ESL SEVEN-EIGHT

"IBM's Predictions for a Smarter World" from VOA

2012-01-25T17:34:00.000-08:00

This is the VOA Special English Technology Report.

Controlling a device with your mind. Powering your home with the energy of your own activities. These are two of the developments that experts at IBM think will become reality within the next five years.

The technology company has released its latest "5 in 5" report. The experts think people will soon be able to control many electronic devices simply by using their minds. Scientists at IBM and other companies are researching ways to do this in a field of science known as bioinformatics.

They say people will soon have a way to just think about calling or e-mailing someone in order to make it happen. Bernie Meyerson is IBM's vice president of innovation.

BERNIE MEYERSON: "[It's a] simple ability to command a system to do something for you without actually doing or saying anything, literally thinking and having something happen as a result that's accurate. Something with really deep capability so that a person, for instance, a quadriplegic, a paraplegic can actually utilize brainwaves to make things happen and basically run their own lives independently."

Another prediction is a way for people to power their homes and offices using energy from activities like walking or running. Bernie Meyerson says this is known as micro-electronic generation.

BERNIE MEYERSON: "For instance, you can have somebody in the third world who has access to a phone or a smartphone but doesn't have access to the power grid, which is a very common thing, and literally in a shoe has something that recovers energy from walking and can charge the battery to enable that person to actually become connected with the rest of the world."

Another prediction: passwords could soon become a thing of the past. IBM says developments in biometric technology could soon make passwords unnecessary. Some of the most common biometrics used to identify people are fingerprints, face and voice recognition, and iris scans. The iris is the colored part of the eye.

Bernie Meyerson says this technology will soon be more widely used by money machines and other devices.

BERNIE MEYERSON: "Imagine that things recognize you. You walk up to an ATM [automated teller machine]. [It] takes one look, says, Yep, you're you."

Another prediction from the experts at International Business Machines: better technology to prevent unwanted e-mail.

BERNIE MEYERSON: "The device, as you act upon it, as you eliminate mail, you don't read it, you just look at it and kill it, after a while it learns your habits and works for you as as your assistant by eliminating stuff you never wanted anyway."

The fifth prediction on IBM's 5 in 5 list is an end to the "digital divide" between those who have technology and those who do not.

BERNIE MEYERSON: "Think about the digital divide today: the haves and the have-nots, people who are and are not connected. We anticipate within five years, better than eighty percent coverage of the world’s populations by cellular to smartphones. At that point, imagine having, for instance, the ability to speak openly with anybody anywhere, anytime and any language -- real time translation. Literally, the old 'Star Trek' idea of the universal translator coming to be, and how the world would change if there were that kind of communication and openness."

And that’s the VOA Special English Technology Report. What are your predictions for the next five years? Share them at voaspecialenglish.com. I'm Steve Ember.

"Langston Hughes" The Greatest African American Poet, from VOA

2012-01-08T15:13:00.000-08:00

I'm Mary Tillotson. And I'm Steve Ember with the VOA Special English program, PEOPLE IN AMERICA. Today, we tell about writer Langston Hughes, who has been called the poet voice of African-Americans.

Langston Hughes is usually thought of as a poet. But he also wrote novels, plays, short stories, essays, autobiographies, newspaper columns, children's books, and the words to operas. He also translated into English the works of foreign poets.

Hughes was one of the first black writers who could support himself by his writings. He is praised for his ability to say what was important to millions of black people.

Hughes produced a huge amount of work during his lifetime. He also has influenced the work of many other writers. He wrote for almost fifty years.

Langston Hughes was famous for his descriptions of black American life. He used his work to praise his people and voice his concerns about race and social injustice. His work is known all around the world and has been translated into many languages.

Hughes's poetry had serious messages. He often wrote about racial issues, describing his people in a realistic way. Although his story was not often pleasant, he told it with understanding and with hope.

Langston Hughes was born in Joplin, Missouri, in nineteen-oh-two. His parents were separated. He spent most of his childhood with his grandmother in Lawrence, Kansas. She told him stories about their family and their fight to end slavery. Her storytelling filled him with pride in himself and his race. He first began to write poetry when he was living with her.

When he was fourteen, he moved to Cleveland, Ohio, to stay with his mother and her new husband.

He attended Central High School in Cleveland, Ohio. Langston was named Class Poet one year. He published his first short stories while he was still in high school.

Walt Whitman
Langston Hughes struggled with a feeling of loneliness caused by his parent's divorce. He developed a love of reading books as a way to deal with the lack of time his parents spent with him. His love for reading grew into a desire to write. He wanted to reproduce the powerful effect other writers had made upon him. Among the early influences on his writing were poets Walt Whitman, Carl Sandburg and Paul Lawrence Dunbar.

After graduating from high school in nineteen twenty, Langston moved to Mexico City to live with his father for one year. His father had moved there to escape racism in America. His father did not offer much warmth to his son. Yet, Langston turned the pain caused by his family problems into one of his most famous poems, "The Negro Speaks of Rivers." In this poem, he speaks of the strength and pride of black people in ancient African civilizations and in America.

(SOUND: "The Negro Speaks of Rivers")

Langston Hughes learned a lot about race, and about social and economic conditions while he was in Mexico. His ability to speak Spanish and his brown skin often made it easy for him to appear to be a native. Many of his works, including a play for children, deal with his days in Mexico.

During the time he stayed with his father in Mexico, Langston wrote many poems because he was always unhappy. He once said that he usually created his best work when he was really not happy.

Langston had a troubled relationship with his father from which he never recovered fully. His father did not think he could earn a living as a writer. His mother, however, recognized his need to be a poet.

Langston's father agreed to pay for his college education at Columbia University in New York City, if he studied engineering. Langston arrived in New York when he was nineteen years old. At the end of that first year at Columbia, he left school, broke with his father, and began traveling. Traveling was a lifelong love that would take him throughout the world before he died.

In nineteen twenty-two, Hughes took a job on a ship and sailed to Africa. He would later sail to France, Russia, Spain and Italy. He wrote poems and short stories during his travels. His experiences while traveling greatly influenced his work. He sent a few of his writings back home. They were published, which helped establish him as a professional writer.

Financial problems ended Hughes's travels. He tried to find work on a ship so he could return to the United States. But in Italy, he had problems finding work on a ship because he was black. In the poem, "I, Too", he noted that the American color line even reached all the way over there.

(SOUND: "I, Too")

Vachel Lindsay
In nineteen twenty-four, Langston Hughes returned to the United States to live with his mother in Washington, D.C. The poet Vachel Lindsay ate in a hotel where Hughes was working. Hughes put some poems he had written next to Lindsay's dinner plate. Lindsay gave a poetry reading later that night. He read some of Hughes's poetry, too. Newspapers across the country wrote about Lindsay's poetry reading. Hughes became known as a new black poet.

A year later, Hughes returned to New York. Through the years he lived in many places, but always came back to New York's Harlem area. Harlem was the center of black life in New York City. Hughes's creativity was influenced by his life in Harlem.

Langston Hughes returned to New York during a period called the Harlem Renaissance. It took place during the nineteen twenties and thirties. The Harlem Renaissance was a period of great artistic creativity among black people. For the first time, black artistic expression was being widely recognized. Hughes became friends with other great black writers of the time, such as Claude McKay, Countee Cullen and Zora Neal Hurston. They hoped that great art could change the racist ideas in America about African Americans.

Hughes was considered one of the leading voices of the Harlem Renaissance. He was the first poet to use the rhythms of black music. He often wrote about the everyday experiences of black working people. And he helped bring the movement of jazz and the sound of black speech into poetry.

Langston Hughes experimented with his writing. Other Harlem Renaissance writers wrote traditional poems like those of English classic poets, such as William Shakespeare. Hughes broke free with his writing and helped change literature forever.

Hughes became firmly established as a successful writer in nineteen twenty-six with the publication of a collection of jazz poems called "The Weary Blues." Hughes wrote the poems in a place in Harlem where blues music was played. He loved to write while sitting in clubs listening to blues and jazz. The title poem, "The Weary Blues," was written to be played with musical instruments. The poem perfectly expressed the desire of Langston Hughes to combine black music and speech in his poetry.

"I got the Weary Blues and I can't be satisfied. Got the Weary Blues and can't be satisfied. I ain't happy no mo' and I wish that I had died."

"And far into the night he crooned that tune. The stars went out and so did the moon. The singer stopped playing and went to bed – while the Weary Blues echoed through his head. He slept like a rock or a man that's dead."

Poems in "The Weary Blues" are warm and full of color. They have a sense of freedom, like that of jazz music. Langston Hughes was excited about the new form of poetry he had discovered for himself.

This Special English program was written by Cynthia Kirk. It was produced by Caty Weaver. The poetry was read by Langston Hughes and Shep O'Neal. I'm Mary Tillotson. And I'm Steve Ember. Join us again next week for another PEOPLE IN AMERICA program on VOA when we finish the story of the life of Langston Hughes.

COMPREHENSION CHECK

1. Langston Hughes's father moved to Mexico ___________________ .
a: to get away from his marriage
b: to escape the racial prejudice that was common in the States
c: to find a better job
d: to learn about Latino culture and the Spanish language

2. Langston Hughes felt __________________________ .
a: tremendous love and respect for his father
b: total support from his father
c: a large emotional distance from his father
d: that his father was too meddlesome in his life

3. Langston Hughes wrote the poem "Weary Blues". The closest in meaning to the word "Weary" is ___________________ .
a: exhausted
b: worried about danger
c: very influenced by women
d: feeling strange, alienated, lonely

4. Langston Hughes's _______________ taught him about pride in his race and heritage.
a: mother
b: father
c: uncle
d: grandmother

5. Langston Hughes was the first poet who ____________________ .
a: used rhyme in poetry
b: used jazz rhythms in poetry
c: expressed loneliness in poetry
d: used the subject of African-American experience in poetry

6. In addition to being a poet, Langston Hughes was also _________________ .
a: an electrician
b: a playwright
c: an advertising man
d: a professor of literature

7. One kind of writing that Langston Hughes didn't do was _________________ .
a: short stories
b: novels
c: children stories
d: science articles

8. As a child, Langston Hughes developed a love of books in reaction to _______________________ .
a: the lack of love he felt from his parents
b: his ambition to become a poet
c: his desire to become a successful teacher
d: his access to a fine public library

9. Because of his appearance and his ability to speak Spanish, many Mexican people thought he was ___________________ .
a: an American
b: a native
c: an indian
d: a Latin American poet

10. Langston Hughes felt that he created his best poetry when ___________________ .
a: he was listening to the blues
b: he was not very happy
c: he was in love with a sympathetic woman
d: he was in line to give a poetry reading

Three by Langston and a short bio. Blues For Peace. The Weary Blues, Night Funeral in Harlem, Juke Box Love Song

Langston Hughes, Part Two

7/8 Listening Test Two

2011-11-28T14:08:00.000-08:00

"Bonjour, Monsieur" by painter Gustave Courbet

The teacher will supply the test booklet and the Scantron card for this test. Please, don't write on the test booklet. Write on the Scantron card only. Choose one answer, marking a, b, c, or d, whichever you think is correct. If you want to change an answer, erase the first one completely. When you're finished, return the test booklet and the Scantron card to the teacher. The teacher will correct your Scantron card and give you your results.

"The Fall of New York" by John Robinson

2011-11-13T08:51:00.000-08:00

I'm pleased to present here the first installment of my historical novel about the battle between revolutionary forces under George Washington and General William Howe's overwhelmingly superior military forces. It's June of 1776. New Yorkers will recognize street and place names. Many quotes from the actual correspondence of the principals are used.

1. A POSTURE OF DEFENSE

New York City. New Years Day. Seventeen Seventy Six. The cobblestones are wet from the rain and the sleet. Horse drawn carts loaded with trunks and furniture click to the wharves. The social observances of New Year's Day are canceled. Even the bells of Trinity Church, the Dutch Reformed, and Saint Paul's are silent. Instead, a slow but steady evacuation of women and children is underway. The British men of war are anchored a stone's throw off the East River slips: the Asia, the Phoenix, and The Duchess of Gordon, each with forty to fifty twenty pound cannon aimed at the town. Huge cakes of ice in the river slap their hulls and force them to hug the shore. The Liberty Boys, armed with muskets stolen from Fort George, eye the cannons on the battery that extends from White Hall Slip as far as Beaver Street. Captain Parker, senior naval officer of the Phoenix Man of War, has warned the rebels that if they attempt to remove the cannons from the battery, he'll order his gunners to fire on the city.

Evening. Light fall of snow. White gauze covers the shoulders of the equestrian statue of King George in the bowling green. Little dots of white fill the small gilded crowns that top the wrought iron fence posts surrounding the regal monument. The streets are deserted, except for the piles of baggage and huddled forms of women and children. They're waiting for the Long Island Ferry at the foot of Wall Street to carry them to safety. Ominous clouds close in about the very roofs and chimneys. The peoples' minds are strained and apprehensive. Should the men of war commence cannonading, there will be no defenses against them. Nothing will prevent the British troops landing and overrunning the island.

The landed, wealthy Tories fear the rebels much more than the British troops. To men like Delancy, the low class dubbing itself The Sons of Liberty has been spreading terror through the town since the Stamp Act. Demagogues like that pirate Isaac Sears whipped the leather aproned joiners, carpenters, and chimney sweeps into frenzies. Deluding the mob with promises of liberty, Sears sought only to feather his own political nest. The Tories are loyal to his majesty King George the Third and his minister Lord North. Yes, the taxation policies of the Ministry are somewhat unreasonable, but the colonies have friends in Parliament. No need to sever ties. Why exchange the most benevolent government in the world for this wildly anarchic, tyrannical Congress in Philadelphia? New York City is evenly divided between those loyal to the king and those swept up in the fever of revolution. Then, there are the moderates. The fence sitters. They just want to avoid trouble. They have the majority in the city Committee of Safety. After the Committee ousted the incendiary Isaac Sears, he journeys to Cambridge and wins the ear of Charles Lee. "New York is a hot bed of Toryism!" he confides in the Major-General. Lee concurs with Sears and promises to take the matter up with the commander of the Revolutionary forces, now based in Boston. He writes George Washington, on January fifth.

General Charles Lee with Spada
"The consequences of the enemy's possessing themselves of New York appear to me so terrible, that I have scarcely slept. If the enemy gains control of the North River, they achieve communication with the Lakes, Canada. They cut the colonies in half. They have a base from which to strike anywhere in America within days."

Lee thought the commander leaned on Congress far too much. He added;

"Do not refer every decision you make to Congress. To so is to drown in indecision. It is to you they look up to for direction. Your effectiveness depends on your striking, at certain crises, vigorous strokes without communicating your intention. New York must be protected. But it will never, I'm afraid, be secured by direct order of Congress. I know that no man can be spared from Boston at this time as General Howe's entire force directly threatens that place. But I propose you should detain me in Connecticut and lend your name for collecting a body of volunteers. I shall find no difficulty in assembling a sufficient number for the purposes wanted. This body will effect the security of New York and the suppression of that dangerous banditti of Tories."

Washington wavers. If he immediately adopts Charles Lee's plan, and directs Lee to New York, would it be within his authority? He might exceed his powers and then Congress would disapprove. He was to act only as Congress directed, not otherwise. But New York is vital. He asks top Revolutionary leader John Adam's opinion.

Adams replies, "Yes. As the city and North River are the nexus of the Northern and Southern colonies, no effort to secure it ought to be omitted."

Washington learned that Howe's army planned soon to embark from the port of Boston. They must be destined for the south. To Charles Lee he writes, "You will with the volunteers from Connecticut repair to New York and put that city in the best posture of defense which the season will admit of, disarming all such persons upon Long Island and elsewhere whose conduct and declarations have rendered them justly suspected of designs unfriendly to the views of Congress."

Major General Charles Lee, second in command. Military genius. Charles Lee had been a Major General in the British Army. Led the Russians against the dreaded Turk. Then, on his return to England, he wrote radical pamphlets and insulted King George to his face. Settled in America. Tall, emaciated, soiled clothes, messy hair, dirty fingernails. Had to swallow his pride to serve under that Virginian amateur, Washington. Lee leaves Cambridge for New Haven. By him in his horse drawn chair his dogs. His favorite, Spada, rests his head on Lee's shoulder. Spada a large Pomeranian resembles a tiny bear. The other hounds battle for a position closest to their beloved master. He arrives in Hartford in the evening and calls upon the people of the neighborhood to join his colors to suppress the Tories and secure the town against the ministerial troops. "Not to crush these serpents before their rattles are grown would be ruinous." He is received with enthusiasm. If the bad news of defeats in Canada served to inspire rather than depress, it is because Lee's zeal spurs them. He reaches Stamford, Connecticut the following day. The New Englanders crowd around him. They love Lee's cursing of all authority, his unshaven face. The slovenly fit of an old faded, threadbare scarlet coat on his stretched, thin frame. His ever present dogs join him at the dinner table.

"I must have some object to embrace. When I can be convinced that men are as worthy as dogs, I shall transfer my benevolence to them." And his angry manner earns for him cheers among the growing throng. The Committee of Safety in New York is nervous about the coming of the temperamental Charles Lee. They just finished getting rid of Isaac Sears, now they dread a worse and more dangerous influence is coming to replace him. They write:

"Sir, since our gunpowder quantity is less than three tons, we haven't got a sufficiency to enable you to act hostilely against the ships of war now in port. Since we are unprepared, we cannot provoke the ships of war until at least the month of March when we might be fortunate enough to obtain more powder. So please, sir, stay on the western confines of Connecticut until you can assure us that the entrance of a large body of troops into this city will not involve us in hostilities."

Lee scoffs. "The timid ones are against my plan, merely from the spirit of procrastination, which is the essence of timidity."

As he writes, cursing the New Yorkers, a nagging pain in his fingers nearly stops him. Gout. The gout come back. The pain spreads to his knees, ankles, toes. Wide eyed, unable to sleep, he twists and turns in agony. He could nowhere find comfort. He stays eight more days in hopes the gout attack will pass, but it doesn't. He has to go to New York, gout or not. So, finally, carried on a litter, he is carefully placed on his carriage. Spada tries to soothe his pain by sliding a long consoling tongue across his cheek. But each bump in the road sends burning jolts into his swollen joints. The following day, he crosses Kings Bridge and enters the island. The Post Road leads him by the stately mansions and lovely rolling farm lands, orchards, and graceful stone walls. South, jutting up behind the hills, the spires of the churches rise. Now, descending the hills, Bowery Road becomes Broadway, newly set with cobblestones.

Dutch Reformed Church, NY, 1776
Even in his anguish, Charles Lee can admire the bright, brick houses of the town, topped with curtained dormer windows and graceful balustrades encircling the roofs. Wrought iron fence, lush Dutch gardens, and the Dutch houses with their glazed yellow bricks and stair step gables. Tree lined sidewalks, and the river, sound, and the flight of gulls. The Major General's chair halts at the common where the upper barracks stand and the Montaigne Public House. His litter bearers bring him to his room and he immediately receives the news that the British General Clinton aboard the war ship Mercury has entered the harbor.

"Let the fireworks begin!" Roared Lee." Send word on board the men of war that if they set a single house on fire in consequence of my coming, I will chain one hundred of their friends together and make that house their funeral pile."

"A dangerous provocation!" Protests the Committee of Safety.

"Hysteria!" Returned Lee. "Bring my litter to survey lower Broadway. That fort must go!"

"Fort George? But it is the King's Fort."

"Exactly. Tear down the bastions; north, west and east and the connecting curtain too. The fort can do us no good, but if the enemy gets it, they can use it to subject the town. Tear it down. Take their stores. And take the guns from the battery and move them to the common. Leave three thirty-two pounders in lower Broadway. Those guns will prevent them from rebuilding the fort."

All available carts are pressed to the Major General's service. He barks commands from his litter. The carts squeak and the wheels buckle under the half ton weight of the old cannon.
Seeing the guns roll by, the inhabitants are struck with panic. Quickly trunks are packed and loaded on horse drawn chairs. The Boston Post Road fills with refugees bound for Kings Bridge and beyond. The ferries too. And soon the din of clopping horses and the creak of wheel ceases. Vesey Street and Dey, Cherry Street and Barclay are silent. Houses vacated and boarded up. Inside a week a town of 28,000, down to 5,000. The Committee of Safety pulls its collective hair while Lee laughs off the mass flight.

"Let them go. Their houses shall be barracks for the Continental troops. And as to the threats of ships, I consider their menaces to fire upon the town as idle gasconades."

New York. It's a desert now, is the common lament. But Charles Lee is pleased. Feeding Spada one of Mrs. Montaigne's muffins, he begins to ponder strategy.

"What to do with the city, I confess, puzzles me. It is so encircled with deep, navigable water, that whoever commands the sea must command the town. And they have the world's greatest navy, with the French a close second best. The British will have no problems landing their forces here. But it is possible to make New York a costly battleground for them. They had to pay a lot to bring troops over 3000 miles of ocean. We must entrench ourselves in the Broadway, making our position so heavily defended that for every inch of progress, they will lose expensive lives."

So the eighteen hundred Connecticut volunteers build barricades at every street leading to the Broadway. Using mahogany logs taken from West India cargoes, and the shade trees of Broad and Wall and Nassau that enclose City Hall Park. Barriers rise at the head of Vesey Street, and one at Murray. Another stretches across Beekman Street at the Brick Church. Bulwark at the entrance to Center Street, another crosses Frankfort, and near that one, yet another facing Chatham. Sweat pours, dirt flies, the sound of hammer on wood, the chunk of shovel, the slap of cobblestone on mounting piles. But mostly the dirt. Soap is in short supply. The soap makers left in the panic. So the men on fatigue are constantly grimy. Barracked in the elegant houses, their mud boots streak hard wood floors, white tiled staircases; their hands soil wainscots, walls. The men burn fine European imported furniture for their heat. Cellars reek with their filth. Oh, when the owners return, they will spend years cleaning up after these motley, ragamuffin, vagabond, poor excuse for soldiers.

Back out the next morning, littered Lee drives them on as Spada pants. Horne's Hook battery goes up, and one opposite it at Hallet's point, to keep British ships out of Hell's Gate and
access to the sound. But we are low, grumbles Lee, on entrenching tools: hoes, shovels, axes, picks.

"We need engineers, carpenters. Can't expect to hold these forts with eighteen hundred. We need more men. We need nine thousand on Long Island alone. And we need soap! The Congress neglects this place. They make proclamations from afar. The appoint a mere amateur, George Washington, to command our troops, and don't even consider me! The only experienced officer they've got! Don't they realize the loss of New York is the death of the cause? We need soap!"

But Congress, instead, sends flattery. Good job Charles Lee. They need you in Canada. Canada?? Lee writes the chief: "New York must be secured. But your Congress is miserly, sir. I have torn down Fort George and begun redoubts in the Broadway and Horne's Hook. More than that I could not do as the Congress has not furnished the force which I was told to expect from Philadelphia!"

Lee shocks the lady innkeeper at dinner by quipping:

"If the British Commander, William Howe, and his brother the admiral were caught in bed with the wives of these congressmen, they would look the other way."

As ice blocks melt, The Asia, the Phoenix, and the Duchess of Gordon move out of the harbor taking the immediate threat of cannonade away with them. Charles Lee's attention shifts to
the Long Island Tory problem. Isaac Sears is dispatched to Long Island with orders to force the Tories to take a strong oath. It should be as follows:

"I will take arms in defense of my country if called upon by the voice of the Congress."

The true Tory, he who we shall imprison, will refuse to sign the oath. To promise to take arms against their sovereign would be too impious. Sears confronts them one by one and reports the results of the oath taking to Charles Lee as follows:

"They swallowed the oath hard as if it was a four pound shot they were trying to get down. But many of them, rather than being forced to sign an oath, escaped to the woods and are hiding out there."

Tories hiding in the woods! They're simply waiting for the King's troops to arrive. Then they'll join up against us. "I must confess", Lee says, "I leave this place in its present state with no small anxiety of mind. As there are no measures taken for its security, I tremble lest the enemy should take possession of it."

Lee's original orders state he must go to Canada. But he receives another letter from Congress, a change of assignment. He is to leave for South Carolina instead. Congress had wanted him in Canada, but Charles Lee is the only general South Carolina will accept. From Congress's point of view, it doesn't really matter where Lee is sent. Just get him out of New York where his inflammatory words and actions could cause the British not just to take over the town, but cruelly punish whoever is there left defending it.

Mrs. Montaigne issues Charles Lee the bill for his lodgement. His gout is calmed and he doesn't scream as much at night, but still she isn't sorry to see him go. She won't miss his foul mouth, unwashed person, and the furniture chewing and the rug shedding of his many dogs. She forces a gracious smile, respectfully requesting payment, but he slaps the bill out of her hand. "Why should I pay you, you damned Tory?" he hisses. The animals bare their teeth at her, growl, and follow their master to his horse and chair.

A stream of men, the newly arrived Continentals line Dey Street to watch Charles Lee ride to the Powle's Hook Ferry. They are motley dressed. Some in blue coats and buckskin breeches, white stockings and half boots, others in green short coats with brass buttons and black velvet jackets and breeches, and still others with blue coats and small castor hats set off by a black band and a silver buckle. They cheer their hero, and each dreads abandonment in this dangerous place with a less competent command. Lee is the best they could have.

The British under Howe leave Boston's Port and head for Halifax, Nova Scotia. But, that's only a ruse. New York will be their next object. Washington sends Lord Stirling to take Lee's place in New York and finish the job Lee started according to Lee's plan. Washington himself slips into town on April fifth and takes residence in the mansion of Richmond Hill.

Washington remains aloof, brooding on the losses of Bunker Hill and Breed's Hill, shuddering as regards the future of this uneven contest. The men never see him except at Trinity Church. And they wonder at his excellency's emotionless expression as the Anglican minister, Charles Inglis, prays for the well being of the King and sermonizes that changes of government should be left in God's hands alone.

But the fort building picks up. All during April and May the pick and shovel, hammer and saw are busy. In addition to the barricades on the Broadway, redoubts appear on Lispenard's Hill to strike war ships trying to embark on the Hudson side. Freshwater Hill redoubt faces the town, protects the hospital. Verplank's Hill behind Trinity Church aims cannon to the south. Bayard's Hill and Jones Hill have good works and at the ship yard, a strong battery backed by a fort higher up on the hill where the Jewish burial ground sits. Works at Colear's Hook and Rutger's Hill behind it protect the East River and more cannon are placed at Peck's and Beekman's slips, Rodman's Slip, Burnett's Key, Hunter's Key, Kruger's Wharf. Murray's Slip, and Whitehall.

General William Howe, commander in chief of the British, Hessian, and Highlander forces arrives on June 26th in the Greyhound frigate, a man of war sporting forty, twenty pounders. June 29th, forty-five more ships. And by now there are eighty-two. Rumour has it there are around 10,000 professionals out there battle ready. And more on the way. The commander's brother is at sea. Admiral Richard Howe with one hundred and fifty ships and some 22,000 more soldiers. The biggest military build up the British have ever mounted. The much delayed conquest of New York is finally about to happen. Perhaps, when the rebels see they must lose their city, they will abandon their "revolution" altogether. Then the British would be done with this idiocy. They want to finish this thing fast and go back home.

