New answers tagged meaning
3
Since Hamlet was published in several editions during the Jacobethan era, it is worth looking at how these early editions rendered these lines.
The first quarto (Q1), published in 1603, which has sometimes been called a "bad quarto", gives the lines as follows:
O that this too much grieu'd and sallied flesh
Would melt to nothing, or that the ...
6
Albert Camus' essay L'Homme révolté (1951, The Rebel) contains a chapter entitled "Roman et révolte", in which the author says (emphasis mine),
Qu’est-ce que le roman, en effet, sinon cet univers où l’action trouve sa forme, où les mots de la fin sont prononcés, les êtres livrés aux êtres, où toute vie prend le visage du destin ? Le monde ...
3
On top of the answer provided by @tum_ (great answer, btw), in earlier English--particularly in Old English (aka Anglo Saxon) and Middle English, though also in early modern English as in the case with Shakespeare--repeated modifiers were a way to emphasize the point. This was especially true with multiple negatives. Whereas today there is the idea that a ...
5
I understand it as an intensifying repetition as in 'very very brave', 'long long time ago' but, apparently, there is no full agreement on this fragment even between the specialists (or, at least, in 1877, there wasn't):
too too] Nares pointed out the intensive effect of this reduplication, giving instances from Holinshed and Spenser, and adding that it is ...
1
To be on your dignity is to act in a very formal manner, in order to
to demand to be shown the respect that you think you deserve:
So, Mr. Wardale is being demanding because Mr. Macauley's language is so objectionable (despite the provocation) that it shows too much disrespect. (Into the logic of that we shall not delve.)
As a Commissioner, being on his ...
6
Interpretations of this line appear to vary.
According to Bernard Lott (New Swan Shakespeare, Advanced Series. Longman, 1968, 1990), the line may mean
that he [Horatio] has not yet woken up fully to the surroundings and has left part of him downstairs in the warmth. Horatio is not in sympathy with all the tension that the others feel.
According to G. R. ...
2
That, while men and women can be equally constant and faithful when they have reciprocated love, or hope that their love will be reciprocated , if a man's beloved died, or is otherwise irrevocably lost (married the other guy), his love is more likely to fade and let him love another woman, while a woman's love will remain constant despite the impossibility.
...
5
Aragorn uses “cheek” here with the meaning “impertinence” or “mild disrespect”. Bilbo has just recited a poem about the mythical figure Eärendil, in verse that is playful in metre and vocabulary, and at times rather fanciful (for example, it’s doubtful that Eärendil’s scabbard was made of chalcedony). But we learn shortly that Eärendil was Elrond’s father:
‘...
6
Here is the entire sentence from the English translation on Wikisource:
During this time, the farewell ceremony was taking place. I have already said that this magnificent function was being given on the occasion of the retirement of M. Debienne and M. Poligny, who had determined to "die game," as we say nowadays.
Here is the corresponding part ...
1
Not even in imagination. She would have thought that even thinking about such a place would taint her.
3
As precise as Conrad is with his nautical descriptions, I think if he had meant a mast was consumed he would have said so.
He spent a number of years as a merchant seaman, though Im not aware he was ever in a ship that went on fire. My reading is that he is just describing the vigour of the first flame to break from the space below decks, and the effect of ...
4
The narrator first says "We didn't grumble at her", and then says "I would just as soon have..." This is saying that he wouldn't grumble at the old church, and he doesn't grumble at the ship.
In both cases, he's saying that he's satisfied with what he's got. No matter how much grumble, your old local church isn't going to turn into a ...
2
A clergyman's son was often expected to a little wild, in revolt against a strict upbringing. Therefore a perfectly regular clergyman's son would be irregular -- that is, not what was expected.
The "were" is used because it's in the subjunctive mode, expressing a hypothetical condition.
The Blue Lion is a pub.
3
I can't get what's meant by "It would be almost irregular, if the clergyman’s son were quite regular".
