| 词组 | shambles |
| 释义 | shambles Shambles is both an old word and a new one—old in that most of its senses had developed by the end of the 16th century, new in that the senses in which it is now commonly (and almost exclusively) used date only from the 1920s. In Old English, the word scamul (variously spelled) meant "a stool" and "a money changer's table." The Middle English derivative shamel had the additional meaning "a table for the exhibition of meat for sale," which in turn gave rise in the early 15th century to a use of the plural, eventually spelled shambles, with the meaning "a meat market." A further extension of meaning in the 16th century produced the sense "a slaughterhouse," from which quickly developed the figurative use of shambles to refer to a place of terrible slaughter or bloodshed. So far, so good. In our own century, however, yet another extension of meaning has taken place. Probably because a place of terrible slaughter, such as a battlefield or a besieged city, is also usually a place of great destruction and disorder, shambles has acquired the senses "a scene or state of great destruction" and "a scene or state of great disorder and confusion; a mess." These senses were first recorded in the 1920s, but they seem not to have become widespread until about the time of World War II. That was also when they were first criticized: • Once, I could have said "The room was a shambles," and would have been instantly understood to mean that the room was splashed with blood But now • I have been robbed of that figure of speech by careless writers who have ignorantly understood the word to mean a place where the furniture has been wrecked —Ted Robinson, Plain Dealer (Cleveland, Ohio), July 1945 Other critics expressed similar dismay, but often in a tone of resignation, recognizing that the battle to keep the blood in shambles had already been lost. The new senses of shambles had actually turned a rare word into a common one (after all, rooms are messy much more often than they are "splashed with blood"). Most usage writers seem to have bowed to the inevitable, and dictionaries now routinely treat the new senses of shambles as standard. They are far and away the most common senses of the word: • Lawrence's story world is a shambles—a world just let go, like a sketchy housekeeper's un-straightened-up room —Eudora Welty, Atlantic, March 1949 • The apartment was usually in disorder, except on the day the maid came in, when it became a shambles —S. J. Perelman, New Yorker, 23 Apr. 1955 • ... saved the evening from becoming an utter shambles —Robert Shaplen, New Yorker, 10 Nov. 1956 • ... tried to fool themselves into thinking that the Axis which they had forged ... was not also in shambles —William L. Shirer, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, 1960 • Having described what a shambles the party system is in —Harry S. Ashmore, Center Mag., September 1968 • ... the only hotel, a shambles of rotting wood — Lewis H. Lapham, Harper's, November 1971 • Inflation, which has made a shambles of most home-makers' budgets —Frank J. Priai, N.Y. Times, 17 Apr. 1979 • ... a version of Romeo and Juliet that turns into a hilarious shambles —James Wolcott, Atlantic, September 1981 • ... the shambles of my high school French vocabulary —Stephen King, Playboy, January 1982 • ... had not the city itself been a shambles of torn-up streets —Eleanor Perenyi, Atlantic, February 1982 • ... the accident had reduced the reactor's inner workings to a shambles —Michael Gold, Science, October 1982 |
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