Sketch of Lispenard's Meadows
From his window at Richmond Hill, Abraham Mortier's residence at Varick and Charleston Streets, his excellency is treated to the view of the trees and grasses of Lispenard's Meadow
where all seems at peace. But he's thinking now of the growing forest of ships masts off Sandy Hook.

"The situation calls for the most vigorous exertions. Nothing less will be sufficient to avert the impending blow," writes General Washington to his adjutant, Colonel Joseph
Reed.

Reed reads. "Exertions?" and thinks: "It will take more than words to whip these amateur, motley, ragamuffin soldiers into any kind of shape."

The British General has a certain respect for the rebels. He remembers the The Bunker Hill fiasco. Howe had ordered his soldiers straight at the rebel batteries. A ridiculous frontal attack. He vows he will not repeat that mistake. Fortunate for him the rebels were largely bereft of ammunition, hence searched for "the whites of their eyes" before firing rationed shots. And those eye whites were spotted usually as rebels' chests got skewered. Too few ended up that way. Alas, Breed's Hill and Bunker Hill were largely abandoned before the redcoats got there.

The British regulars are in high spirits and talk of success in New York with some confidence. When the admiral arrives, with a few swift moves New York will be ours.

Washington stands. The sun throws the shadow of his six foot two frame across the length of the room. "I trust", he says, by God's favor and our own best efforts, they will be
disappointed, like they were at Bunker Hill. It is as Charles Lee says, they'll have to wade through much blood and slaughter before they carry our works.

But we need soldiers to defend them. Many of the militia terms are up and farmers are anxious to get home, angry over having missed the spring planting. The city's defenses are built and the men have nothing to do but wait. Increased cases of small pox from bad water lower morale. Two thousand sick men crowd the new hospital on Freshwater Hill.

Marked increase in rum consumption, madeira. Consorting with the whores of "The holy ground" so named because this vicinity of the women of the night surrounds Trinity Church, New York's largest Episcopal church. One soldier, given thirty-nine lashes in punishment for drunkenness, requests another thirty-nine if he can use them as payment for a pint of rum.

Washington broods. This army has problems. Given to gloomy thoughts, always, this large man with deep set eyes and a heavy brow. His father died when he was eleven and his beloved older brother Lawrence, too, in his prime.

These early tragedies never go away. They remain, a subliminal background hum at the center of his busy life. They rise in pitch and volume under stress. But his mood lifts when he receives the news that Congress has passed the Declaration of Independence, an instrument that severs all ties with the mother country. Just the thing to restore morale and discipline to the army.

He calls the troops to parade at six. Before each battalion the famous words are recited:

"When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation."

The soldiers give the declaration their approval with loud cheers and hats thrown skyward. Loyalists are afraid and shrink into the shadows of buildings. Many try to leave the city, knowing their lives are in jeopardy.

George the Third Statue Attack
The rebels are surrounding the equestrian statue of George the Third. You can imagine the lead horse rearing up in fear. Under the Roman armor, the king modeled upon Marcus Aurelius, shivers. His laurel leafed brow sweats. Rebels mount the marble platform, circle appendages of man and horse with rough, thick rope. Toss the ends into the crowd. With cries of heave, the soldiers pull, the leaden forms hold, but crack. Then, man and horse fall. Hammers undo the thin gold leaf that coats the statue. Entrenching tools and picks attack the grounded sovereign. He's pieces now. One blow cuts his head off neck and shoulder. They chip off the laurel leaves and ax his nose off and pound a musket ball into the left temple.

"Send the lead to Litchfield Connecticut", orders his excellency. "The ladies of Litchfield will mold our former king into bullets, cannon shot, canister, and grape shot. New York is without bullet molds."

The motley rebel soldiers gleefully obey. They collect the lead in wagons. Pieces of George Rex to serve our cause. Shoot his toes into his representatives. Kill the Hessian with his greedy fingertips. Bleed Scotsmen with fragments from his spleen. But they fix the head on a spike and plant it in front of Moore's tavern just south of Kings Bridge. Gold from the veneer buys many a round. And they drink toasts to the lead head of fallen Lucifer deep into the night.

Three days later, they're still celebrating. Tearing King's coats of arms off of buildings, rioting. Only now, the enemy is stirring. The oak masts of the Phoenix and Rose are visible in the East River.

Man the batteries. Forty eight Phoenix cannons are spitting at Powle's Hook. We have no reply to their brisk cannonade. They commence investing the Hudson. Where are the defenders of Bayard's Mount? They're far from the works. They're in their cups. They're at the holy ground with the less than holy ladies. New England Puritans murmur against this devil's town, this Babylon. God's wrath will burn it down.

"Three Books About The Human Brain" from VOA

2011-08-15T16:02:00.000-07:00

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: I’m Shirley Griffith.

STEVE EMBER: And I’m Steve Ember with EXPLORATIONS in VOA Special English. Today we discuss three books that tell about ways the human brain works. One book considers the power of the brain in controlling why some people care about how someone else feels and why others do not. Another book describes how the limitations of the brain can affect our lives. The third book is about how the brain develops in a baby.

(MUSIC)

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: Psychology professor and researcher Simon Baron-Cohen wrote a book called “The Science of Evil: On Empathy and the Origins of Cruelty.” His book asks why it is that human beings are capable of evil behavior towards each other. He says the word “evil” is less helpful in offering a scientific explanation. Instead, he chooses to use the word empathy. We spoke with Professor Baron-Cohen about his book using Skype.

SIMON BARON-COHEN: “If we are trying to do science, we should move away from the concept of evil as an explanation of cruelty and instead use the framework of empathy. Because empathy is something you can measure scientifically. And you can measure it at the psychological level using questionnaires or psychological tests. You can also measure it using the new brain scanning technology, MRI. In that respect, you can also move forward and move deeper.”

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: Simon Baron-Cohen defines empathy as the ability of a person to identify what someone else is thinking or feeling and to react with an appropriate emotion. He says people who do evil acts are showing a lack of empathy. This can be temporary, or part of a more permanent condition.

STEVE EMBER: Professor Baron-Cohen and his research team developed a way to measure individual differences in empathy. They found that most people have average levels of empathy, but some people have extremely low or high levels.

SIMON BARON-COHEN: “In my book I call this the empathy bell curve. And part of what I’m exploring in the book is what determines where an individual scores on this empathy bell curve. Why do some people score much lower or much higher than other people.”

STEVE EMBER: Empathy is linked to physical areas of the brain. Medical imaging technology has identified at least ten parts of the brain that are active when people empathize. And, these areas are less active in people with little or no empathy.

Why would someone lack empathy? Professor Baron-Cohen offers evidence suggesting that zero empathy can be the result of environmental, social and genetic conditions.

The question of empathy is a meaningful one in the field of psychology. Lack of empathy has an influence on borderline personality disorder, narcissism and psychopathy and the developmental disorder autism.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: Professor Baron-Cohen says borderline personality disorder, narcissism and psychopathy are described as personality disorders. But he says psychiatric experts could instead define them as empathy disorders. This could open up new ways of studying and treating these disorders. Recognizing the importance of empathy could also change the way legal and psychiatric experts consider and treat people who commit acts of cruelty. But this recognition goes far beyond psychiatry. The writer says empathy is one of the most valuable resources in our world.

SIMON BARON COHEN: “One thing that I think may have been neglected in the past is just recognizing that empathy also has the power to resolve conflicts between people. So if we think about conflicts, it could be a conflict between two people, like two neighbors. It could be a conflict between two nations. For example, nations that go to war.”

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: That was Professor Baron-Cohen speaking to us with Skype. He says it is important to recognize the value of empathy in areas like politics, education and law, as well as psychiatry.

(MUSIC)

STEVE EMBER: Dean Buonomano is a brain specialist at the University of California, Los Angeles. He works in the Departments of Neurobiology and Psychology and the Brain Research Institute at UCLA.

His book “Brain Bugs” explores how the human brain is one of the best pieces of technology ever created. But at the same time, he shows how a normal, healthy brain is also built with weaknesses and limitations. Professor Buonomano borrows the word “bug” from computer programming to describe the errors which the brain can make.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: One reason for these ‘bugs’ is evolution. Human brains developed over hundreds of thousands of years to be skilled at finding food, shelter and protection from threats. Yet evolution did not fully prepare the brain for the many demands of the modern world.

So, our brains are very good at doing some things. But our brains sometimes fail us when we attempt to remember long lists of information, or compute large numbers in our head. Our brains are also not always very good at making long-term decisions.

STEVE EMBER: Professor Buonomano discusses how and why the brain can play tricks on us in decisions involving memory, time and judging threats. Sometimes these mistakes can have serious effects, like a victim who wrongly identifies her attacker to police.

At other times, the mistakes are harmless. For example, one study found that most people choose to receive one hundred dollars immediately over receiving one hundred twenty dollars in a month. While waiting could lead to more money, most people would want the payment now. Dean Buonomano says that, for human ancestors, the immediate need for food was more important than the future need. So, our brains often want an immediate action instead of having to wait for a reward.

Professor Buonomano explains the causes of many kinds of brain bugs and gives examples of their everyday results. And, he offers ideas for how understanding our brain bugs can become a tool for improving our mental powers.

(MUSIC)

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: John Medina is a developmental molecular biologist in Seattle, Washington. His book is called “Brain Rules for Baby: How to Raise a Smart and Happy Child from Zero to Five.” The book gives scientific information about how a brain develops from its creation to the age of five years.

Professor Medina says parenting is all about brain development. He says what science tells us about the brain gives parents good information for raising smart, happy children.

STEVE EMBER: Many parents ask the professor what they can do to improve brain function before birth. A mother’s actions have a big effect on how her baby develops. He says one of the most important things is for the mother to avoid severe levels of stress.

JOHN MEDINA: “The maternal stress that is felt, that stress hormone -- one of them is called cortisol -- can actually leach into the womb. And, at certain stages of development can actually go into the brain of the baby and rewire the brain of that baby in such fashion that it now becomes stressed.”

STEVE EMBER: John Medina says it is important for a pregnant woman to gain the right amount of weight and eat healthful foods so that her baby will develop normally.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: His book also discusses the science behind a child’s intelligence after birth. He says one of the best things parents can do for their baby has to do with their own relationship. Studies show marriage conflict increases greatly after a baby is born. This can result from new pressures on the parents and lack of sleep. Professor Medina says what conflict the baby witnesses can be important.

JOHN MEDINA: “If you make up in public, by that I mean in front of your child, with the same frequency that you fight in front of your child, the child’s nervous system develops beautifully. It doesn’t matter how much fighting you guys do. In fact, I would argue that if kids could actually see real live conflict going on that is both frank but also resolvable, it teaches the child to begin to have better conflict resolution.”

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: Parents can do other things to help support the mental development of their baby. These include breast feeding and talking and playing with the child. [John Medina says it is wise to avoid television at an early age and not to pressure children to learn.]

STEVE EMBER: As for happiness, Professor Medina says it is important for parents to help children develop language skills to express their emotions.

JOHN MEDINA: “What a parent does when their child’s emotions run hot profoundly influences how that child’s emotional regulation occurs decades later, no kidding.”

STEVE EMBER: He also says parents can help create a healthy emotional life for small children by being watchful and responsive to their needs. He adds that parents need to recognize and not judge the child’s emotions.

Finally, John Medina tells about research that shows the single best predictor of happiness is having friends. He says parents should help children learn to control and understand their emotions because this leads to deeper friendships.

(MUSIC)

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: This program was written and produced by Dana Demange. I’m Shirley Griffith.

STEVE EMBER: And I’m Steve Ember. Our programs are online with transcripts and MP3s at voaspecialenglish.com. And you can find us at Facebook and YouTube at VOA Learning English. Join us again next week for EXPLORATIONS in VOA Special English.

The Diamond Trade - from VOA

2011-07-07T14:05:00.000-07:00

I'm Steve Ember. And I'm Barbara Klein with EXPLORATIONS in VOA Special English.

Today we tell about the trade in diamonds, a worldwide business worth billions of dollars.

(MUSIC: "Diamonds Are Forever")

The use of valuable stones like diamonds goes back thousands of years. Rulers of many ancient cultures used gemstones to show wealth and importance. Diamonds still represent power and fame. Rich and famous people around the world wear diamonds. And, most women in the United States receive a diamond ring when they agree to a marriage proposal.

Diamonds are mined from the Earth. They are cut, made to shine and then sold at high prices. The nation of South Africa is famous for its supply of diamonds. For generations, men have gone deep down into the Earth to bring out the rough stones. It is very difficult and dangerous work. But recently, technology has helped.

Diamonds were formed millions of years ago from carbon under extreme heat and pressure more than one hundred kilometers below the Earth's surface. They are found in volcanic "pipes" called kimberlite. The name comes from Kimberley, the place in South Africa were diamonds were found in the nineteenth century.

The DeBeers company bought the Kimberley mine and soon became the biggest mining company in South Africa. DeBeers employed thousands of workers there. In the late twentieth century, it improved working conditions and offered miners a share of the company's profits.

(MUSIC)

All over the world, valuable stones are mined from deep in the ground, from areas near rivers or coasts and in open gravel pits. Botswana is now the largest diamond producer in Africa. The stones are also mined in Angola, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Namibia and Sierra Leone. Other major diamond-producing nations include Australia, Canada and Russia.

DeBeers still controls half of the world's diamond production. Most of their rough stones are sent to the company's headquarters in London to be sold to a few dealers. But independent buyers are also part of the process.

One million people work in the diamond industry in India. Shrenuj and Company is one of the main diamond factories in the city of Mumbai. Workers cut and shine, or polish, gemstones there.

Most of the world's diamonds, mostly small stones, are polished in India. The diamonds are examined and sorted by color. The most valued color has really no color. Experts make the rough diamonds appear larger with the help of computers, so they can see how best to cut them.

Diamonds are the hardest natural material. Only a diamond can cut another diamond. So diamond cutters use diamond dust on a device called a polisher's wheel. It is difficult work. One wrong move and a stone can break. Sanjay Kambne has been performing this work for years. He says he has to be very careful while working with the stones.

The history of valuable gems in India goes back many centuries. Sanjay Kothari heads India's Gem and Jewelry Export Promotion Council. He says India has valued diamonds, jewelry and gold since the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.

Gems became big business in India in the nineteen fifties and sixties. Mr. Kothari says diamond exports from India last year were worth twenty billion dollars.

(MUSIC)

Halfway across the world, Antwerp, Belgium is the world's largest diamond trading center. Philip Claes is secretary-general of the Antwerp World Diamond Center.

PHILIP CLAES: "Eighty percent of all the rough diamonds are traded in Antwerp and fifty percent of all polished diamonds worldwide are traded in Antwerp. In figures, it means that we have a turnover here in Antwerp of more than forty billion dollars each year."

Antwerp has more than one thousand eight hundred diamond companies. That is why George Read comes to the city. He is a senior vice present with Shoregold, a diamond mining company in Canada. He goes to Antwerp to have his diamonds revalued.

Diamonds are weighed and valued in carats. One carat equals two hundred milligrams. In addition to carat weight and color, a gemstone's value is based on its clearness and cut -- the shape of the polished stone.

Antwerp once had about twenty-five thousand people working as diamond cutters and polishers. Now only a few hundred remain. Belgian cutters lost their jobs to workers in India because they are paid less.

(MUSIC)

The international trade in diamonds is worth an estimated eighty billion dollars a year. This has helped some countries develop economically. It has provided jobs for workers in some of the world's poorest countries. However, the diamond trade has also been used to support wars, frighten civilians and keep dictators in power.

The diamond mines in South Africa are clean. Machines are used to help the workers. But this is not true in other parts of Africa. More than one million people search for diamonds in Africa. They dig in pits and near rivers by hand. They earn less than one dollar a day.

In recent years, armed militias and rebels in some countries used diamonds to pay for civil wars. Thousands of civilians were killed and injured in conflicts in places like Angola, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Sierra Leone. So these gems are called "conflict diamonds" or "blood diamonds."

Global Witness was one of the first non-governmental organizations to call attention to the issue. Annie Dunnebacke says the group's goal was to show the tragedy of conflict diamonds. She says Sierra Leone was one of the worst cases. Hundreds of thousands of people died as a result of the country's civil war in the nineteen nineties. Rebels cut off the arms and legs of innocent people and forced children to fight. The Revolutionary United Front controlled the eastern part of Sierra Leone. This is where the diamond fields are.

The diamonds were an economic reason for the war to continue. Efforts to report the link between the war and the diamonds were successful.

Two years ago, the movie "Blood Diamond" helped bring more attention to the situation. The movie takes place during the civil war in Sierra Leone. Leonardo di Caprio plays a man who sells arms to the rebels in exchange for diamonds. He is involved in a chase for a rare and valuable pink diamond. But in the end, he gives up the diamond, fights off the rebels and helps others learn about the illegal trade.

Global Witness was an adviser on the film. Annie Dunnebacke says it influenced public opinion.

ANNIE DUNNEBACKE: "I think that bringing the message in sort of Hollywood terms to a much wider audience than possibly our reports get to -- it does have value."

International pressure made the diamond industry take action in an effort to prevent the trade in blood diamonds. In two thousand three, the Kimberley Process was established. It requires member governments to prove that exports and imports do not include blood diamonds.

Tom Tweedy is a spokesman for DeBeers, the world's largest producer of rough diamonds. He says the Kimberley Process is a good step forward.

TOM TWEEDY: "We have a system and however imperfect it may be it is probably the only comprehensive system of its type in the world."

Philip Claes of the World Diamond Center says conflict diamonds represented four to fifteen percent of rough diamonds traded worldwide before the Kimberley Process.

Today, he says conflict diamonds represent only two-tenths of one percent of rough diamonds traded worldwide. However, Annie Dunnebacke says some diamonds are being moved illegally between African countries.

Experts say diamonds are not the only valuable gems that are linked to trouble in the world. For example, more than ninety percent of the world's rubies come from Burma. The military government controls the sale of the country's gems. This trade helps keep the government in power.

Human rights activists are working to increase restrictions against Burmese rubies. Activists are hoping that people will start to ask more questions about the jewelry they buy.

7/8 Listening Test One

2011-06-22T13:29:00.000-07:00

"Still Life Volutous" by Cubist Painter, Jay Myers

The teacher will supply the test booklet and the Scantron card for this test. Please, don't write on the test booklet. Write on the Scantron card only. Choose one answer, marking a, b, c, or d, whichever you think is correct. If you want to change an answer, erase the first one completely. When you're finished, return the test booklet and the Scantron card to the teacher. The teacher will correct your Scantron card and give you your results.

Structure Practice. Here is a very good practice exam for TOEFL preparation. You have to choose the correct answer in some questions. Or, your ability to spot mistakes in grammar is tested. This is a timed exam, you have 20 mintues to complete the test. Click on the answer you think is correct, then click "next" and "confirm" to go to the next question. Try it.

TOEFL Structure Practice

TOEFL Vocabulary Test

Ernest Hemingway - Ex patriot Writer - VOA

2011-06-21T08:50:00.000-07:00

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: I'm Shirley Griffith.

FRANK OLIVER: And I'm Frank Oliver with People in America, a Special English program about people who were important in the history of the United States. Today, we tell about the life of writer Ernest Hemingway.

(MUSIC)

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: "A writer is always alone, always an outsider," Ernest Hemingway said. Others said that of the many people he created in his books, Hemingway was his own best creation.

Ernest Hemingway was born in eighteen ninety-nine. He grew up in Oak Park, Illinois, near the middle western city of Chicago. He was the second child in a family of six. His father was a doctor. His mother liked to paint and play the piano.

Each summer the family traveled to their holiday home in northern Michigan. Ernest's father taught him how to catch fish, hunt, set up a camp and cook over a fire.

At home in Oak Park, Ernest wrote for his school newspaper. He tried to write like a famous sports writer of that time, Ring Lardner. He developed his writing skills this way.

FRANK OLIVER: In nineteen seventeen, Hemingway decided not to go to a university. The United States had just entered World War One and he wanted to join the army. But the army rejected him because his eyesight was not good enough.

Ernest found a job with the Kansas City Star newspaper in Kansas City, Missouri. He reported news from the hospital, police headquarters, and the railroad station. One reporter remembered: "Hemingway liked to be where the action was."

The Kansas City Star demanded that its reporters write short sentences. It wanted reporters to see the unusual details in an incident. Hemingway quickly learned to do both.

He worked for the newspaper only nine months before he joined the Red Cross to help on the battlefields of Europe. His job was to drive a Red Cross truck carrying wounded away from battle.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: The Red Cross sent him to Italy. Soon he saw his first wounded when an arms factory in Milan exploded. Later, he was sent to the battle front. He went as close to the fighting as possible to see how he would act in the face of danger. Before long, he was seriously wounded.

The war ended soon after he healed. Hemingway returned to the United States. Less than a year had passed since he went to Europe. But in that short time he had changed forever. He needed to write about what he had seen.

FRANK OLIVER: Ernest Hemingway left home for Chicago to prove to himself, and to his family, that he could earn a living from his writing.

But, he ran out of money and began to write for a newspaper again. The Canadian newspaper, the Toronto Star, liked his reports about life in Chicago and paid him well.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: In Chicago, Hemingway met the writer Sherwood Anderson. Anderson was one of the first writers in America to write about the lives of common people. Hemingway saw that Anderson's stories showed life as it really was, the way Hemingway was trying to do.

Anderson gave Hemingway advice about his writing. He told Hemingway to move to Paris, where living was less costly. He said Paris was full of young artists and writers from all over the world.

In return for Anderson's kindness Hemingway wrote a book called "The Torrents of Spring." It makes fun of Anderson and the way he wrote. There was something in Hemingway that could not say "thank you" to anyone. He had to believe he did everything for himself, even when he knew others helped him.

(MUSIC)

FRANK OLIVER: Hemingway decided to move to Paris. But before he did he married a woman he had recently met. Her name was Hadley Richardson.

Paris was cold and gray when Hemingway and his new wife arrived in nineteen twenty-one. They lived in one of the poorer parts of the city. Their rooms were small and had no running water. But the Toronto Star employed him as its European reporter, so there was enough money for the two of them to live. And the job gave Hemingway time to write his stories.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: Hemingway enjoyed exploring Paris, making new friends, learning French customs and sports. Some new friends were artists and writers who had come to Paris in the nineteen twenties. Among them were poet Ezra Pound, and writers Gertrude Stein, John dos Passos, and F. Scott Fitzgerald. They quickly saw that Hemingway was a good writer. They helped him publish his stories in the United States. He was thankful for their support at the time, but later denied that he had received help.

As a reporter, Hemingway traveled all over Europe. He wrote about politics. He wrote about peace conferences and border disputes. And he wrote about sports, skiing and fishing. Later he would write about bull fighting in Spain. The Toronto Star was pleased with his work, and wanted more of his reports. But Hemingway was busy with his own writing.

He said: "Sometimes, I would start a new story and could not get it going. Then I would stand and look out over the roofs of Paris and think. I would say to myself: 'All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence you know.' So finally, I would write a true sentence and go on from there. It was a wonderful feeling when I had worked well. "

FRANK OLIVER: Hemingway's first book of stories was called "In Our Time." It included a story called "Big Two-Hearted River," about the effect of war on a young man.

It tells about the young man taking a long fishing trip in Michigan. Hemingway had learned from his father when he was a boy about living in the wild.

The story is about two kinds of rivers. One is calm and clear. It is where the young man fishes. The other is dark. It is a swamp, a threatening place.

The story shows the young man trying to forget his past. He is also trying to forget the war. Yet he never really speaks about it. The reader learns about the young man, not because Hemingway tells us what the young man thinks, but because he shows the young man learning about himself.

"Big Two-Hearted River" is considered one of the best modern American stories. It is often published in collections of best writing.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: After the book was published in nineteen twenty-five, Hadley and Hemingway returned to the United States for the birth of their son. They quickly returned to Paris.

Hemingway was working on a long story. He wanted to publish a novel so he would be recognized as a serious writer. And he wanted the money a novel would earn.

The novel was called "The Sun Also Rises." It is about young Americans in Europe after World War One. The war had destroyed their dreams. And it had given them nothing to replace those dreams. The writer Gertrude Stein later called these people members of "The Lost Generation. "

FRANK OLIVER: The book was an immediate success. At the age of twenty-five Ernest Hemingway was famous.

Many people, however, could not recognize Hemingway's art because they did not like what he wrote about. Hemingway's sentences were short, the way he had been taught to write at the Kansas City Star newspaper. He wrote about what he knew and felt. He used few descriptive words. His statements were clear and easily understood.

He had learned from earlier writers, like Ring Lardner and Sherwood Anderson. But Hemingway brought something new to his writing. He was able to paint in words what he saw and felt. In later books, sometimes he missed. Sometimes he even looked foolish. But when he was right he was almost perfect.

(MUSIC)

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: With the success of his novel, Hemingway became even more popular in Paris. Many people came to see him. One was an American woman, Pauline Pfeiffer. She became Hadley's friend. Then Pauline fell in love with Hemingway.

Hemingway and Pauline saw each other secretly. One time, they went away together on a short trip. Years later, Hemingway wrote about returning home after that trip: "When I saw Hadley again, I wished I had died before I ever loved anyone but her. She was smiling and the sun was on her lovely face. "

But the marriage was over. Ernest Hemingway and Hadley separated. She kept their son. He agreed to give her money he earned from his books.
In later years, he looked back at his marriage to Hadley as the happiest time of his life.

(MUSIC)

FRANK OLIVER: This People in America program was written by Richard Thorman and Bill Rogers. I'm Frank Oliver.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: And I'm Shirley Griffith. Join us again next week for the final part of the story of Ernest Hemingway in Special English on the Voice of America.

7/8 Final Listening Exam. (Number Three)

2011-05-17T09:50:00.000-07:00

"Cubist Dragon" by Rose Peng

The teacher will supply the test booklet and the Scantron card for this test. Please, don't write on the test booklet. Write on the Scantron card only. Choose one answer, marking a, b, c, or d, whichever you think is correct. If you want to change an answer, erase the first one completely. When you're finished, return the test booklet and the Scantron card to the teacher. The teacher will correct your Scantron card and give you your results.

Tag Questions Quiz

Reported Speech: Lessons and Exercises

2011-05-08T10:37:00.000-07:00

Max Ernst, "Phases of the Moon", 1946
Reported Speech, Lesson 7: Jennifer explains the difference between direct quotes and reported speech.
Reported Speech, Lesson 8. Jennifer explains how reference words change in reported speech.
Reported Speech, Lesson 9. In this lesson, Jennifer explains that the rule of sequence of tenses (changing tenses in reported speech) doesn't have to be followed if the reported statement is 1. a general truth 2. an immediate reporting 3. informal speech 4. if "say" is in present, present perfect, or future.
Reported Speech, Lesson 10. Jennifer explains how verbs "shift back" when they are used in reported speech. This "shift" is called "The rule of sequence of tenses."
Reported Speech, Lesson 11. Jennifer continues to explain how verbs "shift back" in reported speech. Modals, she will explain, "shift back" to their past forms. (but be careful with "must", it has no past form. So, you have to say, "had to"
Reported Speech, Lesson 12. In this lesson, Jennifer explains that verb tenses change when your report real conditionals, but not when you report unreal conditionals.
Reported Speech, Lesson 13. Jennifer explains how to report yes/no questions. You must use "if" or "whether" and follow the rule for noun clauses as well as the rule of sequence of tenses.
Reported Speech, Lesson 14. Jennifer tells how to report questions that begin with question words.
Reported Speech, Lesson 16. In this lesson, Jennifer explains how to use the infinitive to report imperative statements.
Reported Speech Practice. This is a very complete and challenging grammar exercise for reported speech. It is practice using "the rule of sequence of tenses.

