| 释义 |
kvetch U.S. slang.|kvɛtʃ|
Also kvetsch.
[Yiddish kvetsh, ad. G. quetsche crusher, presser.]
A term of personal abuse: spec. a person who complains a great deal, a fault-finder. Also ˈkvetcher.
1964S. Bellow Herzog (1965) 61 She's got a disgusting father and a kvetsch of a mother. 1964W. Markfield To Early Grave (1965) xi. 187 There was Ozzie Waldman, Ozzie the kvetch. For his favor you could die. He gave away nothing. 1966New Society 12 May 9/2 The idiom of the New Yorker—Gentile or Jew—..has a lot of Yiddish words, like schlepp.. shiksa and kvetsch. 1968L. Rosten Joys of Yiddish 200 What a congenital kvetcher! Ibid., It will take forever, he's such a kvetch. 1970S. Ellin Man from Nowhere xix. 94 A bagger [i.e. investigator] should not dress so conspicuous that even these old kvetchers around here turn and look.
Hence as v. intr. [ad. Yiddish kvetshn], to complain, to whine; so ˈkvetching vbl. n.
1965Holiday July 98 The Beatles..came along in the middle of a wave of kvetching—songs constantly stressing the negative. 1968Atlantic Monthly Oct. 70 He is an amiable one, not given to angry kvetching. 1971Harper's Mag. Feb. 111 After listening to Kashouk kvetch for a couple of hours, Sol Hurok..put the question direct. ‘Tell me, Kashouk,’ Hurok wanted to know. ‘If you always lose so much money, why do you stay in business?’ |