пройти через огонь и воду и медные трубы

• ПРОЙТИ (СКВОЗЬ <ЧЕРЕЗ, И> ОГОНЬ И ВОДУ <ОГНИ И воды> (И МЕДНЫЕ ТРУБЫ) coll

[VP; subj: human; usu. past; the verb may take the final position, otherwise fixed WO]

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⇒ (of a person who, in the course of a difficult or complex life, has acquired vast life experience; occas. of a person with a tarnished reputation, undiscriminating sexual experiences etc) to experience, endure much:

- X прошёл огонь и воду (и медные трубы) ≈ X has been (gone) through fire and water;

- X has survived fire and water;

- X has been through the mill (through it all, through hell, through the wringer);

- X has been there and back;

- [in limited contexts] there's nothing X doesn't know.

     ♦ Осталась она [при немцах] потому, что как пострадавшая от Советской власти ждала себе от немцев много хорошего и, пройдя огни и воды и медные трубы... решила, что и здесь не пропадёт (Рыбаков 1). She had stayed behind because she thought that, as someone who had suffered under Soviet rule, she could do well for herself with the Germans, and as she had already survived fire and water...she thought she would survive this, too (1a).

     ♦ Её [Одинцову] не любили в губернии... рассказывали про неё всевозможные небылицы, уверяли, что она помогала отцу в его шулерских проделках... "Прошла через огонь и воду", - говорили о ней (Тургенев 2). She [Madame Odintsov] was not popular in the province:...all sorts of impossible stories were invented about her: it was asserted that she had helped her father in his gambling escapades. ...'There's nothing she doesn't know," they said of her... (2c).