The following is good conversation practice: Try them with a partner dialogues

Practice With Conditionals

2011-04-23T22:56:00.000-07:00

"The Governors of The Hospital of Saint Elisabeth" Franz Hals, 1661

Chalk 'N Talk by Brian Rhodes: The Three Main Conditional Forms
Future, Real Conditional or Present, Unreal Conditional?
"It Might As Well Be Spring" written by Rogers and Hammerstein, sung by Ella Fitzgerald.
Past Unreal Conditional Practice and Jennifer's Lessons: 2e and 2f
The Volcano is Destroying Pompeii
B.B.C. Planet Earth: "Fresh Water"
"Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" The Beatles
Reported Speech, Lesson 7: Jennifer explains the difference between direct quotes and reported speech.
Reported Speech Practice. This is a very complete and challenging grammar exercise for reported speech.

"Understanding Our Universe" - Albert Einstein

2011-03-25T19:00:00.000-07:00

(MUSIC)

VOICE ONE:

This is Steve Ember.

VOICE TWO:

And this is Sarah Long with the VOA Special English program, Explorations. Today we tell about a scientist who changed the way we understand the universe, Albert Einstein.

(MUSIC)

VOICE ONE:

In the year nineteen-oh-five, Albert Einstein published some important papers in a German scientific magazine. They included one of the most important scientific documents in history. It was filled with mathematics. It explained what came to be called his “Special Theory of Relativity.” Ten years later he expanded it to a “General Theory of Relativity.”

Albert Einstein’s theories of relativity are about the basic ideas we use to describe natural happenings. They are about time, space, mass, movement, and gravity.

VOICE TWO:

Albert Einstein was born in Ulm, Germany, in eighteen seventy-nine. His father owned a factory that made electrical devices. His mother enjoyed music and books. His parents were Jewish but they did not observe many of the religion’s rules.

Albert was a quiet child who spent much of his time alone. He was slow to talk and had difficulty learning to read.

When Albert was five years old, his father gave him a compass. The child was filled with wonder when he discovered that the compass needle always pointed in the same direction -- to the north. He asked his father and his uncle what caused the needle to move.

Their answers about magnetism and gravity were difficult for the boy to understand. Yet he spent a lot of time thinking about them. He said later that he felt something hidden had to be behind things.

VOICE ONE:

Albert did not like school. The German schools of that time were not pleasant. Students could not ask questions. Albert said he felt as if he were in prison.

One story says Albert told his Uncle Jacob how much he hated school, especially mathematics. His uncle told him to solve mathematical problems by pretending to be a policeman. “You are looking for someone,” he said, “but you do not know who. Call him X. Find him by using the mathematical tools of algebra and geometry.”

VOICE TWO:

Albert learned to love mathematics. He was studying the complex mathematics of calculus when all his friends were still studying simple mathematics. Instead of playing with friends he thought about things such as: “What would happen if people could travel at the speed of light?”

Albert decided that he wanted to teach mathematics and physics. He attended the Federal Polytechnic Institute in Zurich, Switzerland. He graduated with honors, but could not get a teaching job. So he began working for the Swiss government as an inspector of patents for new inventions. The job was not demanding. He had a lot of time to think about some of his scientific theories.

VOICE ONE:

From the time he was a boy, Albert Einstein had performed what he called “thought experiments” to test his ideas. He used his mind as a laboratory. By nineteen oh-five, he had formed his ideas into theories that he published.

In one paper he said that light travels both in waves and in particles, called photons. This idea is an important part of what is called the quantum theory.

Another paper was about the motion of small particles suspended in a liquid or gas. It confirmed the atomic theory of matter.

The most important of Albert Einstein’s theories published that year became known as his “Special Theory of Relativity.” He said the speed of light is always the same -- almost three hundred thousand kilometers a second. Where the light is coming from or who is measuring it does not change the speed. However, he said, time can change. And mass can change. And length can change. They depend on where a person is in relation to an object or an event.

VOICE TWO:

Imagine two space vehicles with a scientist travelling in each one. One spaceship is red. One is blue. Except for color, both spaceships are exactly alike. They pass one another far out in space.

Neither scientist feels that his ship is moving. To each, it seems that the other ship is moving, not his. As they pass at high speed, the scientist in each ship measures how long it takes a beam of light to travel from the floor to the top of his spaceship, hit a mirror and return to the floor. Each spaceship has a window that lets each scientist see the experiment of the other.

VOICE ONE:

They begin their experiments at exactly the same moment. The scientist in the blue ship sees his beam of light go straight up and come straight down. But he sees that the light beam in the red ship does not do this. The red ship is moving so fast that the beam does not appear to go straight up. It forms a path up and down that looks like an upside down “V”.

The scientist in the red ship would see exactly the same thing as he watched the experiment by the other scientist. He could say that time passed more slowly in the other ship. Each scientist would be correct, because the passing of time is linked to the position of the observer.

Each scientist also would see that the other spaceship was shorter than his own. The higher the speeds the spaceships were travelling, the shorter the other ship would appear. And although the other ship would seem shorter, its mass would increase. It would seem to get heavier.

The ideas were difficult to accept. Yet other scientists did experiments to prove that Einstein’s theory was correct.

VOICE TWO:

Ten years after his paper on the special theory of relativity, Albert Einstein finished work on another theory. It described what he called his “General Theory of Relativity.” It expanded his special theory to include the motion of objects that are gaining speed. This theory offered new ideas about gravity and the close relationship between matter and energy. It built on the ideas about mass he had expressed in nineteen oh-five.

Einstein said that an object loses mass when it gives off light, which is a kind of energy. He believed that matter and energy were different forms of the same thing. That was the basis of his famous mathematical statement E equals m-c squared (energy equals mass times the speed of light squared). This statement or formula explained that a great amount of energy could come from a small piece of matter. It explained how the sun could give off heat and light for millions of years. This formula also led to the discovery of atomic energy.

VOICE ONE:

In his general theory of relativity, Einstein said that gravity, like time, is not always the same. Gravity changes as observers speed up or slow down. He also said that gravity from very large objects, such as stars, could turn the path of light waves that passed nearby. This seemed unbelievable. But in nineteen nineteen, British scientists confirmed his theory when the sun was completely blocked during a solar eclipse. Albert Einstein immediately became famous around the world.

In nineteen twenty-one, he won the Nobel Prize in Physics. It was given to him, not for his theories of relativity, but for his discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect. This scientific law explained how and why some metals give off electrons after light falls on their surfaces. The discovery led to the development of modern electronics, including radio and television.

VOICE TWO:

Albert Einstein taught in Switzerland and Germany. He left Germany when Adolph Hitler came to power in nineteen thirty-three. He moved to the United States to continue his research. He worked at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. Einstein became a citizen of the United States in nineteen forty.

VOICE ONE:

Einstein was a famous man, but you would not have known that by looking at him. His white hair was long and wild. He wore old clothes. He showed an inner joy when he was playing his violin or talking about his work. Students and friends said he had a way of explaining difficult ideas using images that were easy to understand.

Albert Einstein opposed wars. Yet he wrote to President Franklin Roosevelt in nineteen thirty-nine to advise him that the United States should develop an atomic bomb before Germany did.

Einstein spent the last twenty-five years of his life working on what he called a “unified field theory.” He hoped to find a common mathematical statement that could tie together all the different parts of physics. He did not succeed.

Albert Einstein died in nineteen fifty-five. He was seventy-six years old.

(MUSIC)

VOICE TWO:

This Special English program was written by Marilyn Christiano and produced by Paul Thompson. This is Sarah Long.

VOICE ONE:

And this is Steve Ember. Join us again next week for another Explorations program on the Voice of America.

Reading Comprehension For ESL Students: "The Nightwalkers" from Edcon Publishing.

2011-03-06T14:26:00.000-08:00

Reading Comprehension For ESL Students: "The Nightwalkers" from Edcon Publishing.

"The Carter Family Gives Birth to Country Music" from VOA

2011-03-05T12:48:00.000-08:00

STEVE EMBER: I’m Steve Ember.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: And I’m Shirley Griffith with PEOPLE IN AMERICA in VOA Special English. Today we tell about the Carter Family, the First Family of country music.

STEVE EMBER: It was August second, nineteen twenty-seven. The news had spread fast. A man named Ralph Peer was coming to the city of Bristol, on the border between Virginia and Tennessee. He wanted to make recordings of local people singing and playing musical instruments. And he said he would pay fifty dollars for each song recorded. That was a lot of money in those days.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: Many people came to Bristol that day to play for Mr. Peer. But one group seemed to have just the sound that he was looking for. They were a man named A.P. Carter, his wife, Sara, and her cousin, Maybelle. They had traveled more than one hundred twenty-five kilometers from their home in the mountains of Virginia. They called themselves the Carter family.

(MUSIC: “THE STORMS ARE ON THE OCEAN”)

STEVE EMBER: Sara sang lead, the loudest and highest notes. A.P. sang bass, the lowest notes. Maybelle sang harmony, somewhere in between. She also played the guitar in a new and unusual way. It sounded almost like two people were playing at the same time. She played the main part of the songs on the lowest guitar strings. And then she quickly strummed by playing all the strings at once. This kind of playing became known as the “Carter Scratch.” Guitarists around the world would soon begin to copy her style.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: Those first recordings were sent to radio stations throughout the United States. Many listeners were surprised at what they heard. Instead of classical or jazz songs that radio stations usually played, a new sound was born.

The Carter Family sounded different. They did not sound like they had taken music lessons. But it did not matter. The people in poor rural areas thought they sounded just like their neighbors, or the people who sang in their churches.

Up until then, they had never heard people like themselves perform on the radio. Soon the Carters were being called country singers, because their music came from rural country areas and not big cities.

STEVE EMBER: The Carters sang songs about living in the mountains of Virginia, Tennessee, and North Carolina. They sang about the love of a young man for a special girl. They sang about the beauty of nature. They sang about dying and sadness. And they sang religious songs that told of hope for a better life after death.

(MUSIC: “CAN THE CIRCLE BE UNBROKEN”)

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: A.P. Carter sang in the group and also searched for new songs. He often traveled long distances to small towns in the southeastern United States. He wanted to hear the songs that local people sang in their communities. He wrote down the words but kept the music in his memory. When he returned home, he helped Sarah and Maybelle fit them to the Carter Family musical style.

STEVE EMBER: The Carter Family soon became famous. They recorded more songs. They traveled to many cities and towns in the eastern United States to perform. Thousands of people heard them sing and bought their recordings.

Some people estimate that within three years, the Carter Family sold three hundred thousand recordings.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: In the early nineteen thirties many Americans were poor. The Great Depression had begun. Many people had no jobs. But somehow they found enough money to buy the recordings of the music they loved. A.P., Sarah, and Maybelle Carter knew that the economy was very bad. They knew what it was like to be poor. So they always tried to sing a few songs to make people feel happy.

(MUSIC: “KEEP ON THE SUNNY SIDE”)

STEVE EMBER: The Carter Family continued to make recordings and perform their music live for several years. In nineteen thirty-eight, they traveled to Texas. A very powerful radio station was a short distance across the border in Mexico. It could broadcast much farther than any radio station in the United States. The Carters performed on the station twice each day. Now people from all over America and in some foreign countries could hear them.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: As a musical group, the Carter Family was a great success. But there were problems that the public did not know about. For years, A.P. and Sarah had not been happy with each other. Finally, their marriage ended in divorce. Three years later, Sarah married A.P.’s cousin. The group continued to perform together, but it was not easy. And then, in nineteen forty-three, it all came to an end. Sarah and her second husband moved to California. A.P. Carter also stopped performing, and moved back home to Clinch Mountain to live out the rest of his life.

(MUSIC: “MY CLINCH MOUNTAIN HOME”)

STEVE EMBER: So now the Carter Family was down to one. Maybelle Carter was the only one left to perform. She decided it was not yet time to retire to her “Old Clinch Mountain Home.” She continued to play her guitar and sing. She also played the autoharp. She appeared many times on the live radio program “The Grand Ole Opry” in Nashville, Tennessee. She became known as Mother Maybelle, the mother of American country music.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: In the nineteen fifties and sixties, her daughters performed and made recordings with Mother Maybelle. They appeared many times with the famous country music singer Johnny Cash. June Carter, one of Maybelle’s daughters, married Johnny Cash in nineteen sixty-eight. They all sang together until Mother Maybelle’s death in nineteen seventy-eight.

STEVE EMBER: The Carter Family is remembered today as the First Family of American country music. Their most famous song is still played today. It is about love that did not last. It is called “Wildwood Flower.”

(MUSIC: “WILDWOOD FLOWER”)

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH:

He told me he loved me and called me his flower

That blossomed for him all the brighter each hour

Though my heart is now breaking, he shall never know

That his name makes me tremble, my pale cheeks to glow

I’ll sing and I’ll dance and my laugh shall be gay

I’ll charm every heart and the crowd I will away

I’ll live you to see him regret the dark hour

When he won and neglected this frail wildwood flower

STEVE EMBER: This program was written by Jim Tedder and produced by Dana Demange. I’m Steve Ember.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: And I’m Shirley Griffith. Our programs are online with transcripts and MP3 files at voaspecialenglish.com. And you can find us on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube at VOA Learning English. Join us again next week for PEOPLE IN AMERICA in VOA Special English.

"The History of The Video Game" from VOA.

2011-02-28T19:31:00.001-08:00

CHRISTOPHER CRUISE: I’m Christopher Cruise.

BARBARA KLEIN: And I’m Barbara Klein with EXPLORATIONS in VOA Special English. Video games have evolved over the past fifty years into one of the most popular forms of modern media entertainment. This week on our program, we explore the history of video games and look at some popular releases from the past year.

(MUSIC)

CHRISTOPHER CRUISE: Early versions of video games were not devices for the average person to play at home. Programmers developed them using what were then huge university computers.

In nineteen sixty-two, a team of students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology developed a game called Spacewar! It had a big influence on future games. But it could only be played on a computer at MIT.

BARBARA KLEIN: Ten years later, in nineteen seventy-two, an engineer named Nolan Bushnell and a programmer, Ted Dabney, started the Atari company in California. Atari produced coin-operated video games.

Their first big hit was called Pong. It was an electronic form of ping-pong or table tennis that was easy enough for anyone to play. Atari video games became hugely popular at arcade centers.

Soon, other companies in Japan and the United States started making similar games. Popular games during the late seventies and early eighties included Space Invaders, Asteroids, Defender and Pac-Man.

CHRISTOPHER CRUISE: Little by little, gaming technology became more complex.

Back in the nineteen sixties, an engineer named Ralph Baer started work on an idea. He wanted to turn television sets in every home into a gaming device. His work resulted in the development of the Magnavox Odyssey, a video-game console for home use. The system was released in nineteen seventy-two and came with twelve games.

But it was hard to compete against Atari. Atari's video game system became the most successful on the American market. And it stayed that way until the market crashed briefly in nineteen eighty-three.

BARBARA KLEIN: By that point, another company had established itself as a big name in gaming: Nintendo. The Japanese company was not new at making games. It began in the nineteenth century as a producer of traditional playing cards.

The family-owned business later expanded into developing other kinds of toys.

Nintendo also began developing arcade games, and then game systems that could be played at home. One of the most influential programmers in the world works for Nintendo. Shigeru Miyamoto helped create hits like Donkey Kong, Super Mario Brothers and the Legend of Zelda.

CHRISTOPHER CRUISE: Nintendo also found success with the Nintendo Entertainment System for playing video games at home and the handheld Game Boy.

Today the main competitors to Nintendo systems are Sony’s PlayStation and Microsoft’s X-Box 360.

In two thousand six Nintendo released its first Wii system. The Wii was not like a traditional video game. It was the first wireless system that could capture the movements of the player’s body. This way people could play sports against the game or against another person without ever leaving the house.

These days Wii systems can be found in retirement homes and community centers. One of Nintendo's aims with the Wii was to make video gaming more social and more popular with wider audiences.

(MUSIC)

BARBARA KLEIN: GamePro Media is a publishing company that follows the gaming industry. We asked news editor A. J. Glasser what makes a good video game.

AJ GLASSER: “It’s difficult to say. It will be different, I will say, for each platform.”

BARBARA KLEIN:

For example, games on mobile devices are less technically complex than games played on a system at home and with a high-definition TV. Those games can be enjoyed for hours.

Ms. Glasser says a great game on a mobile phone is a game that can be played for a short time -- even for just a minute on the train.

CHRISTOPHER CRUISE: We also asked her about some of the best games of the past year. She says the horror game Dead Space 2 has been extremely successful.

AJ GLASSER: “It’s sort of a visceral, very gory sort of horror game but at the same time sort of a psychological thriller.”

CHRISTOPHER CRUISE: Another popular game is Red Dead Redemption.

AJ GLASSER: “It’s open world in the way that Grand Theft Auto is, so you play a character that can go almost anywhere, and do almost anything. But it’s set in the Wild West, so you are doing it with horses.”

BARBARA KLEIN: A.J. Glasser at GamePro Media says the video game industry recognizes that many gamers today are girls and women.

AJ GLASSER: “It’s no longer just the twelve- to twenty-one-year-old boys that want to shoot up people or just solve puzzles. It’s everyone wants to play a little bit. So they try to make games for everyone, or at least make games that don’t forbid anyone from enjoying them.”

(MUSIC)

CHRISTOPHER CRUISE: Ryota Wada is a ten-year-old boy who recently moved with his family from Tokyo to Herndon, Virginia, outside Washington. Ryota is listed in the twenty eleven Gamer's Edition of Guinness World Records. He received a perfect score on the most difficult level of Dance Dance Revolution.

The game plays music and requires players to move their feet in difficult dance moves. Ryota began playing Dance Dance Revolution when he was three. He spends hours day playing the game he loves.

BARBARA KLEIN: But is it healthy to spend so much time playing video games? The journal Pediatrics recently published a new study. Researchers studied about three thousand students in Singapore for two years. The study found that children who played video games "obsessively" had higher rates of depression, social fears and stress. Of course, that observation alone does not prove that video games cause mental illness.

Other studies have linked violence in video games to aggressive behavior. In nineteen ninety-three American lawmakers pressured the video game industry to develop a rating system. Since then the industry has rated games based on the age group for which they are considered acceptable.

CHRISTOPHER CRUISE: Video games may have their critics, but other experts see them as offering benefits. The Journal of Adolescent Health just published a new study by researchers at Brigham Young University in Utah.

The researchers said girls who played video games with a parent behaved better, felt more connected to their families and had stronger mental health. Said researcher Laura Padilla-Walker: “We’re guessing it’s a daddy-daughter thing, because not a lot of moms said yes when we asked them if they played video games."

For boys, playing video games with a parent made no noticeable difference in their behavior.

Other studies suggest that video games can be useful in teaching, supporting teamwork and improving hand-eye coordination.

(MUSIC)

BARBARA KLEIN: Mobile phones and other devices have created big competition for the handheld video-game industry. People might wonder why they need to buy a device like Sony’s PlayStation Portable or Nintendo’s DS player. Games that can be downloaded to a phone cost a lot less than games for those handheld players.

CHRISTOPHER CRUISE: For example, the game Angry Birds is a huge hit on the Apple iPhone and other devices. Players launch birds to try to crush their enemies, the fat green pigs. The game is easy enough for children yet difficult enough to keep adults interested. The game has been downloaded tens of millions of times around the world.

A market research company reported an early estimate of fifteen and a half billion dollars in sales of all games content in the United States last year. The NPD Group said that was about the same as the year before.

BARBARA KLEIN: In March, Nintendo will launch the American release of a new device that might make some people forget about playing games on their phones.

The new handheld game player, the Nintendo 3DS, offers three-dimensional images that do not require special glasses. The 3-D technology is not for everyone, though. The company warns that children six years old and younger should not play its games in 3-D mode. Experts say looking at the images for long periods of time could damage young eyes.

CHRISTOPHER CRUISE: Sony is also working on new handheld game devices. In late January, the company announced its next-generation portable entertainment system. The system does not have a name yet but it will have a touch screen, two cameras and 3G wireless service. The system is expected to be released by the end of the year, offering another example of the continuing evolution of video games.

(MUSIC)

BARBARA KLEIN: Our program was written and produced by Dana Demange. I'm Barbara Klein.

CHRISTOPHER CRUISE: And I’m Christopher Cruise. Our programs are online with transcripts and MP3s at voaspecialenglish.com -- where you can also tell us what video games you like and how often you play. You can also post comments on our Facebook wall at VOA Learning English. Join us again next week for EXPLORATIONS in VOA Special English.

Want a career in Video Games? Check out this video from Youtube and VOA:

"American Culture During The Depression" from VOA.

2011-02-22T14:29:00.000-08:00

A Still from "Gone With the Wind"

THE MAKING OF A NATION – a program in Special English by the Voice of America.

Hard economic times and social conflict have always offered a rich source of material for artists and writers. A painter's colors can show the drying of dreams or the flight of human spirits. A musician can express the tensions and uncertainty of a people in struggle. The pressures of hard times can be the force to lift a writer's imagination to new heights.

So it was during the 1930s in the United States. The severe economic crisis -- the Great Depression -- created an atmosphere for artistic imagination and creative expression. The common feeling of struggle also led millions of Americans to look together to films, radio, and other new art forms for relief from their day-to-day cares. Our program today looks at American arts and popular culture during the 1930s.

(MUSIC)

The most popular sound of the 1930s was a new kind of music -- "swing" music. And the "King of Swing" was a clarinet player named Benny Goodman.

(MUSIC)

Benny Goodman and other musicians made swing music extremely popular during the 1930s. Swing music was a new form of jazz. Many of its first players were black musicians in small, unknown groups. It was only when more well-known white musicians started playing swing music in the middle 1930s that the new music became wildly popular.

One reason for the popularity of swing music was the growing power of radio during the 1930s.

Radio had already proven in earlier years that it could be an important force in both politics and popular culture. Millions of Americans bought radios during the 1920s. But radio grew up in the 1930s. Producers became more skillful in creating programs. And actors and actresses began to understand the special needs and power of this new electronic art form.

Swing music was not the only kind of music that radio helped make popular. The 1930s also saw increasing popularity for traditional, classical music by Beethoven, Bach, and other great musicians.

In 1930, the Columbia Broadcasting System began a series of concerts by the New York Philharmonic Orchestra on Sunday afternoons. The next year, the National Broadcasting Company, NBC, began weekly opera concerts.

In 1937, NBC asked Arturo Toscanini of Italy to lead an orchestra on American radio. Toscanini was the greatest orchestra leader of his day. Millions of Americans listened at Christmas time as Toscanini and the NBC Orchestra began playing the first of ten special radio concerts.

It was a great moment for both music and radio. For the first time, millions of average Americans were able to hear classical music by great musicians as it was being played.

Music was an important reason why millions of Americans gathered to listen to the radio during the 1930s. But even more popular were a series of weekly programs with exciting or funny new actors.

Families would come home from school or work and laugh at the foolish experiences of such actors as Jack Benny, Fred Allen, George Burns, Edgar Bergen, and W.C. Fields. Radio helped people forget the hard conditions of the Great Depression. And it helped to bring Americans together and share experiences.

Swing music. Classical music. Great comedy programs. The 1930s truly were a golden period for radio and mass communications. But it was also during this period that Hollywood and the American film industry became much more skilled and influential.

In previous years, films were silent. But the "talkies" arrived in the 1930s. Directors could produce films in which actors could talk. Americans reacted by attending film theaters by the millions. It was a great time for Hollywood.

The films had exciting new actors. Spencer Tracy. Bette Davis. Katharine Hepburn. The young Shirley Temple. The most famous film of the period was "Gone with the Wind" with actor Clark Gable and actress Vivien Leigh. Directors in the 1930s also produced such great films as "It Happened One Night," "Mutiny on the Bounty," and "The Life of Emile Zola."

The success of radio and films, as well as the depression itself, caused problems for many Americans newspapers during the 1930s. The trouble was not so much that readers stopped buying newspapers. It was that companies talked about their products through advertisements on radio instead of buying advertising space in newspapers.

Nearly half of the nation's independently-published newspapers either stopped publishing or joined larger companies during the 1930s. By World War Two, only one-hundred-twenty cities had competing newspapers.

Weekly and monthly publications faced the same problem as daily newspapers -- increased competition from radio and films. Many magazines failed. The two big successes of the period were Life Magazine and the Reader's Digest.

Life Magazine had stories for everyone about film actors, news events, or just daily life in the home or on the farm. Its photographs were the greatest anywhere. Reader's Digest published shorter forms of stories from other magazines and sources.

Most popular books of the period were like the films coming from Hollywood. Writers cared more about helping people forget their troubles than about facing serious social issues. They made more money that way, too.

But a number of writers in the 1930s did produce books that were both profitable and of high quality. One was Sinclair Lewis. His book, "It Can't Happen Here," warned of the coming dangers of fascism. John Steinbeck's great book, "The Grapes of Wrath," helped millions understand and feel in their hearts the troubles faced by poor farmers.

Erskine Caldwell wrote about the cruelty of life among poor people in the southeastern United States, and James T. Farrell about life in Chicago.

The same social concern and desire to present life as it really existed also were clear in the work of many American artists during the 1930s. Thomas Benton painted workers and others with strong tough bodies. Edward Hopper showed the sad streets of American cities. Reginald Marsh painted picture after picture of poor parts of New York City.

The federal government created a program that gave jobs to artists. They painted their pictures on the walls of airports, post offices, and schools. The program brought their ideas and creativity to millions of people.

At the same time, photography became more important as cameras improved in quality and became more moveable. Some photographers like Margaret Bourke-White and Walker Evans used their cameras to report the hard conditions of the Depression.

All this activity in the arts and popular culture played an important part in the lives of Americans during the 1930s. It not only provided relief from their troubles, but expanded their minds and pushed their imaginations.

The tensions and troubles of the Great Depression provided a rich atmosphere for artists and others to produce works that were serious, foolish, or just plain fun. And those works, in turn, helped make life a little better as Americans waited, worked, and hoped for times to improve.

(MUSIC)

You have been listening to THE MAKING OF A NATION, a program in Special English by the Voice of America. Your narrators have been Steve Ember and Bob Doughty. Our program was written by David Jarmul. The Voice of America invites you to listen again next week to THE MAKING OF A NATION.

COMPREHENSION CHECK

1. Hard economic times can _______________ an artist's imagination.
a. depress
b. limit
c. stimulate
d. exaggerate

2. During The Great Depression of the 1930s, people gained _________ from their day-to-day troubles by going to films, listening to the radio, and viewing new art forms.
a. pleasure
b. relief
c. anxiety
d. financial security

3. The most popular music of the 1930s was known as "_____________."
a. Swing
b. Jazz
c. Rock
d. Classical

4. People listened to the radio not only for news and music, but also for __________ programs.
a. historical
b. Toscanini
c. science
d. comedy

5. The type of movie in which you could hear actors' speech was called the ____________ .
a. silent film
b. talkie
c. adventure film
d. radio film

6. One of the following performers is not a comedian:
a. Benny Goodman
b. Jack Benny
c. George Burns
d. W.C. Fields

7. Newspapers began to go out of business in the 30s because _______________ used radio more.
a. entertainers
b. musicians
c. advertisers
d. journalists

8. John Steinbeck's great book "The Grapes of Wrath" told about the troubles of ___________ .
a. fascist victims
b. failed businessmen
c. poor farmers
d. Chicago residents

9. Another name for this article could be ___________________ .
a. "Film and Radio in the 30s"
b. "The Healing Culture of The Great Depression"
c. "Great Comics of the 1930s"
d. "Musical Trends in Desperate Times"

10. This article is mainly about ___________________ .
a. the music of The Great Depression
b. the culture of The Great Depression
c. photography and painting in the 30s
d. the tough economic realities of the 30s

See the trailer for "Gone With The Wind":

"Charles Lindbergh" a great solo pilot from Voice of America.

