Close-up p 51. Fry's Planet Word. Extra Listening

Listening activity
Fry’s Planet Word Episode 4. ’27 ’’38- ’34 ‘’33

Listen to the programme and fill in the gaps.

1.       It is the simplicity of the alphabet and the ability easily to rearrange letters, that gives it its ____________________ as a tool for spreading the word.

2.       Movable type (printed letter) freed the written word from the _____________ of hand-scribing and allowed it to _________________ in printed texts.

3.       There is something magical about a ____________________of printed text. I can never forget the moment I first saw a novel I had written that had arrived from the printers. I put it on the table and I looked at it and I _____________ my eyes to its level, I ________________ it, I opened it, I walked and _____________ it .

4.       Printing would after Guttenberg ____________ knowledge and new ways of thinking that would change everything.

5.       The city of Norwich has a long history of printing. It was the first town in Britain to have a provincial newspaper. “ This __________________ , _____________________ of the river Wensum, in the shadow of Norwich cathedral was once, hard to believe as it may be, the centre of a kind of Silicon Valley of Europe because here was a ________ and prosperous printworks”

6.       Chaucer was fed up with the ___________________ of those who copied out his works for readers. In the envoi (a line or a group of lines which forms the conclusion to a poem) of one of his poems, Troilus and Cressida, Chaucer makes a request that it isn’t too badly ______________.

7.       We say ________________ and ________________ because the capitals used to be in the _________________ on the frame and the small letters used to be in the ____________________.

8.       When the printer tells Stephen Fry that he was 16 when he started and he did 5 years. Stephen Fry exclaims “__________ !”

9.       English in the Middle Ages was incredibly_______________. Dialects of different regions had different words for the same thing and different spellings. When Caxton brought the printing press to Britain in 1476, he was faced with a __________. He couldn’t print all the different ____________ spellings that were spread around the country. By setting words in print, Caxton started to make the English language more ______________ and printed books spread these changes across the country.

10.   With printing, the written word truly began to spread. Printed books, like the Phoenician alphabet ______________ before, _______________ knowledge. Reading was no longer just an activity for the___________, but something that ordinary people could afford to learn to do.

KEY

1.       potency (/ˈpəʊtnsi/ the power that somebody/something has to affect your body or mind. E.g. the potency of desire.)

2.       Drudgery (/ˈdrʌdʒəri/ hard boring work. E.g. domestic drudgery)



take flight (to run away. E.g. the gang took flight when they heard the police car.)

3.       bound volume (bind, bound, bound: bind something (in something). To fasten the pages of a book together and put them inside a cover. E.g. two volumes bound in leather)



lowered 



sniffed (sniff: to breathe air in through the nose in order to discover or enjoy the smell of something)  


circled.

4.       unleash (to suddenly let a strong force, emotion, etc. be felt or have an effect. E.g. the government's proposals unleashed a storm of protest in the press.)

5.       ivy-clad (ivy: a climbing plant. E.g. stone walls covered in ivy; clad: dressed) 


 willow-lined stretch (willow: Sp. sauce. –lined: having the object mentioned along an edge or edges. E.g. a tree-lined road. Stretch: an area of land or water, especially a long one. E.g. You rarely see boats on this stretch of the river)



thriving (thrive: to become, and continue to be, successful, strong, healthy, etc. Flourish. Sp. Prosperar. E.g. New businesses thrive in this area. A thriving industry.

6.       sloppiness (sloppy: that shows a lack of care, thought or effort. Sp. Descuidado, desaliñado. E.g. sloppy thinking. Your work is sloppy. A sloppy worker).  



Mangled (mangle something: to spoil something, for example a poem or a piece of music, by saying it wrongly or playing it badly)

7.       upper case



lower case

8.       Coo! (/kuː /used to show that you are surprised. E.g. Coo, look at him!)

9.       Diverse



 dilemma



arbitrary



stable.

