Петрова О.В. Введение в теорию и практику перевода

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with high interest rates and inflation, Americans are now trading in

pieces of paper instead of things.

The other day I got a call from my accountant who said, "I've

got good news for you. If we give your bank 5,000 pieces of paper,

it will give you back almost 6,000 in six months."

"Big deal. The toaster probably cost them three pieces of

paper."

"But I could use the toaster more than the paper”, I told him.

"Look, if you don't want to go for the bank's deal, I can get

you into a money fund which will pay 7,000 pieces of paper for

every 5,000 you give them, unless the interest rates go down."

"Why can't I take the 5,000 pieces of paper and put them

down on an automobile?"

"Because an automobile wears out. In three years you'll be

lucky to get 900 pieces of paper for it."

"Yeah, but you can't get around town on a piece of paper."

"Believe me, this is no time to get out of paper. If you don't

want to put your money in notes, put it in stock. It's more of a

gamble, but it's still paper."

"What kind of stock?" "There is a company called A&C that

is rumored to be buying out the P&Q Company. The buyers have

offered 65 pieces of A&C paper for each P&Q certificate, which is

only worth 30. If you buy, and the deal goes through, you'll make a

paper profit of 35 certificates."

"What does the A&C Company do?"

"Who knows!"

"Is the P&Q Compamy making any money?"

"No. That's why A&C wants to buy it. You see, P&Q had a

bad year and has huge tax losses. A&C had a good year and made

a lot of profits. So, if it buys the losing company, A&C will be able

to offset its profits against P&Q's losses, and then it won't have to

pay any taxes to the government."

"Sounds like a good deal. Would it be all right to buy a

dishwasher this fall? Ann says the other one is falling apart."

"This is no time to buy a dishwasher. I need all your cash to

put into an ALL-Savers account so you can get tax-free interest."

"Great. But what do we do with all the dirty dishes?"

"Let them pile up until the loan rates go down."

"I don't think Ann's going to like that."

"She will when you show it to her on paper."

"My wife was never much for paper. She likes to buy things

like chairs and lamps and clothes."

"Most of my clients' wives are like that and, believe me, it

doesn't make my life any easier. But you just have to hang tough

and explain that the more pieces of paper you can put away right

now, the less you'll have to worry about your future."

"What do I give my grandchildren for Christmas?"

"How about some nice, safe municipal bonds?"

Text 4

IN THE BANK

Stephen Leacock

When I go into a bank I get rattled. The clerks rattle me; the

wickets rattle me; the sight of money rattles me; everything rattles

me.

The moment I cross the threshold of a bank and attempt to

transact there, I become an irresponsible idiot.

I knew this beforehand, but my salary had been raised to fifty

dollars a month and I felt that the bank was the only place for it.

So I shambled in and looked timidly round at the clerks. I had

an idea that a person about to open an account must needs consult

the manager.

I went up to a wicket marked "Accountant". The accountant

was a tall, cool devil. The very sight of him rattled me. My voice

was sepulchral.

from "My Financial Career"

"Can I see the manager?" I said, and added solemnly,

"alone". I don't know why I said "alone".

"Certainly", said the accountant, and fetched him.

The manager was a grave calm man. I had my fifty-six

dollars clutched in a crumpled ball in my pocket.

"Are you the manager?" I said. God knows I didn't doubt it.

"Yes," he said.

"Can I see you", I asked, "alone?" I didn't want to say "alone"

again, but without it the thing seemed self-evident.

The manager looked at me in some alarm. He felt that I had

an awful secret to reveal.

"Come in here", he said, and led the way to a private room.

He turned the key in the lock.

"We are safe from interruption here", he said; "sit down".

We both sat down and looked at each other. I found no voice

to speak.

"You are one of Pinkerton's men, I presume", he said. He had

gathered from my mysterious manner that I was a detective. I knew

what he was thinking, and it made me worse.

"No, not from Pinkerton's", I said, seeming to imply that I

came from a rival agency.

"To tell the truth," I went on, as if I had been prompted to lie

about it, "I am not a detective at all. I have come to open and

account. I intend to keep all my money in this bank".

The manager looked relieved but still serious; he concluded

now that I was a son of Baron Rothschild or a young Gould.

"A large account, I suppose", he said.

"Fairly large", I whispered. "I propose to deposit fifty-six

dollars now and fifty dollars a month regularly".

The manager got up and opened the door. He called to the

accountant.

"Mr. Montgomery", he said unkindly loud, "this gentleman is

opening an account, he will deposit fifty-six dollars. Good

morning".

I rose.

A big iron door stood open at the side of the room.

"Good morning", I said, and stepped into the safe.

"Come out", said the manager coldly, and showed me the

other way.

Text 5

INDOMITABLE LITTLE MAN

Joseph North

Only those who reach for their gun when they hear the

world “culture” (like the late critic, Herr Dr. Joseph Göbbels) can

dislike Charlie Chaplin whose works are enjoying a revival in New

York today. I took the occasion in the current torrid spell to re-see

his “Modern Times”. I can only say that it remains a masterpiece

of art, and a profound comment on contemporary life in these

United States.

I recall no author of novel or treatise, or, for that matter,

sociologist, historian or journalist or labor figure who captured so

memorably the condition of his time as Chaplin did in this film.

Since it has become fashionable in many circles to deride the

Thirties as an era of literary and cultural renaissance, one must add

Chaplin’s works as refutation. The apex of his career can be found

in that period, for he, the prescient artist, involved with mankind,

reflected the power of the people’s resistant will with which he

identified himself.

The film of ironic genius portrays a time of unemployment

and simultaneously, the march of the machines. His hero, the

hapless vagrant, is fired by the resolve to earn a living to help the

child of a workingman shot dead in an unemployment

demonstration. In his inimitable flatfooted way, Charlie races

through a vast crowd of desperate jobless seeking work in a newly

opened factory. After screwing the bolts in the ever-faster belt,

which attains a lunatic speed at the bidding of the polished, well-

“The Worker”, July 12, 1964

clad gentleman in the executive’s office, Charlie goes in as crazy

the tempo. Wrench in hand, and obsessed by the need to fasten all

the bolts tight, he goes after anything that looks like a bolt. And

this to the consternation of several ladies adorned with large

buttons in delicately strategic spots.

There are many delicious, yet profoundly pertinent

moments, like his natural desire to snatch a moment’s respite from

the belt and steal a smoke in the men’s room. The televised image

of the scowling man in the front office flashes on the wall with a

command to drop that cigarette and get back to work. Remember

this film was made in the mid-Thirties, the use of television as a

tyrannical spy awaited full comment for nearly thirty years in the

current best seller by Vance Packard.

He is caught up in a demonstration of the jobless and is

mistaken for a “Communist leader” by the police. Again the clubs

descend, again there is jail, and he makes acid comment of contrast

between his life behind bars and the roaring hunger outside.

There is the dream of the good life he describes to the

discouraged and lovely waif whom he aspired to help. It is that of a

rose-covered cottage with fruit-trees growing outside the kitchen.

He can pluck an orange from the window, milk a convenient and

congenial cow for the breakfast coffee, all is clean and brilliantly

cheerful in this imaginary homestead where his lunch is packed

with éclat and abundance. The security of love and ample food

reigns over his household. A dream.

Whatever the vicissitudes and thwarted aspirations, this

underdog is indomitable. There is that ultimate fade-out that can be

translated as corny as he and the little lady finally proceed up the

road into the dawning sun. The scene can be interpreted otherwise.

Though there is no safe harbor, they have eluded the cops, and

survived the clap of despair, and they go anew and undaunted.

It is a tale worth telling, worth hearing, and seeing.

Certainly it is one of the best products of the Thirties, or for that

matter, of modern times, certainly the finest in cinema.

To the cavemen at the helm of society, Chaplin is of course

a dangerous man. Thus they exiled the finest artist of our age,

made him go through the paces as Voltaire did who had to flee the

Paris of his time; or Zola after his “J’accuse”, or Brecht after the

critics” came to power who reach for their gun when they hear that

damnable word.

Text 6

CONGRESS – WHAT IS IT?

D.C.Coyle

The United States Congress differs from a parliament

chiefly in the fact that it does not contain the executive. The

President and his Cabinet are not members of the House, as the

Prime Minister and his Cabinet are in England. The Congress

cannot peremptorily ask a question of the President except in an

impeachment proceeding; and if it refuses to pass an

Administration bill, there is no “crisis”. The President in that case

from “The U.S. Political System”

does not resign; nor does he dissolve Congress and force a new

election.

In the United States Government, the people are represented

in one way by the Congress and in another by the President. Each

has the right and the means to appeal directly to the people for

support against the other, and they do. The effect is that the

struggle between the Executive and Congress varies between open

hostilities and armed truce, even when the President’s party is in

control of Congress. Another situation, that cannot occur in a

parliament, arises when the people choose a President of one party

and a Congress of another, putting the executive and the legislative

branches automatically in opposition to each other.