2011-02-15T18:08:00.000-08:00

EXPLORATIONS -- a program in Special English by the Voice of America.
Today, Richard Rael and Shep O'Neal tell the story of one of America's most famous pilots, Charles Lindbergh.
Charles Lindbergh is probably one of the best-known people in the history of flight. He was a hero of the world. Yet, years later, he was denounced as an enemy of his country. He had what is called a "storybook" marriage and family life. Yet he suffered a terrible family tragedy.
Charles Lindbergh was born in the city of Detroit, Michigan, on February fourth, nineteen-oh-two. He grew up on a farm in Minnesota. His mother was a school teacher. His father was a lawyer who later became a United States congressman. The family spent ten years in Washington, D.C. while Mr. Lindbergh served in the Congress.
Young Charles studied mechanical engineering for a time at the University of Wisconsin. But he did not like sitting in a classroom. So, after one-and-one-half years, he left the university. He traveled around the country on a motorcycle.
He settled in Lincoln, Nebraska. He took his first flying lessons there and passed the test to become a flier. But he had to wait one year before he could fly alone. That is how long it took him to save five hundred dollars to buy his own plane.
Charles Lindbergh later wrote about being a new pilot. He said he felt different from people who never flew. "In flying," he said, "I tasted a wine of the gods of which people on the ground could know nothing."
He said he hoped to fly for at least ten years. After that, if he died in a crash, he said it would be all right. He was willing to give up a long, normal life for a short, exciting life as a flier.
From Nebraska, Lindbergh moved to San Antonio, Texas, where he joined the United States Army Air Corps Reserve. When he finished flight training school, he was named best pilot in his class.
After he completed his Army training, the Robertson Aircraft Company of Saint Louis hired him. His job was to fly mail between Saint Louis and Chicago.
Lindbergh flew mostly at night through all kinds of weather. Two times, fog or storms forced him to jump out of his plane. Both times, he landed safely by parachute. Other fliers called him "Lucky Lindy."
In nineteen nineteen, a wealthy hotel owner in New York City offered a prize for flying across the Atlantic Ocean without stopping. The first pilot who flew non-stop from New York to Paris would get twenty-five thousand dollars.
A number of pilots tried. Several were killed. After eight years, no one had won the prize. Charles Lindbergh believed he could win the money if he could get the right airplane.
A group of businessmen in Saint Louis agreed to provide most of the money he needed for the kind of plane he wanted. He designed the aircraft himself for long-distance flying. It carried a large amount of fuel. Some people described it as a "fuel tank with wings, a motor and a seat." Lindbergh named it the Spirit of Saint Louis.
In May, nineteen twenty-seven, Lindbergh flew his plane from San Diego, California, to an airfield outside New York City. He made the flight in the record time of twenty-one hours, twenty minutes.
At the New York airfield, he spent a few days preparing for his flight across the Atlantic. He wanted to make sure his plane's engine worked perfectly. He loaded a rubber boat in case of emergency. He also loaded some food and water, but only enough for a meal or two.
"If I get to Paris," Lindbergh said, "I will not need any more food or water than that. If I do not get to Paris, I will not need any more, either."
May twentieth started as a rainy day. But experts told Lindbergh that weather conditions over the Atlantic Ocean were improving. A mechanic started the engine of the Spirit of Saint Louis.
"It sounds good to me," the mechanic said. "Well, then," said Lindbergh, "I might as well go."
The plane carried a heavy load of fuel. It struggled to fly up and over the telephone wires at the end of the field. Then, climbing slowly, the Spirit of Saint Louis flew out of sight. Lindbergh was on his way to Paris.
Part of the flight was through rain, sleet and snow. At times, Lindbergh flew just three meters above the water. At other times, he flew more than three thousand meters up. He said his greatest fear was falling asleep. He had not slept the night before he left.
During the thirty-three-hour flight, thousands of people waited by their radios to hear if any ships had seen Lindbergh's plane. There was no news from Lindbergh himself. He did not carry a radio. He had removed it to provide more space for fuel.
On the evening of May twenty-first, people heard the exciting news. Lindbergh had landed at Le Bourget airport near Paris. Even before the plane's engine stopped, Lindbergh and the Spirit of Saint Louis were surrounded by a huge crowd of shouting, crying, joyful people.
From the moment he landed in France, he was a hero. The French, British and Belgian governments gave him their highest honors.
Back home in the United States, he received his own country's highest awards. The cities of Washington and New York honored him with big parades. He flew to cities all over the United States for celebrations.
He also flew to several Latin American countries as a representative of the United States government. During a trip to Mexico, he met Anne Morrow, the daughter of the American ambassador. They were married in nineteen twenty-nine.
Lindbergh taught his new wife to fly. Together, they made many long flights. Life seemed perfect. Then, everything changed.
On a stormy night in nineteen thirty-two, kidnappers took the baby son of Charles and Anne Lindbergh from their home in New Jersey. Ten weeks later, the boy's body was found. Police caught the murderer several years later. A court found him guilty and sentenced him to death.
The kidnapping and the trial were big news. Reporters gave the Lindberghs no privacy. So Charles and Anne fled to Britain and then to France to try to escape the press. They lived in Europe for four years. But they saw the nations of Europe preparing for war. They returned home before war broke out in nineteen thirty-nine.
Charles Lindbergh did not believe the United States should take part in the war. He made many speeches calling for the United States to remain neutral. He said he did not think the other countries of Europe could defeat the strong military forces of Germany. He said the answer was a negotiated peace.
President Franklin Roosevelt did not agree. A Congressman speaking for the president called Lindbergh an enemy of his country. Many people also criticized Lindbergh for not returning a medal of honor he received from Nazi Germany.
Charles Lindbergh no longer was America's hero.
Lindbergh stopped calling for American neutrality two years later, when Japan attacked the United States navy base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. The attack brought America into the war.
Lindbergh spent the war years as an advisor to companies that made American warplanes. He also helped train American military pilots. Although he was a civilian, he flew about fifty combat flights.
Lindbergh loved flying. But flying was not his only interest.
While living in France, he worked with a French doctor to develop a mechanical heart. He helped scientists to discover Maya Indian ruins in Mexico. He became interested in the cultures of people from African countries and from the Philippines. And he led campaigns to make people understand the need to protect nature and the environment.
Charles Lindbergh died in nineteen seventy-four, once again recognized as an American hero. President Gerald Ford said Lindbergh represented all that was best in America -- honesty, courage and the desire to succeed.
Today, the Spirit of Saint Louis -- the plane Lindbergh flew to Paris -- hangs in the Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C. And the man who flew it -- Charles Lindbergh -- remains a symbol of the skill and courage that opened the skies to human flight.
(MUSIC)
This Special English program was written by Marilyn Rice Christiano. Your narrators were Richard Rael and Shep O'Neal.
I'm Shirley Griffith.

"Hosni Mubarak Resigns. Egypt Wins the Day" from VOA

2011-02-11T21:38:00.000-08:00

This is IN THE NEWS in VOA Special English.
The resignation of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak after eighteen days of protests filled Cairo's Tahrir, or Liberation, Square with celebrations.

(SOUND)

CROWD: "Freedom!"

But with that freedom comes unanswered questions about Egypt's political future.

On Thursday, Mr. Mubarak had again told Egyptians that he would stay in power until elections planned for September. But on Friday his recently appointed vice president, Omar Suleiman, announced the resignation of the eighty-two-year-old president. He said Mr. Mubarak had asked the military to take control.

AP
An Egyptian woman among many celebrating in Tahrir Square in Cairo

President Obama says the resignation marks only a beginning of Egypt's transition. Mr. Obama said Egyptians had made it clear that they will accept "nothing less than genuine democracy." He said the military will now have to make sure the transition takes place in a way that Egyptians can trust.

BARACK OBAMA: "That means protecting the rights of Egypt's citizens, lifting the emergency law, revising the constitution and other laws to make this change irreversible and laying out a clear path to elections that are fair and free. Above all this transition must bring all of Egypt's voices to the table."

Mr. Mubarak survived at least six assassination attempts as president. He was vice president to Anwar Sadat. He became president in October of nineteen eighty-one after militants killed Mr. Sadat.

Under Mr. Mubarak's rule, Egypt kept peace with Israel and close ties with the West. His government was an important ally of the United States in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. He also earned Western support for his efforts to suppress Islamic extremism.

But he kept Egypt under a deeply unpopular emergency law that restricted freedoms and gave the police wide powers of arrest. Members of the Muslim Brotherhood, Egypt's leading opposition group, were often targets of those arrests.

We asked Egyptians and others to comment on Mr. Mubarak's resignation on the VOA Learning English page on Facebook. Here are some of their comments, starting with this from Wessam Elmeligi:

Ours is one of the most honorable revolutions in history. We did not fall into the pit of civil war. We did not get any help from any government. This is our victory. Our freedom. Our Egypt. Egyptians have taught the world one lesson: when the people speak, their voice is not words. It is thunder. And when thunder strikes the entire forces of nature listen. Because thunder is sent by God.

Another Facebook user named Kefaya Punk said: In Egypt we were told that we can never revolt, but after we saw with our own eyes that Tunisians were able to oust their president and the regime, we were still suspicious that we would be able to repeat what they did, but we did.

Hanaa Elbhery said: I am Egyptian and I am so proud of the first real achievement of our generation.

And Mohammad Elfiky wrote: Some celebrate and some cry but we are all Egyptians. I love this land and I'm ready to die for it. Let's hope the future will be better than ever.

There were also expressions of support from other countries.

Heba Hassan wrote from Bahrain: Congrats to our brothers and sisters in Egypt! We are so happy for them. My eyes were full of tears when I heard the news on TV.

Jill Harper wrote: I am from the US and so happy for the Egyptians!!

Franz Josef Hildinger had this advice: Education is everything. Invest in it now!

Karam Adnan Alhafiz wrote: Congratulations. You proved that the will of the people is above everything.

And Iclal Yoksuc said to Egyptians: I hope you have a good president that cares about all Egyptians and that deserves you.

There were also comments like this from Peshang M Hussen: Now it is step 2 to dictators in other countries. And this from Moshtaq Abdullah Jamel: Mubarak has gone with the wind. Who's next?

You can read all the comments and add your own at the VOA Learning English page on Facebook. Or post a comment at voaspecialenglish.com.
And that's IN THE NEWS in VOA Special English. I'm Steve Ember.

For more news on the events in Egypt, check out this article

"Unrest in the Arab World" from Voa News.

2011-02-05T11:48:00.001-08:00

This is IN THE NEWS in VOA Special English.

Earlier this week, Hosni Mubarak promised to leave office, but not until elections in September. President Obama spoke twice with the Egyptian leader by phone and said an "orderly transition" must begin now.

Supporters of Mr. Mubarak attacked protesters and reporters, but the protests continued in Cairo and other cities.

(SOUND)

Opponents of Mr. Mubarak demanded that he leave office now. They declared Friday the "Day of Departure." Supporters of the Egyptian president declared it the "Day of Loyalty."

Protests also took place in other Arab countries this week.

In Jordan, hundreds of people demonstrated Friday to pressure the newly chosen prime minister to make promised political reforms. The demonstration in Amman came a day after Jordan's main Islamist opposition party met with King Abdullah to discuss its demands.

Some people have called for the newly named prime minister to resign. But leaders of the opposition Muslim Brotherhood say they will give Marouf al-Bakhit a chance to seek reform.

King Abdullah dismissed his government this week following weeks of anti-government protests. The king says reforms have been slow. He says all parties should work together to help increase the role of citizens in decision-making.

One of the demands of the Muslim Brotherhood is to change the constitution to involve parliament in appointing prime ministers. Currently only Jordan's king has that right.

In Yemen, tens of thousands protested in the capital, Sana’a, on Thursday. They called it a "Day of Rage."

(SOUND)

"No to corruption," they say. "No to dictatorship." Others demonstrated in support of President Ali Abdullah Saleh.

Mr. Saleh has been in power since nineteen seventy-eight. The Yemeni leader has been an ally of the United States in fighting terrorism.

His latest promise to leave office came Wednesday. He said he would leave in two years when his term ends, and that his son would not replace him.

Lutfi Shatara of the Yemeni news agency, Aden Press, says the protesters have taken their lead from the uprising in Tunisia.

LUTFI SHATARA: "What happened in Tunisia -- it gives the people in the Middle East belief in themselves."

Nadim Shahadi is a Middle East analyst with Chatham House in London. He thinks the American-led invasion of Iraq in two thousand three led to what is happening now in the Arab world.

NADIM SHAHADI: "I believe that the trigger for this was the fall of the statue of Saddam Hussein. This was a huge shock to the region."

Iran's top leader has praised the anti-government protests in Egypt and Tunisia. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called the demonstrations an "Islamic awakening." He accused Hosni Mubarak of serving the United States and Israel.

There have also been protests in Lebanon, although for different political reasons. Haleem is an international affairs student in New York. He is from Lebanon, but worries about Egypt.

HALEEM: "I am just afraid of the transition and what happens next because we can see for example what happened in the Iranian revolution, and I cannot really rule out the Iranian case to repeat itself in Egypt.

"It can have also many spillover effects, either on Israel, and then if on Israel, it can also have some impacts on Lebanon. The Middle East is like a system by itself."

And that's IN THE NEWS in VOA Special English. I'm Steve Ember.

But what is the response from the Obama Administration? The United States is in conflict because, on the one hand, the U.S. encourages the desire for freedom and democracy, but on the other hand, the U.S. depends on Egypt and Yemen for its support against extremists. This dilemma is well discussed in this article.

A link to Arab-American reaction to events in Tunisia, Cairo, and Yemen.

Here is a video from PBS, reporting on both the protest in Cairo and Yemen.

"Dian Fossey and The Mountain Gorillas" from VOA.

2011-01-23T08:44:00.000-08:00

STEVE EMBER: I’m Steve Ember.

FAITH LAPIDUS: And I’m Faith Lapidus with PEOPLE IN AMERICA in VOA Special English. Today we tell about Dian Fossey. She studied the wild mountain gorillas of central Africa. Her work resulted in efforts to save these rare and endangered animals.

(MUSIC)

STEVE EMBER: Dian Fossey was born in nineteen thirty-two in San Francisco, California. Her parents ended their marriage when she was young. She stayed with her mother, who married another man a short time later. Dian said she had a difficult relationship with both her mother and stepfather.

Dian was interested in animals all her life. She started making plans to be a veterinarian, a doctor who treats animals. After high school, she attended San Jose State College in California. There, she was successful in some subjects, but not others.

She changed her program of study to occupational therapy. Occupational therapists help injured and sick people learn to do their day-to-day activities independently. She completed her studies at San Jose State in nineteen fifty-four.

FAITH LAPIDUS: Dian Fossey left California and moved to the state of Kentucky. She accepted a position at the Kosair Crippled Children’s Hospital in the city of Louisville. People there said she had a special gift of communicating with children with special needs. Yet she also had a desire to see more of the world.

Through friends, she became interested in Africa. She read a book about the wild mountain gorillas of central Africa written by American zoologist George Schaller. The mountain gorilla is the largest of the world’s apes.

STEVE EMBER: Fossey borrowed money and made a six-week trip to Africa in nineteen sixty-three. She visited a camp operated by the famous research scientists Louis and Mary Leakey. The Leakeys were best known for their studies of the development of human ancestors.

Fossey met with Louis Leakey and discussed the importance of scientific research on the great apes. She decided to study mountain gorillas, which were in danger of disappearing. Later on her trip, she traveled to the mountains of Rwanda. This is where she first saw mountain gorillas.

FAITH LAPIDUS: Fossey returned to the United States with a desire to work in Africa. She met with Professor Leakey a second time when he visited the United States to give a series of talks. This time, he asked her to begin a long-term study of the gorillas. He said information she collected might help to show how human ancestors developed.

A group called the Wilkie Foundation agreed to support her research. The Wilkie Foundation already supported another researcher, Jane Goodall, in her study of wild chimpanzees. Fossey also received help from a major scientific and educational organization -- the National Geographic Society.

STEVE EMBER: Fossey returned to central Africa in nineteen sixty-six. She spent a short time observing Jane Goodall. Then she began setting up her own research camp in what was then the country of Zaire. Fossey sought help from the local native people who knew how to follow mountain gorillas in the wild.

A short time later, political unrest forced her to move to nearby Rwanda. She settled in a protected area between two mountains, Karisimbi and Visoke. There, she established the Karisoke Research Center. This would be her home for most of the next eighteen years. Much of that time, she worked alone.

(MUSIC)

FAITH LAPIDUS: Dian Fossey spent thousands of hours observing mountain gorillas. She worked hard to gain acceptance among the animals. To do this, she copied their actions and sounds. She studied the gorillas daily and developed an understanding of each individual.

Many people had believed that mountain gorillas are fierce. Fossey found just the opposite. She learned that gorillas are both gentle and intelligent. They use their strength mainly when defending other members of their family or group.

STEVE EMBER: In nineteen seventy, the National Geographic Society wanted to publish a story about Fossey and her research. It sent a photographer named Bob Campbell to Karisoke to take pictures. He took a picture of an adult male gorilla named Peanuts touching Fossey’s hand. This became the first friendly gorilla-to-human action ever recorded. The picture appeared on the front cover of National Geographic magazine. It helped to make Fossey and her work famous.

The American researcher was able to sit among the gorillas and play with them and their young. She made notes of everything she saw. She took a count, or census, of the gorilla population. She noted what the animals ate and their environment.

Fossey learned a lot about the gorillas. But it became difficult for her to remain an independent observer. She believed that the animals would disappear forever unless something was done to protect them and their environment.

(MUSIC)

FAITH LAPIDUS: Dian Fossey needed money to continue her research project. She believed that she could get more financial assistance for her work by getting an advanced degree. She left Africa in nineteen seventy and attended the University of Cambridge in England. She received a doctorate in zoology a few years later.

Fossey returned to Rwanda to find that hunters were killing some of what she called “her gorillas.” The hunters earned money by selling the heads, hands and feet of the animals. Among the gorillas killed was one called Digit.

Fossey had observed Digit for many years and treated him almost like a friend. His remains were placed with those of other dead gorillas in a special burial area near her camp.

STEVE EMBER: After Digit was killed, Fossey established a program to increase international support for efforts to protect mountain gorillas. It was called the Digit Fund. Fossey also began an active campaign to stop the killing of the gorillas. She opposed efforts by Rwandan officials to increase the number of visitors to the animals’ native environment.

She formed a small force to help guard mountain gorillas against humans. She destroyed traps used to catch the animals. She threatened the hunters and the people who helped them. National Geographic magazine published a report about her efforts. Many people who read the story sent money to support the campaign.

However, not everyone supported what Fossey was doing. Some people condemned her treatment of the hunters. Rwandan officials opposed her efforts to control an area that she did not own. And, some animal experts criticized her strong emotional links with the gorillas. They also questioned her work as a scientist.

(MUSIC)

FAITH LAPIDUS: Dian Fossey suffered from a number of health problems. As she grew older, she spent less time in the field and more time at her camp doing paperwork. This was partly because she had college students assisting in her research efforts.

In nineteen eighty, Fossey left Karisoke and accepted a position at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. There, she began to write a book about her years with the mountain gorillas. Her book was published in nineteen eighty-three. It is called “Gorillas in the Mist.” By then, there were only about two hundred mountain gorillas in the world.

Dian Fossey made a large number of public appearances to publicize her book and the efforts to save the mountain gorillas. Then she returned to Rwanda. On December twenty-sixth, nineteen eighty-five, she was found murdered at her camp. A few days later, her body was buried near the remains of some of her gorillas.

STEVE EMBER: Even now, her death remains unsolved. Some people believe that she was killed by someone who opposed her strong attempts to protect the gorillas.

Three years after her death, a major American motion picture based on her book was released. It is also called “Gorillas in the Mist.” It helped tell her story to millions of people around the world.

Dian Fossey kept a written record of her daily activities. She wrote: When you understand the value of all life, you think less about what is past and think instead about the protection of the future.

Dian Fossey loved her work and used her research to help save the gorillas and their environment. Today, the mountain gorilla population is increasing. Some people have said that without her efforts the animals would no longer exist. The Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund International continues her work.

(MUSIC)

FAITH LAPIDUS: This program was written by George Grow. Lawan Davis was our producer. I’m Faith Lapidus.

STEVE EMBER: And I’m Steve Ember. Join us again next week for PEOPLE IN AMERICA in VOA Special English.

"America in the 1920's" from VOA.

2011-01-16T10:13:00.000-08:00

Disposal of Alcohol during Prohibition

BOB DOUGHTY: Welcome to THE MAKING OF A NATION – American history in VOA Special English.

Americans experimented with many new customs and social traditions during the nineteen twenties. There were new dances, new kinds of clothes and some of the most imaginative art and writing ever produced in the United States.

But in most ways, the nineteen twenties were a conservative time in American life. Voters elected three conservative Republican presidents: Warren Harding, Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoover. And they supported many conservative social and political policies.

This week in our series, Kay Gallant and Harry Monroe continue the story of American conservatism during the nineteen twenties.

KAY GALLANT: One such policy concerned immigration. Most Americans in the nineteen twenties had at least some ties through blood or marriage to the first Americans who came from Britain. Many people with these kinds of historic ties considered themselves to be real Americans, true Americans.

Americans traditionally had welcomed newcomers from such western European countries as Britain, France, or Germany. But most of the people arriving in New York City and other harbors in the nineteen twenties were from the central, eastern and southern areas of Europe.

Some Americans became afraid of these millions of people arriving at their shores. They worried that the immigrant newcomers might steal their jobs. Or they feared the political beliefs of the immigrants.

Calvin Coolidge
HARRY MONROE: Pressure to control immigration increased following the world war. Congress passed a bill that set a limit on how many people would be allowed to enter from each foreign country. And, the Congress and President Calvin Coolidge agreed to an even stronger immigration law in nineteen twenty-four.

Under the new law, limits on the number of immigrants from each foreign country depended on the number of Americans who had families in that country. For example, the law allowed many immigrants to enter from Britain or France, because many American citizens had families in those countries. But fewer people could come from Italy or Russia, because fewer Americans had family members in those countries.

The laws were very difficult to enforce. But they did succeed in limiting the number of immigrants from certain countries.

KAY GALLANT: A second sign of the conservative feelings in the nineteen twenties was the nation's effort to ban the sale of alcoholic drinks, or liquor. This policy was known as Prohibition, because it prohibited -- or banned -- alcoholic drinks.

Many of the strongest supporters of Prohibition were conservative Americans living in rural areas. Many of them believed that liquor was evil, the product of the devil.

A number of towns and states passed laws banning alcohol sales during the first years of the twentieth century. And in nineteen nineteen, the nation passed the eighteenth amendment to the federal constitution. This amendment, and the Volstead Act, made it unlawful to make, sell or transport liquor.

HARRY MONROE: Prohibition laws failed terribly from the start. There was only a small force of police to enforce the new laws. And millions of Americans still wanted to drink liquor. It was not possible for the police to watch every American who wanted to buy a drink secretly or make liquor in his own home.

Not surprisingly, thousands of Americans soon saw a chance to make profits from the new laws. They began to import liquor illegally to sell for high prices.

Criminals began to bring liquor across the long, unprotected border with Canada or on fast boats from the Caribbean islands. At the same time, private manufacturers in both cities and rural areas began to produce liquor. And shop owners in cities across the country sold liquor with little interference from local police.

By the middle of the nineteen twenties, it was clear to most Americans that Prohibition laws were a failure. But the laws were not changed until the election of President Franklin Roosevelt in nineteen thirty-two.

KAY GALLANT: A third sign of conservatism in the nineteen twenties was the effort by some Americans to ban schoolbooks on modern science. Most of the Americans who supported these efforts were conservative rural Americans who believed in the traditional ideas of the Protestant Christian church. Many of them were fearful of the many changes that had taken place in American society.

Science became an enemy to many of these traditional, religious Americans. Science seemed to challenge the most basic ideas taught in the Bible. The conflict burst into a major public debate in nineteen twenty-five in a trial over Charles Darwin's idea of evolution.

HARRY MONROE: British scientist Charles Darwin published his books "The Origin of the Species" and "The Descent of Man" in the nineteenth century. The books explained Darwin's idea that humans developed over millions of years from apes and other animals.

Most Europeans and educated people accepted Darwin's theory by the end of the nineteenth century. But the book had little effect in rural parts of the United States until the nineteen twenties.

William Jennings Bryan
William Jennings Bryan led the attack on Darwin's ideas. Bryan was a rural Democrat who ran twice for president. He lost both times. But Bryan remained popular among many traditional Americans.

Bryan told his followers that the theory of evolution was evil, because it challenged the traditional idea that God created the world in six days. He accused scientists of violating God's words in the Bible.

Bryan and his supporters called on local school officials to ban the teaching of evolution. Some state legislatures in the more conservative southeastern part of the country passed laws making it a crime to teach evolution theory.

John Scopes-indicted for
teaching evolution in school
KAY GALLANT: In nineteen twenty-five, a young science teacher in the southern state of Tennessee challenged the state's new teaching law. The teacher -- John Scopes -- taught Darwin's evolution ideas. Officials arrested scopes and put him on trial.

Some of the nation's greatest lawyers rushed to Tennessee to defend the young teacher. They believed the state had violated his right to free speech. And they thought Tennessee's law againt teaching evolution was foolish in a modern, scientific society. America's most famous lawyer, Clarence Darrow, became the leader of Scopes' defense team.

Bryan and other religious conservatives also rushed to the trial. They supported the right of the state of Tennessee to ban the teaching of evolution.

The trial was held in the small town of Dayton, Tennessee. Hundreds of people came to watch: religious conservatives, free speech supporters, newsmen and others.

The high point of the trial came when Bryan himself sat before the court. Lawyer Clarence Darrow asked Bryan question after question about the bible and about science. How did Bryan know the Bible is true. Did God really create the earth in a single day. Is a day in the Bible twenty-four hours. Or can it mean a million years.

HARRY MONROE: Bryan answered the questions. But he showed a great lack of knowledge about modern science.

The judge found Scopes guilty of breaking the law. But in the battle of ideas, science defeated conservatism. And a higher court later ruled that Scopes was not guilty.

The Scopes evolution trial captured the imagination of Americans. The issue was not really whether one young teacher was innocent or guilty of breaking a law. The real question was the struggle for America's spirit between the forces of modern ideas and those of traditional rural conservatism. The trial represented this larger conflict.

KAY GALLANT: American society was changing in many important ways during the early part of the twentieth century. It was not yet the world superpower that it would become after World War Two. But neither was it a traditional rural society of conservative farmers and clergy. The nineteen twenties were a period of growth, of change and of struggle between the old and new values.

