小词详解 | bane
bane 英 [beɪn] 美 [beɪn]
SAT TEM8 GRE
外刊例句
Long hours have been the bane of the legal profession for ages; few of them involve thrilling courtroom antics.
长久以来,法律行业的一大弊端是工作时间太长。很少有律师真的会到法庭上展开激动人心的唇枪舌战。
——《经济学人》With the campaign, Madrid, a city of more than 3 million people, joins others around the world trying to tackle the posture, the bane of many commuters.
通过这项活动,马德里这座拥有300多万人口的城市与世界各地的其他城市一起,努力解决这一困扰许多通勤者的姿势。
——《纽约时报》
基本释义
[noun] a cause of great distress or annoyance
[名词] 引起极大痛苦或烦恼的起因
深入解读
Bane 一词不仅比熟词 ban 在结尾处多了一个字母 e ,同时也与小站(微信公众号:田间小站)之前推送过的 wane 和 arcane 有着相同的结尾。
该词源自古英语 bana (杀人者、杀人犯、凶手;致死剂),最早于16世纪70年代开始用来表示“祸根、灾星”或者说“苦恼之根、烦扰之源”,即引起极大且持续痛苦、困扰或烦恼的起因,常用搭配 the bane of sth ,比如:
贪婪是损毁幸福的祸根。
Avarice is the bane to happiness.这种高技术对于人类与其说造福不如说酿灾。
This kind of high tech is more of a bane than a boon for mankind.
除此之外, bane 也可以用来表示“毒药、毒物”,现在主要用于复合词中,比如 ratsbane (杀鼠药)。
名著用例
Only one thing I know: you said you were not as good as you should like to be, and that you regretted your own imperfection;—one thing I can comprehend: you intimated that to have a sullied memory was a perpetual bane.
我只知道一点,你曾说你并不像自己所希望的那样好,你对自己的缺陷感到遗憾,有一件事我是理解的,那就是你说的,玷污了的记忆是一个永久的祸根。
出自英国女作家夏洛蒂·勃朗特(Charlotte Brontë)创作的具有自传色彩的长篇小说《简·爱》(Jane Eyre)。
同近义词
scourge: a person or thing that causes great trouble or suffering
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