What particularly commended the 1966 season to me wasthat it promised to be a particularly lively one. Various reportsof a new “hard-line approach” by company managements tostockholders had appeared in the press. (I was charmed by thenotion of a candidate for office announcing his new hard-lineapproach to voters right before an election.) The newapproach, it was reported, was the upshot of events at theprevious year’s meetings, where a new high in stockholderunruliness was reached. The chairman of the CommunicationsSatellite Corporation was forced to call on guards to eject bodilytwo badgering stockholders at his company’s meeting, inWashington. Harland C. Forbes, who was then the chairman ofConsolidated Edison, ordered one heckler off the premises13 inNew York, and, in Philadelphia, American Telephone &Telegraph Chairman Frederick R. Kappel was goaded14 intoannouncing abruptly15, “This meeting is not being run byRobert’s [Rules of Order]. It’s being run by me.” (Theexecutive director of the American Society of CorporateSecretaries later explained that precise application of Robert’srules would have had the effect not of increasing thestockholders’ freedom of speech but, rather, of restricting it. Mr.
Kappel, the secretary implied, had merely been protectingstockholders from parliamentary tyranny.) In Schenectady,Gerald L. Phillippe, chairman of General Electric, after severalhours of fencing with stockholders, summed up his new hardline by saying, “I should like it to be clear that next year, andin the years to come, the chair may well adopt a morerigorous attitude.” According to Business Week, the GeneralElectric management then assigned a special task force to thejob of seeing what could be done about cracking down onhecklers by changing the annual-meeting pattern, and early in1966 the bible of management, the Harvard Business Review,entered the lists with an article by O. Glenn Saxon, Jr., thehead of a company specializing in investor16 services tomanagement, in which he recommended crisply that thechairmen of annual meetings “recognize the authority inherentin the role of the chair, and resolve to use it appropriately.”
Apparently17, the theoretical holders of fundamental powerunequalled in the history of the world were about to be put intheir place.
ONE thing I couldn’t help noticing as I went over the scheduleof the year’s leading meetings was a trend away from holdingthem in or near New York. Invariably, the official reason givenwas that the move would accommodate stockholders from otherareas who had seldom, if ever, been able to attend in the past;however, most of the noisiest dissident stockholders seem to bebased in the New York area, and the moves were taking placein the year of the new hard line, so I found the likelihood of arelationship between these two facts by no means remote.
United States Steel holders, for example, were to meet inCleveland, making their second foray outside their company’snominal home state of New Jersey19 since its formation, in 1901.
General Electric was going outside New York State for the thirdtime in recent years—and going all the way to Georgia, a statein which management appeared to have suddenly discoveredfifty-six hundred stockholders (or a bit more than one per centof the firm’s total roll) who were badly in need of a chance toattend an annual meeting. The biggest company of them all,American Telephone & Telegraph, had chosen Detroit, whichwas its third site outside New York City in its eighty-one-yearhistory, the second having been Philadelphia, where the 1965session was held.
To open my own meeting-going season, I tracked A.T.& T. toDetroit. Leafing through some papers on the plane going outthere, I learned that the number of A.T. & T. stockholders hadincreased to an all-time record of almost three million, and Ifell to wondering what would happen in the unlikely event thatall of them, or even half of them, appeared in Detroit anddemanded seats at the meeting. At any rate, each one of themhad received by mail, a few weeks earlier, a notice of themeeting along with a formal invitation to attend, and it seemedto me almost certain that American industry had achievedanother “first”—the first time almost three million individualinvitations had ever been mailed out to any event of any kindanywhere. My fears on the first score were put to rest when Igot to Cobo Hall, a huge riverfront auditorium20, where themeeting was to take place. The hall was far from filled; theYankees in their better days would have been disgusted withsuch a turnout on any weekday afternoon. (The papers nextday said the attendance was four thousand and sixteen.)Looking around, I noticed in the crowd several families withsmall children, one woman in a wheelchair, one man with abeard, and just two Negro stockholders—the last observationsuggesting that the trumpeters of “people’s capitalism” mightwell do some coordinating21 with the civil-rights movement. Theannounced time of the meeting was one-thirty, and ChairmanKappel entered on the dot and marched to a reading stand onthe platform; the eighteen other A.T. & T. directors trooped toa row of seats just behind him, and Mr. Kappel gavelled themeeting to order.
From my reading and from annual meetings that I’d attendedin past years, I knew that the meetings of the biggestcompanies are usually marked by the presence of so-calledprofessional stockholders—persons who make a full-timeoccupation of buying stock in companies or obtaining theproxies of other stockholders, then informing themselves moreor less intimately about the corporations’ affairs and attendingannual meetings to raise questions or propose resolutions—andthat the most celebrated23 members of this breed were Mrs.
Wilma Soss, of New York, who heads an organization ofwomen stockholders and votes the proxies22 of its members aswell as her own shares, and Lewis D. Gilbert, also of NewYork, who represents his own holdings and those of hisfamily—a considerable total. Something I did not know, andlearned at the A.T. & T. meeting (and at others I attendedsubsequently), was that, apart from the prepared speeches ofmanagement, a good many big-company meetings really consistof a dialogue—in some cases it’s more of a duel—between thechairman and the few professional stockholders. Thecontributions of non-professionals run strongly to ill-informed ortame questions and windy encomiums of management, andthus the task of making cogent24 criticisms or askingembarrassing questions falls to the professionals. Though largelyself-appointed, they become, by default, the sole representativesof a huge constituency that may badly need representing. Someof them are not very good representatives, and a few are sobad that their conduct raises a problem in American manners;these few repeatedly say things at annual meetings—boorish,silly, insulting, or abusive things—that are apparently permissibleby corporate rules but are certainly impermissible bydrawing-room rules, and sometimes succeed in giving theannual meetings of mighty25 companies the general air ofbarnyard squabbles. Mrs. Soss, a former public-relations womanwho has been a tireless professional stockholder since 1947, isusually a good many cuts above this level. True, she is notbeyond playing to the gallery by wearing bizarre costumes tomeetings; she tries, with occasional success, to taunt26 recalcitrantchairmen into throwing her out; she is often scolding andoccasionally abusive; and nobody could accuse her of beingunduly concise27. I confess that her customary tone and mannerset my teeth on edge, but I can’t help recognizing that,because she does her homework, she usually has a point. Mr.
