|
Reader question: Please explain “true to form” in this passage, a comment on the State of the Union address by Barack Obama (This was the best moment of Obama’s State of the Union address, HuffingtonPost.com, January 20, 2017): “True to form, the President in his State of the Union speech is more interested in politics than in leadership,” former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney wrote on Facebook. “More intent on winning elections than on winning progress, he ignores the fact that the country has elected a Congress that favors smaller government and lower taxes.” My comments: First of all, true to form simply means as expected. In other words, there’s nothing unusual. I’ve written about this phrase before. Normally, one doesn’t want to write about the same subject twice lest they find themselves repeating themselves and saying nothing new. However, I don’t mind making an exception this time because it’s a good question. It’s newsy, up to date and the phrase itself is really a good one – one of those nitty-gritty idioms to grasp if you want to speak good English. Anyways, form is the way in which things exist. Different types of things appear in different shape and sizes. And that outward shape and size in which something appears is its form. Everyday, we see things in their different forms and expect to see them that way. Birds in the sky, you know what I mean. Fish in the sea, yeah, you know what I mean. | 
