《绯闻女孩》第二季第2集学习笔记
日期:2009-05-14 10:56

(单词翻译:单击)

重点讲解1

简介:Marcus勋爵夫人的身份让上东区富豪们大为吃惊。Nate和S关系更为亲密。Chuck与Marcus开始了一段出人意料的友谊,却被B拆穿。

1. -Things are going south with Lord Marcus.
-Who’s Lord Marcus?
-James. It turns out that he was only pretending to be a commoner. It’s like Roman Holiday, only I’m Gregory Peck, and he’s Audrey Hepburn.
- Oh, suddenly it’s all so clear.

go south means things are turning bad. 这个说法来源于地图"上北下南"的规定,所以go south可以用来代表任何下降、变坏的趋势。可以用来形容和某人的关系,经济走势,或者物品的变坏。
commoner: 普通人,凡人。另外,这里B用了罗马假日来做比喻,把自己比作记者,Marcus则是那位公主,非常可爱的比喻。
suddenly it’s all so clear: 一下子就明朗了,清楚了。clear是个常用词,一种表示“无障碍,畅通的”,比如警察冲进房间,发现里面没有危险,他就会喊clear。第二种用法是用来询问对方是否明白你的意思,通常有种很权威,很高高在上的语气,比如Do I make myself clear? / Is it clear?

2. - He’s a lord, and I love him.
- Okay, I’m gonna take your word for it, but, Blair, love?
- And not just because Tom Hanks gave him a Kleenex at Lady Di’s funeral.

take your word for it: 我相信你说的话
Kleenex: 其实就是“舒洁”,世界上第一张面巾纸,已经被字典收入,用来表示“纸巾”。类似的还有Xerox, 施乐,这个单词可以用来指复印机。
Lady Di: Lady Diana, 黛安娜王妃。西方人一般都用昵称Di来称呼她。

3. Blair Waldor, a fling? You’re not exactly low maintenance.

fling: 在第1集里已经介绍过,指那种短暂的,不用负责任的邂逅
low maintenance: 相对于high maintenance而言,就是《蛋白质女孩》里提到的“高维修女子”,那种需要花很多心思,要求特别高的女孩子就叫做high maintenance,B就是其中的典型. 而low maintenance,指的就是那种要求很低,很容易打发的人。

4. -Charles, sidebar.
-Actually, we weren’t finished.
-Notice how my voice didn’t go up at the end?

这里B叫Chuck到旁边的吧台去,Chuck说还没跟Marcus谈完。B就说“你没注意到我的语气不是升调吗?”在英语里,语调上升就表示询问和请求,语调下降表示命令。很明显,B是命令Chuck,而不是邀请他去旁边。所以我们说英文的时候,也要注意自己的语调,否则同一句话,表达的意思会完全不一样。

重点讲解2

5. -The federal prosecutor(起诉人,控方) has taken your father’s leaving town as an admission of guilt(认罪). They want to forfeit(没收) our assets for restitution(归还,赔偿).
-What, they wanna take our money?
-Well, not yet, but they have frozen(冻结) our accounts.
-And now they are making an inventory(盘点) of everything that we own.

主要是一些法律词汇,“认罪”除了admission of guilt(这里指默认自己有罪), 还有一种叫做plead guilty, 后者多用于法庭,法官问,被告是否认罪,回答就是plead guilty(PG), 或者plead not guilty(PNG).
inventory: 存货,make an inventory of就是盘点存货的意思。后文Chuck还提到自己在liquidate my shares in Victorla, 这里的liquidate是清算财产的意思, share就是股份。

6. Something tells me you’re off your game. Anything I can help with?

off: to be weird, off center, not normal. 在这里指“心不在焉。”

7. -I’ve dated a lot of top flight girls, and she always sends them running. It’s like…and she gets inside their head, figures out their worst fears and just ruthlessly exploits that fear.
-That’s rough.
-Not to mention, she’s completely got my father’s ear. Of course, Blair is desperate to meet her. And when Blair sets her mind on something

top flight: top notch, very good. Moslty used to describe ones wife.
send them running: 使她们落荒而逃
get my father’s ear: 我父亲对她言听计从
sets her mind on something: 下定决心做某事

8. -Marcus dated the descendant of Princess Grace. His consort needs to be able to host royal dinners and hobnob with oligarchs and dictators.
- Well, if you can’t find common ground with a dictator, I don’t know who can.

hobnob with: 亲切交谈
oligarchs: 寡头政治执政者
find common ground with: 找到共通点。这里S在嘲讽B,暗指B也是一个独裁者。

9. You know, they’re obviously just trying to scare us to get us to rat out my dad.

scare: 吓到某人。最常用的短语就是You scare me! 你吓倒我了。形容词是scary, 比如scary movie(恐怖电影)。
rat out: 告密。A rat is a tattletale or a snitch. To rat out someone is to snitch on others or tell on others.

