滔 tāo
- Strokes
- 13
- Radical
- 氵 — water
- Made of
- 氵 water 舀 to ladle out
- How it's built
- Phono-semantic — one part hints at the meaning, another at the sound
滔滔不绝
tāotāobùjué
to talk endlessly; to flow on without pause
Characters in this word
不 bù
- Strokes
- 4
- Radical
- 一 — one
- How it's built
- Ideograph — the meaning is built from its parts
绝 jué
- Strokes
- 9
- Radical
- 纟 — silk
- Made of
- 纟 silk 色 color, tint, hue, shade
- How it's built
- Phono-semantic — one part hints at the meaning, another at the sound
Example phrases
- 一谈到旅行，爷爷就滔滔不绝，讲了一下午也没停。 Yì tán dào lǚxíng, yéye jiù tāotāobùjué, jiǎngle yí xiàwǔ yě méi tíng. Once he starts talking about travel, grandpa speaks endlessly and does not stop the whole afternoon.
- 他一说起自己养的猫，就滔滔不绝，根本停不下来。 Tā yì shuōqǐ zìjǐ yǎng de māo, jiù tāotāobùjué, gēnběn tíng bù xiàlái. As soon as he starts talking about his cat, he talks on and on and simply cannot stop.
- 会议上他滔滔不绝地讲了四十分钟，大家都听得累了。 Huìyì shàng tā tāotāobùjué de jiǎngle sìshí fēnzhōng, dàjiā dōu tīng de lèi le. At the meeting he talked on and on for forty minutes, and everyone was tired of listening.