Samy閱讀筆記【5】Hair Splitting

字號(hào):

偶爾看到一個(gè)吉尼斯紀(jì)錄:
    Hair Splitting
    The greatest reported achievement in hair splitting has been that of Britains's Alfred West. who succeeded in splitting a human hair 17 times into 18 parts on eight occasions. All the divisions were made from the same point.
    此人真是“吹毛求疵”(hair-splitter)的大師了,一根頭發(fā)分這么多層!所以,這個(gè)紀(jì)錄也算是the making of unreasonably fine distinctions,不知道把頭發(fā)分得這么細(xì)有什么用處?如果事事都是如此,還讓人怎么過(guò)日子?
    令人不勝煩惱的還有這個(gè)說(shuō)法:in the hair,意思是煩惱人的事情。你想想,有個(gè)東西掉在你的頭發(fā)里,比如口香糖之類(lèi),雖然不是很了不起的東西,但要想把這個(gè)東西取出來(lái)倒是很麻煩。所以,可以說(shuō):
    My teacher is always getting in my hair.
    我的老師老是煩我。
    還可以說(shuō):
    I am working on my paper, but my son is always in my hair.
    我在做論文,可我兒子老是煩我。
    所以,可以命令說(shuō):Get out of my hair! 別煩我!
    要注意的是,out of one's hair一般用于祁使語(yǔ)氣。
    我們都知道,hair是毛發(fā)的意思,細(xì)小不起眼的東西,有時(shí)候作用還挺大的,某些動(dòng)物的毛發(fā)可以制作成衣服。又因?yàn)槊l(fā)的細(xì)小,還可以用來(lái)指距離間隙小、精確程度、相似程度高,比如:
    They won by a hair. 他們以微弱優(yōu)勢(shì)贏了。
    These two papers were similar to a hair. 這兩篇論文驚人地相似。
    最后,還有一個(gè)說(shuō)法,中文里面常說(shuō)的白頭發(fā),是說(shuō)頭發(fā)灰白,通常是衰老的象征,英文應(yīng)該說(shuō)grey hair,而不是white hair,white hair只是說(shuō)頭發(fā)自然就是白的——不過(guò),好像我沒(méi)有見(jiàn)過(guò)這樣的人,要是突然見(jiàn)到這樣的人,恐怕你會(huì)跟我一樣,it will make my hair stand on end, 令人寒毛直豎!