to live in a hovel
1
8.4
- phrasal verb
:
vivir en un tugurio
- They struggled to find a better place to live in a hovel that was infested with pests.
Examples
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You'll just be a whore, living in a hovel.
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* * They turned me away and did not give a reason * * I'm back in the fields for the next planting season * * I live in a hovel my cupboard is stark * * I work in the fields every day till its dark * * The noblemen say it's the price I must pay * * For them and their soldiers to kick me all day
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I live in a hovel.
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We're living in a hovel in Menlo Park.
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She would live in a hovel and dress in rags.
Fiction book (2002) -
Once he remarked that he was the only member of the family who did work and that without him they would all live in a hovel?
Academic text (1990) -
You demean the dreams of goddesses and queens, but this king lives in a hovel in Jamaica, Queens.
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* I live in a hovel my cupboard is stark * * I work in the fields every day till its dark * * The noblemen say it's the price I must pay * * For them and their soldiers to kick me all day * * When I was a boy my da' said take the sword * * You'll capture some lands, and you'll be your own lord
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Many families are forced to live in a hovel due to rising housing costs.
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After losing his job, he had no choice but to live in a hovel without running water.
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'to reside in very poor accommodation' is directly and compositionally derived from combining 'live' (to inhabit) with the locative preposition 'in' and 'a hovel' (a dirty, poorly constructed home). This is a literal, non-idiomatic locative construction that maps transparently onto the meanings of its parts and is cross-linguistically common, so a B1 learner who knows the constituents will understand it.
Etymology
The phrase live in a hovel comes from the word hovel, which once meant a very small, dirty hut with no comforts. Picture someone living in that tiny, messy shelter to see why the phrase means 'to live in very poor or uncomfortable housing'.