PRACTICAL ASSIGNMENT № 4
List of Proverbs
1. Life is not all beer and skittles.
Life is not all pleasure, amusement, ease.
Жизнь — не ложе из цветов.
2. Like to like.
Things and people of the same sort are drawn to one another
Свои свояка видит издалека. Масть к масти подбирается.
3. Live and let live.
If one lives the sort of life, that one chooses for oneself, one should allow to others the right and means to do the same.
Сам живи и другим не мешай.
4. All is fair in love and war.
All tactics are allowed, fair and unfair, when fighting for someone, i.e. in love, or against someone, i.e. in war. (The saying is often used by cynics.)
В любви и на войне все средства хороши.
5. No man can serve two masters.
A person cannot satisfactorily devote himself to two different causes that have different or opposed aims.
Двум господам не служат.
6. One man's meat is another man's poison.
What is liked by one person is disliked by another.
What is beneficial to some may be harmful to others.
Что полезно одному, то другому вредно.
7. You can't make an omelet without omelet without breaking eggs.
Small sacrifices of some kind must be made in order to attain one's purpose.
Лес рубят, щепки летят. Не разбив яиц, не сделаешь яичницы.
A miss is as good as a mile.
Even if one fails only by a narrow margin, one has still failed to do something.
However little, a failure is still a failure.
7.«Чуть-чуть» не считается. Промах есть промах.
8. Ask no questions, and you will be told no lies.
If one asks one may get deceitful inappropriate questions answers.
Много будешь знать, скоро состаришься.
9. A penny saved is a penny.
Money that has been kept, instead of being spent, can be counted equivalent to that amount earned.
Сбережешь - что найдешь.
10. The man who pays the piper calls the tune.
He who bears the cost, has the right to decide what shall be done
Кто едет, тот и правит.
11. Little pitchers have long ears.
Children have sharp ears, so one should keep guard when saying things in their presence.
Что говорит большой, слышит и малый. И стены имеют уши.
12. Pride goes before a fall.
A person who behaves in a proud and impatient way is likely to suffer an early misfortune.
Гордыня до добра не доведет.
13. The proof of the pudding is in the eating.
It is only experience and result that will show the value of an arrangement, plan, or theory.
Обед узнают по кушанью, а ум по слушанью.
14. What is worth doing at all is worth doing well.
One should do things properly or not at all.
Если уж делать, то хорошо. Ср.: Рваться не рвись, а крепче берись.
15. Give a man enough rope and he will hang himself.
Let a foolish person act as he pleases, and he will cause his own destruction.
Дай дураку веревку, он и повесится. Ср.: Заставь дурака богу молиться, он и лоб расшибет.
16. Among the blind the one-eyed man is king.
If a man 'shows greater ability than those around him, he has a decided advantage, even though his talents are not really outstanding.
Кривой среди слепых — король.
18.Never say die.
Never abandon hope, never give in.
Пока живу - надеюсь.
| 19. You cannot make a silk purse out of a sow's ear | Nothing good can be made from material that is bad or of poor quality. | |
Кривого веретена не выпрямишь. Ср.: Дурака учить - что мертвого лечить. Горбатого могила исправит.
|
| О вкусах не спорят. |
Exercise I. Translate the following excerpts and give a corresponding Russian equivalent for each of the English proverbs.
