Биография mark twain на английском и русском. Презентация по английскому языку на тему "марк твен". Тема по английскому языку: Михаил Ломоносов

It was at a banquet in London in honour of one of the two or three conspicuously illustrious English military names of this generation. For reasons which will presently appear, I will withhold his real name and titles, and call him Lieutenant-General Lord Arthur Scoresby, V.C., K.C.B., etc., etc., etc. What a fascination there is in a renowned name! There say the man, in actual flesh, whom I had heard of so many thousands of times since that day, thirty years before, when his name shot suddenly to the zenith from a Crimean battle-field, to remain for ever celebrated. It was food and drink to me to look, and look, and look at that demigod; scanning, searching, noting: the quietness, the reserve, the noble gravity of his countenance; the simple honesty that expressed itself all over him; the sweet unconsciousness of his greatness--unconsciousness of the hundreds of admiring eyes fastened upon him, unconsciousness of the deep, loving, sincere worship welling out of the breasts of those people and flowing toward him.

The clergyman at my left was an old acquaintance of mine--clergyman now, but had spent the first half of his life in the camp and field, and as an instructor in the military school at Woolwich. Just at the moment I have been talking about, a veiled and singular light glimmered in his eyes, and he leaned down and muttered confidentially to me--indicating the hero of the banquet with a gesture,--"Privately--his glory is an accident-- just a product of incredible luck."

This verdict was a great surprise to me. If its subject had been Napoleon, or Socrates, or Solomon, my astonishment could not have been greater.

Some days later came the explanation of this strange remark, and this is what the Reverend told me.

About forty years ago I was an instructor in the military academy at Woolwich. I was present in one of the sections when young Scoresby underwent his preliminary examination. I was touched to the quick with pity; for the rest of the class answered up brightly and handsomely, while he--why, dear me, he didn"t know anything, so to speak. He was evidently good, and sweet, and lovable, and guileless; and so it was exceedingly painful to see him stand there, as serene as a graven image, and deliver himself of answers which were veritably miraculous for stupidity and ignorance. All the compassion in me was aroused in his behalf. I said to myself, when he comes to be examined again, he will be flung over, of course; so it will be simple a harmless act of charity to ease his fall as much as I can.

I took him aside, and found that he knew a little of Caesar"s history; and as he didn"t know anything else, I went to work and drilled him like a galley-slave on a certain line of stock questions concerning Caesar which I knew would be used. If you"ll believe me, he went through with flying colours on examination day! He went through on that purely superficial "cram", and got compliments, too, while others, who knew a thousand times more than he, got plucked. By some strangely lucky accident--an accident not likely to happen twice in a century--he was asked no question outside of the narrow limits of his drill.

It was stupefying. Well, although through his course I stood by him, with something of the sentiment which a mother feels for a crippled child; and he always saved himself--just by miracle, apparently.

Now of course the thing that would expose him and kill him at last was mathematics. I resolved to make his death as easy as I could; so I drilled him and crammed him, and crammed him and drilled him, just on the line of questions which the examiner would be most likely to use, and then launched him on his fate. Well, sir, try to conceive of the result: to my consternation, he took the first prize! And with it he got a perfect ovation in the way of compliments.

Sleep! There was no more sleep for me for a week. My conscience tortured me day and night. What I had done I had done purely through charity, and only to ease the poor youth"s fall--I never had dreamed of any such preposterous result as the thing that had happened. I felt as guilty and miserable as the creator of Frankenstein. Here was a wooden- head whom I had put in the way of glittering promotions and prodigious responsibilities, and but one thing could happen: he and his responsibilities would all go to ruin together at the first opportunity.

The Crimean war had just broken out. Of course there had to be a war, I said to myself: we couldn"t have peace and give this donkey a chance to die before he is found out. I waited for the earthquake. It came. And it made me reel when it did come. He was actually gazetted to a captaincy in a marching regiment! Better men grow old and gray in the service before they climb to a sublimity like that. And who could ever have foreseen that they would go and put such a load of responsibility on such green and inadequate shoulders? I could just barely have stood it if they had made him a cornet; but a captain--think of it! I thought my hair would turn white.

