confound

Word family

con·found /kənˈfaʊnd/ verb [transitiveT]

1 SURPRISEDto confuse and surprise people by being unexpected 〔因出乎意料〕使困惑；使驚訝

His amazing recovery confounded the medical specialists.

他的神奇康複使醫學專家感到驚訝。

2 to prove someone or something wrong 證明…有錯

confound the critics/pundits/experts etc

United’s new striker confounded the critics with his third goal in as many games.

聯隊的新前鋒以三場比賽的三個進球讓批評者目瞪口呆。

3. formalBEAT/DEFEAT to defeat an enemy, plan etc 挫敗〔敵人、計劃等〕

4 formalNOT KNOW if a problem etc confounds you, you cannot understand it or solve it 〔問題等〕把…難住，使不知所措

Her question completely confounded me.

她的問題把我徹底難住了。

5. confound it/him/them etc ANNOY old-fashioned used to show that you are annoyed with someone or something 討厭，該死

Examples from the Corpus

confound it/him/them etc• And if Callie confuses them, Mona confounds them.• Placed there to confront and confound him.• She summons Deronda and pours out her desire to be what he wants, her inarticulate misery confounding him.• Use their expectations and then confound them.• Hell and the devil confound it, this was his home!

Examples from the Corpus

confound• I think they are absolutely confounding.• Henry Kissinger was also confounded and frustrated by the Communists during his secret negotiations with them.• Even travel agents are confounded by the logic of airline ticket pricing.• The traditional monument has tended to confound gender politics.• The close score after 12 games confounds pre-match predictions that Kasparov would win this time by a large margin.• He has utilized the pictorial logic of the photograph to confound rather than to clarify space.• Dan's speedy recovery confounded the medical experts.• The simple memory span measure confounds these variables.• Parental education will be confounded with social class and it is therefore important to consider them jointly.

confound the critics/pundits/experts etc• Thus did ordinary children confound the experts.

Origin confound