voskresenskaya_e_g_i_dr_sost_sovremennye_angliiskie_romany

The Business Plan

PRE-READING

Focus Activity

1 Comment on the quotation below and answer the questions that follow it.

‘They are travelogues, invitations au voyage, that lead us out of the flat lands of the north, out of the cold and wet, out of the mud, out of the dull daily round, to distant shores where the sun shines and things are different.’ (p. 94)

1)What is a travelogue?

2)What other types of travelogues apart from paintings can you name? Are they necessary for people nowadays?

ACTIVE READING

Vocabulary Practice

2 Find the English equivalents to the following words and expressions. Give the context they are used in.

обдумывать, размышлять (p. 92); скала, утес (p. 93); благоразум- ный (p. 97); старательный (p. 98); захватить добычу; грабить (p. 102); осведомляться, уточнять (p. 103); сомнительный (p. 106); потерпеть крах, кончиться ничем (p. 107); запоздало (p. 110); мо- шенничество (p. 111); донкихотский, идеалистический (p. 113); педантизм (p. 115); за штуку (p. 117); сложившаяся ситуация (p. 124); абсурдный, нелепый (p. 126); кающийся (p. 130); дейст- венный, убедительный (p. 132); напрямик, прямо (p. 133)

3 Find the antonyms to the following words and expressions in the text.

deliberate, planned (p. 91); belittle, degrade (p. 94); clean (p. 98);

4Rewrite underlined parts of the following sentences using synonyms from the text.

1)The Chinese were given a colorable excuse for joining in the fight. (p. 91)

2)Our route that day offered a little bit of everything typically Dutch – including changeable weather. (p. 92)

3)She had brought it up again on the way to the airport. (p. 96)

4)I' m going to call the police and say you’re trying to kidnap my daughter. (p. 101)

5)But if there is any extra, I don't want you to have any hesitation about taking it. It'll be yours. (p. 102)

6)This impulsiveness is such a turn-on that I feel elated for the rest of the day. (p. 110)

7)Lowell and his wife had decided to get away for a weekend without premeditation. (p. 110)

8)I take full advantage of the numerous opportunities life presents. (p. 115)

9)All your questions will be answered in due course. (p. 117)

10)South Korea went on alert as the police hunted for two men suspected of being North Korean agents who shot a prominent South Korean diplomat. (p. 128)

11)His face was red and he was seething with anger. (p. 136)

5Translate the following sentences into English. Pay attention to the underlined words and expressions.

1)Он и понятия не имел, что затаилось в том доме, располо- женном на вершине отвесной скалы. (p. 93)

2)Картины на стенах живописали жуткие муки бесчисленных святых. (p. 94)

3)Стоицизм учит с самообладанием принимать превратности судьбы. (p. 95)

4)Все теперь меня знали и предоставляли мне редкую приви- легию – право беспрепятственно разъезжать по частным владениям. (p. 97)

5)Пылающие потоки лавы низверглись в тот злосчастный день на поселения, расположенные у подножия вулкана. (p. 97)

6)Он решился на чистосердечное признание. (p. 99)

7)Полиция заявила, что подозреваемый признался без приме- нения силы. (p. 100)

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8)Некоторые считают, что им и работать не стоит, раз можно получать деньги от государства. (p. 104)

9)Является ли социальное неравенство неизбежным следстви- ем экономической независимости? (p. 105)

10)Достоверности ради, нам пришлось выдавать себя за ино- странцев. (p. 105)

6Match words (1–5) with their definitions (a-e); complete the sentences with these words and make up your own sentences.

1)There was a lurking suspicion that our work was a … to superimpose American economic control upon ingenuous foreign countries.

2)The idea was to eventually expand the pilot … to all cities.

3)House is vast in extent and confusing in its ….

4)He's always coming up with these dumb … for making money that just land us in trouble.

5)This dome, like most architecture erected since the Gothic age, was a compilation rather than a ….

6)She had her … clearly in her head, with every detail distinct.

7)A … is merely the pattern on which the story is arranged.

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7Fill the gaps in the following sentences with a suitable word or expression from the box below. Put it in an appropriate form. Some words and expressions are used more than once.

1)Monday morning, the stock market … and the panic ensued.

2)The boy is as … as can be, hands clasped ever so respectfully behind his back.

3)My fork froze … to my mouth.

4)And I married Tom and did everything …, without ever seeking her approval.

5)It's at this … that he makes his comment about the dangers of speaking or knowing the truth.

6)Such optimism seems almost … in the middle of the worst recession this country has seen in decades.

7)Did Senator Nelson made a … backroom deal, or is he being hammered unfairly?

8)The hand-painted canvases were priced modestly, at $100 …, roughly what Warhol had charged a decade earlier for the muddled paintings he produced.

9)The German government was informed of the Allied peace terms on 7 May, shortly after the counter-revolutionary bloodbath in Munich that put an end to a … socialist experiment.

10)It is not a decision that you take ….