Consider what I did--I who so loved repose and inaction. I said to myself, I am responsible to the country for this, and I must go along with him and protect the country against him as far as I can. So I took my poor little capital that I had saved up through years of work and grinding economy, and went with a sigh and bought a cornetcy in his regiment, and away we went to the field.

And there--oh dear, it was awful. Blunders? why, he never did anything but blunder. But, you see, nobody was in the fellow"s secret--everybody had him focused wrong, and necessarily misinterpreted his performance every time--consequently they took his idiotic blunders for inspirations of genius; they did honestly! His mildest blunders were enough to make a man in his right mind cry; and they did make me cry--and rage and rave too, privately. And the thing that kept me always in a sweat of apprehension was the fact that every fresh blunder he made increased the lustre of his reputation! I kept saying to myself, he"ll get so high that when discovery does finally come it will be like the sun falling out of the sky.

He went right along up, from grade to grade, over the dead bodies of his superiors, until at last, in the hottest moment of the battle of.... down went our colonel, and my heart jumped into my mouth, for Scoresby was next in rank! Now for it, said I; we"ll all land in Sheol in ten minutes, sure.

The battle was awfully hot; the allies were steadily giving way all over the field. Our regiment occupied a position that was vital; a blunder now must be destruction. At this critical moment, what does this immortal fool do but detach the regiment from its place and order a charge over a neighbouring hill where there wasn"t a suggestion of an enemy! "There you go!" I said to myself; "this is the end at last."

And away we did go, and were over the shoulder of the hill before the insane movement could be discovered and stopped. And what did we find? An entire and unsuspected Russian army in reserve! And what happened? We were eaten up? That is necessarily what would have happened in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred. But no; those Russians argued that no single regiment would come browsing around there at such a time. It must be the entire English army, and that the sly Russian game was detected and blocked; so they turned tail, and away they went, pell-mell, over the hill and down into the field, in wild confusion, and we after them; they themselves broke the solid Russia centre in the field, and tore through, and in no time there was the most tremendous rout you ever saw, and the defeat of the allies was turned into a sweeping and splendid victory! Marshal Canrobert looked on, dizzy with astonishment, admiration, and delight; and sent right off for Scoresby, and hugged him, and decorated him on the field in presence of all the armies!

And what was Scoresby"s blunder that time? Merely the mistaking his right hand for his left--that was all. An order had come to him to fall back and support our right; and instead he fell forward and went over the hill to the left. But the name he won that day as a marvellous military genius filled the world with his glory, and that glory will never fade while history books last.

He is just as good and sweet and lovable and unpretending as a man can be, but he doesn"t know enough to come in when it rains. He has been pursued, day by day and year by year, by a most phenomenal and astonishing luckiness. He has been a shining soldier in all our wars for half a generation; he has littered his military life with blunders, and yet has never committed one that didn"t make him a knight or a baronet or a lord or something. Look at his breast; why, he is just clothed in domestic and foreign decorations. Well, sir, every one of them is a record of some shouting stupidity or other; and, taken together, they are proof that the very best thing in all this world that can befall a man is to be born lucky.

Our story today is called "The Californian"s Tale." It was written by Mark Twain. Here is Shep O"Neal with the story.

STORYTELLER: When I was young, I went looking for gold in California. I never found enough to make me rich. But I did discover a beautiful part of the country. It was called "the Stanislau." The Stanislau was like Heaven on Earth. It had bright green hills and deep forests where soft winds touched the trees.

Other men, also looking for gold, had reached the Stanislau hills of California many years before I did. They had built a town in the valley with sidewalks and stores, banks and schools. They had also built pretty little houses for their families.

At first, they found a lot of gold in the Stanislau hills. But their good luck did not last. After a few years, the gold disappeared. By the time I reached the Stanislau, all the people were gone, too.

Grass now grew in the streets. And the little houses were covered by wild rose bushes. Only the sound of insects filled the air as I walked through the empty town that summer day so long ago. Then, I realized I was not alone after all.