It's pretty close to what you think. They're saying this would be abnormal behavior in general for the sober individual that you might expect of the son of clergy, but it's normal for him. So he is abnormal, but that's normal behavior for him.
And ...
3
This refers to the War of Wrath during the First Age. Thangorodrim referrred to three volcanic peaks raised by Morgoth (see chapter 9, "Of the flight of the Noldor" in The Silmarillon) Chapter 24, "Of the voyage of Eärendil and the War of Wrath", explains (emphasis added),
But Eärendil came, shining with white flame, and about Vingilot ...
0
Thangorodrim was destroyed in the war that brought down Morgoth -- the dragon Ancalagon fell on them and crushed them.
4
Napoleon died in exile on St. Helena, but many people have died there without being Napoleon.
This is a metaphor for how various similarities to great figures do not mean you yourself are great. It is impossible to tell without context, but it may additionally hold the connotation that the person is claiming greatness on the basis of being metaphorically ...
3
Watts includes small vignettes at regular intervals in his book. They have names such as Arithmo (page 21 in the 1885 reprint), Positivo (page 26), Jocander (page 28), Niveo and Euron (page 49), Studentio and Plumbinus (page 54), Cario and Faber (page 64), Divito, Politulus and Aulinus (page 65), Solinus and Probus (page 66), Pellucido (page 83), Penseroso (...
4
TL;DR: These are fictional types, not real people.
Take your first example with a little more context:
A Man much addicted to Luxury and Pleasure, Recreation and Pastime, should never pretend to devote himself entirely to the Sciences, unless his Soul be so reform’d and refin’d that he can taste all these Entertainments in his Closet, among his books and ...
12
Elrond is saying it was not chance but Providence that brought them all together.
To expand on Glorfindel's correct answer, let me explain the passage phrase by phrase. This is actually pretty important in terms of understanding Tolkien's theology of Middle-earth.
That [what shall we do with the Ring] is the purpose for which you are called hither. Called, ...
8
The full paragraph is:
That is the purpose for which you are called hither. Called, I say, though I have not called you to me, strangers from distant lands. You have come and are here met, in this very nick of time, by chance as it may seem. Yet it is not so. Believe rather that it is so ordered that we, who sit here, and none others, must now find counsel ...
8
It could be a reference to the classical nursery rhyme Little Miss Muffet:
Little Miss Muffet
Sat on a tuffet,
Eating her curds and whey;
Along came a spider,
Who sat down beside her,
And frightened Miss Muffet away.
This was what immediately came to my mind on seeing "spider", "beside", and "frightened" in the same sentence. ...
14
Mother Goose, in fact.
Little Miss Muffet
Sat on a tuffet,
Eating her curds and whey;
Along came a spider,
Who sat down beside her,
And frightened Miss Muffet away.
It has the spider, the fright, and being Mother Goose, the pop-cultural awareness for the reader to recognize.
1
My read on it is more than he is alluding to the idea that Yggdrasil was present in all of the Nine Worlds. Similarly, among the trees, seeing them reach up into the heavens, he was entertaining the conceit that they, too, stretched into another world, that of the stars, such that one could traverse the tree and arrive there.
2
"there’s so much of it that deserve to be down on"
The Master is trying to indicate that Communism is not nearly as prevalent or as dangerous as they think. They're taking what is a minor issue, that the tendency of young students to profess an admiration for Socialism or Communism isn't some indicator that there's a great movement that must be ...
2
The phrase "last summer's manifestations" refers to the manifestations (i.e. becoming visible), according to witnesses, of the spirit called Katie King. Apparently, a woman named Eliza White had come forward and revealed that she had impersonated Katie King at séances organised by Jennie and Nelson Holmes.
"They" in "they have been ...
4
I think Chesterton is packing multiple allusions and metaphors into the opening paragraphs of that short story. The first paragraph says there was "something that blasted like lightning", which is followed in the second paragraph by "when the Gothic fell from heaven". These phrases are reminiscent of Luke 10, 18:
He replied, "I saw ...
Top 50 recent answers are included
