Ольга Володина The Truest Wisdom Петрозаводск - umotnas.ru o_O
Ольга Володина The Truest Wisdom Петрозаводск - umotnas.ru o_O
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Ольга Володина The Truest Wisdom Петрозаводск 2008 Карельский государственный педагогический университет Ольга Володина Учебно-методическое пособие Петрозаводск 2008 Составитель, автор предисловия и учебно-методического приложения Володина Ольга Васильевна кандидат педагогических наук доцент кафедры иностранных языков КГПУ Рецензенты: Гвоздева М.С. - зав. кафедрой английского языка факультета иностранных языков КГПУ, кандидат педагогических наук, доцент Содержание
The Picture of Dorian Gray стр. 7
Cakes and Ale: or the Skeleton in the Cupboard стр. 16
Theater стр. 23
Список литературы для внеаудиторного чтения стр. 54
Творческие работы студентов стр. 60 Предисловие Природа каждому орудие дала: Орлу - горбатый клюв и мощные крыла, Быку – его рога, коню – его копыта, У зайца – быстрый бег, гадюка ядовита, Отравлен зуб ее. У рыбы – плавники, И, наконец, у льва есть когти и клыки. В мужчину мудрый ум она вселить умела, Для женщин мудрости природа не имела И, исчерпав на нас могущество свое, Дала им красоту – не меч и не копье. Пред женской красотой мы все бессильны стали, Она сильней богов, людей, огня и стали. Ронсар Любовь и стремление к красоте – одно из самых возвышенных проявлений чувств, общих всему человечеству, - выступают как свободное и непредсказуемое выражение глубин личности. Важность и сложность явления любви определяется тем, что в нем, как в фокусе, пересекаются противоречия биологического и духовного, личностного и социального, интимного и общезначимого. Красота представляет совершенством чувственного познания. Цель пособия - научить студентов критически подходить к литературному произведению, представляющему интерес как в идейном, так и в языковом отношении, помочь студентам осмыслить и сформулировать собственное представление о прочитанном. Анализ поступков и мыслей литературных героев способствует их переосмыслению и провоцирует читателя к рефлексии, переносу прочитанного на свой жизненный опыт. Главным критерием выбора англоязычного художественного материала для чтения и изучения является представление художественного образа – характера, события, обстоятельства, идеалы, выражающего эстетические идеи и чувства любви и стремления к прекрасному. Упражнения и задания, включенные в пособие, направлены на пополнение и идиоматизацию словарного запаса студентов, на развитие навыков устной речи. Упражнения носят разноплановый характер. Предусматривается проверка понимания прочитанного, углубленная работа над словами и выражениями, а так же повторение некоторых грамматических явлений, представляющих трудности для студентов. Грамматические упражнения основаны на языковом материале, встречающемся в тексте. Многие упражнения предназначены для контроля понимания текста и призваны научить студентов интерпретировать текст своими словами, а также выражать собственное мнение по поводу прочитанного. Пособие снабжено учебно-методическим приложением, в котором представлен материал по темам Traits of Character, Studying Literature, различные тестовые задания, которые преподаватель может использоваить при организации работы студентов с англоязычной литературой, а также список произведений английской и американской литературы, рекомендованной студентам для внеаудиторного чтения. Обращение на практических занятиях по английскому языку к миру литературы в поиске представлений о женщине и мужчине, их любви и красоте отношений позволяет рассмотреть эти понятия разносторонне, широкомасштабно. И затем, работая самостоятельно, студенты имеют возможность увидеть, осознать и принять разные отражения этих высших эстетических и духовных категорий в произведениях Д.Г. Лоуренс и Д.Голсуорси, Ф.С. Фицджеральда и Т. Драйзера, Дж. Фаулза и Дж. Селенджера и других мастеров английской и американской литературы. Пособие рассчитано на студентов неязыковых факультетов педагогического вуза. Кроме того, оно может быть интересно всем поклонникам английской и американской литературы. The Picture of Dorian Gray is Wilde’s masterpiece. The book describes the spiritual biography of a young man, Dorian Gray. The author touches upon many important problems of contemporary life, morality and beauty in particular. The novel shows the man’s chief purpose in life cannot be seeking for pleasure. The novel is a psychological study of gradual degradation of an innocent and inexperienced man. It is centered round problems of art and reality. The three principal characters: Dorian Gray, a young and brilliant nobleman, his friend, the painter Basil Hallward and the cynical Lord Henry – discuss the problems of art and reality, beauty and morality. To Basil Hallward beauty is a source of inspiration and creative work. His portrait of Dorian Gay is a masterpiece, the reflection of his soul. Dorian lives only for pleasure, he leads an immoral life. Under Lord Henry’s influence he becomes a selfish and cruel dandy who commits terrible crimes. Also the important part of this story is a young beautiful and talented actress – Sybil Vane. She is left by Dorian Gray because of her true love. Sybil kills herself. The portrait shows a cynical, aged and corrupted man. Dorian wants to get rid of the picture and stabs it. That is the last of his crimes. He falls down on the floor with a knife in his heart.