A man was smiling at me as he stood in front of one of the little houses. This house was not covered by wild rose bushes. A nice little garden in front of the house was full of blue and yellow flowers. White curtains hung from the windows and floated in the soft summer wind.

Still smiling, the man opened the door of his house and motioned to me. I went inside and could not believe my eyes. I had been living for weeks in rough mining camps with other gold miners. We slept on the hard ground, ate canned beans from cold metal plates and spent our days in the difficult search for gold.

Here in this little house, my spirit seemed to come to life again.

I saw a bright rug on the shining wooden floor. Pictures hung all around the room. And on little tables there were seashells, books and china vases full of flowers. A woman had made this house into a home.

The pleasure I felt in my heart must have shown on my face. The man read my thoughts. "Yes," he smiled, "it is all her work. Everything in this room has felt the touch of her hand."

One of the pictures on the wall was not hanging straight. He noticed it and went to fix it. He stepped back several times to make sure the picture was really straight. Then he gave it a gentle touch with his hand.

"She always does that," he explained to me. "It is like the finishing pat a mother gives her child"s hair after she has brushed it. I have seen her fix all these things so often that I can do it just the way she does. I don"t know why I do it. I just do it."

As he talked, I realized there was something in this room that he wanted me to discover. I looked around. When my eyes reached a corner of the room near the fireplace, he broke into a happy laugh and rubbed his hands together.

"That"s it!" he cried out. "You have found it! I knew you would. It is her picture. I went to a little black shelf that held a small picture of the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. There was a sweetness and softness in the woman"s expression that I had never seen before.

The man took the picture from my hands and stared at it. "She was nineteen on her last birthday. That was the day we were married. When you see her…oh, just wait until you meet her!"

"Where is she now?" I asked.

"Oh, she is away," the man sighed, putting the picture back on the little black shelf. "She went to visit her parents. They live forty or fifty miles from here. She has been gone two weeks today."

"When will she be back?" I asked. "Well, this is Wednesday," he said slowly. "She will be back on Saturday, in the evening."

I felt a sharp sense of regret. "I am sorry, because I will be gone by then," I said.

"Gone? No! Why should you go? Don"t go. She will be so sorry. You see, she likes to have people come and stay with us."

"No, I really must leave," I said firmly.

He picked up her picture and held it before my eyes. "Here," he said. "Now you tell her to her face that you could have stayed to meet her and you would not."

Something made me change my mind as I looked at the picture for a second time. I decided to stay.

The man told me his name was Henry.

That night, Henry and I talked about many different things, but mainly about her. The next day passed quietly.

Thursday evening we had a visitor. He was a big, grey-haired miner named Tom. "I just came for a few minutes to ask when she is coming home," he explained. "Is there any news?"

"Oh yes," the man replied. "I got a letter. Would you like to hear it? He took a yellowed letter out of his shirt pocket and read it to us. It was full of loving messages to him and to other people – their close friends and neighbors. When the man finished reading it, he looked at his friend. "Oh no, you are doing it again, Tom! You always cry when I read a letter from her. I"m going to tell her this time!"

"No, you must not do that, Henry," the grey-haired miner said. "I am getting old. And any little sorrow makes me cry. I really was hoping she would be here tonight."

The next day, Friday, another old miner came to visit. He asked to hear the letter. The message in it made him cry, too. "We all miss her so much," he said.

Saturday finally came. I found I was looking at my watch very often. Henry noticed this. "You don"t think something has happened to her, do you?" he asked me.

I smiled and said that I was sure she was just fine. But he did not seem satisfied.

I was glad to see his two friends, Tom and Joe, coming down the road as the sun began to set. The old miners were carrying guitars. They also brought flowers and a bottle of whiskey. They put the flowers in vases and began to play some fast and lively songs on their guitars.

Henry"s friends kept giving him glasses of whiskey, which they made him drink. When I reached for one of the two glasses left on the table, Tom stopped my arm. "Drop that glass and take the other one!" he whispered. He gave the remaining glass of whiskey to Henry just as the clock began to strike midnight.

Henry emptied the glass. His face grew whiter and whiter. "Boys," he said, "I am feeling sick. I want to lie down."

