Word study: already, yet, still

ALREADY

Already means before now, up to now, by this time, sofar, e.g.

Ihave already explained this.

Hob has already eaten six cakes and is starting on the seventh. Kcrnm, He rryraliTe already M all ready. IIpMMepbI yrrOTpe6-

nemrn 3TMX CJIOB,[(aHbl HIDKe:

Susan has already set the table for dinner. It's all ready now.

At last all is ready.

YET

Yet has the meanings up to now, so far, at this moment, e.g. He hasn't yet replied to my letter.

Ihaven't finished my work yet; Ican't come out just yet.

Has the postman come yet!

Have you heard from your brother yet!

Pa:mm1a B yrrOTpe6neHMM Me)K)Jy already M yet 3aKJIIOqaeT­ C51 B CJie,[(yIOIIIeM: already yrrOTpe6JI51eTC51 B yTBep,[(MTeJibHbIX rrpe,[(JlmKeHM5IX, yet yrroTpe6JI51eTC51 B OTpMilaTeJibHbIX M BOII­ poCMTeJibHbIX rrpeM02KeHM5IX. 0,[(HaKo, already M02KeT yrroT­ pe6JI51TbC51 M B BorrpocMTeJihHbIX rrpeM02KeHM51X, ecJIM Bbl o)Klf,[(aeTe yTBep):(MJibHbIM OTBeT «,[(a». HarrpMMep:

"Here's my work, Mr. Priestley". "What! Have you fin­ ished it already?"

KaK rrpaBMJIO, 3TM cnoBa yrroTpe6JI5IIOTC51 c rnaronaMM, CTOJIIIIMMM B Perfect Tenses, HO MoryT MCIIOJib30BaTbC51 M c Continuous Tenses. HarrpMMep:

"The girls are already planning the dresses they will wear" (ypOK 2).

You are not going yet, are you?

STILL

Still has the meaning "right up to the present moment", e.g. The doctor is still there.

It is eleven o'clock but Jan is still hard at work.

B HeKOTOpb1x cnyqaJix still M yet MMeIOT O.ll.MHaKoBoe 3Ha­ qeHMe. HarrpMMep:

I've still a few pages to read (I've a few pages to read yet).

Are all the students here? No, Hob hasn't come yet. (No, there's still Hob to come.)

Still qacTO rrponrnorrocrnBJrneTCH not yet. HarrpMMep:

He is still busy; he has not yet finished his work (he has not finished his work yet).

IlpM MCIIOJib30BaHMM still B BOrrpocax qacTO II05IBJUieTC5I orreHoK y,[(MBJieHMH MJIM pa3,[(pa)l(eHMH. HarrpMMep:

What, are you still working? I thought you had gone home. Is that fellow still here? I wish he'd go away.

06paTMTe BHMMaHMe Ha coqeTaHMe still M yet co CTerreHH­

MM cpaBHeHMH. HarrpMMep:

You must work harder yet. (You must work still harder).

We have exported a lot of goods but we must export still

more. (We must export more yet).

PAEOTA C f.JIArOJIOM (5): give

"He will have to give up his studies". Give up = abandon, stop. There are two usual patterns with give:

(1)

 

Subject+give	(Pro)noun	to	(Pro)noun
He gave	food	to	the hungry man
		(2)

 

 

Subject+give Indirect Object Direct Object Mr. Priestley gave his class an English lesson

Other idiomatic usage with give:

The teacher will give out (= distribute) the books. Henry says he is going to give up (= stop) smoking.

The railing on which he was leaning gave way (= broke) and

he fell from the cliff.

He pretended to be English but his foreign accent gave him away (= betrayed him).

 

IIPE,IV!Of lI (2)

About

About has the meaning (a) "concerning", e.g. I want you to tell me about your work.

I shall be thinking about you all the time you are away. That is all right for you but what about me?

(b) "approximately", e.g.

I'll see you about six o'clock.

There is about £120 difference betwen this car and that one.

(c) "in various directions or places", e.g. I go about the country a good deal.

You will be warm enough if you move about.

This is not screwed down firmly, it moves about when you touch it.

(d) (with come) "happen", e.g.

I hear that George has broken his leg; how did that come about!

Above

Above (a) has often the same meaning as over and car be contrasted with below, e.g.

In Mr. Priestley's room there is a clock above (over) the fireplace 1.

We flew above the clouds.

(b) "mentioned earlier", e.g.

In the above2 examples (in the examples above).

(c) "most important of ', e.g.

