德特务为了接近那个女反共分子,并且监视她和朋友们的活动而和这名女士结了婚。这个特务为了掩盖真相对太太编造了他的身份,说自己是一份报纸的记者。


他是特务却把自己说成记者。由此可见,cover story是虚假不实的故事。换句话说是为了掩盖真相而编造的谎话。


大家一定记得我们刚才学的cock and bull story不也是虚假不实的谎话吗。那么cover story和cock and bull story有什么区别呢?比较一下刚才的两个例子,能看出其中的不同来。其中一个丈夫突然三天没回家,却骗妻子说,自己执行政府的特殊使命去了;另一个当密探的丈夫说自己是报社记者。两者虽然都是谎言,但是在哪一个例子里说话人更表达出一种对事情感到荒谬不可信的语气呢?是前面的那个例子,因此说话的人用了cock and bull story来表示。


由此可见,虽然cock and bull story和cover story都是虚假不实之词,但是cover story不见得像cock and bull story那样显得那么荒谬。

 



学英语单词
alkali-resistant beaker
aphrophoras
automatic colour separation device
baer stapler
bandwidth hog
barkas effect
bedrockrockbottom
beer muscles
Beethoven exploder
bloodysputum
borduring
boron carbide fiber
brittlebush
buyable
centre control board
cereals and oilseeds processing machinery
chilladors
circuit contact
close one's ears to
collalto (hochgall)
come to town
constult
contact icing
cordless terminal
cornigera
country ham
cross-referencing system
deadener
decision for context free grammar
delocalized pi-bond
department hour rate method
dirt collector
double sampling mode
Dugong idae
folliott
free gas cap
gamma-function
generalized Green's function
genus hippocrepiss
giovans
give one's word of hono u r
gold auction
Gouin accumulator
gruard rail
high-titer
home sweet home
horizontal parabola dc control voltage
HSAM
hydropneumatic recoil system
imperialities
inflow entrance
interest-rate futures
kiddywinkle, kiddywinky
lattice continuity
limit of rollability
lock-in-clause
long-wavelength region
mabels
maugein
Maughold Head
mazonia
miscreates
moblog
moist cough
ne-yo
neo Impressionism
noncommitally
nuclear fuel fabrication plant
numinen
oil cells
oil rigs
onkilonite
organiza
orifice-metering coefficient
pay his attentions to
pedestrian barrier
physician-patient
Populus lancifolia
premium and bond issuance expense
printed works
qualified audit certificate
randonne
raw wounds
real analytic fiber bundle
rotating field type alternator
runaway collision
Salix gyirongensis
secure against
share the booty
side-tracking
silent agitators
skysurfing
socket base
Socratics
solanum wendlandiis
southern chernozem
squeezed fold
Stadol
valvular
wet-ink pen
without success
zone of pollution