The last act was played to almost empty benches. The curtains went down on a titter, and some groans. As soon as it was over, Dorian Gray rushed behind the scenes into the green room. The girl was standing there alone, with a look of triumph on her face. Her eyes were lit with an exquisite fire. There was radiance about her. Her parted lips were smiling over some secret of their own. When he entered, she looked at him, and an expression of infinity joy came over her. “How badly I acted tonight, Dorian!” She cried. “Horribly!” he answered, gazing at her in amazement - “horribly! It was dreadful! Are you ill? You have no idea what it was. You have no idea what I suffered.” The girl smiled. “Dorian,” she answered, lingering over his name with long-draw music in her voice, as though it were sweeter than honey to the red petals of her mouth – “Dorian, you should have understood. But you understand now, don’t you?” “Understood what?” he asked, angrily. “Why I was so bad tonight. Why I shall always be bad. Why I shall never act well again.” He shrugged his shoulders. “You are ill, I suppose. When you are ill you shouldn’t act. You make yourself ridiculous. My friends were bored. I was bored.” She seemed not to listen to him. She was transfigured to joy. An ecstasy of happiness dominated her. “Dorian, Dorian,” she cried, “before I knew you, acting was the one reality of my life. It was only in the theatre that I lived. I thought that it was all true. I was Rosalind one night, and Portia the other. The joy of Beatrice was my joy, and the sorrows of Cordelia were mine also. I believed in everything. The common people who acted with me seemed to be godlike. The painted scenes were my world. I knew nothing but shadows, and I thought them real. You came – oh, my beautiful love! – and you freed my soul from prison. You taught me what reality really is. Tonight, for the first time in my life, I saw through the hollowness, the sham, the silliness of the empty pageant in which I had always played. Tonight, for the first time, I became conscious that the Romeo was hideous, and old, and painted, that the moonlight in the orchard was false, that the scenery was vulgar, and that the words I had to speak were unreal, were not my words, were not what I wanted to say. You had brought me something higher, something of which all art is but a reflection. You had made me understand what love really is. My love! My love! Prince Charming! Prince of life! I have grown sick of shadows. You are more to me than all art can ever be. What have I to do with puppets of a play? When I came on tonight, I could not understand how it was that everything had gone from me. I thought that I was going to be wonderful. I found that I could do nothing. Suddenly it dawned on my soul what it all meant. The knowledge was exquisite to me. I heard them hissing, and I smiled. What could they know of love such as ours? Take me away, Dorian – take me away with you, where we can be quite alone. I hate the stage. I might mimic a passion that I do not feel, but I cannot mimic one that burns me like fire. Oh, Dorian, Dorian, you understand now what it signifies? Even if I could do it, it would be profanation for me to play at being in love. You have made me see that.” He flung himself down on the sofa, and turned away his face. “You have killed my love,” he muttered. She looked at him in wonder, and laughed. He made no answer. She came across to him, and with her little fingers stroke his hair. She knelt down and pressed his hands to her lips. He drew them away, and a shudder ran through him. Then he leaped up, and went to the door. “Yes”, he cried “you have killed my love. You used to stir my imagination. Now you don’t even stir my curiosity. You simply produce no effect. I loved you because you were marvelous, because you had genius and intellect, because you realized the dream of great poets and gave shape and substance to the shadows of art. You have thrown it all away. You are shallow and stupid. My God! How mad I was to love you! What a fool I have been! You are nothing to me now. I will never see you again. I will never think of you. I will never mention your name. You don’t know what you were to me, once. Why, once. .. Oh, I can’t bear to think of it! I wish I had never laid eyes upon you! You have spoiled the romance of my life. How little you can know of love, if you say it mars your art! Without your art you are nothing. I would have made you famous, splendid, magnificent. The world would have worshipped you, and you would have borne my name. What are you now? A third-rate actress with a pretty face.” The girl grew white, and trembled. She clenched her hands together, and her voice seemed