Gilbert, who has been at it since 1933 and is the dean ofthem all, almost invariably has a point, and by comparison withhis colleagues he is the soul of brevity and punctilio as well asof dedication28 and diligence. Despised as professionalstockholders are by most company managements, Mrs. Sossand Mr. Gilbert are widely enough recognized to be listed inWho’s Who in America; furthermore, for what satisfaction itmay bring them, they are the nameless Agamemnons andAjaxes, invariably called “individuals,” in some of the prose epicsproduced by the business Establishment itself. (“The greaterportion of the discussion period was taken up by questions andstatements of a few individuals on matters that can scarcely bedeemed relevant.… Two individuals interrupted the openingstatement of the chairman.… The chairman advised theindividuals who had interrupted to choose between ceasing theirinterruption or leaving the meeting.…” So reads, in part, theofficial report of the 1965 A.T. & T. annual meeting.) Andalthough Mr. Saxon’s piece in the Harvard Business Reviewwas entirely29 about professional stockholders and how to dealwith them, the author’s corporate dignity did not permit him tomention the name of even one of them. Avoiding this wasquite a trick, but Mr. Saxon pulled it off.
Both Mrs. Soss and Mr. Gilbert were present at Cobo Hall.
Indeed, the meeting had barely got under way before Mr.
Gilbert was on his feet complaining that several resolutions hehad asked the company to include in the proxy30 statement andthe meeting agenda had been omitted from both. Mr. Kappel—astern-looking man with steel-rimmed spectacles, who wasunmistakably cast in the old-fashioned, aloof31 corporate mold,rather than the new, more permissive one—replied shortly thatthe Gilbert proposals had referred to matters that were notproper for stockholder consideration, and had been submittedtoo late, anyhow. Mr. Kappel then announced that he wasabout to report on company operations, whereupon theeighteen other directors filed off the platform. Evidently, theyhad been there only to be introduced, not to field questionsfrom stockholders. Exactly where they went I don’t know; theyvanished from my field of vision, and I wasn’t enlightenedwhen, later on in the meeting, Mr. Kappel responded to astockholder’s question as to their whereabouts with the laconicstatement “They’re here.” Going it alone, Mr. Kappel said in hisreport that “business is booming, earnings32 are good, and theprospect ahead is for more of the same,” declared that A.T. &T. was eager for the Federal Communications Commission toget on with its investigation33 of telephone rates, since thecompany had “no skeletons in the closet,” and then painted apicture of a bright telephonic future in which “picture phones”
will be commonplace and light beams will carry messages.
When Mr. Kappel’s address was over and themanagement-sponsored slate of directors for the coming yearhad been duly nominated, Mrs. Soss rose to make anomination of her own—Dr. Frances Arkin, a psychoanalyst. Inexplanation, Mrs. Soss said that she felt A.T. & T. ought tohave a woman on its board, and that, furthermore, shesometimes felt some of the company’s executives would bebenefited by occasional psychiatric examinations. (This remarkseemed to me gratuitous35, but the balance of manners betweenbosses and stockholders was subsequently redressed36, at least tomy mind, at another meeting, when the chairman suggestedthat some of his firm’s stockholders ought to see apsychiatrist.) The nomination34 of Dr. Arkin was seconded by Mr.
Gilbert, although not until Mrs. Soss, who was sitting a coupleof seats from him, had reached over and nudged himvigorously in the ribs37. Presently, a professional stockholdernamed Evelyn Y. Davis protested the venue38 of the meeting,complaining that she had been forced to come all the wayfrom New York by bus. Mrs. Davis, a brunette, was theyoungest and perhaps the best-looking of the professionalstockholders but, on the basis of what I saw at the A.T. & T.
meeting and others, not the best informed or the mosttemperate, serious-minded, or worldly-wise. On this occasion,she was greeted by thunderous boos, and when Mr. Kappelanswered her by saying, “You’re out of order. You’re justtalking to the wind,” he was loudly cheered. It was only thenthat I understood the nature of the advantage that thecompany had gained by moving its meeting away from NewYork: it had not succeeded in shaking off the gadflies, but ithad succeeded in putting them in a climate where they weresubject to the rigors39 of that great American emotion, regionalpride. A lady in a flowered hat who said she was from DesPlaines, Illinois, emphasized the point by rising to say, “I wishsome of the people here would behave like intelligent adults,rather than two-year-olds.” (Prolonged applause.)Even so, the sniping from the East went on, and bythree-thirty, when the meeting had been in session for twohours, Mr. Kappel was clearly getting testy40; he began pacingimpatiently around the platform, and his answers got shorterand shorter. “O.K., O.K.” was all he replied to one complaintthat he was dictatorial41. The climax42 came in a wrangle43 betweenhim and Mrs. Soss about the fact that A.T. & T., although ithad listed the business affiliations44 of its nominees45 for director ina pamphlet that was handed out at the meeting, had failed tolist them in the material mailed out to the stockholders, theoverwhelming majority of whom were not at the meeting andhad done their voting by proxy. Most other big companiesmake such disclosures in their mailed proxy statements, so thestockholders were apparently entitled to a reasonableexplanation of why A.T. & T. had failed to do so, butsomewhere along the way reason was left behind. As theexchange progressed, Mrs. Soss adopted a scolding tone andMr. Kappel an icy one; as for the crowd, it was having a finetime booing the Christian46, if that is what Mrs. Soss represented,and cheering the lion, if that is what Mr. Kappel represented.