1. I just had to come in and have a chat. I've been feeling pretty fed up lately. Married life is not all beer and skittles, I don't mind telling you. (E. Waugh)
2. I liked Frank Crawley. I did not find him dull and uninteresting as Beatrice had done. Perhaps it was because I was dull myself. We were both dull. We neither of us had a word to say for ourselves. Like to like. (D. du Maurier)
3. The truth is that, in most civilized countries nowadays, about the only foreigners who are really welcome are tourists, businessmen who want to buy or invest, technicians whose brains can be picked and Americans with aid appropriations to dole out. Soldiers of fortune with my sort of know- how are simply not wanted. The good old liberal principle of live - and - let - live is on the scrap-heap. They only want people who can be exploited. (E. Ambler)
4. «But I now perceive how right my cousin Charles was to warn me to have nothing to do with you, Sir Vincent! I did not think you would have served Sir Horace such a back-handed turn!» «All is fair, dear Sophy, in love and war!» he said sententiously. (G. Heyer)
5. «And henceforward,» said De Aquila, «I counsel thee to serve one master – not two.» «What?» said Falke. «Can I work no more honest trading between the two sides these troublesome times?» «Serve Robert or the king – England or Normandy,» said De Aquila. «I care not which it is, but make choice here and now.» (R. Kipling)
6. The car stood untouched, a little dewy. Hilda got in and started the engine. The other two waited. «All I mean,» she said from her entrenchment, «is that I doubt if you'll find it's been worth it, either of you!» «One man's meat is another man's poison,» he said, out of the darkness. «But it's meat an' drink to me.» (D. Lawrence)
7. When the bullet struck just a few inches above his head, I couldn't help saying to myself: «A miss is as good as a mile.» (B. Whiting)
8. That he could not manage to feel in the least like a man who has done a fine thing, and that he did feel much like a gentleman who has disgraced himself, was unfortunate; but such is the tyranny of tradition that there was no help for that. One must accept the rough with the smooth, and omelettes cannot be made without breaking of eggs. (W. Norris)
9. She eyed him a little suspiciously. «You seem a nice fellow,» she said, «but you shouldn't ask so many questions.» She forced a coquettish smile. «Ask no questions and you'll be told no lies. Understand?» she said. (F. Hardy)
10. My proverbs are: «A penny saved is a penny earned; A stitch in time saves nine; Look before you leap»; and the British Empire rests on them. (E. Forster)
11. There is only one freedom that is really important and that is economic freedom, for in the long run the man who pays the piper calls the tune. (S. Maugham)
12. Tatiana: Where's your mother? Joan: Mum'U be in the dairy now. We've got a new separator and once a week Mum separates the cream and butter. If she's not there she'll have gone to the pigsty. Tatiana: Does your mother look after the pigs as well? Joan: No, but she takes the skim milk down to them. That's to feed the young pigs on, you know. Tatiana: You kids seem to know everything that's going on. Fred: Little pitchers have big ears, Tanya. (G. Hanna)
13. «Well, darn it, if you won't come, you won't, that's flat!» the young man exclaimed, angrily. «This is your nasty pride, Miss Alma; but, mind you, pride goes before a fall,» he added. (M. Grey)
14. The shareholder, whose neck and back were like a doctor's, rose to answer. «I differ from the last speaker in his diagnosis of the case. Let us admit all he says, and look at the things more widely. The proof of the pudding is in the eating. When a Government makes a bad mistake of judgement, the electorate turns against it as soon as it feels the effects. This is a very sound check on administration; it may be rough and ready, but it is the less of two evils. A Board backs its judgement; when it loses, it should pay.» (J. Galsworthy)
15. Now I want you, gentlemen, to remember that anything that's worth doing at all is worth doing welland furthermore on this ship what's difficult we do at once, and the impossible takes a little longer. (H. Wouk)
16. «If Sir John has found out about the allowance and thinks I have been defrauding Mary all these years, he might have had the decency to tell me himself, and employ a detective,» she said. «Oh, no, here we go,» thought Black. «Give the old lady enough rope and she'll hang herself.» (D. du Maurier)
17.Among the blind the one-eyed is king, and among a crowd of total strangers an acquaintance rises into a friend. Lonely Esther is half-inclined to effect this metamorphosis in the case of Miss Blessington. (R. Broughton)
18. «Here, No. 942, take your fare, and take yourself off-respectable gentleman – know him well-none of your nonsense – this way, Sir – where're your friends? – all a mistake, I see – never mind – accidents will happen-best regulated families – never say die-down upon your luck – pull him up – put that in your pipe – like the flavour – damned rascals.» And with a lengthened string of similar broken sentences, delivered with extraordinary volubility, the stranger led the way to the traveller's waiting room. (Ch. Dickens)
19. Too late Julia realized that the best and the most sacrificing of wives cannot make a silk purse out of a sow's ear, an Arnold Bennett out of an Oswald. (R. Aldington)
20. «...most English people dislike them (beards).» «Well, let them shave, there is no accounting for tastes,» observed Antonio, with an air of resignation. (J. Ruffini)
Exercise II. Give the English proverb equivalent to each of these statements.