Henry was asleep almost before the words were out of his mouth.

In a moment, his two friends had picked him up and carried him into the bedroom. They closed the door and came back. They seemed to be getting ready to leave. So I said, "Please don"t go gentlemen. She will not know me. I am a stranger to her."

They looked at each other. "His wife has been dead for nineteen years," Tom said.

"Dead?" I whispered.

"Dead or worse," he said.

"She went to see her parents about six months after she got married. On her way back, on a Saturday evening in June, when she was almost here, the Indians captured her. No one ever saw her again. Henry lost his mind. He thinks she is still alive. When June comes, he thinks she has gone on her trip to see her parents. Then he begins to wait for her to come back. He gets out that old letter. And we come around to visit so he can read it to us.

"On the Saturday night she is supposed to come home, we come here to be with him. We put a sleeping drug in his drink so he will sleep through the night. Then he is all right for another year."

Joe picked up his hat and his guitar. "We have done this every June for nineteen years," he said. "The first year there were twenty-seven of us. Now just the two of us are left." He opened the door of the pretty little house. And the two old men disappeared into the darkness of the Stanislau.

ANNOUNCER: You have just heard the story "The Californian"s Tale." It was written by Mark Twain and adapted for Special English by Donna de Sanctis. Your storyteller was Shep O"Neal. For VOA Special English, this is Shirley Griffith.

Mark Twain was bom in the state of Missouri in the United States in 1835 His father was an unsuccessful lawyer. The family seldom lived more than a year or two in the same town That is why the future writer did not even finish secondary school. He went to work at the age of 12.

For two years he worked for his elder brother"s small newspaper both as a printer and reporter.

In 1857 he became a pilot on the Mississipi river. He continued to write.

In 1976 he wrote The Adventures of Tom Sawyer . The book was read by everybody, by the young and old and was translated into nearly every language in the world. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer was such a success that in 1884 he wrote The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn , and then Tom Sawyer Abroad and Tom Sawyer the Detective in 1896. There were many other books written by Mark Twain. But his novels about Tom Sawyer and his friend Huckleberry Finn brought him world fame. Mark Twain"s real name was Sammuel Clemens. He took his penname from the words to mark and twain which were used by leadsmen on the steamboats to mark the depth of two fathoms.

Mark Twain"s stories enjoy widespread popularity. His characters are always well-drawn, his stories are true-to-life and the plots of his stories are skilfully built up.

Many years have passed since Mark Twain"s ti death, but even now we enjoy reading his works. Besides being a humorist, Mark Twain is also a realist - the author of biting satires and bitterly critical pages revealing a good deal of the truth about American way of life.

Марк Твен

Марк Твен родился в штате Миссури в Соединенных Штатах Америки в 1835 году. Его отец был неудачливым юристом. Семья редко жила в одном и том же городе более 1 - 2 лет. Вот почему будущий писатель даже не закончил среднюю школу. Он пошел работать в возрасте 12 лет.

Два года он работал печатником и репортером в редакции небольшой газеты, принадлежащей старшему брату.

В 1857 году он стал лоцманом, плавая по реке Миссисипи и продолжал писать.

В1876 году он написал "Приключения Тома Сойера". Книгу читали все - дети и взрослые, она была переведена почти на все языки мира. "Приключения Тома Сойера" имели такой успех, что в 1884 году он написал "Приключения Гекльберри Финна", и затем "Том Сойер за границей" и "Том Сойер - сыщик", вышедшие в 1896 г. Марк Твен написал еще много других книг, но всемирную известность ему принесли его романы о Томе Сойере и Гекльберри Финне. Настоящее имя Марка Твена было Сэмюэль Клеменс. Он избрал себе в качестве псевдонима выражение "марктвен", которое у лоцманов на пароходах обозначало глубину в две морские сажени.

Рассказы Марка Твена пользуются широкой популярностью. Характеры его героев всегда хорошо раскрыты, его истории правдивы, сюжеты мастерски построены.