“I can’t hear you, sir,” Mrs. Soss said at one point. “Well, ifyou’d just listen instead of talking—” Mr. Kappel returned. ThenMrs. Soss said something I didn’t catch, and it must have beena telling bit of chairman-baiting, because Mr. Kappel’s mannerchanged completely, from ice to fire; he began shaking hisfinger and saying he wouldn’t stand for any more abuse, andthe floor microphone that Mrs. Soss had been using wasabruptly turned off. Followed at a distance of ten or fifteen feetby a uniformed security guard, and to the accompaniment ofdeafening booing and stamping, Mrs. Soss marched up the aisleand took a stand in front of the platform, facing Mr. Kappel,who informed her that he knew she wanted him to have herthrown out and that he declined to comply.
Eventually, Mrs. Soss went back to her seat and everybodycalmed down. The rest of the meeting, given over largely toquestions and comments from amateur stockholders, ratherthan professional ones, was certainly less lively than what hadgone before, and not noticeably higher in intellectual content.
Stockholders from Grand Rapids, Detroit, and Ann Arbor47 allexpressed the view that it would be best to let the directorsrun the company, although the Grand Rapids man objectedmildly that the “Bell Telephone Hour” couldn’t be received ontelevision in his locality anymore. A man from Pleasant Ridge,Michigan, spoke48 up for retired49 stockholders who would like A.T.
& T. to plow50 less of its earnings back into expansion, so that itcould pay higher dividends. A stockholder from rural Louisianastated that when he picked up his telephone lately, the operatordidn’t answer for five or ten minutes. “Ah brang it to yourattention,” the Louisiana man said, and Mr. Kappel promised tohave somebody look into the matter. Mrs. Davis raised acomplaint about A.T. & T.’s contributions to charity, giving Mr.
Kappel the opportunity to reply that he was glad the worldcontained people more charitable than she. (Tax-exemptapplause.) A Detroit man said, “I hope you won’t let the abuseyou’ve been subjected to by a few malcontents keep you frombringing the meeting back to the great Midwest again.” It wasannounced that Dr. Arkin had been defeated for a seat on theboard, since she had received a vote of only 19,106 sharesagainst some four hundred million, proxy votes included, foreach candidate on the management slate. (By approving themanagement slate, a proxy voter can, in effect, oppose a floornomination, even though he knows nothing about it.) And thatwas how the 1966 annual meeting of the world’s largestcompany went—or how it went until five-thirty, when all but afew hundred stockholders had left, and when I headed for theairport to catch a plane back to New York.
THE A.T. & T. meeting left me in a thoughtful mood. Annualmeetings, I reflected, can be times to try the soul of anadmirer of representative democratic government, especiallywhen he finds himself guiltily sympathizing with the chairmanwho is being badgered from the floor. The professionalstockholders, in their wilder moments, are management’s secretweapon; a Mrs. Soss and a Mrs. Davis at their most stridentcould have made Commodore Vanderbilt and Pierpont Morganseem like affable old gentlemen, and they can make a latter-daymagnate like Mr. Kappel seem like a henpecked husband, if notactually a champion of stockholders’ rights. At such moments,the professional stockholders become, from a practicalstandpoint, enemies of intelligent dissent51. On the other hand, Ithought, they deserve sympathy, too, whether or not onebelieves they have right on their side, because they are in theposition of representing a constituency that doesn’t want to berepresented. It’s hard to imagine anyone more reluctant toclaim his democratic rights, or more suspicious of anyone whotries to claim them for him, than a dividend-fattenedstockholder—and, of course, most stockholders are thoroughlydividend-fattened these days. Berle speaks of the estate ofstockholding as being by its nature “passive-receptive,” ratherthan “managing and creating;” most of the A.T. & T.
stockholders in Detroit, it seemed to me, were so deeplydevoted to the notion of the company as Santa Claus that theywent beyond passive receptivity to active cupboard love. Andthe professional stockholders, I felt, had taken on anassignment almost as thankless as that of recruiting for theYoung Communist League among the junior executives of theChase Manhattan Bank.
In view of Chairman Phillippe’s warning to General Electricstockholders at Schenectady in 1965, and of the report aboutthe company’s hard-line task force, it was with a sense ofbeing engaged in hot pursuit that I boarded a southboundPullman for the General Electric annual meeting. This one washeld in Atlanta’s Municipal Auditorium, a snappy hall, the rearof which was brightened by an interior garden complete withtrees and a lawn, and in spite of the fact that it was held ona languorous52, rainy Southern spring morning, more than athousand G.E. stockholders turned out. As far as I could see,three of them were Negroes, and it was not long before I sawthat another of them was Mrs. Soss.
However exasperated53 he may have become the previous yearin Schenectady, Mr. Phillippe, who also conducted the 1966meeting, was in perfect control of himself and of the situationthis time around. Whether he was expatiating54 on the wondersof G.E.’s balance sheet and its laboratory discoveries or sparringwith the professional stockholders, he spoke in the samesingsong way, delicately treading the thin line between patient,careful exposition and irony55. Mr. Saxon, in his HarvardBusiness Review article, had written, “Top executives arefinding it necessary to learn how to lessen56 the adverse57 impactof the few disrupters on the majority of shareowners, whilesimultaneously enhancing the positive effects of the good thingswhich do take place in the annual meeting,” and, havinglearned sometime earlier that the same Mr. Saxon had beenengaged by G.E. as an adviser58 on stockholder relations, Icouldn’t help suspecting that Mr. Philippe’s performance was ademonstration of Saxonism in action. The professionalstockholders, for their part, responded by adopting precisely59 thesame ambiguous style, and the resulting dialogue had thegeneral air of a conversation between two people who havequarrelled and then decided60, not quite wholeheartedly, to makeit up. (The professional stockholders might have demanded toknow how much money G.E. had spent in the interest ofkeeping them under control, but they missed the chance.) Oneof the exchanges in this vein61 achieved a touch of wit. Mrs.
