| 释义 |
▪ I. twister, n.|ˈtwɪstə(r)|
[f. twist v. + -er1.]
One who or that which twists.
†1. One who prunes or clips trees. Obs. rare—0.
1483Cath. Angl. 399/2 A Twyster of trees, defrondator.
2. A girder. Cf. twist n.1 3 b.
1875Knight Dict. Mech., Twister..2, a girder.
3. a. One who (or that which) spins thread, cord, or the like; spec. one whose occupation is to twist together the ends of the yarns of the new warp to those of that already woven. Also twister-in.
1579J. Stubbes Gaping Gulf B iv b, Which strong cord..the Lorde..turned to the strangling of the twisters thereof. 1599T. M[oufet] Silkwormes 69 How many winders liue, How many twisters eke, and weauers thriue Vppon this trade? 1611Cotgr., Retordeur, a twister, twiner. 1723Lond. Gaz. No. 6172/8 Samuel Brooke.., Twister. Ibid., Nicholas Gudgeon.., Silver-Twister. 1799Hull Advertiser 2 Mar. 4/4 The Man of the People..at a rope⁓maker's shop..besought..his interest..when the twister replied [etc.]. 1815G. Beattie John o' Arnha' (1826) 36 Elspet, Mausie, fatal sisters, Of the thread of life the twisters. 1878A. Barlow Hist. & Princ. Weaving xxx. 311 The ‘twister-in’ has no difficulty in finding the proper threads to twist together. 1895Daily News 3 July 7/5 The threatened lock-out..at Burnley has been averted by the settlement of the twisters' dispute.
b. A mechanical device for spinning yarns, etc.; spec. a throw-crook (dial.).
a1703Wallis in J. Greenwood Eng. Gram. (1711) 283 He [a rope-maker], twerling his twister, makes a twist of the twine. 1875Knight Dict. Mech., Twister, a reel used in twisting yarns or threads. 1890Gloucester. Gloss., Twister, an implement used for twisting straw ropes for thatching, resembling a brace and bit, except that the bit has a hooked end. 1903Dundee Advertiser 25 July 9 This machine..does more work in a given time than any other type of twister.
c. A wheel, tourniquet, or other device by which torsional force is applied.
1833Loudon Encycl. Archit. §2075 The Wringing-Machine..for small laundries. The articles to be wrung, when large, are taken out of the washing-tub, and, being passed over the pin,..the two ends are put through the hole of the twister,..which is turned round by the spokes. 1892Columbus (Ohio) Dispatch 24 May, One of the highwaymen..confessed his guilt after being tortured with ‘twisters’ and hot coals.
4. One who or that which turns about, turns from side to side, rotates, etc.
†a. A twisting or twining shoot. Obs. rare.
1799G. Smith Laboratory I. 431 Fill a bag..of leaves and twisters of vine.
b. One who turns this way and that; fig. one who shuffles or prevaricates; a dishonest person, a crook. slang.
1834Beckford Italy, etc. II. xvi. 359 The ambassador is..no commonplace twister and turner in the paths of diplomacy. 1863Once a Week IX. 568/2 One swags all that the palmer purchases, and stays outside to render the ‘twister’ any assistance he may need. 1897Blackmore in Blackw. Mag. July 61/2, I have handled a good many twisters and skippers in the way of savages. 1915Film Flashes 4 Dec. 1 ‘Twisters’..endeavour to put German films in the picture houses, under the pretext that they were made in a neutral, Continental country. 1930J. B. Priestley Angel Pavement vii. 367 If you ask me, he looks a rotten twister—bit of a crook or something. 1937[see spiv n.]. 1940E. Pound Cantos lv. 53 And Liu-hoei said Ngan was a twister. 1966[see knuck 3]. 1976Milton Keynes Express 23 July 7/3 He was said to have called two women teachers ‘cheats and twisters’ and had refused to apologise for his remarks.
c. Cricket. A delivery in which the ball twists or ‘breaks’; a break; transf. in Real Tennis and other ball-games, a ‘screw’.
1832P. Egan Bk. Sports I. 348/2 The batsman now his weapon rais'd To meet a puzzling twister. 1857Hughes Tom Brown ii. vi, To come out..to Tom's wicket, and bowl slow twisters to him. 1862Calverley Verses & Tr. ‘Hic vir, hic est’ viii, I have stood serene..While the Buttress of the period Bowled me his peculiar twisters. 1884Marshall Tennis Cuts 202 T was the Twister, that settled the rest.
d. U.S. A whirling wind-storm: a cyclone, tornado.