10.   Millennia (millennium / mɪˈleniəm/ plural: millennia / mɪˈleniə/)



 democratised  



elite / i ˈliːt/

To watch more episodes go to: Fry's Planet Word

Objective Proficiency p 143. Pride. Vocabulary

Positive:

• Look up to somebody: to admire or respect somebody. E.g. He looked up to his older sister and cousins as an example and was influenced by their ways and the music they listened to. 
• Have a good head on your shoulders: to be a sensible person. E.g. John has a good head on his shoulders and can be depended on to give good advice.
• Sober: /ˈsəʊbə(r)/ serious and sensible. E.g. He is honest, sober and hard-working.
• Sobriety: /səˈbraɪəti/ the fact of being sensible and serious. E.g.  She was a model of sobriety and honesty.

Negative:

• To look down on sb/sth: to think that you are better than somebody/something. E.g. She looks down on people who haven't been to college.
• To look down your nose at sb/sth: (informal, especially British English) to behave in a way that suggests that you think that you are better than somebody or that something is not good enough for you. E.g. He looked down his nose at them. He criticized and screamed at employees. He publicly humiliated any employee who made a mistake.
• Go to your head: to make you feel too proud of yourself in a way that other people find annoying. E.g. Don't let all this praise go to your head.

• Pretentious: /prɪˈtenʃəs/ trying to appear important, intelligent, etc. in order to impress other people; trying to be something that you are not, in order to impress. E.g. That's a pretentious name for a dog! It was just an ordinary house—nothing pretentious. He's so pretentious!
• Haughty: behaving in an unfriendly way towards other people because you think that you are better than them. Arrogant. E.g. a haughty face/look/manner. He replied with haughty disdain.
• Scornful: showing or feeling scorn. E.g. He was scornful of such ‘female’ activities as cooking.
• Scorn: a strong feeling that somebody/something is stupid or not good enough, usually shown by the way you speak. E.g. She was unable to hide the scorn in her voice.
• Pour/heap scorn on somebody/something: to speak about somebody/something in a way that shows that you do not respect them or have a good opinion of them. E.g. He heaped scorn on the government's handling of the economy.
• Disdainful (of somebody/something): showing disdain. E.g. She's always been disdainful of people who haven't been to college.
• Contemptuous:  /kənˈtemptʃuəs/ feeling or showing that you have no respect for somebody/something. E.g. The company has shown a contemptuous disregard for Henry's complaints. He was contemptuous of everything I did.
• Contempt: /kənˈtempt/: the feeling that somebody/something is without value and deserves no respect at all. E.g. She looked at him with contempt.

• Obsequious: / əbˈsiːkwiəs/ trying too hard to please somebody, especially somebody who is important. Servile . E.g. an obsequious manner. Smiling obsequiously. 
• Servile: /ˈsɜːvaɪl /wanting too much to please somebody and obey them E.g. Parents have no right to demand servile obedience from their children

• Crawl (to somebody): (informal, disapproving) to be too friendly or helpful to somebody in authority, in a way that is not sincere, especially in order to get an advantage from them. E.g. She's always crawling to the boss.
• Creep (to somebody): (British English, informal, disapproving) to be too friendly or helpful to somebody in authority in a way that is not sincere, especially in order to get an advantage from them. E.g. They creep to the boss and claim good work by somebody else as their own and shift any blame to somebody else.
• Suck up (to somebody): (informal, disapproving) to try to please somebody in authority by praising them too much, helping them, etc, in order to gain some advantage for yourself. E.g. I never sucked up to my teachers, and I'm not going to start now.
• Butter sb up: to say nice things to somebody so that they will help you or give you something. E.g. Stop trying to butter me up! He's always trying to butter up the boss.

• Creep: a person who is not sincere but tries to win your approval by being nice to you. E.g. He's the sort of creep who would do that kind of thing!
• Crawler :a person who tries to get somebody's favour by praising them, doing what will please them, etc. E.g. Don't be such a crawler. 
• Brown-noser (offensive); arse (Br E) /ass (Am E) kisser/licker (offensive); Butt licker/kisser (less offensive): a person who is too friendly to somebody in authority and is always ready to do what they want. E.g. He is a butt kisser who just wants to be told he's a "good boy." 
• Teacher's pet a person who is given special attention by somebody, especially in a way that seems unfair to other people. Favourite. E.g. She's the teacher's pet.

