A Comparative Study of English and Chinese Idiom Idioms are the important part of a language. As a language form, idioms has its own characteristic and patterns and are used in high frequency whether in written language or oral language because idioms can convey a host of language and cultural information when people chat to each other. What do idioms mean? Different experts have different opinions and definitions to idioms. Some people consider idioms as quintessence of a language. Others regard them as treasury of a language. These statements in certain degree reflect the idioms' characteristics, but can't be regarded as idioms' definition. It is difficult to give a clear definition to idioms. First, people are often confused with their scope, content and form. Second, experts have different opinions about how to divide idioms from narrow sense and general sense. What kind of language expression really belongs to idioms .All of these causes bring difficulty to define a idiom .Maybe owing to those causes, the word “ idiom” even hasn't been collected in such authoritive reference books as Modern Chinese Dictionary and Cihai(辞海).However, some English Dictionaries give“idiom”a varity of definitions. For example, Longman Active English-Chinese Dictionary (1990) defines an idiom as “a phrase which means something different from the meanings of the separate words”. The concise Oxford Dictionary (2000) gives such a definition as “a group of words established by usage and having a meaning not deducible from those of the individual words ”. Longman Dictionary of contemporary English (1998) gives the definitive “ a phrase which means something different from them meanings of the separate words from which it is formed ”. And Webster's New World Dictionary of the American language (2nd college edition, 1972) gives this definition “an accepted phrase, construction, or expression contrary to the patterns of the language having a meaning different from the language or having a different from the literal”. According to all the above mentioned “idiom” is a phrase or a group of words approved by people and has unique form. Its meaning is different from the literal. In general sense, the scope of English and Chinese idioms includes, set phrase common sayings, proverbs, idiomatic phrases, slang, a two-part allegorical and allusion, and so on. As to English and Chinese idioms, English idioms mainly include:(1) set phrase, idiomatic phrases such as “to have one's head in in clouds”, “the man in the streets”; (2) proverbs such as “many men, many minds”, “No man is born wise or learned”;(3) common sayings “to charge someone an arm and a leg”, “going banana”; (4) allusion such as “much cry and little word ”, “skeleton in the cupboard”;(5) slang “slang off”. Chinese idioms generally include:(1) set phrase especially the four-word set phrases “气贯长虹”，“国泰民安”; (2) proverbs “好事不出门,坏事传千里”; (3) common saying “天下无难事, 只怕有心人”;( 4) allusion “青女素娥”; (5) a two-part allegorical saying “肉包子打狗-有去无回”, and so on. Each nation has its own language， among which idiom is the essence and treasure, and has strong cultural characteristics. Because of idiom’s advantages, having a long history, and a profound moral and strong expression. Idioms often have strong national color and local color. Generally, idioms could be divided into four aspects: set phrases, proverbs, common sayings and a two-part allegorical saying. Just as its scope, English and Chinese idioms come from different fields, including people's thoughts about objective world, human being themselves, philosophy and the life experience, and so on, about people's thoughts about objective world and social law. There are such idioms as: “As brooks make rivers, rivers run to sea. / All rivers run into sea.” (犹如小溪汇成江河, 江河奔向大海。
/ 大江总东去, 时代总向前). And from the following idioms, you can know (1) people's judgment on one's manner and action: “The greatest talkers are the least doers. / Great braggarts are little doers.”(最伟大的空谈家是最渺小的实干家. / 语言的巨人, 行动的矮子.) “ First think, then speak. / Look before you leap.” (先思而后言. / 深思熟虑而后行.) People's experience about society and life:” Life is a comedy to him who thinks and a tragedy to him who feels. /Living without an aim is like sailing without a compass.”(对于明哲善思的人来说, 人生是个喜剧；对于多愁善感的人来说, 人生是个悲剧. / 生活无目的, 犹如航海无罗盘.) (2) citizen's altitude towards national affairs“ Every man has a share of responsibility for the fate of his country.”