1. Lesson One Pub Talk and the King’s English
主讲：高福猛

2. structure Part I (paras.1-3):
What is and what makes a good conversation.
Part II (paras. 4-11):
The topic “the king’s English” was discussed during a pub talk.
Part III (paras ):
Study or reflections done about the king’s or queen’s English.
Part IV (paras ):
The writer resumed to the topic of how to make a good conversation.

3. Part I (paras. 1-3)
What’s the central idea of para.1 ? What’s the function of the first sentence?
It is the 1st sentence: “Conversation is the most sociable of all human activities. And it is an activity only of humans.” The first sentence is the theme of this essay, which is repeated in many places in this essay.

4. Part I
2. What’s the differences between human language and animal sounds?
Human language has unlimited structures of sounds that represent unlimited meanings, while animals can only produce several sounds representing limited simple meanings; An idea or meaning can be expressed in different ways in human language, while animals can’t; we can use language to discuss things happened in the past or to happen in the future, while animals only convey the present things.

5. Part I 3. What’s and what makes a good conversation from para.2-3?
No fixed topic, staring from nowhere and going nowhere, no point to make;
There is no winning or losing in conversation, for conversation is not for persuading others to accept our idea or point of view;
Conversation-mates are not intimates, did not delve into each other’s lives or the recesses of their thoughts and feelings.

6. Part I 4. Why did the writer compare conversationalists to the three
musketeers?
The three musketeers in Dumas’ novel were very close friends. They supported each other with their fortune and their lives, yet they showed no curiosity in nor tried to find out anything about each other’s private lives. Bar friends, likewise, do not probe deep into each other’s lives nor do they try to find out the inmost thoughts and feelings of their drinking companions.

7. Part II (paras 4-11) 1. What’s the central idea of this para.4-5 ?
Someone mentioned the topic “the King’ English” unawares, and the pun conversation naturally follows about it as a focal subject.
2. While discussing about “the King’s English”, what else is the author
trying to show us?

8. Part II
On the one hand the writer is discussing about “the King’s English” with his pub friends, on the other hand he is also showing us what is and what makes a good conversation from the way they unfold the conversation. Their conversation exactly bears the very features of a good conversation.
3. Try to find evidences of sentence to prove their talk is a good
conversation.

9. No fixed topic: the conversation moved desultorily here and there, from the most commonplace to thoughts of Jupiter, without ant focus and with no need for one;
No preparation, staring from nowhere: I do not remember what made one of our companions say it – she clearly had not come into the bar to say it:
It sparkles or glows: The glow of the conversation burst into flames. There were affirmations and protests and denials, and of course the promise…
It meanders or leaps but goes nowhere: We had traveled in five minutes to Australia, and then swung to the English peasants of the 12th century;
There is no winning or losing, for conversation is not for persuading others: Who was right or wrong, did not matter.

10. Part III (paras. 12-17): 1. What’s the central idea of para.12 ?
The original time or beginning of when the term was first used or appeared--- in the 16th century:
“Queen’s English” is found in Nash’s “Strange Newes of the Intercepting Certaine Letters”in 1593;
In 1602, Dekker wrote of someone, “thou clipst the King’s English’’;
Shakespeare used it once, “… here will be an old abusing of God’s patience and the King’s English,”

11. Part III 2. What is the main idea of paras.13-14?
The developing course or history of “the King’s English”:
It was coined in 16th century;
After five centuries of growth, of tussling with the French of the Normans at last absorbing it, and English had come royally into its own.
The Elizabethans blew on it as on a dandelion clock, and the its seeds multiplied, and floated to the ends of the earth. “The King’s English” was no longer a form or what would now be regarded as racial discrimination.

12. Part III 3. What is the writer doing in paras.15-17?
He is giving his comments on “the King’s English”:
The rebellion of lower class against a cultural dominance is still there, as they find the upper class people also sometime lose his control and speak with the vigor of ordinary folk.
It is worth trying to speak it, but it should not be laid down as an edict, and made immune to change from below.
The King’s English is a model – a rich and instructive one – but it ought not to be an ultimatum.

13. Part IV (paras ):
1. Find the topic sentence for each para from 18-21?
Para.18: There is no worse conversationalist than the one who punctuates his words as he speaks as if he were writing, or even who tries to use words as if he were composing a piece of prose for print.
Para.19: One suspects that the great minds were gossiping and judging the quality of the food and the wine.
Para. 20: One will bind the conversation, one will not let it flow freely here and there if consulting a dictionary in the middle of a conversation.
Para. 21: The bother about teaching chimpanzees how to talk is that they will probably try to talk sense and so ruin all conversation.

14. Part IV (paras. 18-21): 2. What do Chimpanzees stand for here?
What’s the author’s true intention of saying so?
They stand for nonhuman animals which are incapable of talk and conversation. Chimpanzees are chosen because they are thought of as the possible category of animals which could be taught to speak. This is a biting satire in which the writer derides people who ruin good conversation by trying to talk sense.

15. Figures of speech
1. No one has any idea where it will go as it meanders or leaps and
sparkles or just glows.
2. They got out of bed on the wrong side is simply not a concern.
3. They are like the musketeers of Dumas who, although they lived
side by side with each other, did not delve into each other’s…
4. Suddenly the alchemy of conversation took place
5. The glow of the conversation burst into flames.

16. Figures of speech
6. We ought to think ourselves back into the shoes of the Saxon peasant.
7. The Elizabethans blew on it as on a dandelion clock, and its seeds multiplied, and floated to the ends of the earth.
8. I have an unending love affair with dictionaries.
9. Otherwise one will bind the conversation, one will not let it flow freely here and there.
10. We would never have gone to Australia, or leaped back in time to the Norman Conquest.

17. Language features conversational style; loosely organized;
informal and colloquial language --- to suit the theme;
the misleading title; mixed metaphors;
no big and abstract words sentence fragments;
An imitation of a bar conversation/good conversation

18. Homework: A question to think about
What’s your standard of good conversation?