Group read! 《秘密花园》; "The Secret Garden" (300-ch. book). Discussing through Chapter 2!

[Marguerite]

Score! And just in time for Chapter 2. (Sorry for the delay. I missed having it ready before work today, and then have had an emergency from the office, so I'm just posting now.)

My summary and reactions:

李叶 is shipped off to 南京 to live with her 叔叔. (Note: is '他的叔叔' at the start of the second line a typo, or am I missing a reference to some other '他'?) I looked the cities up, and it's about 2300km. That's quite a distance. We spend the time getting some background info on 李叶的叔叔, 文先生, and his house and sad past.

Grammar:

• More on the separation of verbs, and asking questions, with structures like 知不知道.
• My buddy 着! 很多房间都关着。 Obviously, the simple explanation of '着 means -ing' is insufficient here, but the notion of continuity is correct. They did not close, end action; they were not closed (but are now open); they were closed and are still closed.
• The order of things. Subject + EVERYTHING EVER + Verb + Object. And sometimes it feels like Subject + EVERYTHING INCLUDING SHOVING THE OBJECT IN HERE + Verb. Just one of those things to get used to!
• Which 'but' to use. So many options, so much nuance I don't understand.

Writing practice and questions:

还有李叶关心的人。她很远的地方去。现在还需要很多时间从海南来南京旅行。

家人的阿姨带李叶她的叔叔的房子。

李叶不想给马阿姨说话，但是马阿姨自己说话。李叶只听到。马阿姨知道跟不喜欢的孩子说话！

李叶也她的家人都是很奇怪。叔叔有了一个爱人，但是她死了十年前。叔叔旅行很多次以后。

英国的书用些词所以读者知道这些人说方言。中文有一样吗？

在英国的书‘文先生’是‘李叶’的爸爸的姐姐（或者妹妹）的爱人。中文和汉语有很多词说家人关系，有一个次说这个关系吗？

[lechuan]

There's a section on the 'two words for "but"' in the Allset Learning Grammar Wiki that Jon mentioned above, as well as a number of other grammar points for each chapter.

[Crush]

Just as a warning, my Chinese isn't that great so take what i've got to say with a grain of salt.

 

-I think the 很远的地方 sentence is a bit off, i would use either 到 (她到很远的地方去了) or move 去 to the front (她去了很远的地方).

-Instead of 很多时间 i would use 长: 很长时间, but i couldn't say if one way is more correct. And i'm not sure, but it sounds better to me putting that at the end of the phrase: 从海南去南京要很长时间.

-英国 is English as in the UK, the language would be 英文. "The English version" i believe would be 英文版. I'm not quite sure what the rest of the sentence means, maybe 英文版用些词来让读者知道这些人在说方言: The English version/book uses some words to let the reader know these people are speaking a dialect?

-Family vocabulary in Chinese is a lot more robust, you might be able to clean up the next sentence a bit by replacing "爸爸的姐姐" with "姑母" (father's older sister aka paternal aunt older than your father). I really don't know how commonly these words are used in practice, i just know that repeating 的 so many times sounds a little odd and is often left out except for the last item: 李叶姑母的爱人. Your father's older sister's husband would be your '姑父'. And i totally looked up all this on the Wikipedia page.

 

I'm gonna stop here since i don't really feel comfortable giving you possibly bad information, but hopefully it can give you something to think about at least

[lechuan]

And new vocab from Chapter 2...

[lechuan]

... is attached here (forgot to hit the "attach file" button)

SGchap2.txt

[Marguerite]

There's a section on the 'two words for "but"' in the Allset Learning Grammar Wiki that Jon mentioned above, as well as a number of other grammar points for each chapter.

Haha, I know, but thank you. Despite how it probably seems, I do look at it and other sites when unsure about something. Sometimes it takes me some time and practice to feel comfortable with the differences nonetheless.

Crush, thank you too. I knew there had to be some such word for family relationships! I kind of wanted the awkwardness of so many 的 to emphasize that there must be a better way, but not at the expense of comprehension or incorrect usage.

Now that you mention it, I agree with you about 长. I remember my teacher using that in "how far" constructions. I'll make a note of the placement, too.

You're quite right about the 英国 mistake; I should have been more careful. You're right about the intended meaning. I'll come back and expand this when I'm at a real keyboard, but I was wondering whether Chinese books show dialect or accent, and, if they do, how. Vocabulary choices? Erhua or lack thereof?

Edited to give a little more meat to my dialect example. In The Secret Garden, here's our first example of "speaking Yorkshire": '"I see tha's got back," he said. "An' tha's browt th' young 'un with thee."' So we've got the grammatical substitution of 'tha' ('thou') for 'you', the pronunciation of 'brought' to 'browt', and then dropping sounds with 'an', 'th', 'un'. Since Chinese words aren't "spelled" the same way English ones are, is such writing possible? Stuff like 那儿 instead of 那里 (or vice versa) and use of local slang or vocab seems like it'd be straightforward, but is it used? Is there a way of showing that a character's pronunciation sounds "funny" to the narrator?

