Dictionary

ring down the curtain en · VERB

Pronunciation

• (Australia) audio

Etymology

In reference to ringing a bell to end a performance. See ring up the curtain.

Meanings

1. (idiomatic) To end something.
   • And although he is impatient with the Beat pose, uniform, and rhetoric, he too disaffiliates himself and prepares to "ring down the curtain on the American dream." 1964, William Wasserstrom, Civil Liberties and the Arts: Selections from Twice a Year, 1938-48:
   • Now Tyrone, in mixed charity and despair, tries to ring down the curtain on the tragic farce of his son's life. 2000, Edward L. Shaughnessy, Down the Nights and Down the Days: Eugene O'Neill's Catholic Sensibility, →ISBN:
   • Ring down the curtain on To-day And give the Past the right of way, Till fields of battle red with rust, Shine through the ashes and the dust Across the Age, and burn as plain As glowing Mars through window-pane. 1876, Josiah Gilbert Holland, Richard Watson Gilder, The Century Illustrated Monthly Magazine - Volume 12, page 360:
   • A visibly frail Roosevelt played his usual role of mediator between the pugnacious Churchill and the scowling tyrant Stalin. All three leaders left Yalta believing they had obtained the assurances they needed for the postwar world. Churchill rebutted any and all suggestions that the British ring down the curtain on their empire. 2000, Edward R. Kantowicz, Coming Apart, Coming Together, →ISBN, page 3:
2. (idiomatic) To mark the end of something.
   • But tonight the Union veteran of Maryland clasps hands with the rebel veteran of Missouri, and the gap is closed. In this supreme moment the imperfect welding of the broken Union is perfected at last, and from this hour the seam of the joining shall no more be visible. The long tragedy is ended — ring down the curtain! 2006, Mark Twain, Paul Fatout, Mark Twain Speaking, →ISBN, page 219:
   • Life is too difficult. O. Greenbaum, H. Knape, T. Kornflower, J. Davenport, all would agree that “Life is but the span from womb to tomb; a sigh, a smile; a chill, a fever; a throe of pain, a spasm of volupty: then a gasping for breath, and the comedy is over, the song is ended, ring down the curtain, the clown is dead.” 2012 -, Nathanael West, The Dream Life of Balso Snell, →ISBN:
   • The great natural routes in Yosemite have been done. The Wall of Early Morning Light merely rang down the curtain. —Jim McCarthy, 1971 2013, Steve Roper, Camp 4: Recollections of a Yosemite Rockclimber, →ISBN:

Forms

Antonyms

start · ring up the curtain

Synonyms

stop (end something) · finish (end something)