重点讲解3

10. -He’s outside of my regular circle.
-Oh, so you just asked someone you barely know for money?

第一句用来表示“他不是我社交圈子里的人”,第二句里的barely know指“不太熟的人”。注意这两种句型,有时候在中翻英的时候,我们不一定能想到如此地道的表达方法。

11. -I wasn’t expecting anyone so young or so beautiful.
-Just because I didn’t give birth to Marcus doesn’t mean I’m any less interested in his well-being. I don’t usually take meetings with children, Charles, so what do you have to say for yourself?
-Lordy, lordy, look who’s 40-or ate least a well-preserved 38.

expect: 料想到,预料到。特地highlight出来,是因为很多人在写“想到”的时候,都习惯用think,其实很多时候expect会更贴切。
give birth to: Marcus不是我生的。怀孕叫做carry a baby, 流产就是miscarry. 预产期叫做due date, 生孩子就是give birth to a child.
well-being: 幸福
what do you have to say for yourself: 你有什么要说的?
well-preserved: 保养的很好

12. -Chuck’s here, and Blair didn’t invite him.
-Maybe he’s her plus-one.

plus-one: your guest when you are invited to an event. 这个在第1集里面也出现过,Jenny就是Eric的plus-one, 然后才得以进入white party.

13. -But I assure you, there’s an explanation for all of it.
-Save your breath(省省吧), Blair. Chuck didn’t tell me a thing.
-Wait, he didn’t?
-I told him not to bother(不用麻烦了). None of it makes any difference to me(对我来说毫无意义), because nothing will change the fact the despite your best efforts which are completely transparent(显而易见), by the way, Marcus is never going to end up with a lowly(地位低下的) Waldorf.

make difference: It means to make an important effect on something, especially a good effect. 意思是对某事产生巨大的影响或者作用,或者也可以表示为意义重大,与众不同。比如夸一个新产品如何的标新立异,就可以说it makes huge difference. 用在否定句里,it doesn’t make any difference, 表示这样做没有必要,没有什么差别。
end up: 相当于wind up, 注意这里的wind发I的音,和“风”那个wind发音不同,这个词组表示最后结局如何,沦落到什么地步,你可以说He ends up alone.(他最后孤独终老), 以可以说Jack ends up in the jail.(Jack最终沦落到蹲监狱的地步). end up也可以表示arrive at, 比如说After 30 minutes’ driving, we finally ended up at the shopping center.

14. -This party is a complete bust. My whole life is a bust.
-Well, it serves you right. You were scheming to convince Marcus you’re someone you’re not.
-But my intentions were good. I really do like him. I just…as soon as I knew he like me, I would have relaxed and dropped the manipulative plotting and devoted myself to being the best girlfriend ever.

bust: A total failure, a complete waste of time. 另外,在枪战片里,我们也经常能听到got busted,这个时候bust指的是police action, or got caught, e.g. Joey got busted for selling drugs to an undercover police.
it serves you right: 给某人应得的结果,可以指生活带你不薄,也可以指给你应得的报应。贬义褒义都可以用。
scheme, manipulative, plot: 这三个单词都可以指诡计多端的,善用心计的
But my intentions were good: 但我的出发点是好的。这也是我们口语里经常说的一句话。
drop: give up

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重点单词
  • forfeitn. 没收物,罚金,丧失 vt. 没收,丧失 adj.
  • minutesn. 会议记录,(复数)分钟
  • gracen. 优美,优雅,恩惠 vt. 使荣耀,使优美
  • roughadj. 粗糙的,粗略的,粗暴的,艰难的,讨厌的,不适的
  • plotn. 阴谋,情节,图,(小块)土地, v. 绘图,密谋,
  • flightn. 飞行,航班 n. 奇思妙想,一段楼梯 n.
  • circlen. 圈子,圆周,循环 v. 环绕,盘旋,包围
  • inventoryn. 详细目录,存货(清单) vt. 编制(详细目录)
  • relaxedadj. 放松的, 松懈的,随意的 relax的过去式(
  • explanationn. 解释,说明