(MUSIC)

BOB DOUGHTY: Our program was written by David Jarmul. The narrators were Kay Gallant and Harry Monroe.

You can find our series online with transcripts, MP3s, podcasts and images at voaspecialenglish.com. You can also follow us on Facebook and Twitter at VOA Learning English. Join us again next week for THE MAKING OF A NATION -- an American history series in VOA Special English.

"Arts in America During the 1920s" from VOA

2011-01-08T13:00:00.000-08:00

"Cliff Dwellers" George Bellows, 1913

BOB DOUGHTY: Welcome to THE MAKING OF A NATION – American history in VOA Special English.

There were many changes in the social customs and day-to-day life of millions of Americans during the administration of President Calvin Coolidge.

Many young people began to challenge the traditions of their parents and grandparents. They experimented with new ideas and ways of living. People of all kinds became interested in the new popular culture. Radio and films brought them exciting news of court trials, sports heroes and wild parties.

The nineteen twenties also was one of the most active and important periods for the more serious arts. Writers, painters and other artists produced some of the greatest work in the nation's history.

This week in our series, Kay Gallant and Harry Monroe take a look at American arts during this exciting period.

KAY GALLANT: Most Americans approved strongly of the economic growth and improved living conditions during the nineteen twenties. They supported the conservative Republican policies of President Calvin Coolidge. And they had great faith in the country's business leaders and economic system.

However, many of the nation's serious artists had a different and darker view of society. They were troubled deeply by the changes they saw. They believed that Americans had become too interested in money and wealth.

These artists rejected the new business society. And they also questioned the value of politics. Many of them believed that the first World War in Europe had been a terrible mistake. These artists had little faith in the political leaders who came to power after the war. They felt a need to protest the way the world was changing around them.

HARRY MONROE: The spirit of protest was especially strong in serious American writing during the nineteen twenties. Many of the greatest writers of this period hated the new business culture.

One such writer was Sinclair Lewis. He was the first American to win the Nobel Prize for Literature.

Lewis wrote about Americans living in the towns and villages in the central part of the United States. Many of the people in his books were foolish men and women with empty values. They chased after money and popularity. In his famous book "Main Street," Lewis joked about and criticized small-town business owners.

Social criticism also was central to the writing of the newspaper writer H. L. Mencken, from the eastern city of Baltimore. Mencken considered most Americans to be stupid and violent fools. He attacked their values without mercy.

Of course, many traditional Americans reacted strongly to such criticism. For example, some religious and business leaders attacked Mencken as a dangerous person whose words were treason against the United States. But many young people thought Mencken was a hero whose only crime was writing the truth.

KAY GALLANT: The work of Lewis, Mencken, and a number of other writers of the nineteen twenties has been forgotten by many Americans as the years have passed. But the period did produce some truly great writing.

One of the greatest writers of these years was Ernest Hemingway. Hemingway wrote about love, war, sports, and other subjects. He used short sentences and rough words. His style was sharper and different from traditional American writing. And his strong views about life set him apart from most other Americans.

Another major writer was F. Scott Fitzgerald. Fitzgerald wrote especially about rich Americans searching for happiness and new values. His books were filled with people who rejected traditional beliefs. His book "The Great Gatsby" is considered today to be one of the greatest works in the history of American writing.

A third great writer of the nineteen twenties was William Faulkner.

Faulkner wrote about the special problems and ways of life in the American south. His books explored the emotional tension in a society still suffering from the loss of the Civil War sixty years before. Some of Faulkner's best books were "The Sound and The Fury," "As I Lay Dying" and "Absalom, Absalom." Like Hemingway, he won the Nobel Prize for Literature.

(MUSIC)

HARRY MONROE: The nineteen twenties also produced the greatest writer of theater plays in American history, Eugene O'Neill.

O'Neill was an Irish-American with a dark and violent view of human nature. His plays used new theatrical methods and ways of presenting ideas. But they carried an emotional power never before seen in the American theater. Some of his best known plays were "Mourning Becomes Electra," "The Iceman Cometh" and "A Long Day's Journey into Night."

A number of American writers also produced great poetry during the nineteen twenties. Probably the most famous work was "The Waste Land," a poem of sadness by the writer T. S. Eliot.

KAY GALLANT: There also were important changes in American painting during the nineteen twenties. Economic growth gave many Americans the money to buy art for their homes for the first time. Sixty new museums opened. Slowly, Americans learned about serious art.

Actually, American art had been changing in important ways since the beginning of the century.

In nineteen-oh-eight, a group of New York artists arranged a historic show. These artists tried to show real life in their paintings. They painted new kinds of subjects. For example, George Bellows painted many emotional and realistic pictures of the sport of boxing. His work, and the painting of other realistic artists, became known as the "Ash Can" school of art.

Another important group of modern artists was led by the great photographer Alfred Stieglitz. This group held a major art show in nineteen thirteen in New York, Chicago, and Boston. The show presented modern art from Europe. Americans got their first chance to see the work of such painters as Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque.

The show caused a huge public debate in the United States. Traditional art critics accused the organizers of the show of trying to overthrow Christianity and American values. Former president Theodore Roosevelt and others denounced the new art as a threat to the country.

However, many young American painters and art lovers did not agree. They became very interested in the new art styles from Europe. They studied them closely.

Soon, Charles Demuth, Joseph Stella, and other American painters began to produce excellent art in the new Cubist style. John Marin painted beautiful views of sea coasts in New York and Maine. And such artists as Max Weber and Georgia O'Keeffe painted in styles that seemed to come more from their own imagination than from reality.

As with writing, the work of many of these serious modern painters only became popular many years later.

HARRY MONROE: The greatest American designer of buildings during the nineteen twenties was Frank Lloyd Wright. Wright believed that architects should design a building to fit its location, not to copy some ancient style. He used local materials in new ways. Wright invented many imaginative methods to combine useful building design with natural beauty.

But again, most Americans did not know of Wright's work. Instead, they turned to local architects with traditional beliefs. These architects generally designed old and safe styles for buildings -- for homes, offices, colleges, and other needs.

KAY GALLANT: Writers and artists now look back at the roaring nineteen twenties as an extremely important period that gave birth to many new styles and ideas.

Hemingway's style of writing continues to influence American writers. Many painters say the period marked the real birth of modern American art. And architecture students in the United States and other countries now study the buildings of Frank Lloyd Wright.

The changes in American society caused many of these artists much sadness and pain in their personal lives. But their expression of protest and rich imagination produced a body of work that has grown in influence with the passing years.

(MUSIC)

BOB DOUGHTY: Our program was written by David Jarmul. The narrators were Kay Gallant and Harry Monroe.

You can find our series online with transcripts, MP3s, podcasts and images at voaspecialenglish.com. You can also follow us on Facebook and Twitter at VOA Learning English. Join us again next week for THE MAKING OF A NATION -- an American history series in VOA Special English.

"Flannery O'Connor" She wrote about the South. VOA.

2010-12-29T09:28:00.000-08:00

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: I'm Shirley Griffith.

RAY FREEMAN: And I'm Ray Freeman with the VOA Special English program, People in America. Today, we tell about writer Flannery O’Connor.
(MUSIC)

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: Late in her life someone asked the American writer Flannery O’Connor why she wrote. She said, "Because I am good at it." She was good. Yet, she was not always as good a writer as she became. She improved because she listened to others. She changed her stories. She re-wrote them, then re-wrote them again, always working to improve what she was creating. Flannery had always wanted to be a writer. After she graduated from Georgia State College for women, she asked to be accepted at a writing program at the State University of Iowa. The head of the school found it difficult to understand her southern speech. He asked her to write what she wanted. Then he asked to see some examples of her work. He saw immediately that the writing was full of imagination and bright with knowledge, like Flannery O’Connor herself.

RAY FREEMAN: Mary Flannery O’Connor was born March twenty-fifth, nineteen twenty-five, in the southern city of Savannah, Georgia.

Flannery O'Connor grew up in the small southern town of Milledgeville, Georgia. The year she was born, her father developed a rare disease called lupus. He died of the disease in 1941. By that time the family was living in the small southern town of Milledgeville, Georgia, in a house owned by Flannery's mother. Life in a small town in the American South was what O’Connor knew best. Yet she said, "If you know who you are, you can go anywhere."

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: Many people in the town of Milledgeville thought she was different from other girls. She was kind to everyone, but she seemed to stand to one side of what was happening, as if she wanted to see it better. Her mother was her example. Her mother said, "I was brought up to be nice to everyone and not to tell my business to anyone." Flannery also did not talk about herself. But in her writing a silent and distant anger explodes from the quiet surface of her stories. Some see her as a Roman Catholic religious writer. They see her anger as the search to save her moral being through her belief in Jesus Christ. Others do not deny her Roman Catholic religious beliefs. Yet they see her not writing about things, but presenting the things themselves.

RAY FREEMAN: When she left the writing program at Iowa State University she was invited to join a group of writers at the Yaddo writers' colony. Yaddo is at Saratoga Springs in New York state. It provides a small group of writers with a home and a place to work for a short time. The following year, 1949, she moved to New York City. She soon left the city and lived with her friend Robert Fitzgerald and his family in the northeastern state of Connecticut. Fitzgerald says O’Connor needed to be alone to work during the day. And she needed her friends to talk to when her work was done.
(MUSIC)

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: While writing her first novel, “Wise Blood”, she was stricken with the disease lupus that had killed her father. The treatment for lupus weakened her. She moved back to Georgia and lived the rest of her life with her mother on a farm outside Milledgeville. O’Connor was still able to write, travel, and give speeches. “Wise Blood” appeared in nineteen fifty-two. Both it and O’Connor's second novel, “The Violent Bear it Away,” are about a young man growing up. In both books the young men are unwilling to accept the work they were most fit to do. Like all of Flannery O’Connor's writing, the book is filled with humor, even when her meaning is serious. It shows the mix of a traditional world with a modern world. It also shows a battle of ideas expressed in the simple, country talk that O’Connor knew very well.

RAY FREEMAN: In “Wise Blood”, a young man, Hazel Motes, leaves the Army but finds his home town empty. He flees to a city, looking for "a place to be.” On the train, he announces that he does not believe in Jesus Christ. He says, "I wouldn't even if he existed. Even if he was on this train."

Many people in the town of Milledgeville thought she was different from other girls. His moving to the city is an attempt to move away from the natural world and become a thing, a machine. He decides that all he can know is what he can touch and see. In the end, however, he destroys his physical sight so that he may truly see, because he says that when he had eyes he was blind. Critics say his action seems to show that he is no longer willing to deny the existence of Jesus but now is willing to follow him into the dark.

The novel received high praise from critics. It did not become popular with the public, however.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: O’Connor's second novel, “The Violent Bear it Away,” was published in nineteen sixty. Like “Wise Blood,” it is a story about a young man learning to deal with life. The book opens with the young man, Francis Marion Tarwater, refusing to do the two things his grandfather had ordered him to do. These are to bury the old man deep in the ground, and to bring religion to his uncle's mentally sick child. Instead, Tarwater burns the house where his grandfather died and lets the mentally sick child drown during a religious ceremony.

RAY FREEMAN: Critics say Tarwater's violence comes from his attempt to find truth by denying religion. In the end, however, he accepts that he has been touched by a deeper force, the force of the word of God, and he must accept that word. Both of O’Connor's novels explore the long moment of fear when a young man must choose between the difficulties of growing up and the safe world of a child.

(MUSIC)

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: Flannery O’Connor is at least as well known for her stories as for her novels. Her first book of stories, “A Good Man is Hard to Find,” appeared in nineteen fifty-five. In it she deals with many of the ideas she wrote about in “Wise Blood,” such as the search for Jesus Christ.

In many of the stories there is a conflict between the world of the spirit and the world of the body. In the story, "The Life You Save May Be Your Own," a traveling workman with only one arm comes to a farm. He claims to be more concerned with things of the spirit than with objects.

RAY FREEMAN: The woman who owns the farm offers to let him marry her deaf daughter. He finally agrees when the mother gives him the farm, her car, and seventeen dollars for the wedding trip. He says, "Lady, a man is divided into two parts, body and spirit. . . The body, lady, is like a house: it don't go anywhere; but the spirit, lady, is like an automobile, always on the move."

He marries the daughter and drives off with her. When they stop to eat, the man leaves her and drives off toward the city. On the way he stops and gives a ride to a wandering boy. We learn that when the one-armed man was a child, his mother left him. Critics say that when he helps the boy, he is helping himself.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: In nineteen sixty-four, O’Connor was operated on for a stomach disease. One result of this operation was the return of lupus, the disease that killed her father. On August third, nineteen sixty-four, Flannery O’Connor died. She was thirty-nine years old. Near the end of her life she said, "I'm a born Catholic, and death has always been brother to my imagination."

RAY FREEMAN: The next year, in nineteen sixty-five, her final collection of stories, “Everything That Rises Must Converge,” appeared. In it she speaks of the cruelty of disease and the deeper cruelty that exists between parents and children. In these stories, grown children are in a struggle with parents they neither love nor leave. Many of the children feel guilty about hating the mothers who, the children feel, have destroyed them through love. The children want to rebel violently, but they fear losing their mothers' protection.

In nineteen seventy-one, O’Connor's “Collected Stories” was published. The book contains most of what she wrote. It has all the stories of her earlier collections. It also has early versions of both novels that were first published as stories. And it has parts of an uncompleted novel and an unpublished story. In nineteen seventy-two this last book won the American book industry's highest prize, The National Book Award. As one critic noted, Flannery O’Connor did not live long, but she lived deeply, and wrote beautifully.

(MUSIC)

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: This Special English program was written by Richard Thorman. I'm Shirley Griffith.

RAY FREEMAN: And I'm Ray Freeman. Join us again next week for another People in America program on the Voice of America.

The Cop and The Anthem by O. Henry

2010-12-05T15:23:00.000-08:00

On his bench in Madison Square in New York City, Soapy moved uneasily. The wild geese were calling loudly. Couples snuggled up for lack of winter coats. Snow began to fall. It was very, very cold. No wonder Soapy was nervous about the coming winter.

A dead leaf fell in Soapy's lap. That was a sign from the winter spirit, Jack Frost. Jack Frost knows there are homeless people sleeping on benches, and he is kind enough to give them plenty of warning that, yes, winter is on the way. At the corners of the four streets leading to Madison Square, Jack Frost hands out his “cards”, the falling leaves, carried by the North Wind, so that the inhabitants of the outdoors may read them get themselves ready.

Soapy became aware of the fact that the time had come for him to prepare himself for all the difficulties that were coming. He needed to plan a strategy. That’s why he nervously moved on his bench.

Soapy didn’t have a lot of options. He wasn’t a bear, so he couldn’t hibernate. He wasn’t rich, so he couldn’t go on any Mediterranean cruises, to warm places under Southern skies like Acupulco or tropical beaches on Hawaii. Three months on the Island was what his soul craved. Three months of certain board and bed and congenial company, safe from wind and cops, seemed to Soapy the essence of things desirable. Yes, you guessed it, the Island was a prison.

For years the nice warm Blackwell's Island Prison had been his winter quarters. Just as his more fortunate fellow New Yorkers had bought their tickets to Palm Beach and the Riviera each winter, so Soapy had made his modest arrangements for his annual stay at the Island. And now the time was come. On the previous night three Sunday newspapers, one under his coat, another around his ankles, and the third over his lap, had failed to prevent the cold from getting to him as he slept on his bench near the fountain in the ancient square. He wasn’t very fond of shivering as he tried to sleep. So he looked forward to a warm cell in the Island prison. It was time. He didn’t want any charity, he didn’t want to stay in any shelter provided by the city. In Soapy's opinion the Law was better than Philanthropy. Sure, there were many opportunities for a free meal and a room provided by the city or by some church. But to one of Soapy's proud spirit the gifts of charity are not an option. You have to pay for it one way or another. If you don’t pay for it with money, you must pay in humiliation of spirit for every benefit received at the hands of philanthropy. For every bed of charity, you must take a bath, for every loaf of bread, you’ll have to answer questions or promise to look for a job, or some painful prospect like it. That’s why it is better to be a guest of the Island Prison, which though conducted by rules, does not interfere inappropriately with a gentleman's private affairs.

Soapy, having decided to go to the Island, at once set about accomplishing his desire. There were many easy ways of doing this. The most pleasant was was to dine luxuriously at some expensive restaurant; and then, after refusing to pay for the meal, be handed over quietly and without much fuss to a policeman. An accommodating judge would do the rest.

Soapy left his bench and strolled out of the square and across the level sea of asphalt, where Broadway and Fifth Avenue flow together. Up Broadway he turned, and stopped at a shiny cafe, where every night you could find the best wines and the finest food.

Soapy had total confidence in himself from the lowest button of his vest to the top button of his shirt. He was shaven, and his coat was decent and he had a neat black, very nice necktie that had been presented to him by a lady missionary on Thanksgiving Day. If he could reach a table in the restaurant without getting thrown out, success would be his. The portion of him that would show above the table would raise no doubt in the waiter's mind. A roasted duck, thought Soapy, would be about the thing--with a bottle of Chablis, and then Camembert Cheese, a cup of expresso and a cigar. One dollar for the cigar would be enough. The total he would simply say, he couldn’t pay. Then would come his arrest, and yet the meat would leave him filled and happy for the journey to his winter refuge in the jail.

But as Soapy set foot inside the restaurant door the head waiter's eye fell upon his dirty, torn trousers and decadent, worn out shoes. Strong and ready hands turned him about and pushed him in silence and haste to the sidewalk and so the fine meal of duck wouldn’t land on Soapy’s plate that night.

Soapy turned off Broadway. It seemed that his route to the desired island was not to be through the pleasant unpaid meal in a restaurant. He must invent some other way of breaking the law so he could enter the nice, warm jail.

At a corner of Sixth Avenue electric lights and cleverly displayed wares behind plate-glass made a shop window stand out. Soapy took a stone and threw it at the glass. People came running around the corner, a policeman in the front. Soapy stood still, with his hands in his pockets, and smiled at the sight of brass buttons.

"Where's the man that done that?" inquired the officer excitedly.

"Don't you figure out that I might have had something to do with it?" said Soapy, not without sarcasm, but friendly, as one greets good fortune.

The policeman's mind refused to accept Soapy even as a clue. Men who smash windows do not remain to talk about it with the cops. They run away as fast as they can. The policeman saw a man half way down the block running to catch a street car. He took out his club and he ran after the man. Soapy, with disgust in his heart, shuffled away. Now he was unsuccessful twice!

On the opposite side of the street was an inexpensive restaurant. It served people with large appetites and modest purses. It was crowded. The plates and silverware weren’t very fancy. The soup wasn’t bad, but also wasn’t very substantial. Into this place Soapy took his worn out shoes and torn, dirty trousers, and he wasn’t much different from any of the other customers. At a table he sat and ate a beefsteak, pancakes, doughnuts and pie. And then to the waiter be confessed that the he didn’t even have a dime to pay for any of it. Then he said to the waiter:

"Now, get busy and call a cop, and don't keep a gentleman waiting."

"No cop for you," said the waiter, with a tough voice and eye burning like bright cherries. "Hey, Con!"

Two waiters threw Soapy onto the sidewalk. Soapy landed there on his ear. He got up slowly, and beat the dust from his clothes. Arrest seemed but a rosy dream. The Island seemed very far away. A policeman who stood before a drug store two doors away laughed and walked down the street.

Five blocks Soapy traveled before his courage permitted him to try again to commit some crime in order to be arrested. This time the opportunity presented itself to him in a way that looked very, very simple. A young woman who looked modest and pretty was standing before a show window gazing with a lot of interest at its display of shaving mugs and inkstands, and two yards from the window a large policeman who looked pretty tough and mean leaned against a fire hydrant.

It was Soapy's plan to play the part of a crude womanizer. He pretended to sexually harass the young woman. The refined and elegant appearance of his victim and the appearance of the serious cop encouraged him to believe that he would soon feel the pleasant official grab on his arm that would insure his winter quarters on the right little, tight little isle.

Soapy straightened the lady missionary's tie, dragged his hands out of his sleeves, rubbing them together, set his hat at an angle and marched toward the young woman. He made eyes at her, then started coughing and clearing his throat. He smiled, winked, and acted very obnoxiously toward her. With half an eye Soapy saw that the policeman was watching him carefully. The young woman moved away a few steps, and again placed her attention on the shaving mugs in the shop window. Soapy followed, boldly stepping to her side, raised his hat and said:

"Ah there, honey baby! Don't you want to come and play in my yard?"

The policeman was still looking. The persecuted young woman had only to wave at him and Soapy would be practically on the way to his island. Already he imagined he could feel the cozy warmth of the station-house. The young woman faced him and, stretching out a hand, caught Soapy's coat sleeve.

“Sure, Mike," she said joyfully, "How about you treat me to a pint of good beer? I'd have spoken to you sooner, but the cop was watching."

With the young woman playing the enthusiastic receiver of his inappropriate advances, Soapy walked past the policeman overcome with sadness. He seemed doomed to liberty, unable to do anything wrong.

At the next corner he shook off his companion and ran. He halted in the district where by night are found the very well lit streets, happy hearts, great restaurants and theaters.

Women in furs and men in overcoats moved gaily in the wintry air. A sudden fear grabbed Soapy. He imagined that he was under some sort of curse that made him immune to arrest. The thought brought a little of panic to him, and when he came to another policeman lounging grandly in front of a richly decorated theatre he decided that he would try the crime of "disorderly conduct."

On the sidewalk Soapy began to yell drunken gibberish at the top of his harsh voice. He danced, howled, raved and caused enough noise to wake the dead.

The policeman twirled his club, turned his back to Soapy and remarked to a citizen.

"It’s one of those damn Yale students celebrating their football victory over Harvard. You know, Yale won and Harvard got zero points. He’s noisy; but no harm. We've instructions to leave those Yale students alone."

Disappointed, Soapy stopped his useless racket. Would a policeman never lay hands on him? In his imagination, the Island seemed like an unattainable paradise. He buttoned his thin coat against the chilling wind.

In a cigar store he saw a well-dressed man lighting a cigar at a swinging light. His silk umbrella he had set by the door on entering. Soapy stepped inside, secured the umbrella and walked off with it slowly. The man with the cigar followed quickly.

"My umbrella," he said, angrily.

"Oh, is it?" sneered Soapy, adding insult to petty theft. "Well, why don't you call a policeman? I took it. Your umbrella! Why don't you call a cop? There stands one on the corner."

The umbrella owner slowed his steps. Soapy did likewise, with a fear that luck would again run against him. The policeman looked at the two curiously.

"Of course," said the umbrella man--"that is--well, you know how these mistakes occur--I--if it's your umbrella I hope you'll excuse me--I picked it up this morning in a restaurant--If you recognise it as yours, why--I hope you'll--"

"Of course it's mine," said Soapy, viciously.

The ex-umbrella man retreated. The policeman hurried to assist a tall blonde in an opera cloak across the street in front of a street car that was approaching two blocks away.

Soapy walked eastward through a street damaged by road work. He threw the umbrella angrily into an excavation. He muttered against the men who wear helmets and carry clubs. Because he wanted to fall into their grasp, yet they seemed to treat him as a king who could do no wrong.

At last Soapy reached one of the avenues to the east where the glitter and turmoil was but faint. He set his face down this toward Madison Square, for the homing instinct survives even when the home is a park bench.

But on an unusually quiet corner Soapy came to a standstill. Here was an old church, quaint and rambling and gabled. Through one violet-stained window a soft light glowed, where, no doubt, the organist praticed over the keys, making sure of his mastery of the coming Sabbath anthem. For there drifted out to Soapy's ears sweet music that caught and held him transfixed.

The moon was above, shiny and calm; vehicles and pedestrians were few; sparrows sang sleepily under the roof--for a little while the scene might have been a country churchyard. And the anthem that the organist played glued Soapy to the iron fence, for he had known it well in the days when his life contained such things as mothers and roses and ambitions and friends and pure thoughts and collars.

The mixture of Soapy's receptive state of mind and the influences about the old church created a sudden and wonderful change in his soul. He viewed with immediate dislike the terrible life he had drifted into, the degraded days, unworthy desires, dead hopes, and bad decisions that made up his existence.

And also in a moment his heart responded excitedly to this new emotion. An immediate and strong impulse moved him to battle with his uncertain fate. He would pull himself out of the dirt; he would make a man of himself again; he would get rid of the evil that had taken possession of him. There was time; he was comparatively young yet; he would resurrect his old ambitions and follow them without failure. He would go back to work. He would go to night school and improve his situation. Those solemn but sweet organ notes had set up a revolution in him. Tomorrow he would go into the downtown district and find work. A fur importer had once offered him a place as driver. He would find that person tomorrow and ask for the position. He would be somebody in the world. He would--

Soapy felt a hand on his arm. He looked quickly around into the broad face of a policeman.

"What are you doing here?" asked the officer.

"Nothing," said Soapy.

"Then come along," said the policeman.

"Three months on the Island," said the judge in the Police Court the next morning.

Pearl Buck, Author of "The Good Earth" from VOA

2010-11-14T20:48:00.000-08:00

FAITH LAPIDUS: I’m Faith Lapidus.

JIM TEDDER: And I’m Jim Tedder with PEOPLE IN AMERICA in VOA Special English. Today we tell about the award-winning writer Pearl S. Buck.

(MUSIC)

FAITH LAPIDUS: The year was nineteen thirty-one. Americans were suffering through the Great Depression. The famous criminal Al Capone was sent to prison for not paying his taxes. “The Star Spangled Banner” officially became America’s national song. The Empire State Building in New York City was completed. And the top selling book in the United States was “The Good Earth” by Pearl S. Buck.

(MUSIC)

JIM TEDDER: Pearl Buck won the Pulitzer Prize for the best novel by an American writer. She was the first American woman to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. She wrote more than one hundred books. She also wrote short stories, poetry, plays, essays and children’s literature. But most people remember Pearl Buck for her novels about China. She knew the country and its people very well. For nearly forty years, China was her home.

FAITH LAPIDUS: Pearl’s parents were Caroline and Absalom Sydenstricker. They were religious workers in China. In eighteen ninety-two they were visiting in the United States when Pearl was born in Hillsboro, West Virginia. Three months after her birth, the family left the United States and moved back to China.

Pearl and her family lived among the Chinese people. Pearl played with Chinese children and visited their homes. She listened to their ideas and learned about their culture. From an early age, she spoke both Chinese and English.

JIM TEDDER: Pearl’s education began at home. Her mother taught her many of the things she would have learned in an American school. A Chinese tutor taught Pearl other subjects. They included the writings of the famous thinker Confucius and Chinese reading, writing and history. When she was seven, she began reading the works of British writer Charles Dickens. Many years later, after she had become a famous author, she said that Dickens’ writing style had the greatest influence on her own style.

FAITH LAPIDUS: In nineteen ten, Pearl went back to the United States to study philosophy at Randolph-Macon Woman’s College in Lynchburg, Virginia. After graduation, she returned to China. Three years later, she met John Lossing Buck. He was a religious worker who studied agriculture. They were married and moved to a small village in the north of China. Their life among the poorest people provided the subject matter for many of the books she later wrote.

(MUSIC)

JIM TEDDER: In nineteen twenty, Pearl and John Buck’s first child was born. Her name was Carol. Doctors found that Carol had an unusual disease called PKU. This caused her to have trouble learning. Carol was sent to live at a special school in New Jersey. Pearl Buck was deeply saddened by having to send her only child to live far away from home. She also learned that she would never be able to give birth again.

