Электронные учебные задания по грамматике и практике перевода для студентов 2 курса отделения английского языка и литературы факультета РГФ.

Составитель: ст. преп. Кустова Н. В.

Компьютерная вёрстка: Горощук А. В.

The Treasury of Humorous Quotations

Sayings of clever and talented people are like human beings: they are born, and live, and die, and preserve the vital and poetical treasury of the linguistic creation of their people for future generations. In each of them we can see those who argue, doubt, joke, ridicule, sorrow or quarrel… and a great number of real – life happenings appear. We hope the quotations, given below, will help you to master grammar of the English language, and come closer to the rich, versatile world of world culture. They belong to outstanding politicians and philosophers, historians and satirists, actors and dramatists from the UK, the USA, France, Italy, Greece, Germany, Ireland and Russia, who lived in different centuries. The quotations are thoroughly selected and borrowed from the very popular in the UK book “The Treasury of Humorous Quotations” published in Oxford, in 1999.

Assignment 1.

Among the 188 sentences select those with oblique moods, write them out under their number in the list, and underline the oblique mood forms. Translate the sentences into English.

Assignment 2.

Select the sentences with modal verbs and write them out. State the meanings of the modal verbs and translate the sentences into Russian.

Assignment 3.

Select the sentences with verbals and write them out. Be ready to comment on the verbals in class. Translate the sentences into Russian.

1. Health is the thing that makes you feel that now is the best time of the year.

2. Insomniacs don’t sleep because they worry about it, and they worry about it because they don’t sleep.

3. There’s no accounting for tastes, as the woman said when somebody told her son was wanted by the police.

4. Early to bed and early to rise, and you’ll meet very few of our best people.

5. Here’s to man: he can afford anything he can get; here’s to woman: she can afford anything she can get a man to get for her.

6. “Whom are you? ” said he, for he had been to night school.

7. It has always been said that money talks, but I’d rather think that it is beginning to talk too loudly.

8. Long experience has taught me that in England nobody goes to the theatre unless he or she has bronchitis.

9. California is a fine place to live in – if you happen to be an orange.

10. Keep running after a dog, and he will never bite you.

11. A loving wife will do anything for her husband except stop criticizing and trying to improve him.

12. What man wants: all he can get; what woman wants: all she can’t get.

13. We go on fancying that each man is thinking of us, but he is not; he is like us: he is thinking of himself.

14. Everything is funny, as long as it is happening to somebody else.

15. How wonderful opera would be if there were no singers.

16. To offend is my pleasure; I love to be hated.

17. To write a love letter we must begin without knowing what we intend to say, and end without knowing what we have written.

18. A good woman is known by what she does; a good man by what he doesn’t.

19. A conference is a gathering of important people who singly can do nothing but together can decide that nothing can be done.

20. Some movie stars wear their sunglasses even in church; they are afraid God might recognize them and ask for autographs.

21. It’s amazing how nice people are to you when they know you are going away.

22. She not only expects the worst, but makes the worst of it when it happens.

23. What’s our knowledge worth? We don’t even know what the weather will be tomorrow.

24. A good neighbour is a fellow who smiles at you over the back fence but doesn’t climb over it.

25. Hello! We heard you at the door, but just thought you were part of the bad weather.

26. It was as helpful as throwing a drowning man both ends of a rope.

27. The cure for admiring the House of Lords is to go and look at it.

28. The greatest pleasure in life is doing what people say you cannot do.

29. A good husband is never the first to go to sleep at night, or the last to awake in the morning.

30. May God defend me from myself!

31. If good books did good, the world would have been converted long ago.

32. There is only one rule for being a good talker: learn to listen.

33. Three things matter in a speech; who says it, how he says it and what he says-and, of the three, the last matters the least.

34. It is as easy to give advice to yourself as to the others, and as useless.

35. The worst misfortune that can happen to an ordinary man is to have an extraordinary father.

36. Had Cleopatra’s nose been shorter, the whole face of the world would have been different.

37. The last thing we decide in writing a book is what to put first.

38. There are two reasons for drinking: one is, when you are thirsty, to cure it; the other, when you are not thirsty, to prevent it.

39. I divide all readers into two classes: those who read to remember and those who read to forget.

40. This is the final test of a gentleman: his respect for those who can be of no possible service to him.

41. If we all said to people’s faces what we say behind each other’s backs, society would be impossible.

42. When a woman gets too old to be attractive to a man she turns to God.

43. The good die young – because they see it’s no use living if you’ve got to be good.

44. To me, old age is always fifteen years older than I am.

45. It is not necessary to understand things in order to argue about them.

46. Getting married is a serious matter for a girl; not getting married is even more serious.

47. No news is good news; no journalists is even better.

48. Acquaintance: a person whom we know well enough to borrow from, but not well enough to lend to.

49. One should not exaggerate the importance of trifles.

50. Bore: a person who talks when you wish him to listen.

51. Brain: the apparatus with which we think we think.

52. I wish Adam had died with all his ribs in his body.

53. Shakespeare was a dramatist of note who lived by writing things to quote.

54. It takes less time to do a thing right than to explain why you did it wrong.

55. The foolish and the dead alone never change their opinions.

56. There is no good in arguing with the inevitable; the only argument available with an east wind is to put on your overcoat.

