Does this have an idiomatic meaning?
Are both of these links correct?
eng
The lamp is out of oil.
eng
He's lost the will to live.
I don't know anything about this having an idiomatic meaning, although I wouldn't be surprised if it had, but just isn't used much. Although I would rather expect it to mean that he doesn't have much energy left or something like that.
@Dorenda, maybe you could suggest some meanings based off of this?:
https://www.woorden.org/spreekw...hp?woord=olie+
"geen olie meer in de lamp hebben (=platzak zijn - levensmoe (of ernstig ziek))"
I think my trying to translate it from that wasn't great.
If you are levensmoe this indeed means that you don't feel like living anymore. Platzak means that you don't have any money, so apparently this expression has more than one meaning. However "geen olie meer in de lamp hebben" and "de olie in de lamp is op", even though they come down to the same thing, are different expressions, so I personally wouldn't link this sentence directly with He's lost the will to live. Also because one is idiomatic and the other means just literally what it means. In my opinion it's better to translate sayings with sayings, if possible, and "normal" sentences with "normal" sentences.
OK, I unlinked it!
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