| 释义 |
large as/larger than life, as larger than lifeMore important, impressive, or exciting than the average person or thing. Celebrities are always larger than life to their fans. Have you seen the new stadium? It really seems like it's larger than life when you're inside.See also: larger, life*large as lifeFig. in person; actually, and sometimes surprisingly, present at a place. (*Also: as ~.) I thought Jack was away, but there he was as large as life. Jean was not expected to appear, but she turned up large as life.See also: large, lifelarger than lifeFig. [of someone] having an aura of greatness, perhaps not supported by the real person. Perry seemed larger than life to those who had only read about him. To the rest of us, he was a boor. To the children, the star athlete who spoke at the school assembly seemed larger than life.See also: larger, lifelarge as lifeAlso, larger than life. See big as life. See also: large, lifelarge as life BRITISH, AMERICAN or big as life AMERICANIf you say that someone is somewhere, large as life, you mean that you are surprised and sometimes shocked to see them there. And now she was back, large as life, to claim her inheritance. Amos walked big as life into the diner and took his time over the menu.See also: large, lifelarger than life BRITISH, AMERICAN or bigger than life AMERICANCOMMON If you describe someone as larger than life, you mean that they have a very strong personality and behave in a way that makes people notice them. She was larger than life yet intensely human, brilliant yet warm. He's bigger than life, and she's quiet and humble. Note: Larger-than-life is often used before nouns. John Huston was a larger-than-life character, whose temperament was as dramatic as any of the characters in his own films.See also: larger, lifelarge as life (of a person) conspicuously present. informal This expression was originally used literally, with reference to the size of a statue or portrait relative to the original: in the mid 18th century Horace Walpole described a painting as being ‘as large as the life’. The humorous mid 19th-century elaboration of the expression, large as life and twice as natural , used by Lewis Carroll and others, is still sometimes found; it is attributed to the Canadian humorist T. C. Haliburton ( 1796–1865 ).See also: large, lifelarger than life 1 (of a person) attracting attention because their appearance or behaviour is more flamboyant than that of ordinary people. 2 (of a thing) seeming disproportionately important. 1996 Face I feel that Keith from The Prodigy has been your best cover this year—he is London, in your face, loud and larger than life. See also: larger, life(as) large as ˈlife (humorous) used of somebody who is seen in person, often unexpectedly: I thought she’d left the country, but there she was, large as life, in the supermarket!See also: large, lifelarger than ˈlife looking or behaving in a way that is more interesting or exciting than other people, and so is likely to attract attention: He’s one of those larger than life characters.See also: larger, lifelarge as/larger than life, asLife-size, appearing to be real; on a grand scale. The first expression may be an English version of a much older Latin saying, ad vivum, or “to the life.” It dates from the late eighteenth century, when it appeared in Maria Edgeworth’s Lame Jervas (1799): “I see the puppets, the wheelbarrows, everything as large as life.” In the nineteenth century a number of writers not only used the term but added to it, “and quite as natural.” Among them were Cuthbert Bede (1853), Lewis Carroll (in Through the Looking Glass, 1871), and George Bernard Shaw (1893). A similar addition, essentially meaningless, was “and twice as natural.” The second version, larger than life, conveys the idea of being on a grand or heroic scale. A less alliterative form, big as life, is sometimes used.See also: large, larger |