English Language Learners

Damkerng T.

12:00 AM

(p.143)

StoneyB

Hello @DamkerngT. ... I must have just missed you earlier. Keep going - this is strong stuff.

Damkerng T.

I'm not sure what he meant by "Was I on somebody's staff?"

7 mins ago, by Damkerng T.

> We had another drink.
Was I on somebody's staff?
No.
He was.
It was all balls.

Damkerng T.

(p.143)

> They all squabbled about divisions and only killed them when they got them.
They were all cooked.
The Germans won the victories.
By God they were soldiers.
The old Hun was a soldier.

> But they were cooked too.
We were all cooked.
I asked about Russia.
He said they were cooked already.
I'd soon see they were cooked.

> Then the Austrians were cooked too.
If they got some Hun divisions they could do it.
Did he think they would attack this fall?
Of course they would.
The Italians were cooked.

> Everybody knew they were cooked.
The old Hun would come down through the Trentino and cut the railway at Vicenza and then where would the Italians be?
They tried that in 'sixteen, I said.
Not with Germans.

> Yes, I said.
But they probably wouldn't do that, he said.
It was too simple.
They'd try something complicated and get royally cooked.
I had to go, I said.

> I had to get back to the hospital.
"Good-by," he said.
Then cheerily, "Every sort of luck!"
There was a great contrast between his world pessimism and personal cheeriness.

Damkerng T.

> I stopped at a barber shop and was shaved and went home to the hospital.
My leg was as well as it would get for a long time.
I had been up for examination three days before.

> There were still some treatments to take before my course at the Ospedale Maggiore was finished and I walked along the side street practising not limping.

> An old man was cutting silhouettes under an arcade.
I stopped to watch him.
Two girls were posing and he cut their silhouettes together, snipping very fast and looking at them, his head on one side.

> The girls were giggling.
He showed me the silhouettes before he pasted them on white paper and handed them to the girls.

StoneyB

12:15 AM

"Staff" is the central command for troops, as opposed to "line", which is the troops in the field. "Staff officers" --generals, and lesser officers heading staff departments-- were generally despised in WWI by "line officers", colonels commanding regiments and their subordinates.

Damkerng T.

Ahh... That fits the context perfectly. Thank you very much!

Earlier, I thought it might be baseball-speak.

StoneyB

No, no - he's a British major. Brits play cricket, not baseball.

Damkerng T.

Haha.

Now the next page...

Damkerng T.

(p.144)

> "They're beautiful," he said. "How about you, Tenete?"
The girls went away looking at their silhouettes and laughing. They were nice-looking girls. One of them worked in the wine shop across from the hospital.
"All right," I said.
"Take your cap off."

> "No. With it on."
"It will not be so beautiful," the old man said. "But," he brightened, "it will be more military."
He snipped away at the black paper, then separated the two thicknesses and pasted the profiles on a card and handed them to me.
"How much?"

> "That's all right." He waved his hand. "I just made them for you."
"Please." I brought out some coppers. "For pleasure."
"No. I did them for a pleasure. Give them to your girl."
"Many thanks until we meet."
"Until I see thee."

Damkerng T.

> I went on to the hospital.
There were some letters, an official one, and some others.
I was to have three weeks' convalescent leave and then return to the front.
I read it over carefully.
Well, that was that.

> The convalescent leave started October forth when my course was finished.
Three weeks was twenty-one days.
That made October twenty-fifth.

> I told them I would not be in and went to the restaurant a little way up the street from the hospital for supper and read my letters and the Corriere Della Sera at the table.

(p.145)

Damkerng T.

12:25 AM

> There was a letter from my grandfather, containing family news, patriotic encouragement, a draft for two hundred dollars, and a few clippings; a dull letter from the priest at our mess, a letter from a man I knew who was flying with the French and had gotten in with a wild gang and was telling about it, and a note from Rinaldi asking me how long I was going to skulk in Milano and what was all the news?