But if it had not been for Carol’s health problems, her mother might never have become a famous writer. The reason was money. Pearl Buck needed a lot of it over the years to pay for her daughter’s care. So she tried writing books about the subject she knew best. Her first novel was called “East Wind, West Wind.”

It tells the story of a Chinese girl who learns about the western world. But it was Pearl Buck’s next book that made her famous and brought the money she needed.

PEARL BUCK: “Now when I began to write, not having anything else to write about, I only knew China. And my first very successful book was “The Good Earth.” I used to say to these young people, ‘Why don’t you write about your peasants? They are wonderful people.’ And they would say, ‘Oh nobody would be interested.’ And so I said well I’m gonna write that book then. If none of you will do it, I will write it. So I wrote ‘The Good Earth.’”

FAITH LAPIDUS: “The Good Earth” became the top selling book in the United States in nineteen thirty-one and nineteen thirty-two. Pearl Buck won the Pulitzer Prize. She also received the William Dean Howells Medal from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. In nineteen thirty-seven, “The Good Earth” became an Oscar-winning motion picture. The next year, Pearl S. Buck was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.

JIM TEDDER: “The Good Earth” is the story of a poor Chinese man named Wang Lung. His wife is O-Lan. They work together very hard and finally make enough money to buy some land for a farm.

After a time, they grow enough crops to feed their family well, with some left over to sell. Their lives improve greatly, and they are happy. But the good times do not last.

FAITH LAPIDUS: For a long time it does not rain. The land dries up and no crops will grow. Many people starve to death. Wang sells all he owns, except the land. Once again his family is poor and hungry. They beg on the streets to survive. Wang fears that they will die. But just when it seems that the end is near, good luck arrives.

JIM TEDDER: Poor people attack some rich people, hoping to get food and money. A crowd forces Wang into a rich man’s home. The rich man fears Wang and gives him gold coins. With this new-found wealth, Wang and his family survive. Every chance he gets, he buys more land. After a while he is richer than he ever thought he would be. For the rest of his life, Wang finds happiness in owning land and raising crops. He tells his sons that after he dies, they must never sell their land.

PEARL BUCK: “Now you couldn’t imagine anything less interesting to Americans, you would say, than a book like ‘The Good Earth.’ It came in the midst of depression times. And it was a comfort to the American people to know that there were people worse off than they were.”

FAITH LAPIDUS: In nineteen thirty-two, Pearl Buck wrote a book called “Sons.” It tells about Wang Lung’s family after his death. Three years later, she wrote “A House Divided.” This book is mostly about Wang Lung’s grandson, Wang Yuan, who lives during a time of revolution in China. This book tells how China’s people began to change from their old ways to a more modern way of thinking.

Pearl Buck wrote her first books about China at a time when most people in the world knew almost nothing about the Chinese way of life. She told her stories with honesty. Her readers soon learned that the Chinese were far different from the way they had been shown in Hollywood movies.

(MUSIC)

JIM TEDDER: After almost forty years in China, the writer moved back to the United States. She bought Green Hills Farm in eastern Pennsylvania. She began to write articles for newspapers and magazines. She expressed her opinion on war, politics, religion, equal rights for all people and many other subjects.

PEARL BUCK: “One of the sad things about war is ...it’s not so much that you lose the money because you can always make money, somehow. But you lose people that you can’t replace … the people who should lead our country are the best, who die early … the bravest, the most brilliant, the ones with the best leadership … and they are the ones who die, out of proportion to their numbers.”

FAITH LAPIDUS: Pearl Buck’s ideas often brought her criticism. But she continued to speak and write about her support for the civil rights of black people in the United States. She also believed in birth control and equal rights for women. She said that there would be world peace only when all races had respect for each other.

PEARL BUCK: “We are one world and if we don’t know it, it’s dangerous. But I think we are beginning to know it more and more, and that does not mean that we give up our nationhood or our differences.”

JIM TEDDER: Pearl Buck gave many speeches in America. She talked to young people about the importance of a good education. She told them they needed to know more about other people around the world.

PEARL BUCK: “I beg of you to pay special attention to your history. Not just the history of the United States, but the history of the countries with which we are involved.”

FAITH LAPIDUS: In nineteen forty-nine, Pearl Buck helped start the Welcome House Adoption Agency. She had become very concerned about the children of mixed races around the world. She urged families to adopt these children without concern for the color of their skin or their cultural background. Pearl and her second husband, Richard Walsh, raised seven adopted children. Two of these were of mixed race. They also cared for many other children while they lived at Green Hills Farm.

(MUSIC)

JIM TEDDER: Pearl Buck died in nineteen seventy-three. She was eighty years old. She was buried near her house in Pennsylvania. Her memory lives on in the work done by Pearl S. Buck International. This organization provides adoption services and help to adopted people and their families. It also supports cultures around the world and works to end prejudice.

FAITH LAPIDUS: This program was written by Jim Tedder and produced by Dana Demange. I’m Faith Lapidus.

JIM TEDDER: And I’m Jim Tedder. You can learn about other famous Americans at voaspecialenglish.com. You can also find us on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube at VOA Learning English. Join us again next week for PEOPLE IN AMERICA in VOA Special English.

"The Business of Winemaking, Part One" from Voice of America

2010-11-07T19:30:00.000-08:00

FAITH LAPIDUS: I’m Faith Lapidus.

DOUG JOHNSON: And I’m Doug Johnson with EXPLORATIONS in VOA Special English. Since ancient times, people have grown grapes to produce wine. Join us as we tell about the history of wine and how it is made. We will also visit a vineyard in the United States and meet a winemaker.

(MUSIC)

FAITH LAPIDUS: It is hard to say how long people have been drinking wine. Wine is far older than recorded history. Some experts say it is as old as civilization itself.

The first wine ever made was probably an accident. People in ancient times might have picked ripe grapes. Some juicy grapes at the bottom of the container were crushed together. As the grapes broke open, yeasts on the skins went to work turning sugar from the fruit into alcohol. This is the fermentation process that turns grape juice into wine.

DOUG JOHNSON: Winemaking probably began in the ancient Near East and Egypt. Burial places in ancient Egypt provide information about wine and its importance in Egyptian culture. Egyptian rulers were buried with wine offerings to help them in the afterlife. Archeological evidence also suggests that some of the earliest known wine producers were in Georgia and Iran thousands of years ago.

FAITH LAPIDUS: North Africa, Spain, France and Italy had their first vineyards during the Greek and Phoenician empires. The ancient Romans greatly expanded the winemaking industry. By the end of the Roman Empire, almost all of the major wine producing areas still in production today had been established in western Europe.

During the period of the Middle Ages, the Catholic Church owned many of the great vineyards of Europe. Wine also played an important part in the church’s religious ceremonies.

Wine was not just about having an enjoyable drink. It could be stored for future use. And, it was nutritious and often much safer to drink than water during early times, especially in cities.

Some experts say that up until the the sixteen hundreds in Europe, wine was one of the only prepared drinks. After that, wine had competition from beer, coffee and tea.

DOUG JOHNSON: One thing was very important for the start of the modern wine industry. Wine needed a better storage method. In the mid sixteen hundreds people began making glass wine bottles that were stronger and low cost. Before that, wine was transported in containers made out of wood, clay or leather.

Glass bottles and the tight seal of a cork permitted wine to last longer in storage. It became clear that wine aged well and tasted even better over time. These developments led to a whole new kind of wine culture.

Today, the top wine producing countries in the world are Italy, France and Spain, followed by the United States.

Although Europe is still important in the wine industry, many other countries around the world are making top wines. These include Argentina, Chile, South Africa and Australia. Wine production is even increasing in countries like India and China.

(MUSIC)

FAITH LAPIDUS: Before we discuss how wine is made, we tell about several kinds of grapes. Some grapes are grown internationally. Chardonnay is probably the best known white grape. sauvignon blanc and riesling are other well known white grapes. Grapes for making red wine include pinot noir, syrah, merlot and cabernet sauvignon.

Other kinds of grapes are special in certain areas. For example, albarino and tempranillo are grown in Spain while Italian grapes include vermentino and nebbiolo. Other more local examples include Austria’s gruner veltliner grape and Hungary’s kadarka.

DOUG JOHNSON: Grapes contain water, sugar, acidity and tannin. These four elements are influenced by the kind of grape and the soil and climate of the vineyard. Wine growers can also affect the taste of their wine using other methods.

The French have a special name for the importance of the place where a grape is grown and its effect on the taste of a wine. “Terroir” is the word used to describe how a vineyard’s soil and climate give a wine special qualities. For example, a chardonnay wine grown in France will taste very different from one grown in California.

FAITH LAPIDUS: Now that we know about grapes and geography, we have some important tools for understanding the label on a bottle of wine. Some vineyards define their wine by the kind of grapes used in making the wine. Others define their wine based on where it is produced, such as wine made in France.

A bottle of wine may cost several dollars or hundreds of dollars. The cost of a wine usually has to do with how it was produced. Some wines are mass produced by companies with well known brand names. Other wines are made in very small quantities and require a great deal of time and effort to produce.

(MUSIC)

DOUG JOHNSON: How grapes become wine begins with the harvest. A winemaker must make an important decision about the best time to pick the grapes. Next, the grapes must be prepared for fermentation. The grapes are closely examined and sorted. Diseased or overly ripe grapes are thrown away.

Some winemakers choose to keep the stems of the grapes, while others remove them. The grapes are then crushed by machines. In the past, people crushed the grapes with their feet inside large containers. Some winemakers today still use this method. The grapes and their liquid are then stored in large containers where fermentation takes place.

FAITH LAPIDUS: The juice of white grapes is separated from the skins before fermentation. The skins of red grapes stay with the juice during fermentation. The skins give the wine its red color and much of its taste.

During fermentation, sweet grape juice slowly turns into a dryer and more complex tasting wine. During this stage, yeasts are changing sugar into alcohol, heat and carbon dioxide. Next, the wine is pressed so that solids are removed from the liquid.

Wine is often then stored in wooden containers called barrels. Aging the wine in barrels permits the flavors to come together. The oak wood can also give the wine a special taste. After the wine has aged for an extended period of time it is put into bottles. The wine is now ready to drink.

(MUSIC)

DOUG JOHNSON: Our description of winemaking is very general, but it gives you an idea of the process. In the United States, California is the most famous and top producing state for wine. But most people do not know that there are wineries in all fifty American states, including Alaska and Hawaii.

In nineteen forty-five, there was just one vineyard in the state of Maryland. Today, there are about forty vineyards in the state and that number is growing.

FAITH LAPIDUS: Earlier this month, we visited Black Ankle Vineyards in Maryland to learn more about wine production. Ed Boyce and Sarah O’Herron are a husband and wife team who own this fifty-nine hectare farm.

During our visit, many of the grapes were being harvested. Ms. O’Herron took us to check on the remaining grapes.

SARAH O’HERRON: “So this is Cabernet Sauvignon, that’s still on the vines. So they’re coming along.”

REPORTER: “So when will these be ready?”

SARAH O’HERRON: “ Two weeks maybe? They’re getting close, though.”

FAITH LAPIDUS: Ms. O’Herron tastes a grape and looks at its seeds.

SARAH O’HERRON: “And then these skins are still a little bit crunchy still. A little tannic, but not so much. It’s getting, these guys are getting close, which is good.”

DOUG JOHNSON: Ms. O’Herron shows us containers of newly picked pinot noir grapes. These grapes are now going through the wine process we talked about earlier.

Ed Boyce and Sarah O’Herron once worked as business professionals. But they spent a great deal of time travelling around the world and researching wine and the wine industry.

They decided to change careers and make wine their life’s work. They bought the farm that would become Black Ankle Vineyards in two thousand two. Their first full harvest was in two thousand six.

We asked Ms. O’Herron about the difficulties of being a winemaker.

SARAH O’HERRON: “First and foremost, it’s farming. We grow everything here right on this farm, so you are very much beholden to the weather, just like any other kind of farming. This year has been mostly a hot dry year, that’s generally good for us. But we can have a big rain storm, we just had a bunch of rain, and that will make an impact.”

FAITH LAPIDUS: Ms. O’Herron says their vineyard is getting increasing attention for the quality of their wine. She says this is partly because people do not expect such great wine to be produced in a state that is relatively unknown for its wine traditions.

Black Ankle Vineyards is a good example of how local winemakers are adding to the culture of wine production in the United States.

DOUG JOHNSON: Next week, we will continue our discussion about wine and talk to a wine professor and writer. This program was written and produced by Dana Demange. I’m Doug Johnson.

FAITH LAPIDUS: And I’m Faith Lapidus. You can comment on this program on our website, voaspecialenglish.com. Join us again next week for EXPLORATIONS in VOA Special English.

"Graves-End Road" by Caty Weaver, from VOA

2010-10-31T12:50:00.000-07:00

PAT BODNAR: Now, the VOA Special English program AMERICAN STORIES.

I'm Pat Bodnar. October thirty-first is Halloween. In the spirit of this ancient holiday, we present a story written by Special English reporter and producer Caty Weaver. It's called "The Boy on Graves-End Road.

NARRATOR: Kelly Ryan was making dinner. Her ten-year-old son Benjamin was watching television in the living room. Or at least she thought he was.

KELLY: "Benny-boy, do you want black beans or red beans?"

BEN: "Red beans, Mama."

Kelly: "Don't do that, Ben. You scared me half to death! You're going to get it now ... "

NARRATOR: Ben had come up quietly right behind her.

(SOUND)

KELLY: "I'll get back to you, stinker!"

NARRATOR: Kelly goes to the phone, but as soon as she lays her hand on it, the ringing stops.

KELLY: "How strange. Oh, the beans!"

NARRATOR: Kelly turns her attention back to cooking. As soon as she does, the phone rings again.

KELLY: "Honey, can you get that?"

BEN: "Hello? Oh, hi. Yes, I remember. Sure, it sounds fun. Let me ask my mom. Can you hold? She might wanna talk to your mom. Oh, um, OK. See you tomorrow."

KELLY: "Ben, your rice and beans are on the table. Let's eat."

(SOUND)

KELLY: "So, what was that call about?"

BEN: "That was Wallace Gray. You know him, from class. He wants to play tomorrow. Can I go home with him after school? Please, Mom? I get bored around here waiting for you after work."

KELLY: "But, Ben, I don't even know his parents. Maybe I should talk to them."

BEN: "You can't, Mom. He was with his babysitter. He said his parents wouldn't be home until late tonight and they would leave before he went to school in the morning. Please Mom, Wallace lives right over on Graves-End Road. It's a five-minute walk from here. PLEASE,?”

KELLY: "Well, OK. What's so great about this guy, anyway? You've got a ton of friends to play with."

BEN: "I know. But Wallace is just different. He's got a lot of imagination.”

NARRATOR: The school week passes, and Ben starts to go home almost every day with Wallace. Kelly notices a change in her son. He seems tired and withdrawn. His eyes do not seem to really look at her. They seem ... lifeless. On Friday night she decides they need to have a talk.

KELLY: "Sweetie, what's going on with you? You seem so tired and far away. Is something wrong? Did you and your new friend have a fight?"

BEN:"No, Mom. We've been having a great time. There's nothing wrong with us. Why don't you like Wallace? You don't even know him, but you don't trust him."

KELLY: "Benjamin, what are you talking about? I don't dislike Wallace. You're right, I don't know him. You just don't seem like yourself. You've been very quiet the past few nights."

BEN: "I'm sorry, Mom. I guess I'm just tired. I have a great time with Wallace. We play games like cops and robbers, but they seem so real that half of the time I feel like I'm in another world. It's hard to explain. It's like, it’s like ... "

KELLY: "I think the word you're looking for is intense."

BEN: "Yeah, that's it -- it's intense."

KELLY: "Well, tell me about today. What kind of game did you play?"

(SOUND)

BEN: "We were train robbers. Or Wallace was. I was a station manager. Wallace was running through a long train, from car to car. He had stolen a lot of money and gold from the passengers. I was chasing right behind him, moving as fast as I could. Finally he jumps out of the train into the station to make his escape. But I block his path. He grabs a woman on the station platform. She screams 'No, no!' But he yells 'Let me through, or she dies.' So I let him go."

KELLY: "What happened then?"

BEN: "Well, that's what was weird and, like you said, intense. Wallace threw the lady onto the tracks. And laughed. He said that's what evil characters do in games. They always do the worst."

NARRATOR: Later, after Ben went to bed, Kelly turned on the eleven o'clock news. She was only half-listening as she prepared a list of things to do the next day, on Halloween.

KELLY: "Let's see, grocery shopping, Halloween decorating, dog to the groomer, hardware store, clean up the garden ...

(SOUND)kelly

NEWS ANNOUNCER: "... the victim, who has not been identified, was killed instantly. Reports say it appears she was pushed off the station platform into the path of the oncoming train. It happened during rush hour today. Some witnesses reported seeing two boys running and playing near the woman. But police say they did not see any images like that on security cameras at the station. In other news, there was more trouble today as workers protested outside the Hammond ... "

KELLY: "No! It can't be. The station is an hour away. They couldn't have gotten there. How could they? It's just a coincidence."

NARRATOR: The wind blew low and lonely that night. Kelly slept little. She dreamed she was waiting for Ben at a train station. Then, she saw him on the other side, running with another little boy.

It must be Wallace she thought. The little boy went in and out of view. Then, all of a sudden, he stopped and looked across the tracks -- directly at her.

He had no face.

NARRATOR: Saturday morning was bright and sunny, a cool October day. Kelly made Ben eggs and toast and watched him eat happily.

KELLY: "You know, Benny-boy, a woman DID get hurt at the train station yesterday. She actually got hit by a train. Isn't that strange?"

NARRATOR: She looked at Ben.

BEN: "What do you mean, Mom?"

KELLY: "Well, you and Wallace were playing that game yesterday. About being at a train station. You said he threw a woman off the platform, and she was killed by a train."

NARRATOR: Kelly felt like a fool even saying the words. She was speaking to a ten-year-old who had been playing an imaginary game with another ten-year-old. What was she thinking?

BEN: "I said we played that yesterday? I did? Hmmm. No, we played that a few days ago, I think. It was just a really good game, really intense. Yesterday we played pirates. I got to be Captain Frank on the pirate ship, the Argh.

"Wallace was Davey, the first mate. But he tried to rebel and take over the ship so I made him walk the plank. Davey walked off into the sea and drowned. Wallace told me I had to order him to walk the plank. He said that's what evil pirates do."

KELLY: "I guess he's right. I don't know any pirates, but I do hear they're pretty evil!"

BEN: "So can I play with Wallace today when you are doing your errands? Please, Mom? I don't want to go shopping and putting up Halloween decorations."

KELLY: "Oh, whatever. I guess so. I'll pick you up at Wallace's house at about five-thirty, so you can get ready for trick or treating. Where does he live again?

BEN: "Graves-End Road. I don't know the street number but there are only two houses on each side. His is the second one on the left."

KELLY: "OK. I can find that easy enough. Do you still want me to pick up a ghost costume for you?"

BEN: "Yep. Oh, and guess what, Mom: Wallace says he's a ghost, too! I suppose we'll haunt the neighborhood together."

NARRATOR: Everywhere Kelly went that day was crowded. She spent an hour and a half just at the market. When she got home, decorating the house for Halloween was difficult.

But finally she had it all up the way she wanted.

KELLY: "Oh, gosh, five already. I don't even have Ben's costume."

NARRATOR: She jumped into her car and drove to Wilson Boulevard. The party store was just a few blocks away.

Kelly soon found the ghost costume that Ben wanted. She bought it and walked out of the store.

EILEEN: "Hey, Kelly! Long time no see. How's Benjamin doing?"

KELLY: "Eileen! Wow, it’s great to see you. How's Matt? We've been so busy since the school year started, we haven't seen anyone!"

EILEEN: "Matt's good. Well, he broke his arm last month so no sports for him. It is driving him crazy, but at least he's got a lot of time for school now!"

EILEEN: "Anyway, Matt was wondering why Benny-boy never comes by anymore. We saw him running around the neighborhood after school last week. It looks like he’s having fun, but he's always alone. We don't need to set up a play date. Ben should know that. You just tell him to come by anytime -- "

KELLY: "Wait, wait a minute. Alone? What do mean alone? He started playing with a new friend, Wallace somebody, after school, like everyday this past week. Ben hasn't been alone. Wallace Gray, that's it. Do you know him? Does Matt?"

EILEEN: "Oh, Kell. Kelly, I'm sure he's a fine kid. I don't know him but don't worry, Ben's got great taste in friends, we know that! I'm sure he wasn't really alone, he was probably just playing hide and seek or something. I didn't mean to worry you. I guess everybody's on edge because of what happened to the Godwin boy this morning."

NARRATOR: Kelly suddenly felt cold and scared. What Godwin boy? And what happened to him? She was not sure she wanted to know, but she had to ask.

EILEEN: "Frank Godwin's youngest boy, Davey, the five-year-old. You know Frank, we call him Captain. He used to be a ship captain. Well, this morning the rescue squad found Davey in Blackhart Lake. They also found a little toy boat that his dad made for him. Davey and his dad named it the Argh. Davey must have been trying to sail it. It’s so sad."

KELLY: "Wait, he's dead?

EILEEN: "Yes. Davey drowned."

KELLY: "Where's Blackhart Lake?"

EILEEN: "It's right off Graves-End Road, right behind that little cemetery. That's why they call it Graves-End. Kelly, where are you going?"

Kelly: "I've got to get Benjamin."

(MUSIC)

NARRATOR: Kelly raced down Main Street. She had no idea who Wallace Gray was or how he was involved in any of this. But she did not trust him and she knew her child was in danger.

Finally she was at Graves-End Road.

BEN: "Only two houses on each side."

NARRATOR: She remembered what Ben had told her.

EILEEN: "Right behind that little cemetery."

NARRATOR: And what Eileen had told her. Kelly got out of the car and walked down the street. She looked around.

BEN: "It’s the second one on the left."

NARRATOR: She could see the lake. Some fog was coming up as the sky darkened on this Halloween night. But there was no second house. Instead, what lay before her was grass and large white stones. The cemetery. Kelly walked through the gate into the yard of graves.

Kelly: "Ben?"

NARRATOR: No answer. She kept walking.

KELLY: "Ben? Answer me. I know you're here."

NARRATOR: Again no answer. But the wind blew and some leaves began to dance around a headstone. Kelly walked slowly toward the grave. Suddenly the sky blackened -- so dark, she could not see anything. She felt a force pushing at her. It tried to push her away from the grave. But she knew she had to stay.

KELLY: "Benjamin Owen Orr, this is your mother. Come out this second!"

NARRATOR: No one answered, except for the sound of the blowing wind. The darkness lifted. Silvery moonlight shone down directly onto the old gravestone in front of her. But Kelly already knew whose name she would see.

KELLY: "'Wallace Gray. October thirty-first, nineteen hundred, to October thirty-first, nineteen hundred and ten. Some are best when laid to rest.'"

NARRATOR: Kelly took a deep breath. Then ...

KELLY: "Wallace Gray this play date is OVER! Give me back my son. Wallace, you are in TIME-OUT."

NARRATOR: Suddenly, the ground shoots upward like a small volcano. Soil, sticks and worms fly over Kelly's head and rain down again -- followed by her son, who lands beside her.

BEN: (COUGHING, CHOKING)

KELLY: "Ben! Ben!"

BEN: (COUGHING, CHOKING) "Mom, Mom! Are you there? I can't see. All this dirt in my eyes."

KELLY: "Ben, I'm here, I’m here baby, right here. Oh, sweet Benny-boy. Can you breathe? Are you really ok? What happened? How long were you in there?"

BEN: "I don't know, Mom. But I didn't like it. I didn't like where Wallace lives. I want to go home."

KELLY: "Oh, me too, Sweetie. C’mon, Ben, put your arm around me. C’mon.

(SOUNDS)

BEN: "And Mom, one more thing ... "

KELLY: "What is it, Ben?"

BEN "I don't want to be a ghost for Halloween."

(MUSIC)

PAT BODNAR: Our story "The Boy on Graves-End Road" was written and produced by Caty Weaver. The voices were Andrew Bracken, Faith Lapidus, Katherine Cole, Shirley Griffith and Jim Tedder. I'm Pat Bodnar.

Join us again next week for another American story in VOA Special English.

"Beyond The Door" by Philip K. DickRead by Roy Trumbull

2010-10-23T11:46:00.000-07:00

Did you ever wonder at the lonely life the bird in a cuckoo clock
has to lead--that it might possibly love and hate just as easily as
a real animal of flesh and blood? Philip Dick used that idea for
this brief fantasy tale. We're sure that after reading it you'll
give cuckoo clocks more respect.

"Beyond The Door" by Philip K. Dick

Larry Thomas bought a cuckoo clock
for his wife--without knowing the
price he would have to pay.

That night at the dinner table he brought it out and set it down beside
her plate. Doris stared at it, her hand to her mouth. "My God, what is
it?" She looked up at him, bright-eyed.

"Well, open it."

Doris tore the ribbon and paper from the square package with her sharp
nails, her bosom rising and falling. Larry stood watching her as she
lifted the lid. He lit a cigarette and leaned against the wall.

"A cuckoo clock!" Doris cried. "A real cuckoo clock like my mother
had." She turned the clock over and over. "Just like my mother had, when
Pete was still alive." Her eyes sparkled with tears.

"It's made in Germany," Larry said. After a moment he added, "Carl got
it for me wholesale. He knows some guy in the clock business. Otherwise
I wouldn't have--" He stopped.

Doris made a funny little sound.

"I mean, otherwise I wouldn't have been able to afford it." He scowled.
"What's the matter with you? You've got your clock, haven't you? Isn't
that what you want?"

Doris sat holding onto the clock, her fingers pressed against the brown
wood.

"Well," Larry said, "what's the matter?"

He watched in amazement as she leaped up and ran from the room, still
clutching the clock. He shook his head. "Never satisfied. They're all
that way. Never get enough."

He sat down at the table and finished his meal.

The cuckoo clock was not very large. It was hand-made, however, and
there were countless frets on it, little indentations and ornaments
scored in the soft wood. Doris sat on the bed drying her eyes and
winding the clock. She set the hands by her wristwatch. Presently she
carefully moved the hands to two minutes of ten. She carried the clock
over to the dresser and propped it up.

Then she sat waiting, her hands twisted together in her lap--waiting for
the cuckoo to come out, for the hour to strike.

As she sat she thought about Larry and what he had said. And what she
had said, too, for that matter--not that she could be blamed for any of
it. After all, she couldn't keep listening to him forever without
defending herself; you had to blow your own trumpet in the world.

She touched her handkerchief to her eyes suddenly. Why did he have to
say that, about getting it wholesale? Why did he have to spoil it all?
If he felt that way he needn't have got it in the first place. She
clenched her fists. He was so mean, so damn mean.

But she was glad of the little clock sitting there ticking to itself,
with its funny grilled edges and the door. Inside the door was the
cuckoo, waiting to come out. Was he listening, his head cocked on one
side, listening to hear the clock strike so that he would know to come
out?