Think about what I have told you; but above all, don't breathe a word of it to Henry.

Idiomatic expression: Brown's business is not doing well; he is finding it difficult to keep his head above water (= to pay his way).

Across

Across means "from one side to the other", e.g. The child ran across the road.

You cross a cheque by drawing two lines across it and writ­

ing "& Co".

Run across can also mean "meet unexpectedly", e.g. I run across our friend Smith yesterday.

After

After is generally used to denote time or order, e.g. I'll see you after dinner.

He goes on working day after day, week after week without

any change.

"To look after' = to care for, e.g.

If my wife goes away for a week, who's going to look after

me and the children?

After all = "in spite of what you thought", e.g. You can see I was right after all.

1 See picture Essential English I, p.76.

2 Above in this case is an adjective.

Against

Against expresses the idea of:

(a) "opposition", e.g.

He who is not for us is against us.

(b) "support", e.g.

He rested his bicycle against the wall.

(c) "to avoid the danger from", e.g. My house is insured against fire.

Among (Amongst)

Among (amongst) expesses:

(a) "position in the midst of ', e.g.

You can see my house among the trees.

(b) "included in", e.g.

Shelley is among (= one of) the world's greatest poets.

(c) "sharing", e.g.

The sweets are to be shared among the five children.

With this last meaning between is generally used for two, among for more than two, e.g. "The sweets were divided be­ tween the two children". But this distinction is not always strictly observed.

At

At is used mainly to denote a place or point of time, e.g. I'll see you at the station at four o'clock.

He lives at Torquay in Devonshire; I live in London.

At is generally used for small towns, in for large cities, coun­ ties, or countries, but it depends on how we are thinking about a place. We could say "I live in the village of Newton" because I am thinking of the place and its surroundings, but "Does this train stop at Crewe" (a big town) because we are thinking of Crewe merely as a point on the railway. But there are many other meanings of at, e.g.

The apples were sold at 6d. a pound, but that was really at

a loss not at a profit.

He is good at football /English/ his work. Shakespeare died at the age of fifty-two.

(Many further examples of all prepositions are given in the Teacher's Book IV.)

Y nP A >K HE HIHI

I. BcTaBLTe yet, already, still. (B ueKOTOpbIX c;1y•uuIX MO)KllO BCTaBHTh

60.11 ee 0,!l;HOfO CJIOBa):

1. Pedro is going to leave London; the others have gone.

2. Hob hadn't arrived when the lesson started.

3. I had learned some English before I came to England.

4. I have studied English for some years but I am learning.

5. What, are you here? I thought you had gone home.

6. Hasn't that letter come?

7. Are you going to see the picture at the Cinema? No, I have seen it.

8. You have worked hard but you must work harder.

9. Have you read that book? 1 thought it would take you longer.

10. I told you to take all that wood away and it is there.

II. Ilplf,!Q'MaiITe 6 npe;:uIO)KeHHH, r,!l;e give BXO,!J;HJI 6bl B COCTaB lf>pa3e­ OJIOfll'leCKOf0 o6opoTa.

III. PaccMoTpnTe KapTHHKH Ha 3Toii cTpaHun.e, a 3aTeM cocTaBbTe paccKa3 "The Reading of the Will".

 

 

THE READING OF THE WILL

LESSON 8

GREAT BRITONS (1): CHARLES DICKENS (I)

P e d r o: I've been trying my hand at making a little play out of a scene from Dickens's David Coppelfield turned into Essential English. Would you mind reading it?

M r. P r i e s t 1e y: I should be delighted. When will it be ready?

P e d r o: Tomorrow, I think. I don' t know what you will think of it, but I've often thought how naturally Dickens's novels could be made into plays. They seem more like a collec­ tion of separate scenes than a single novel.

M r. P r i e s t 1e y: That is what they are, especially the earlier books. Later, when he got to know Wilkie Collins1, another popular writer of the times, he tried to construct a plot, but it is never for the plot but for the characters in his books that we remember Dickens. This lack of construction is largely due to the circumstances in which they were writ­ ten. Pickwick Papers and many of the other novels came out in fortnightly parts and the story developed as it went along. Dickens himself often didn't know how it was going to end, he just went ahead and let the story go wherever his imag­ ination led him.

01a f: I don't know anything at all about Dickens. Before we read Pedro's play could you tell us something about his life?

