140. Vanish into thin air

Diálogo entreouvido na Academia brasileira de Letras:

- Eu acho que os políticos, de maneira geral, são ladrões, gatunos, larápios,  batedores de carteira, punguistas, trombadinhas, salteadores, assaltantes, mãos-leves, roubadores, ratoneiros, malandrins, malandréus, abafadores, lapinantes, lapins, rapinantes, ladravazes, furtadores, capoeiros, agadanhadores, agafanhadores, pechelingues, ventanistas, rapinadores, pilhantes, pandilheiros e rapaces. Aceita mais uma chávena de chá?

- Obrigado. Sem açúcar, por favor. Para mim, eles não passam de figuras desprezíveis e sórdidas. Verdadeiros vagabundos. E mais: são canalhas, crápulas, patifes, ordinários,  biltres, mariolas, pulhas, pústulas,  vermes, biscas, cafajestes, desbriados, meliantes, sacripantas, safados, salafrários, mequetrefes, calhordas e pilantras

O que Shakespeare diria deles?

140. Vanish into thin air

Tradução: Evaporar-se no ar

Significado: Desaparecer

Fonte: Othello, Ato III, cena 1

Clown: Then put up your pipes in your bag, for I'll away:

Go; vanish into air; away!

Bufão: Então guardai as flautas no saco, pois já me vou:

Ide; evaporai-vos no ar; ide embora!

 Exemplo moderno: Into thin air

We’ve all heard the phrase “to vanish into thin air.” It means to disappear completely from sight or existence.

But if you vanish into thin air, where do you go? And are things actually … thinner there?

Let’s find out.

The American Heritage Dictionary of Idioms describes this term as using “the rarified atmosphere above the earth as a metaphor for an unknown location.”

And the air above the earth is rarified. It’s less dense than the air down here. In fact, 89% of the gases that cushion the earth are in the lowest two levels of our atmosphere—what are called the troposphere and stratosphere. The gases in the top three levels, in contrast, are spread out over a vast area. In other words, the air really is thin up there.

Shakespeare probably didn’t know the details of atmospheric pressure. Yet he introduced this phrase into our language. In The Tempest, the sorcerer Prospero writes of spirits that have “melted into air, into thin air.” (http://www.quickanddirtytips.com, 14 April 2016)