etymology - Origin of the phrase "pit of despair" - English …
2022年11月9日 · The pit of despair was a name used by American comparative psychologist Harry Harlow for a device he designed, technically called a vertical chamber apparatus, that he used in experiments on rhesus macaque monkeys at the University of Wisconsin–Madison in the 1970s. - Wikipedia. Curious if y'all might have some thoughts.
metaphors - About the use of metaphorical language - English …
2013年1月10日 · Now consider "the 12 foot pit was a bottomless pit of despair", which is now a metaphor. Now jump to "the 12 foot pit was a bottomless pit", which is roughly the same metaphor. Finally we can leap over to the question OP has asked, which i think in rough and ready terms is actually a metaphor.
What's the origin of the phrase "show true colours?"
2021年3月25日 · The OED's first citation is 1551, from Thomas Becon, A Fruitful Treatise of Fasting, which describes how Satan "setteth forth him selfe in his true colours".
etymology - The origin of the phrase "Eskimo Brothers" - English ...
2016年8月29日 · Popularized by the Fx show The League, the term Eskimo Brothers is a slightly misogynistic term for two men who have been physically intimate with the same woman. It is usually considered offensiv...
Origin and variants of phrase: "let's blow this popsicle stand"
2015年10月3日 · J.E. Lighter, The Random House Historical Dictionary of American Slang (1994) notes that expression also appears in the closely related forms "blow this pop stand" and "blow this popcorn stand."
Origin of the saying “happy wife, happy life”
2018年1月10日 · The adage 'happy wife, happy life' could be said to have appeared at least as early as 1903, in the final verse of a choice bit of doggerel titled "The Work and Wages Party", where the parallel and rhyming phrases might as well have been no more than a congeries, rather than expressing causality:
phrases - More idioms like "needle in a haystack" relevant to …
Are there more idioms, sayings or phrases similar to "needle in a haystack" that are relevant to hidden objects, or difficult to find items?
The "wrought /wreaked havoc" misunderstanding
2016年2月7日 · Here's an Ngram chart that tracks the frequency in Google Books search results of "wrought havoc" (blue line) versus "wreaked havoc" versus "worked havoc" (green line) for the period 1800–2005:
meaning in context - English Language & Usage Stack Exchange
2014年12月5日 · Two loves I have of comfort and despair, Which like two spirits do suggest me still; The better angel is a man right fair, The worser spirit a woman colour'd ill. To win me soon to hell, my female evil Tempteth my better angel from my side, And would corrupt my saint to be a devil, Wooing his purity with her foul pride.
Is "worser" correct grammatically? - English Language & Usage …
2014年10月22日 · Two loves I have of comfort and despair, Which like two spirits do suggest me still: The better angel is a man right fair, The worser spirit a woman colour'd ill. It also appears in The Taming of the Shrew and Antony and Cleopatra. Does this mean that using worser is grammatically correct today? Not at all.