[Lu]

 

Edited to give a little more meat to my dialect example. In The Secret Garden, here's our first example of "speaking Yorkshire": '"I see tha's got back," he said. "An' tha's browt th' young 'un with thee."' So we've got the grammatical substitution of 'tha' ('thou') for 'you', the pronunciation of 'brought' to 'browt', and then dropping sounds with 'an', 'th', 'un'. Since Chinese words aren't "spelled" the same way English ones are, is such writing possible? Stuff like 那儿 instead of 那里 (or vice versa) and use of local slang or vocab seems like it'd be straightforward, but is it used? Is there a way of showing that a character's pronunciation sounds "funny" to the narrator?

To my knowledge it's hard, unusual, and hardly ever done in Chinese books. 那兒 and 那裏 hardly register as dialect. You can use words like 俺 (I, North-Eastern) or 儂 (you, Shanghai), and a few other words, but the problem you run into: if you picture your character as speaking with an accent, it's hardly possible to convey that they are speaking Mandarin but not standard. If you picture them speaking a dialect, you would need to know that dialect, and the way it is written, very well (which is rare) and most of your audience will not know it that well, so the effect will be more like having a French speaker in your English book.

[imron]

To my knowledge it's hard, unusual, and hardly ever done in Chinese books

You do see it sometimes when for example there is a character from a rural setting, and they use different vocabulary (like the words Lu mentioned).  I don't expect you'd see this distinction being made with a 300 character graded reader.

[Marguerite]

Oh, goodness no. I just wondered whether it were ever done.

[roddy]

I'd second Crush (good to see you following my link!) on 她去了很远的地方, but I'd add in 一个. Not telling you where though. 

家人的阿姨带李叶她的叔叔的房子。 could do with a 去

马阿姨知道跟不喜欢的孩子说话！ - are you trying to say she knows *how* to speak to kids she doesn't like?

You're misusing 也 - you can't put it in there as 'and'. The nearest equivalent is 和， but 跟 is also common. 

她死了十年前 - what was that you were saying about everything having to go before the verb?

叔叔旅行很多次以后 - this sounds like you're saying 'After her uncle went on a lot of trips... (something else happened)', rather than, 'Afterwards, her uncle travelled a lot."

 

Tiring work correcting this stuff. You've got to pick the right stuff to correct, then figure out what it should be and hopefully even how to explain it. 

[Marguerite]

Ugh, why is it that practicing is so much more palatable when you're already past the stage of being embarassingly terrible? Thank you all very much for your time.

Using spoiler tags to spare everyone's scrolling fingers.

Original attempt

还有李叶关心的人。她很远的地方去。现在还需要很多时间从海南来南京旅行。

家人的阿姨带李叶她的叔叔的房子。

李叶不想给马阿姨说话，但是马阿姨自己说话。李叶只听到。马阿姨知道跟不喜欢的孩子说话！

李叶也她的家人都是很奇怪。叔叔有了一个爱人，但是她死了十年前。叔叔旅行很多次以后。

英国的书用些词所以读者知道这些人说方言。中文有一样吗？

在英国的书‘文先生’是‘李叶’的爸爸的姐姐（或者妹妹）的爱人。中文和汉语有很多词说家人关系，有一个次说这个关系吗？

Correction #1

还有李叶没有关心她的人。

她去了一个很远的地方。

现在也从海南来南京旅行还需要很长时间。 (也 here for 'also', since I don't yet know the expression for 'even now'/'even today'.)

家人的阿姨带李叶去她的叔叔的房子。

李叶不想给马阿姨说话，但是马阿姨自己说话。// left alone for now

李叶只听到。 // left alone for now

马阿姨知道跟不喜欢的孩子说话！// I'm trying to get across the idea that she knows how to communicate with kids even when those kids don't want to respond. 马阿姨 + 知道 + 怎么 +　对　＋　不喜欢回答的孩子 + 说话 (?)

李叶也她的家人都是很奇怪。 // I have no idea why I put 也 in here. I would like to think it was a pinyin typo of 和, but I probably just got it wrong.

叔叔有了一个爱人，但是她十年前死了。 // I reserve the right to be as inconsistent and exaggeratory and neologist as I like. However, I take your point. 'When' before verb!

叔叔旅行很多次以后。

他的太太死了以后，李叶的叔叔旅游很多次。 // Something more like this? After his wife died, or since his wife died, Li Ye's uncle travels a lot.

英文的书用几个单词让读者知道这些人在说方言。

中文有一样吗？ // left alone for now

在英国的书‘文先生’是‘李叶’的爸爸的姐姐（或者妹妹）的爱人。 // left alone for now

中文和汉语有很多词说家人关系，有一个次说这个关系吗？// left alone for now

[roddy]

Lets see if there's anything else I can pick at ;-) and good idea on using the spoiler tags...

