新编英语教程6各单元词汇解释U1 insight: the capacity to gain an accurate and deep instinctive understanding of a situation checkered tablecloth: tablecloth that has a pattern consisting of alternating squares of different colors. chew the cud(slang):think reflectively gnome:(in legends) a little old man who lives underground and guards the earths treasures/a small ugly person melancholy: sad, gloomy，depressed berate: scold or criticize angrily a perverse streak: an obstinate quality ruefully: regretfully drag(slang):a boring thing; nuisance immortality: never-ending life or endless fame U2 cool ones heels :be forced to wait; be kept waiting attest to: testify to; serve as an evidence to affirm/to be proof of apocalyptic: foreboding imminent disaster or final doom proconsul: an administrator in a colony usually with wide powers ruminate: go over in the mind repeatedly and often slowly nattering: chattering; hence; noisy echelon: rank, level fotify: encourage; support reappraisal: re-evaluation academe: the academic community; academics shrink(slang): psychoanalyst or psychiatrist subliminal: existing or functioning outside the area of conscious awareness truism: an undoubted or self-evident truth mellow and marinate: to mellow is to become ripe or fully developed and the marinate is to steep(meat, fish)in a savory sauce to enrich its flavor; here, ripen and mature U3 tangible: substantially real; material custom: business patronage ;the fact of a person or people buying goods or services at a shop/store or business impregnable: unassailable, unattackable; sturdy credit: trust in a persons ability and intention to pay at a later time for goods, etc. supplied dash: vigor in style and action; here means enthusiasm flair: ingenuity and vitality invulnerability: freedom from harm or attack composition: arrangement into proper proportion or relation and especially into artistic form illusory: deceptive preclude: make impossible U6 assumption: sth. taken for granted; supposition crave for: long for; desire eagerly humdrum: lacking variety; dull immerse: involve deeply; absorb transmute: change; transform physiological pressures: irritation; annoyance; affliction vexation: illness; discomforts seminal: having possibilities of future development; highly original and influencing the development of future events inordinate: excessive compatible with: able to exist together thrive on: enjoy and do well as a result of stave off: keep off; prevent in time U7 lamely: weakly, unsatisfactorily paradoxical: seemingly self-contradictory; incongruous; puzzling seductive: attractive; charming pedagogical: teaching wary: heedful; careful on the defensive: prepared for disapproval or attack demeaning overtones: implications of humiliation vestiges: traces that have once existed but exist no more to the detriment of: to the harm of throes: a condition of agonizing struggle or effort: upheaval narcissism: excessive admiration of oneself obligation: duty; social requirement that compels one to follow a certain course of action fretful: irritable; complaining pass muster: be accepted as satisfactory depreciation: a disparaging or a belittling act or instance censure: an expression of blame or disapproval preen: adorn or trim(oneself)carefully interminable :endless U8 multitudinous: very numerous, existing in great numbers lust: overwhelming desire or craving orgy: excessive indulgence in any activity; wild festivity pitch: point, level, degree texture: quality; structure of a substance deliberate fasting: eating little or no food on purpose bludgeon: force sb. into (doing sth);beat blow-out(slang):a large, usu. lavish, meal indulgence: great satisfaction; gratification of desires homage: honor or respect; reverence paid gorge: stuff/fill oneself completely with food impotence: powerlessness; ineffectualness U10 plight: condition, state, or situation; esp. an unfavorable one as often as not: at least half the time; frequently articulate: using language easily and fluently; having facility with words a coveted fellowship: a fellowship that everyone longs jealously to possess allegorically: figuratively gibberish: talk or writing containing many obscure, pretentious, or technical words; meaningless or unintelligible talk or writing providentially: fortunately; luckily inexorably: inescapably profundity: profound or deep matters grapple with: try to deal with U12 virtual: in essence or effect though not formally recognized or admitted poignant: deeply moving chivalry: qualities that knights in the western countries in the middle ages were expected to have, such as courage, honor, loyalty obeisance: submission or obedience to a fault: to an extreme degree groove: set way of doing sth tenacity: perseverance burgeoning: thriving fidelity: loyalty, faithfulness in ones debt: under obligation to one