1. Горбатого могила исправит. 2. Кривой среди слепых – король. 3. Дай дураку веревку, он и повесится. 4. Обед узнают по кушанью, а ум по слушанью. 5. Дети любят слушать разговоры взрослых. 6. Кто едет, тот и правит. 7. Гордыня до добра не доведет. 8. Если уж делать, то хорошо. 9. Пока живу – надеюсь. 10. О вкуcах не спорят. 11. Много будешь знать – скоро состаришься. 12. «Чуть-чуть» не считается. 13. Что полезно одному, то другому вредно. 14. В любви и на войне все средства хороши. 15. Свой свояка видит издалека. 16. Жизнь – не ложе из цветов. 17. Сам живи и другим не мешай. 18. Двум господам не служат. 19. Лес рубят, щепки летят. 20. Сбережешь – что найдешь.
Exercise III. Paraphrase the following using the proverbs
1. The money which is saved can be regarded as being earned. 2 A person who is pitied by people who do not share his particular misfortune is himself regarded as fortunate by people less fortunate then he. 3 Be concerned with your own affairs and let other people govern their affairs and live as they wish. 4. There are some things that cannot be done without drastic or violent actions, or sacrificing something. 5. Although they may not give that impression, young children often take in every world spoken by their elders. 6. One cannot and shall not be loyal to two completely opposed principles or ideas. 7. Only performance is the true test, not appearances, promises, etc. 8. Never despair! Never give up! 9. Life is not all eating, drinking and play; it is not all pleasure. 10. Do not put awkward questions! Replies may be unpleasant. 11. Pride goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall. 12. Those things that are liked or enjoyed by one person are not necessarily liked by another person. 13. The person who is paying for something has a right to control how it is used. 14. We are attracted by the people of similar behaviour. 15. People may like different things and it is hardly possible to prove that one's taste is superior to the other's 16. To miss doing or getting a thing by even the smallest distance or amount is as serious as (to miss) by a great distance or amount. 17. The thing must be (should be) done only thoroughly and only well. 18.It is impossible to turn a person coarse or stupid by nature into a refined and cultured (humane) person. 19. All stratagems in love, and war are lawful. 20 A wicked man is sure to bring about his own destruction.
Exercise IV. The following is a series of proverbs current in the languages of various peoples of the world. Which of them do you like better and why?.Give their English equivalents.
1. The one-eyed person is a beauty in the country of the blind (Arabian) 2. If you ferry at all, ferry right over. (Chinese) 3. Do as you would be done by. (Italian) 4. Tastes do not admit of argument. (Latin) 5. Not all is roses in the life. (French) 6. He who eats and puts something by spreads the table twice. (Spain) 7. Haughtiness com before the fall (German) 8. What has benefited one has destroyed others (Latin) 9. Who does not break eggs will not make pancakes. (Italian) 10. Jackdaw always perches by jackdaw. (Latin) 11. A pfenning makes a taler. (German) 12 Either don't attempt it, or go through with it. (Latin) 13. You cannot make a sparrow-hawk out of a buzzard. (French) 14. In love a ruse is like a stratagem in war. (French) 15. Little pots have ears. (Flemish) 16. Every man likes to associate with those who are like himself. (Italian) 17. He who hesitates between two mosques, returns without prayer. (Turkish)
Exercise V. Read the text paying attention to the provebs
Sanatorium (abridged)
by W.S. Maugham
Ashenden had contracted tuberculosis of the lungs, and the specialist he saw in London had sent him up to a sanatorium in the north of Scotland. There were people lying all along the veranda in deck-chairs, some chatting with their neighbours and some reading. Before the nurse left Ashenden she turned with a kind of professional briskness to the man who was lying in the next chair.
