English 中文网 漫画网 爱新闻iNews 翻译论坛
中国网站品牌栏目(频道)
当前位置: Language Tips> 译通四海> Columnist 专栏作家> Zhang Xin

A steroid-fuelled example

[ 2009-06-16 14:29]     字号 [] [] []  
免费订阅30天China Daily双语新闻手机报:移动用户编辑短信CD至106580009009

A steroid-fuelled exampleReader question:

In this sentence – “At the centre of the Asian development model, with China providing a steroid-fuelled example, were policies aimed at mobilizing high levels of domestic savings and channeling massive investment into productive capacity” – what does “a steroid-fuelled example” mean?

My comments:

It means that the Chinese economy has been growing extra-fast.

Steroid-fuelled? Fuelled by steroids, as cars are fuelled by oil.

“Steroid-fuelled” is a metaphorical expression here – pointing out that the Chinese economy has been powered by steroids, or chemicals that help people improve performances.

In other words, if the Chinese economy were viewed as a person, it would have been taking drugs – performance-enhancing drugs that enable athletes to run faster and jump higher.

In fact, steroids are most often talked about in sports in the form of performance enhancing drugs. They enable athletes to run unfairly faster and jump unfairly higher.

These drug-taking athletes tend to grow impossibly big muscles, too. Ben Johnson, the former 100-meter world record holder for example had such improbable muscles on the shoulders and legs that he looked suspicious to many even before he was stripped of his medals and records.

You may correctly say that Johnson had a steroid-fuelled career.

Anyways, steroid-taking is unfair. And by referring to the Chinese economy as steroid-fuelled, the author might as well suggest that the Chinese economy has been growing at an unfairly fast rate. Unfair because Chinese and other Asian countries have, for instance, political policies that encourages and utilizes higher savings, “channeling massive investment into productive capacity” – while Western economies simply don’t have such luxuries.

Alright, this is what I have to say about this “steroid-fuelled example.

And a good example it is too – keep up with the good work.

本文仅代表作者本人观点,与本网立场无关。欢迎大家讨论学术问题,尊重他人,禁止人身攻击和发布一切违反国家现行法律法规的内容。

我要看更多专栏文章

About the author:

Zhang Xin is Trainer at chinadaily.com.cn. He has been with China Daily since 1988, when he graduated from Beijing Foreign Studies University. Write him at: zhangxin@chinadaily.com.cn, or raise a question for potential use in a future column.

相关阅读:

Pep talk

Smart money

Love to hate

Eleventh hour

 
 
中国日报网英语点津版权说明:凡注明来源为“中国日报网英语点津:XXX(署名)”的原创作品,除与中国日报网签署英语点津内容授权协议的网站外,其他任何网站或单位未经允许不得非法盗链、转载和使用,违者必究。如需使用,请与010-84883631联系;凡本网注明“来源:XXX(非英语点津)”的作品,均转载自其它媒体,目的在于传播更多信息,其他媒体如需转载,请与稿件来源方联系,如产生任何问题与本网无关;本网所发布的歌曲、电影片段,版权归原作者所有,仅供学习与研究,如果侵权,请提供版权证明,以便尽快删除。
 

关注和订阅

人气排行

翻译服务

中国日报网翻译工作室

我们提供:媒体、文化、财经法律等专业领域的中英互译服务
电话:010-84883468
邮件:translate@chinadaily.com.cn