Soss, speaking in her sweetest tone, called attention to the factthat one of the board-of-directors candidates—Frederick L.
Hovde, President of Purdue University and former chairman ofthe Army Scientific Advisory62 Panel—owned only ten shares ofG.E. stock, and said she felt that the board should be madeup of more substantial holders, whereupon Mr. Philippe pointedout, just as sweetly, that the company had many thousands ofholders of ten or fewer shares, Mrs. Soss among them, andsuggested that perhaps these small holders were deserving ofrepresentation on the board by one of their number. Mrs. Sosshad to concede a fine stroke of chairmanship, and she did. Onanother matter, although decorum was stringently63 maintained byboth sides, outward accord was less complete. Severalstockholders, Mrs. Soss among them, had formally proposedthat the company adopt for its director elections the systemcalled cumulative64 voting, under which a stockholder mayconcentrate all the votes he is entitled to on a single candidaterather than spread them over the whole slate, and whichtherefore gives a minority group of stockholders a much betterchance of electing one representative to the board. Cumulativevoting, though a subject of controversy65 in big-business circles,for obvious reasons, is nevertheless a perfectly66 respectable idea;indeed, it is mandatory67 for companies incorporated in morethan twenty states, and it is used by some four hundredcompanies listed on the New York Stock Exchange.
Nevertheless, Mr. Phillippe did not find it necessary to answerMrs. Soss’s argument for cumulative voting; he chose instead tostand on a brief company statement on this subject that hadbeen previously68 mailed out to stockholders, the main point ofwhich was that the presence on the G.E. board, as a result ofcumulative voting, of representatives of special-interest groupsmight have a “divisive and disruptive effect.” Of course, Mr.
Phillippe did not say he knew, as he doubtless did know, thatthe company had in hand more than enough proxies to defeatthe proposal.
Some companies, like some animals, have their private, highlyspecialized gadflies, who harass69 them and nobody else, andGeneral Electric is one. In this instance, the gadfly was Louis A.
Brusati, of Chicago, who at the company’s meetings over thepast thirteen years had advanced thirty-one proposals, all ofwhich had been defeated by a vote of at least ninety-seven percent to three per cent. In Atlanta, Mr. Brusati, a gray-hairedman built like a football player, was at it again—not withproposals this time but with questions. For one thing, hewanted to know why Mr. Phillippe’s personal holdings of G.E.
stock, listed in the proxy statement, now were four hundredand twenty-three shares fewer than they had been a year ago.
Mr. Phillippe replied that the difference represented shares thathe had contributed to family trust funds, and added, mildly butwith emphasis, “I could say it’s none of your business. I believeI have a right to the privacy of my affairs.” There was morereason for the mildness than for the emphasis, as Mr. Brusatidid not fail to point out, in an impeccably unemotionalmonotone; many of Mr. Phillippe’s shares had been acquiredunder options at preferential prices not available to others, and,moreover, the fact that Mr. Phillippe’s precise holdings hadbeen included in the proxy statement clearly showed that in theopinion of the Securities and Exchange Commission his holdingswere Mr. Brusati’s business. Going on to the matter of the feespaid directors, Mr. Brusati elicited70 from Mr. Phillippe theinformation that over the past seven years these had beenraised from twenty-five hundred dollars per annum first to fivethousand dollars and then to seventy-five hundred. The ensuingdialogue between the two men went like this:
“By the way, who establishes those fees?”
“Those fees are established by the board of directors.”
“The board of directors establish their own fees?”
“Yes.”
“Thank you.”
“Thank you, Mr. Brusati.”
Later on in the morning, there were several lengthy71 andeloquent orations4 by stockholders on the virtues72 of GeneralElectric and of the South, but this rather elegantly ellipticalexchange between Mr. Brusati and Mr. Phillippe stuck in mymind, for it seemed to sum up the spirit of the meeting. Onlyafter adjournment—which came at twelve-thirty, following Mr.
Phillippe’s announcement that the unopposed slate of directorshad been elected and that cumulative voting had lost by 97.51per cent to 2.49 per cent—did I realize that not only had therebeen no stamping, booing, or shouting, as there had been inDetroit, but regional pride had not had to be invoked73 againstthe professional stockholders. It had been General Electric’s holecard, I felt, but General Electric had won on the board, withoutneeding to turn it up.
EACH meeting I attended had its easily discernible characteristictone, and that of Chas. Pfizer & Co., the diversifiedpharmaceutical and chemical firm, was amicability74. Pfizer, whichin previous years had customarily held its annual meeting at itsheadquarters in Brooklyn, reversed the trend by moving thisyear’s meeting right into the lair75 of the most vocal76 dissenters,midtown Manhattan, but everything that I saw and heardconvinced me that the motivation behind this move had beennot a brash resolve on the company’s part to beard the lionsin their den11 but a highly unfashionable desire to get themaximum possible turnout. Pfizer seemed to feel self-confidentenough to meet its stockholders with its guard down. Forinstance, in contrast with the other meetings I attended, nostockholder tickets were collected or credentials78 checked at theentrance to the Grand Ballroom79 of the Commodore Hotel,where the Pfizer meeting was held; Fidel Castro himself, whoseoratorical style I have occasionally felt that the professionalstockholders were using as a model, could presumably havewalked in and said whatever he chose. Some seventeenhundred persons, or nearly enough to fill the ballroom, showedup, and all the members of the Pfizer board of directors saton the platform from start to finish and answered anyquestions addressed to them individually.