«I want to introduce Mr Ashenden to you,» she said. And then to Ashenden: «This is Mr Mc Leod. He and Mr Campbell have been here longer than anyone else.»
On the other side of Ashenden was lying a pretty girl, Miss Bishop, with red hair and bright blue eyes. She gave Ashenden a friendly look, but did not speak, and Ashenden, feeling rather shy among all those strange people, waited to be spoken to.
«First time they've let you get up, is it?» said Mc. Leod. «Yes.» Mc Leod, lying there, gave you the impression that he was immenselv tall; his skin was stretched tight over his bones, his cheeks and temples hollow.
«I like it here. At first, after a year or two, I went away in the summer, but I don't any more. It's my home now. I shan't stir again till they carry me out feet first in my coffin.»
At that moment a man, leaning on a stick, came walking slowly along the veranda.
«Oh, look, there's Major Templeton,» said Miss Bishop, a smile lighting up her blue eyes; and then, as he came up: «I'm glad to see you up again.» «Oh, it was nothing. Only a bit of cold. I'm quite all right now.» The words were hardly out of his mouth when he began to cough. He leaned heavily on his stick. But when the attack was over he smiled gaily. «Can't get rid of this damned, cough,» he said. «Smoking too much. Dr. Lennox says I ought to give it up, but it's no good – I can't.» Miss Bishop made Ashenden known to him. Major Templeton said a few civil words in an easy, cordial way, and then asked the girl to go for a stroll with him; he had been ordered to walk to a certain place in the wood behind the sanatorium and back again. Mc Leod watched them as they sauntered off. «I wonder if there's anything between those two,» he said. «They do say Templeton was a devil with the Bids before he got ill.» «How long has Templeton been here?» «Three or four months. He's been in bed most of the time. He's for it all right. Ivy liishop'll be a damned fool if she gets stuck on him. She's got a good chance of getting well. I give Templeton about two years myself.»
Dr. Lennox was small, brisk and genial. He was a good enough doctor. Ashenden told him the nurse had introduced him to Mc Leod. Dr. Lennox laughed. «The oldest living inhabitant. He knows more about the sanatorium and its inmates than I do. Did he tell you about Campbell?» «He men-lioned him.» «He hates Campbell, and Campbell hates him. Funny, when you come to think of it, those two men, they've been here for seventeen years and they've got about one sound lung between them. They loathe the sight of one another. I've had to refuse to listen to the complaints about one another that they come to me with. Campbell's room is just below Mc Leod's and Campbell plays the fiddle. It drives Mc Leod wild. He says he's been listening to the same tunes for fifteen years, but Campbell says Mc Leod doesn't know one tune from another. Mc Leod wants me to stop Campbell playing, but I can't do that, he's got a perfect right to play so long as he doesn't play in the silence hours. I've offered to change Mc Leod's room, but he, won't do that.»
Of all those people in the sanatorium Major Templeton was probably from the moral standpoint the least worthy, but he was the only one who genuinely accepted the inevitable with unconcern. He snapped his fingers in the face of death.... The last thing that ever occurred to him when he came to the sanatorium was that he might fall more deeply in love there than he had ever done before. His amours had been numerous, but they had been light. It was simply from habit that he began to make love to Ivy Bishop. She was the prettiest and the youngest girl in the sanatorium. All she knew of the world she had learnt in these establishments, so that she combined rather curiously extreme innocence with extreme sophistication. She had seen a number of love affairs run their course. A good many men, of various nationalities, had made love to her; she accepted their attentions with self-possession and humour, but she had at her disposal plenty of firmness when they showed an inclination to go too far. She was quite ready to have a flirtation with George Templeton. It was a game she understood, and though always charming to him, it was with a bantering lightness that showed quite clearly that she had summed him up and had no mind to take the affair more seriously than he did. Time passed. It was plain that she liked his company, but she did not seek it, and indeed it looked as though she took pains not to be alone with him.
