Английский язык. Практикум по домашнему чтению (к рассказам Дж. Арчера и Р. Даля)

THE GREAT AUTOMATIC GRAMMATIZATOR

(BY R. DAHL)

Comprehension check

1. Do you agree or disagree with the following statements?

1)Mr Bohlen and A. Knipe built a pocket electronic device.

2)Knipe was immensely proud of his invention.

3)Mr Bohlen appreciated Knipe’s contribution to the original plans.

4)The functions of this small device were limited.

5)A. Knipe admired Mr Bohlen’s appearance and manners.

6)The boy was tall and handsome and he was always immaculately dressed.

7)Something was bothering Knipe and Bolen thought it was a woman.

8)Knipe spent his holiday in Jamaica.

9)Knipe toyed with the delicious idea for ten minutes and then dropped it, as he thought it impracticable.

10)Mr.Bohlen planned to get rid of Knipe and his crazy ideas.

11)Knipe was not very good at making calculating machines, though his heart was really in it.

12)Bohlen considered the new project an astonishing but useless piece of work.

13)In ten years Knipe had written and sold hundreds of short stories.

14)Knipe made Mr Bohlen a commercial proposition.

15)The machine could run off a story in 30 seconds.

16)Knipe was going to invent names for the authors and sell the stories wholesale.

17)Mr Bohlen insisted on his own name being put on all the better stories.

b)Make up 5 wrong and correct statements concerning the second half of the story.

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2. Answer the following questions: a)

1)What had Mr Bohlen and A. Knipe created? What was the function of this device? How fast did it work? Whose contribution to it was the most important?

2)What was the two men’s attitude to each other?

3)Why did Bohlen offer the boy a holiday? Where did Knipe spend it?

4)What depressed Knipe? Speak about the change of his mood. What caused it?

5)What did the new idea promise? Who were Knipe’s greatest enemies? Why?

6)What was Knipe stumped by?

7)Follow Knipe’s train of thoughts about the principles of the new device. In what way was it to be similar to a computer? What did Knipe think about grammar rules? What was he going to store in it instead of numbers?

8)Describe the period of intense labour. What was the living-room littered with? Describe Knipe’s mood at that period.

9)Speak about the change Mr.Bohlen noticed in Knipe.

10)What was Bohlen’s opinion of Knipe and his project?

11)What was Knipe’s life long dream? What urge did he have? What troubled the boy? What did Bohlen advise him?

12)What was Knipe’s opinion of magazines? What did his study prove?

13)What plan did Knipe suggest? What was the point of it?

14)How did Knipe manage to persuade Bohlen to set out creating the new device?

15)What surprised Bohlen? What did the boy work out? What was considered the advantage of machine-made articles? Why was Knipe sure that machine-made stories would sell?

16)Why did Bohlen’s expression change? Describe the change.

17)What kind of agency was Knipe going to set up? What did he say about the authors of the future books? Why did Bohlen call it trickery?

18)Where were the future plots to come from?

19)What little refinements were there in the plans?

b)Write down 10 questions concerning the second half of the story and put them to the rest of the group.

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Vocabulary

3.Pick out the words and expressions describing the appearance of a) Knipe;

b) Bohlen.

4.Which of the following adjectives can be applied to

a)Knipe?

b)Bohlen?

Add some more adjectives to each list.

5.Pick out all colloquial words and slang in the story, give their neutral equivalents.

6.Find the idioms used in the story and explain them.

7.Match the synonyms from columns A and B.

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8.Express the given notions using the words from the text.

1)an active feeling of interest;

2)a folded piece of cardboard used for holding loose papers;

3)a person of a great ability or a very high intellect;

4)nearly correct but not exact;

5)a strong wish or need;

6)not careful, not thorough;

7)something that is produced so as to be publicly sold;

8)amusingly strange, with strange ideas;

9)to sell goods in large quantities;

10)having a strong desire for success;

11)a slight change in order to make suitable for a practical purpose;

12)ability to find ways to deal with difficult situations;

13)to make less angry;

14)in the business centre of a city;

15)producing many works;

16)to seize and hold.

9.Explain the meaning of the following phrasal verbs:

1)I’ve got it all worked out.

2)Mr Bohlen edged up straighter in his chair.

3)It stands to reason”.

4)We’ll set up our own literary agency.

5)I was thinking of using my own name on one or two stories, just to help out.

6)He was completely sold on the idea.

7)They got ready to run off the first story.

8)Just get on with it and cut out the preliminaries.

9)Knipe set out to discover the fault.

10)This boy arranged for a friend to hold up the rich man’s daughter on a dark night.

11)The boy broke down and confessed.

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12)The father, instead of kicking him out of the house, said that he admired the boy’s resourcefulness.

13)This is a skilful job, but in our opinion it doesn’t quite come off.

14)Knipe slowly and carefully stepped up the output.

15)What I’m going to do is a serious novel, something that’ll make’em sit up and take notice.

16)Those who were running out of ideas and taken to drink were the easiest to handle.

17)Many more are hurrying to tie up with Mr Knipe.

10.Pick out all slang words and expressions and give their neutral equivalents.

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11. Do the crossword:

ACROSS: 3) extremely large; 4) punishment given to someone in return for harm done to oneself; 5) nonsense; 6) a curse, a swearword; 9 ) a puzzling question or problem; 10) the face of an instrument such as a clock showing measurements by means of a pointer and figures

DOWN: 1) coming before and preparing for something more important; 2) showing cleverness at making or inventing things; 7) nearly correct but not exact; 8) very offensive

1

2

3

4

5

8

9

10

11

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Style

12.What is the stylistic role of technical terms in this story? What is the effect of the abundance of colloquial expressions?

