各位新老学员们,欢迎来到《可可说法话茬》教室。
本期课题:今天,我们的目标是用英文来正确表达下面这个意思:别把价抬得太高,否则会把顾客吓跑的。
课题详解:那么在众多说法中,有一个是这样的:Don't put your prices too high or you'll frighten the customers to go off.
这个说法的对与错,咱们暂且不论。请先跟我来学习一个词语的用法。这个词语是我们近期来一直在讨论和学习的及物动词:frighten。与之相关的两个短语:frighten off和frighten away。这两个短语的意思完全相同。它们的意思是:To frighten someone away or frighten them off means to make them nervous so that they decide not to become involved with a particular person or activity. 翻译为:吓跑某人就意味着是他们感到紧张害怕以至于他们决定不参与某个活动,或与某人打交道。请看下面的这个例句:
The government is convinced that the bombers want to frighten away foreign investors. 政府确信炸弹袭击者的目的是想吓跑外国投资者。
在上面的例句中,可以看到是用frighten off/away来表达“吓得某人不敢参与某个活动或与某人打交道”。那么,我们回看今天的课题句子:Don't put your prices too high or you'll frighten the customers to go off. (别把价要的太高,否则会把顾客吓跑的。
句中使用到的谓语结构是frighten sb to do something,是使用动词不定式来做宾语customer的补足语。在frighten的所有用法中,没有使用动词不定式来做宾语补足语的现象。
因此,根据要表达的意思——别把价要的太高,否则会把顾客吓跑的。正确的说法是:Don't put your prices too high or you'll frighten the customers off. 或者是Don't put your prices too high or you'll frighten the customers off.
本期习题:请将下面的中文翻译为英文。
建屋互助协会收回未偿清房贷的住房,这吓退了很多买家。
参考翻译答案:Building society repossessions have frightened buyers off.