riding crop / halter

Yoko Ogawaの "Hotel Irish"を読んでいます。
ロシア語の翻訳をしている老人が現在翻訳中の小説に出てくるMarieについて語っているところです。

"She has finally met the riding master. They are embracing in a corner of the stable. He has his riding crop in his hand. A horse whinnies softly, shaking its halter. Straw rustles at their feet A ray of sunlight cuts through the darkness, and then they..."

馬小屋にいるので、"riding crop" も "halter" も乗馬や馬に関する言葉ですね。（脱線しますが、馬小屋を指す "stable" は相撲部屋の意味でも使われますね。）まず "riding crop" を調べます。
・Collins Dictionary: a short whip with a thong at one end and a handle for opening gates at the other: He wore a tweed jacket, riding breeches, boots, and a silk scarf at his throat, and he carried a riding crop.

次に "halter" を調べます。
・Collins Dictionary: A halter is a piece of leather or rope that is fastened round the head of a horse so that it can be led easily.: He grabbed the front ox by the halter and yanked hard at it.

この後、突然老人は豹変します。

cabbage moth

Yoko Ogawaの "Hotel Irish" を読み始めました。海岸近くにあるHotel Irishで騒動を起こした老人の客は、近くの小島に住んでいて毎週日曜日に買い物等で町にやって来ると言う。ホテルの所有者の娘で、そこで働いているMari(１７歳、多分主人公)は町の花時計のある広場にその老人に会いに行きました。（小説でしか考えられない設定ですが）

He brushed a blade of grass from the bench. When he notied a cabbage moth hovering around the flowerrs at his feet, he pulled back his legs to avoid disturbing it. There were age spots on his hands, and the knot of his tie sunk into the wrinkles on his neck. His face was ordinary, but his ears were remarkable.

"cabbage moth" は "moth" が付いているので蛾を連想しますが、花時計があるような場所なので蝶の一種の気がします。辞書には "cabbage moth" の項目は無かったので辞典を見ました。

Wikipedia: The cabbage moth (Mamestra brassicae) is primarily known as a pest that is responsible for severe crop damage of a wide variety of plant species. The common name, cabbage moth, is a misnomer as the species feeds on many fruits, vegetables, and crops in the genus Brassica (i.e. cabbage, broccoli, Brussels sprouts).
Note: The small white butterfly is commonly called the "cabbage moth" in North America.

Wikipedia: Pieris brassicae, the large white, also called cabbage butterfly, cabbage white, cabbage moth (erroneously), or in India the large cabbage white, is a butterfly in the family Pieridae. It is a close relative of the small white, Pieris rapae.

写真を見ると "cabbage moth" は本当は蛾ですね。しかし、注にあるように "white butterfly" を "cabbage moth" と誤って呼ぶ米国人が多いので、 "Hotel Irish" の "cabbage moth" はモンシロチョウを指していると推測します。　いつか日本語の原本で確認したいと思います。


追記（10/8/2022）：　小川洋子著『ホテル・アイリス』を借りて 'cabbage moth' が出て来た箇所だけを探して読みました。　該当の箇所は「足もとの花に寄って来る紋白蝶」となっていました。やはり「蛾」ではありませんでした。

the whole shebang

Reader's Digest 7/8月合併号の記事 'The Best Sandwich in Every State' からの引用です。

CALIFORNIA
French dip
Two Los Angeles eateries, Philippe's and Cole's, each claim to be the birthplace of this barguette sandwich with roast beef. The whole shebang then gets dunked in the beef's jus (French for gravy).

"shebang" は見かけない単語ですが、辞書を見ると古くは他の意味もあったようですが、現在では "the whole shebang" で使われるだけの様です。

・Oxford English Dictionary: A matter, operation, or set of circumstances.: I even had to buy a new case/box/container to fit the whole shebang into.
・Collins Dictionary: a situation, matter, or affair (esp in the phrase the whole shebang)
・Cambridge English Dictionary: the whole of something, including everything that is connected with it: The wedding's next week, but my parents are taking care of the whole shebang.
・Vocabulary.com: A shebang is a thing or a group, used in the phrase "the whole shebang." When your teacher says the test will cover the whole shebang, she means everything you've studied is fair game.

bad blood

Page Turnersシリーズの小説 "Bad Blood" を読みました。多読本なので難しい単語は全く使われていませんが一つだけ気になった表現があったのでそれを取り上げます。題名にもなっている "Bad Blood" の章から引用します。

Jay went toward Tony. "Think about it," he said. "Louie put Wu in jail for fifteen years. There's a lot of bad blood between them. Of course he wanted to get him! And he found the cruelest way. He found you!"

"bad blood between them" の箇所の "them" はJayの父であるLouieとLouieの目撃証言により刑務所に入り、つい最近出所したWuを指しています。　WuがLouieを恨んでいるのは分かりますが、"between them" となっているのが気になります。

・Oxford English Dictionary:　Ill feeling.: there has always been bad blood between these families
・Collins English Dictionary: If you say that there is bad blood between people, you mean that they have argued about something and dislike each other.: There is, it seems, some bad blood between Mills and the Baldwins.
・Cambridge English Dictionary: feelings of hate between people because of arguments in the past: There has been bad blood between the two families for years.