• Brazen: open and without shame, usually about something that people find shocking. Shameless. Sp. Descarado. E.g. She had become brazen about the whole affair. His brazen admission that he was cheating. She had brazenly admitted allowing him back into the house.
• blatant:  (of actions that are considered bad) done in an obvious and open way without caring if people are shocked. E.g. a blatant attempt to buy votes. It was a blatant lie.
• flagrant /ˈfleɪɡrənt/ (of an action) shocking because it is done in a very obvious way and shows no respect for people, laws, etc. E.g. In flagrant disobedience of her father, Ivy stayed out all night.
• barefaced /ˈbeəfeɪst/ showing that you do not care about offending somebody or about behaving badly. Sp. descarado. E.g. a barefaced lie/ liar. The company's claim that profits had jumped by ten per cent was obviously a barefaced lie. John was at the pub last night bragging about his goal-scoring again – but we all know he's a barefaced liar. Listen to BBC Learning English
  
   

Objective Proficiency p 138. Dashiell Hammett's The Thin Man. Extra Listening

Listen to the audio on NPR

Dashiell Hammett and "The Thin Man"

Dashiell Hammett's "The Thin Man" represented  a new kind of crime fiction which was about murder but which was also (1) …………..- ………….. and funny.

The Thin Man was extremely popular and (2) ……………… five sequels.

Richard Layman has been involved in the publication of two novellas and the stories have been in his (3) …………. /……….. for over twenty years.

MGM expected The Thin Man to be another of the (3) ……-………../ …………… that they were usually involved in.

MGM had to ask Hammet to get involved in the second series because they didn’t believe they had the talent to do it (4) …………- ………..  .

In the second movie “After The Thin Man”,  Nick Charles and Nora return to San Francisco, find a body and get involved in a murder investigation despite the fact that they have (5) …………. / ………… crime.  

As this murder is somehow linked to Nora’s family, Nick Charles can’t (6) ………… / ……….. from it.

During the reading from the story, one of the reporters suggests that Nick is no longer retired from being a detective and is in fact, working (7) ………………. .

Hammett knew that his special talents would be well received in Hollywood after he heard the first  (8) “…………. “.

What made Hammett’s  scripts different from the screenplay was their (9) ………….. .

Joseph Breen was the (10) …………….. / ………… of the Motion Picture Association.

The character of Nick Charles spent most of his day drinking alcohol but his character seemed to improve with (11) ………… / ……….. .

It would seem that this capacity for alcohol was also a characteristic of Hammett and for this reason he (12) …………….. this quality in Nick Charles.

MGM became disillusioned with Hammett because of his habit of never appearing at the (13) ………………… / ……………  and also because he was a member of the communist party  with a (14) ………….. - ………….. / ……………… .

Hammett himself became sick of the (15) …..…………… of the protagonists of his scripts.

After MGM paid a huge sum pf money for the rights to his characters, Hammett wrote that no other writer had ever produced a more (16) ………………. / ……………. set of characters.

KEY

Dashiell Hammett and "The Thin Man"

Dashiell Hammett's "The Thin Man" represented  a new kind of crime fiction which was about murder but which was also (1) ……light……..- ……hearted…….. and funny.

The Thin Man was extremely popular and (2) ……spawned………… five sequels.

Richard Layman has been involved in the publication of two novellas and the stories have been in his (3) ……file ……. /……cabinet….. for over twenty years.

MGM expected The Thin Man to be another of the (3) …six…-…week……../ ……wonders……… that they were usually involved in.

MGM had to ask Hammet to get involved in the second series because they didn’t believe they had the talent to do it (4) ……in……- ……house…..  .

In the second movie “After The Thin Man”,  Nick Charles and Nora return to San Francisco, find a body and get involved in a murder investigation despite the fact that they have (5) ……sworn ……. / ……off…… crime.  

As this murder is somehow linked to Nora’s family, Nick Charles can’t (6) …back……… / …off…….. from it.

During the reading from the story, one of the reporters suggests that Nick is no longer retired from being a detective and is in fact, working (7) ……undercover…………. .

Hammett knew that his special talents would be well received in Hollywood after he heard the first  (8) “……talkie……. “.

