小説を読みながら、語彙を増やしましょう。
夏目漱石の小説『坊っちゃん』の原文と毛利八十太郎が英訳した “Botchan (Master Darling)” を併せて見ていきます。
【あらすじ】
兄から受け取った600円を学費にあてることを決めた主人公は、物理学校に3年通って卒業し、四国にある中等学校の数学教師という職を得ます。
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Lying in my bed, I meditated on the best way to spend that 600 yen. A business is fraught with too much trouble, and besides it was not my calling. Moreover with only 600 yen no one could open a business worth the name. Were I even able to do it, I was far from being educated, and after all, would lose it. Better let investments alone, but study more with the money. Dividing the 600 yen into three, and by spending 200 yen a year, I could study for three years. If I kept at one study with bull-dog tenacity for three years, I should be able to learn something. Then the selection of a school was the next problem. By nature, there is no branch of study whatever which appeals to my taste. Nix on languages or literature! The new poetry was all Greek to me; I could not make out one single line of twenty. Since I detested every kind of study, any kind of study should have been the same to me. Thinking thus, I happened to pass front of a school of physics, and seeing a sign posted for the admittance of more students, I thought this might be a kind of "affinity," and having asked for the prospectus, at once filed my application for entrance. When I think of it now, it was a blunder due to my hereditary recklessness.
For three years I studied about as diligently as ordinary fellows, but not being of a particularly brilliant quality, my standing in the class was easier to find by looking up from the bottom. Strange, isn't it, that when three years were over, I graduated? I had to laugh at myself, but there being no reason for complaint, I passed out.
Eight days after my graduation, the principal of the school asked me to come over and see him. I wondered what he wanted, and went. A middle school in Shikoku was in need of a teacher of mathematics for forty yen a month, and he sounded me to see if I would take it. I had studied for three years, but to tell the truth, I had no intention of either teaching or going to the country. Having nothing in sight, however, except teaching, I readily accepted the offer. This too was a blunder due to hereditary recklessness.
meditate on 熟慮する
be fraught with …に満ちた
calling 天職
bull-dog tenacity ブルドッグのような粘り強さ
nix 拒否する
Greek まったくわけのわからない、ちんぷんかんぷん
physics 物理学
affinity 縁
prospectus 学校案内
blunder 大失態
hereditary 親譲りの
diligently まじめに、熱心に
pass out 出て行く、卒業する
sound 当たってみる、打診する
夏目漱石による原文は
こちら。
*** 慣用句を覚えよう ***
Bull/Cow(牛)
You cannot sell the cow and drink the milk.
牛を売り、かつその牛の乳を飲むことはできない(同時にふたつよいことはない)
The bull must be taken by the horns.
牛と闘うには角をつかめ(恐るべき者に対するにはまともにぶつかるほうがかえってよい)
a bull in a china shop
はた迷惑の乱暴者、(微妙な時に)計画をぶちこわしてしまう者
have a cow
大笑いする、とてもこわがる、かっとなる
till the cows come home
久しい間、永久に
Holy cow!
おやまあ!
a bull and cow
(特に 夫婦の)口げんか
put the bull on
…に圧力をかける、…を締めつける、…に居丈高になる
bull’s eye
標的、的中、大当たり
the bull of the woods
重要人物、偉ぶるやつ
【参考】
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青空文庫