(国家兴亡, 匹夫有责.) In short, idiom is the sediments of culture and the vital component part of a culture and a language, which is deeply influenced and limited by a culture. Idiom, the essence of a language, is the carrier of a culture. The mass of people is the creator of a language. Starlin had said that if one wants to study a language, one should establish a link between this language, and the people who create and use this language and their cultural history. Most of English and Chinese idioms are created by the masses. Folk common saying is the main source of idioms, such as “百闻不如一见” ( It is better to see once than hear a hundred times.), “人不知, 鬼不觉” (not know by man or perceived by ghosts), “成人之美” (help one accomplish something good). Many English and Chinese idioms created by people during their working and farming, are the true-to-life portraryal of common people's life. Peasants produce idioms about farm work while sailors create idioms about sailing and life on sea. Idioms towards sports and hunting are created by athletes and hunters, and so on. The British live on sailing and fishing, thus there are numerous idioms related to sea fishing, such as “to beep ones head above water (奋力图存, 使免于负责)” “to know the ropes; (懂得秘决, 内行) “ to be over head and ears in debt) 深陷于债务中) in china ,people often praise a man for his good ability in a small village as “小庙里的大菩萨”, but English people praise that man as a big fish in a small pond. The Chinese set phrase “疾风知劲草 ” (sturdy grass withstands high winds) means that strength of character is tested in a crisis and adversity is the measure of a man. There have more similar idiom like this, good pilot is not known when the sea is calm and the water is fair. (天气晴朗和大海平静时看不出好水手). The Chinese idiom “未雨绸缪” (to plough mulberry field and repair the house before it rains) implies that people should make enough preparation before something changes bad. The similar English idioms is “ while it is fine weather, mend your sail”（修帆趁天晴）. As England is an island country, English people are fond sea. They established a dose connection between their life struggle and sea. So you could get many idioms related to sea from their talking. 1.3.1 A Language is not only the means by which people exchange their views each other, but also the medium which human beings reflect the subjective thoughts towards the objective world. Different nations have different living-surroundings and customs, For example, the Chinese translate the idiom “一箭双雕” as “ to shoot two hawks with one arrow”, but the English say “to kill two birds with one stone”. Viewing from a different angle, such different expression toward one same idiom reflects the habit difference of each nation. The westerners are deeply interested in watching horse racing. Therefore, many set phrases derive from this sport. For example, people use “a dark horse” to metaphor the unexpected winner and use “beton the wrong horse” or “back the wrong horse” to describe the man who made a false judgemen or got a wrong choice consequently. Different history produces different allusions. However, different aullsions all over the world are amazingly similar. The Chinese allusion “破釜沉舟” （to break the cauldrons and sink the boats after crossing, to burn ones boats）originate from Historical Records, which means to cat off all means of retreat and to defeat the enemy till one gains the success. The idiom “burn ones boats”, however, derives from a western allusion. In 49 BC, Kaisa, the General of old ancient Roman, commanded the country’s armed forces to attack the Roman city, crossing Kubicon implied that Kaisa declared war to Roman Senior Congress and Pongpei, the most powerful man at that time. After they crossed the Rubicon, Kaisa had proclaimed “We have crossed the Rubicon. We must go forward but never fall back.” Using the idiom to metaphor 破釜沉舟, expressed the meaning that once a man made a decision or an action, he cannot change later. The idiom “to meet one’s Waterloo” derives from a western allusion. In 1815, Napoleon had all but suffered a devastating defeat in waterloo. With this idiom, people describe a man who suffered a complete defeat or an attack. Astonishing parallels can often be found in history. The Chinese allusion “败走麦城” deriving from The Romance of Three Kingdoms by Luo Guanzhong of the early Ming Dynasty, is the same meaning as “to meet one’s Waterloo”. There are many characteristics in English and Chinese idioms. The first one is colorful and vivid in meaning, which is rich and varied. English and Chinese idioms have various rhetoric meaning, such as 明喻(simile) , “like a cat on hot bricks” (像热锅上的蚂蚁)；暗喻（metaphor）“沉鱼落雁之容，闭月羞花之貌”(have features that can make fish sink and birds alight , and looks that can outshine the moon and put the flowers to shame); 借代（metonym）: 老骥伏枥；志在千里(An old steed in the stable still aspires to gallop a thousand Li);回文(chiasmus)：人不犯我，我不犯人；人若犯我，我必犯人。
