Revision Exercises

(based on the Introductory Material)

Exercise 1. Make up several questions of different types (including Indirect questions) based on the following sentences: 1, 9, 12.

Exercise 2. Make up several sentences on the analogy of sentences 1, 10.

Exercise 3. Comment on the following sentences: 1, 8.

Exercise 4. Develop the following sentences into short situations: 6, 11.

Exercise 5. Build dialogues round the following sentences: 1, 13.

14. Continual, continuous

Introductory material

Read and translate the following sentences paying special attention to the words in bold type.

1. «To speak frankly, the woman drank. Her flat was actually on the top floor above mine and there were continual disorderly parties, with broken glass, furniture knocked over, singing and shouting, a lot of — er — coming and going.» «She was, perhaps, a lonely woman,» suggested Poirot. «That was hardly the impression she conveyed,» said Mrs Jacobs acidly. 2. That some of the family were converts was something which Hilda felt as a continual affront to herself. It caused her real pain. 3. I have been miserable, Monsieur Poirot, miserable ever since I returned here. I always hated City life. The boring round of office routine, continual consultations with lawyers and financiers. 4. She makes continual complaints about her neigh­bours. 5. He was very weary and often wished to rest — to lie down and sleep; but he was continually driven on, not so much by his desire to gain the land of little sticks as by his hunger. 6. «I woke up with a nightmare.» «Yes, you were continually having nightmares as a child.» 7. Like most Englishmen, Simon pretended to like hot weather but really didn’t. London in July with the sun for once continually shining had become a mad place, stifling, enclosed, dry. 8. He (Osterman) was not without a certain energy, but he devoted it to small ends, to perfecting himself in little accomplishments, continually running after some new thing, incapable of persisting long in any one course. 9. All day Saturday, he continually interrupted his work to think about Savina. 10. It was not his dog. But today it seemed as if he could not let the subject rest. For no reason that he could explain even to himself, he recurred to it continually. 11. Magnus had given her his promise that once the ranch was well established, they two should travel. But continually he had been obliged to put her off, now for one reason, now for another. 12. She had big dark brown eyes which she continually narrowed, perhaps because she was short-sighted. Her reddish-brown hair to which a fine and scarcely perceptible scattering of grey gave a metallic patina, was much plaited and entwined. 13. What had seemed to her a mighty bastion was but the city wall and on this, massive and dark, her eyes rested continually. Behind its crenellations lay the city in the dread grip of the pestilence. 14. Despite the continuous rain, the court room was packed several hours before the proceedings commenced. 15. The committee paints a picture of the treatment — wall-standing for hours, hooding, loud, continuous noise, bread and water diet and little sleep. (Morning Star) 16. Upon the asphalt sidewalk itself, soft and sticky with the morning’s heat, was a continuous movement. 17. During his speech Mr Jones ignored continuous heckling from a group of young people, but Miss Joan Lester sailed into them straight away. Shaking her red hair, she said: «I may look very demure and placid, but I assure you I am not. I advise you to keep quiet while I am speaking.» 18. The machine ran continuously for eight days. 19. «Stop it, Otto. And do stop drinking.» Otto had been drinking the champagne continuously.

EXPLANATORY NOTES

Continual adj. Going on all the time without stopping, or with only short breaks; very frequent; happening over and over again; going on in rapid succession, e.g. ~ rain, ~ arguments, ~ presence, a ~ dream, a ~ effort, ~ parties, ~ consultations; ~ progress, ~ growth, ~ fear, ~ bouts of toothache.

Derivative: continually adv.

Continuous adj. Going on without a break; connected, unbroken; uninterrupted in time or sequence, e.g. a ~ expanse, ~ struggle, a ~ siege of six months; a ~ conveyor, a ~ line, ~ coughing, a ~ show, a ~ voyage, a ~ madness, ~ roaring, ~ production, ~ service.

Derivative: continuously adv.

The adjectives continual and continuous as well as the adverbs continually and continuously are often confused because of the similarity of their meanings. Continual applies to that which recurs repeatedly or goes on unceasingly over a long period of time. As applied to objects in the singular, continual also stresses the idea of going on indefinitely (though not without interruptions) in time rather than (like continuous) that of unbroken connection or substance. Continuous applies to that which extends without interruption. Continual refers only to time, continuous both to time and space, e.g. a continual (or continuous) noise; a continuous (not continual) expanse. The Russian equivalents of these adjectives are very much alike: continual непрерывный, почти не прекращающийся, повторяющийся снова и снова; continuous непрерывный, непрекращающийся, длительный. The adverbs continually and continuously derived from the adjectives continual and continuous reflect, on the whole, the basic meanings of the latter: continually means again and again; very frequently; repeatedly and often without stopping (неоднократно, снова и снова; непрерывно, все время); continuously means uninterruptedly, without a break (непрерывно, постоянно),