Speaking, appropriately, with a faint trace of a Brooklynaccent, Chairman John E. McKeen welcomed the stockholdersas “my dear and cherished friends” (I tried to imagine Mr.
Kappel and Mr. Phillippe addressing their stockholders that way,and couldn’t, but then their companies are bigger), and saidthat on the way out everyone present would be given a bigfree-sample kit80 of Pfizer consumer products, such as Barbasol,Desitin, and Imprévu. Wooed thus by endearments81 and thepromise of gifts, and further softened82 up by the report ofPresident John J. Powers, Jr., on current operations (recordsall around) and immediate83 prospects84 (more records expected),the most intransigent professional stockholder would have beenhard put to it to mount much of a rebellion at this particularmeeting, and, as it happened, the only professional presentseemed to be John Gilbert, brother of Lewis. (I learned laterthat Lewis Gilbert and Mrs. Davis were in Cleveland that day,attending the U.S. Steel meeting.) John Gilbert is the sort ofprofessional stockholder the Pfizer management deserves, orwould like to think it does. With an easygoing manner and ahabit of punctuating85 his words with self-deprecating little laughs,he is the most ingratiating gadfly imaginable (or was on thisoccasion; I’m told he isn’t always), and as he ran throughwhat seemed to be the standard Gilbert-family repertoire86 ofquestions—on the reliability87 of the firm’s auditors88, the salaries ofits officers, the fees of its directors—he seemed almostapologetic that duty called on him to commit the indelicacy ofasking such things. As for the amateur stockholders present,their questions and comments were about like those at theother meetings I’d attended, but this time their attitude towardthe role of the professional stockholder was noticeably different.
Instead of being overwhelmingly opposed, they appeared to besplit; to judge from the volume of clapping and of discreetgroaning, about half of those present considered Gilbert anuisance and half considered him a help. Powers left no doubtabout how he felt; before adjourning89 the meeting he said,without irony, that he had welcomed Gilbert’s questions, andmade a point of inviting90 him to come again next year. And,indeed, during the later stages of the Pfizer meeting, whenGilbert, in a conversational91 way, was praising the company forsome things and criticizing it for others, and the variousmembers of the board were replying to his comments just asinformally, I got for the first time a fleeting92 sense of genuinecommunication between stockholders and managers.
THE Radio Corporation of America, which had held its last twomeetings far from its New York headquarters—in Los Angelesin 1964, in Chicago in 1965—reserved the current trend evenmore decisively than Pfizer by convening93 this time in CarnegieHall. The entire orchestra and the two tiers of boxes werecompletely filled with stockholders—about twenty-three hundredof them, of whom a strikingly larger proportion than at any ofmy other meetings was male. Mrs. Soss and Mrs. Davis wereon hand, though, along with Lewis Gilbert and someprofessional stockholders I hadn’t seen before, and, as withPfizer, the company’s whole board of directors sat on theplatform, where the chief centers of attraction in R.C.A.’s casewere David Sarnoff, the company’s seventy-five-year-oldchairman, and his forty-eight-year-old son, Robert W. Sarnoff,who had been its president since the beginning of the year.
For me, two aspects of the R.C.A. meeting stood out: theevident respect, amounting almost to veneration94, of thestockholders for their celebrated chairman, and anunaccustomed disposition95 of the amateur stockholders to speakup for themselves. The elder Mr. Sarnoff, looking hale andready for anything, conducted the meeting, and he and severalother R.C.A. executives gave reports on company operationsand prospects, in the course of which the words “record” and“growth” recurred96 so monotonously97 that I, not being an R.C.A.
stockholder, began to nod. I was brought wide awake with ajolt on one occasion, though, when I heard Walter D. Scott,chairman of R.C.A.’s subsidiary the National BroadcastingCompany, say in connection with his network’s televisionprogramming that “creative resources are always running aheadof demand.”
No one objected to that statement or to anything else in theglowing reports, but when they were over the stockholders hadtheir say on other matters. Mr. Gilbert raised some favoritequestions of his about accounting98 procedures, and arepresentative of R.C.A.’s accountants, Arthur Young & Co.,made replies that seemed to satisfy Mr. Gilbert. A Dickensianelderly lady, who identified herself as Mrs. Martha Brand andsaid she held “many thousands” of shares of R.C.A. stock,expressed the view that the accounting procedures of thecompany should not even be questioned. I have since learnedthat Mrs. Brand is a professional stockholder who is ananomaly within the profession, in that she leans strongly towardthe management view of things. Mr. Gilbert then advanced aproposal for the adoption99 of cumulative voting, supporting itwith about the same arguments that Mrs. Soss had used atthe G.E. meeting. Mr. Sarnoff opposed the motion, and so didMrs. Brand, who explained that she was sure the presentdirectors always worked tirelessly for the welfare of thecorporation, and added this time that she was the holder7 of“many, many thousands” of shares. Two or three otherstockholders spoke up in favor of cumulative voting—the onlyoccasion at any meeting on which I saw stockholders not easilyidentifiable as professionals speak in dissent on a matter ofsubstance. (Cumulative voting was defeated, 95.3 per cent to4.7 per cent.) Mrs. Soss, still in as mild a mood as in Atlanta,said she was delighted to see a woman, Mrs. Josephine YoungCase, sitting on the stage as a member of the R.C.A. board,but deplored100 the fact that Mrs. Case’s principal occupation wasgiven on the proxy statement as “housewife.” Couldn’t awoman who was chairman of the board of Skidmore College atleast be called a “home executive”? Another lady stockholderset off a round of applause by delivering a paean101 to ChairmanSarnoff, whom she called “the marvellous Cinderella man of thetwentieth century.”