Прошло много лет с тех пор, как Марк Твен умер, но даже и сейчас мы получаем удовольствие от его произведений. Кроме того, что он юморист, он также реалист, автор острой сатиры и страниц резкой критики, раскрывающих правду об американском образе жизни.

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Тема по английскому языку: Марк Твен

Топик по английскому языку: Марк Твен (Mark Twain). Данный текст может быть использован в качестве презентации, проекта, рассказа, эссе, сочинения или сообщения на тему.

Ранние годы

Марк Твен родился в штате Миссури в Соединенных Штатах 30 ноября 1835. Он считается великим юмористом американской литературы 19 века. Отец Твена был неудачливым юристом. В 1838 семья Марка переехала в Ганнибал, Миссури, на реке Миссисипи, где молодой Твен испытал волнение, увидев красочные достопримечательности набережной. Как и многие другие авторы своего времени, он не получил положенного образования. Он даже не окончил среднюю школу. Он начал работать в возрасте 12 лет. Два года Твен работал в маленькой газете своего старшего брата и печатником, и репортером. 1853 Марк покинул Ганнибал, чтобы путешествовать. По пути в Новый Орлеан он убедил речного пилота научить его своему мастерству. К весне 1859 Марк Твен был лицензированным лодочным пилотом.

Литературный псевдоним

Настоящее имя Марка Твена было Самюэль Клеменс. Его литературный псевдоним в речной тематике означает «две морские сажени».

Первый популярный рассказ

С началом Гражданской войны в США Твен решил не вмешиваться в происходящие события и переехал в Карсон-Сити, штат Невада. После неудачной попытки добычи золота и серебра он был зачислен в штат газеты в Вирджиния-Сити, штат Невада. Твен написал свой первый популярный рассказ в 1865; он назывался «Прыжки лягушки Калаверас Каунти».

Приключения Тома Сойера

В 1876 Марк написал «Приключения Тома Сойера», которые принесли ему мировую славу. Книга была чрезвычайно популярна и переведена почти на каждый язык мира. Позже были изданы «Приключения Гекльберри Финна», «Том Сойер за границей», и «Том Сойер – детектив». Персонажи историй Твена всегда хорошо изображены; сами истории являются жизненными, а сюжеты искусно выстроены.

Другие работы

Между 1873 и 1889 Твен написал несколько романов, включая «Принц и нищий» и «Янки из Коннектикута при дворе короля Артура». Марк Твен был также автором сатир и критики, которые открывали правду об американском образе жизни.

Смерть

Он умер в 1910.

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Mark Twain

Early years

Mark Twain was born in the state of Missouri in the United States on 30 November, 1835. He is considered the greatest humorist of 19th Century American literature. Twain’s father was an unsuccessful lawyer. In 1839 Mark’s family moved to Hannibal, Missouri, on the Mississippi River where young Twain experienced the excitement and colorful sights of the waterfront. Like many authors of his day the future writer had little formal education. He didn’t even finish secondary school. He started working at the age of 12. For two years Twain worked for his elder brother’s small newspaper both as a printer and reporter. In 1853 Mark left Hannibal in order to travel. On a trip to New Orleans he persuaded a riverboat pilot to teach him his skill. By the spring of 1859 Mark Twain was a licensed riverboat pilot.

Pen name

Mark Twain’s real name was Samuel Clemens. His pen name means “two fathoms” in riverboat-talk.

First popular story

At the outbreak of the American Civil War Twain chose not to get involved and moved to Carson City, Nevada. After an unsuccessful attempt at gold and silver mining he joined the staff of a newspaper in Virginia City, Nevada. Twain wrote his first popular story in 1865; it was called The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County.

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer

In 1876 Mark wrote The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, which brought him world fame. The book was extremely popular and translated into nearly every language of the world. Later were published The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Tom Sawyer Abroad and Tom Sawyer the Detective. The characters of Twain’s stories are always well-drawn; the stories themselves true-to-life and the plots are skillfully built up.

Other works

Between 1873 and 1889 Twain wrote several novels, including The Prince and the Pauper and A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court. Mark Twain was also the author of satires and critical pages revealing a good deal of the truth about American way of life.