| 词组 | prodigal |
| 释义 | prodigal 1. The adjective prodigal is frequently used with of: • ... like a lovely woman graciously prodigal of her charm and beauty —W. Somerset Maugham, The Moon and Sixpence, 1919 • Wildly prodigal of color, the new sun then sketched a wide band of throbbing red-gold —F. Van Wyck Mason, Himalayan Assignment, 1952 • She had been prodigal of all her resources, money and energy and imaginative strategems —Katherine Anne Porter, The Never-Ending Wrong, 1977 Prodigal is also commonly followed by with: • He had always been prodigal with his whistle, tooting it for children's birthday parties —John Cheever, The Wapshot Chronicle, 1957 • ... excludes the debilitating habit of some state courts of being too prodigal with rehearing —Felix Frankfurter, in Aspects of American Government, ed. Sydney D. Bailey, 1950 It has also been used sometimes with as to or in: • Masterfully economical as to words, Mr. Saroyan is ... almost recklessly prodigal as to feeling —Elizabeth Bowen, New Republic, 9 Mar. 1953 • Nor will posterity censure the present age for having been too prodigal in its applause of this great man — Joseph Wood Krutch, Samuel Johnson, 1944 2. Bryson 1984 and Harper 1975, 1985 say that many people think prodigal means "wandering" or "tending to stray" because they associate it with the New Testament parable of the prodigal son who, having received his inheritance, "took his journey into a far country, and there wasted his substance with riotous living" (Luke 15:13, AV). The son returned, repentant, and was welcomed back by his father, who killed the fatted calf in celebration. Our files do not show the adjective being used to mean "wandering." The usage, if it exists, may be primarily oral, or perhaps the idea has been oversimplified in the usage books. The OED includes a sense under the noun prodigal that covers the many meanings the word can have when it is used in allusion to the parable. The examples there all reflect one aspect or another of the parable—especially that of the repentant sinner welcomed home—and not just the "wasteful" meaning of the adjective. We have some recent allusive examples, but all are for the noun or for the adjective in the compounds prodigal son and prodigal daughter. • ... stared at the prodigal who had come home to her —Priscilla Johnson McMillan, excerpt in Book Digest, February 1978 • ... she was received into her mother's household as a prodigal daughter —John Updike, NY. Times Book Rev., 23 Feb. 1986 • I used it again on this visit home, leaving it behind as an offering at the bier from a prodigal son —Harry S. Ashmore, Center Mag., May 1968 • ... had been dropped for six months, then returned, a prodigal son, to the BBC, all forgiven and forgotten —Janice Elliott, Angels Falling, 1969 These uses echo the parable and do not necessarily imply extravagance or wastefulness. Such use dates back to Shakespeare in 1596 and Ben Jonson in 1601 and, while apparently not especially common, would appear to be entirely legitimate. But it seems not to be the use Harper and Bryson are talking about. |
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