57. People who are late are often so much jollier than the people who have to wait for them.

58. If you make people think they are thinking, they’ll love you but if you really make them think, they’ll hate you.

59. It must be a hard life to be the child of a psychologist.

60. When you become used to never being alone, you may consider yourself Americanized.

61. The chief knowledge that a man gets from reading books is the knowledge that very few of them are worth reading.

62. Bachelors know more about women than married men; if they didn’t, they’d be married too.

63. It is hard to believe that a man is telling the truth when you know that you would lie if you were in his place.

64. A teacher is one who, in his youth, admired teachers.

65. Don’t talk about yourself; it will be done when you leave.

66. I despise the pleasure of pleasing people whom I despise.

67. I sometimes give myself admirable advice, but I am incapable of taking it.

68. If it was the fashion to go naked, the place would be hardly observed.

69. Many people live alone and like it, but most of them live alone and look it.

70. They defend their errors as if they were defending their inheritance.

71. To the lexicographer, God is simply the word that comes next to “go – cart”.

72. One of the pleasures of reading old letters is the knowledge that they need no answer.

73. If dogs could talk, perhaps, we’d find it just as hard as to get along with them as we do with people.

74. If it were not for the government, we should have nothing left to laugh at in France.

75. Young people think old men are fools, but old men know young men are fools.

76. A man and a woman marry because both of them don’t know what to do with themselves.

77. It saves a lot of trouble if, instead of having to earn money and save it, you can just go and borrow it.

78. A politician thinks of the next election, a statesman, of the next generation.

79. Learn all the rules, every one of them, so that you will know how to break them.

80. You couldn’t tell if she was dressed for an opera or an operation.

81. To refuse praise is to seek praise twice.

82. True love is like a ghost: everybody talks about it but few have seen it.

83. We all have enough strength to bear the misfortunes of others.

84. We confess little faults in order to suggest that we have no big ones.

85. We think very few people sensible except those who agree with us.

86. We would often be ashamed of our best actions if the world only knew the motives behind them.

87. If you wish to appear agreeable in society, you must consent to be taught many things which you already know.

88. Never say you know a man until you have divided an inheritance with him.

89. The parent who could see his boy as he really is would shake his head and say, ” Willie is no good. I’ll sell him. ”

90. What a blessing it would be if we could open and shut our ears as easily as we do our eyes.

91. God must have loved the plain people; he made so many of them.

92. If this is coffee, please bring me some tea; but if this is tea, bring me some coffee.

93. No man feels like laughing when he bumps his funny – bone.

94. There is no pleasure in having nothing to do; the fun is in having lots to do and not doing it.

95. Tact consists in knowing how far we may go too far.

96. There are three classes of elderly women: first, that dear old soul, second, that old woman, third, that old witch.

97. A man is as old as he’s feeling, a woman as old as she looks.

98. A husband should tell his wife everything that he is sure, she will find out, and before anyone else does.

99. The people are to be taken in very small doses.

100. The biggest fish he ever caught were those he got away.

101. When children are doing nothing, they are doing mischief.

102. Never lend books, for no one ever returns them, the only books I have in my library are books that other people have lent me.

