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Владимир Дмитриевич Аракин

persevering, industrious, hard-working, sweet, gentle, proud

2. Evil (bad) characteristics: ill-natured, unkind, hard-hearted, reserved, uncommunicative, unsociable, hostile, haughty, arro-

gant, dashing, showy, indiscreet, unscrupulous, greedy, inconsistent, tactless, insincere, hypocritical, false, vulgar, double-faced,

indifferent, dispassionate, fussy, unrestrained, dishonest, cruel, partial, intolerant, conceited, self-willed, wilful, capricious, per verse,

insensible, inconsiderate, servile, presumptuous, deceitful, harsh, sulky, sullen, obstinate, coarse, rude, vain, impertinent, im pudent,

revengeful.

1. Read the text for obtaining its information.

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Girlhood of Anna Brangwen

Anna Brangwen is one of the protagonists of the novel which tells a life story of the Brangwens, the farm-people. The men spent their lives in hard

toil, the women dreamt about "the supreme life" for their children. And it was not money, it was education and experience.

In the given below extract Anna's school-years are described. The writer presents a true picture of the problems that a young girl faces in life.

Anna became a tall, awkward girl ... She was sent to a young ladies school in Nottingham.

And at this period she was absorbed in becoming a young lady. She was intelligent enough, but not interested in learning. At

first, she thought all the girls at school were ladylike and wonderful, and she wanted to be like them. She came to a speedy

disillusion: they failed and maddened her, they were petty and mean. After the - loose, generous atmosphere of her home,

where little things did not count, she was always uneasy in the world, that would snap and bite at every trifle.

A quick change came over her. She mistrusted herself, she mistrusted the outer world. She did not want to go on, she did not

want to go out into it, she wanted to go no further.

"What do I care about that lot of girls?" she would say to her father, contemptuously, "they are nobody."

The trouble was that the girls would not accept Anha at her measure. They would have her according to themselves or not at

all.

So Anna was only easy at home, where the common sense and the supreme relation between her parents produced a freer

standard of being than she could find outside.

At school, or in the world, she was usually at fault, she felt usually that she ought to be slinking in disgrace. She never felt quite sure,

in herself, whether she were wrong or whether the others were wrong. She had not done her lessons: well, she did not see any reason

why she should do her lessons, if she did not want to. Was there some occult reason why she should? Were these people, schoolmistresses, representatives of some mystic Right, some Higher Good? They seemed to think so themselves. But she could not

for her life see why a woman should bully and insult her because she did not know thirty lines of "As You Like It". After all, what did