1897Strand Mag. Sept. 266/1 Kansas..is a favourite spot of the ‘twisters’ as the Westerns playfully term their windy enemy (the tornado). 1902W. M. Davis Elem. Phys. Geog. ii. 67 Violent local storms..are often called cyclones, or prairie twisters, in the Mississippi valley, but the name tornado is to be preferred. 1903G. S. Wasson Cap'n Simeon's Store vi. 108 He see in his paper where the English ship Falls of Ettrick was plunked on the Diamond Shoal and had went to pieces in that ole twister of a breeze there was a spell ago. 1930Neff & Henry Folk-Say Regional Misc. 48, I never did see so many of them little twisters all a-goin at one and the same time. 1955Sci. News Let. 18 June 388/2 A Weather Bureau meteorologist is making miniature tornadoes in a small box in the hope of learning more about what causes ‘twisters’. 1967Boston Sunday Globe 23 Apr. 1/2 The most vicious twisters in the history of the Midwest, striking heavily-populated sections of Northern Illinois and Western Michigan, left 53 dead. 1974V. Nabokov Look at Harlequins (1975) iv. ii. 162 A group of fifteen schoolchildren..were safe in the sudden darkness of that sturdy building when the twister struck. 1977J. Cleary Vortex iv. 93 You hear the twister warnings, too?
e. A handle operated by twisting or rotating it.
1902F. T. Bidlake in Cycl. Tour. Cl. Gaz. Aug. 359/2 The..machine with the compound brake application, i.e., the combination of the lever and the twister.
f. A grossly exaggerated tale; a lie. Naut. slang. ? Obs.
1834W. N. Glascock Naval Sketch-Bk. 2nd Ser. I. 235 I'm an even-minded man..that's providin' I wasn't provok'd by lying lip,—but if the best man in the sarvus was to come up to me,..to tell me such a thund'ring twister..why I'd just..floor the feller as flat as a flounder. 1850H. Melville White Jacket II. xxviii. 184 Among innumerable ‘yarns and twisters’ reeled off in our maintop during our pleasant run to the north, none could match those of Jack Chase. 1873Routledge's Yng. Gentl. Mag. May 358/1 ‘Twister’, broke in the petty officer; ‘I tell you it's as true as gospel’.
g. A type of handcuff (see quot. 1939).
1910[see nipper n.1 4 c]. 1939Fortune July 104/1 A style of handcuff, sometimes called ‘twisters’, used by the New York police instead of the old bracelet type. It consists of a short length of chain with a T-bar at each end. The policeman wraps it around the prisoner's wrist, twists the two T's like a tourniquet as tightly as necessary to make the prisoners come along like a lamb.
h. A key. twister to the slammer: (see quot. 1940). U.S. slang.
1940Music Makers May 37/3 Twister to the slammer, the key to the door. 1941J. Smiley Hash House Lingo 55 Twister, key. 1944D. Burley in A. Dundes Mother Wit (1973) 208 Give the jivers a break and substitute the phrase, ‘twister to the slammer’, for the word ‘key’. 1970C. Major Dict. Afro-Amer. Slang 117 Twister, doorkey.
i. = twitch n.1 3 b (spec. sense). U.S.
1940W. Faulkner Hamlet iii. ii. 223 He..reached down from its nail in the wall a short, smooth white-oak stick eyed at the end with a loop of hemp rope—a twister which Houston had used with his stallion. 1948Richmond (Va.) Times-Dispatch 23 Aug. 4/4 A mean horse may take up to eight hours to shoe, using rope harnesses to tie up the leg being worked on, or even a ‘twister’ for the horse's nose. 1968R. F. Adams Western Words (ed. 2) 334/1 Twitch, a small loop of cord with a stick through it used to punish a held horse. The loop is placed vertically around the animal's upper lip and then tightened by twisting the stick. Also called twister.
j. One who dances the twist (twist n.1 13 c).
[1942Berrey & Van den Bark Amer. Thes. Slang §583/27 Hip dancer{ddd}twister, wiggle dancer, wiggler.] 1966‘K. Nicholson’ Hook, Line & Sinker viii. 97 ‘I just go on Twist nights, don't I, Di?’ ‘She's a jolly good twister too.’ 1977J. Wilson Making Hate ii. 21 He'd been the runner-up in the Champion Twister competition at the Palais.
