| 释义 |
reinˈvent, v.
[re- 5 a.]
To invent again.
1686Plot Staffordsh. 371 This not being the first time, that the same thing has been reinvented. 1870Lowell Among my Bks. Ser. i. (1873) 180 After Spenser..had reinvented the art of writing well. 1894Brit. Jrnl. Photogr. XLI. 69 This system..has also been reinvented and patented a year or two ago.
absol.1888H. S. Holland Christ or Ecclesiastes 73 [The mind] invents;..it corrects; it reinvents.
So reinˈvention, reinˈventor.
1719Weekly Medley 28 Mar., An Art now so long lost, its Loss so lamented, and its re-invention so much coveted. 1852Hawthorne Wonder-Bk. (1879) 118 My merit as a reinventor and improver. 1878Newcomb Pop. Astron. ii. i. 108 He..set himself to the reinvention of the instrument. 1964W. L. Goodman Hist. Woodworking Tools 38 It appears to be a re-invention of the Minoan and Roman tool. 1973Sci. Amer. Apr. 85/1 James thought up the idea of the differential gear (actually a reinvention).
▸ trans. To adopt a new image or identity for (a person or thing). Usu. refl.: to adopt a new image or identity for oneself; to change one's behaviour in order to respond to a change in environment or react to opportunity.
1955L. A. Fiedler End to Innoc. 47 One can almost feel pity for the man who has become as vividly unreal as a political slogan, or as the newspaper headlines that reinvent him daily. 1973S. Bellow in College Eng. 34 979/2 Every individual had to re-invent himself and everything that surrounded him in an original way. 1983Washington Post 13 Mar. g11/6 What, he is asked, is the best way to know Truman Capote, this man always reinventing himself? 1993Globe & Mail (Toronto) 15 June c1/2 CBC Television has been attempting to reinvent itself in the past year as part of ‘repositioning’, an exercise designed to make the CBC more distinct from its competitors. 2002Mojo Feb. 44/1 Who had the idea of reinventing you as a power-balladeering AOR goddess in the mid-'80s?
▸ to reinvent the wheel: to recreate something that already exists, esp. at the expense of unnecessary time and effort; to repeat effort needlessly.
1967Times 27 Jan. 9/3 (advt.) We are not out to do a technological equivalent of re-inventing the wheel. 1972Computers & Humanities 7 104 There need be no fear, however, that those using the computer are merely ‘reinventing the wheel’, even when their programs and results closely resemble those which are available elsewhere. 1989J. Churchill Grime & Punishm. (1992) vi. 62 Every generation has to reinvent the wheel. 1993A. McNab Bravo Two Zero (1994) iii. 59 We'd covered everything and to carry on would just be reinventing the wheel. 2000Superintendent Winter 7/2 There is also the risk of reinventing the wheel every time a new initiative is proposed. |