The foreign student of English may be discouraged and dismayed when he learns that there are over 400,000 words in English language. More than half of these words are dead. They are not in current use. Even Shakespeare used a vocabulary of only some 20,000 words. The average English man today perhaps has a vocabulary range of from 12,000 to 13,000 words. It is good to male your vocabulary as complete as you can, but a great deal can said and written with a vocabulary of no more than 10.000 words. The important thing is to have a good control and command over the words you do know. Better know two words exactly than three vaguely. A good carpenter is not distinguished by the number of his tools, but by the craftsmanship with which he uses them. So a good writer is not measured by the extent of his vocabulary, but by his skills in finding the "mot juste", the word that will hot the nail cleanly on the head.
译文：外国学生也许会在学习英语那不含俚语就达四万之巨的单词时，倍觉灰心沮丧。请振作起来。有一多半单词已近消亡，不再通用。莎翁不过也只使用了约两万词汇。而今，英国大众词汇量掌握约在一万二至一万三。致辞行文中大量应用的词汇不愈一万，完备词汇量大有裨益，掌握会的单词则至关重要。精确掌握两个大慈比模糊了解三个更为有用。杰出的匠师出类拔萃不是单靠拥有的工具的数量而是靠其精湛的技艺。同理，作家不以词汇量论英雄，其行文论事，发掘”中的之语“的技能，才是衡量其卓尔不群的标准。
Uploading ....