We will not attack unless we are attacked ;if we are attacked , we will certainly counterattack);倒装（inversion）: “A thousand sails pass by sunken ship, ten thousand saplings shoot up beyond the withered tree ”(沉舟侧畔千帆过，病树前头万木春)There are any other rhetorical means we can’t list one by one here .The second one is similarity in metaphorical meaning. Because people’s experience and thoughts about the world in many quarters are similar, although English culture differs from Chinese culture, there are similarities, even the same between these two cultures. For example, both in the east and the western country, workers have the experience “strike while the iron is hot”(趁热打铁), and nearly all peasants say “As a man sows, so he shall reap”(种瓜得瓜，种豆得豆). Through the struggle with nature both the easterners and westerners have come to know that unity is strength. The following idioms “a bolt from the blue” and “晴天霹雳”, “burn one’s boats” and “破釜沉舟”, “add fuel to the fire” and “火上加油”, and so on, as well versed in connotations well as figures. Unless such circumstances, English and Chinese idioms in usage are interlinked, which is conformed to the structure and form of idiom and faithful to the original figure and characteristic. Just as one word has many synonym words, both English and Chinese idioms have the character of similarity in metaphorical meaning. For example, the English idiom “in for a penny, in for a pound” shows that “一不做，二不休；一旦开始就干到底”；and “to go the whole hog” shows that “全力以赴”； “one may as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb”(犯重罪和犯轻罪都受一样的处罚，不如索性一不做二不休). These idioms are extremely similar in metaphorical meaning. Chines idioms also have this character, such as “一不做，二不休”, “全力以赴”, “一往无前” and so on. The third one is polysemy. English and Chinese idioms have the characteristics of polysemy. The same word or phrase of idioms often has various interpretations. For example, the phrase “looking at” in the sentence “He is looking at the manuscript” has two meaning “to see and red” and “to examine and think over”. So th esentence can be translated into two different sentences: the one is 他在检查手稿，another is 他在看手稿. Another example, the famous sentence “To be or not to be”, deriving from Shakespeare’s play Hamlet, also has two translation forms: “生存还是毁灭”or “存在还是消失”. That’s because the word “be” usually has two meanings: “存在” and “生存”. However, readers can get the concise meaning from the context. There is a close relation between origination of idioms and people’s living-surroundings. Idioms, the carrier of culture and information, are the important part of a language. Generality and particularity coexist in different cultures. Cultural generality reflects cultural similarity and cultural particularity reflects cultural varity. It is the cultural particularity tat causes English and Chinese idioms having strong national and cultural characteristics. Some idioms are apparently in harmony but actually at variance. Idioms, deriving from different living-surroundings, have striking national and cultural color. Since ancient times, Chinese have lived off the land. The agricultural population in China holds the most part of whole population. Peasants accumulate a wealth of experience from farm work which far too many idioms full of agricultural culture rise therefrom, such as 瓜田李下(in a melon path or under a plum tree); 瓜熟蒂落 (when a melon is ripe, it falls off its stem-things are settled once conditions are ripe), and so on. While England is a island country which fishery and navigation historically has a booming development. As a result, many idioms derive from sailing and fishing, such as “struggle not against the stream”; “pull not against the wind”; “a cold fish”, and so on.1.3.2 Different idioms originate from different customs and reflect them. Folk custom, long-established by human being, is a general term of habits, etique, convention and belief and a fixed cultural pattern approved by people. There are numerous English and Chinese idioms about customs. However, owing to the custom difference, although the British and Chinese describe the same thing, there is quite a complete difference. For example , the Chinese often say “红白喜事”（red and white affairs）. They hold that weddings are red (happy) affairs while funerals