 

还有李叶没有关心她的人。 - 还有 is more 'and there's one more thing' - for example, 对了，还有一个问题 would be 'Oh yes, there was one more thing I wanted to ask you...' Use 还 or 还是 (and before the verb)

她去了一个很远的地方。

现在也从海南来南京旅行还需要很长时间。- you don't need the 也, the 还 is enough.

家人的阿姨带李叶去她的叔叔的房子。 - good. You can omit the second 的.

李叶不想给马阿姨说话，但是马阿姨自己说话。// left alone for now

李叶只听到。 // left alone for now

马阿姨知道跟不喜欢的孩子说话！// I'm trying to get across the idea that she knows how to communicate with kids even when those kids don't want to respond. 马阿姨 + 知道 + 怎么 +　对　＋　不喜欢回答的孩子 + 说话 (?) Good, but I'd use 说话 twice. Chinese is very tolerant of repetition, and we're not specifically talking about her asking questions.

李叶也她的家人都是很奇怪。 // I have no idea why I put 也 in here. I would like to think it was a pinyin typo of 和, but I probably just got it wrong.

叔叔有了一个爱人，但是她十年前死了。 // I reserve the right to be as inconsistent and exaggeratory and neologist as I like. However, I take your point. 'When' before verb!

叔叔旅行很多次以后。

他的太太死了以后，李叶的叔叔旅游很多次。 // Something more like this? After his wife died, or since his wife died, Li Ye's uncle travels a lot. - the most natural way to put this that comes to mind would use 经常去。。。

[Marguerite]

Addressing only the comments this time.

还有李叶没有关心她的人。 - 还有 is more 'and there's one more thing' - for example, 对了，还有一个问题 would be 'Oh yes, there was one more thing I wanted to ask you...' Use 还 or 还是 (and before the verb)

So just <李叶还没有关心她的人。>?

现在也从海南来南京旅行还需要很长时间。- you don't need the 也, the 还 is enough.

现在从海南来南京旅行还需要很长时间。

家人的阿姨带李叶去她的叔叔的房子。 - good. You can omit the second 的.

家人的阿姨带李叶去她叔叔的房子。

马阿姨知道跟不喜欢的孩子说话！// I'm trying to get across the idea that she knows how to communicate with kids even when those kids don't want to respond. 马阿姨 + 知道 + 怎么 +　对　＋　不喜欢回答的孩子 + 说话 (?) Good, but I'd use 说话 twice. Chinese is very tolerant of repetition, and we're not specifically talking about her asking questions.

马阿姨知道怎么对不喜欢说话的孩子说话.

他的太太死了以后，李叶的叔叔旅游很多次。 // Something more like this? After his wife died, or since his wife died, Li Ye's uncle travels a lot. - the most natural way to put this that comes to mind would use 经常去。。。

Hmm. This one is definitely not as obvious to me. Is the first part okay?

他的太太死了以后，李叶的叔叔经常去很远的地方。

[roddy]

Without going through them point by point - well done!

[Marguerite]

Hooray! Now to see if I retain any of it by the time I write the Ch3 post for tomorrow.

[Crush]

Some other ideas might be:

他（的）太太死了以后，李叶的叔叔常常出去（很远的地方）旅游。

 

Original: 马阿姨知道怎么对不喜欢说话的孩子说话。

Another option: 连不喜欢说话的孩子都会跟马阿姨说话。I guess the meaning here is a bit different, i'm not sure if that's the meaning you're trying to convey. I just wanted to comment that sometimes it can be easier/simpler to turn the sentence around. I've often been criticized (or just misunderstood ) for overcomplicating my sentences.

 

Anyways, great work!

[Marguerite]

I've often been criticized (or just misunderstood ) for overcomplicating my sentences.

Same. My eyes glaze over while trying to read my own Chinese texts above, nevermind how I mangle English.

Question for those of you following along in the book - how are you finding the pace of the posts? Is every third day too often? Too far apart?

[JiangshiLieren]

Every third day is too fast for me but only because my schedule limits me to about 10 minutes of free reading per night, if that. On the upside, my speakmandarin.com teacher is now going through this same book with me so I am reading it aloud, stumbling on lots of words, but getting good insight on radicals for the characters and the grammar and meaning. Reading it through with a dictionary once and then reading it online in class I think will be a really good way to reinforce and remember all the characters I haven't yet memorized (or forgot from my days studying for HSK2).

 

Here's a link to my thread on speakmandarin.com if anybody's curious: http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/42409-speakmandarincom-learning-chinese-via-voip/#comment-319599

[Marguerite]

Anybody else want to chime in? I wouldn't mind dropping it to a chapter a week, or one every 5 days instead, or whatever people would like. Originally I just wasn't sure if people would like to take 3 months to go through all 12 chapters, or if that was too slow.

[Ruben von Zwack]

I'm reading along, just don't have much time to write these days, cause I am ridiculously behind with, errrm, some other duties... (cough). I may pop in with a grammar/sentence structure question here or there in the future.
 

Marguerite, do you know lang-8, or maybe you're already there?