Did he sleep between hours? Well, she would soon see him: she could ask
him. And she would show the clock to Bob. He would love it; Bob loved
old things, even old stamps and buttons. He liked to go with her to the
stores. Of course, it was a little awkward, but Larry had been staying
at the office so much, and that helped. If only Larry didn't call up
sometimes to--

There was a whirr. The clock shuddered and all at once the door opened.
The cuckoo came out, sliding swiftly. He paused and looked around
solemnly, scrutinizing her, the room, the furniture.

It was the first time he had seen her, she realized, smiling to herself
in pleasure. She stood up, coming toward him shyly. "Go on," she said.
"I'm waiting."

The cuckoo opened his bill. He whirred and chirped, quickly,
rhythmically. Then, after a moment of contemplation, he retired. And the
door snapped shut.

She was delighted. She clapped her hands and spun in a little circle. He
was marvelous, perfect! And the way he had looked around, studying her,
sizing her up. He liked her; she was certain of it. And she, of course,
loved him at once, completely. He was just what she had hoped would come
out of the little door.

Doris went to the clock. She bent over the little door, her lips close
to the wood. "Do you hear me?" she whispered. "I think you're the most
wonderful cuckoo in the world." She paused, embarrassed. "I hope you'll
like it here."

Then she went downstairs again, slowly, her head high.

Larry and the cuckoo clock really never got along well from the start.
Doris said it was because he didn't wind it right, and it didn't like
being only half-wound all the time. Larry turned the job of winding over
to her; the cuckoo came out every quarter hour and ran the spring down
without remorse, and someone had to be ever after it, winding it up
again.

Doris did her best, but she forgot a good deal of the time. Then Larry
would throw his newspaper down with an elaborate weary motion and stand
up. He would go into the dining-room where the clock was mounted on the
wall over the fireplace. He would take the clock down and making sure
that he had his thumb over the little door, he would wind it up.

"Why do you put your thumb over the door?" Doris asked once.

"You're supposed to."

She raised an eyebrow. "Are you sure? I wonder if it isn't that you
don't want him to come out while you're standing so close."

"Why not?"

"Maybe you're afraid of him."

Larry laughed. He put the clock back on the wall and gingerly removed
his thumb. When Doris wasn't looking he examined his thumb.

There was still a trace of the nick cut out of the soft part of it.
Who--or what--had pecked at him?

* * * * *

One Saturday morning, when Larry was down at the office working over
some important special accounts, Bob Chambers came to the front porch
and rang the bell.

Doris was taking a quick shower. She dried herself and slipped into her
robe. When she opened the door Bob stepped inside, grinning.

"Hi," he said, looking around.

"It's all right. Larry's at the office."

"Fine." Bob gazed at her slim legs below the hem of the robe. "How nice
you look today."

She laughed. "Be careful! Maybe I shouldn't let you in after all."

They looked at one another, half amused half frightened. Presently Bob
said, "If you want, I'll--"

"No, for God's sake." She caught hold of his sleeve. "Just get out of
the doorway so I can close it. Mrs. Peters across the street, you
know."

She closed the door. "And I want to show you something," she said. "You
haven't seen it."

He was interested. "An antique? Or what?"

She took his arm, leading him toward the dining-room. "You'll love it,
Bobby." She stopped, wide-eyed. "I hope you will. You must; you must
love it. It means so much to me--_he_ means so much."

"He?" Bob frowned. "Who is he?"

Doris laughed. "You're jealous! Come on." A moment later they stood
before the clock, looking up at it. "He'll come out in a few minutes.
Wait until you see him. I know you two will get along just fine."

"What does Larry think of him?"

"They don't like each other. Sometimes when Larry's here he won't come
out. Larry gets mad if he doesn't come out on time. He says--"

"Says what?"

Doris looked down. "He always says he's been robbed, even if he did get
it wholesale." She brightened. "But I know he won't come out because he
doesn't like Larry. When I'm here alone he comes right out for me, every
fifteen minutes, even though he really only has to come out on the
hour."

She gazed up at the clock. "He comes out for me because he wants to. We
talk; I tell him things. Of course, I'd like to have him upstairs in my
room, but it wouldn't be right."

There was the sound of footsteps on the front porch. They looked at each
other, horrified.

Larry pushed the front door open, grunting. He set his briefcase down
and took off his hat. Then he saw Bob for the first time.

"Chambers. I'll be damned." His eyes narrowed. "What are you doing
here?" He came into the dining-room. Doris drew her robe about her
helplessly, backing away.

"I--" Bob began. "That is, we--" He broke off, glancing at Doris.
Suddenly the clock began to whirr. The cuckoo came rushing out, bursting
into sound. Larry moved toward him.

"Shut that din off," he said. He raised his fist toward the clock. The
cuckoo snapped into silence and retreated. The door closed. "That's
better." Larry studied Doris and Bob, standing mutely together.

"I came over to look at the clock," Bob said. "Doris told me that it's a
rare antique and that--"

"Nuts. I bought it myself." Larry walked up to him. "Get out of here."
He turned to Doris. "You too. And take that damn clock with you."

He paused, rubbing his chin. "No. Leave the clock here. It's mine; I
bought it and paid for it."

In the weeks that followed after Doris left, Larry and the cuckoo clock
got along even worse than before. For one thing, the cuckoo stayed
inside most of the time, sometimes even at twelve o'clock when he should
have been busiest. And if he did come out at all he usually spoke only
once or twice, never the correct number of times. And there was a
sullen, uncooperative note in his voice, a jarring sound that made Larry
uneasy and a little angry.

But he kept the clock wound, because the house was very still and quiet
and it got on his nerves not to hear someone running around, talking and
dropping things. And even the whirring of a clock sounded good to him.

But he didn't like the cuckoo at all. And sometimes he spoke to him.

"Listen," he said late one night to the closed little door. "I know you
can hear me. I ought to give you back to the Germans--back to the Black
Forest." He paced back and forth. "I wonder what they're doing now, the
two of them. That young punk with his books and his antiques. A man
shouldn't be interested in antiques; that's for women."

He set his jaw. "Isn't that right?"

The clock said nothing. Larry walked up in front of it. "Isn't that
right?" he demanded. "Don't you have anything to say?"

He looked at the face of the clock. It was almost eleven, just a few
seconds before the hour. "All right. I'll wait until eleven. Then I want
to hear what you have to say. You've been pretty quiet the last few
weeks since she left."

He grinned wryly. "Maybe you don't like it here since she's gone." He
scowled. "Well, I paid for you, and you're coming out whether you like
it or not. You hear me?"

Eleven o'clock came. Far off, at the end of town, the great tower clock
boomed sleepily to itself. But the little door remained shut. Nothing
moved. The minute hand passed on and the cuckoo did not stir. He was
someplace inside the clock, beyond the door, silent and remote.

"All right, if that's the way you feel," Larry murmured, his lips
twisting. "But it isn't fair. It's your job to come out. We all have to
do things we don't like."

He went unhappily into the kitchen and opened the great gleaming
refrigerator. As he poured himself a drink he thought about the clock.

There was no doubt about it--the cuckoo should come out, Doris or no
Doris. He had always liked her, from the very start. They had got along
well, the two of them. Probably he liked Bob too--probably he had seen
enough of Bob to get to know him. They would be quite happy together,
Bob and Doris and the cuckoo.

Larry finished his drink. He opened the drawer at the sink and took out
the hammer. He carried it carefully into the dining-room. The clock was
ticking gently to itself on the wall.

"Look," he said, waving the hammer. "You know what I have here? You know
what I'm going to do with it? I'm going to start on you--first." He
smiled. "Birds of a feather, that's what you are--the three of you."

The room was silent.

"Are you coming out? Or do I have to come in and get you?"

The clock whirred a little.

"I hear you in there. You've got a lot of talking to do, enough for the
last three weeks. As I figure it, you owe me--"

The door opened. The cuckoo came out fast, straight at him. Larry was
looking down, his brow wrinkled in thought. He glanced up, and the
cuckoo caught him squarely in the eye.

Down he went, hammer and chair and everything, hitting the floor with a
tremendous crash. For a moment the cuckoo paused, its small body poised
rigidly. Then it went back inside its house. The door snapped tight-shut
after it.

The man lay on the floor, stretched out grotesquely, his head bent over
to one side. Nothing moved or stirred. The room was completely silent,
except, of course, for the ticking of the clock.

* * * * *

"I see," Doris said, her face tight. Bob put his arm around her,
steadying her.

"Doctor," Bob said, "can I ask you something?"

"Of course," the doctor said.

"Is it very easy to break your neck, falling from so low a chair? It
wasn't very far to fall. I wonder if it might not have been an accident.
Is there any chance it might have been--"

"Suicide?" the doctor rubbed his jaw. "I never heard of anyone
committing suicide that way. It was an accident; I'm positive."

"I don't mean suicide," Bob murmured under his breath, looking up at the
clock on the wall. "I meant something else."

But no one heard him.

Third Form Participle List

2010-09-29T11:25:00.000-07:00

"Catalan Guitarist" Joan Miro, 1924

Text of Three Verbs, Page One
Text of Three Verbs, Page Two
Text of Three Verbs, Page Three

Grammartalk 10HB, Page 1 - Prepositions of Place and Time

2010-09-26T14:38:00.000-07:00

"Women in the Garden" Claude Monet, 1866

1.
A: Where do you live?
B: I live on Valencia Street. It’s in the Mission District.
A: Do you live near 16th Street?
B: Not too far. I live between 20th and 21st Streets.
A: Where do you attend English class?
B: I attend English class at Mission Campus

2.
A: How can I find your apartment?
B: It’s on the top floor. I live in Number 31.
A: Is there an elevator in the building?
B: Yes, there is. My apartment is on the right as you leave the elevator.
A: How long have you lived in San Francisco?
B: I’ve lived here for six years.

3.
A: How long did you live in Mexico City?
B: I lived there for sixteen years. I moved in 1995.
A: How long have you studied at Mission Campus?
B: I’ve studied English at Mission Campus for two semesters.
A: Are you interested in the computer classes also?
B: Yes, I’m also interested in the computer classes.

4.
A: Where is Mission Campus located?
B: It’s at 106 Bartlett Street.
A: Is it near 22nd Street?
B: Yes, it is. It’s on the corner of Bartlett and 22nd.
A: When is the first class at Mission Campus?
B: The first class begins at 8:30 am.

5.
A: Could you tell me where the canned soup is?
B: It’s in aisle 3 on the second shelf.
A: Could you tell me where the potatoes are?
B: You’ll find them in the middle of aisle 4, on the bottom shelf.
A: I’m looking for disposable diapers. Where are they?
B: There aren’t any diapers in this store. You’ll find them at Walgreens. It’s on Mission Street.

6.
A: Do you live on Mission Street?
B: No, I don’t. I live on Noe Street.
A: Do you live on the top of the hill?
B: No, I don’t. I live on the bottom of the hill.
A: Is there a patio in back of your house?
B: No, there isn’t. But there’s a small garden in front of my house.

7.
A: Could you tell me how to get to Mission Campus?
B: Certainly. Walk up Mission Street to 22nd.
A: This is 18th. Is 22nd four blocks from here?
B: That’s right. Turn right on 22nd. Walk along 22nd.
A: Ok. I turn right on 22nd and walk along 22nd.
B: Yes. You’ll see Mission Campus on the left, at the corner of Bartlett and 22nd.

8.
A: Can you tell me how to get to the post office?
B: Sure. Walk along 22nd Street to South Van Ness.
A: Let’s see. Walk along 22nd Street to South Van Ness. Is that what you said?
B: Yes. When you reach South Van Ness, turn right.
A: So I turn right on South Van Ness.
B: Yes. Walk up South Van Ness, and you’ll see the
post office on the right, at the corner of South Van Ness and 23rd.

9.
A: I’m trying to reach Mr. Parker. Is he at home?
B: No, he isn’t at home right now. He’s at school.
A: I tried to reach him at school, but I couldn’t.
B: You couldn’t reach him at school? He must be at work.
A: No, I tried to get him at work. He wasn’t there.
B: That’s right. He’s at the laundromat. I forgot.

10
A: You can buy the book for this class at the bookstore.
B: Could you tell me where the bookstore is?
A: Yes, it’s on the first floor.
B: Is it near the entrance of the building?
A: Yes. As you enter the building, you’ll see it on the left.
B: Okay. As I enter the building, it’ll be on my left.

Grammartalk 16, Page 2 - Present, Unreal Conditional

2010-09-10T18:53:00.000-07:00

"Portrait of Mary Cassatt" by Edgar Degas, 1880-1884

1.
A: If I weren't really hungry right now, I wouldn't eat this pizza.
S: I wouldn't eat the whole thing if I were you. If you eat that pizza, you might get sick.
A: I wouldn't get sick unless I ate two extra large pizzas. This one is just a medium.
S: If it didn't have all that sausage and pepperoni on it, it would be healthier.
A: Thanks for your advice, but I really don't think I'll be any the worse for having eaten it. S: If I were you, I would eat less pizza and more fruits and vegetables.
A: If I had some beer right now, this pizza would taste a million times better.

2.
A: My work schedule has been changed. If I had the same schedule as before, I could attend class.
B: Many students have the same problem. If employers understood the importance of learning English, they wouldn't make it impossible for students to go to school.
A: If I didn't have to make a living, I wouldn't let my job stand in the way of my education.
S: The teacher understands your situation. He will welcome you back when you're able to attend school again.
A: If I didn't have to miss so many classes, I would be able to progress to the next level.
B: You would be exposed to more English if you had to speak it at your work place.

3.
A: Would you like to go swimming at the pool this weekend?
S: I don't know how to swim. If I knew how to swim, I'd like nothing better than to go swimming.
A: Professor Hopkins is giving a lecture on modern painting tomorrow night. How about going with me? S: Thanks for asking, but I don't really enjoy modern painting. If I appreciated it more, I'd really like to attend that lecture.
A: Let's not stay home and watch TV tonight. There really isn't much on. Let's go to the movies instead.
B: Unfortunately, I saw the Entertainment Section today. There are no movies I'm especially interested in. If there were an interesting movie, I'd certainly like to go and see it.

4.
A: Mr. Atkins, I'd like to talk to you about your orchard. You have far too many apple trees in it.
S: Thanks. I think so too. If I didn't have such a large orchard, I wouldn't have so many apple trees.
A: And if you didn't have so many apples, you'd be able to sell them all and make more money.
S: If more people came to the farmer's market, I'd sell a larger quantity of apples.
A: You should sell some of your orchard to a developer. He could build some nice houses.
B: No way. If I sold my land to a developer, I would have too many noisy neighbors.

5.
A: I wish I weren't so busy. If I weren't so busy, I would be able to take a break once in a while.
S: You don't relax enough. If you relaxed more and didn't drink so much coffee, you'd feel a lot calmer.
A: I like to stay busy. When I'm real busy, I don't have time to worry about my problems.
B: You shouldn't run around like a chicken with its head cut off. If I were you, I'd stay home and read instead of going to another party.
A: If I were twenty-five, I wouldn't worry about my overactive lifestyle. But I'm afraid it's going to catch up with me some day.
B: You would feel a lot more relaxed if you took a short afternoon nap once in a while.

6.
A: Would you mind if I asked you some advice? I'm considering getting married next month.
S: I hope you're not thinking of marrying Karl Woodruff. He's rich but he's not very nice. You would be miserable together.
A: If I married Karl Woodruff, would I be making a terrible mistake?
B: Yes. To tell the truth, I wouldn't marry that idiot if I were you. If you looked around, you'd find a better boyfriend.
A: So, what kind of guy do you think I should marry? Do you have any bright ideas?
B: Yes. I think you should marry my brother Ralph. If you married him, you'd be very happy in my opinion.

Grammartalk 15, Page Three, Modal Plus Present Perfect

2010-09-06T09:06:00.000-07:00

"Around the Fish" Paul Klee, 1926

1.
A: I can't find Charlie's Restaurant in the phone book. It used to be so popular.
B: He must have gone out of business. I'm not surprised. The quality has been going downhill in recent years.
A: The chef he had working for him was top notch. The food was really exceptional.
B: That chef must have quit. He might have found a higher paying restaurant.
A: It's really a shame. Charlie's Restaurant was one of the best places for seafood in town.
B: We must have eaten there more than fifty times, but that's a rough guess.

2.
A: I'm really frustrated. Every time I call this number, I get their voice mail.
B: It's twelve thirty. They must have gone out to lunch. What's the problem?
A: I'm having trouble with this new printer. I'm trying to get some advice from technical support.
B: The power light isn't on. You must not have plugged it in.
A: My God. How could I have forgotten to plug it in? That's what's wrong, of course.
B: Try plugging it in and see if that solves your problem. If not, you might have to take your printer back to the place you bought it.

3.
A: How is the investigation proceeding, Detective Polumbo? Are you any closer to solving the mystery?
B: I have several important clues. You see those muddy foot prints? They must have been left by the killer.
A: That's unlikely, sir. Look at your own shoes. You must have tracked mud in here yourself.
B: Hmm. You're right. These prints are exactly my shoe size.
A: Any other important clues to report?
B: I just analyzed the bullet wound. It must have been caused by a Smith and Wesson revolver.
A: That's exactly the kind of revolver you're carrying. You must be the murderer!

4.
A: Do you know where my reading glasses are? I thought I left them on the bookshelf.
B: I saw them on your briefcase next to the kitchen table.
A: I must have used them to read the morning paper. Then, I must have just set them on the briefcase absentmindedly.
B: Be careful where you leave your glasses. Some day, you might lose them.
A: Do you have any idea where my briefcase is? I must have searched everywhere for it.
B: I think it's in the kitchen. Don't you remember? I just told you that your glasses are sitting on it.

5.
A: You very tired today, aren't you? You must not have slept very well last night.
B: Every morning, I get up at five. That means I have to be in bed asleep no later than ten.
A: So, you must have gone to bed too late. When did you finally fall asleep?
B: I didn't fall asleep until around two in the morning. I was too nervous to sleep.
A: I know. You're a fan of horror movies. You must have seen a really scary movie on TV before you went to bed last night. Right or wrong?
B: You guessed it. I saw "Night of The Serial Killers." It was one of the worst movies I've ever seen. And, it scared the daylights out of me.

6.
A: Judy has been smiling all day long, and she hasn't been concentrating on her work.
B: She must have had a good time on her date last night. She went out with Jeff Hoyle again.
A: But she has gone out with Jeff Hoyle before. She has never been this happy the next day.
B: I think he finally must have proposed to her. That's why she's acting so distracted.
A: Is that why she keeps looking at that ring on her finger instead of typing reports?
B: It's definitely an engagement ring. The diamond is huge. It must have cost a fortune.

Grammartalk 8, Present Perfect Progressive Tense, Page Two

2010-09-04T17:22:00.000-07:00

"The Farmyard" Marc Chagall, 1957

11.
A: You’ve been yawning all day. What’s up?
B: I haven’t been sleeping very well lately.
A: That’s a shame. Why haven’t you been sleeping?
B: I’ve been waking up in the middle of the night a lot.
A: You should try drinking Nighty Night tea. It will help you sleep.
B: That’s a good idea. I haven’t been doing anything about my sleeping problem.

12.
A: You’ve been acting nervous all day. What’s up?
B: I’m going to fly in an airplane tomorrow.
A: Haven’t you ever flown in an airplane before?
B: No, I haven’t. I’ve been worrying about it for weeks.
A: Don’t worry! I’ve been flying in airplanes for years.
B: OK. I guess there’s nothing to be nervous about.

13.
A: Toshi has been living in a small town in Japan all his life.
B: Yes, and now he’s going to move to San Francisco.
A: He’s nervous, because he’s never studied English.
B: His cousins have been studying English for years.
A: They’ll be able to help him.
B: Toshi has been speaking Japanese all his life.

14.
A: Toshi has never shopped at an American supermarket.
B: Toshi’s cousins have been shopping in American supermarkets for years.
A: That’s great. They’ll be able to help him to adjust.
B: Toshi has been eating only Japanese food.
A: His cousins have been eating hamburgers for years.
B: They’ve also been having stomach problems.

15.
A: Toshi has been taking his girlfriend to the movies for years.
B: Now, Toshi will have to leave his girlfriend.
A: Toshi’s cousins have been dating in America for years.
B: That’s nice. They’ll be able to introduce him to their friends.
A: Toshi has never left his small town in Japan.
B: His cousins have been traveling around for years.

16.
A: How are you feeling, Mr. Jackson?
B: Well, Doctor, I’ve been having a back problem.
A: How long have you been having this problem?
B: It’s been bothering me for two weeks.
A: Have you ever had a back problem before?
B: No, I haven’t. This is the first time.

17.
A: How is your appetite? Have you been eating well lately?
B: I’ve been eating a balanced diet, I think.
A: A lot of people have been coming to me with back problems recently.
B: What do you usually recommend?
A: I’ve been advising my patients to exercise regularly.

18.
A: This is a list of exercises. Do them twice a day.
B: Have you other patients been using these exercises.
A: Yes, they have. And they’ve been getting good results.
B: Well, thank you. Frankly, I haven’t been exercising much.
A: It’s not easy to make time to exercise. But, try it.
B: I’ve been thinking about exercise for a long time.

19.
A: Mario has been assembling cameras since 7 A.M.
B: Really? How many cameras has he assembled?
A: He’s assembled 19 cameras so far.
B: He’s never assembled that many cameras in one day before.
A: I know. Fortunately, he only has to assemble one more camera. Then, he can go home.
B: I bet he’s looking forward to a break.

20.
A: Judy has been typing letters since 9 A.M.
B: Really? How many letters has she typed so far?
A: She’s typed 25 letters today, and she’s tired.
B: She’s never typed that many letters in one day before.
A: I know that. Fortunately, she only has to type one more letter. Then, she can go home.
B: I bet she’s looking forward to a relaxing dinner.

"Music Around the World" from VOA.

2010-08-14T11:33:00.000-07:00

STEVE EMBER: I’m Steve Ember.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: And I’m Shirley Griffith with EXPLORATIONS in VOA Special English. Today we travel around the world listening to the music from six creative and exciting albums. Some artists are well known, while others are at the start of their musical careers. The music we will listen to comes from a wide range of influences and traditions. We begin with music from South Africa that is sure to make listeners want to dance.

(MUSIC: “Vana Vasesi”)

STEVE EMBER: That was the song “Vana Vasesi” from the album “Shangaan Electro: New Wave Dance Music from South Africa.” It features twelve songs by different artists. The Shangaan are an ethnic group living in southern Mozambique and parts of South Africa. In the township of Soweto, music producer Richard Hlungwani redefined traditional Shangaan music by making the beat much faster. New York-based radio producer Wills Glasspiegel discovered this energetic music and helped bring Richard Hlungwani’s work to a larger audience outside South Africa.

Dancing is a huge part of this music. Shangaan street dancers move their feet as fast as lightning and shake their bodies to the music’s beat.

(MUSIC- “Problema de 2”)

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: Ana Tijoux was born in France to a French mother and Chilean father, who lived in exile during the rule of Augusto Pinochet. When she was in school, she loved to study poetry, which has influenced her song-writing.

In Chile, Ana Tijoux became interested in the hip-hop music she was hearing in Santiago. She was a member of a successful hip-hop group called Makiza.

She has also made two albums performing on her own. Her latest album “1977” is named after the year she was born. Here is the title song from that album.

(MUSIC: “1977”)

STEVE EMBER: Rachid Taha was born in Algeria but grew up in France. His songs are influenced by North African music as well as rock and techno. He sings in both Arabic and French.

(MUSIC: “Ha Baby”)

Taha is known for being both a rebel and a poet. His songs often discuss the reality of living in exile and missing one’s homeland. His music has earned him many fans, especially among Arab-speaking immigrants living in France.

(MUSIC: “Bonjour”)

Rachid Taha’s latest album “Bonjour” is influenced by American rock and country music. It is the first album he recorded in the United States. He has said that he has another musical goal related to American music: to one day sing a song with country music star Dolly Parton.

(MUSIC: “Basement Bhangra Anthem”)

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: DJ Rekha is the professional name of Rekha Malhotra. She was born in London to Pakistani parents but grew up in New York City where she still lives. DJ Rekha has helped introduce bhangra music to New Yorkers with her monthly music parties. Bhangra music is an ancient form of folk music from the Punjab area of India and Pakistan. This music was performed during seasonal dance celebrations. Modern bhangra music is a huge part of pop culture in South Asia.

(MUSIC: “Snake Charmer”)

DJ Rekha combines bhangra with electronic music, hip-hop and many other sounds and influences. She is helping to break barriers in a dance club industry where many DJ’s are men.

(MUSIC: “Hold You”)

STEVE EMBER: The Jamaican singer Windel Beneto Edwards, known as Gyptian, sings reggae and dancehall music. He grew up singing at his mother’s church. He was also influenced by the music his Rastafarian father listened to.

He first gained wide attention in two thousand four when he won a talent competition on Jamaican television. Gyptian most often sings love songs. He has a gentle and expressive voice that has earned him the name of the “Sexy Rasta”. One of his early hits in Jamaica, “Serious Times”, had a political message. His recent release “Hold You” is bringing Gyptian a whole new level of attention and praise.

(MUSIC: “Oursoul”)

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: Hindi Zahra writes songs that combine jazz and blues music with the drumbeats of Morocco. Critics have compared her sensual voice to the American blues singer Billie Holiday. Hindi Zahra grew up in a Berber family in Morocco. Her mother sang in their village, and her uncles were musicians. The many traditions of North African music she listened to as a child had a big influence on her.

Zahra later moved to Paris, France. She found work singing on other artists’ hip-hop recordings. She also spent years writing her own music. Her album “Handmade” shows some of the results of these song-writing efforts. She sings mostly in English, with one song in her native Berber language. We leave you with Hindi Zahra’s song “Stand Up.”

(MUSIC: “Stand Up”)

STEVE EMBER: This program was written and produced by Dana Demange. I’m Steve Ember.

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: And I’m Shirley Griffith. You can read and download programs on our Web site, voaspecialenglish.com. You can also find us on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube at VOA Learning English. Join us again next week for EXPLORATIONS in VOA Special English.

"Doctor and Writer Oliver Sacks"

2010-07-30T12:42:00.001-07:00

This is SCIENCE IN THE NEWS in VOA Special English. I'm Barbara Klein. And I'm Bob Doughty. This week, we tell about the doctor and writer Oliver Sacks. He has spent most of his adult life treating patients in New York City. He also teaches neurology and psychiatry at Colombia University.

But Doctor Sacks is most famous for his books about people with disorders of the brain and nervous system. The stories he writes explore the science of the brain and the way it works. But they also tell a very human story about the experiences of real people struggling to live with unusual conditions.

(MUSIC)

Imagine a person who has no memory of the past twenty years of his life and still thinks he is a young man. The patient suffers from Korsakov's syndrome, a brain disorder that leads to memory loss. He remains trapped in a distant past because his memory of recent activities only lasts a few minutes.

Or imagine a man who learns to control the repeated movements and shouts that are signs of Tourette's syndrome. His doctor gives him medicine to take during the week to control the disorder. But on the weekends, the man decides to enjoy the signs of Tourette's because they are a part of his identity and personality.

These are examples of stories about patients as described in Oliver Sacks' book, "The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat." Published in nineteen eighty-five, the book became a huge success.

Doctor Sacks' earlier book, "Awakenings," told about his work with post-encephalitic patients at a hospital in New York City. Signs of this sickness include loss of speech and movement. In the nineteen sixties, Doctor Sacks gave the then-new drug L-Dopa to the patients. The drug gave them an explosive and sudden awakening to a temporary experience of active life.