are white (sad) events. “Red” derived from Han people’s traditional marriage customs. When holding weeding ceremony, the bride wears in red and is carried in a red sedan, lighting red candles in every houseroom, pasting up red paintings, eating red eggs. “Red” is the symbol of happiness and jubilation. “White” originated from the tradition custom that in funeral ceremony, the relatives are dressed in white and with burlap over their shoulders in mourning for deceased people. However, the marriage and funeral custom in western countries is totally different from that of the Han people. In England and American, the bride wear white garment when holding wedding ceremony, because they think that white stands for pure and honest. So “正式婚礼” in English is “white wedding” , among which white is entirely contrary to red in Chinese. As to funeral ceremony, the westerners consider life superior to other. The death of individual life is extremely sad. Where can people find happiness? In order to avoid touching on the sensitive issue, they express “died ”in a roundabout way. For example they usually say “ passing away” or “ kick the bucket” or other euphemisms to stand for “ died ”. 1.3.3 The religion of the Chinese is quite different from that of English. The British and American believe in Christianity, which is a vital part of their national culture and extremely exert an influence even dominates people’s life and daily activity, therefore many idioms related to Christianity rise therefrom. For example , the sentence “ Man shall not live by bread alone , but by every word that proceeded out of the mouth of God ” (人不能靠面包过活，还要靠发自上帝的每个旨意生活) , quoted from Bible. Matthew, implies that human need not only material life but also spirit life. There are many other idioms such as “ God forbid ”, “ He that serves God for money will serve the devil for better wages.” and so on. However, in China people are deeply influenced by Buddhism. The set phrases deriving from Buddhism hold more than ninety per cent among foreign words. Take the following digital idioms for example : 一 尘 不 染 , 二 佛 升 天 , 三 世 轮 回 , 四 大 皆 空, 五 体 投 地 , 六 根 不 净, 七 手 八 脚, 八 共 得 水 , 九 泉 之 下 . Thus from those, we can know, different idioms reflect different religions. In any country, the national characteristics are reflected not only in the native language, but also in the connotation of the national culture. Idiom, as a particular language form, has different symbolic meaning. The same object has different, even completely contrary meaning between English culture and Chinese culture. For example, dragon in Chinese culture is the symbol of authority, regarded as a mascot. The word “dragon” is a commendatory term. From the following idioms, you can understand fully “望子成龙”（long to see one’s son become dragon - long to see one’s son succeed in life）“龙驹凤雏” （dragon colt or young phoenix - a brilliant young man）. On the contrary, dragon in English culture is the symbol of evil, often regarded as a fierce and brutal beast. The slang “chase the dragon” refers to the drug addicts. Another example, dog is usually the symbol of base and sordid men in Chinese culture. Thus “dog” is a derogatory term in Chinese mind. People often say狗仗人势（like a dog threatening people on the strength of its master power）, 狗嘴里吐不出象牙（no ivory issues from the mouth of a dog）. However, in English culture, the dog is the guard of a house and the helpful friend of men. In the western countries of mediaeval age, dog was often the symbol of loyalty to feudal lord and faith to marriage. Thus “dog” is a commendatory term in English people’s mind. Usually, people draw an anology between human and dog, such as “every dog has his day”, “a luck dog” and “to teach an old dog new tricks”. The word “dog” is often used as a term of abuse in Chinese culture while in English culture it is used as a term of praise. Owing to the cultural difference, the use of idioms is not encouraged or the learners who have little knowledge about the circumstances under which they are to be applied, nor should one attempt it at the expense of intelligibility, which will ultimately do harm to successful communication .Idioms, the carrier of rich cultural information, are a vital part of language. Because of the cultural difference, English and Chinese idioms have their own characteristics with strong national color. Although generality, to a certain extent, exist in between English and Chinese idioms, there has particularity in language expression, cultural intension as well as in origin and usage。