> He wanted me to bring him phonograph record and enclosed a list.
I drank a small bottle of chianti with the meal, had a coffee afterward with a glass of cognac, finished the paper, put my letters in my pocket, left the paper on the table with the tip and went out.

> In my room at the hospital I undressed, put on pajamas and a dressing-gown, pulled down the curtains on the door that opened onto the balcony and sitting up in the bed read Boston papers from a pile Mrs. Meyers had left for her boys at the hospital.

> The Chicago White Sox were winning the American League pennant and the New York Giants were leading the National League.

> Babe Ruth was a pitcher then playing for Boston.

> The papers were dull, the news was local and stale, and the war news was all old.
The American news was all training camps.
I was glad I wasn't in a training camp.
The baseball news was all I could read and I did not have the slightest interest in it.

> A number of papers together made it impossible to read with interest.
It was not very timely but I read at it for a while.
I wondered if America really got into the war, if they would close down the major leagues.
They probably wouldn't.

> There was still racing in Milan and the war could not be much worse.
They had stopped racing in France.
That was where our horse Japalac came from.
Catherine was not due on duty until nine o'clock.
I heard her passing along the floor when she first came on duty and once saw her pass in the hall.

Damkerng T.

I think this sentence looks a little strange, grammatically: There were riots twice in the town against the war and bad rioting in Turin.

Perhaps this might be better: There were riots twice ... and a bad riot in Turin.

(But I'm not very sure.)

Tristan

Hello @Damkerng T. This is interesting.

StoneyB

I'd point it with a comma after war, but Hemingway seems to like commas even less than I do.

Damkerng T.

He also seems to love long sentences.

@Tristan I'm very curious about it. :)

StoneyB

Actually, Hemingway is famous for his very brusque style. Some of his sentences look long - but if you look closely they consist mostly of coordinated clauses, with very little subordination. Syntactically Hemingway is very simple. To my ear, reading Hemingway is more like boxing than prose ... jab, jab, jab .. jab, jab .. jab, hook, jab, jab ... jab-jab punch. Very tiring.

Damkerng T.

12:35 AM

That's a nice way to put it!

Damkerng T.

(p.146)

> She went to several other rooms and finally came into mine.

Damkerng T.

> "I'm late, darling," she said. "There was a lot to do. How are you?
I told her about my papers and the leave.
"That's lovely," she said. "Where do you want to go?"
"Nowhere. I want to stay here."
"That's silly. You pick a place to go and I'll come too."
"How will you work it?"

> "I don't know. But I will."
"You're pretty wonderful."
"No I'm not. But life isn't hard to manage when you've nothing to lose."
"How do you mean?"
"Nothing. I was only thinking how small obstacles seemed that once were so big."

> "I should think it might be hard to manage."
"No it won't, darling. If necessary I'll simply leave. But it won't come to that."
"Where should we go?"
"I don't care. Anywhere you want. Anywhere we don't know people."
"Don't you care where we go?"

> "No. I'll like any place."
She seemed upset and taut.
"What's the matter, Catherine?"
"Nothing. Nothing's the matter."

> "Yes there is."
"No nothing. Really nothing."
"I know there is. Tell me, darling. You can tell me."
"It's nothing."

Damkerng T.

(p.147)

> "Tell me."
"I don't want to. I'm afraid I'll make you unhappy or worry you."
"No it won't."
"You're sure? It doesn't worry me but I'm afraid to worry you."
"It won't if it doesn't worry you."
"I don't want to tell."

> "Tell it."
"Do I have to?"
"Yes."
"I'm going to have a baby, darling. It's almost three months along. You're not worried, are you? Please please don't. You mustn't worry."
"All right."

> "Is it all right?"
"Of course."
"I did everything. I took everything but it didn't make any difference."
"I'm not worried."
"I couldn't help it, darling, and I haven't worried about it. You mustn't worry or feel badly."