Mrs. Davis—who had earlier objected to the site of themeeting on the ground, which I found dumfounding, thatCarnegie Hall was “too unsophisticated” for R.C.A.—advanced aresolution calling for company action “to insure that hereafterno person shall serve as a director after he shall have attainedthe age of seventy-two.” Even though similar rulings are ineffect in many companies, and even though the proposal, notbeing retroactive, would have no effect upon Mr. Sarnoff’sstatus, it seemed to be aimed at him, and thus Mrs. Davisdemonstrated again her uncanny knack102 of playing intomanagement’s hands. Nor did she appear to help her cause byputting on a Batman mask (the symbolism of which I didn’tgrasp) when she made it. At all events, the proposal gave riseto several impassioned defenses of Mr. Sarnoff, and one of thespeakers went on to complain bitterly that Mrs. Davis wasinsulting the intelligence of everyone present. At this, theserious-minded Mr. Gilbert leaped up to say, “I quite agreeabout the silliness of her costume, but there is a valid103 principlein her proposal.” In making this Voltairian distinction, Mr.
Gilbert, to judge from his evident state of agitation104, wasachieving a triumph of reason over inclination105 that was costinghim plenty. Mrs. Davis’s resolution was defeated overwhelmingly;the margin106 against it served to end the meeting with whatamounted to a rousing vote of confidence in the Cinderellaman.
CLASSIC farce107, with elements of slapstick, was the dominantmood of the meeting of the Communications SatelliteCorporation, with which I wound up my meeting-going season.
Comsat is, of course, the glamorous108 space-age communicationscompany that was set up by the government in 1963 andturned over to public ownership in a celebrated stock sale in1964. Upon arriving at the meeting site—the Shoreham Hotel, inWashington—I was scarcely startled to discover Mrs. Davis, Mrs.
Soss, and Lewis Gilbert among the thousand or so stockholderspresent. Mrs. Davis, decked out in stage makeup109, an orangepith helmet, a short red skirt, white boots, and a black sweaterbearing in white letters the legend “I Was Born to Raise Hell,”
had planted herself squarely in front of a battery of televisioncameras. Mrs. Soss, as I had learned by now was her custom,had taken a place at the opposite side of the room from Mrs.
Davis, and this meant that she was now as far as possiblefrom the television cameras. Considering that Mrs. Soss doesnot ordinarily seem to be averse110 to being photographed, Icould write down this choice of seat only as a hard-wontriumph of conscience akin18 to Mr. Gilbert’s at Carnegie Hall. Asfor Mr. Gilbert, he took a place not far from Mrs. Soss, andthus, of course, a long way from Mrs. Davis.
Since the previous year, Leo D. Welch, the man who hadconducted the 1965 Comsat meeting with such a firm hand,has been replaced as chairman of the company by JamesMcCormack, a West Point graduate, former Rhodes Scholar,and retired Air Force general with an impeccably polishedmanner, who bears a certain resemblance to the Duke ofWindsor, and Mr. McCormack was conducting this year’ssession. He warmed up with some preliminary remarks in thecourse of which he noted—-smoothly, but not withoutemphasis—that as for the subject of any intervention111 that astockholder might choose to make, “the field of relevance112 isquite narrow.” When Mr. McCormack had finished his warmup,Mrs. Soss made a brief speech that may or may not havecome within the field of relevance; I missed most of it, becausethe floor microphone supplied to her wasn’t working right. Mrs.
Davis then claimed the floor, and her mike was working all toowell; as the cameras ground, she launched into an earsplittingtirade against the company and its directors because there hadbeen a special door to the meeting room reserved for theentrance of “distinguished guests.” Mrs. Davis, in a good manywords, said she considered this procedure undemocratic. “Weapologize, and when you go out, please go by any door youwant,” Mr. McCormack said, but Mrs. Davis, clearlyunappeased, went on speaking. And now the mood of farcewas heightened when it became clear that the Soss-Gilbertfaction had decided to abandon all efforts to keep ranks closedwith Mrs. Davis. Near the height of her oration3, Mr. Gilbert,looking as outraged113 as a boy whose ball game is being spoiledby a player who doesn’t know the rules or care about thegame, got up and began shouting, “Point of order! Point oforder!” But Mr. McCormack spurned114 this offer of parliamentaryhelp; he ruled Mr. Gilbert’s point of order out of order, andbade Mrs. Davis proceed. I had no trouble deducing why hedid this. There were unmistakable signs that he, unlike anyother corporate chairman I had seen in action, was enjoyingevery minute of the goings on. Through most of the meeting,and especially when the professional stockholders had the floor,Mr. McCormack wore the dreamy smile of a wholly bemusedspectator.
Eventually, Mrs. Davis’s speech built up to a peak of bothvolume and content at which she began making specificallegations against individual Comsat directors, and at this pointthree security guards—two beefy men and a determined-lookingwoman, all dressed in gaudy115 bottle-green uniforms that mighthave been costumes for “The Pirates of Penzance”—appeared atthe rear, marched with brisk yet stately tread up the centeraisle, and assumed the position of parade rest in the aislewithin handy reach of Mrs. Davis, whereupon she abruptlyconcluded her speech and sat down. “All right,” Mr.
McCormack said, still grinning. “Everything’s cool now.”
The guards retired, and the meeting proceeded. Mr.
McCormack and the Comsat president, Joseph V. Charyk, gavethe sort of glowing report on the company that I had grownaccustomed to, Mr. McCormack going so far as to say thatComsat might start showing its first profit the following yearrather than in 1969, as originally forecast. (It did.) Mr. Gilbertasked what fee, apart from his regular salary, Mr. McCormackreceived for attending directors’ meetings. Mr. McCormackreplied that he got no fee, and when Mr. Gilbert said, “I’mglad you get nothing, I approve of that,” everybody laughedand Mr. McCormack grinned more broadly than ever. (Mr.
