Martin Eden / Мартин Иден (в сокращении). Книга для чтения на английском языке

Two are in South Africa now, an’ another’s on a whaling voyage, an’ one’s travellin’ with a circus – he does trapeze-work. An’ I guess I’m just like them. I’ve taken care of myself since I was eleven – that’s when my mother died. I’ve got to study by myself I guess, an’ what I want to know is where to begin.”

“I should say the first thing of all would be to get a grammar book. Your grammar is…” She had intended saying “awful,” but she amended it to, “is not particularly good.

”

He flushed and sweated.

“I know I must talk a lot of slang an’ words you don’t understand. But, then, they’re only words I know… how to speak. I’ve got other words in my mind – picked ’emup from books – but I can’t pronounce ’em, so I don’t use ’em.”

“It isn’t what you say so much as how you say it. You don’t mind my being frank, do you? I don’t want to hurt you.”

“No, no!” he cried; while he secretly blessed her for her kindness. “Fire away; I’ve got to know, and I’d sooner know from you than anybody else.

”

“Well, then, you say �You was’; it should be �You were.’ You say �I seen’ for �I saw.’ You use the double negative…”

“What’s the double negative?” he demanded, then added humbly: “You see, I don’t even understand your explanations.”

“I’m afraid I didn’t explain that,” she smiled. “A double negative is… let me see – well, you say, �Never helped nobody.’ �Never’ is a negative.

�Nobody’ is another negative. It is a rule that two negatives make a positive. �Never helped nobody’ means that, not helping nobody, they must have helped somebody.”

“That’s pretty clear,” he said. “I never thought of it before, and I’ll never say it again.”

“You’ll find it all in the grammar book,” she went on. “There’s something else I noticed in your speech. You say �don’t’ when you shouldn’t. �Don’t’ is a contraction, and stands for two words.

Do you know them?”

He thought a moment, then answered: “�Do not.’”

She nodded her head, and said: “And you use �don’t’ when you mean �does not.’”

He was puzzled over this.

“Give me an illustration,” he asked.

“Well…” she thought a moment. “’It don’t do to be hasty.’ Change �don’t’ to �do not,’ and it reads, �It do not do to be hasty,’ which is wrong. It must jar on your ear.