to catch in her throat. “You are not serious, Dorian?” she muttered. “You are acting.” “Acting. I leave that to you. You do it so well,” he answered, bitterly. She rose from her knees, and, with a piteous expression of pain in her face, came across the room to him. She put her hand upon his arm, and looked into his eyes. He thrust her away. “Don’t touch me!” he cried. A low moan broke from her, and she flung herself at his feet, and lay like a trampled flower. “Dorian, Dorian, don’t leave me!” she whispered. “I am so sorry I didn’t act well. I was thinking of you all the time. But I will try – indeed? I will try. It came so suddenly across me, my love for you. I think I should never have known it if you had not kissed me – if we had not kissed each other. Kiss me again, my love. Don’t go away from me. But you, oh! can’t you forgive me for tonight? I will work so hard, and try to improve. Don’t be cruel to me, because I love you better than anything in the world. After all, it is only once that I have not pleased you. But you are quite right, Dorian. I should have shown myself more of an artist It was foolish of me; and yet I couldn’t help it.” A fit of passionate sobbing choked her. She crouched on the floor like a wounded thing, and Dorian Gray, with his beautiful eyes, looked down at her, and his chiseled lips curled in exquisite disdain. There was always something ridiculous about the emotions of people whom one has ceased to love. Sibyl Vane seemed to him to be absurdly melodramatic. Her tears and sobs annoyed him. “I am going,” he said at last, in his calm, clear voice. “I don’t wish to be unkind, but I can’t see you again. You have disappointed me.” She wept silently, and made no answer, but crept nearer. Her little hands stretched blindly out, and appeared to be seeking for him. He turned on his heel, and left the room. In a few minutes he was out of the theatre. … After a little later, he hailed a hansom, and drove home.… As he was turning the handle of the door, his eye fell upon the portrait Basil Hallward had painted of him. He went over to the picture, and examined it. In the dim arrested light that struggled through the creamcoloured silk blinds, the face appeared to him to be a little changed. The expression looked different. One would have said that there was a touch of cruelty in the mouth. It was certainly strange. 3. Learn the active vocabulary: the scene, the curtains, a look of triumph, to be lit with an exquisite fire, to gaze at somebody in wonder (amazement), to suffer, to be in love, to transfigure with joy, to dominate, to mutter, to stir one’s curiosity (imagination), to mar one’s art, to grow white, to tremble, to whisper, to please, to disappoint 4. Recall the situations from the text in which the active vocabulary is used. 5. Make up your own sentences with the words and phrases of the active vocabulary. 6. Explain the meaning of the following words and phrases in English. Use the English- English dictionary. ridiculous, exquisite, radiance, infinity, dreadful, passionate, marvelous, genius 7. Form nouns from the following verbs from the text and use them in the sentences of your own. to act, to suffer, to imagine, to annoy, to reflect, to appear, to express, to amaze, to disappoint 8. Translate into English using the active vocabulary. 1). Тяжелый занавес опущен, свет на сцене потушен, театр опустел. 2). Она не сводила с него восхищенного взгляда. 3). Быть влюбленным – это прекрасно, но любовь без ответа приносит много страданий. 4). Она была маленькой и хрупкой, но подавляла его силой своего характера. 5). Твой поступок разочаровал меня. 6). От его слов она побледнела, ее голос задрожал от слез, она смогла лишь прошептать что-то непонятное. 7). Ее победный взгляд смутил его. 9. Translate the following into Russian. Explain the grammar rules concerning the verbs: 1) I wish I had never laid eyes upon you! 2) You make yourself ridiculous. 3) You should have understood. 4) I should have shown myself more of an artist. 5) Her parted lips were smiling over some secret of their own. 10. Give your first impression of the novel. Would you like to read the whole work of O. Wilde? Why? 11. Make an outline of the text in the form of key questions. Stick to one tense. Answer the questions in groups. 12. Give a Russian literary translation of the offered extract from the novel. Comment upon Dorian’s impression of Sibyl Vane before the last scene in the theater. … Imagine a girl, hardly seventeen years of age, with a little flower-like face, a small Greek head with plaited coils of dark-browned hair, eyes that were violet wells of passion, lips that were like the petals a rose. She was the loveliest thing I had ever seen in my life. I could hardly see this girl for the mist of tears that came across me. And her voice – I never heard such a voice. It was very low at first, with deep mellow notes, that seemed to fall singly upon one’s ear. Then it became a little louder and sounded like a flute or a distant hautbois. … Why should I not love her?… I do love her. 13. Make up a list of adjectives pertaining to Sibyl Vane before and after the last talk with Dorian Gray. 14. Give the character sketch of Dorian Gray. Keep to the scheme when speaking of him. Dorian Gray
