кукиш в кармане

• КУКИШ В КАРМАНЕ (показывать кому; ФИГА <ДУЛЯ> В КАРМАНЕ all highly coll, derog

[NP; sing only; fixed WO]

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⇒ an expression of disagreement, censure, threat etc made in a cowardly manner, not to s.o.'s face:

- thumbing one's nose at s.o. behind his back;

- giving s.o. the finger behind his back.

     ♦ В пятьдесят четвёртом году ко мне в руки попала первая самиздатская... тетрадка - поэма Твардовского "Тёркин на том свете". Многое сразу же запомнила наизусть, читала везде, и у Гидашей тоже. У них вместо радости, с которой встречали эти строки мои предшествующие слушатели, холодный душ. Агнеса олимпийски спокойная и олимпийски непогрешимая: "Что тебе тут нравится? Кукиши в кармане. Интеллигентская фронда" (Орлова 1). In 1954 the first samizdat... manuscript found its way into my hands: Tvardovsky's poem Tyorkin in Hell. I memorized a great deal of it at once and I [recited] it everywhere, at the Hidases as well. Instead of the joy with which my earlier listeners had greeted these verses, they expressed their cool indifference. With Olympian calm and Olympian infallibility Agnessa said: "What appeals to you here? He's just thumbing his nose behind their backs. Nothing but petty intellectual opposition" (1a).