What made Hammett’s  scripts different from the screenplay was their (9) …sexuality……….. .

Joseph Breen was the (10) ……appointed……….. / …censor……… of the Motion Picture Association.

The character of Nick Charles spent most of his day drinking alcohol but his character seemed to improve with (11) ……each…… / ……sip….. .

It would seem that this capacity for alcohol was also a characteristic of Hammett and for this reason he (12) …invested……….. this quality in Nick Charles.

MGM became disillusioned with Hammett because of his habit of never appearing at the (13) ……appointed…………… / ………time……  and also because he was a member of the communist party  with a (14) ……long…….. - …term……….. / ……commitment………… .

Hammett himself became sick of the (15) …exploitation…………… of the protagonists of his scripts.

After MGM paid a huge sum pf money for the rights to his characters, Hammett wrote that no other writer had ever produced a more (16) …insufferably……………. / …smug…………. set of characters.

Transcript

http://www.npr.org/2012/11/03/164195799/nick-nora-and-asta-return-in-thin-man-novellas

This is WEEKEND EDITION from NPR News. I'm Scott Simon. Dashiell Hammett's "The Thin Man" invented a new kind of crime fiction. It was hard-boiled, but also light-hearted, funny, with a hint of homicide. Nick and Nora Charles and Asta, their wire-haired terrier were rich, witty and in love, when America was in the middle of the Depression and often depressed.

(SOUNDBITE OF MOVIE, "THE THIN MAN")

MYRNA LOY: (as Nora) How they expect a woman to still have any mystery left from that after living in a place like this for three days, I don't know.

WILLIAM POWELL: (as Nick) Darling, you don't need mystery. You got something much better, something more alluring.

LOY: What?

POWELL: Me.

LOY: You?

SIMON: They also drank a lot - Nick and Nora, not Asta, though he got an occasional leftover slurp. "The Thin Man" was made into a popular motion picture, starring William Powell and Myrna Loy and a wire-haired terrier, which spawned five sequels, including "After the Thin Man" and "Another Thin man." And although the screenwriting couple of Albert Hackett and Frances Goodrich usually completed the screenplays, the MGM studio needed the stories and characters that only Dashiell Hammett could write. Now, for the first time, the stories of "After the Thin Man" and "Another Thin Man" have been published as novellas - "The Return of the Thin Man." They have been edited and published by Richard Layman, who joins us now from the studios of SEETV in Columbia, South Carolina. Richard, thanks so much for being with us.

RICHARD LAYMAN: Thank you for having me. It's a pleasure to be here.

SIMON: Where have these stories been?

LAYMAN: They've been in my file cabinet since 1981 roughly. Before that, they were in the archives at the legal office of MGM in Culver City.

SIMON: Tell us about these writing contracts that Hammett would get from MGM. I don't know if that kind of thing is done any more in Hollywood.

LAYMAN: After "The Thin Man" was first produced in 1934 by MGM but it was a B-movie. It was done on a $250,000 budget, and MGM expected it to be just another of the, you know, six-week wonders that they routinely produced. In fact, the movie was a big success. It was nominated for four Academy Awards, including Best Picture, and it made the studio a lot of money. So, they decided immediately that they needed a second story in the series. They didn't have the talent to do it in-house, they didn't believe, so they went to Hammett.

SIMON: Let's try and set this up, the story, 'cause once again in this story, Nick Charles and Nora have sworn off crime solving, but they come home to San Francisco, find a body and get dragged back in. What happens?

LAYMAN: Well, Nick Charles is always reluctantly pulled into a murder. This time, the murder has associations with Nora's family, so he can't back away from it.

SIMON: Let's hear a reading from "After the Thin Man."

UNIDENTIFIED MAN: (Reading) They arrive at the house and they go up the front steps. Nora: Last one in bed is a sissy. They run into the house pulling off clothes. From the living room to meet them come Asta and the reporters they left at the Hall of Justice, the reporters asking questions. The police suspect Mrs. Landis. What connections did Pedro Dominguez have with the Landis killing, etc., etc.? Nick insists he knows nothing about it and has nothing to say as they go back into the living room winding up with: I'm going to give you boys one drink apiece and then put you out. One of the reporters asks, well, answer another question for us and we won't print it if you don't want us to. Is it true that you actually didn't retire as a detective but are working undercover? Nick, starting to pour drinks: No, it's not true, but don't print it, because I don't want my wife's relatives to know that I'm living on her money.