15. Characterize the personages. Make use of the following word combinations. an artist to the core, to put one’s soul into work, a brilliant wit, art is long and life is fleeting, an embodiment of beauty, pleasant to listen to, to mar one’s life, to be fascinated, to seek pleasure, to gain a reputation, to have the best of, to care for, to be devoted to, to worship 16. How does the author describe Dorian Gray and Sibyl Vane? What devices does he use? 17. Speak on the place and time of the events. Could it happen in other circumstances? Why? 18. Dramatize the scene in the theater. 19. How do you understand the following? Dorian Gray was Faustus-like. 20. What is the role of the portrait in the novel? Can you prove that the portrait is the symbolic conscience of Dorian Gray? 21. Read the extract from the novel. Comment upon the questions raised in it: Beauty, Thought, Hedonism (living for pleasure), Time and Youth. Some day, when you are old and wrinkled and ugly, when thought has seared your forehead with its lines, and passion branded your lips with its hideous fires, you will feel it terrible. Now, wherever you go, you charm the world. Will it always be so?... You have a wonderfully beautiful face, Mr. Gray. Don’t frown. You have. And Beauty is a form of Genius – is higher, indeed, than Genius, as it needs no explanation. It is the great facts of the world, like sunlight, or spring-time, or the reflection in dark waters of that silver shell we call the moon. It can’t be questioned. It has its divine right of sovereignty. It makes princess of those who have it. You smile? Ah! When you have lost it you won’t smile… People say sometimes that Beauty is only superficial. That may be so. But at least it is not so superficial as Thought is. To me, Beauty is the wonder of wonders. It is only shallow people who do not judge by appearance. The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible…. Yes, Mr. Gray, the gods have been good to you. But what the gods give they quickly take away. You have only a few years in which to live really, perfectly, and fully. When your youth goes, your beauty will go with it, and then you will suddenly discover that there are no triumphs left for you, or have to content yourself with those mean triumphs that the memory of your past will make bitter than defeats. Every month as it wanes, brings you nearer to something dreadful. Time is jealous of you, and wars against your lilies and your roses. You will become shallow, and hollow-cheeked, and dull-eyed. You will suffer horribly…Ah! Realize your youth while you have it. Don’t squander the gold of your days, listening to the tedious, trying to improve the hopeless failure, or giving away your life to the ignorant, the common and the vulgar. These are the sickly aims, the false ideas, of our age. Live! Live the wonderful life that is in you! Let nothing be lost upon you. Be always searching for new sensations. Be afraid of nothing… A new Hedonism - that is what our century wants. You might be its visible symbol. With your personality there is nothing you could not do. The world belongs to you for a season… The moment I met you I saw that you were quite unconscious of what you really are, of what you really might be. There was so much in you that charmed me that I felt I must tell you something about yourself. I thought how tragic it would be if you were wasted. For there is such a little time that your youth will last – such a little time. The common hill-flowers wither, but they blossom again. The laburnum will be as yellow next June as it is now. In a month there will be purple stars on the clematis, and year after year the green night of its leaves will hold its purple stars. But we never get back our youth. The pulse of joy that beats in us at twenty becomes sluggish. Our limbs fail, our senses rot. We degenerate into hideous puppets, haunted by the memory of the passion of which we were too much afraid and the exquisite temptations that we had not the courage to yield to. Youth! Youth! There is absolutely nothing in the world but youth! 22. Write about “Real Beauty”. Make use of the following O. Wilde’s statements:
23. Prove the following.
24. Oscar Wilde’s gift of the writer lies in his ability to express the contradictions of life in accurate paradoxes. Explain the meaning of the following O. Wilde’s paradoxes.
25. Make a written analysis of your thoughts on the message of the text. William Somerset Maugham Cakes and Ale: or the Skeleton in the Cupboard 1. Learn the following material. The name of Somerset Maugham is connected with critical realism in the English literature. He possessed a keen and observant eye in his best works he ridiculed philistinism, narrow-mindedness, hypocrisy, self-interest, utilitarian approach to art. His work is marred by cynicism and disbelieve in human nature. Maugham thinks that it is not in the power of man to reform the world. In his works he compares life to the theater where human comedy, as old as the world itself, is being staged. As the course of human life cannot be altered, Maugham believes in the wisdom of those the failing of this world but learn to accept it as it is. “Cakes and Ale...” is a story of Edward Driffield, a writer. In the author’s preface Maugham wrote that “it was as a short story, and not a very long one either that I first thought of the novel… But I had long had in mind the character of Rosie. I had wanted for years to write about her, but the opportunity never presented itself; I could contrive no setting in which she found a place to suit her, and I began to think I never should.… It suddenly struck me that the little story I had jotted down offered me just the framework for the character that I had been looking for. I would make her the wife of my distinguished novelist.” Edward Driffield worked at night, and Rosie, having nothing to do, was glad to go out with one or other of her friends. She liked luxury and Quentin Forte was well-to-do. He would fetch her in the cab and take her to dine, and she would be on her grandest clothes for him; and Harry Retford, though he never had a bob, behaved as if he had, and took her about in hansoms too and gave her dinner in one or other of the little restaurants that were becoming modish in Soho. He was an actor and clever one, but he was difficult to suit and so was often out of work. He was about thirty, a man with a pleasantly ugly face and a clipped way of speaking that made what he said sound funny. Rosie liked his devil-may-care attitude toward life, the swagger with which he wore clothes made by the best tailor in London and unpaid for, the recklessness with which he would put a fiver he hadn’t got on a horse, and the generosity with which he flung his money about when a lucky win put him in funds. He was gay, charming, vain, boastful, and unscrupulous. Rosie told me that once he had pawned his watch to take her out to dinner and then borrowed a couple of pounds from the actor manager who had given them seats for the play in order to take him out to supper with them afterwards. But she was just as well pleased to go with Lionel Hillier to his studio and eat a chop that he and she cooked between them and spent the evening talking, and it was only very rarely that she would dine with me at all. I used to fetch her after I had my dinner out and she hers with Driffield, and we would get on a bus and go to a music hall. We went here and there, to the Pavilion or the Tivoli, sometimes to the Metropolitan if there was a particular turn we wanted to see; but our favourite was the Canterbury. It was cheap and the show was good. We ordered a couple of beer and I smoked my pipe. Rosie looked round with delight at the great dark smoky house, crowded to the ceiling with the inhabitants of South London. I discovered that she was a great reader. She liked history, but only history of certain kind, the lives of queens and mistresses of royal personages; and she would tell me with a childish wonder of the strange things she read. “I like to read about real things”, she said.” I don’t much care about novels.” She was never a great talker. Often when, the night being fine, we decided to walk back from the hall at which we had been spending the evening, she never opened her mouth. But her silence was intimate and comfortable. It did not exclude you from thoughts that engaged her apart from you; it included you in a pervasive well-being. I was talking about