СЛОВООБРАЗОВАНИЕ
3. Суффикс -ty (-ity)
Среди новых слов этого урока вы встретите прилагательное certain уверен-
ный, известный и существительное certainty несомненный факт, уверен-
ность. Суффикс -ty (-ity) образует существительные, чаще всего обозначаю-
щие отвлеченные понятия. Сравните известные вам прилагательные с родст-
венными им существительными:
real действительный — reality действительность
able способный — ability способность
cruel жестокий — cruelty жестокость
УПРАЖНЕНИЕ В ЧТЕНИИ
[Iq]: fear, dear, clear, spear, Shakespeare ['SeIkspIq]
[q:]: fir, sir, heard, world [wq:ld], certain ['sq:tn], certainty
Прочтите и переведите текст;
WHAT WE KNOW ABOUT SHAKESPEARE
I
The facts that we know with absolute certainty about William Shakespeare can
be given in a few paragraphs. It is not strange that we know so little about one of
the greatest men that the world has produced. His age was not one of biographical
writing. Newspapers and magazines did not exist. Encyclopaedias, dictionaries of
names and volumes of Who Is Who (1) had not been heard of. Few letters were
written and less were kept. Yet we know about Shakespeare as much as (2) we do
about most of the writers of his time, and even of many who lived much later.
The playwright's father, John Shakespeare, moved to Stratford-on-Avon (3)
about 1550 and became a dealer in corn, meat, wool and leather. He probably dealt
besides in all things that farmers about the village produced. He seems to have
been a good man of business (4), though he could not write. His wife, the writer's
mother, Mary Arden, was the daughter of a rich farmer in the village of Wilmcote.
He gave his daughter a house, with some land and a good sum of money.
John Shakespeare and his wife were living in a house in Hanley Street when
their children were born. It was a house two storeys high (5) with small windows
cut in the roof. In general appearance it remains much the same as it looked in
1556. Simple and ordinary-looking, it is still the most famous house in England
and one of the most famous in the world.
Men and women from all parts of the earth have visited Stratford to see it. Sto-
ries and poems have been written about it. For here, in a small room on the second
floor, William Shakespeare was born.
How little we know of Shakespeare, compared with poets of the 19th century, is
shown by the fact that we are not certain of the exact date on which the greatest
of all poets was born. But most probably he was born on April 23, 1564. He died
also on this date, April 23, in 1616.