beggar description难以形容
something beggars description指某物分外美丽、与众不同,难以用言语去形容。如:
The calmness of the sea in the evening light beggared all description.
静谧的大海在夜光的映衬下分外美丽。
这一表达出自莎士比亚的戏剧《安东尼和克莉奥佩特拉》(Antony and Cleopatra )第2幕第2场中安东尼的朋友伊诺巴柏斯(Enobarbus)之口:
The barge she sat in, like a burnish’d throne,
Burn’d on the water; the poop was beaten gold,
Purple the sails, and so perfumed, that
The winds were love-sick with them, the oars were silver,
Which to the tune of flutes kept stroke, and made
The water which they beat to follow faster,
As amorous of their strokes. For her own person,
It beggar’d all description …
她坐的那艘画舫就像一尊
在水上燃烧的发光的宝座;舵楼是用黄金打成的;
帆是紫色的,熏染着异香,
逗引得风儿也为它们害起相思来了;桨是白银的,
随着笛声的节奏在水面上下,
使那被它们击动的痴心的水波加快了速度追随不舍。
讲到她自己,
那简直没有字眼可以形容……
[译者按]译文引自朱生豪译、方重校《安东尼和克莉奥佩特拉》,见《莎士比亚全集》(十),北京:人民文学出版社,1978年,第35页。