Контрольные работы

Variant 1

NOAH WEBSTER (1758-1843)

Noah Webster was a famous American lexicographer, whose books on grammar and spelling and American Dic­tionary of the English Language standardized American English.

Noah Webster was born in Connecticut in 1758 and grew up on his father's farm. He was an exceptional stu­dent and went on to college at Yale, his education inter­rupted briefly by his service in the army. He returned to college, graduated, and then studied law. But without enough money to open his own office, he became a teacher rather than a lawyer. In the school where he taught, the only books available were a Bible and several spelling books from England. They were filled with names of English kings and English places, things which meant little to these Ame­rican children. So he decided to produce some books of his own, books about American people and places, filled with expressions more commonly used in the United States.

He published three small books, one on spelling, one on grammar, and a reader. These books sold very well, and he thought the royalties would soon make him finan­cially independent. But there were no Federal copyright laws in effect as yet, and others began copying and selling his books. Within a few years, however, strong copy­right laws were enacted, and at last he was able to live comfortably from the earning of his little books, which were in use in nearly every classroom in the country. Now he could devote himself to a project he had been dreaming about: to produce a book on the English lan­guage the way it was spoken in the United States, a book emphasizing American word usage and pronunci­ation, not British.

His monumental undertaking took him more than twenty years to complete. Webster listed the origin and meaning of every word in the language, and his final manuscript contained seventy thousand entries. He later wrote that when he came to the final word, his hand trembled so much that he could hardly keep his pen on the paper. His dictionary, first published in 1828, is still the basis for most dictionaries in use today, a fit­ting tribute to the man who spent his lifetime enriching the language of America.

Vocabulary:

exceptional – исключительный

briefly – быстро

available – доступный

royalty – авторский гонорар

undertaking – дело

contain – содержать

tribute – дань, должное

I. Найдите в тексте следующие слова и выражения:

1. лексикограф; 7) за несколько лет;

2. прерывать; 8) рукопись;

3. изучать законы; 9) его рука дрожала;

4. открыть собственную контору; 10) словарь;

5. Библия; 11) основа;

6. опубликовать; 12) обогащая язык Америки.

II. Ответьте письменно на вопросы:

1. What was Noah Webster?

2. Where and when was he born?

3. Why did he become a teacher?

4. What books were available for him in school?

5. Why did others begin copying and selling Webster’s books?

6. What was his dream?

7. How many years did his undertaking take him to complete?

8. How many entries did his final manuscript contain?

9. How did he feel when he came to the final word of his work?

10. When was his dictionary first published?