A Lifer Keen on Canaries

Robert Franklin is an American criminal, a convicted murderer who became a self - taught ornithologist during his 54 years in prison, forty-two of them in solitary confinement. He became known for his contribution to the study of birds.

At the age of 13 Franklin ran away from home and, by the age of 18, was in Alaska, working as a pimp and living with a dancehall girl. An argument over the girl led to his fighting and killing a man. Pleading guilty to manslaughter in 1909, he was sentenced to 12 years in a federal prison. After stabbing a fellow prisoner and proving generally troublesome, he was transferred to Kansas, where he continued to be a loner but began to educate himself, taking university extension courses. In 1916 he stabbed and killed a guard and was tried, convicted and sentenced to hanging, but in 1920 President Woodrow Wilson commuted his sentence to life imprisonment in solitary confinement.

Thereafter, mostly in solitary confinement, he began raising canaries and other birds, collecting laboratory equipment, and studying the diseases of birds and their breeding and care. Some of his research writings were smuggled out of prison and published in 1943. Later, however, he was allowed to continue his research but denied further right of publication. His research was considered an important work in the field of ornithology (From Гуманова Ю. 2011).

1. Study of birds – вивчення птахів

2. Self-taught ornithologist – орнитолог-самоучка

3. Solitary confinement – одиночне ув’язнення

4. Contribution – внесок

5. Pimp – сутенер

6. Dance - hall – танцівниця

7. An argument over the girl – суперечка за дівчину

8. Fighting and killing – бійка та вбивство

9. Pleading guilty – визначити себе винним

10. Manslaughter – ненавмисне вбивство

11. Stab –заколоти

12. Loner – ув’язнений в одиночній камері

13. Extension courses –заочне навчання

14. A guard – охоронець

15. Hanging – повішання

16. Commute a sentence – пом’якшувати покарання

17. To raise – розводити канарок

18. Disease – хвороба

19. Breeding and care – розведення та піклування

20. Smuggle – провозити контрабандним шляхом

21. Research – дослідження

Topic 10

Prison Life

Ex.1 Read and memorize the following words and expressions:
1.pains of imprisonment	проблеми ув’язнення
2. deprivation of liberty(freedom)	позбавлення волі
3. loneliness and boredom of imprisonment	самотність і нудьга ув’язнення
4. goods and services	товари та послуги
5. absence of heterosexual relationships	відсутність різностатевих відносин
6. body of institutional regulations	правила внутрішнього розпорядку
7. behavior	поведінка
8. essence of imprisonment	суть ув’язнення
9. a means of maintaining security	засоби збереження безпеки
10. introduction of weapons	надходження зброї
11. contraband substances	заборонені речовини
12. be deprived of	бути позбавленим
13. be subjected to	підпорядковуватися
14. prevent escapes	запобігати втечам
15. within the sight	під наглядом
16. within one’s hearing	прослуховуючи
17. be searched for contraband	бути оглянутим на наявність заборонених речей
18. receive letters	отримувати листи
19. telephone call	телефонний дзвінок
20. be subject to censorship	підлягати цензурі
21. prison authorities	керівництво в’язниці
22. privilege	привілей
23. make purchases	робити покупки
24. earn money	заробляти гроші
25. punishment block (cell)	карцер
26. loss of remission	втрата помилування
27. prohibited offences	заборонені злочини
28. mutiny and violence	заколот та насильство

Ex 2. Read the text below and translate it into Ukrainian: