クリストファー・ベルトンの「英語の世界」＜第１６号＞ [まぐまぐ！]

2008/03/02

クリストファー・ベルトンの「英語の世界」＜第１６号＞

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クリストファー・ベルトンの「英語の世界」

　　　　第１６号：０８年0３月０２日

Official Site: http://www.chrisbelton.com/

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------------------------------ 目次 -----------------------------

☆ What's New?
☆ Belton's Blog
☆ ワン・ポイント英語＜日本語の直訳は自然な英語にはならない＞
☆ Potluck －＜Husband and Wife Jokes＞
☆ オンライン英字小説－＜The Henderson Arrows: Part XIII＞

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☆ What's New?
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★ 「多聴多読マガジン Vol.7 [春号]」は03月06日に出版します。
    今回の私の連載記事のテーマは[The Golden Compass (by Philip
　　Pullman )]。

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★ 携帯サイトを開始しました。QRコードはサイトのTop Pageにあります。

　　http://www.chrisbelton.com/

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★ 『「ハリーポッター」Vol.7が英語で楽しく読める本』は好評発売中！！！
    By Christopher Belton / 訳：渡辺順子

　　http://www.chrisbelton.com/book_har_v7.html

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☆ Belton's Blog
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A new English Pub has opened close to the pub I usually visit, and
on Friday night a few friends and I tried it out. The name of the pub is
the Full Monty, but there not a naked man in sight, so it is quite safe
to take your wife or girlfriend there...:-) It is quite authentic and sells
a wide range of beer straight from the barrel, and it also has quite an
extensive menu (fish and chips, steak and kidney pudding, Cornish pasty
and lots of other stereotypical British food.) The owner is British, and
and the pub was filled with Brits, but I managed to make friends with a
couple of Japanese guys who were a little drunk. I originally wasn't intending
to go out on Friday, but a British friend of mine (Simon) asked me if I
would translate some official papers for him, and my reward for this was
a couple of pints of beer. Simon plays rubgy for a team in Yokohama and
invited a few of his friends along, too. If you want my advice, never go
drinking with rugby players. They drink too fast and too much. On Saturday
morning it felt as if the World Cup Soccer Tournament was being played
inside my head...:-)

☆ The Full Monty
　　パブの名前でありながら、映画のタイトルでもあります。
　　フル・モンティ。英1997（監督：ピーター・カッタネオ）鉄鋼不況で
　　失業した男たちが金稼ぎのために男性ストリッパーに挑むコメディ。
　　
☆ authentic
　　本格的、正真正銘の

☆ beer straight from the barrel
　　樽入りのビール

☆ extensive
　　多数の、（品ぞろえが）豊富な

☆ Cornish pasty
　　コーニッシュパイ（英国のミートパイ）

☆ stereotypical
　　お決まりの、固定観念

☆ Brit
　　イギリス人

☆ intend(ing)
　　つもり

☆ reward
　　褒美、報酬

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☆ ワン・ポイント英語＜日本語の直訳は自然な英語にはならない＞
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★ 日本語の直訳は自然な英語にはならない

　この例をひとつあげてみましょう。日本人は英語を話すときにtooという語を
使いすぎるということをご存じでしたか。日本語では「～すぎる」という語がよく
使われ、そのまま英語にされることがよくあります。しかし、tooという語は英語
ではそれほど頻繁に使われるわけではありません。ほとんどの場合、veryを
使ったほうがより自然な英語になります。以下に例をあげてみましょう。

- It is too hot today.　　→　　It is very hot today.
　（今日は暑すぎる→今日はひどく暑い）

- His house is too big.　　→　　His house is very big.
　（彼の家は広すぎる→彼の家はたいへん広い）

- I am too busy.　　→　　I am very busy.
　（わたしは忙しすぎる→わたしは非常に忙しい）

　tooという語は英語ではある意見を述べるときに用いる語です。しかし、上の
例文はみな単なる事実を述べているだけで、強い主張が含まれているわけ
ではありません。もちろん、tooを使ったこれらの文は、文法的にまちがって
いるわけではありませんが、どれも不自然に響きます。一方、もしも本当に
自分の意見を強く述べたいのなら、tooを使ってかまいません。ただしその
ときはほとんどの場合、文の構成を変えるとともにいくつかの語（ここでは
for me）をつけ加え、これは一般論ではなく自分にとっての意見にすぎない
ことを示したほうがいいでしょう。

- Today is too hot for me.
　（今日はわたしには暑すぎる）

- He has a nice house, but it is too large for me.
　（彼は立派な家を持っているが、わたしには広すぎる）

- We are very busy at work at the moment. It’s too busy for me.
　（いま職場は大忙しだ。わたしには忙しすぎる）

★ 上記の文は [英会話の勉強の仕方」から引用したものです。
　　詳細はこちらへ：
　　http://www.chrisbelton.com/eng/book_eng_07.html

★ 異なる内容の「ワン・ポイント英語」（イラスト付き）はOfficial Siteの
　　トップ・ページに毎週月曜日に更新しています。
　　http://www.chrisbelton.com/

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☆ Potluck －＜Husband and Wife Jokes＞
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★ Husband and Wife Jokes

☆ The Wishing Well

On their twentieth wedding anniversary, a couple decided to visit the
quaint old English village in which they had spent their honeymoon. This
village was famous for its wishing well, and upon arrival their first stop was
at this very place. The husband drew a coin from his pocket, tossed it in
the well and made his wish. His wife then took a coin from her purse, but
she lost her balance as she tried to throw it in and fell headfirst down the
well. The husband looked on in surprise and muttered, “Well, fancy that.
It actually works!”
ある夫婦が、結婚20周年を迎え、かつてハネムーンで訪れたイギリスの古風な
村に出かけることにした。この村は願かけ井戸があることで有名だった。そして
ふたりがこの村で最初に立ち寄ったのは、この井戸だった。夫はポケットから
コインを出して井戸に投げ入れ、願いごとをした。妻も財布からコインを取り
出したが、コインを投げようとしたときにバランスを崩し、井戸の中にまっ逆さま
に落ちてしまった。夫はこれを見て驚き、つぶやいた。「やあ、驚いた。本当に
願いがかなうとはな！」

☆ The Magic of Alcohol

One night over dinner, Mr. Johnson looked at his wife and said, “You
know, darling, alcohol makes you more attractive.”
Puzzled, his wife said, “But I don’t drink.”
“You don’t,” said Mr. Johnson, “But I do.”
ある晩、夕食のときに、ジョンソン氏は妻を見て言った。「アルコールを
飲むと、君はますます魅力的になるよ」。
妻は困惑して言った。「でも、私は飲んでいないのに」。
「そうさ、君は飲まない」とジョンソン氏は言った。「飲むのはぼくさ」

☆ Warning by Example

"Honey," said this husband to his wife, "I invited a friend home for
supper."
"What? Are you crazy? The house is a mess, I didn't go shopping, all
the dishes are dirty, and I don't feel like cooking a fancy meal!"
"I know all that."
"Then why did you invite a friend for supper?"
"Because the poor fool's thinking about getting married."
夫が妻に言った。「なあ、友人を食事に招待したからな」
「なんですって？　気でも違ったの？　部屋は散らかっているし、買い物
には行っていないし、皿はすべて汚れたまま。わたしは腕によりをかけて
料理を作ったりなんかしませんからね！」
「そんなことはわかってるさ」
「それならどうしてお友だちを呼んだりしたのよ？」
「そのばかは、かわいそうに、これから結婚しようと考えているんだよ」

