ring up the curtain

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English[edit]

Etymology[edit]

In reference to ringing a bell to start a theatrical performance.

Pronunciation[edit]

  • (file)

Verb[edit]

ring up the curtain (third-person singular simple present rings up the curtain, present participle ringing up the curtain, simple past rang up the curtain, past participle rung up the curtain)

  1. (idiomatic) to start something
    • 1879, The Peterson magazine - Volumes 75-76, page 444:
      I caught her in my arms; she kissed me, pushed me gently away, and added: “Ring up the curtain, uncle. Little Moccasin is ready"
    • 1976, Waldemar Gutwinski, Cohesion in Literary Texts: A study of some grammatical and lexical features of English discourse, →ISBN:
      She remembered perfectly the first sign he had given of it — it had been like the bell that was to ring up the curtain upon the real drama of their life.
    • 1992, Albro Martin, Railroads Triumphant, →ISBN:
      After Congress had waited as long as it was willing to wait for Durant to ring up the curtain, it was lucky when all seemed lost to get the blessing, the services, and a great deal of the personal capital of one of the most wrongly judged men in the history of American railroad leadership: Oakes Ames.
    • 2014, Ernest Newman, The Life of Richard Wagner, →ISBN, page 49:
      He was one of those who hold that revolutions are not made with rose-water; and with strange prescience he looked to the Russian peasant's hatred of his oppressors to ring up the curtain on a world-drama that should mean the destruction of civilisation.

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