> "I only worry about you."
"That's it. That's what you mustn't do. People have babies all the time. Everybody has babies. It's a natural thing."
"You're pretty wonderful."
"No I'm not. But you mustn't mind, darling. I'll try and not make trouble for you. I know I've made trouble now. But haven't I been a good girl until now? You never knew it, did you?"

> "No."
"It will all be like that. You simply mustn't worry. I can see you're worrying. Stop it. Stop it right away. Wouldn't you like a drink, darling? I know a drink always makes you feel cheerful."

StoneyB

You are a very fast typist!

Damkerng T.

No, I'm not. I typed while chatting; that's all. :-)

I usually type in another window, and then paste it here one page at a time.

Damkerng T.

12:50 AM

(p.148)

> "No. I feel cheerful. And you're pretty wonderful."
"No I'm not. But I'll fix everything to be together if you pick out a place for us to go. It ought to be lovely in October. We'll have a lovely time, darling, and I'll write you every day while you're at the front."
"Where will you be?"

> "I don't know yet. But somewhere splendid. I'll look after all that."
We were quite awhile and did not talk. Catherine was sitting on the bed and I was looking at her but we did not touch each other. We were apart as when some one comes into a room and people are self-conscious. She put out her hand and took mine.

> "You aren't angry are you, darling?"
"No."
"And you don't feel trapped?"
"Maybe a little. But not by you."
"I didn't mean by me. You mustn't be stupid. I meant trapped at all."
"You always feel trapped biologically."

> She went away a long way without stirring or removing her hand.
"'Always' isn't a pretty word."
"I'm sorry."
"It's all right. But you see I've never had a baby and I've never even loved any one. And I've tried to be the way you wanted and then you talk about 'always.'"

> "I could cut off my tongue," I offered.
"Oh, darling!" she came back from wherever she had been. "You mustn't mind me." We were both together again and the self-consciousness was gone. "We really are the same one and we mustn't misunderstand on purpose."

Damkerng T.

(p.149)

> "We won't."
"But people do. They love each other and they misunderstand on purpose and they fight and then suddenly they aren't the same one."
"We won't fight."
"We mustn't. Because there's only us two and in the world there's all the rest of them. If anything comes between us we're gone and then they have us."

> "They won't get us," I said. "Because you're too brave. Nothing ever happens to the brave."
"They die of course."
"But only once."
"I don't know. Who said that?"
"The coward dies a thousand deaths, the brave but one?"

> "Of course. Who said it?"
"I don't know."
"He was probably a coward," she said. "He knew a great deal about cowards but nothing about the brave. The brave dies perhaps two thousand deaths if he's intelligent. He simply doesn't mention them."
"I don't know. It's hard to see inside the head of the brave."

> "Yes. That's how they keep that way."
"You're an authority."
"You're right, darling. That was deserved."
"You're brave."
"No," she said. "But I would like to be."

> "I'm not," I said, "I know where I stand. I've been out long enough to know. I'm like a ball-player that bats two hundred and thirty and knows he's no better."

StoneyB

"Cowards die many times before their deaths;
The valiant never taste of death but once." -- Shakespeare, *Julius Caesar*

Damkerng T.

Now I know who said it. Thank you!

(p.150)

> "What is a ball-player that bats two hundred and thirty? It's awfully impressive."
"It's not. It means a mediocre hitter in baseball."
"But still a hitter," she prodded me.
"I guess we're both conceited," I said. "But you are brave."
"No. But I hope to be."

> "We're both brave," I said. "And I'm very brave when I've had a drink."
"We're splendid people," Catherine said. She went over to the armoire and brought me the cognac and a glass. "Have a drink, darling," she said. "You've been awfully good."
"I don't really want one."
"Take one."

> "All right." I poured the water glass a third full of cognac and drank it off.
"That was very big," she said. "I know brandy is for heroes. But you shouldn't exaggerate."
"Where will we live after the war?"

> "In an old people's home probably," she said. "For three years I looked forward very childishly to the war ending at Christmas. But now I look forward till when our son will be a lieutenant commander."
"Maybe he'll be a general."
"If it's an hundred years' war he'll have time to try both of the services."
"Don't you want a drink?"

> "No. It always makes you happy, darling, and it only makes me dizzy."
"Didn't you ever drink brandy?"
"No, darling. I'm a very old-fashioned wife."
I reach down to the floor for the bottle and poured another drink.

Damkerng T.

(p.151)

> "I'd better go to have a look at your compatriots," Catherine said. "Perhaps you'll read the papers until I come back."
"Do you have to go?"
"Now or later."

> "All right. Now."
"I'll come back later."
"I'll have finished the papers," I said.

Damkerng T.

(end of chapter 21)

StoneyB

1:03 AM

An ominous conclusion ...

Damkerng T.

I believe so.

StoneyB

(I cheated - I read the next chapter while you were typing!)

Damkerng T.

The story seems to be about to turn once again, I think.

Hehe!

StoneyB

I haven't read this in more than fifty years ...

ELL is gradually making me smarter.

Damkerng T.

Hah! I would say it the other way around. (You make us smarter.)

Have you read Anne of Green Gables?

StoneyB

1:07 AM

No, it's definitely the other way around. ELL asks questions that never occur to me, so I run away and read up furiously and come back and report what I found.

Damkerng T.

(I'm looking for the next novel after A Farewell to Arms. Previously, I was thinking about The Old Man and the Sea, but it might still be in copyright.)

StoneyB

I have not. Listenever, who hasn't been around much lately, was working her way through it at one time. I find it very interesting what you guys pick to read. You're doing Farewell to Arms, Listenever did Harry Potter and Pride and Prejudice simultaneously! and then To Kill a Mockingbird and something by Carson McCullers, somebody now is doing Dorian Grey ...

What sort of thing do you want to do? (other than pre-1923)

Damkerng T.

Basically, anything!

StoneyB

Well, but it's no good reading something you're not interested in for its own sake - then it's just homework.

Damkerng T.

I'd like something as contemporary as possible.

Just like movies, I can read almost everything.

Though I enjoy watching sci-fi movies and reading sci-fi novels, I'd like to try something else for a change.

StoneyB

1:13 AM

'Contemporary' is hard if you're limited to public domain. The language and the literature have both moved a long way since 1923.

Damkerng T.

And absorb the grammar and vocabulary at the same time.

Reading this work of Hemingway's, I now sometimes get confused between anyone and any one.

(He also always uses some one.)

StoneyB

I'll take a look and see if he makes a consistent distinction. He may not.

Damkerng T.

Oh, and there is this line too: "If it's an hundred years' war he'll have time to try both of the services."

I guess it would be an hundred years back then.

StoneyB

Initial h's are tricky - some people pronounce them, some don't. Beyond that, it's an allusion to The Hundred Years' War between England and France, which ran intermittently from the middle of the 14th century to the middle of the 15th.

Damkerng T.

Thank you very much.

Mentioning England and France reminds me of A Tale of Two Cities, which I haven't read yet. Is it a good read?

StoneyB

1:26 AM

That's one I was going to suggest - exciting action, complicated plot, and some very funny stuff too. The only problem with Dickens is he can't write women worth a damn, so you may lose your girlfriends here!

Damkerng T.

I've never read Dickens' before. Is his work that bad for ladies?

(I think I could try it anyway. :-)

StoneyB

No, just his women are mostly plaster statues rather than real human beings.

(Not that Hemingway's are much better.)

Damkerng T.

Ah, I see. Thanks for the tip.

StoneyB

Do you want good dialogue, or complex grammar?

Damkerng T.

I want both, but they don't have to come together at once.

