| 释义 |
whizz-bang, int., n., and a. slang.|ˈhwɪzbæŋ|
Also whiz-bang, without hyphen, and as two words.
[f. whizz, whiz v. or int. + bang n.1]
A. int. Expressing a whizzing sound that ends with a thud or explosion, such as may be heard as a bullet or shell strikes a target.
1836Dickens Pickw. (1837) ii. 9 Fired a musket..rushed into wine shop..back again—whiz, bang. c1838C. Mathews in M. R. Booth Eng. Plays of 19th Cent. (1973) IV. 133 She called in a farmer..Who loaded his blunderbuss..Whizz, bang! Lord, I thought I was murdered outright. 1920Lipscomb Staff Tales 59 Whizz-bang! Something grazes parapet.
B. n.
1. colloq. The shell of a small-calibre high-velocity German gun, so called from the noise it made.
1915‘Ian Hay’ 1st Hund. Thous. xviii, A whizz-bang is a particularly offensive form of shell which bursts two or three times over, like a Chinese cracker. 1918W. Owen Poems (1920) 16 What murk of air remained stank old, and sour With fumes of whizz-bangs. 1923Kipling Irish Guards in Gt. War I. 143 Three men killed in the line by a single whizz-bang. 1968J. R. Ackerley My Father & Myself vi. 51 In 1918, just before the Armistice, he was killed by a whizz⁓bang. 1979S. Wilson Vampire ii. 56 Those guns. Those ever present guns. Eighty-eights. Whizz-bangs. None of us need to be reminded of the names.
2. A resounding success; a marvel.
1916in Amer. Speech 1972 (1975) XLVII. 116 Masson is a whizbang at getting up the kind of food that makes the troops want to fight. 1944T. H. Wisdom Triumph over Tunisia 182 The raid was a whizz-bang, the R.A.F. expression denoting something highly successful. 1978M. Puzo Fools Die xvi. 169 These were the sharpest kids in America, the future business giants, judges, show business whizbangs. 1983Listener 14 July 37/1 George Stevens..knew how to make box-office whizz-bangs but not very interesting movies.
3. A firework that jumps around making a whizzing noise and periodic bangs.
1960J. Lodwick Asparagus Trench 53, I carried..whizz-bang fireworks, harmless but disconcerting pyrotechnical trivia these, by reason of their strange gyrations. 1983D. Lambert Judas Code iii. 55 He lit three more firecrackers—Whizz Bangs they were called.
C. adj.
a. Excellent.
b. Fast-paced, very lively; spectacular.
1959I. & P. Opie Lore & Lang. Schoolch. ix. 161 Other superlatives currently in favour are:..swell, whizzing, whiz-bang, whizzo. 1963Economist 5 Jan. 28/1 Americans are often the first to admit that sometimes a whiz-bang quality about their methods tends to upset their friends. 1965Listener 16 Sept. 431/1 I'm not suggesting that programmes on the arts should be as whizz-bang as The Dick Van Dyke Show, but I do suspect that Drama and Light Entertainment could teach them a lot. 1967Spectator 8 Dec. 725/2 A sculptor whose inventions..are made for prolonged contemplation when much work is made for whizzbang impact. 1972National Observer (U.S.) 27 May 20/5 Bernstein inclines to brisk tempos; it would be interesting to see a regiment actually try marching to his whiz-bang ‘Stars and Stripes Forever’. 1984Listener 5 Jan. 8/3 As for home-grown, whizzbang, laugh-a-line comedy—Channel 4, where are you?
Hence as v. trans., to shoot whizz-bangs at; ˈwhizz-banged ppl. a.
1918G. Frankau One of Them ix. 66 How oft, in some wild Western whizz-banged dug-out..Has my soul flown from Staff-emitted paper To the glad days, when from my purse I'd lug out That last fat stake. 1919King's Royal Rifle Corps Chron. 1916 139 This line was whizz⁓banged heartily. 1928Blunden Undertones of War iv. 35 Some of us were just in time, when next the enemy gunners whizzbanged here, to jump down from the fire-step into a dugout stairway. |