なるほど、二人の間のことだけではなく二つの家の間の関係を示しているのですね。

Fish Lover

Reader's Digest 7/8月合併号の記事 'LIFE in these United States' からの引用です。
Our goldfish died. When I told my five-year-old son we had buried it in the garden, he burst into tears. I was trying to think of how to explain how all living things die when he tearfully said, "I wanted to eat it!"
アメリカ人には珍しく魚好きな子でした。

lotus eater's dream

O. Henryの短編小説 "Madam Bo-Peep, of the Ranches" を読んでいます。

Came the long, hot season from May to September, when work is scarce on the ranches. Octavia passed the days in a kind of lotus eater's dream. Books, a hammocks, correspondence with a few intimate friends, a renewed interest in her old water-colour box and easel--these disposed of the sultry hours of daylight.

"lotus eater's dream" の意味を調べます。 辞書には "lotus-eaters" 又は "lotus-eater" の項目で次の説明がありました。
・Oxford English Dictionary: A person who spends their time indulging in pleasure and luxury rather than dealing with practical concerns.: life as a lotus eater in sunny climes appears to be well and truly over
・Collins Dictionary: Greek mythology: one of a people encountered by Odysseus in North Africa who lived in indolent forgetfulness, drugged by the fruit of the legendary lotus
・Dictionary.com: a person who leads a life of dreamy, indolent ease, indifferent to the busy world; daydreamer.
ギリシャ神話から来た表現なのですね。

hubris

７月に辞任した大統領一族による長年の悪政により、中国に借金漬けにされ、コロナで主産業の観光も撃滅、ついには国家破産したスリランカはロシアに助けを求める状況は世界の他の国にとっても良くない方向に向かっている。そのスリランカに関するThe Japan Times 7/16/2002 OPINION面の記事 "The fall of the house of Rajapaksa" から引用します。

Through a combination of authoritarianism, nepotism, cronyism, and hubris, the Rajapaksa family weighed down Sri Lanka’s economy with more debt than it could possibly bear.

"nepotism" も "cronyism" も縁故主義ですが、"hubris" は何でしょう？　辞書を見ます。
・Oxford English Dictionary: Excessive pride or self-confidence.: the self-assured hubris among economists was shaken in the late 1980s
・Collins Dictionary: If you accuse someone of hubris, you are accusing them of arrogant pride.: It was an act of hubris that was to cost him dear.
・Cambridge English Dictionary: a way of talking or behaving that is too proud: He was punished for his hubris.

専制的な政治を行う人間に特徴的な性格・態度ですね。

head calls

Reader's Digest 6月号の記事 'Humor in UNIFORM' からの引用です。
In basic training, our drill instructor made it clear that everything we recruits used belonged to her. For instance, she referred to our foot lockers as "my trash," and the racks where we slept as "my racks."
One time when we were all whispering in the bathroom while making "head calls," she surprised us by yelling, "Why do I hear voices in my head?"
"head calls" は兵隊さん達の俗語の様ですが、気になるので調べます。
普通の辞書には "head calls" の項目はありませんが、俗語の場合に頼りになるのが次の辞書です。
・Urban Dictionary: U.S. Marine Corps- to relieve oneself of urine and or feces in a designated location such as the head (restroom): Good morning sir. This recruit requests to permission to speak to the Drill Instructor. This recruit would like to request permission to make a head call.
-Frickin darn head call?! Now?! Are you getting ready to soil yourself?

"head" は俗語でトイレの意味で、これは普通の辞書にも掲載されていました。
・Oxford English Dictionary: Nautical: A toilet or bathroom on a boat or ship.: they were cleaning out the heads
・Collins Dictionary: Nautical a toilet, or lavatory
・Cambridge English Dictionary: (nautical) The toilet of a ship.: I've got to go to the head.

なるほど、それで "drill instructor" が "I hear voices in my head" と言うのが可笑しい落ちになるのですね。

MIA

Reader's Digest 6月号の記事 'HOW TO Stop Losing Your Stuff' からの引用です。
Her angst is probably familiar to anyone whose phone is MIA a dozen times a day, or who can't find the TV remote until ten minutes after a favorite show has been.

略語 "MIA" を調べます。
・Oxford English Dictionary: short for missing in action: the elderly mother of an MIA soldier
・Collins Dictionary: MIA is used to describe members of the armed forces who do not return from a military operation but who are not known to have been killed or captured. MIA is an abbreviation for 'missing in action'.: He was listed as MIA.
・Wiktionary:
(military) Initialism of missing in action.: When his patrol didn't come back from the front, he and all his buddies were listed as MIA.
(by extension) to be absent for a long time.: My friends have been MIA today.

元々は行方不明の兵士を指していた言葉ですが、Reader's Digestの例は人ではなく携帯電話やリモコンですよ！