Name: English Tutor Nick P Prepositionsal Phrase (5) With Bated Breath
Uploaded: 2019-10-07T04:07:14.000Z
Duration: 2 min 34 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

Hi this is Tutor Nick P and this is prepositional phrase five. The  prepositional

phrase today is "with bated breath. " Okay.  Let's take a look at the note here. If

someone does something with bated breath,  he or she does it

eagerly and with great anticipation. You know,  very excitedly waiting for it or

almost like holding their breath waiting for it to happen. So that's what means. It

suggests that one is holding ones breath in suspense or fear. So they're probably

like (bated breath sounds ) kind of like that. That would be like with bated breath. You know just

before something happens. So they're they're holding their breath waiting.

Waiting to hear something. All right.  Let's continue. The word "bated " in this

phrase is from an older abbreviated form of "abate"  which we still have. It's a

formal word,  but we still have the word abate today which means to become less in

intensity or less extreme. So it's really your breath which is actually coming

less in intensity. Because you're kind of (bated breath sounds )  kind of holding it like that. The origin

of the phrase comes directly from Shakespeare's,  Merchant of Venice.  Spoken

by the character , Shylock who was actually the bad guy in the play.

Shakespeare is given credit for coining this term. Okay. All right. And let's just

give several examples here. Example number one. That hopeful actress waited

with bated breath as they were about to announce the winner of the Best Actress

Award. And you know obviously she's probably one who was nominated for the

award. So she's looking in anticipation excited and (bated breath sounds ) you know,  just before they

they announced it. Or number two. Fans looked on with bated breath as the

basketball went through the hoop to score the winning shot and win the

championship. So maybe somebody right at the last minute,  the last second the ball

is in the air and it's going around ...  especially if it circles around the hoop and

falls through. They're like (bated breath sounds)  you know,  and in

anticipation hoping that it goes through.  Or number three here. Yeah. With bated

breath,  she listens intently you know,  very seriously as her boyfriend proposed

to her okay. Good. So anyway,  I hope you got it. I hope  it was clear. I  hope it was

informative . Tank you for your time.  Bye-bye.