her once to Lionel Hillier and I said to him that I could not understand how she had turned from the fresh pleasant-looking young woman into the lovely creature whose beauty now practically everyone acknowledged. (There were people who made reservations. “Of course she has a very good figure,” they said, “but it’s not the sort of face I very much admire personally.” And others said: “Oh, yes, of course, a very pretty woman; but it’s a pity she hasn’t a little more distinction.”) “I can explain that to you in half a jiffy,” said Lionel Hillier. “She was only flesh, buxom wench when you first met her. I made her beauty.” I forget what my answer was, but I know it was ribald. “All right. That just shows you don’t know anything about beauty. No one ever thought very much of Rosie till I saw her like the sun shining silver. It wasn’t till I painted it that anyone knew that her hair was the most lovely thing in the world.” “Did you make her neck and her breasts and her carriage and her bones?” I asked. “Yes, damn you, that’s just what I did do.” When Hillier talked of Rosie in front of her she listened to him with a smiling gravity. A little flush came into her pale cheeks. I think that at first when he spoke to her of her beauty she believed he was just making game of her; but when she found out that he wasn’t, when he painted her silvery gold, it had no particular effect on her. She was a trifle amused, pleased of course, and a little surprised, but it didn’t turn her head. She thought him a little mad. I often wondered whether there was anything between them. Sometimes when we were sitting side by side in a music hall I looked at her face; I do not think I was in love with her; I merely enjoyed the sensation of sitting quietly beside her and looking at the pale gold of her hair and the pale gold of her skin. She had the serenity of a summer evening when the light fades slowly the unclouded sky. There was nothing dull in her immense placidity; it was as living as the sea when under the August sun laid calm and shining along the Kentish coast. She reminded me of a sonatina by an old Italian composer with its wistfulness in which there is yet an urbane flippancy and its light rippling gaiety in which echoes still that trembling of a sigh. Sometimes, feeling my eyes on her, she would turn round and for a moment or two look me full in the face. She did not speak. I did not know of what she was thinking. Then one night when we had walked home from the Canterbury, and I was leaving her at her door, when I held out my hand she laughed a little, a low chuckle it was, and leaned forward. “You old silly,” she said. She kissed me on the mouth. It was not a hurried peck, nor was it a kiss of passion. Her lips, those very full red lips of hers, rested on mine long enough for me to be conscious of their shape and their warmth and their softness. Then she withdrew them, but without hurry, in silence pushed open the door, slipped inside, and left me. I was so startled that I had not been able to say anything. I accepted her kiss stupidly. I remained inert. I turned away and walked back to my lodging. I seemed to hear still in my ears Rosie’s laughing. It was not contemptuous or wounding, but frank and affectionate; it was as though she laughed because she was fond of me. well-to-do, devil-may-care attitude, here and there, to have no particular on somebody, to be difficult to suit, used to work, every other day, to gossip, to pawn, to put somebody in funds 7. Form nouns from the following verbs of the active vocabulary and use them in the sentences of your own. to persuade, to effect, to behave, to acknowledge, to admire, to exclude, to include 8. Form nouns from the following adjectives and use them in the sentences of your own speaking about the characters of the text. generous, gay, charming, vain, boastful, unscrupulous, inert, contemptuous, wounding, frank, affectionate 9. Translate into English using the active vocabulary. 1. Он вел себя как богач, хотя не имел ни копейки. 2. Твои слова вскружили ей голову, а ты всего лишь беззаботно играл с ней. 3. Ее признание не произвело на него никакого впечатления. 4. Неудача в любви не исключает положительных эмоций. 5. Она сопровождала его повсюду. 6. Ты слишком свободно общаешься с ней. Веди себя прилично.