It sounds like you have a good suggestion for me. :)

StoneyB

1:41 AM

Dickens gives you both; he had a phenomenal ear, especially for dialect. You could do a lot worse than Tale of Two Cities, or Bleak House if you want something darker. Kipling is fantastic - he has a bad reputation as a champion of British Imperialism, though I think that's misunderstood. My hero is Bernard Shaw, but he wrote plays - extraordinarily funny and moving plays - rather than novels. The dialect in Twain and Hardy is probably too thick for ELL.

By the way, the search tool on archive.org says the Farewell only uses "some one" and "any one", in the same sense as PDE "someone" and "anyone".

Damkerng T.

Thank you very much (for both a great list, and the "some one" and "any one").

Did George Bernard Shaw really never write a novel?

I think I've seen his name when I was browsing archive.org.

StoneyB

He wrote novels when he was young, but they were not successful. He was casting about in the 1880s, and his best work was going into criticism and politics. It wasn't til he started writing for the theatre that he found his voice.

Of course you could put up a play AND its Preface, and get both drama and prose.

Damkerng T.

I think I could do that.

Ahh... I have to leave now. It's my pleasure having a chat with you. Thank you very much for so many things you kindly told me.

Good night! And see you soon!

Anonymous

3:50 AM

@DamkerngT. Technically, that's not true.

Anonymous

Try saying talk without saying anything else before it. With /t/ in utterance-initial position, there's only a release.

Anonymous

(And there, it's required!)

Anonymous

Likewise, stops aren't always literal stops--sometimes the sound is greatly reduced instead of completely stopped.

Anonymous

But we use a lot of simplifications when talking about phonetics.

Anonymous

Like "formants"--although the voice doesn't actually make formants in reality, using them as an approximation sometimes makes the topic easier to discuss, so we do.

Anonymous

3:54 AM

We just have to keep in mind that our descriptions are usually simplifications, and sometimes it makes sense to talk about the ways in which they're not accurate, so that the rest of the time we can go on using those simplifications without being misleading.

hellodear2

12:18 PM

Damkerng T.

Oh, hi!

How is your day?

hellodear2

little bit irriatted.

Damkerng T.

What happened?

hellodear2

Actually, my so called girl friend has gone out of station

without even telling me

with her friends

and she is not picking my phone at all.

and blocked me from facebook

and whatsapp

Damkerng T.

Oh!

hellodear2

12:20 PM

and she doesn't give me a damn.

doesn't even respect me at any place and I am very highly irriatted.

Damkerng T.

What happened before that?

hellodear2

She is saying I should marry her.

But I am just 20.

How can I?

She is not rather so beautiful and that too she is out of my caste.

and my dad would never agree for that

Nothing. When I didn't call her for more than 20 hours, she goes like hell.

So, I am in hell right now.

Damkerng T.

Don't give yourself a hell, man.

hellodear2

So what should I do?

Damkerng T.

Things will get better, I believe.

hellodear2

12:24 PM

You are elder.... you have passed through this age....

Damkerng T.

You will see her anyway soon, right, like at the university or something.

hellodear2

No. we are not of same college.

I have called her 55 times today.

But she didn't pick up.

Damkerng T.

So, both of you didn't have any fight...

until she mentioned something about marriage, perhaps?

hellodear2

No. not like that. Actually, I want to keep myself away from her anyhow.

I don't know how should I do that.

I want to leave her. I am irritated because of her. You know I shouted on my Mom because of that irritation which she gave me yesterday. :'(

Then I said sorry to my Mom after that. :'(

Damkerng T.

Now I'm not sure, so you want or don't want her?

hellodear2

12:28 PM

No. I want some beautiful girl. :'( and that too caring one.

:-o

Damkerng T.

I don't know much about her and your relationship, I'm afraid I'm not in a good position to give much advice.

But usually time will help.

One way or another.

Was there any other girl got involved?

hellodear2

Not at all.

Damkerng T.

But if you want to express your feelings and would like to have someone to listen to, I'm here.

hellodear2

Yup.

You can read my brain now.

You know what I am thinking right now.

