alive: [OE] Alive comes from the Old English phrase on life, literally ‘on life’. Līfe was the dative case of līf ‘life’; between two vowels f was pronounced /v/ in Old English, hence the distinction in modern English pronunciation between life and alive. => life
c. 1200, from Old English on life "in living." The fuller form on live was still current 17c. Alive and kicking "alert, vigorous," attested from 1859; "The allusion is to a child in the womb after quickening" [Farmer]. Used emphatically, especially with man; as in:
[A]bout a thousand gentlemen having bought his almanacks for this year, merely to find what he said against me, at every line they read they would lift up their eyes, and cry out betwixt rage and laughter, "they were sure no man alive ever writ such damned stuff as this." [Jonathan Swift, Bickerstaff's Vindication, 1709]
Thus abstracted as an expletive, man alive! (1845).
双语例句
1. It's an affront to human dignity to keep someone alive like this.
如此维持一个人的生命是对人类尊严的冒犯。
来自柯林斯例句
2. The big factories are trying to stay alive by cutting costs.
大型工厂正试图通过削减成本以维持生存。
来自柯林斯例句
3. I never expected to feel so alive in my life again.
我怎么也没想到自己会再一次这样活力焕发。
来自柯林斯例句
4. She made history come alive with tales from her own memories.
通过讲述自己记忆中的故事，她把逝去的岁月变得生动起来。
来自柯林斯例句
5. To remain together was like volunteering to be flayed alive.
