| 词组 | hitherto |
| 释义 | hitherto There are two complaints about hitherto. Flesch 1964 and Janis 1984 suggest avoiding hitherto because it is old-fashioned. For Janis if it is not old-fashioned, it is overformal. But neither label is borne out by the evidence. Hitherto is in frequent current use; it is not old-fashioned. And Bremner 1980 produces an example from the sports pages, not noted for their overformality, to complain about. Bremner 1980 says the word means "up to now" and not "up to then." This is the gist of the second complaint, which can also be found in Bernstein 1965, Copperud 1970, 1980, and Bryson 1984. We find the argument back in a 1956 Winners & Sinners; there Bernstein says that now is the time implied by hitherto. It is, but we must be careful not to restrict our notion of time so severely that now refers only to today and everything else is then. For look at this example, which is typical of a certain approach to writing about the past: • Bogus naturalization of immigrants and repeating at elections were now carried to hitherto unknown lengths —Dictionary of American Biography, 1936 The now in that passage refers to 1869 or 1870 (the article is about Boss Tweed) and means "at the time we are talking about," and hitherto there means "up until the time we are talking about." This use of hitherto is not rare in the 20th century: • Hitherto when in London I had stayed with my family in Bedford Park —William Butler Yeats, The Trembling of the Veil, 1922 • No, Owen was a poet—a War Poet only because the brief span of his maturity coincided with a war of hitherto unparalleled sweep, viciousness and stupidity —Osbert Sitwell, Noble Essences, 1950 • Locke, too, saw the necessity of examining the problem of knowledge more thoroughly than had hitherto been attempted —Frank Thilly, A History of Philosophy, rev. ed. by Ledger Wood, 1951 • Hitherto Scottish students had in the main gone to John Balliol's college in Oxford —Sir James Mountford, British Universities, 1966 • They claimed only the power to exclude it from federal territories, where it had never hitherto existed —Harry V. Jaffa, National Rev., 29 Dec. 1970 Underlying the critics' objection, though not always mentioned, is the existence of a contrasting word for hitherto that decidedly means "up until then"—thitherto. Two commentators, Bryson and Bremner, are clearly aware of the word. It is a nice word but very rare. It is strange for newspapermen like these to recommend it, for we have no evidence of its being used in newspapers. Here are two examples: • ... the ruts in the lane—thitherto as deep as the Union trenches before Vicksburg—had mysteriously filled up by themselves —S. J. Perelman, New Yorker, 6 June 1953 • ... was interrupted when his younger daughter, thitherto immersed in her reading, asked ... —John Simon, New York, 5 Jan. 1976 Now if you want to devote yourself to the preservation of thitherto, we commend it to your use—it is a fine word. If not, you can go right ahead and use hitherto in the sense of "up until the time we are talking about" like William Butler Yeats. Or you can try the journalists' other suggestions: theretofore (almost as rare and bookish as thitherto) and previously (acceptable to all). |
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