I don't know how but it's true.

Sometimes, you want to have someone so that you can say everything which you want to tell.

Damkerng T.

nods

hellodear2

12:38 PM

Do you also feel same sometimes?

Damkerng T.

Breaking up with girlfriends?

Many times.

hellodear2

Umm.... yup

How many? :-p

Damkerng T.

Not too many, I think. :)

I ran into my ex-girlfriend a few times, a couple of years ago.

hellodear2

But you must be married for a so long time now. Right?

Damkerng T.

She greeted me and talked to me nicely.

hellodear2

12:41 PM

May be more than 10 years

Damkerng T.

Yes, about 10 years.

hellodear2

Yay. I can also read your brain. :D

Damkerng T.

Hehe. Nice!

hellodear2

Damkerng T.

LOL

I usually felt like that when I played badminton.

hellodear2

12:43 PM

LOL.

Haha.

Today, I had no classes held.

Was a boring day.

Damkerng T.

Ah, I thought you have classes on Thursday.

And Friday too, perhaps?

hellodear2

Yup. :-)

4 years ago, Brian Acton was looking for a job- Twitter and Facebook said NO and rejected him. So he and Jan Koum, his colleague from Yahoo, set out to do their own thing- They built Whatsapp.

Today, they have sold Whatsapp to Facebook for 19 Billion Dollars!

Being rejected is not the end of the world- It is a stepping stone to achieve something BIG

Damkerng T.

If I knew you didn't have class today, I would give you lots of drills. :-)

@hellodear2 That sounds pretty much true.

hellodear2

No No. I had gone to college but I didn't know it before going there. :-)

I have just come from there before 1 hour.

It is 6:15 in my clock.

Damkerng T.

Are you going to jog in the park today?

hellodear2

12:46 PM

Aha.

Why not?

Damkerng T.

Good.

hellodear2

Do you wana join me?

Damkerng T.

If I could transmit myself there, I would. :-)

hellodear2

Hey, don't you think whatsapp wwas a great story.

Only in 4 years?

Don't you open your mouth when you listen to these type of news?

Damkerng T.

4 years sounds about right to me.

hellodear2

12:48 PM

4 years and 19 billion dollars?

Damkerng T.

Perhaps I wasn't surprised much because it's the same pattern with Google, iPhone, and Facebook.

hellodear2

What the hell.

Can't I do these things? What is common between Mark Zuckerberg, bill gates, this whatsapp, google,iPhone, Damkerng T.?

Damkerng T.

You can try, but not everyone will get a jackpot like they did.

hellodear2

Yup. But what is common?

How did they achieve this level?

1. Intelligence 2. Luck. 3. Hard work?

Damkerng T.

But those in the list seem to have at least two things in common...

I was about to say goal and determination

But you list is good too! :-)

(Because after that, I would add luck. ;-)

hellodear2

12:52 PM

you list is good too means?

Facebook and Twitter has rejected 1000s of people till now, but only 1 person has done that.

Damkerng T.

@hellodear2 It means: I think that as a good list (of things in common)

hellodear2

hmmm.....

Damkerng T.

Most people don't have a clear goal.

Those who have it, usually don't have enough determination.

And even with that, you still need a lot of luck.

hellodear2

Did Bill gates know that he will be billionare?

Did Whatsapp person know that?

Damkerng T.

Nobody knows.

hellodear2

12:54 PM

Yup.

So, I will be a person who will run after companies to get a higher pay and I will have children and that's my life goes like this.

Normal life.

Like everyone has.

Damkerng T.

That sounds nice!

hellodear2

Nice?

LOL

what is nice?

Everyone does that.

What is nice?

Damkerng T.

Many people couldn't have that.

hellodear2

Yoo!

you think on the positive side.

:-)

Damkerng T.

Don't underestimate a simple life. :-)

hellodear2

12:56 PM

That's cool, man.

Many people don't have even that. :') You said a very big thing. :-)

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