18
votes
What does this Peter Sellers sentence mean?
I'd like to bahn dahn and 'arken unto 'im
I'd like to go down and listen to him.
'arken/harken/hearken in this sense is 'listen'. It's not a past tense form of hark, though it looks like one.
I have [...
- 1,089
6
votes
Accepted
What is the meaning of 'to summon the future'?
One of the definitions provided by M-W is:
to call into being through the use of one's inner resources or powers
So the sentence
One man cannot summon the future.
means that a man cannot call the ...
- 32k
5
votes
What does this Peter Sellers sentence mean?
I don't quite have it, but I hear
I'd like to bah dahn and 'arken unto 'im
Note that Sellers was speaking in a Yorkshire accent, and relating words said by his grandfather, perhaps deliberately hard ...
- 20.1k
2
votes
Meaning of "bring them away" in Shakespeare's "Measure for Measure" (Act2, scene1)?
Not exactly. It is the usual difference between take and bring. If he had said “take them away”, it would have been a demand that the people in question be separated from him and removed to another ...
- 28.3k
1
vote
What is the difference between “scream” and “shriek”?
Screaming is generally active. It is something one would 'do' to another, or even to themselves (Stop screaming at me, already!)
Shrieks are more reactive, brought about by genuine surprise, alarm, ...
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