Питер Пэн

УДК 372.8
ББК 81.2 Англ-93
           Б 25

© КАРО, 2008
ISBN 978-5-9925-0450-7

Барри Дж.
Б 25
Питер Пэн: Книга для чтения на английском языке. —
СПб.: КАРО, 2009. — 336 с. — (Серия «Classical Literature»)

ISBN 978-5-9925-0450-7

Книга содержит оригинальный текст известной детской
повести о чудесном мальчике Питере Пэне шотландского писателя Джеймса Барри.
Для облегчения понимания текста даны комментарии с
объяснением сложных языковых конструкций и вопросы к тексту. В конце книги приведен словарь, состоящий из слов, встречающихся в рассказах.
Предлагаемое учебное пособие предназначено для школьников средних и старших классов специализированной и общеобразовательной школы, студентов вузов, а также для всех интересующихся английской классической литературой. Может
быть использовано в качестве пособия для домашнего и классного чтения.

УДК 372.8
ББК 81.2 Англ-93

He was a successful novelist and playwright in his
time. And his best-known story is Peter Pan.
He was born in 1860 in Kirriemuir, Scotland. He
was a son of a weaver. He studied at Dumfries, and
graduated from Edinburg University in 1882. He started
working as a journalist first for the Nottinghamshire Journal. Later he moved to London, where he published
several collections of stories and novels including Thrums
and The Little Minister. In 1891 his first play, Richard
Savage, was performed. In 1900 Barrie wrote Tommy and
Grizel. The book contains elements of his later famous
play, Peter Pan. After the death of his friend Arthur Davies
and his wife, their five sons started living with Barrie.
The idea of Peter Pan came from stories he made up for
them. Peter Pan was first performed in 1904. It was such
a success that it became an annual Christmas event for
the next sixty years. Barrie wrote Peter Pan in novel form
in 1911. Then he wrote such plays as What Every Woman
Knows, Dear Brutus and Mary Rose. James M. Barrie
was made a baronet. He was also awarded the Order of
Merit. He tried to help children all his life. And his best
present was the story of Peter Pan.

PETER PAN

All children, except one, grow up. They soon know
that they will grow up, and the way Wendy knew was
this. One day when she was two years old she was
playing in a garden, and she plucked another flower
and ran with it to her mother. I suppose she must
have looked rather delightful, for Mrs. Darling put
her hand to her heart and cried, “Oh, why can’t you
remain like this for ever!” This was all that passed
between them on the subject, but henceforth Wendy
knew that she must grow up. You always know after
you are two. Two is the beginning of the end.
Of course they lived at 14, and until Wendy came
her mother was the chief one. She was a lovely lady,
with a romantic mind and such a sweet mocking
mouth1. Her romantic mind was like the tiny boxes,
one within the other, that come from the puzzling
East, however many you discover there is always one

1 mocking mouth — рот с приподнятым уголком

more; and her sweet mocking mouth had one kiss on
it that Wendy could never get, though there it was,
perfectly conspicuous in the right-hand corner.
The way Mr. Darling won her was this: the many
gentlemen who had been boys when she was a girl
discovered simultaneously that they loved her, and
they all ran to her house to propose to her except Mr.
Darling, who took a cab and nipped in first, and so
he got her. He got all of her, except the innermost
box and the kiss. He never knew about the box, and
in time he gave up trying for the kiss. Wendy thought
Napoleon could have got it, but I can picture him
trying, and then going off in a passion, slamming the
door.
Mr. Darling used to boast to Wendy that her
mother not only loved him but respected him. He
was one of those deep ones who know about stocks
and shares. Of course no one really knows, but he
quite seemed to know, and he often said stocks were
up and shares were down in a way that would have
made any woman respect him.
Mrs. Darling was married in white1, and at first
she kept the books perfectly, almost gleefully, as if it

1 Mrs. Darling was married in white — Миссис Дарлинг
выходила замуж в белом платье (т.е. вся церемония
была торжественной и пышной)

PETER BREAKS THROUGH

PETER PAN

were a game, not so much as a Brussels sprout was
missing; but by and by whole cauliflowers dropped
out, and instead of them there were pictures of babies
without faces. She drew them when she should have
been totting up. They were Mrs. Darling’s guesses.
Wendy came first, then John, then Michael.
For a week or two after Wendy came it was doubtful whether they would be able to keep her, as she
was another mouth to feed. Mr. Darling was frightfully proud of her, but he was very honourable, and
he sat on the edge of Mrs. Darling’s bed, holding her
hand and calculating expenses, while she looked at
him imploringly. She wanted to risk it, come what
might, but that was not his way; his way was with a
pencil and a piece of paper, and if she confused him
with suggestions he had to begin at the beginning
again.
“Now don’t interrupt,” he would beg of her.
“I have one pound seventeen here, and two and
six at the office; I can cut off my coffee at the office,
say ten shillings, making two nine and six1, with your
eighteen and three makes three nine seven, with five
naught naught in my cheque-book makes eight nine

1 two nine and six — 2 фунта 9 шиллингов и 6 пенсов
(устар. система: 1 фунт = 20 шиллингов; 1 шиллинг =
12 пенсам)

seven — who is that moving? — eight nine seven,
dot and carry seven — don’t speak, my own — and
the pound you lent to that man who came to the
door — quiet, child — dot and carry child — there,
you’ve done it! — did I say nine nine seven? yes, I said
nine nine seven; the question is, can we try it for a
year on nine nine seven?”
“Of course we can, George,” she cried. But she
was prejudiced in Wendy’s favour, and he was really
the grander character of the two.
“Remember mumps,” he warned her almost
threateningly, and off he went again. “Mumps one
pound, that is what I have put down, but I daresay it
will be more like thirty shillings — don’t speak —
measles one five, German measles half a guinea, makes
two fifteen six — don’t waggle your finger — whooping-cough, say fifteen shillings” — and so on it went,
and it added up differently each time; but at last
Wendy just got through, with mumps reduced to
twelve six, and the two kinds of measles treated as
one.
There was the same excitement over John, and
Michael had even a narrower squeak1; but both were
kept, and soon, you might have seen the three of them

1 and Michael had even a narrower squeak — а Майклу
досталось еще меньше

PETER BREAKS THROUGH

PETER PAN

going in a row to Miss Fulsom’s Kindergarten school,
accompanied by their nurse.
Mrs. Darling loved to have everything just so, and
Mr. Darling had a passion for being exactly like his
neighbours; so, of course, they had a nurse. As they
were poor, owing to the amount of milk the children
drank, this nurse was a prim Newfoundland dog,
called Nana, who had belonged to no one in particular until the Darlings engaged her. She had always
thought children important, however, and the Darlings had become acquainted with her in Kensington
Gardens, where she spent most of her spare time peeping into perambulators, and was much hated by careless nursemaids, whom she followed to their homes
and complained of to their mistresses. She proved to
be quite a treasure of a nurse1. How thorough she was
at bath-time, and up at any moment of the night if
one of her charges made the slightest cry. Of course,
her kennel was in the nursery. She had a genius for
knowing when a cough is a thing to have no patience
with and when it needs stocking around your throat.
She believed to her last day in old-fashioned remedies like rhubarb leaf, and made sounds of contempt
over all this new-fangled talk about germs, and so on.

1 She proved to be quite a treasure of a nurse. — Она оказалась чудесной няней.

It was a lesson in propriety to see her escorting the
children to school, walking sedately by their side when
they were well behaved, and butting them back into
line if they strayed1. On John’s footer days she never
once forgot his sweater, and she usually carried an
umbrella in her mouth in case of rain. There is a room
in the basement of Miss Fulsom’s school where the
nurses wait. They sat on forms, while Nana lay on
the floor, but that was the only difference. They affected to ignore her as of an inferior social status to
themselves, and she despised their light talk. She resented visits to the nursery from Mrs. Darling’s friends,
but if they did come she first whipped off Michael’s
pinafore and put him into the one with blue braiding, and smoothed out Wendy and made a dash at
John’s hair.
No nursery could possibly have been conducted
more correctly, and Mr. Darling knew it, yet he sometimes wondered uneasily whether the neighbours
talked.
He had his position in the city to consider.
Nana also troubled him in another way. He had
sometimes a feeling that she did not admire him. “I know

1 butting them back into line if they strayed — а стоило
комунибудь отбежать в сторону, шлепком возвращала его на место

PETER BREAKS THROUGH

PETER PAN

she admires you tremendously, George,” Mrs. Darling
would assure him, and then she would sign to the
children to be specially nice to father. Lovely dances
followed, in which the only other servant, Liza, was
sometimes allowed to join. Such a midget she looked
in her long skirt and maid’s cap, though she had sworn,
when engaged1, that she would never see ten again.
The gaiety of those romps! And gayest of all was Mrs.
Darling, who would pirouette so wildly that all you
could see of her was the kiss, and then if you had
dashed at her you might have got it. There never was
a simpler happier family until the coming of Peter
Pan.
Mrs. Darling first heard of Peter when she was
tidying up her children’s minds. It is the nightly custom of every good mother after her children are asleep
to rummage in their minds and put things straight2
for next morning, repacking into their proper places
the many articles that have wandered during the day.
If you could keep awake (but of course you can’t) you
would see your own mother doing this, and you would
find it very interesting to watch her. It is quite like
tidying up drawers. You would see her on her knees,
I expect, lingering humorously over some of your con
1 when engaged — когда ее нанимали
2 put things straight — раскладывать все по местам