☆ A Popular Dog

A woman was leaving a convenience store with her morning coffee when
she noticed a most unusual funeral procession approaching the nearby
cemetery. A long black hearse was followed by a second long black hearse
about 50 feet behind. Behind the second hearse was a solitary woman
walking a pit bull dog on a leash. Behind that were 200 women walking
in single file. The woman couldn't stand the curiosity. She respectfully
approached the woman walking the dog and said, "I am so sorry for your
loss, and I know now is a bad time to disturb you, but I've never seen a
funeral like this. Whose funeral is it?" The woman replied, "Well, that
first hearse is for my husband."
"What happened to him?"
The woman replied, "My dog attacked and killed him."
She inquired further, "Well, who is in the second hearse?"
The woman answered, "My mother-in-law. She was trying to help my
husband when the dog turned on her."
A poignant and thoughtful moment of silence passes between the two women.
"Can I borrow the dog?"
"Get in line."
ある女性が朝のコーヒーを片手にコンビニを出ると、見たこともないような葬列
が、近くの墓地に向かっているところだった。細長く黒い霊柩車の50フィート
ばかりうしろには、二台目の霊柩車が続いていた。二台目の霊柩車のうしろに
は、綱につないで闘犬を連れた女性がひとり歩いていた。そのうしろには、200人
の女性たちが一列になって歩いていた。彼女は好奇心を抑えられなくなり、犬を
連れた女性にうやうやしく近づいて話しかけた。「ご愁傷さまです。こんなときに
よけいなことをおたずねしてはいけないとは思うのですが、このようなお葬式は
見たことがありません。いったいどなたのお葬式ですか？」「一台目の霊柩車
に乗せられているのはわたしの夫です」
「どうなさったんですか？」
「わたしの犬が襲いかかって、夫を殺したのです」
彼女はさらにたずねた。「では、二台目の霊柩車は？」
「わたしの義理の母です。義母はわたしの夫を助けようとして、犬にやられたん
です」
ふたりの女性はもの思いに沈んで黙りこんだ。
「その犬を貸していただけます？」
「それじゃ、列にお並びなさい」

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☆ オンライン英字小説
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　　★★★★　 The Henderson Arrows (by Christopher Belton)　★★★★

　　　　メルマガ限定オリジナル作品の「オンライン英字小説」の
　　　　　　　　　　　　　　連載を毎週提供します！

　　The Henderson Arrowsは出版されていないオリジナル・コメディー
　　小説です。

　　書き方はかなりイギリスっぽく、多少難しいかもしれませんが、典型的な
　　イギリスを描写しているストーリーです。

　　１９週間をわたって、毎週ワン・チャプターを部分的に発行しますので、
　　是非是非、最後まで読んでみてください。

　　途中からの方はバック・ナンバーでキャッチアップできます。
　　Part Iはこちらへ：
　　http://blog.mag2.com/m/log/0000251837/109226991.html