(LAUGHTER)

SIMON: What do you learn by working with Hammett words about Hammett dialogue?

LAYMAN: Oh, Hammett was a master of dialogue and that was why it was so important to MGM. You know, when Hammett was first attracted to Hollywood, he heard the first talkie and he knew that the talents that he had were in demand in Hollywood, and indeed they were. You know, Hollywood had gone from a formula by which action advanced a plot in the days of the silent movies to a formula in which dialogue and character advanced the plot. And the two things that Hammett did superbly was develop character and write dialogue.

SIMON: Were the screenplays, the stories that he wrote, darker than the movies that got made out of them?

LAYMAN: In some respects, they were darker. But the big difference that you see between the Hammett story and the produced movie has to do with the drinking and the sexuality, but especially the sexuality. It was a time in which the Motion Picture Association had developed a code of decency. A character named Joseph Breen was the appointed censor. When he saw Hammett's scripts, he must have had fits of apoplexy.

(SOUNDBITE OF MOVIE, "THE THIN MAN")

LOY: (as Nora) Now, how many drinks have you had?

POWELL: (as Nick) This will make six martinis.

LOY: All right. Will you bring me five more martinis?

SIMON: Nick Charles drank from morning to midnight and seemed to grow more charming and clever with each sip. Was that true of Dashiell Hammett?

LAYMAN: It was indeed. You know, there was a famous photo session of all of the former writers for Black Mask magazine. Raymond Chandler was also a Black Mask writer. And this photo that was made in, what, 1935, 1936, one of the only known photos of Hammett and Chandler together. Afterwards, Chandler wrote to someone saying that Hammett had had at least 12 drinks during the time that they worked together and didn't show the least effect from them.

SIMON: And so that's a quality with which he invested Nick Charles.

LAYMAN: Yes, it was. Nick Charles is, in many respects, like Hammett, just as Nora is, in many respects, like Hammett's girlfriend Lillian Hellman, to whom "The Thin Man," the published book, is dedicated.

SIMON: Why did the studio eventually get tired of Dashiell Hammett?

LAYMAN: The studio got tired of him for two reasons, I think. First of all, because of his, quote, "irregular habits."

SIMON: Irregular habits meant regular drinking.

LAYMAN: Regular drinking. He had a reputation for not showing up at the appointed time, often because he was drunk, sometimes because he had been out partying all night and just didn't feel like getting out of bed. But more important than that, Hammett was, at that time, becoming political active and he was involved in the Screenwriters Guild, a unionization effort of the screenwriters, to force the studios to give the writers credit and money for the work that they did.

SIMON: And he'd also been at least briefly a communist.

LAYMAN: No. It wasn't briefly - it was a long-term commitment. He was a member of the Communist Party, card-carrying. He apparently joined the party in about 1935, at about the time he was - just before the time he was writing after "After the Thin Man." And he remained a member of the party, you know, for the next, what, two decades.

SIMON: How did he grow to feel about this franchise that he'd created?

LAYMAN: I think he was fed up with Nick and Nora Charles. Not fed up - he was tired of them pretty early on and he was fed up with the studios for the exploitation of the characters that he saw. Just before he finished the last draft for "Another Thin Man," MGM bought all rights to the characters Nick and Nora Charles and Asta so that they could develop the series without him. They paid $40,000 for those character rights. And Hammett wrote to Lillian Hellman just after that: There may be better writers than I am, but nobody ever created a more insufferably smug set of characters than the Charleses, and they can't take that away from me, even for $40,000.

SIMON: Richard Layman. He's edited two stories by Dashiell Hammett, featuring the beloved characters, Nick and Nora Charles and the little dog Asta...

(SOUNDBITE OF DOG BARKING)

SIMON: They're published under the title "The Return of the Thin Man." Richard, thanks so much for being with us.

LAYMAN: Thank you.