When Oliver Sacks began treating patients, a traditional case history might be a detailed scientific description of a person's disorder. Doctor Sacks has expanded what he calls mechanical neurology to include the effects of the disorder on a patient's identity and personality.

In most cases, there is nothing Doctor Sacks can do to heal his patients. His aim is to help them find a way to live with and accept their conditions as well as is possible.

His stories describe a patient's disorders in detail. But more importantly, the stories express the patient's humanity as he or she struggles to survive in a world that has been changed by sickness.

(MUSIC)

Oliver Sacks was born in nineteen thirty-three in Britain to a family of doctors and scientists. His mother and father were doctors. His grandfather was an inventor. Doctor Sacks wrote a book, "Uncle Tungsten," about his uncle -- a scientist who made light bulbs with pieces of tungsten wire.

As a child, Oliver had a deep love of chemistry. His childhood heroes included the British chemist Humphry Davy and the French chemist Marie Curie. Oliver's questioning mind later led him to study medicine and neurology. Oliver Sacks moved to the United States in the early nineteen-sixties.

One expert who had a great influence on Doctor Sacks' work was the Soviet neuropsychologist Alexander Luria. Doctor Luria believed that the study of the brain and nervous system could not just be about facts and information. He urged neurologists to have a more "personalistic" method that included an understanding of the patient's self and identity. He also believed that patients could be taught to adapt, or get used to, their conditions as fully as possible even if they remained sick. Shortly before he died, Alexander Luria urged Oliver Sacks to combine scientific investigation with literary observation.

Oliver Sack's story "To See and Not See" gives a good example of his writing. This story is one of several in "An Anthropologist on Mars," a work published in nineteen ninety-five. It tells about Virgil, a fifty-year old man who had been blind since he was a child. Doctors believed that his blindness resulted from a genetic condition.

Virgil visits a doctor who believes he may not be permanently blind. The doctor successfully operates on one eye. But after the eye heals, Virgil has trouble seeing and understanding the light and images moving in front of him.

Doctor Sacks explains that people with eyesight have spent a lifetime learning how to see. So, they know how to judge distance and depth. He says they understand new experiences and sights based on similar, past experiences.

Virgil had an active, but partly damaged retina and optic nerve. Yet his brain did not know how to deal with the information coming from these areas of the eye.

As a blind man, Virgil had a rich life. He could enjoy great freedom because of his excellent sense of touch, hearing, and smell. But with sight, he was unable to understand the visual world around him.

Doctor Sacks explains that the brain's cortex in people like Virgil who become blind adapts to its new situation. By regaining sight, Virgil's nervous system had to undo its specialized adaptations.

Doctor Sacks also noted that such a big change made Virgil more fearful about his condition. The story Doctor Sacks tells is medically descriptive and informative. But it also remains personal and respectful of Virgil's special situation.

(MUSIC)

Doctor Sacks has written books on many subjects. In "Migraine", he explores severe head pain to further understand the way neurons in the brain operate.

In "The Island of the Colorblind," Doctor Sacks writes about a community living on an island in the Pacific Ocean. These islanders all suffer from colorblindness. They describe their world to Doctor Sacks in terms of lightness, darkness, and pattern.

In "Oaxaca Journal," Doctor Sacks explores his interest in pteridology, or the study of ferns. Ferns are some of the oldest plants on earth. They have not changed much over millions of years. In this book, he explores the ferns native to Oaxaca, Mexico and the cultural history of the area.

In his latest book, "Musicophilia," Oliver Sacks describes the effect music has on the brain by studying the experiences of many people with unusual conditions.

OLIVER SACKS:

" 'Musicophilia' means love of music. And this is a very general word. But I think this is almost universal among people. And the width of the title has really allowed me to embrace dozens and dozens of different musical experiences and sensations."

Music is an interesting subject for neurologists because many parts of the brain work together to listen to and make music. Music activates even more areas of the brain than language. And, music is very powerful. Even people with severe brain damage can still react to and even find healing in music.

For some people, music can actually change the structure of the brain. Researchers have found that an area of the brain called the corpus callosum is enlarged in professional musicians.

Another part of the brain is enlarged in musicians with absolute pitch. A person with absolute pitch can identify or recreate a musical note without the help of a musical instrument. Researchers also believe that the younger a musician begins training, the greater the changes in his or her brain.

One part of the book "Musicophilia" is about people with synesthesia.

OLIVER SACKS:

"The word 'synesthesia' has been around for a century, a little bit more. It was introduced in the eighteen nineties for people who would perhaps see colors when they heard music. Or in whom generally, one sensation would give rise to another sensation."

For example, one person Doctor Sacks writes about is a musician who experiences color with every musical note. The note G minor is a yellowish color, while D major is blue. Another person with synesthesia sees colors, shapes, and light when she listens to music.

Modern brain imaging has helped medical experts understand conditions like synesthesia. Brain images show that synesthetes have activity both in the area of the brain that sees and in another area that reacts to music.

OLIVER SACKS:

"I think of the book as sort of a treasury of stories and information which other people and in particular neuroscientists and others will be able to use and make sense of. But also, it's a fun book."

After the publication of "Musicophilia", Doctor Sacks received hundreds of messages from people with examples of the conditions he described.

A second version of the book includes information about their cases. Doctor Sacks has once again provided his readers with a rich exploration of the complex workings of the human mind.

(MUSIC)

This SCIENCE IN THE NEWS was written by Dana Demange, who was also our producer. I'm Barbara Klein. And I'm Bob Doughty. Listen again next week for more news about science, in Special English, on the Voice of America.

"Pecos Bill, an American Folk Tale from VOA"

2010-07-24T09:01:00.001-07:00

Pecos Bill had one of the strangest childhoods a boy ever had. It all started after his father decided that there was no longer enough room in east Texas for his family.

"Pack up, Ma!" he cried. "Neighbors movin' in fifty miles away! It's getting' too crowded!"

So they loaded up a wagon with all their things. Now some say they had fifteen children while others say eighteen. However many there were, the children were louder than thunder. And as they set off across the wild country of west Texas, their mother and father could hardly hear a thing.

Now, as they came to the Pecos River, the wagon hit a big rock. The force threw little Bill out of the wagon and he landed on the sandy ground. Mother did not know Bill was gone until she gathered the children for the midday meal. Mother set off with some of the children to look for Bill, but they could find no sign of him.

Well, some people say Bill was just a baby when his family lost him. Others say he was four years old. But all agree that a group of animals called coyotes found Bill and raised him. Bill did all the things those animals did, like chase lizards and howl at the moon. He became as good a coyote as any.

(SOUND)

Now, Bill spent seventeen years living like a coyote until one day a cowboy rode by on his horse. Some say the cowboy was one of Bill's brothers. Whoever he was, he took one look at Bill and asked, "What are you?"

Bill was not used to human language. At first, he could not say anything. The cowboy repeated his question. This time, Bill said, "varmint."

That is a word used for any kind of wild animal.

"No you aren't," said the cowboy.

"Yes, I am," said Bill. "I have fleas."

"Lots of people have fleas," said the cowboy. "You don't have a tail."

"Yes, I do," said Bill.

"Show it to me then," the cowboy said.

Bill looked at his backside and realized that he did not have a tail like the other coyotes. "Well, what am I then?" asked Bill.

"You're a cowboy! So start acting like one!" the cowboy cried out. Well that was all Bill needed to hear. He said goodbye to his coyote friends and left to join the world of humans.

(MUSIC)

Now, Pecos Bill was a good cowboy. Still, he hungered for adventure. One day he heard about a rough group of men. There is some debate over what the group was called. But one storyteller calls it the "Hell's Gate Gang."

So Bill set out across the rough country to find this gang of men. Well, Bill's horse soon was injured so Bill had to carry it for a hundred miles. Then Bill met a rattlesnake fifty feet long. The snake made a hissing noise and was not about to let Bill pass. But after a tense minute, Bill beat the snake until it surrendered. He felt sorry for the varmint, though, and wrapped it around his arm.

After Bill walked another hundred miles, he came across an angry mountain lion. There was a huge battle, but Bill took control of the big cat and put his saddle on it. He rode that mountain lion all the way to the camp of the Hell's Gate Gang.

Now, when Bill saw the gang he shouted out, "Who's the boss around here?"

A huge cowboy, nine feet tall, took one look at Bill and said in a shaky voice, "I was the boss. But you are the boss from here on in."

With his gang, Pecos Bill was able to create the biggest ranch in the Southwest. Bill and his men had so many cattle that they needed all of New Mexico to hold them. Arizona was the pasture where the cattle ate grass.

Pecos Bill invented the art of being a cowboy. He invented the skill of throwing a special rope called a lasso over a cow's head to catch wandering cattle.

Some say he used a rattlesnake for a lasso. Others say he made a lasso so big that it circled the whole Earth.

Bill invented the method of using a hot branding iron to permanently put the mark of a ranch on a cow's skin. That helped stop people from stealing cattle. Some say he invented cowboy songs to help calm the cattle and make the cowboy's life easier. But he is also said to have invented tarantulas and scorpions as jokes. Cowboys have had trouble with those poisonous creatures ever since.

Now, Pecos Bill could ride anything that ever was. So, as some tell the story, there came a storm bigger than any other. It all happened during the worst drought the West had ever seen. It was so dry that horses and cows started to dry up and blow away in the wind. So when Bill saw the windstorm, he got an idea. The huge tornado kicked across the land like a wild bronco. But Bill jumped on it without a thought.

He rode that tornado across Texas, New Mexico and Arizona, all the time squeezing the rain out of it to save the land from drought. When the storm was over, Bill fell off the tornado. He landed in California. He left a hole so deep that to this day it is known as Death Valley.

(MUSIC)

Now, Bill had a horse named Widow Maker. He got that name because any man who rode that horse would be thrown off and killed and his wife would become a widow. No one could ride that horse but Bill.

And Widow Maker, in the end, caused the biggest problem for Pecos Bill. You see, one day Bill saw a woman. Not just any woman, but a wild, red- haired woman, riding a giant catfish down the Rio Grande River.

Her name was Slue-foot Sue. And Bill fell in love with her at first sight. Well, Bill would not rest until he had asked for her hand in marriage. And Slue-foot Sue accepted.

On their wedding day, Pecos Bill dressed in his best buckskin suit. And Sue wore a beautiful white dress with a huge steel-spring bustle in the back. It was the kind of big dress that many women wore in those days — the bigger the better.

Now, after the marriage ceremony Slue-foot Sue got a really bad idea. She decided that she wanted to ride Widow Maker. Bill begged her not to try. But she had her mind made up.

Well, the second she jumped on the horse's back he began to kick and buck like nothing anyone had ever seen. He sent Sue flying so high that she sailed clear over the new moon.

She fell back to Earth, but the steel-spring bustle just bounced her back up as high as before.

Now, there are many different stories about what happened next. One story says Bill saw that Sue was in trouble. She would keep bouncing forever if nothing was done. So he took his rope out -- though some say it was a huge rattlesnake -- and lassoed Sue to catch her and bring her down to Earth. Only, she just bounced him back up with her.

Somehow the two came to rest on the moon. And that's where they stayed. Some people say they raised a family up there. Their children were as loud and wild as Bill and Sue were in their younger days. People say the sound of thunder that sometimes carries over the dry land around the Pecos River is nothing more than Pecos Bill's family laughing up a storm.

"The History of Longitude" - VOA Explorations.

2010-07-14T11:03:00.000-07:00

STEVE EMBER: This is Steve Ember.

BOB DOUGHTY: And this is Bob Doughty with the VOA Special English program EXPLORATIONS. Today, we tell about how people learned an important piece of information necessary for safely sailing on the oceans. It is called longitude.

(MUSIC)

STEVE EMBER: On a foggy October night in seventeen-oh-seven, four English navy ships hit rocks in the Atlantic Ocean and sank. Two thousand men drowned. The ships had been sailing in the thick fog for twelve days. There was no sure way to know where they were. The commander of the ships had been worried that they could hit rocks if they were not careful. He asked his navigators for their opinion on their location in the ocean.

The navigators did not really know. They told the commander they thought they were west of a small island near the coast of northwestern France.

They were wrong. Instead, they sailed onto rocks near a small group of islands southwest of England's Atlantic coast. The navigators' lack of knowledge led to the loss of four ships and two thousand lives.

BOB DOUGHTY: When people began sailing out of sight of land, sailors did not know how to tell where they were on the open sea. Land travelers can look at a mountain, or a river, or an object that shows them where they are in relation to where they came from. On the ocean, however, there is no sign to tell a sailor where he is.

The most important device for knowing directions on the ocean is a compass. A compass is a device containing a metal object that points toward the magnetic north pole. This shows navigators the direction of north, and therefore also south, east and west. But sailors need more information to sail safely on the open sea.

STEVE EMBER: Most maps of the world show lines that are not on the Earth's surface. One line is the equator. It is an imaginary line around the widest part of the Earth. There are similar lines both north and south of the equator. These circles become smaller and smaller toward the north pole and the south pole.

These lines, or circles, are parallel -- meaning that they are equally distant from each other at any point around the world. These lines show what is called latitude.

A navigator can know the latitude of his ship by observing the location of stars, where the sun rises in the morning and sets in the evening, and what time of year it is. With this information he knows where his ship is in relation to the north or south pole and the equator.

BOB DOUGHTY: Still, there is one more important piece of information necessary for safely sailing the oceans. For many centuries, scientists, astronomers and inventors searched for a way to tell longitude. The lines of longitude go the other way from latitude lines. They stretch from the north pole to the south pole, and back again in great circles of the same size. All of the lines of longitude meet at the top and bottom of the world.

In her book, “Longitude,” writer Dava Sobel tells the story about longitude and how the problem of knowing it was solved.

(MUSIC)

STEVE EMBER: For centuries, the great scientists of the world struggled to develop a way to learn longitude. To learn longitude at any place requires knowledge about time. A navigator needs to know what time it is on his ship and also the time at another place of known longitude -- at the very same moment.

The Earth takes twenty-four hours to complete one full turn or revolution of three-hundred-sixty degrees. One hour marks one twenty-fourth of a turn, or fifteen degrees. So each hour's time difference between the ship and the starting point marks a ship's progress of fifteen degrees of longitude to the east or west. Those fifteen degrees of longitude mark a distance traveled.

At the equator, where the Earth is widest, fifteen degrees stretches about one thousand six hundred kilometers. North or south of that line, however, the distance value of each degree decreases. One degree of longitude equals four minutes of time all around the world. But in measuring distance, one degree shrinks from about one hundred nine kilometers at the equator to nothing at the north and south poles.

BOB DOUGHTY: For many centuries, navigators hoped they could find longitude by observing the movement of stars at night. During the day, the sun provided information about the time on a ship, and its direction. However, it did not provide necessary information about the time somewhere else.

In the sixteenth century, one astronomer suggested that navigators could observe the moon as it passed in front of different known stars to tell longitude. But, there was not enough information about the stars to use this method effectively. Astronomers could not tell exactly where the moon would be from one night or day to the next.

Yet it seemed to those seeking to solve the longitude problem that the only solution was in the moon and stars.

(MUSIC)

STEVE EMBER: During the seventeenth century, English astronomers began a major effort to map the stars and their relationship to the moon as it passed across the sky. Royal Astronomer John Flamsteed worked at this task for forty years. The next Royal Astronomer, Edmund Halley, spent another forty years gathering information about the moon's orbit.

After many years of gathering the necessary information, it became possible to learn longitude by observing the stars and the moon. In seventeen sixty-six, Royal Astronomer Nevil Maskelyne published the Nautical Almanac and Astronomical Ephemeris. It contained all the necessary information about the moon and stars that sailors would need to help them learn their longitude.

This new method was not simple. A navigator had to use complex observing instruments to note the position of the moon and stars. Then he had to seek the correct information in the Nautical Almanac about the moon and stars at that time of night or day. The final step in the process was to take the mathematical information from the book, link it to the current information and solve the resulting problem. This took an average of four hours to do.

BOB DOUGHTY: While scientists were studying the stars and moon to solve the longitude problem, a man named John Harrison was working on another project. He was trying to build a clock that would help sailors learn longitude.

His task also was difficult and complex. Mister Harrison had to develop a clock that was not affected by the movement of a ship on the ocean or changes in temperature or atmospheric pressure.

He began developing his clock in seventeen thirty. It took five years to complete. The complex device weighed thirty-four kilograms. Several years later, Mister Harrison built a second clock. It was smaller, but weighed more than the first. Mister Harrison was not satisfied and began working on yet another device.

Twenty years later, he completed a device that was smaller than the first two, and weighed less. But still Mister Harrison was not satisfied.

Two years later, in seventeen fifty-seven, he produced a small clock that he could hold in his hand. The clock could tell the correct time in two places, meeting the requirements for learning longitude on the sea.

STEVE EMBER: For many years after Mister Harrison's work was completed, the idea of using a clock to learn longitude was rejected. However, that opinion changed when manufacturers learned how to make better and less costly versions of Mister Harrison's clocks. The clocks became known as chronometers.

By eighteen fifteen, five thousand chronometers were in use on ships sailing the world's oceans. The complex documents and mathematical work were no longer necessary. Almost any sailor could tell what his longitude was by simply looking at a clock. The world had changed.

BOB DOUGHTY: John Harrison's clocks can be seen today at the Old Royal Observatory in Greenwich, England. The first three are still operating, showing the correct time. To look at them is to see the simple solution to a problem that worried people for many centuries.

Today, the solution to the problem is so common that it is difficult to understand that there was a problem at all.

(MUSIC)

STEVE EMBER: This program was written by Oliver Chandler and produced by Paul Thompson. Our studio engineer was Al Alaby. This is Steve Ember.

BOB DOUGHTY: And this is Bob Doughty. Join us again next week for EXPLORATIONS, a program in Special English on the Voice of America.

Logical Deduction from Past Events.

2010-05-18T20:35:00.000-07:00

"Summer House, Backyard" by Marc Chagall, 1918

Use "must have + past participle" to make a logical deduction about an event in the past. For example, "I have a stomachache. I must have eaten something bad.

Write the following sentences. Use the cue in the drop down menu to complete your sentence. Check your answer by clicking on the arrows to open the drop down menu.

1. Paul came late to work today.

2. I have a bad stomachache

3. Maria skipped dessert at the restaurant last night.

4. My neighbor yelled at me this morning.

5. You talked in your sleep last night.

6. Margaret looks tired.

7. Gary drove through a red light this morning.

8. Mr. Parker's front door was wide open all day.

9. The streets were very wet this morning.

10. The teacher's shoelaces are untied.

11. Jim and Marlene have been spending a lot of time together.

12. Arnold just left the boss's office. Arnold has a smile on his face.

13. The birds ate all the blackberries in our backyard.

14. Lily and Arthur left the movie after only fifteen minutes.

15. Yesterday, the flowers were small. Today they're very large.

16. Several students aren't taking the final exam today.

17. Milly won't wear her nice yellow dress today.

18. Wally and Sue are walking in the rain without their umbrellas.

19. I called you yesterday, but no one answered the phone.

20. Wilma got out of the swimming pool and she looked exhausted.

21. It's three thirty and Angela's kids aren't at school

22. The operation is over and the doctor looks quite calm and satisfied.

23. Josephina was accepted at many colleges.

24. Andy had the flu for a couple of weeks. Now, he's back at work.

25. Johnny was playing baseball outside. Now, there's a broken window, and a ball on the living room floor.

26. Rudy is posting pictures of his dog Fido on telephone poles.

27. Dorothy's car isn't parked in the usual place.

28. Yesterday, the front steps were dirty. Now they're very clean.

29. Edward's dishes were on the counter last night. This morning, they're all on the shelves.

30. My backyard was dry last night. This morning, it was very wet.

Past Modal Practice: Should + Present Perfect.

2010-04-25T12:36:00.001-07:00

"At the Opera" Mary Cassatt, 1879

Use Should + Present Perfect Tense to comment about a past action. You're saying that the past action didn't happen in the best way. The person doing the action made a mistake. The speaker supposes that the past action would have turned out better if the recommended action had been followed.

1. I didn't ask my employer for a raise.

2. I parked in a towaway zone yesterday.

3. Bill didn't tell Julie he was married.

4. Our team didn't practice enough before the game.

5. I forgot to clean my glasses before the movie.

6. Maria and Jose left their passports in their hotel room.

7. The children are cranky because they didn't take a nap this afternoon.

8. My sink didn't work very well, and I didn't call the plumber. Now, it's worse.

9. I drank a lot of coffee before bedtime last night and couldn't sleep at all.

10. Steve didn't wear a suit to his job interview yesterday.

11. I didn't bring an umbrella with me to work and it rained cats and dogs.

12. Lydia went away for the weekend without watering her house plants. Unfortunately, they died.

13. Dave forgot to put his car keys on the hook where they belong. He couldn't find them this morning.

14. We didn't buy a map and, as a result, we got lost on dark roads in Oklahoma City.

15. I got up late and just missed the bus. So, I didn't get to the meeting on time.

16. Sally didn't take the cookies out of the oven soon enough. So, they burned.

17. I didn't go to the opera with you last night. I really missed a good performance.

18. Fred didn't drive carefully enough during his driving test.

19. Olivia didn't dance well enough at her audition last weekend.

20. Andrew bought a used computer and it crashed the day after he bought it.

21. Pratt didn't speak clearly enough at his presentation yesterday.

22. Sally was very late to work yesterday.

Using the Past Perfect Tense.

2010-04-01T16:32:00.000-07:00

"Still Life with Musical Instruments"
Georges Braque, 1908

Combine Two Sentences To Make One.

1. I got to the bank. It closed.

2. He went to Canada. He read several books about it.

3. I arrived at the party. The food was eaten.

4. Jack called for an interview. He wrote his resume.

5. Jane got to the concert. It already started.

6. He arrived at the airport. He realized he forgot his passport.

7. She decided to buy one. She looked at a lot of dresses.

8. Aaron got hired. He went on a lot of interviews.

9. We ate at the cafeteria. We went to class.

10. Maria fed the cat. She called her mother.

11.I woke up this morning. My roommate already left.

12. Sam knew Paris very well. He visited the city several times.

13. I didn't know how to cook salmon. I never cooked it.

14. Mary moved to Istanbul. Bill already bought a house there.

15. You were hired by the company. I already got a raise.

16. I didn't go dancing last night. I went dancing the night before.

17. I arrived at the meeting. It already ended.

18. Shiela didn't attend the conference. She went to one the previous weekend.

19. Tom served his guests. He realized he forgot to set the table.

20. Maria went out on a date. She realized she didn't comb her hair.

21. My suit was ready. I gained some weight.

22. He won the chess match. He practiced for years.

23. Patricia passed the English exam. She studied for a long time.

24. I arrived at the lake. The ice melted.

25. I started watching the TV show. I realized I already saw it.

26. Tom had a good interview. He prepared for it.

27. They packed their suitcases. They took a taxi to the airport.

28. They were afraid they forgot something. They packed so quickly.

29. The party ended. She met many new friends.

30. The students finished the exercises. They understood the grammer.

The Superlative and The Third Form Participle (Past Participle)

2010-02-09T08:00:00.000-08:00

"Self Portrait and Chess Game" by Marcel Duchamp

Using the model, create conversations using the following pattern:

A: Did you ___________ yesterday?

B: Yes, and it/she/he was the _______ I've ever __________ .

1. Did you eat a delicious meal yesterday?

2. Did you meet a famous movie star yesterday?

3. Did you run a difficult marathon yesterday?

4. Did you grow a beautiful flower last year?

5. Did you draw a pretty picture yesterday?

6. Did you take a fascinating photograph yesterday?

7. Did you visit an interesting museum yesterday?

8. Did you see a large building yesterday?

9. Did you ride a fast horse yesterday?

10. Did you get a good letter yesterday?

11. Did you drive a bad car yesterday?

12. Did you spend a lot of time at the supermarket yesterday?

13. Did you write a long letter yesterday?

14. Did you blow up a colorful balloon yesterday?

15. Did you catch a big fish yesterday?

16. Did you teach an easy English lesson yesterday?

17. Did you buy an expensive jacket yesterday?

18. Did you throw a good curve ball yesterday?

19. Did you go out with a nice man/woman yesterday?

20. Did you sing a lovely song yesterday?

21. Did you drink a sweet Coca Cola yesterday?

22. Did you find a roomy apartment yesterday?

23. Did you feel a bad pain in your finger yesterday?

24. Did you speak a complicated sentence in English yesterday?

25. Did you make a long phone call yesterday?

26. Did you give an expensive present to your friend yesterday?

27. Did you choose a friendly roommate yesterday?

28. Did you feed a hungry child yesterday?

29. Did you fight a tough guy yesterday?

30. Did you fly in a comfortable airplane yesterday?

31. Did you forget an important appointment yesterday?

32. Did you sell a cheap watch yesterday?

33. Did you swim in a wide river yesterday?

34. Did you sweep a dirty floor yesterday?

More exercises with Present Perfect Tense.
Practice with Present Perfect Progressive Tense.

ESL SEVEN-EIGHT

"IBM's Predictions for a Smarter World" from VOA

"Langston Hughes" The Greatest African American Poet, from VOA

7/8 Listening Test Two

"The Fall of New York" by John Robinson

"Three Books About The Human Brain" from VOA

The Diamond Trade - from VOA

7/8 Listening Test One

Ernest Hemingway - Ex patriot Writer - VOA

7/8 Final Listening Exam. (Number Three)

Reported Speech: Lessons and Exercises

Practice With Conditionals

"Understanding Our Universe" - Albert Einstein

Reading Comprehension For ESL Students: "The Nightwalkers" from Edcon Publishing.

"The Carter Family Gives Birth to Country Music" from VOA

"The History of The Video Game" from VOA.

"American Culture During The Depression" from VOA.

"Charles Lindbergh" a great solo pilot from Voice of America.

"Hosni Mubarak Resigns. Egypt Wins the Day" from VOA

AP

"Unrest in the Arab World" from Voa News.

"Dian Fossey and The Mountain Gorillas" from VOA.

"America in the 1920's" from VOA.

"Arts in America During the 1920s" from VOA

"Flannery O'Connor" She wrote about the South. VOA.

The Cop and The Anthem by O. Henry

Pearl Buck, Author of "The Good Earth" from VOA

"The Business of Winemaking, Part One" from Voice of America

"Graves-End Road" by Caty Weaver, from VOA

"Beyond The Door" by Philip K. DickRead by Roy Trumbull

Third Form Participle List

Grammartalk 10HB, Page 1 - Prepositions of Place and Time

Grammartalk 16, Page 2 - Present, Unreal Conditional

Grammartalk 15, Page Three, Modal Plus Present Perfect

Grammartalk 8, Present Perfect Progressive Tense, Page Two

"Music Around the World" from VOA.

"Doctor and Writer Oliver Sacks"

"Pecos Bill, an American Folk Tale from VOA"

"The History of Longitude" - VOA Explorations.

Logical Deduction from Past Events.

"Summer House, Backyard" by Marc Chagall, 1918

Past Modal Practice: Should + Present Perfect.

"At the Opera" Mary Cassatt, 1879

Using the Past Perfect Tense.

"Still Life with Musical Instruments"Georges Braque, 1908

The Superlative and The Third Form Participle (Past Participle)

"Still Life with Musical Instruments"
Georges Braque, 1908