Complete the sentences with the appropriate modal verb.

might	1. His overardent glance … be hastily deflected.
must	2. I … have gone on the stage, or been a diplomat’s wife or an international spy.
could	3. Actually, she doubted whether she … ever have been an actress, acknowledging that she found it more amusing and more gratifying to play herself than to interpret any character conceived by a dramatist.
should	4. In these private theatricals it was her own many-faceted nature that she put on exhibit, and the audience, in this case unfortunately limited to two, … applaud both her skill of projection and her intrinsic variety.
could	5. These endearments of hers were sanctioned by law, usage, and habit; they belonged to her role of wife and … be condemned or paralleled by a young man who was himself unmarried.
had	6. Eventually, however, her reluctance to wound her husband and her solicitude for his pride were overcome by an inner conviction that her love affair … move on to its next preordained stage.
could	7. So you … tell, even later on, that I told you about this today.
could not	8. I felt I … to talk to someone.
must	9. From her husband, at least, she … expect the favor of an open attack to which she … respond with the prepared defense that she carried, unspoken, about with her.
mustn’t

Complete these sentences with prepositions.

1. She got no fun, she told the Young Man, … putting horns … her darling’s head, and never … a moment, she said, did he appear … her as the comic figure … the cuckolded husband that one saw … the stage.

2. To meet … a friend’s house … design and to register surprise, to strike just the right note … young-matronly affection … cocktail parties, to treat him formally as “my escort” … the theatre … intermissions – these were triumphs … stage management, more difficult … execution, more nerve-racking than the lunches and teas, because two actors were involved.

3. She loved him, she knew, … being a bad actor, … his docility … accepting her tender, mock-impatient instruction.

4. Though she was aware … the sadistic intention … these displays, she was not ashamed … them, as she was something twistingly ashamed … the hurt she was preparing to inflict … her husband.

5. … this time a touch … acridity entered … her relations … the Young Man.

6. She would look … dark spots … his character and drill away … them as relentlessly as a dentist … a cavity.

7. And, as it turned …, the drama … the triangle was not quite ended … the superficial rupture … her marriage.

8. It was natural, … course, that everyone should feel sorry … him, and be especially nice.

9. “Yes,” she answered … her most humble and feminine tones, but she knew that they had suddenly dropped … a new pattern, that they wre no longer the cynosure … a social group, but merely another young couple … an evening to pass, another young couple looking desperately … entertainment, wondering whether to call … a married couple or to drop … somewhere … a drink.

10. But the Young Man, she now saw, was merely a sort … mirage which she had allowed herself to mistake … an oasis.

Use the verbs in brackets in an appropriate tense and voice forms.

1. Once a solid understanding … (to reach), there … (to follow) a short intermission of ritual bashfulness, in which both parties awkwardly … (to participate), and then … (to come) the Announcement.

2. Lunches and teas, which … (to be) time-killers, matters of routine, now … (to become) perilous and dramatic adventures.

3. These endearments of hers … (to be) sanctioned by law, usage, and habit; they … (to belong) to her role of wife and could … (not to condemn) or … (to parallel) by a young man who … (to be) himself unmarried.

4. The possibilities of the subterranean courtship … (to exhaust); it … (to be) time for the Announcement.

5. She … (to relieve) but faintly … (to disappoint) when it … (to become) clear that he … (to ascribe) her sharpness to the tension of the situation and … (to decide) to stick it out.

6. She … (to woo) him all over again, but … (to woo) him to a deeper attachment than he previously … (to experience), to an unconditional surrender.

7. When at last he … (to answer) her repeated and agonized I-love-you’s by grasping her hand more tightly and saying gently, “I know,” she … (to see) that she … (to win) him over.

8. The Young Man had … (to telephone) and … (to summon) to a conference à trois, a conference, she … (to say), of civilized, intelligent people.

9. Though she … (to leave) her husband’s apartment and … (to offer) shelter by a confidante, it … (to be) still necessary for her … (to see) him every day.

10. When she … (to learn) from her husband that he … (to receive) invitations from members of her own circle, invitations in which she and the Young Man unaccountably … (not to include), she … (to go) at once to the station and … (to buy) her ticket.

Reading Comprehension and Discussion Tasks

1. Answer the questions:

1. Why did the main heroine think that “being a potential divorcee was deeply pleasurable in somewhat the same way that being an engaged girl had been”?

2. Did she like to play Young Man and her Husband’s feelings in public? In what way did she do that?

3. Were the members of “love triangle” ashamed of the situation?

4. Did the heroine really love her husband? And the Young Man? Why did she begin to “look for dark spots in his character and drill away at them as relentlessly as a dentist at a cavity”?

5. In your opinion was she capable of loving anybody deeply?

6. Why did she decide that “it was time for the Announcement”?

7. Where and when did she tell the truth to her husband?

8. How was “a conference à trois” held?

9. How were the relationships developed after the shoot-out?

10. Did the friends change their attitude to the situation?

11. Where and why did the main female character decide to go?

2. Discuss the following:

1. Why was scarcely any name mentioned in the story?

2. Do you believe that the main female character was really “designed for the role of femme fatale ”?

 

Carson McCullers THE SOJOURNER

Exercises

Pre-reading Tasks

1. Practise the pronunciation of the words from the story. When in doubt refer to the dictionary:

sojourner, twilight, fountains, dawn, wounded, transience, quiver, anodyne, candid, bourbon, luggage, impulsive, marquee, awkwardly, acknowledged, scientist, amenities, wreckage, rouged, jealousy, knobby, knees, prelude, fugue, intermingling, chorded, riot, tumultuous, trilingual, minor, anxieties, equanimity, succession, transitory, squatting, pulse.

Vocabulary Tasks

1. Find in the story the English for:

присмеркова межа між сном і пробудженням; вигнуті вузькі вулички; напівсвідомість; щось неприємне чекало на нього; безхмарний осінній день; тьмяне сонячне світло; хмарочоси пастельного кольору; зайти у сусідню аптекарську крамницю; сісти в кінці кабінки поруч із вітриною; вітрина виходить на тротуар; яєчня-бовтанка з ковбасою; приїхати на батьківській похорон; у нього випадало волосся; його тіло було худорлявим за винятком опуклого живота; роки дещо послабили цю синівську відданість; непередбачене збентеження; випадкове кохання; відчуття небезпеки; шалене тремтіння його серця; вона мала прекрасну поставу; вогкість його рук; його захмарене серце дивно не відповідало сонячному чистому осінньому дневі; витягнутися у кріслі; мати цілий день попереду; імпульсивне рішення; суперечка із самим собою; знайомий голос; портьє; рудоволоса дитина у веснянках; вайлуватий рудоволосий чоловік із повільними рухами; красиве волосся каштанового кольору; зіщулитися від непроханих спогадів; таця з напоями; бути „зайцем”, пасажиром без квитка; додати з раптовою впевненістю; посадити дитину на коліна; торкатися пальцями окулярів у роговій оправі; відчувати себе спостерігачем, людиною, що втручається у чужі справи; емігрант, експатріант; витягнуте тіло на стьобаному шовку у труні; хлопчик семи років із засмученим маленьким обличчям і опуклими колінками; основна мелодія була сплетена з двох голосів; сидіти за столом між господарем і господинею; бути трохи п’яним; білошкірий російській міняйло; який володіє трьома мовами; кататися на поні; задувати свічки; пильно вдивлятися у нічне місто; схожий на іграшку; м’яка заздрість; незрозумілий жаль; мокрий тротуар; сидіти навпочіпки; відчувати м’які вії; внутрішній розпач.