| 释义 |
stumblebum|ˈstʌmb(ə)lbʌm|
Also stumble bum, stumble-bum. slang (orig. and chiefly U.S.).
[f. stumble v. + bum n.4]
a. A worthless, clumsy, or inept person; a ‘down and out’, a drunkard.
1932E. Hemingway Death in Afternoon 297 American word would be awkward bum, stumble-bum, flat-footed tramp. 1935Punch 11 Dec. 652/3 An American gangster is stated to have begun his career by starting as a stumble⁓bum. 1936[see palooka]. 1940G. Frankau Self-Portrait xxxi. 178 The good old English word for a posterior, which possesses a different meaning (cf. ‘stumblebum’—a guy who comes home drunk) in America. 1954Sun (Baltimore) 11 Feb. 1/4 He became a ragged stumble-bum, raging drunkenly through the village and selling mediocre poetry. 1955D. Keene Who has Wilma Lathrop? x. 93 He had a stubble of beard that made him look like a stumblebum. 1966A. La Bern Goodbye Piccadilly xii. 113 These stumble-bums may have stumbled across the real culprit. 1970Guardian 25 Sept. 10/5 Iago is a red-necked farm boy... He's a stumblebum. 1981Times Lit. Suppl. 11 Sept. 1042/1 The Eisenhower of the war years has lost much of his lustre, and the successful organizer of Montgomery, Bradley and Patton has been reduced by some writers to the level of a strategic stumble-bum.
b. attrib. or as adj. Also fig.
1940Topeka (Kansas) Daily Capital 16 Jan. 4/4 Russia's stumblebum campaign in Finland. 1952B. Wolfe Limbo '90 (1953) vi. xxii. 372 It made its slapstick stumblebum way back and forth. 1975N. Freeling What are Bugles blowing For? xii. 75 Airs and graces with plain stumblebum cops. 1981Washington Post 23 July c9/4 Joe Benjamin has a nihilistic, stumblebum-drunk son (splendidly played by Michael Rothhaar). |