Templeton at last had taken Ashenden into his confidence. He was rather amused at himself. «Rum thing at my time of life, falling in love with a decent girl. Last thing I'd ever expected of myself. And it's no good denying it, I'm in it up to the neck. D'you know what's got me? Damned ridiculous when you come to think of it. An old rip like me. Virtue. Makes me laugh like a hyena. Last thing I've ever wanted in a woman, but there it is, no getting away from it, she's good, and it makes me feel like a worm.»
Ashenden by now was pretty sure that she was just as much in love with Templeton as he was with her. He had seen the flush that coloured her cheeks when Templeton came into the dining-room and he had noticed the soft glance she gave him now and then. Then an incident occurred to disturb the monotony of life. Though Mc Leyod and Campbell were always at odds they played bridge together because, till Templeton came, they were the best players in the sanatorium. They bickered incessantly, ... and they took a keen delight in scoring off one another. One afternoon Templeton consented to play with Campbell and Mc Leod. Ashenden was the fourth. The cards ran high. ... The players at otherr tables, who had broken off, gathered round and the hands were played in deadly silence to a little crowd of onlookers. Mc Leod's face was white excitement and there were beads of sweat on his brow. His hands trembled Campbell was very grim. Mc Leod had ... got the last of the thirteen tricks. There was a burst of applause from the onlookers. Mc Leod, arrogant in victory, sprang to his feet. ... He shook his clenched fist at Campbell «Play that off on your blasted fiddle,» he shouted.... «I’ve wanted to get it all my life and now I’ve got it.. Вy God. By God.» He gasped. He staggered forward and fel1 across the table. A stream of blood poured from his mouth. The doctor was sent for Attendants came. He was dead.
He was buried two days later, early in the morning so that the patients should not be disturbed by the the sight of a funeral. No one had liked him. No one regretted him. At the end of a week so far as one could tell, he was forgotten.
But presently it appeared that there was one person who had not forgotten him. Campbell went about like a lost dog. He wouldn't play bridge. He wouldn't talk. There was no doubt about t he was moping for Mc Leod. «Why don't you play your violin?» the matron asked him at length. «I haven't heard you plav for a fortnight.» «I haven't.» «Why not?» «It's no fun anymore. I used to get a kick out of playing because I knew ,it maddened Mc Leod. But now nobody cares if I play or not. I shall never play again.»
Nor did he for all the rest of the time that Ashenden was at the sanatorium. It was strange, now that Mc Leod was dead, life had lost its savour for him. With no one to quarrel with, no one to infuriate, he had lost his incentive and it was plain that it would not be long before? he followed his enemy to the grave. But on Templeton Mc Leod's death had another effect, and one which was soon to have unexpected consequences. He talked to Ashenden about it in his cool, detached wav. «Grand, passing out like that in his moment of triumph. He'd been here for years, hadn’t he?» «Eighteen, I believe.» «I wonder if it's worth it. I wonder if it's notbetter to have one's fling and take the consequences.» «I suppose it depends on how much you value life.» «But is this life?» Ashenden had no answer. In a few months he could count on being well, but you only had to look at Templeton to know that he was not going to recover. The death-look Was on his face. «D'you know what I've done?» asked Templeton. «I’ve asked Ivy to marry me.» Ashenden was startled. «What did she save?» «Bless her little heart, she said it was the most ridiculous idea she'd ever heard in her life and I was crazy to think of such a thing.» «You must admit she was right.» «Quite. But she's going to marry me.» «It's madness.» «I dare say it is; but anyhow, we're going to see Lennox and ask him what he thinks about it.»
