Square是“方块、格子”，这个短语是什么意思呢？请看对话：

    A: How are your negotiations going with the creditors?

    B: Negotiations have broken down. We thought everything was settled, but now they say they’re not happy with the deal, so we’re back to square one again.

    Note: This idiom means “having to start all over again.” Some people say the phrase refers to Snakes and Ladders or similar board games. The earliest citation of the phrase in print is currently 1952, from the Economic Journal: “He has the problem of maintaining the interest of the reader who is always being sent back to square one in a sort of intellectual game of snakes and ladders.” Other people say it originated from hopscotch, a playground game played on a grid of numbered squares.