常時英心:言葉の森から 1.0

約10年間,はてなダイアリーで英語表現の落穂拾いを行ってきました。現在はAmeba Blogに2.0を開設し,継続中です。こちらはしばらくアーカイブとして維持します。

doggerel

Umeさん、Koyamamoto先輩のfollow-upになります。プロボクシングの元世界ヘビー級チャンピオンのモハメド・アリ氏が死去された記事からです。

Muhammad Ali, Titan of Boxing and the 20th Century, Dies at 74

Muhammad Ali, the three-time world heavyweight boxing champion who helped define his turbulent times as the most charismatic and controversial sports figure of the 20th century, died on Friday in a Phoenix-area hospital. He was 74.

His death was confirmed by Bob Gunnell, a family spokesman.

Ali was the most thrilling if not the best heavyweight ever, carrying into the ring a physically lyrical, unorthodox boxing style that fused speed, agility and power more seamlessly than that of any fighter before him.

But he was more than the sum of his athletic gifts. An agile mind, a buoyant personality, a brash self-confidence and an evolving set of personal convictions fostered a magnetism that the ring alone could not contain. He entertained as much with his mouth as with his fists, narrating his life with a patter of inventive doggerel. (“Me! Wheeeeee!”)


http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/04/sports/muhammad-ali-dies.html?emc=edit_na_20160604&nlid=61645515&ref=cta

“doggerel”/dˈɔːg(ə)rəl/を取りあげます。『ジーニアス英和辞典』によると「(韻律不整の)へたな詩, へぼ詩」という意味がありました。LDOCEでは“poetry that is silly or funny and not intended to be serious”という定義がありました。記事にある“Me! Wheeeee!”は
ハーバード大学の卒業式に招かれた際に学生を前に話した中で、最後に一言アリが伝えた世界で一番短い詩とされています。「私がいてあなたたちがいる」という意味になりますそうです。(lua)