đ Early as it was, every one had breakfasted, and my basin of bread and milk was put on the oven-top to await my coming down. Every one was gone about their work. The first to come into the house-place was Phillis with a basket of eggs. Faithful to my resolution, I asked – ‘What are those?’ She looked at me […]
Lesson #173: The Passive Voice in Gaskell’s ‘Cousin Phillis’ Read More »
đïž Robinson Crusoe (1719) has been widely acknowledged as the first novel ever written in English. Many of us, whether or not we grew up in an English-speaking culture, are long familiar with the storyline of Robinson Crusoe – an Englishman who gets shipwrecked (the ship is sunk by a storm at sea) and ends up
In this second part of our lesson on modal verb forms ‘should/should have’, ‘could/could have’, and ‘would/would have’ to express past regrets or desires for the future, we will be focusing mainly on the differences between ‘could/could have’ and ‘would/would have’. đ If you would like to review our analysis of ‘should/should have’, you can find
đ Here I come to one of the memoir writerâs difficultiesâ one of the reasons why, though I read so many, so many are failures. They leave out the person to whom things happened. The reason is that it is so difficult to describe any human being. So they say: âThis is what happenedâ; but
đ ‘O!’ says I, willing to give him a little lesson, ‘I have no fear of the justice of my country.’ ‘As if this was your country!’ said he. ‘Or as if ye would be tried here, in a country of Stewarts!’ ‘It’s all Scotland,’ said I. – Robert Louis Stevenson, Kidnapped (1886) … We are approaching
âNearly everyone knows about â even if they have not read â Jane Austen’s famous novels: Pride and Prejudice (1813), Sense and Sensibility (1811), Persuasion (1818), and Emma (1815), not to mention Mansfield Park (1814)and Northanger Abbey (1817). đ But most people, including native English speakers, are less familiar with Austenâs earlier (or unpublished) writings. Works like The
Lesson #162: All About Hyphens and Dashes (in UK and US English) Read More »
đ Here was one of the advantages of having lived alone so long! The little bustling, active, cheerful creature existed entirely within herself, talked to herself, made a confidante of herself, was as sarcastic as she could be, on people who offended her, by herself; pleased herself, and did no harm. If she indulged in
đ The White House was on the edge of a hill, with a wood behind itâ and the chalk-quarry on one side and the gravel-pit on the other. Down at the bottom of the hill was a level plain, with queer-shaped white buildings where people burnt lime, and a big red brewery and other houses;
If you missed the first part of this lesson where we described the main functions of ‘either/or’, ‘neither/nor’, and ‘both’, you can check it out here. This is part 2 of our lesson on these important word groups, where we consider how they relate to the preposition ‘of’, their word order and verb conjugation rules,
âđ ‘âLucy was never visible at these times, being either engaged in the school-room, or in taking an airing out of doors; but, knowing that she was now comfortable, and had given up the, to him, depressing idea of going off to the other side of the globe, he was quite content.â’â – Thomas Hardy,
đ Miss Tita confided to me that at present her aunt was so motionless that she sometimes feared she was dead; moreover she took hardly any foodâone couldn’t see what she lived on. – Henry James, The Aspern Papers (1888) If you have been studying or reading in English for a while, chances are that you have
This lesson post completes the yesterday’s, so please make sure to read it before this one. The last principle or rule for distinguishing how to use ‘shall’ vs. ‘will’ in English: … đ #5 When describing a future action or decision in a non-interrogative context, should you use ‘shall’ or ‘will’? The best way to
Lesson #150 (Part 2): When Should You Use ‘Shall’ Vs. ‘Will’? Read More »