花樣say no，教你委婉拒絕

有時我們需要拒絕別人但no又很難說出口。事實上，英文中還有很多詞可以用來表達否定的意思，讓你say “no”不再重複。

1. No 不

Let’s start with the easy one. No dates to Old English.

讓我們從簡單的開始。No可以追溯到古英語。

2. uh-uh  啊；哼

The imitative uh-uh is first found in its written form in the 1920s.

書面形式的uh-uh在1920年代首次出現。

3. Nix 拒絕；不行

Originally Victorian slang, nix can be compared withthe earlier German nix, which is a colloquial shortened form of nichts (‘nothing’).

最初是維多利亞時代的俚語，與德語中的nix相近，是nichts(其含義爲nothing“沒什麼”)的口語縮寫形式的。

4. nixie / nixy / nixey  不

And it wasn’t long until this slang term was given a –y/-ie suffix, used to form pet names and familiar diminutives.

沒多久，這個俚語添加了-y/-ie後綴，用來作寵物姓名和熟人的暱稱。

5. nope 不

The earliest sense of nope was actually another name for the bullfinch, used in the early 17th century –but fast forward to the the late 19th century and nope is being used for no, with an apparently arbitrary extension, at around the same time that yep began being used for yes.

實際上，在17世紀早期，Nope最早的含義是紅腹灰雀（bullfinch）的別名。但到19世紀末期時，nope被用來表達no的意思（不），相似地，大約在同一時間，yep開始被用於表達yes（是）的含義。

6. nay 不；拒絕

This form of no is particularly characteristic of Northern English. In origin it is a borrowing from early Scandinavian (cf. Icelandic nei). You could once also nick with nay –that is, ‘answer in the negative’.

Nay的使用是英國北部語言的特徵。早期起源於北歐冰島的nei。你可以用nay來表達否定的含義。

7. nah

A non-standard spelling of no, nah is often used when representing southern English pronunciation, particularly cockney speech

非標準拼寫，常用作南方發音的代表，特別是倫敦音。

8. no way 決不；一點兒也不

Though decried as slang by some, no way (for ‘no’) has a long history, dating back at least as far as the 18th century.

有人認爲這個表達只是俚語表達，但no way有很長的發展歷史，可以追溯到18世紀以前。

9. no way, José 拒絕；決不

It’s not entirely clear why José is added to this expression, other than the obvious novelty of the rhyme. Its history (unsurprisingly) is far shorter, with the current earliest known use dating only to 1979.

no way後面添加José的原因還並不清楚，但發音更加舒適。這個用法出現的時間較短，最早的使用是在1979年。

10. negative  否定，拒絕

If you’re feeling in a military frame of mind, you can say negative instead of no (as opposed to affirmative for yes). This probably started as a way of saying ‘no’over the radio with as much clarity as possible.

如果你內心崇尚軍事，你可能會說negative而不是no（對應的肯定詞爲yes）。這可能由於在廣播中採用negative來表達否定含義，因爲negative比no更清晰。

11. veto 否決；禁止

Veto joins that group of Latin words  that are used as everyday parts of English. Literally translating as ‘I forbid’, this is a fairly commanding way to show your disapproval of a scheme.

Veto來源於日常拉丁詞彙。按字面翻譯爲“我禁止……”，這是一個相當強硬的方式表明你反對某個計劃。

12. out of the question 不可能

Originally meaning ‘beside the point, not relevant to the matter under discussion. One of the earliest uses of this later sense comes from Eliza Haywood’s The History of Betsy Thoughtless: ‘A marriage with miss Betsy was, therefore, now quite out of the question with him’.

最初的意思是“離題，與正在討論的問題無關的”。out of the question作爲“不可能”最早出自伊麗莎海伍德的作品《貝琪的粗心歷史》中:“因此，他和貝特西小姐結婚是不可能的。

13. no siree

You would be right in thinking that siree here is derived from sir —ultimately it is, but it developed as a variant of sirrah (much used in Shakespeare), which (in turn) was formed directly from sir with a (perhaps arbitrary) suffix, as a term used when addressing men or boys with contempt.

Siree源於sir，sir是sirrah的變體，sirrah又sir和後綴（可能是arbitrary）組成，用來表示對男性的輕蔑。

14. for foul nor fair 不可能

Putting opposites together to cover a spectrum is a pretty good way to indicate that something isn’t going to happen: this one can be found as far back as Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales.

將反義詞放在一起表達一些不會發生的事是非常好的方式:這個用法最早可以追溯到喬叟的《坎特伯雷故事集》。

15. not on your life 一點也不；絕對不行

This emphasizes your reluctance to comply with a request –that, even if the requester’s life was at stake, you’d still be a hard pass.

這個俚語強調你不願遵守某一個請求——即使請求者有生命危險，你也不願意服從。

16. not on your Nelly 絕對不

The British expression not on your Nelly, in its earliest incarnation in a 1941 issue of the New Statesman . Not on your Nelly is just another way of saying not on your life.

not on your Nelly是英式表達，這個表達最早出現在1941年發行的《新政治家》上。Not on your Nelly是not on your life的另一種表達。

17. not on your tintype

Atintypewas a photograph taken as a positive on a thin tin plate but also found its way into this phrase, which dates to at least 1900.

Tintype最初指的錫版照相法，後在大約1900年以前Tintype在短語中也有應用，。

18. not for all the tea in China絕不可能

This phrase, despite drawing on Britain’s national obsession, is actually originally from colloquial Australian English.