11. Open the brackets using the appropriate form of the Infinitive. Explain the grammar rule. Translate into Russian.
12. Answer the following questions:
13. Describe the males courting Rosie:
14. What would you say if you were different characters? 1. Imagine you are Lionel Hillier. Tell us about your concern for Rosie’s appearance and behavior. 2. Imagine you are Rosie. Tell us about your friendship with Harry Retford. 3. Imagine you are the author. Tell us your impression of Rosie. 15. Say everything you can about Rosie ... (Consider the following):
16. Discuss the text. 1. In what tenor is the extract written (dry, matter-of fact, ironical, pathetic)? 2. Note the choice of words in which the author described Rosie. What role do the many adjectives play in the text? 3. How did the author accentuate the contrast between Rosie and other women? 17. What impressed you most of all in the text and why? 18. Write а summary of your comments on the extract. State its message. William Somerset Maugham Theater 1. Learn the material about the novel. The main character of “The Theater” Julia Lambert was in her prime, the greatest actress in England. On stage she was a true professional, in full possession of her emotions. Off stage, however, she was bored with her husband, less disciplined about her behavior. She is first amused by the attention of a shy but ambitious fan then thrilled by his persistence and at last wildly but dangerously in love… Although Maugham is most celebrated as a novelist and a shortstory writer, it was as a playwright that he first knew success. Theater was both a tribute to a world which he had retired and a persuasive testimony to his enthusiasm for drama and the stage. 2. Read the extracts from the novel. After taking off her stage make-up Julia had done nothing to her face except put the very faintest shading of blue under her eyes. She had a smooth, pale skin and without rouge on her cheeks or red on her lips she looked wan. The man’s dressing-gown gave an effect at once helpless, fragile and gallant. Her heart was beating painfully and she was very anxious, but looking at herself in the glass she murmured: Mimi in the last act of Boheme. Almost without meaning to she coughed once or twice consumptively. She turned off the bright lights on her dressing-table and lay down on the sofa. Presently there was a knock on the door and Evie announced Mr Fennell. Julia held out a white, thin hand. “I’m lying down. I’m afraid I’m not very well. Find yourself a chair. It’s nice of you to come.” “I’m sorry. What’s the matter?” “Oh, nothing.’ She forced a smile to her ashy lips. “I haven’t been sleeping very well the last two or three nights.” She turned her beautiful eyes on him and for a while gazed at him in silence. His expression was sullen, but she had a notion that he was frightened. “I’m waiting for you to tell me what you’ve got against me?” She said at last in a low voice. It trembled a little, she noticed, but quite naturally. (“Christ, I believe I’m frightened too”.) “There’s no object in going back to that. The only thing I wanted to say to you was this: I’m afraid I can’t pay you the two hundred pounds I owe you right away. I simply haven’t got it, but I’ll pay you by degrees. I hate having to ask you to give me time, but I can’t help myself.” She sat up on the sofa and put both her hands to her beating heart. “I don’t understand. I’ve lain awake for two whole nights turning it all over in my mind. I thought I should go mad. I’ve been trying to understand. I can’t. I can’t. (What play did I say that in?”) “Oh yes, you can, you understand perfectly. You were angry with me and you wanted to get back on me. And you did. You got back on me all right. You couldn’t have shown your contempt for me more clearly.” “But why should I want to get back on you? Why should I be angry with you?” “Because I went to Maidenhead with Roger to that party and you wanted me to come home.” “But I told you to go. I said I hoped you’d have a good time.” “You know you did, but your eyes were blazing with passion. I didn’t want to go, but Roger was keen on it. I told him I thought we ought to come back and dine with you and Michael, but he said you’d be glad to have us off your hands, and I didn’t like to make a song and dance about it. And when I saw you were in a rage it was too late to get out of it.” “I wasn’t in a rage. I can’t think how you got such an idea in your head. It was so natural that you should want to go the party. You can’t think I’m such a beast as to grudge you a little fun in your fortnight’s holiday. My poor lamb, my only fear was that you would be bored. I so wanted you to have a good time.” “Then why did you send me that money and write me that letter? It was so insulting.” Julia’s voice faltered. Her jaw began to tremble and the loss of control over her muscles was strangely moving. Tom looked away uneasily. “I couldn’t bear to think of your having to throw away your money on