Reader question:

Please explain “saving grace” in this passage:

Her first thought was that he had left. And then she thought that maybe he has never been at all, that she had dreamed him, that he had no flesh or blood, existed only as a thought she had thought, a wish she had wished, a saving grace she had imagined to keep between herself and the thing she sensed in the shadowed distance.

My comments:

While we’re not at all clear what that “thing she sensed in the shadowed distance” is, we can be pretty sure what “a saving grace” means here – something great in strength and especially redeeming power.

Whether “he” has been and has left or just had been a dream, “he” now serves one single function – something for her to back on for strength and comfort. “He” is a “saving grace”, something that makes her feel wholesome and complete, without whom her life – at least her mind – would not have been, well, all well.

To exaggerate: “He” is the saving grace that prevents her life from becoming a total disgrace.

Now, definitions. “Saving grace” comes from God.

Not directly, for goodness sake, but from Christians who talk of God’s great redeeming power.

Grace refers to “God’s grace”, in other words God’s great, inexhaustible, unconditional love, benevolence, protection and of course, redeeming power – to resurrect the dead and to pardon sins and to, for instance, let sinners make a triumphant comeback from disgrace to renewed respectability, authority, fame and power. You might say God’s saving grace is what Tiger Woods, among others, is currently seeking.

Anyways, you may be forgiven to understand “saving grace” as something that saves you from being a disgrace, supposing you fully understand what a total disgrace is.

This is a rather simplistic way to sum up, but I think you – and I – may very well be able to get away with it.

Here are recent media examples of “saving grace”:

1. The possibility of a 2010 climate bill in the United States is looking bleak but, ironically, the delay may emerge as a saving grace for climate legislation. Senate Democrats and Republicans are at an impasse on current versions of the proposed bill. However, according to analysts and industry insiders speaking at the first major post-Copenhagen energy and environment conference this week, a lack of enthusiasm for addressing emission reductions through the stick of EPA regulation may flip the negotiation dynamics in a positive direction.

- Senate impasse not the end for climate laws, CarbonPositive.net, February 5, 2010.

2. Toyota has some 8 models in recall over this defective accelerator assembly; 4 million or so cars, worldwide. Hopefully, for them, they can fix the problem and move on, literally (and still be able to stop;...pun intended). It will be interesting if the defective part was, in fact, built at some plant in Indiana. That part is still in question - one saving grace for auto workers and the American business in general. Foreign car makers, like Toyota, began building cars here sometime in the 1980s. After so many years of building quality automobiles, it would be ironic if the first huge recall by a foreign car maker would be the result of a defect found to be the result of an American parts company. Whether it would be their fault or if Toyota itself had defective specifications, will be the key question.

- Toyota’s PR nightmare, Examiner.com, February 1, 2010.

3. The 14th Congress was punctuated by the investigation of the NBN-ZTE scandal and its cover-up. The President claimed executive privilege just when damaging testimony was to be given. Without legislation that could have defined the parameters of executive privilege, the Supreme Court upheld her on this untested doctrine. This was the low point for transparency and accountability in this government. The passage of the Freedom of Information Act will be a saving grace that would add to the merit side of this government’s scorecard when history judges it.

There are only three more session days before Congress adjourns for the campaign period. As this government draws its last breath, it would do them good to reflect on the words of John Newton’s evangelical hymn:

Amazing grace how sweet the sound

That saved a wretch like me!

I once was lost, but now am found

Was blind but now I see.

I join the “Right to Know. Right Now!” campaign in calling on Congress to ratify the Bicameral Conference Committee Report on the Freedom of Information bill and to transmit it to the President for approval.

- Business Matters: Saving grace, Alberto A. Lim, Philippine Daily Inquirer, January 30, 2010.

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。

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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.

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（作者张欣 中国日报网英语点津 编辑陈丹妮）