| 释义 |
faceless, a.|ˈfeɪslɪs|
[f. face n. + -less.]
Without a face. †a. Of persons: Lacking face or courage; cowardly; without a (visible) face. Hence anonymous, characterless, without identity. Also transf. and fig. b. Of a coin: Having the device and legend obliterated.
a.1567Sempill Lordis Just Quarrel in Ballates (1872) 30 Quhen faceles fuillis sall not be settin by. 1596Edward III, i. ii. 9 Faceless fear that ever turns his back. 1727–36in Bailey. 1775in Ash. 1865G. Meredith R. Fleming I. xi. 176 Dahlia..lay..with her handkerchief across her eyes... She lay faceless. 1936A. Huxley Eyeless in Gaza xix. 250 Those voluptuous and faceless bodies created by the stylists had actually come to assume Joan's features. 1936M. Mitchell Gone with Wind xix. 331 Always, faceless soldiers stood on the dark porch. 1953N.Y. Times 4 Oct. 15/1 The ‘faceless men’—about 15,000 anti-Communist Chinese and 7,800 anti-Communist North Koreans... In all their wars the Communists have regarded prisoners not as human beings but as hostages and pawns. 1959Observer 28 June 15/1 The Institute of Directors was attacked as a pressure group for industry's ‘faceless men’. 1960Times 28 Sept. 15/4 One of those firms that has grown from a compact community into a sprawling, faceless industrial monster. 1967New Statesman 29 Dec. 902/1 We shall go on being lectured and told to draw in our belts by a faceless and endlessly replaceable body of men whom [sic] we know quite well are not about to do anything very important with the money we save for them. 1970Times 4 May 8/5 In Brussels..as in Bonn, where there are a surprising number of faceless men, his warmth, genuine jollity and readiness to learn were refreshing.
b.1855Fraser's Mag. LI. 272 Specimens of the bronze coinage of the later empire..mostly trite and faceless, as a farthing of the reign of George III.
So ˈfacelessness.
1950Sat. Rev. Lit. 21 Oct. 14 Joe Saul appears in the hospital..as only a voice and a white facelessness. 1961Times 20 Dec. 7/1 It [sc. a production of Macbeth] claps a mask of facelessness on a tragedy. |