Menahune

SUPERSTITIONS (СУЕВЕРИЯ)

OAKLEY ANNIE

Born 1860 in Darke County. Ohio, USA. Sharpshooting star of the Wild West. Died 1926, aged 66.

Phoebe Anne Moses was born on a farm. When she was very young, she used to watch her father and his friends shoot animals: she wanted to try too. They laughed at her because they throught she was too young and not strong enough to hold a gun properly. But she suprised them all by learning to shoot and becoming very good at it. Her family were guite poor to give Annie a good education. When she was a child, her family had to borrow money from the bank to keep their farm; no rabbit was quick enough to escape her bullets!

Anne maried a markman whom she met at a shooting competition. Together they started their own shooting show and they performed in variety shows and circuses around the country.

When Annie Okley (her stage name) was twenty-five, the legendary Buffalo Bill saw her perform and said she was too good to perform in small shows: her skills deserved a bigger, better known show. That year, she and her husband joined the famous ‘Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show”. For the seventeen years that she was part of the show, Annie was the main attraction. She was such a good shot that she could split a playing card from the side, standing ten meters away. She could hit a coin thrown in the air and even shoot cigarettes held between her husband’s lips. Annie Oakly travelled to Europe with the Wild West Show. When she was in Berlin, the Kaiser Wilhelm insisted that she shoot a cigaterre from his lips.

When Annie was forty-one, she was seriously injured in a train crash. Everyone thought that would be the end of her career. But she recovered quickly and as soon as she was well enough to perform she continued to amaze her audiences for many years.

In 1946, years after her death, a musical called Annie Get Your Gun, was written about Annie Oakley. However, she was much quieter in real life than the character in the musical. Some of the stories about her shooting skills are almost too extraordinary to be true. Annie Oakley has become a legendary figure of the wild West.

Commentary:

1) marksman = a sharp shooter

2) game = wild animal, birds and fish

3) to split a playing card – расщепить игральную карту пулей см.также: to hit a coin – попадать в монету пулей

4) Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show – зд. «Шоу Дикого запада по программе Буффало (или в Буффало)»

Night spirits of the Hawaiian Islands. They are unusual spirits because they are helpful than dangerous. Like the brownies of the British isles, the menahune appear when the house-hold is asleep and do all the housework. It seems, however, that the menahune are very particular about their employers. They do their work only for families which they feel to be especially pleasant and kind. Very few people have seen the menahune, which are believed to have pointed ears, shaggy black hair and tiny agile bodies.

Words to the text:

menahune – добрые духи

dangerous – опасный

brownie – (зд.) добрые духи (на Британских островах)

household – домашние (семья)

particular – разборчивый, особенный

employer – работодатель

shaggy – лохматые

agile – проворные, быстрые

Дата добавления: 2014-12-17