词组 | shrink |
释义 | shrink According to our evidence, in written use the usual past tense of shrink is shrank: • ... he shrank from forcing the decision —Henry F. Graff, N.Y. Times Book Rev., 20 May 1979 • Families shrank partly because ... —Christopher Jencks, N.Y. Times Book Rev., 10 Apr. 1983 Shrunk also occurs as the past tense of shrink. In fact, in linguistic surveys conducted in the eastern and mid-western U.S. several decades ago more than 80 percent of the people polled used shrunk in preference to shrank. The past tense shrunk is undoubtedly standard, but we have relatively little evidence of its use in writing: • The Suez shutdown shrunk U.S. Middle East oil imports by one-third —Newsweek, 3 Dec. 1956 • ... I shrunk self-consciously in my seat —Stringfel-low Barr, Center Mag., May 1968 Shrunk and shrunken are both used as the past participle of shrink. Shrunk is the usual choice when the participle is functioning as a verb: • ... the lake has shrunk to a mirage of shimmering blue —William Kittredge, Fiction, vol. 1, no. 3, 1973 • Or had they only shrunk? —Wilfrid Sheed, The Good Word and Other Words, 1978 Shrunken is the usual choice when the participle is functioning as an adjective: • ... a somewhat shrunken functionary, barely worth a book —Wilfrid Sheed, The Good Word and Other Words, 1978 • ... a frail and shrunken fragment of the old dream —Mavis Gallant, N. Y. Times Book Rev., 11 May 1983 |
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