英國人很傾向於用這個短語，但這個短語源於澳大利亞口語。

19. not in a million years 絕不可能

People haven’t been using it for quite a million years, but it certainly dates back over a century.

這個短語的使用可以追溯到一個世紀以前，但已經很久沒什麼人使用了。

20. under no circumstances 決不

For avoidance of doubt, this one pretty much covers all bases. Circumstance was originally a noun of action or condition, in the singular, but is now usually pluralized.

爲避免產生歧義，你可以用這個詞組來表達堅決的否定。起初詞組中的circumstance用的是單數，但現在都是用複數形式了。

21. not likely 不見得；不會

Although you’re probably in complete control of the likelihood or otherwise of something happening if you say not likely, it’s an option for dismissing someone’s suggestion with a bit of sass.

如果你說not likely，你可能對事情的可能性及發生的事有一定把握。如果有人提了無禮請求，可以用這個詞拒絕。

22. not for Joe 決不

The phrase not for Joe, meaning ‘not on any account’, dates from the mid-19th century and appears to use Joe as a non-specific person (although the phrase may have originally arisen from the name of the 18th-century comedian Joe Miller, and a popular jest-book published after his death）.

短語not for Joe意思爲not on any account “決不”，可以追溯到19世紀中葉，當時joe並不代表具體的個人，(儘管這個詞可能最早出現是由於18世紀的喜劇演員喬•米勒，一個受歡迎的笑話集在他去世後出版）。

23. thumbs down  拒絕

Turning the thumb down is, of course, a gesture intended to indicate disapproval or rejection –and the term can be used figuratively for the same thing; i.e. a substitute for no –but it’s got a somewhat muddled history. The earliest uses of thumbs down and thumbs up relate to ‘the use of the thumb by the spectators in the ancient amphitheatre’–but in these instances, thumbs up would indicate rejection.

當然將大拇指反轉向下的手勢表示反對或拒絕，這個短語可以用來代替no——但短語的來源歷史卻比較混亂。最早使用拇指向下指的是“古劇場中觀衆大拇指指向”。但是，在這些情況下，大拇指向上意味着拒絕。

24. pigs might fly 不可能

Pigs (we hate to break it to you) don’t fly, andpigs might fly, pigs have wings, and similar expressions are used to indicate impossibility or incredulity. The first known use, in this way, of pig’s grounded behaviour is not quite synonymous with no –but has the distinction of being found in Alice’s Adventures of Wonderland: ‘‘I’ve a right to think,’said Alice sharply…‘Just about as much right,’said the Duchess, ‘as pigs have to fly.’’

豬當然是不會飛的，類似的pigs might fly, pigs have wings地表達用來表示“不可能；懷疑”。第一次爲衆所周知的以豬的行爲作比喻的用法是在《愛麗絲夢遊仙境》中，愛麗絲說：“I've a right to think（我有權思考）”。公爵夫人回答了一句“Just about as much right as pigs have to fly”（對，這個權利就像豬在天空飛翔一樣）。

25. not a cat (in hell)’s chance  沒有機會

If you think the pig did badly, the cat fares even worse: as far back as Grose’s Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue in 1796, he cited ‘No more chance than a cat in hell without claws; said of one who enters into a dispute or quarrel with one greatly above his match’. Its application now is, of course, rather wider than disputers and quarrellers.

如果你認爲豬的表現力不夠，那貓的表現更糟:早在在1796年，格羅斯的俗語詞典中，他以“No more chance than a cat in hell without claws;來比喻一個人進入一個對手遠比自身強大的爭議或吵架之中。當然，現在的應用更廣泛，不僅僅運用在爭吵中。

26. fat chance  機會很小

Fat chance is an ironic use of the adjective fat in its sense ‘a large amount, a great deal’. Interestingly, this sense seems only to be used ironically, implying ‘very little, hardly anything’.

Fat chance是形容詞fat的諷刺用法。Fat chance原意爲“大量的”，有趣的是，通常都含有諷刺意味，表示“很少；幾乎沒有”。

27. catch me!

Catch me! and catch me at it! are also suggestive of their opposite: that is, that the interlocutor would never be able to catch the person at it, since it (whatever ‘it’is) wouldn’t happen. The sense of catch being used is ‘to come upon suddenly or unexpectedly’, which is also still used in sentences such as ‘I catch myself speaking like my mother’.

Catch me和catch me at it（抓住我）有時也表達相反的含義：表示對方並不能發現某人在某方面的真實狀況（it可指具體的方面），暗指這件事不會發生。Catch在這裏的含義爲“偶然發現、無意中發現”。這種含義現在仍然使用，例如“I catch myself speaking like my mother”。（我突然發現我和我媽媽的說話語氣很像）。

28. no fear  不

Fear here originally meant ‘ground or reason for alarm’, though even in its earliest uses (including a 16th-century translation of Psalms) it appeared chiefly in (there is) no fear –that is, that there is no grounds for alarm. The usual sense now is as an informal but definite no.

這裏的fear最初表示“驚慌/恐懼的原因和根據”，在最早的使用中（16世紀的詩篇翻譯），no fear—“沒有原因和根據的驚恐”。現在no fear 是no的非正式表達。

29. go fish 拒絕

Go fishis an American card game, usually played by children, in which each player in turn asks an opponent for a particular card and is told to ‘go fish’from the undealt deck if denied. The term has taken on broader use as a playful way of saying no.

Go fish是美國紙牌遊戲，通常由兒童參與，每位玩家輪流向對手要特定的牌，如果對方拒絕給牌就會說“go fish”，後來這個說法被廣泛使用來代表示一種玩笑式的“no”。

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