The United States Congress is therefore more irresponsible

than a parliament, for the member of the President’s party can vote

against an Administration proposal without voting to have the

President resign. This lack of responsibility encourages

demagogues in Congress to play for headlines, since the party in

power does not feel that strict discipline is a matter of life and

death.

One effect of the separation of powers is that the Senate is

as important a body as the House. In other countries there is a

tendency for the lower house, since it controls the executive, to

assume all the power, letting the upper house live on as a debating

society of elder statesmen.

The tradition of a two-chambered legislature is deeply

rooted in American political life. The colonial governments had

two chambers and so do all the States except Nebraska. But the

principal reason that no one can conceive of any movement toward

a one-chamber Congress is that the United States is still a Federal

Union of large and small States.

The fact that all bills have to pass two different bodies does

not cause delay in emergencies when the people are united in favor

of following the President’s leadership. But on ordinary matters in

ordinary times, legislation is slow, hearings are duplicated, and an

opposition has advantages over the proposition.

The Senate and the House of Representatives differ in their

composition and attitude, even though the Constitution has been

amended to shift the election of senators from the State legislatures

to the plain voters. The senators average a few years older than the

congressmen. Congressmen often move up into the Senate, but few

ex-senators have ever run for the House. The senators are more

distinguished by their office because there are only 100 of them

while there are 435 congressmen. A seat in the Senate has a high

publicity value which can be used for good or ill purposes.

Text 7

INTRODUCTION TO THE UNITED NATIONS

Peter Lyon

Those who depend upon the press – and upon the televised

“news” programs – for their information about what is going in the

world can be excused for believing that there is nothing to the

United Nations but the Security Council and the General

from “The UN in Action”

Assembly; that what goes on there is only an interminable, sterile

debate, periodically punctured in the Security Council by Soviet

vetoes; and that there is no achievement, no progress, no positive

action proposed, planned, or indeed possible.

A glance at the structure of the United Nations, however,

affords a quite different and happier view of our present and future.

It also shrinks the Security Council to its proper scale.

The General Assembly is the core of the United Nations,

here the nations, whether great or small, sit on an equal basis, each

with one vote. Ringing the General Assembly like five planets

around the sun are the Secretariat, the International Court of

Justice, the Security Council, the Trusteeship Council, and the

Economic and Social Council. Each has its particular function,

each its particular authority.

The influence and authority of the Secretariat depends to an

extent (though not nearly to the extent that is popularly supposed)

on the talent of one individual – the Secretary General. The job is a

peculiar one. Some of those who drafted the Charter imagined that

the Secretary General would be merely a superclerk, taking orders

from the great powers as they desired; others sensed that he might

become an executive, willing and doing, even sometimes obliging

a Great Power to tail along after him. In the event, the Secretary

General has exerted power according to his individual capacity.

The International Court of Justice, which sits in the Peace

Palace in The Hague, is the juridical arm of the United Nations

adjudicating international squabbles of a special kind. The

qualification is a weighty one, involving that sacred shibboleth,

national sovereignty. Obviously, there are times when a proud

power does not care to have fifteen impartial judges, citizens, as it

may be, of fifteen foreign countries, deciding that particular

power’s rights. The rights may be so important that the power may

elect to fight for them. This being the case, no issue comes before

the Court unless the disputing parties have agreed to abide by the

Court’s decision. (Many treaties and international conventions

contain clauses binding the signatories to accept the jurisdiction of

the Court). Despite this limitation on its jurisdiction, the Court

manages to smooth a considerable number of petty frictions, and

keep them form becoming serious vexations.

The Security Council, as we are all painfully aware, has the

responsibility of keeping peace in the world. Since war, as one of

its proponents has observed, is only the continuation of politics by

other means, the Security Council has in practice taken on the

more intransigent political problems of the time; when they have

continued to resist solution, they have been transformed into

various bureaucratic appendages of the Security Council: the

Disarmament Commission, the United Nations Operation in

Congo, the International Atomic Energy Agency, and so on. To the

Security Council has also been delegated the decisions as to

whether a state qualifies for membership in the United Nations:

down through the years this responsibility has spawned some epic

spats, and provoked repeated use of the veto (not always by the

USSR). Moreover, in the Security Council the dialogue, spoken

and snarled, is exceedingly public, and therefore the diplomats are

obliged to strike the posture of propagandists. In the process the

cause of peace is not served, but the kindergarten theory flourishes.

Text 8

IS THE MONROE DOCTRINE DEAD?

Let me assure you that any report that you may have

read concerning the death of the Monroe Doctrine was

greatly exaggerated.

Carl Vinson, Chairman of the House

New York Herald Tribune, September 10, 1963