Templeton and Ivy went to see Dr. Lennox together. They told him what they had in mind. He examined them; they were X-rayed and various tests were taken. He showed them the results of his examinations and explained to them in plain language what their condition was. «All that's very fine and large,» said Templeton then, «But what we want to know is whether we can get married.» «It would be highly imprudent. I don't think Miss Bishop will ever be strong enough to lead a normal life, but if she continues to live as she has been doing for the last eight years...» «In sanatorium?» «Yes. There's no reason why she shouldn't live very comfortably, if not to a ripe old age, as long as any sensible person wants to live. If she marries, if she attempts to live an ordinary life, the foci of infection may very well light up again, and what the results may be no one can foretell. So far as you are concerned, Templeton, I can put it even more shortly. You've seen the X-ray photos yourself. Your lungs are riddled with tubercle. If you marry you'll be dead in six months.» «And if I don't, how long can I live?» «Two or three years.» «Thank you, that's all we wanted to know.»
They went as they had come, hand in hand; Ivy was crying softly. No one knew what they said to one another; but when they came into luncheon they were radiant. They told Ashenden that they were going to be married as soon as they could get a licence. When the news spread among the patients that Dr. Lennox had told Templeton that if he married he would be dead in six months, they were awed to silence. Even the dullest were moved at the thought of these two persons who loved one another so much that they were prepared to sacrifice their lives. A spirit of kindness and good will descended on the sanatorium: people who hadn't been speaking spoke to one another again; others forgot for a brief space their own anxieties. Everyone seemed to share in the happiness of the happy pair. And it was not only the spring that filled those sick hearts with new hope, the great love that had taken possession of the man and the girl seemed to spread its effulgence on all that came near them.
Exercise VI. While answering the following question use the proverbs in brackets.
1. Was the life in the sanatorium pleasant? (Life is not all beer and skittles.)
2. How did it come that Mc Leod liked the life at the sanatorium? (There is no accounting for tastes.)
3. Did Mc Leod like Campbell's music? (One man's meat is another man's poison.)
4. Were Templeton and Ivy Bishop ready to sacrifice their lives for love's sake? (You can't make an omelet without breaking eggs.)
5. Do you think Templeton and Ivy Bishop would live a long life together? (The proof of the pudding is in the eating.)
6. Among the patients that had only a year or two to live, Ashenden, who counted on being well in a month or two, was envied, wasn't he? (Among the blind the one-eyed man is king.
7. Mc Leod and Campbell hated each other but could not live without one another. How can you explain it? (Like to like).
8. Was it noble of Templeton to marry Ivy when he knew himself to be doomed? (All is fair in love and war.)
9. Could Mc Leod change and become kind and benevolent to Campbell? (You cannot make a silk purse out of a sow's ear.)
10. To which person can we apply the proverb «Pride goes before a fall» if we understand its meaning literally?
11. How did Major Templeton accept his inexorable doom? (Never say die.)
12. How could a prosy and matter-of-fact professional, like Dr. Lennox, estimate Ivy and Templeton, who insisted on a marriage? (Give a man enough rope and he will hang himself.)
13. Why didn’t Major Templeton care much of the opinion of the people around? (Ask no questions and you will be told no lies.)
14. Dr. Lennox couldn't object to Ivy and Templeton's marriage because he understood them. Didn't he? (Live and let live.)
15. Major Templeton had come to the sanatorium «to worship the God of Health», i.e. to fight T.B.C. Could he be smoking immoderately at the same time, or, to use a figure of speech, «serve the malevolent Goddess of Tobacco?» (No man can serve two masters.)
16. The patients paid very high fees for the care and treatment at the sanatorium. So they could take the doctor's advice or not, could they? (The man who pays the piper calls the tune.)
17. In cards, as in life, even a slight error of judgement may lose the game, may it not? (A miss is as good as a mile.)
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