| 释义 |
prompter|ˈprɒm(p)tə(r)|
Also 5 -ar(e, -owre, 7 -or.
[f. prompt v. + -er1.]
One who prompts.
1. One who moves or incites to action; an instigator, mover.
c1440Promp. Parv. 415/1 Promptare, or he þat promp⁓tythe (v. r. promptowre), promptator. a1548Hall Chron., Hen. VI 176 The Mayre aunswered that he..neded neither of prompter, nor yet of Coadiutor, either to defend or gouerne the citie. 1637Nabbes Microcosmus iii. i, Come my best prompter, with indeavours wings Let's cut the ayre. 1722De Foe Col. Jack (1840) 244 The devil is..a..prompter to wickedness, if he is not the first mover of it. 1875Buckland Log-bk. 130 No greater prompter of good fellowship.
2. a. One who helps a speaker or reciter by supplying him, when at a loss, with a name, word, or something to say.
1592Greene Groat's W. Wit (1617) 13 He stoode like a trewant that lackt a Prompter. 1657W. Morice Coena quasi κοινὴ xv. 188 The very season was a kinde of prompter to remember them of that. 1661Papers on Alter. Prayer Bk. 77 We pray without a Monitor or promptor because we do it from the heart, or from our own breast. 1870Anderson Missions Amer. Bd. II. xi. 90, After two or three years, she was able to spell out her words without a prompter.
b. spec. Theatr. A person stationed out of sight of the audience, to prompt or assist any actor at a loss in remembering his part. Also Comb. in possessive, as prompter's bell, box, copy, table = prompt-bell, -box, -copy, table s.v. prompt n. 2 b.
1604Shakes. Oth. i. ii. 84 Were it my Cue to fight, I should haue knowne it Without a Prompter. 1710Steele Tatler No. 193 ⁋2 A Letter from poor old Downes the Prompter, wherein that Retainer of the Theatre desires my Advice. 1874Burnand My Time xvii. 144 Everybody being more or less inaudible, with the solitary exception of the Prompter.
1812C. Mathews Let. 20 Jan. in A. Mathews Mem. Charles Mathews (1838) II. viii. 187, I..never did believe (nor will I, till I hear the prompter's bell) that Drury would be played in next winter. 1895W. Archer Theatr. World 1894 369 Where, at the stroke of the prompter's bell, a new world is revealed to the delighted sense.
1775F. Abington Let. in Private Corr. D. Garrick (1835) II. 32 Begging leave to sit in the prompter's box. 1870E. L. Blanchard Diary 23 Mar. in Scott & Howard Life E. L. Blanchard (1891) II. 381 Adelphi; Byron's new four-act drama of The Prompter's Box: A Story of the Footlights and the Fireside.
1770A. Murphy Let. 20 Sept. in Private Corr. D. Garrick (1831) I. 399 Having the prompter's copy in my drawer for above two years past.
1834W. C. Macready Diary 10 June (1912) I. 152, I came up and was first at rehearsal; from the prompter's table I wrote a hasty note to R. Price. 1889J. L. Toole Reminisc. I. i. 29, I was sitting at the prompter's table, when I heard a voice at my elbow. |