Hi, everyone. And welcome back to《词源考古研究所》 It Means What?

So 安澜 with the silly voice again.

Yes. Hi, everyone.

Hi. What are we going to talk about today? Which word or which phrase are we going to focus on to explore its origin?

Today, I thought we could focus on “steal someone's thunder”.

Thunder. You mean like thunder lightning?

That's it.

就是打雷吗? “偷走某人的雷”。 Sounds a bit weird. It's not mythological, is it?

No. It's sounds a bit of a weird phrase. But that's what we're gonna talk about today. We can talk about its story. But first of all, what does it actually mean? So to steal someone's thunder means to take credit for someone else's idea or to undermine their success.

No, hang on a minute. So these two are two slightly different meaning. So the first one ‘to take credit for someone's idea’, for example, if I say my boss takes credit for my idea, this means it's my thoughts, but he or she claims it to be their own. That is take credit就抢别人的功劳. Or did you say undermine?

Yeah. So undermine someone's success or someone's achievement.

To undermine means to make whatever they have achieved seems smaller or insignificant.

Exactly. So a good example is in the UK, during a wedding, people have to be very careful when they go to a wedding because they don't want to steal the bride's thunder. So they don't want to dress in something that is even more attractive or even more expensive than the bride.

Is that why all the, like the bridesmaids’ dresses are sometimes super ugly or bland?

Exactly.

Unflattering.

Because they don't want to steal the bride's thunder.

所以伴娘不能...其实中文叫”抢风头”。We also use like a weather references like风头. But where does.

it come from? Why is it thunder?

The phrase comes from the early 18th century when a playwright, so someone who writes plays.

剧作家.

John Dennis, he invented a new method for creating the sound of thunder on stage for his play.

I would imagine that was before all of these high techy electrical sound system.

Exactly, this is the 18th century. So for example, they would use things like cannons, actual real cannons.

炮吗？ for thunder? It is not a bit exaggerated?

It's a little bit dangerous. That's how the first Globe Theatre burned down because they let off the cannon. And also they would use other special effects like pig’s blood in a bladder. So they stab the bladder and out spurts pig’s blood.

So it's this rudimentary props. So, this playwright in 18th century invented a new method to create sound of thunder.

Yeah. Now his play failed. But later he went to a performance of a new play from one of his rivals. And he heard the sound effect being used in his rival’s play. So according to the story, he stood up and shouted in the middle of the performance, “They were stealing my thunder!”

That is typical, isn't it? But then again, I bet his rival argued, well, your play failed, anyway.

Exactly.

So what's the harm of me using it?

So ever since then, that's why we say in English “to steal someone's thunder”. So you can imagine he stood up in the middle of his performance and shouted, you are stealing my thunder!

And the other people, the linguistic experts were like, this is a nice little phrase.

Exactly. Probably there were a few people who wrote dictionaries sitting next to him, so they thought that's a good phrase.

Yeah, I mean, a language, the evolution of language is fascinating. But bringing back to the origin itself, the etymology itself, the whole idea of creating all these sound special effects on stage, as we know it like the sound effect, the special effects of modern days, these are very recent. Think about, I teach Shakespeare, when we were talking about Shakespeare, Shakespeare's time that was earlier than this. I guess they didn't really have any of these. They had to rely on shouting and really melodramatic...

They had basic stage effects, but very basic. Eventually it just got more and more complicated. It also helped that plays were being performed indoors. So it was easier to control the environment.

Yes, because before it was open air, yeah, was open top or open air theatre.

Which is why later Shakespeare plays, they use a lot more special effects, so plays like The Tempest which is all about magic and all about this mysterious island and wizards that has a lot of special effects because it was first performed indoors.

I see. Okay, though so that's like a little bit of history lesson about I guess drama tech. Speaking about sort of the expanded meaning, the figurative meaning of stealing one's thunder. I always remembered the first time I got to learn this phrase was when I was watching Friends. Remember there was this episode where Monica and Chandler when they got engaged, Monica was so happy and that was literally all she wanted. She was shouting to everyone. I'm engaged. I'm engaged. And then she bumped into Rachel kissing Ross. She was so angry. She's like this is my night, it’s supposed to be the night I got engaged, not the night you went back to your ex boyfriend kissing my brother. So you're stealing my thunder.

I vaguely remember that episode, but I do have a confession to make to everybody here, I don't actually like Friends.

That's very, very typical. I mean, it's very typical. I can understand that. It’s a urban myth. But then again, we are dialing it back, stealing one's thunder. Let me try to ask you a question and see how we use this. Have you ever got your thunder stolen?

I would say once or twice at university, or for example, I helped someone with their work with a project and they took the credit for it. So I would say that my classmates sometimes stole my thunder.

Would that actually make you angry? Would you actually confront them?

In that situation, I did. I was rather angry because I did spend a lot of time helping them and the fact that they didn't acknowledge that, I have to admit it did make me rather angry.

Yeah, I mean, either way of stealing my thunder, either it's taking credit for the work I do, or undermine my success, or just stealing my spotlight. That's another word, right? It's also another stage reference. Stealing my spotlight. Spotlight就是舞台聚光灯. 如果你抢走了我的聚光灯, 也是抢走了我的风头.

Exactly.

You know how much of a narcissist I am.

I know. I have noticed.

So if people steal my thunder or steal my spotlight, I would be quite angry.

That's why I would never dare.

You better watch out.

Okay, so I think on that note, we are going to wrap up this episode here. So here's the question for you. Would you get angry or even confront this person if he or she steals your thunder?

Let us know in the comment section.

And also if you have any request for any special words or phrases that you would like to hear us talk about in this segment, leave us comment. We'll see you next time.

Bye.

Bye.

a.

Etymology: The phrase comes from the early 18th century, when playwright John Dennis invented a new method for creating the sound of thunder on stage for his play.

b.

His play failed, but later, when his sound effect was used in another play, he exclaimed that they were "stealing his thunder."