Focus on vocabulary

1. Transcribe and read aloud the following words.

solemn, narrative, insight, mournful, gigantic, insoluble, chaos, banish, menace, virtue, microcosm, superb, cease, primarily

2. Give the words for these definitions.

1. a state of disorder and confusion

2. causing deep thought and respect

3. invent, design

4. warm and comfortable

5. put away from, out of (the mind)

6. morally good or right

7. make easy to do or understand

8. complicated in form

9. long for with great, tender feeling

10. worry about (a solution to a problem)

3. Give synonyms.

1. magnificent, first-rate 6. bad-tempered

2. threat 7. traditional

3. stimulate 8. sad, gloomy

4. understanding 9. cunning, deceitful

5. story 10. advantage

4. Fill in the blanks with the correct prepositions.

1. to be fascinated … violence

2. to be involved … some form of crime

3. to appeal … one’s taste … narrative

4. to oppose … the muddle … the real world

5. compared … the problem of staying sane

5. Say it in English.

1. недооценивать

2. покончить с суетой дня

3. приходить в восторг от описания насилия

4. перестать удовлетворять потребность читателя в хорошо рассказанной истории

5. быть в первую очередь рассказчиком

6. глубокое понимание психологии

7. искусно придуманная история

8. история с занимательным элементом загадочности

9. традиционный и стилизованный роман

10. недостатки детектива являются частью его очарования

11. люди окружены колоссальными проблемами

12. ясные упрощения

13. входить в хорошо организованный микрокосм

14. детектив – это то, что нужно

15. своеобразные достоинства

6. Paraphrase this passage replacing the underlined words and making any other necessary changes.

Reading detective stories is especially pleasant when one is away from home. The day’s nervous agitation is over; and now to make the mind as cosy as the body. But some grave stuff won’t do. The detective story is the thing, though its merits haven’t been adequately valued. Genuine enthusiasts of the genre condemn the violent atmosphere and wish detective novelists were not so traditional. An excellent detective story could be written about people who are not involved in any form of crime.

What a modern reader wants is a narrative, an artfully designed tale. A really good detective story opposes to the enormous grim world its own clearly organized problems and clever solutions.

As conscientious citizens, we are surrounded by immense problems that are threatening and seem to escape solution. That’s why it is so enjoyable to spend an hour or two thinking about the mystery of the detective story. After the newspaper headlines, it’s refreshing to enter this well-organized microcosm.

7. Explain how you understand the following.

1. You are snugly installed in bed.

2. The fuss of the day is done with.

3. Good literature challenges and excites the mind.

4. A romance will not do.

5. Sleep is banished for hours.

6. Its peculiar virtues have not been sufficiently appreciated.

7. Most serious fiction has ceased to appeal to our taste for narrative.

8. We deplore the blood-and-bone atmosphere.

9. A detective story is highly conventional and stylized.

10. We are hemmed in by gigantic problems that seem insoluble and menacing.

11. A detective story opposes to the vast mournful muddle of the real world its own tidy problems and neat solutions.

12. After the newspaper headlines, it is refreshing to enter this well-ordered microcosm.

8. As you read the following passages, try to decide what the missing words might be.

A. The most potent writing to be found in any mystery of recent years appears in Jonathan Valin’s Extenuating Circumstances. His __________, Harry Stoner, __________ another of the ex-cops so beloved of the genre, is hired to __________ the disappearance of a wealthy politician and do-gooder. The missing man is found tortured to death. His __________: two boy prostitutes.

Would you like to read the book? Why (not)?

B. It’s The Reader Who Decides

By the end of the first __________ of Sherlock Holmes stories, the author, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, had become tired of writing __________. So at the end of his second book of Holmes stories, he decided to have the detective die. The last story in the collection, The Final Problem, ends __________ Holmes and his greatest enemy, Moriarty, plunging to their deaths from a high cliff. After that, hundreds of letters poured in to Conan Doyle, begging him to bring Holmes back. Also, magazines offered him __________ sums of money for additional Sherlock Holmes __________. Finally, after nine years, Conan Doyle wrote a new story in which Holmes __________ and tells Dr Watson that he didn’t die after all. Sometimes it is the reader, not the author, who determines how long __________ heroes will live.

Have you read any Sherlock Holmes stories?

What do you think of them?