Does "he was a hard case to push" mean "he was troublesome"?

Forums: English, Esl, Grammar
Email this Topic • Print this Page

Context:

For all the sympathy Pollard generated in Israel, he was a hard case to push in America; he had sold our country’s secrets for money, not conviction, and for years had not shown any remorse.

Topic Stats
Top Replies
Link to this Topic

Type: Question • Score: 1 • Views: 494 • Replies: 6

No top replies

View best answer, chosen by oristarA

@oristarA,

No, it means that the idea(s) that he was promoting or believed in were hard to advance/sell through the society because of his perceived misconduct.

1 Reply

@hawkeye10,

hawkeye10 wrote:

No, it means that the idea(s) that he was promoting or believed in were hard to advance/sell through the society because of his perceived misconduct.

Thanks.
But it is still not very clear to me. My problem of understanding this originated from the following sentence:
If her abundant talent is not evident in every sentence I produce, it is because I remain a hard case.

What does "a hard case" mean here?

1 Reply

@oristarA,

Need more context....is the speaker speaking of a former teacher? Hard case often means something being resistant to something else, in this case it might be a guy claiming that he might be resistant to skill in writing in spite of good teaching.

0 Replies

@oristarA,

oristarA wrote:

Context:

For all the sympathy Pollard generated in Israel, he was a hard case to push in America; he had sold our country’s secrets for money, not conviction, and for years had not shown any remorse.

Yes, hawkeye is right. In this case, we could also say he was a "hard sell" to the American public. It would be hard to make Americans like or accept him.

In the other sentence, it seems like this guy was talking about his composition instructor. She was very good, but he wasn't a good student, so his writing doesn't reflect how good his teacher was. His failure to learn made him a hard case. It was hard for the teacher to accomplish her goal of teaching him to write well.

0 Replies

@oristarA,

Jonathan Pollard was arrested in 1986 after spying for Israel and given a life sentence. Recently there's been a campaign to get President Obama to pardon him. Since it's a legal and moral case that Pollard "owns," the wording

"his was a hard case to advance..."

might be better. It doesn't mean Pollard himself is troublesome, it just means he wants to get out of prison after 30 years.

1 Reply

@Hatshepsut,

Hatshepsut wrote:

Jonathan Pollard was arrested in 1986 after spying for Israel and given a life sentence. Recently there's been a campaign to get President Obama to pardon him. Since it's a legal and moral case that Pollard "owns," the wording

"his was a hard case to advance..."

might be better. It doesn't mean Pollard himself is troublesome, it just means he wants to get out of prison after 30 years.

Crystal clear! Thank you.

Look like "a hard case" gets a difference use in the context below:

If her abundant talent is not evident in every sentence I produce, it is because I remain a hard case.

Does "remain a hard case" refer to "am still not smart enough"?

0 Replies

Does "he was a hard case to push" mean "he was troublesome"?

Related Topics

Quick Links

My Account

able2know