| 释义 |
Rolls-Royce|rəʊlz ˈrɔɪs|
[Name of the manufacturing company.]
1. A Rolls-Royce motor car.
1908Trade Marks Jrnl. 26 Feb. 300 Rolls Royce... Motor cars and chassis included in this class. Rolls Royce, Limited, Cooke Street, Hulme, Manchester; Motor car manufacturers. 1915‘I. Hay’ First Hundred Thousand xiii. 173 Not long ago he was..driving a Rolls-Royce for a Duke. 1932D. H. Lawrence Last Poems 256 Do you hear my Rolls Royce purr, as it glides away? 1936J. B. Priestley Walk in City i. 5 So he popped into a long black Rolls-Royce. 1958[see bish]. 1975Sunday Times 16 Nov. 44/3 The electric oven..had a dark glass front like a pop star's Rolls-Royce.
2. fig.
a. Any product considered to be of the highest quality.
1916W. A. Robson Aircraft in War & Peace xi. 161 None of the different machines made for these specialised purposes..will compare with the best pleasure aeroplane, the Rolls-Royce of the air. 1923A. Bennett Things that have interested Me II. 107 The Row was flanked by processions of nun-like nursemaids pushing single prams and double prams—the Rolls-Royces of the pram-world. 1957A. MacNab Bulls of Iberia ii. 28 The famous Murubes of old. Principal herd of main-line Vistahermosa. The ‘Rolls-Royce’ of taurine breeds. 1974Daily Mail 24 Aug. 12/6 A lustrous Isphahan—the finest are the Rolls-Royces of rugs—size 6ft. by 4ft. might take two women two years to complete, and the value would be {pstlg}1,800. 1977New Yorker 19 Sept. 92/2 There was a nine-foot Bechstein—which many people feel is the Rolls-Royce of pianos—but when she opened the lid she found a mouse inside, eating the felt.
b. attrib. passing into adj.
1951H. Hastings Seagulls over Sorrento in Plays of Year 1950 IV. i. 45 Wot the 'ell's a bloke like 'im with a Rolls Royce accent..want to get mixed up in this mob for? 1960Sunday Express 6 Nov. 16/6 Stanley Baker's rugged style has put him up in the Rolls-Royce class of actors. 1961Partridge Dict. Slang Suppl. 1251/2 A bit Rolls Royce in his ideas. 1974Daily Tel. 7 June 16 Vintage port— the Rolls-Royce end of the trade—accounts for only about one per cent. of port production. 1977Times 23 Dec. 14/1 Norman Royce..disclaimed any pretensions to a ‘Rolls-Royce performance’, as a speaker.
Hence (nonce-wds.) Rolls-ˈRoyced a. travelled in a Rolls-Royce; Rolls-ˈRoyceless a., without a Rolls-Royce, devoid of Rolls-Royces; Rolls-ˈRoycey a., suggestive of a Rolls Royce; exceedingly wealthy.
1918G. Frankau One of Them iii. 29 And the shrill cycle-bell's first tintillations Resounded from the dawning to the dark In a Rolls-Royceless, Peter Pan-less Park. Ibid. xxi. 162 For scarce a score of Rolls-Royced miles away..Miss Parker sat. 1926D. H. Lawrence Let. 7 July (1932) 664 He was very nice; and apparently rich, too rich: Rolls-Roycey. |