Часть I

§ 1. Инфинитив

1.1. Инфинитив в различных функциях

А. Инфинитив в функции определения переводится на русский язык, как правило, определительным придаточным предложением с модальным глагольным сказуемым, выражающим возможность или долженствование, или же глаголом-сказуемым в будущем времени.

This question will be discussed at the conference shortly to open in Moscow. Этот вопрос будет обсуждаться на конференции, которая должна вскоре открыться (вскоре открывается) в Москве.

1) После слова the last и порядковых числительных (если в данном предложении они выполняют функцию предикативного члена) инфинитив в функции определения переводится личной формой глагола в том же времени, что и глагол-сказуемое главного предложения.

The Secretary general was the first to raise this question. Генеральный секретарь первым поставил этот вопрос (...был первым, кто поставил...).

Если же эти слова выполняют какую-либо другую синтаксическую функцию, то инфинитив может также переводиться и причастием.

Тhe first person to raise objections was the Minister himself. Первым, выступившим с возражениями, был сам министр.

2) Пассивная форма инфинитива в функции определения сохраняет после себя предлог, с которым употребляется данный глагол, и переводится обычно на русский язык неопределенно-личным предложением.

There was nothing to be astonished at. Удивляться было нечему.

This was not a matter to be easily agreed upon. He такой это был вопрос, чтобы по нему можно было легко договориться (по этому/такому вопросу договориться было нелегко).

3) В отдельных случаях инфинитив в функции определения может переводиться причастием, прилагательным или существительным с предлогом.

The shape of things to come is shown by the data obtained by the experts. О характере предстоящих событий можно судить по данным, полученным специалистами (экспертами).

4) В зависимости от сочетаемости слов в русском языке предложение с инфинитивом в функции определения может быть переведено простым предложением; модальность при переводе передается лексически.

Не had no objections to make. У него не было возражений (Он не мог ничего возразить.)

The items to be discussed at the next session were already agreed upon. Вопросы, подлежащие обсуждению на следующей сессии, были уже согласованы.

5) Если определение указывает на назначение предмета, то оно сближается по значению с обстоятельством цели и переводится соответственно либо определением, либо обстоятельством цели, что зависит от контекста и от сочетаемости слов в русском языке.

Automation is one of the ways to increase production. Автоматизация — один из способов повысить производительность (повышения производительности).

Б. Инфинитив в функции дополнения не вызывает затруднений при переводе на русский язык, он обычно переводится инфинитивом, иногда придаточным предложением.

They want to submit a new proposal. Они хотят внести новое предложение.

They claim to be working for peace. Они заявляют (утверждают), что они (якобы) трудятся во имя мира (служат делу мира).

В. Инфинитив в функции обстоятельства результата или следствия и сопутствующего обстоятельства.

1) Инфинитив результата или следствия, которому пред-шествуют слова such, (as), enough, so ... , too ... , only, часто имеет модальное значение и переводится на русский язык или инфинити-вом, или самостоятельным предложением, вводимым союзами и, но.

This question is too difficult to be settled without further consultations. Этот вопрос слишком сложен, чтобы его можно было разрешить (чтобы его разрешить) без дальнейших консультаций.

Не managed to obtain this concession from the management only to find that no one really needed it. Он добился этой уступки от администрации, но обнаружил, что она никому не нужна.

2) Если в предложении с инфинитивом в функции обстоя-тельства результата или следствия нет вышеупомянутых прила-гательных и наречий, то инфинитив переводится, в зависимости от сочетаемости слов в русском языке, часто самостоятельным пред-ложением, вводимым союзом и.

Last year he resigned his post never to return to public life. В прошлом году он ушел в отставку и никогда уже не возвращался к общественной жизни (государственной деятельности).

Примечание. Инфинитив в этой функции представляет трудности при переводе потому, что он ошибочно может быть принят за обстоятельство цели. Только смысл всего предложения, а иногда и более широкий контекст позволяет определить, является ли инфинитив обстоятельством цели или результата.

Г. Инфинитив в функции подлежащего, предикативного члена, именной части составного сказуемого и обстоятельства цели не представляет трудности при переводе на русский язык. В этих функциях он переводится инфинитивом (в функции подлежащего или обстоятельства цели) или существительным.

To postpone an election due in a month's time is not technically easy; postponement would require complex legal maneuvers, which might take weeks. Отложить выборы, которые должны состояться через месяц, непросто с организационной точки зрения; отсрочка потребует сложных правовых маневров, на которые могут уйти недели.

