Bulgaria´s Revenge for Turkish lavatory in Brussels!

[vera_j]

http://www.novinky.cz/clanek/159613-bulhari-vraci-uder-za-entropu-svejk-kali-na-cr.html
I laughed a lot,Svejk fouls CR...Well, I think the quotation is "hoisted by our own petards"?
I am not sure in you are familiar with Jaroslav Hašek´s novel "Good Soldier Svejk"  but someone there is very, very witty!!!:-)
Um...I wonder if this will go further? :-) 

Comments

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Hahaha, good one! And I love the good soldier Svejk. :-)

[vjezkova.livejournal.com]

It is still topical :-)

[watervole.livejournal.com]

"hoist by your own petard" indeed.

I haven't read Svejk, but I'm glad you reminded me of it as I heard a bit serialised on the radio recently and thought it sounded like fun. I've just added it to my list of books to read.

[vjezkova.livejournal.com]

It must have been extremely difficult to translate! There are so many special words, situations, connections. And - there are real people as a base for the main characters in the novel, real places too.

[hafren.livejournal.com]

Oh yes, that novel is well known here, though it's a long time since I read it.

[vjezkova.livejournal.com]

*Grins*

[entropy-house.livejournal.com]

*grin* Good for them!

The phrase as I've heard it nearly always uses 'hoist' and 'petard' when used as an incomplete phrase. And nearly always is in that form even when referring to past actions applying to groups, as in 'we'd been hoist by our own petard'.

'Hoisted by our own petard' can be read as either 'We *were* hoisted by our own petard' or 'We *are being* hoisted by our own petard'. The second one would imply that the action is in progress and might be prevented (such as if a business has made a decision which will cause them trouble unless they reverse it.)

It is *possible* to say it as you've done, but I believe it sounds less natural.

[vjezkova.livejournal.com]

*Grins* Fortunately the sense was still there... :-)

[entropy-house.livejournal.com]

Oh, yes, it was perfectly understandable. I wouldn't have mentioned it, except that I thought you'd find it interesting.

English has a lot of 'invisible' things- incomplete phrases with parts 'understood'. Prepositions are also very difficult to explain as they often are colloquially used to do *strange* things.

For example, being 'locked up' can be (if used in the sense of a person in jail) very similar to a 'lock down' (when the jail's on high security), but being 'locked out' (not able to get access to a place, or to information) and 'locked in' (which can mean trapped in a physical place or unchangeable situation- as in 'the travel dates are locked in') have very different meanings. And then there's 'locked away' (kept in a secure place).

And then there are words that are spelled and sound exactly the same but have different origins so their meanings bear no relation at all. Such as 'lock, stock, and barrel' which is a phrase meaning 'complete- as in all the parts' and refers to the parts of an old type of firearm.

And then there are totally confusing things such as'slowing up' and 'slowing down' meaning exactly the same!

Ok, I had fun with that. :^)

[reapermum.livejournal.com]

The phrase comes from Shakespeare.

Hoist is to be pulled or pushed up. A petard is a small bomb (for blowing open a door etc) or firework. So the whole phrase means Blown up by your own bomb

Just thought you'd like to know that.

[vjezkova.livejournal.com]

Thank you very much! Although Shakespeare in not taught properly here together with the quotations, I discovered after reading a lot of sci-fi zines and other stuff, that Shakespeare is quoted every time, also Alice in Wonderland adn number of English classics:-) So I knew about this one - but I will be always grateful for any enlightening!

[entropy-house.livejournal.com]

Ah! That sounds familiar, in a vague way. Thank you. :^)

[vjezkova.livejournal.com]

Ah, hahaha, so YOU had fun! Well, these pretty expressions are a nightmare for most of us who struggle to learn English. They are known as "phrasal verbs" and apart from some that have somehow remained in my head, there is no hope I would remember more! You are so kind, I appreciate every chance to discover something but, to my chagrin, I will not be able to put it down without a dictionary (even WITH it).
Funny, I also tend to remember lots of a/idiotic b/vulgar c/strange etc words but not the standart ones :-)
I also confess that I learned a great amount of my vocabulary from TOS Star Trek books and later on almost only from TOS zines, B7 zines, and now Sharpe books. I sometimes shake my head over myself! But...I really love English!
Thank you!!!!!