tips. I know that you’re not terribly rich and I knew you’ve spent a lot on green fees. I hate women who go about with young men and let them pay for everything. It’s in considerable. I treated you just as I’d have treated Roger. I never thought it would hurt your feelings.” “Will you swear that?” “Of course I will. My God, is it possible that after all these months you don’t know me better than that? If what you think were true, what a mean, cruel, despicable woman I should be, what a cad, what a heartless, vulgar beast! Is that what you think I am?” A poser. “Anyhow it doesn’t matter. I ought never to have accepted valuable presents from you and allowed you to lend me money. It’s put me in a rotten position. Why I thought you despised me is that I can’t help feeling that you’ve got a right to. The fact is that I can’t afford to run around with people who are so much richer than I am. I was a fool to think I could. It’s been fun and I’ve had a grand time, but now I’m through. I’m not going to see you any more.” She gave a deep sigh. “You don’t care two hoots for me. That’s what that mean.” “That’s not fair.” “You’re everything in the world to me. You know that. I’m so lonely and your friendship means a great deal to me. I’m surrounded by hangers-on and parasites and I knew you were disinterested. I felt I could rely on you. I so loved being with you. You were the only person in the world with whom I could be entirely myself. Don’t you know what a pleasure it was to me to help you a little? It wasn’t for your sake I made you little presents, it was for my own; it made me so happy to see you using the things I’ve given you. If you’d cared for me at all they wouldn’t have humiliated you, you’d have been touched to owe me something.” She turned her eyes on him once more. She could always cry easily, and she was really so miserable now that she did not have to make even a small effort. He had never seen her cry before. She could cry, without sobbing, her wonderful dark eyes wide open, with a face that was almost rigid. Great heavy tears ran down it. And her quietness, the immobility of the tragic body, were terribly moving. She hadn’t cried like that since she cried in The Stricken Heart. Christ, how that play had shattered her. She was not looking at Tom, she was looking straight in front of her; she was really distracted with grief, but what was it? Another self within her knew what she was doing, a self that shared in her unhappiness and yet watched its expression. She felt a sudden anguish wring his heartstrings; she felt that his flesh and blood could not suppose the intolerable pain of hers. “Julia.” His voice was broken. She slowly turned her liquid eyes on him. It was a woman crying that he knew, it was all the woe of humankind, it was the immeasurable, the inconsolable grief that is the lot of man. He threw himself down on his knee and took her in his arm. “Dearest, Dearest.” For the moment she didn’t move. It was as if she did not know that he was there. …When he had gone she sat down at the dressing-table and had a good look at herself. “How lucky I am that I can cry without my eyelids swelling”, she said. She massaged them a little. “All the same, what mugs men are.” She was happy. Everything would be all right now. She had got him back. But somewhere, at the back of her mind or in the bottom of her heart, was a feeling of ever so slight contempt for Tom because he was such a simple fool. to look wan, to give an effect, to murmur, to announce, to cough, to gaze at, to frighten, to tremble, to owe, to pay by degrees, to be angry with, to get back on somebody, to have a good time, to blaze with passion, to be keen on, to have somebody off one’s hands, to be in rage, to be bored, to hurt one’s feelings, to despise, to swear, to have a grand time, hanger-on, to be for one’s sake, to care for, to sob, to mean a great deal, to contempt, to make an effort, to be distracted with grief, to rely on somebody, to humiliate, to lend money, to look uneasily, to tip 4. Recall the situations from the text in which the active vocabulary is used. 5. Make up your own sentences with the words and phrases of the active vocabulary. 6. Explain the meaning of the following words and phrases in English. Use the English- English dictionary. to contempt, the woe of humankind, a mug, rigid, hanger-on, fragile, to despise, anxious, gallant 7. Form nouns from the following adjectives from the text and use them in the sentences of your own. anguish, miserable, mean, cruel, despicable, fragile, gallant, angry, boring 8. Translate into English using the active vocabulary.
9. Translate the following into Russian paying attention to the italicized words and phrases, say it in other English words:
10. Open the brackets using the appropriate form of the Infinitive. Explain the grammar rule.
11. Explain the use of the article and its absence in the following sentences.
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