               ----- The Henderson Arrows: Part XIII -----

Sir Edward Horseworthy stepped before the board shaking
with fury. Being a firm disbeliever in the benefits of providence and
coincidence, he did not imagine for one moment that Arlington had
suddenly become overcome with the irresistible desire to let rip with
such a gusty blaster as he had accidentally. Foul play was afoot, he
decided. He wouldn’t put it past the fat cat to have paid off the land-
lord to queer his game. He cast suspicious eyes over to the referee,
as if expecting to see a sly wink pass between the two men to confirm
his worst fears, but instead he noticed that the ref was staring at him
with a frown on his face, indicating that he was not yet ready to forgive
and forget the slanderous overtures that Sir Edward had placed upon
him. A stronger man might have refused to play on the suspicion of
collaboration, but Sir Edward, although not a lesser man, was definitely
not the sort of man who would risk disembowlment at the horny hands
of cockney landlords.
He threw his darts.
His first two were well off the mark, but by some quirk of
the fate in which he didn’t believe, his third managed to climb over
the wire and imbed itself precariously in the double tops. Feeling that
that was not too bad a start, he sneered at Arlington and stood back
to take a sip of Scotch and water.
Sir Peter got away first dart with a double one, and placed
the following two in the twenty, bringing the scores down to almost
level.
The game followed on with both men playing, if not
brilliantly, steadily. Sir Edward scored an eighty-five with his next
three, and Sir Peter added a nice compact sixty to his card. Sir Edward
then had a bit of bad luck with a treble one, just a millimeter away from
the sixty, a twenty just above it, and the last dart bouncing off the wire
like a demented pear-drop. Sir Peter then took the lead by copying
Horseworthy’s earlier darts and walked away with an eighty-five, but
Sir Edward made a beautiful comeback and scored a jammy, as Arlington
called it, ton. Arlington’s subsequent sixty caused Horseworthy a
little anxiety, so he decided to take a try at that old standby, the nine-
teen, and decreased his score by a further fifty-seven. Sir Peter, in
retaliation, put two in the twenty and one in the treble five, and Sir
Edward hit gold in the treble nineteen, but rather messed up a potentially
good score by following up with a seven and a three, to which Arlington
answered with an impressive ninety-five that should, he claimed disap-
pointedly, and Benjy totally agreed with him, have been a one-hundred
and forty.
This brought both men down to within sight of a shoot-out,
and the tension once again built up to magnificent dimensions. A dropped
pin would have sounded like a cymbal clash, and in fact, Benjy’s raspberry
through toothless lips brought censorship at the noise as well as the odor.
Even Lil was ignoring the snug and leaning over the bar with eyes glued
to the activity that resembled the lumberings of two pregnant grizzly bears
engaged in some strange prehistoric dance over by the dart board. Old
man B craned his stringy neck to take in the blackboard, turned to old
man A, and whispered, “The fat one’s on one-hundred and twenty-nine,
and the fatter one’s on one-hundred and four.”
Sir Edward Horseworthy stepped forward.
Staying down on the nineteens, he placed his first for a single
and his second in the double, but the third went wide and whumped into
the single sixteen. Not as good as he had hoped, but at least it put him
within two darts of the coveted Henderson trophy. The idea of sabotage
from the opposing team still occupied his thoughts to a certain extent,
but he had lost a good deal of the righteous indignation that had gotten
in amongst him so much earlier. Not even Arlington, he thought, and he
probably had the lowest opinion of him than anyone else in the whole of
Europe, if not the world, would stoop so low as to try another trick. Still,
he would have to keep his eyes skinned.
Sir Peter Arlington exceeded even his own expectations by
scoring eighty with his first two throws, leaving him with a double twelve
and one dart to get it. The slim, well-balanced tungsten and Union Jack
nestled gently in his fat fingers as he stared at the board as if willing the
tiny area to exercise a magnetic attraction over his dart and draw it into
its recesses. The double twelve gave no indication that it had heard this
plea from the heart, so Sir Peter let the dart fly with nothing but hope
and a good deal of confidence.
A large sigh was emitted by the two men, the young man, the
bouncer, Benjy, Lil, the landlord and, not least of all, Sir Edward Horse-
worthy, as the dart came to rest a fraction of an inch east of the twelve,
leaving him with a double six.
Sir Edward, with a sarcastic, ‘Nice darts, wombat,’ stepped
up to the line with a grin spread over his ample features. Three darts
with which to shoot out. A piece of cake! He threw the first straight
into the sixteen and the second just below the double tops. He passed
his eyes down to the double ten. The ten, he felt, was no problem.
True, he would have liked three darts at it, but the ten was a nice
comfortable double to pierce. No trouble. Just relax and exclude all
other thought from the mind. The ten. The ten. The ten.
He threw his dart.
At the same moment, Sir Peter Arlington dropped a metal
ashtray.
Had Sir Edward paused to look, he would have seen his dart
pierce the lower abdomen of the last fly of the year, who was busy strop-
ping his back legs on the wall one yard to the northeast of the dart board.
However, discovering an emotion that was, as yet, undefined by modern
science, he screamed a noise that old man A recognized immediately as
the sound a rogue elephant makes when crashing through the jungle and
having a solid sapling spring back from being trodden underfoot, striking
the elephant a hefty one in the wedding tackle. His face suffused with
blood, Sir Edward leapt around to face Arlington and then made the lunge.
Unfortunately, the rubber mat, which had become rumpled by
the patter of two sets of heavy feet, became tangled around his ankles
and received the honor of being the third party in the introduction of Sir
Edward’s cranium and the corner of a table.
Sir Peter Arlington, perceiving this lunge and not being in a
position to see the happy outcome, took a step backwards with instant
decisiveness. Had he been Gregg, the butler, he would have known that
the thing to do when Sir Edward Horseworthy makes the lunge is to
boot him where it hurts, but he wasn’t, so he didn’t. Instead of this, his
backward step alighted upon the ample back of Benjy, the dog, causing
him to lose his balance and make a rather large dent in the door, which
had just been opened by a brigadier from the Salvation Army, with his
head.
The unanimous opinion of all those present declared both men
out for the count.

＜Part XIVは来週につづく＞

(C) Christopher Belton, all rights reserved

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                 クリストファー・ベルトンの「英語の世界」

発行者：                   クリストファー・ベルトン
オフィシャル・サイト：   http://www.chrisbelton.com/

発行システム：          『まぐまぐ！』  http://www.mag2.com/
配信中止はこちら：    http://www.mag2.com/m/0000251837.html

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