STOPPING BY WOODS ON A SNOWY EVENING Whose woods these are I think I know. His house is in the village though; He will not see me stopping here To watch his woods fill up with snow. My little horse must think it queer To stop without a farmhouse near Between the woods and frozen […]
In last Monday’s Lesson we looked at adjective groups based on their endings; we saw how they were different from verb forms that look similar. In today’s Lesson we are going to also look at verbs ending with -en, many of which are created from adjectives. ✏️ 👉 For this reason, some of them will
Lesson #208: “Don’t go frightening the princess”: Ten English Verbs ending with -en Read More »
Welcome to Part 2 of our Lesson, where we will focus on understanding ‘be used to’ and what makes it uniquely different from ‘used to’ constructions (covered in Part 1 of this Lesson). … 📝 ‘BE USED TO’ Be (conjugate the verb) + Used To + Gerund OR Noun ✍️ This construction expresses a state
‘Used to’ or ‘be used to’? 🤔 At first glance it might seem that both of these expressions are the same, but they are not! They imply (help us to understand something without actually saying it directly) two different things. Today’s Lesson will help to clarify the differences between them, with examples taken from another
🌼I wandered lonely as a cloud That floats on high o’er vales and hills, When all at once I saw a crowd, A host, of golden daffodils … – William Wordsworth, ‘The Daffodils’ (1807) 🌼 This is Part 2 of our Lesson on ‘Different Ways of Seeing’: having read Wordsworth’s poem in Part 1, we
🏵️ The first of March – also known as ‘St David’s Day’, Wales’ national day, when the Welsh like to wear small daffodils (or leeks) as a national symbol. That, together with our own daffodils, crocuses, and snowdrops has brought to mind one of the most famous poems in the English language, William Wordsworth’s ‘The
🥀 ‘Does it not make you think of Cowper? “Ye fallen avenues, once more I mourn your fate unmerited.”‘ – Fanny Price in Jane Austen’s Mansfield Park Austen fans will be interested to know that William Cowper (1731-1800) was her favourite poet, as well as her contemporary. Cowper (pronounced COO-per) was known not only for his
Lesson #199: Observing changes in English words over time, through Cowper’s ‘The Rose’ Read More »
📗 “Take care of the sense, and the sounds will take care of themselves.” – Lewis Carroll, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865) One of the most famous children’s books in the word is certainly Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865), which has been translated into at least 174 since it was first published over
📙 ‘As though a rose should shut And be a bud again.’ – Thomas Hardy, Far From The Madding Crowd (1874) 🥀 … If you have been around native English speakers enjoying a casual conversation, you are likely to have heard them use the word ‘like’ often when making a comparison of some kind. ✒️
Lesson #196: ‘As If’ vs ‘As Though’ through Hardy’s ‘Far from the Madding Crowd’ Read More »
📗 ‘I probably never should have loved him, and if I loved him first, and then made the discovery, I fear I should have thought it my duty not to have married him.’ – Anne Bronte, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall We will continue our Lesson on ‘modal verb forms that express obligation’ here. We
📗 ‘You must go back with me to the autumn of 1827.’ – Anne Brontë, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall Since modal verbs (also known as auxiliary or helping verbs) are so important in English, we are going to look at four forms that are sometimes problematic for English learners of all levels. These are
If you have ever heard someone mention ‘Lilliput’ or ‘Brobdingnag’, you have heard a reference to one very early English classic, Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World (1726). 📗 It is a fantasy story of a surgeon and captain called Lemuel Gulliver who is shipwrecked on islands of tiny people