| 释义 |
maladroit, a.|ˈmælədrɔɪt|
[a. F. maladroit: see mal- and adroit a.]
Wanting in adroitness or dexterity; awkward, bungling, clumsy.
1685Cotton tr. Montaigne i. xxiv. (1711) I. 179 When he comes back from School..there is nothing so aukward and maladroit. 1731in Bailey vol. II. 1845 Carlyle Cromwell (1871) IV. 79 Maladroit ship-carpenters. 1848Clough Amours de Voy. i. 205 My bookish and maladroit manners. 1898J. E. C. Bodley France II. iv. iv. 380 The fortunes of a maladroit faction.
Hence ˈmaladroitly adv., ˈmaladroitness.
1673Dryden Marr. à la Mode ii. i, Doing all things so mal a droitly [sic]. 1781Justamond Priv. Life Lewis XV, II. 212 His maladroitness was soon the cause of his Sovereign's losing the castles. 1827Carlyle Misc., Richter (1869) 4 They rather testify, however maladroitly, that the Germans have felt their loss. 1862Merivale Rom. Emp. xlv. (1865) V. 318 With his usual maladroitness, the terms he used were such as seemed to imply a feeling of jealousy. |