More Heroic Failures

b
The painter: 
i)
was a monkey, 
ii)
was not ready to answer questions about his work. 
c 
Mr Feddersen:
i)
showed the wrong pictures.
ii)
showed the pictures because he wanted to sell them. 
4 In which stories do we read about these things?
Why are they important? 
a
a Pekinese dog
c
a computer 
b
telegraph poles
d
some pullovers 
5 In which stories do these things happen? 
a
A thief gives money to a supermarket. 
b
A woman in a bank starts laughing at some bank robbers.
c
A singer sings a very, very boring song.
d
A police dog bites a policeman’s leg.
e
Four thousand people order a man to eat a lot of bananas.
f 
A man takes a photo of a refrigerator.
g 
Some English football players play a game in Germany.
h
A thief falls into a large pot of cooking oil. 
Discussion
 


1
Who do you think is the worst failure in this book. Why?

2
‘Success is not really important.’ Do you agree?
Why or why

not?
Writing 

Write a letter to The Not Very Good Club of Great Britain, telling 
them about something that you are not very good at (100-150 
words). 
40
 

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‘We all know that people are really good at doing things 
badly.’ 
In these true stories we meet some of these people - the 
robber who lost more money than he stole, the man who 
burned down half his house and the fighters who did not 
fight. 
 
Penguin Readers is a series of simplified stories which introduces 
you step-by-step to the literature that has made Penguin Books 
world famous. This series offers you classics, best-sellers, film-
titles and original stories. Each book has extensive exercises, a 
detailed introduction and clear information about the syllabus. 
They are published at six levels from Beginner (300 words) to 
Advanced (3000 words). 
The Series Editor is Derek Strange, a leading authority on reading schemes.