11)After the violent outbursts, Susan would be …, concerned about how badly she’d hurt Mark.

12)Meanwhile, a … vigilante in a dimly lit room packs into a case what appears to be a sniper rifle.

Comprehension and Discussion

8 Answer the questions below.

1)Why the chapter is called “The Business Plan”?

2)Where is Martin heading for? What is his purpose?

3)Why does the narrator try to transform the surroundings in his mind? Which purpose does he pursue? What colours does he use for his painting? What is their significance (pp. 94–5)?

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4)How does “rusty barbed wire” (p. 97) contribute to characterization of the Churts? (cf.: p. 8 – “secured with string or rusty barbed wire…”; p. 98 “pink baler…”)

5)Is Martin good at business plans? Why? Who would play a better role in business planning in your opinion?

6)What information did the narrator find about Giordano and his painting that Tony possesses?

7)Which deal does Tony offer to Martin? Comment on Tony’s behaviour at making a deal.

8)What is the author’s concept of art? Do you agree that lie is the reverse of art?

9)Was Martin’s plan a success in your opinion?

10)What are Martin’s thoughts on his way home? In what ways are they different from his thoughts during the “outward journey”?

11)Does Martin’s imaginary conversation with Tony Churt seem plausible? What can we infer from it?

12)Why does Martin compare himself to the hunters from Bruegel’s painting? (p. 120) Why is it Kate’s fault?

13)Why does Kate disapprove of “the business plan” Martin concocted?

14)What further details about their first meeting do we get to know from this chapter? Who is to blame that Martin didn’t continue his project on Nietzsche?

15)What is the worst-case scenario Martin depicts? (Which scenario is more feasible?)

16)What is Kate’s suggestion? Why didn’t she mention that she had money before?

9Give a summary of the chapter using words from Vocabulary Practice section.

10Comment on the following quotations and explain their meaning. Do you agree with them?

1)I Patinirize it as I look at it, I Bruegelize it. (p. 94)

2)…And paint my way, blue by blue, up to the distant sea, where my ship lies waiting. (p. 95)

3)And I launch boldly out into the deep waters. (p. 102)

4)All I know’, I say, ‘is that he’s a Belgian. (p. 106)

5)I should have become a confidence trickster ages ago. (p.110)

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6)The deal’s going to unroll slowly over the course of many months, like the slowly changing seasons, each with its characteristic labour. (p. 114)

7)Now comes the hardest labour of all. (p. 118)

8)But she’s absorbed in Tilda again already, and there’s something so simple and concrete and complete about the two of them together, and something so confused and abstract and unfinished about what I have to say, that I let the air out again. (p. 119)

9)We’ve crossed some kind of watershed, and a new landscape’s opened in front of us. (p. 120)

10)We are on the road to becoming Tony and Laura. (p. 128)

11)…I know that something infinitely precious and good has slipped away from us forever. (p. 135)

Creating a Commentary

11 Prepare PowerPoint presentation on each entry.

Hunters in the Snow (p. 120); The Flight into Egypt (p. 122); Christ and the Woman Taken in Adultery (p. 122); The Three Soldiers

(p. 123); Icarus in Musée des Beaux-Arts (p. 130).

12 Comment on the meaning and usage of the following references and allusions, give the context they are used in.

Genre scene (p. 92); Mischlandschaft (p. 93); Scenes from the Life of the Virgin and of Christ by Hans Memling (p. 93); Joachim Patinir (p. 93); travelogues, invitations au voyage (p. 94); Gauleiter (p. 102); Menelaus (p. 108); Rockefeller (p. 111); Getty (p. 111); suggestio falsi (p. 111); the Daily Telegraph (p. 114); the Guardian (p. 114); Neuschwanstein (p. 125); Nietzsche (p. 125); Yellow Pages (p. 130); Gespritzen (p. 134); Frauenkirche (p. 134).

Language and Style

13Translate the following passages.

1)It’s real country all right… – …landscape is given the rank of an independent subject. (pp. 92–93);

2)I follow my own leisurely progress…. – …for the paler tones near the horizon. (p. 95)

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A Hint of Thunder

PRE-READING

Focus Activity

1 Comment on the quotation below and answer the questions that follow it.

‘… So instead of trying to relate his iconography to Bruegel himself, perhaps I could relate it to what was going on around him at the time. If I can’t see Bruegel, perhaps I could try to put myself into the space he occupied at the centre of his world, and see what he saw.’ (p. 142)

1)Can a person put themselves in another person’s shoes?

2)What will the result be?

ACTIVE READING

Vocabulary Practice

2Fill in the blanks in the sentences below with the most appropriate word from the corresponding page.