13.Pick out epithets describing Knipe and Bohlen. Point out the words with opposite meanings. Pay attention to transferred epithets.

14.Comment on the implications of the following metaphors:

“Little pearls of sweat were oozing out all over Mr. Bohlen’s face.”

(160)

“Knipe’s Literary agency became famous for its large stable of promising young novelists.” (161)

Find some more metaphors in the text.

15.What is the stylistic effect of simile and hyperbole in the following descriptions?

“The fellow had ears as big as rhubarb leaves.” (145)

“He was jumping up and down like a man with hives.” (153)

16.What emotional state of the characters do the following repetitions transfer?

– “I want to do a novel,” he kept saying. ”I want to do a novel.”

– “And so you will, sir. And so you will.”

Find some more repetitions in the dialogues.

17. The description of the writing process sounds extremely ironic. Look at the extract “Finally there was the question of passion…the operating procedure for the new wonder.” (158). Point out the words used in the meanings opposite to the dictionary ones? Which words seem not suitable for the description of an artistic creative process?

Speaking

18.Give an account of the events that followed.

19.Draw word-portraits of Knipe and Bohlen.

20.Give their character-sketches.

21.Act out the conversation about the new device.

22.Give more details about the creation of the machine.

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23. Describe the process of running off a novel.

Discussion

24.Do you agree or disagree with the following statements? Prove your point.

1)“English grammar is governed by rules that are almost mathematical in their strictness.”

2)“Creative urge” is bunk.

3)Mediocrity is easy to seduce.

4)Knipe revenged himself “in a most devilish manner”.

5)“A machine cannot have brains.”

6)“Nowadays no hand-made article can compete with massproduction.”

25.Discuss with your partner your willingness/reluctance to do or read a machine-made novel.

26.Think over the following.

1)What sort of talent had Knipe? Was it a literary gift?

2)Did Knipe manage to revenge himself upon his enemies?

3)Did one need a special talent to manage Knipe’s machine?

4)What do you think of the artistic value of Knipe’s books? Could they be great literary works? What did they lack?

5)What is the genre of this story? Is it science-fiction or grotesque satire?

6)Who (what) does the author mock at?

27.Comment on the phrase “Give us strength, oh Lord, to let our children starve” (p.164).

28.Which of the following points do you think is dominant in this story? Which would you disagree with?

1)An electronic “writer” can (cannot) be produced.

2)Writers would never agree to pass their work to a machine.

3)Most books published nowadays are in some ways alike.

4)There are certain patterns that can be found in different books of all times.

5)There are certain rules according to which all books are created.

6)The author’s personality is essential in a work of art.

7)No hand-made story or novel can be perfect.

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8)Many contemporary writers would like to run off machine-made books.

9)Literary work is a kind of business.

10)“Stories are just another product and no one cares how you produce them so long as you deliver the goods” (p.150).

11)“A machine however ingenious is incapable of original thought” (p.143).

12)Artists often have to let their families starve.

29.What eternal values do you discern in this story?

30.Is the problem “art and money” up-to-date? Is it urgent? Prove it.

Writing

31.Write a convincing speech for or against a) machine-produced literature, b) commercial art.

32.On behalf of Mr Knipe write an article to a magazine about the New Literary Agency.

33.Write an essay on the topic “Art and Money”.

34.Translate the following text into English.

Выражение его лица изменилось, любопытство сменилось выра- жением удовольствия.

Начиная с этой минуты, Адольф Найп ни о чем другом думать не мог. Идея захватила его. Он работал с упоением. Взял лист бумаги и сделал несколько предварительных записей. Суть сводилась к сле- дующему. Грамматика английского языка в известной степени под- чиняется математическим законам. Допустим, даны слова и смысл того, что надо сказать, тогда возможен только один порядок органи- зации слов. Компьютеру можно задать не цифры, а слова, чтобы он расставлял их в соответствии с правилами грамматики. Потом нужно подкинуть ему несколько сюжетов, и пусть он пишет.

С помощью особого регулятора, соединяющего «отдел памяти» с «сюжетным отделом», просто нажав на нужную кнопку, можно по- лучить любой необходимый рассказ в зависимости от направления журнала, позволяющий ставить свое имя под произведением.

Нажатием кнопки выбирался жанр: исторический, философиче- ский, эротический, юмористический или любой другой. Затем кноп- ки предлагали выбор темы: солдатские будни, первые переселенцы,

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война, расовая проблема, воспоминания о детстве, приключения и многие другие.

Затем можно было выбирать литературный стиль: классический, эротический, пикантный, модернистский, стиль женских романов, стиль Джойса, Хемингуэя, Фолкнера. При этом добавляется тайна, пафос, юмор, напряжение и страсть.

Рассказы тоже товар, как ковры и стулья. Мы будем производить их оптом и по низким ценам, мы завоюем рынок.

Надо только придумать фамилию автора или несколько подаю- щих надежду авторов. И еще предложить нескольким преуспеваю- щим писателям пожизненный контракт.

И опять он споткнулся о старую истину, заключающуюся в том, что насколько бы совершенна ни была машина, она не способна творчески мыслить.

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