M r. P r i e s t 1e y: Certainly, and perhaps the best place to begin is at the beginning. Charles Dickens was born in 1812 at Portsmouth, where his father was a clerk in the Navy Pay Office. But Dickens didn't live long in Portsmouth. When he was about four years of age his family moved to Chatham, and the five years he spent there were the happiest of all his boyhood. Just as young Shakespeare resolved that some day he would return to Stratford and buy the big house, New Place, there, so little Charles dreamed that some day, perhaps, he might live in a big house that he loved, Gadshill Place, at Rochester. And one day the dreams of both of them came true. But at the time there seemed little chance of it for Dickens. He was the oldest of a large family,

 

 

etc.

1Wilkie Collins (1824- 1889). Wrote The Moonstone, The Woman in White,

eight in all, and his father, a happy-go­ lucky, irresponsible man (the original of Mr. Micawber in David Coppeifielcf), was, like Mr. Micawber, always "waiting for something to turn up". What schooling Dickens had, he got at Chatham at a small day-school, and from his mother, who was a well-educated woman.

Then one day, in a room upstairs, he found a pile of books, Robinson Crusoe1, Roderick Random2, Tom Jones3, The Vic- ar of Wakefielcf -rather strong meat for

a boy of nine, but Dickens was delighted; the key to the trea­ sure-house of English literature had been put in his hand and his own imagination was wakened.

In 1821 the Dickens family moved to Camden Town, London, into "a mean, small house". Mr. Dickens was heavily in debt and didn't know which way to turn for money. The few possessions that they had were sold one by one, but things got no better, and finally Mr. Dickens was taken to the Marshalsea Prison, London, for debt. You will find the Marshalsea fully described in Little Dorrit. Dickens knew it only too well from bitter experience, for when all the goods had been sold, Mrs. Dickens and the younger children went to the prison, too, to join the father.

Meanwhile, Charles had got a job in an underground cellar at a blacking 5 factory at Old Hungerford Stairs in the East End of London. This was the most unhappy time of all his life. He was lonely and hungry (though later he got his breakfast and supper in the prison and so was better fed). He hated the coarse, rough boys with whom he had to work and who cared for none of the things that he loved. "No words", he wrote, "can ex­ press the secret agony of my soul as I sank into this com­ panionship and compared these people with those of my hap­ pier childhood and felt my early hope of growing up to be a learned and famous man crushed in my heart".

 

1 By Daniel Defoe (1661- 1731).

2 By Henry Fielding (1721- 1771).

3 By Tobias Smollett (1707- 1754).

4 By Oliver Goldsmith (1728- 1774).

5 Blacking was stuff for giving a polish to black shoes. Now we use shoe­ polish.

But his fortunes took a turn for the better. He was able to leave the blacking factory and he entered a lawyer's office in Lincoln's Inn. He learned shorthand and was able to do some reporting in the House of Commons for newspapers. Finally, in 1834, he was taken on the staff of a newspaper, the Morning Chronicle, and his life-work of writing had really begun. He went all over the country getting news, writing up stories, meeting people and using his eyes.

Ihave said rather a lot about Dickens's early days but they are important, for they made a very deep impression on his mind, and all these stored-up impressions are poured out later in his books Little Dorrit, Nicholas Nickleby, Oliver Twist, and above all, David Coppeifield.

PABOTA C f.JIArOJIOM (6): turn

06panne BHMMam1e Ha TpM 3Haqemrn rnaroJia turn B ypo­ Ke 8:

His father was, like Mr. Micawber, always "waiting for some­ thing to tum up" (= some good fortune to come).

Mr. Dickens was heavily in debt and didn't know which way to tumfor (= what to do to get) money.

His fortunes took a tum (= changed) for the better.

BoT HeCKOJibKO rrp11MepoB yrroTpe6Jiemrn rnaroJia tum:

The wheels of the cart tum round.

When he became rich he turned his back on (= refused to recognise) his old friends.

She could not be turned aside.

Thundery weather often turns milk (= makes it go) sour.

The pretty girl got so much flattery it quite turned her head

(= made her foolishly conceited).

Even a worm will tum (= there is a point where even the most gentle and humble person will get angry).

The weather has suddenly turned (= become) colder.

I have been very lazy but I am going to tum over a new leaf

(= make a new start, behave better) and work hard.

I will tum the matter over in my mind (consider it) and tell you tomorrow what I have decided.

When he is in trouble he always turns to (= applies to, trusts to) his mother for help.

Hob isn't here yet; he probably won't tum up (= come) at all. "Ted turned up at 3 o'clock".