1)It became clear that calm, … arguments were not working in this volatile situation. (p. 139)

2)He gave an … roar of rage, scrambled to his feet and turned round, his right arm raised. (p. 141)

3)Talent, hard work and sheer … are all crucial to career success. (p. 143)

4)Niagara Falls was seen, correctly, as the source that would create an industrial … in Southern Ontario. (p. 145)

5)To have convinced him that he would be justified in killing Smith was a …. (p. 145)

6)But he had ridden up on a valiant steed with all the trappings of … knighthood. (p. 146)

7)Religious … have often employed the cunning device of converting other people's heroes into villains, to suit their own purposes. (p. 146)

8)There is still an illegal but … trade in ivory between Africa and South-East Asia. (p. 150)

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3Correct collocation/phrasal verb errors in the following sentences if there are any.

1)Eriugena himself was never part of the Carolingian ecclesiastical establishment and worked directly for the private patronage of Charles the Bald. (p. 151)

2)It should be always noted on the memo what time the call came in. (p. 151)

3)In many ways, his books, written in the first three decades of the last century, were ahead their time. (p. 152)

4)His capital offense was that he had omitted to mention her at all. (p. 153)

5)During wartime a money payment was made from the sultan's coffers to supplement the spoil of war. (p. 154)

6)These countries need aid and support to help sort their main problems i.e. family planning, health, starvation etc. (p. 155)

7)Michelangelo was commissioned to paint the Sistine Chapel in Rome. (p. 157)

8)The chance to get out of the house for a few hours had clearly raised her spirits. (p. 158)

4Choose the correct preposition to complete each sentence below.

1)Accept that and formulate an organised plan … action and you're nearly there! (p.159)

2)… breakfast a short length of bamboo was seen floating away behind the raft. (p.159)

5)He could always find fault … something, either in my writing or in my personality. (p.166)

a) in; b) to; c) with

6) Such a rise in long-term rates sits oddly … still scanty evidence of economic recovery. (p.166)

a) with; b) in; c) on

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7)By late Friday evening, the campsite was already half full with more campers arriving … the minute. (p.167)

8)He seems friendly, but he wouldn't hesitate to stab you … the back if he thought it would help him get your job. (p.167)

5 Give a word or expression for the following definitions.

1)something or someone that you use or accept instead of the usual or natural one (p. 169);

2)to give facts or reasons in order to prove that something is true (p. 171);

3)a drawing, painting, or description that you do of yourself (p. 172);

4)have no hesitation in stating or dealing with (something), however unpleasant or awkward it is (p. 173);

5)contrary to the natural inclination or feeling of someone or something (p. 174);

6)to expose, reveal, or cause to be seen (p. 176);

7)a very steep rock face or cliff, especially a tall one (p. 178);

8)lacking in movement, action, or change (p. 180);

9)surprisingly large or impressive (p. 183).

Make up your own sentences with the words/expressions you’ve found.

6 Translate the following sentences into Russian paying attention to the underlined words and expressions.

1. She completed it by studying her own face in a mirror and painting a self-portrait with clownly detailing. 2. Chivalrous heroes emerged beside selfish elbow-thrusters in what one survivor described as an “orderly disorder”. 3. I was always the one who went against the grain, no matter the consequences. 4. It's a small farming community in America's heartland. 5. She made no bones about the fact that Coco was a disappointment to her. 6. He was also the first to adduce his natural goodness as an alibi for his own unmistakable lack of virtue. 7. He's the guy that has founded black entertainment television and he has made a stupendous fortune. 8. I think we are on the precipice of another technological revolution

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that really is finally the fruition of the Internet boom. 9. Furthermore, anyone who questioned that premise risked denunciation as a bigot. 10. A decision to add detachable white cuffs to this season's black Chanel jackets was a master-stroke.

Comprehension and Discussion

7 Answer the questions below.

1)Why is the chapter entitled ‘A Hint Of Thunder’?

2)Why didn’t Kate want to be consulted about the picture? Why did she decide to get involved altogether?

3)Why are there so many different interpretations of Bruegel’s life, outlook and philosophy? How do these uncertainties help Frayn to shape the book into farce?

4)Why does Martin decide to research history of the Netherlands of the late 16th century?

5)At what times did Bruegel live?

6)Who is Antoíne Perrenot?

7)In what ways were the lives of Bruegel and Perrenot connected?

8)What does Martin mean by saying, ‘He had a bit of a past.’ (p. 155)?

9)Why is Martin skeptical about Bruegel’s position as the collaborator for the state?

10)Why does Martin decide to stay in their apartment in London overnight?

11)Why did Ortelius compare Bruegel to Apelles de Kos? With the help of realia comment on other allusions made by Ortelius.

12)How did the 6th painting of the set disappear? Why did it reemerge at the Churts’ house?

13)‘Bruegel shows his face quite literally in three of his pictures.’ (p. 171) Why does this sentence introduce a new part of the chapter? Describe the pictures in which Bruegel painted himself.

14)‘If this is what Bruegel was painting, then he was certainly playing with thunder and lightning.’ (p. 174) What was Bruegel painting that was too dangerous to paint, according to SteinSchneider?

15)Which article did Martin find through computer terminal search? How does it support the epitaph written by Ortelius?

16)Why didn’t Martin check Giordano prices?

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