Примечание. 1. В сочетании с глаголом to fail или существительным failure инфинитив передает неудавшуюся попытку совершить действие или просто отрицание и часто переводится на русский язык личной формой глагола в отрицательной форме.

The negotiators failed to come to agreement. Участники переговоров не пришли к согласию (не смогли договориться)

2. Сочетание is (was) bound с инфинитивом переводится обязательно, неизбежно должно было

It was bound to happen. Это неизбежно должно было произойти (случиться).

Д. Инфинитив может быть вводным элементом: to tell the truth... по правде говоря , to be frank, откровенно говоря, to put it mildly мягко выражаясь.

Примечание Инфинитив в начале предложения может выступать либо в функции подлежащего или обстоятельства цели, либо быть вводным элементом. Синтаксический анализ предложения дает возможность совершенно точно определить его функцию.

Проанализируйте и переведите следующие предложения.

1. Kurds are especially happy with a US pledge last September to protect them against Baghdad.

2. India and Pakistan are racing to put warheads on fast-flying missiles, set on a hair trigger, to be launched at first warning or lost to an in coming strike.

3. Efforts to attract investment by selling Ireland abroad also have a long history.

4. British Airways said, it would install heart monitors and cordial defibrillators devices on all its aircraft within a year, becoming the first international airline to do so.

5. Military rule and disdain for human rights have supposedly made Nigeria a country not to be visited.

1. Even from the point of view of Britain's homegrown capitalists, the current policies are failing. That is the only conclusion to be drawn from the Bank of England's quarterly review and the report of the Commons Treasury and Civil Service Committee.

6. Information comes in floods now, but we haven't installed a way to use the brains with the capacity to filter and distill it.

7. The decision to ban export of beef and cattle from Portugal was made after a sharp increase in the number of cases last year of «mad cow» disease in cattle grown in Portugal.

8. The candidate said this morning that he was fully aware of the obstacles to be faced and the charges that would be made.

10. The Euro-American democracies have, in the new NATO, a central organization to coordinate the military actions of those NATO members which decide they need to act.

11. The US government controls exports of strong encryption products to preserve its capability to decode messages from foreign governments and criminals.

12. There are lessons to be learnt from the cold war, but the inevitability of a peaceful outcome is not one of them.

13. Most Japanese educators concede that a reliance on rote learning and cramming does great damage to creativity, and many universities are moving to include interviews and essay writing in their entrance tests.

14. A personal campaign to acquaint the farmers with the facts about this year's agricultural price review will be launched by the Minister of Agriculture on Monday.

15. Peru plans to raise $1 billion through bond sales and loans to help the country's struggling companies restructure debt.

16. Britain had the most extensive network of double taxation agreements in the world to protect companies trading in Britain and other countries from paying tax twice over.

17. The said tax increases to reduce government borrowing would do little to help recession hit industry or reduce unemployment.

18. The United States used the UN inspection team to send a US spy into Baghdad to install a highly sophisticated electronic eavesdropping system.

19. In his semiannual report to Congress, the US Federal Reserve chairman suggested that “storm clouds massing over the western Pacific and headed our way” might dampen demand for US goods and services just enough to relieve inflationary pressure — and render unnecessary a Fed hike in short-term rates.

20. Having shed enough of its history to look outward and prosper in Europe, Ireland has retained enough, up to now, to ameliorate the strains of rapid social change. This is a balance that will be difficult to preserve

21. The general feeling in Egypt is that the government has won its war against the Islamist militants. What it is still not confident enough to do is to allow political Islam a public voice.

22. Japanese consumers have simply not been purchasing many of the high-ticket items — particularly automobiles and appliances — insufficient volume to keep Japan's economy moving at the higher rate business would like to achieve.

23. Although Mr. Kim [South Korea] was the first of the three to embrace the need for a rescue by the International Monetary Fund, he made worrying noises about wanting to renegotiate the deal once he entered office.

24. Mr. Cook is not the first British foreign secretary to arrive in office determined to change things, nor will he be the last to run up against the diplomats' natural scepticism about his ability to do.

25. The achievement [of Ireland] is certainly not to be dismissed, as some would have it, as a matter of statistical fudges, subsidies from Europe and tax dodges for multinationals. But lessons for would-be tigers are either difficult to infer or of little use.

