The Tower of Babel

And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech.

And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shi’-nar; and they dwelt there.

And they said one to another, Go to, let us make brick, and burn them thoroughly. And they had brick for stone, and slime had they for mortar.

Now the whole world had one language and a common speech. As men moved eastward, they found a plain in Shinar and settled there.

They said to each other, “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly.” They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar. Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves and not be scattered over the face of the whole earth.”

But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower that the men were building. The Lord said, “If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not under­stand each other.”

So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. That is why it was called Babel — because there the Lord confused the language of the whole world. From there the Lord scattered them over the face of the whole earth.

A Joke

... If you are learning English because you intend to travel in England and wish to be understood there, do not try to speak English perfectly because, if you do, no one will understand you.

... Though there is no such thing as perfectly correct English, there is presentable English which we call “good English”, but in London nine hundred and ninety-nine out of every thousand people not only speak bad English, but speak even that very badly. You may say that even if they do not speak English well them­selves they at least understand it when it is well spoken. They can when the speaker is English, but when the speaker is a foreigner, the better he speaks the harder it is to understand him. There­fore the first thing you have to do is to speak with a strong fo­reign accent, and speak broken English: that is English without any grammar. Then every English person will at once know that you are a foreigner, and try to understand and be ready to help you.

He will not expect you to be polite and to use elaborate gram­matical phrases. He will be interested in you because you are a foreigner. If you say: “Will you have the goodness, sir, to direct me to the railway terminus at Charing Cross,” pronouncing all the vowels and consonants beautifully, he will not understand you, and will suspect you of being a beggar. But if you shout: “Please! Charing Cross! Which way?” you will have no difficulty. Half your directions at once.

(From Spoken English and Broken English by G. B. Shaw)

Дата добавления: 2015-08-20