Gilbert was clearly trying to make what he considered to be aserious point, but this didn’t seem to be the day for that sortof thing.) Mrs. Soss took a dig at Mrs. Davis by sayingpointedly that anyone who opposed Mr. McCormack ascompany chairman was “lacking in perspicacity;” she did note,however, that she couldn’t quite bring herself to vote for Mr.
Welch, the former chairman, who was now a candidate for theboard, inasmuch as he had ordered her thrown out last year.
A peppy old gentleman said that he thought the company wasdoing fine and everyone should have faith in it. Once, whenMr. Gilbert said something that Mrs. Davis didn’t like and Mrs.
Davis, without waiting to be recognized, began shouting herobjection across the room, Mr. McCormack gave a shortirrepressible giggle116. That single falsetto syllable117, magnificentlyamplified by the chairman’s microphone, was the motif118 of theComsat meeting.
On the plane returning from Washington, as I was musing119 onthe meetings I had attended, it occurred to me that if therehad been no professional stockholders at them I wouldprobably have learned almost as much as I did about thecompanies’ affairs but that I would have learned a good dealless about their chief executives’ personalities120. It had, after all,been the questions, interruptions, and speeches of theprofessional stockholders that brought the companies to life, ina sense, by forcing each chairman to shed his officialportrait-by-Bachrach mask and engage in a human relationship.
More often than not, this had been the hardly satisfactoryhuman relationship of nagger121 and nagged122, but anyone lookingfor humanity in high corporate affairs can’t afford to pick andchoose. Still, some doubts remained. Being thirty thousand feetup in the air is conducive123 to taking the broader view, and,doing so as we winged over Philadelphia, I concluded that, onthe basis of what I had seen and heard, both companymanagements and stockholders might well consider a lessonKing Lear learned—that when the role of dissenter77 is left to theFool, there may be trouble ahead for everybody.
点击
收听单词发音
收听单词发音 |
1
diplomat
|
|
| n.外交官，外交家；能交际的人，圆滑的人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
corporate
|
|
| adj.共同的，全体的；公司的，企业的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
oration
|
|
| n.演说，致辞，叙述法 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
orations
|
|
| n.（正式仪式中的）演说，演讲( oration的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
feudal
|
|
| adj.封建的，封地的，领地的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
oligarchy
|
|
| n.寡头政治 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
holder
|
|
| n.持有者，占有者；(台，架等)支持物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
holders
|
|
| 支持物( holder的名词复数 )； 持有者； （支票等）持有人； 支托（或握持）…之物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
indifference
|
|
| n.不感兴趣，不关心，冷淡，不在乎 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
dividends
|
|
| 红利( dividend的名词复数 )； 股息； 被除数； （足球彩票的）彩金 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
den
|
|
| n.兽穴；秘密地方；安静的小房间，私室 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
slate
|
|
| n.板岩，石板，石片，石板色，候选人名单；adj.暗蓝灰色的，含板岩的；vt.用石板覆盖，痛打，提名，预订 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
premises
|
|
| n.建筑物，房屋 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
goaded
|
|
| v.刺激( goad的过去式和过去分词 )；激励；（用尖棒）驱赶；驱使（或怂恿、刺激）某人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
abruptly
|
|
| adv.突然地，出其不意地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
investor
|
|
| n.投资者，投资人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
apparently
|
|
| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
akin
|
|
| adj.同族的，类似的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
jersey
|
|
| n.运动衫 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
auditorium
|
|
| n.观众席，听众席；会堂，礼堂 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
coordinating
|
|
| v.使协调，使调和( coordinate的现在分词 )；协调；协同；成为同等 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
proxies
|
|
| n.代表权( proxy的名词复数 )；（测算用的）代替物；（对代理人的）委托书；（英国国教教区献给主教等的）巡游费 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
celebrated
|
|
| adj.有名的，声誉卓著的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
cogent
|
|
| adj.强有力的，有说服力的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
mighty
|
|
| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
taunt
|
|
| n.辱骂，嘲弄；v.嘲弄 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
concise
|
|
| adj.简洁的，简明的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
dedication
|
|
| n.奉献，献身，致力，题献，献辞 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
entirely
|
|
| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
proxy
|
|
| n.代理权，代表权；（对代理人的）委托书；代理人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
aloof
|
|
| adj.远离的；冷淡的，漠不关心的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
earnings
|
|
| n.工资收人；利润，利益，所得 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
investigation
|
|
| n.调查，调查研究 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
nomination
|
|
| n.提名，任命，提名权 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
gratuitous
|
|
| adj.无偿的，免费的；无缘无故的，不必要的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
redressed
|
|
| v.改正( redress的过去式和过去分词 )；重加权衡；恢复平衡 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
ribs
|
|
| n.肋骨( rib的名词复数 )；（船或屋顶等的）肋拱；肋骨状的东西；（织物的）凸条花纹 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
venue
|
|
| n.犯罪地点，审判地，管辖地，发生地点，集合地点 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
39
rigors
|
|
| 严格( rigor的名词复数 )； 严酷； 严密； （由惊吓或中毒等导致的身体）僵直 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
40
testy
|
|
| adj.易怒的；暴躁的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
41
dictatorial
|
|
| adj. 独裁的，专断的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
42
climax
|
|
| n.顶点；高潮；v.(使)达到顶点 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
43
wrangle
|
|
| vi.争吵 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
44
affiliations
|
|
| n.联系( affiliation的名词复数 )；附属机构；亲和性；接纳 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
45
nominees
|
|
| n.被提名者，被任命者( nominee的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
46
Christian
|
|
| adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
47
arbor
|
|
| n.凉亭；树木 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
48
spoke
|
|
| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
49
retired
|
|
| adj.隐退的，退休的，退役的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
50
plow
|
|
| n.犁，耕地，犁过的地；v.犁，费力地前进[英]plough | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
51
dissent
|
|