26. Scientology tries to turn its followers' minds and part them from their money; of course it will try to change their lives forever. But so do lots of religions.

27. Any newly elected government can expect to be given the benefit of the doubt by the public.

28. The U.S. Federal law allows the satellite systems to provide net work programming only to a viewer who cannot receive the local affiliate of a network using a conventional TV antenna.

29. The United Nations said that a UN delegation would visit China next month to look at what help the country needs to implement its commitments on human rights.

30. This attack on Serbia may be the start of a new trend to restrain thugs and despots, though it does not look terribly likely.

31. They say ways and means must be found whereby developing countries can expand their exports and increase foreign exchange earnings to pay for such internal programmes as power projects, transport services, exploitation of natural resources and industrialization generally.

32. The US President calls on America to accept a global role.

33. To meet the need for increasingly precise forecasts, meteorologists hope to extend their observational system until it covers every corner of the earth.

34. The chancellor in fact, was quick to warn us against raising false hopes on the basis of the new international support given for the pound.

35. The Prime Minister had told the party meeting that as a tough Prime Minister, he refused to be dictated to by any group.

36. [NATO] Already the Europeans cannot agree to finance the modernization programs that were considered essential even before enlargement came into the picture.

37. In London the British Government's special envoy said on returning yesterday from a two-week Far East “factfinding mission”, that he was disappointed not to have been invited to take part in the talks on the region's problems.

38. Perhaps BNP [Banque Nationale de Paris] felt left out: it courted Societe General unsuccessfully for two years only to see the bank fall into the arms of Paribas.

39. The retired director of the Brain Institute at the University of California — Los Angeles, devoted his life to studying that complex organ, only to be crippled by a brain disease that leaves its victims unable to care for themselves.

40. Education standards are bound to be hit by the government's latest round of spending cuts, the Education Secretary admitted yesterday.

41. Japan's economic success carries inevitable political consequences, and they are bound to be recognized sooner or later.

42. The announcement of his latest trip is bound to intensify suspicions about the objectives of the Government's manoeuvres.

43. “The US economy already looks fairly bubble-like. Such an economy is bound to slow once stock prices fall, and so the base trend will be a stronger yen once Japan's economy strengthens,” said a top official in the Finance Ministry.

44. The Chancellor of Germany said he had serious concerns that failure to reach agreement on the EU reforms could lead to complications concerning the European single currency, the euro.

45. Even a public apology from the prime minister for failing to explain his policy failed to turn the tide of opinion in his favour.

46. European Union leaders last night failed to make any breakthroughs on the future financing of the community.

47. The two social workers stood bail of $500 each. When the youth failed to appear, they were summoned to court and ordered to forfeit $300 each...

48. Will Republicans squabble so acrimoniously to define the soul of their party that they condemn themselves to a protracted civil war that, two years from now, will lead not just to failure to recapture the White House but to failure to keep control of Congress?

49. The old controversy about whether government borrowing imposes a burden on the future has lately been given a new airing. Consider, to begin with, the recipe for making a “primary real burden” of the national debt as laid down by Professor Brown of the University of Virginia.

50. To begin with, the cumulative effect of so many cocktail and other parties amounts to a serious physical drain on the U.N. delegates; considerable stamina is required to stand up to some seven hundred social functions a year.

51. It was freely stated, to begin with, that she was little more than a figurehead, used by the politicians of her party to get back into power on a strong wave of emotion which only she could inspire.

52. To judge living standards, it is better to add to GDP the income earned by foreign assets, and to deduct from it the income paid to foreign creditors.

53. The other leg of the Nissan plan is to raise operating margins from below zero up to 5% within two years.

54. The commercial broadcasting industry convinced Americans that it was “good citizenship to consume news at regular intervals”.

55. In many respects the father of both the supersonic Concorde and the wide-bodied Airbus airliners, Henri Ziegler lived long enough to see the recent major restructuring of the French aircraft industry.

56. Behind the closed doors of homes ranging from modest apartments to mansions in Virginia, many foreign servants live in silent despair, toiling long hours for low wages but too fearful, isolated or insecure about what will happen to them to complain or break-free, human rights advocates and investigators say.

57. It is increasingly recognized that the current peacekeeping resources and powers of the UN are too limited to enable it to intervene effectively in many conflicts. One solution would be to create peace enforcement units, to be made available in clearly defined circumstances.