时间:2018-12-08 作者:英语课 分类:Modern English 洋话连篇


英语课

  Turn the table

  一位亲戚和妻子失和到了要离婚的地步。几天前接到亲戚电话,说他们在走进律师楼之前,先去求助于心理和婚姻问题专家。夫妇俩心平气和地坐下来谈了好多次,互相之间多了一份理解,少了一份猜疑、埋怨,结果化干戈为玉帛。说简单也简单,就这么拯救了这场婚姻。

  我打心眼里为他们高兴,把这一消息告诉了同样也认识他们的一位美国朋友。这位朋友挺激动的,连连说着"感谢上帝,感谢上帝",她还补充了一句"He turned the table"。

  这话让我心里很不舒服,她是指我亲戚动粗吗?我打抱不平说:"不会,不会,他很斯文,很有绅士风度,不会以粗鲁的举动压制对方,不会以高压让对方屈从。"

  结果,越说谁也听不懂谁。看着我那一脸不快的表情,朋友突然茅塞頓开了,以另一种方法向我解释。终于让我明白,她是说我亲戚"扭转了局面",那"table"和我想到的"桌子"根本无关。

  再说远一点, turn the tables (on someone)这个短语也和桌子没什么关系,它的意思是to suddenly take a position of strength or advantage that was formerly 1 held by someone else (反败为胜,转弱为强),例如: "She played badly in the first set, but then she turned the tables on her opponent and won the match.


1 formerly
adv.从前,以前
  • We now enjoy these comforts of which formerly we had only heard.我们现在享受到了过去只是听说过的那些舒适条件。
  • This boat was formerly used on the rivers of China.这船从前航行在中国内河里。
学英语单词
anomalomyids
ariosoma major
assessment technique
audiovisual technique
autarkic, autarkical
automatic drain separator
battement tendu relev?
battering-ram political tactics
Beavis
beckmans
becoming one flesh
Berlin edema
capacity optimization
Carex hirticaulis
cattle-truck
chea-
child behavior
coal slurry pump
coefficient of separate determination
complex instruction
cyclobutanedicarboxylato
de-interlacing
deodar
displace
djounoud
Eastern Arabic numerals
engine bracket
entwining twill
epicardially
Essebsi
Forefathers' Day
full-bodied
Gandhist
genus heterosceluss
gouge flap
government reengineering
granular sludge
Home-Equity Loan
honor-roll
hydrogen blister
immunolabelling
iontotherapy
IRQ
jandal
lanthanum iodite
law-governed
lebensspuren
lignocaine
lower retina
majority element
microinstruction width
misanalysing
mixed acid fermentation
mogis
Mubadala
multilayer(ed) thermal insulation system
naengmyeon
nullosetigera impar
ollite
peak pendent
polyethylene balloon
pond scums
ravenstones
record selector
retained earnings statement
retest
rod handling equipment
self-supplying of feed
serious injuries resulting in death
shoulder breadth
Sigsbee Deep
single-strand wire rope
Slavophil
snow melter
social inflation
specifying
spindle-type drilling machine
split salve fire
stained wool
steel carburized
stereocillia
supervisory regime
suppering
syphionthus
to make a long story short
tomtits
tractor mounting
tube tongs
tulip poplars
twunts
United Nations Peace-Keeping Force
unrecounselled
unregularized
variable path-length cell
varisized
verbification
william shakespeares
wonkily
work station structure diagram
yottalitre
you don't know
zymogenes