英语词汇brevity is the soul of wit的起源、历史背景-英语词源词典

brevity is the soul of wit. “Since brevity is the soul of wit, and tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes, I will be brief,” Polonius says in Hamlet. But Shakespeare did not mean wit in the sense of a witty remark when he wrote this. He used wit here in its older meaning of “wisdom,” and what Polonius is really saying is that wise men know how to put things succinctly—which the Bard knew was a dramatically ironic thing for a windy chap like Polonius to say. The newer meaning of wit was known in Shakespeare’s time; he himself used it in Much Ado About Nothing: “They never meet but there’s a skir- mish of wit between them.” Yet “brevity is the soul of wit” meant “brevity is the soul of wisdom” for many years before it took on its present, universal meaning. Swinburne’s “An Epi- gram” (1802) is both witty and wise:

词汇	brevity is the soul of wit
词源	brevity is the soul of wit. “Since brevity is the soul of wit, and tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes, I will be brief,” Polonius says in Hamlet. But Shakespeare did not mean wit in the sense of a witty remark when he wrote this. He used wit here in its older meaning of “wisdom,” and what Polonius is really saying is that wise men know how to put things succinctly—which the Bard knew was a dramatically ironic thing for a windy chap like Polonius to say. The newer meaning of wit was known in Shakespeare’s time; he himself used it in Much Ado About Nothing: “They never meet but there’s a skir- mish of wit between them.” Yet “brevity is the soul of wit” meant “brevity is the soul of wisdom” for many years before it took on its present, universal meaning. Swinburne’s “An Epi- gram” (1802) is both witty and wise: What is an Epigram? A dwarfish whole, Its body brevity, and wit its soul.
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