103. A woman must choose: with a man liked by women, she is not sure; with a man disliked by women, she is not happy.

104. Keep your eyes wide open before marriage, and half – shut afterwards.

105. To find out a girl’s faults, praise her to her girlfriends.

106. A mother takes 20 years to make a man of her boy, and another woman makes a fool of him in 20 minutes.

107. Never praise a sister to a sister in the hope of your compliments reaching the proper ears.

108. God may forgive you your sins, but your nervous system won’t.

109. There are no ugly women there are only women who do not know how to look prettier.

110. It is impossible to please the whole world and your father as well.

111. Since all the maids are good and loveable, from where come the evil wives.

112. We read to say that we have read.

113. He looked at me as if I was a side dish he hadn’t ordered.

114. He who is pleased with nobody is much more unhappy than he with whom nobody is pleased.

115. If we had no faults of our own we should take less pleasure in noticing the faults of others.

116. It takes much cleverness to know how to conceal cleverness.

117. A man who is always satisfied with himself is seldom satisfied with others.

118. Most our faults are more pardonable than the means we use to conceal them.

119. Nothing prevents us from being natural so much as the desire to appear so.

120. Old men are fond of giving good advice to console themselves for their inability to give bad examples.

121. A person is never as happy or as unhappy as he thinks he is.

122. There are bad people who would be less dangerous if they had no good in them.

123. There are some people who would have never fallen in love if they had never heard of love.

124. Men were born to lie, and women to believe them.

125. It is well to love; not to love anymore is well also.

126. Some people spend the day in complaining of a headache, and the night in drinking the wine that gives it.

127. It happens in life, as in grammar, that the exceptions outnumber the rules.

128. Man begins by making love and ends by loving a woman; woman begins by loving a man and ends by loving love.

129. Some people make promises for the pleasure of breaking them.

130. A rolling stone gathers no moss, but it gains a certain polish.

131. What can’t be cured must be insured.

132. A woman’s mind is clearer than a man’s; she changes it more often.

133. Women have a wonderful sense of right and wrong, but little sense of right and left.

134. Work is the greatest thing in the world, so we should always save some of it tomorrow.

135. If I had my way I’d make health catching instead of disease.

136. I like work; it fascinates me; I can sit and look at it for hours.

137. If I were a gravedigger, or even a hangman, there are some people I could work for with a great deal of enjoyment.

138. If an earthquake were to engulf England tomorrow, the English would manage to meet and dine somewhere among the rubbish, just to celebrate the event.

139. My notion of a wife at forty is that a man should be able to change her, like a banknote for two twenties.

140. Troubles are like babies; they only grow by nursing.

141. A fishing rod is a stick with a hook at one end and a fool at the other.

142. We are inclined to believe those whom we do not know because they have never deceived us.

143. What I gained by being in France was learning to be better satisfied with my own country.

144. Wine makes a man better pleased with himself; I do not say that it makes him more pleasing to others.

145. Worth seeing? Yes, but not worth going to see.

146. You raise your voice when you should reinforce your argument.

147. If men knew all that women think, they’d be twenty times more daring.

148. Some people are always grumbling that roses have thorns; I am thankful that thorns have roses.

149. Borrow trouble for yourself, if that’s your nature, but don’t lend it to your neighbours.

150. A woman marries the first time for love, the second time for companionship, the third time for support, and the rest of the times just from habit.

151. It is better to have loved your wife than never to have loved at all.

152. Society would be delighted were all women married and all men single.

153. Englishmen never will be slaves; they are free to do whatever the government and public opinion allow them to do.

154. First love is only a little foolishness and a lot of curiosity.

155. He who can, does; he who cannot, teaches.

156. I dislike feeling at home when I’m abroad.

157. My speciality is being right when other people are wrong.

158. My way of joking is to tell the truth; it is the funniest joke in the world.

159. The things most people want to know about are usually none of their business.

160. The test of a man or woman’s breeding is how they behave in a quarrel.

161. If I owned Texas and Hell, I’d rent out Texas and live in Hell.

162. A fluent tongue is the only a mother doesn’t like her daughter to resemble her in.

163. I’m most fond of talking and thinking; that is to say, talking first and thinking afterward.

164. If I were to begin life again, I would devote it to music. It is the only cheap and unpunished rapture on earth.

165. Early to rise and early to bed makes a male healthy, and wealthy and dead.

166. He never chooses an option; he just wears whatever happens to be in style.

167. April 1 is the day upon which we are reminded of what we are on the other 364.

168. Good breeding consists in concealing how much we think of ourselves and how little we think of the other person.

169. He liked to like people, therefore people liked him.

170. I could never learn to like her – except on a raft at sea with no other provisions in sight.

171. I like criticism, but it must be my way.

172. Nothing so needs reforming as other people’s habits.

173. The only way to keep your health is to eat what you don’t want, drink what you don’t like, and do what you’d rather not.

174. There is no use in walking 5 miles to fish when you can depend on being just as unsuccessful near home.

175. To cease smoking is the easiest thing I ever did; I ought to know because I’ve done it a thousand times.

176. When I speak my native tongue in its utmost purity in England, an Englishman can’t understand me at all.

177. He speaks to me as if I were at public meeting.

178. If God didn’t exist, it would be necessary to invent Him.

179. The secret of being a bore is to tell everything.

180. A woman keeps one secret – the secret of age.

181. I wish there were windows to my soul, so that you could see some of my feelings.

182. Crying is the refuge of plain women, but the ruin of pretty ones.

183. If one could only teach the English how to talk and the Irish how to listen, society would be quite civilized.

184. I never put off till tomorrow what I can possibly do the day after.

185. Life is far too important a thing ever to talk seriously about.

186. One should always be in love; that is the reason one should never marry.

187. Women are meant to be loved, not to be understood.

188. Perfection is such a nuisance that I often regret having cured myself of using tobacco.

189. One should not exaggerate the importance of trifles. Life, for instance, is much too short to be taken seriously.

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