Minis
Mini Copy Book

Each post in this section is a short précis (summary) of a passage in The Copy Book. All of them are in modern English. They are intended for students of English as a Foreign Language at Elementary Level.

Character and Conduct

Sweet and Sour

The great Dr Johnson argues that you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.

Length: 59 words

Lives of the Saints

St Nicholas the Wet

Two frantic parents implore St Nicholas’s help in rescuing their baby boy.

Length: 58 words

Tudor Era

The Voyage of the ‘Golden Hinde’

Elizabethan adventurer Sir Francis Drake combined sailing round the world with really annoying the King of Spain.

Length: 111 words

Poets and Poetry

Ring out the Old, Ring in the New

For Alfred, Lord Tennyson, Christmas was a time to let the dead past bury its dead.

Length: 58 words

Poets and Poetry

Christmas Bells

The sounds of an English country Christmas helped Tennyson in his deep mourning for an old friend.

Length: 49 words

Mediaeval History

Wenceslaus: A Life for a Life

By Divine providence, the shocking murder of Good King Wenceslas led to a flowering of Christian faith in Europe.

Length: 60 words