| 词组 | grisly, grizzly |
| 释义 | grisly, grizzly The adjective that means "inspiring horror or disgust" is usually spelled grisly: • ... that grisly and still mysterious disease —Nan Robertson, N. Y. Times Mag., 19 Sept. 1982 • ... one of the grisliest bloodbaths in all history — Wall Street Jour., 26 Jan. 1982 The adjective that means "somewhat gray" is spelled grizzly: • ... the grizzly old Field Marshal —William L. Shirer, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, 1960 • ... the man, a grizzly old country preacher —Richard M. Levine, Harper's, April 1971 The grizzly bear is so named because its fur has a grayish appearance. When most people think of grizzly bears, however,the images that come to mind (rightly or wrongly) are of a fierce and terrifying animal, the color of whose fur is of no special importance. The association of grizzly bears with fierceness may be part of the reason why the "inspiring horror or disgust" adjective is often spelled grizzly. Another part of the reason is that this spelling reflects the word's pronunciation, \\\\griz-lē\\\\, more accurately than grisly does. • Why otherwise torture their victims...?... It is not for themselves or for us these grizzly dramas are played out —Archibald MacLeish, Atlantic, June 1950 • ... the grizzly tale of Lizzie Borden —Suzanne K. Steinmetz & Murray A. Straus, Society, September-October 1973 • ... reduced the abstract issue of capital punishment to grizzly reality —C. Robert Zelnick, Christian Science Monitor, 2 Dec. 1976 • ... three dozen or so grizzly murders —People, 20 Sept. 1982 We have substantial evidence for this spelling, and like the OED we treat it as a legitimate variant in our dictionaries. It is far less common than the grisly spelling, however, and there are many people who regard it simply as an error. |
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