5. One who curves, bends, or rolls something.
1879Cassell's Tech. Educ. iii. 158 The leaves are..placed over charcoal fires... The twisters roll them over with their hands until twisted.
6. That which (or one who) wrings or causes contortion; esp. fig. something that confounds, non-plusses, or ‘doubles up’, a ‘staggerer’ (slang). Also (dial.), a blow which makes the victim twist or writhe; also fig. in U.S. colloq. phr. to knock one the (or a) twister.
1835in Amer. Speech (1965) XL. 133 So, low each pill was a twister. I swallow'd about three Doctor's shops. 1843J. R. Planché Fortunio i. ii. 9 Ha, ha! I think that was a twister! 1879Black Macleod of D. xl, Well, you have had a twister; but you'll come through it. 1884Clark Russell Jack's Courtship xvi, She had a letter from you this morning—a regular twister. 1886F. T. Elworthy W. Somerset Word-bk. 783 Twister.., a blow with a whip or other instrument. 1893Daily Tel. 1 May 5/1 This was evidently a twister for the beggar-boy. 1896G. Ade Artie vi. 55 That's what knocked me the twister. I thought this fellow was all right. 1908G. Sanger 70 Yrs. a Showman xvii. 59, I got a twister well home under his ribs that sent him grunting and staggering. 1934G. Ade Let. 15 Mar. (1973) 181, I was, to use an old slang phrase, ‘knocked a twister’ when I received your letter [etc.].
7. A voracious feeder. slang. ? Obs.
1694Motteux Rabelais v. Prol. A vj b, What Swillers, what Twisters will there be!
8. Insurance. An insurance salesman or agent who unscrupulously induces a holder to switch his policy from one company to another. orig. U.S.
1924[see twist v. 12 e]. 1979Telegraph (Brisbane) 24 Sept. 24/2 The industry calls it twisting. Presumably its practitioners are called twisters. The industry says that life insurance consumers are being ripped off by its practice.
9. U.S. slang. In various senses with reference to the taking of drugs (see quots.).
1936[see marijuana addict s.v. marijuana 3]. 1936Amer. Speech XI. 127/1 Twister. 1. A feigned spasm. 1938Ibid. XIII. 192/1 Twister. 3. A speed-ball or whiz-bang [vein-shot of mixed drugs]. 4. A bit of violent retching or vomiting of blood or mucus during withdrawal distress. 5. A ration of narcotics. 1951Even. Sun (Baltimore) 27 Mar. 4/1 A powerful combination of ‘bernice snorting’ and heroin ‘shooting’ was called ‘blowing speed balls’ or ‘twisters’ or ‘whiz bangs’. 1959J. E. Schmidt Narcotics 185 Twister, an intravenous injection of a potent narcotic taken by a drug addict, esp. a dose composed of heroin or morphine and cocaine.
10. Var. twistor 1.
11. Comb. twister's cramp Path., pain in the hands or fingers produced by twisting or wringing.
1923E. W. Hope Industr. Hygiene & Med. viii. 516 This process of knotting [the warp threads] is done by a peculiar rolling motion of the fingers. The constant repetition of the movement..gives rise in certain operatives to a peculiar trade affection known as ‘twister's cramp’, the symptoms of which are pain, usually referred to the base of the thumb, tenderness of the muscles, and sometimes swelling at the base of the thumb. 1967Punch 29 Mar. 458/3 Twister's Cramp can still be acquired by any housewife who is eccentric enough to wring clothes by hand.
▪ II. twister, v. Now dial.|ˈtwɪstə(r)|
[f. twist v. + -er5.]
†1. trans. and intr. To twist, spin thread. Obs.
c1605Alleg. Worsted Weavers (B.M. Add. MS. 12504, art. 64), Twistering one thridd of one coullour with another of another coullour. Ibid., To twister a thridd of one colour with a thridd of another. 1687R. Ferrier in Camden Misc. IX. vii. 30 Many..as they grow up, do work, some of whom twister, others net.
2. intr. To wind, meander. dial.
1872[J. Spilling] Giles' Trip to Lond. ii. 17 Straight on as ever yow can go in these twistering straats. 1895E. Anglian Gloss., Twister, to twist or turn.
Hence ˈtwistering ppl. a., winding, twisting; also † ˈtwisterer Obs., a twister or spinner.
1725Lond. Gaz. No. 6380/13 Charles Scot,..Twisterer. 1872Twistering [see 2 above]. |