| n./v.不同意，持异议 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
52
languorous
|
|
| adj.怠惰的，没精打采的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
53
exasperated
|
|
| adj.恼怒的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
54
expatiating
|
|
| v.详述，细说( expatiate的现在分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
55
irony
|
|
| n.反语，冷嘲；具有讽刺意味的事，嘲弄 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
56
lessen
|
|
| vt.减少，减轻；缩小 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
57
adverse
|
|
| adj.不利的；有害的；敌对的，不友好的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
58
adviser
|
|
| n.劝告者，顾问 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
59
precisely
|
|
| adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
60
decided
|
|
| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
61
vein
|
|
| n.血管，静脉；叶脉，纹理；情绪；vt.使成脉络 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
62
advisory
|
|
| adj.劝告的，忠告的，顾问的，提供咨询 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
63
stringently
|
|
| adv.严格地，严厉地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
64
cumulative
|
|
| adj.累积的，渐增的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
65
controversy
|
|
| n.争论，辩论，争吵 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
66
perfectly
|
|
| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
67
mandatory
|
|
| adj.命令的；强制的；义务的；n.受托者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
68
previously
|
|
| adv.以前，先前（地） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
69
harass
|
|
| vt.使烦恼，折磨，骚扰 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
70
elicited
|
|
| 引出，探出( elicit的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
71
lengthy
|
|
| adj.漫长的，冗长的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
72
virtues
|
|
| 美德( virtue的名词复数 )； 德行； 优点； 长处 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
73
invoked
|
|
| v.援引( invoke的过去式和过去分词 )；行使（权利等）；祈求救助；恳求 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
74
amicability
|
|
| n.友善，亲善 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
75
lair
|
|
| n.野兽的巢穴；躲藏处 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
76
vocal
|
|
| adj.直言不讳的；嗓音的；n.[pl.]声乐节目 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
77
dissenter
|
|
| n.反对者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
78
credentials
|
|
| n.证明，资格，证明书，证件 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
79
ballroom
|
|
| n.舞厅 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
80
kit
|
|
| n.用具包，成套工具；随身携带物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
81
endearments
|
|
| n.表示爱慕的话语，亲热的表示( endearment的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
82
softened
|
|
| （使）变软( soften的过去式和过去分词 )； 缓解打击； 缓和； 安慰 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
83
immediate
|
|
| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
84
prospects
|
|
| n.希望，前途(恒为复数) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
85
punctuating
|
|
| v.（在文字中）加标点符号，加标点( punctuate的现在分词 )；不时打断某事物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
86
repertoire
|
|
| n.(准备好演出的)节目，保留剧目；(计算机的)指令表，指令系统， <美>(某个人的)全部技能；清单，指令表 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
87
reliability
|
|
| n.可靠性，确实性 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
88
auditors
|
|
| n.审计员，稽核员( auditor的名词复数 )；（大学课程的）旁听生 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
89
adjourning
|
|
| （使）休会， （使）休庭( adjourn的现在分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
90
inviting
|
|
| adj.诱人的，引人注目的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
91
conversational
|
|
| adj.对话的，会话的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
92
fleeting
|
|
| adj.短暂的，飞逝的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
93
convening
|
|
| 召开( convene的现在分词 )； 召集； （为正式会议而）聚集； 集合 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
94
veneration
|
|
| n.尊敬，崇拜 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
95
disposition
|
|
| n.性情，性格；意向，倾向；排列，部署 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
96
recurred
|
|
| 再发生，复发( recur的过去式和过去分词 )； 治愈 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
97
monotonously
|
|
| adv.单调地，无变化地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
98
accounting
|
|
| n.会计，会计学，借贷对照表 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
99
adoption
|
|
| n.采用，采纳，通过；收养 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
100
deplored
|
|
| v.悲叹，痛惜，强烈反对( deplore的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
101
paean
|
|
| n.赞美歌，欢乐歌 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
102
knack
|
|
| n.诀窍，做事情的灵巧的，便利的方法 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
103
valid
|
|
| adj.有确实根据的；有效的；正当的，合法的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
104
agitation
|
|
| n.搅动；搅拌；鼓动，煽动 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
105
inclination
|
|
| n.倾斜；点头；弯腰；斜坡；倾度；倾向；爱好 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
106
margin
|
|
| n.页边空白；差额；余地，余裕；边，边缘 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
107
farce
|
|
| n.闹剧，笑剧，滑稽戏；胡闹 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
108
glamorous
|
|
| adj.富有魅力的；美丽动人的；令人向往的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
109
makeup
|
|
| n.组织；性格；化装品 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
110
averse
|
|
| adj.厌恶的；反对的，不乐意的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
111
intervention
|
|
| n.介入，干涉，干预 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
112
relevance
|
|
| n.中肯，适当，关联，相关性 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
113
outraged
|
|
| a.震惊的，义愤填膺的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
114
spurned
|
|
| v.一脚踢开，拒绝接受( spurn的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
115
gaudy
|
|
| adj.华而不实的；俗丽的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
116
giggle
|
|
| n.痴笑，咯咯地笑；v.咯咯地笑着说 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
117
syllable
|
|
| n.音节；vt.分音节 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
118
motif
|
|
| n.(图案的)基本花纹，(衣服的)花边；主题 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
119
musing
|
|
| n. 沉思，冥想 adj. 沉思的, 冥想的 动词muse的现在分词形式 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
120
personalities
|
|
| n. 诽谤，（对某人容貌、性格等所进行的）人身攻击； 人身攻击；人格, 个性, 名人( personality的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
121
nagger
|
|
| n.爱唠叨的人，泼妇 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
122
nagged
|
|
| adj.经常遭责怪的；被压制的；感到厌烦的；被激怒的v.不断地挑剔或批评（某人）( nag的过去式和过去分词 )；不断地烦扰或伤害（某人）；无休止地抱怨；不断指责 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
123
conducive
|
|
| adj.有益的，有助的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |