Eragon Ch.2 pt.1

Here is 龍騎士：飛龍聖戰, otherwise known as "Eragon" in English. A friend brought this book back from Taiwan for me, I think it is about time I started reading it. I am going to use sentences from the book that I found easy to read and understand to teach a little bit of Mandarin. I will also be posting sentences that I find particularly interesting or difficult even (who knows!)

These next four posts will be dedicated to the first paragraph of the second chapter of the book. Each post will contain one of the sentences, and I will try to break it down. Also, since I love this font so much, we're going to have pictures of each sentence written in it!

艾瑞岡跪在被踐踏過的蘆葦草上，用他那熟練的眼神掃視著。足印告訴他那群鹿半個小時前才在這草地上，牠們很快就會停下來休息。他的目標——一隻跛了左前腳的小母鹿，仍跟在鹿群中。他很驚訝她竟然走了那麼久都沒有被一隻狼或熊抓到。


第一句

Click to enlarge

艾瑞岡 → Eragon
跪在…上 → kneel on ...
被踐踏過的蘆葦草 → here 踐踏 means to trample. With 被 we now have the passive tense, "been trampled". Next, add a 過 particle to mark an experience, so "has been trampled". Now let's wrap it all up with a 的 so the entire phrase is modifying the noun that comes after it. Often you can translate this by the relative pronoun, "that". 蘆葦草 means "reeds", so all together this part means "the reeds that have been trampled on".
用他那熟練的眼神 → use his THAT skilled eyesight. The 那 adds a greater degree to 熟練. It's like the difference between "he is skilled" and "he is THAT skilled". 熟練 means practiced, proficient, or skilled. 眼神 means eyesight.
掃視＋著 → to glance, to sweep ones eyes over + particle showing progression of action.

So the literal translation would be, "Eragon kneels down on the reeds that have been trampled on, use his THAT skilled eyesight sweeping over (the area)" or in more plain English...

"Eragon knelt down on the trampled reeds, using his honed eyesight to scan the area."


Please comment and let me know what you think of these. Would you like to see more of them? Were my explanations clear enough? Would you like me to explain things differently? Please let me know^^