IV. Un ratón muy elegante
. . .
«¿ ?», .
« , . . . . ¡ !».
«¿ ?», .
«, , . », . « , . ¡ !».
A first-tooth tale adapted for A1
Ratoncito Pérez El ratoncito Pérez
Luis Coloma
What you read here is not Luis Coloma’s original but a retelling in simpler Spanish for level A1: MovaReader rewrote Ratón Pérez, the tale Coloma wrote in 1894 for the boy king Alfonso XIII. It runs to about 3,900 words, 7 words per sentence on average, with nearly every verb in the present tense. Over 8 chapters little King Buby loses his first milk tooth, writes a letter to Ratón Pérez and sets off with him at night through dark passages under the city.
- A1
- 3 948 words
- 1 hour
Will this text hold?
A1
This text
Right for A1: sentences average 7 words, nearly every verb is in the present tense, and a chapter of 350 to 640 words reads in one sitting with a few single-word translations.
Check this passageA2
With room to spare
At A2 this is light warm-up reading: little will be new apart from household words like babero (bib) or tuberías (pipes).
Start readingSentences here average 7 words. Don Quixote, adapted for A2, averages 10, while Mist by Unamuno, the complete Spanish text with the shortest sentences in the catalog, averages 13 and is rated B2. About one word in 150 has 9 letters or more, against one in 36 in the Don Quixote adaptation and one in 14 in Mist; the whole tale holds 26 such words, among them diplomático, esmeraldas and telegrama. Nearly every verb is in the present tense, and almost one word in four sits inside «»: the characters’ lines, their thoughts and the king’s letter. No chapter breaks the pattern: chapter averages run from 6 words in V to 7 in VIII, so the book has no bands and the verdict is A1. This is the catalog’s assessment, not a certificate.
- 3 948
- words
- 7
- words in an average sentence
- 1
- hour of reading
MovaReader. Project Gutenberg
What it is about, without the ending
King Buby is still very small, and his first milk tooth is loose. The doctors gather in council and the ministers argue over what to do with the tooth, but the queen mother settles it simply: like every child, Buby will write to Ratón Pérez and put the tooth under his pillow. That night a mouse in a straw hat and gold spectacles appears on the pillow. He tickles the king’s nose with the tip of his tail, Buby sneezes and becomes a mouse himself, and the two run off through dark passages: to tea with the Pérez family, who live in a big biscuit box, past the fearsome cat don Gaiferos, and up to the attic room of a poor boy called Gilito. What Buby sees there and what he asks his mother in the morning is not revealed here.
Compare two places
El ratoncito Pérez
VII. El cuarto de Gilito
. , . , . . . .
. , . . . , .
Choose an underlined word.
Knowing people, knowing things
Conocer and saber both translate as “to know”, but they know different things: conoce a gente muy fina, “he is acquainted with very refined people”, and sabe muchas cosas, “he knows a lot”. The “I” form of conocer is irregular: conozco. In Me los como the pronoun los, “them”, meaning the books, comes before the verb, and me adds the sense of eating them all up.
On one side, on the other
Por un lado... Por el otro lado means “on one side... on the other side”, and here it is literal: on one side the ceiling touches the floor. Hay, “there is”, lists what the room holds: hay hielo, hay una cesta, while casi no hay nada means “there is almost nothing”. The first sentence pairs ser and estar: es muy pequeño says what the room is like, está muy sucio what state it is in.
Chapters
Translation while you read
The book stays free on every plan. Reader, €1 a month, removes the daily limit on words and sentences.
Reader
€1 a month
With Reader, word translation is not capped by a daily limit, and whole sentences such as «Quiero ver el peligro cara a cara» are translated in full.
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Is this the original or a learner adaptation?
No, this is not the original: MovaReader retold Coloma’s tale in simpler Spanish. The source is Luis Coloma’s tale Ratón Pérez, written in 1894 for the boy king Alfonso XIII; it was first printed in 1902 together with other stories, and in 1911 it came out as a book of its own with drawings by Mariano Pedrero, the edition that Project Gutenberg holds. The language has changed: Coloma’s long sentences, full of rare and old-fashioned words, are broken into short ones of 7 words on average, and the verbs have moved into the present tense. The length is about the same, but the text is split into 8 titled chapters, which Coloma does not have, and his mock-chronicle opening, full of the names of ancient kings, is replaced by a short introduction. Coloma’s episodes keep their order: the loose tooth and the doctors’ council, the ministers’ quarrel, the letter to Ratón Pérez, the night journey through passages under the city, the visit to the Pérez family, the cat don Gaiferos and Gilito’s attic.
Is there an audiobook?
MovaReader has no recording of this tale: it exists only as a text for reading with word translation. The words you will tap most often name things in the palace and the attic, such as almohada, bandeja or cesta.
Can I translate a whole sentence?
Yes, if you are on the Reader plan, although with 7 words per sentence on average length is rarely the problem here. Whole-sentence translation earns its keep where a set phrase makes no sense word by word, as in Todos quieren quedar bien con la reina. Without that plan you are left with single-word translation, which has a daily limit.
How many hours does it take?
Plan on about an hour: the catalog times reading with translation of unfamiliar words, not a native speaker’s speed. Chapter IV is the longest at about 640 words and chapter I the shortest at about 350: at the catalog’s pace that is roughly 4 to 11 minutes a chapter.
Where does the text get easier?
The tale has no easier stretch, since it has no harder one either: whichever chapter you open, a sentence runs to 6 or 7 words on average. Chapter II, where the doctors and ministers debate the tooth, has the highest share of long words (ministros, telegrama), yet its sentences are no longer than elsewhere.
Will my place in the book be saved?
Yes, and you do not have to do anything for it once you have signed in: the reader saves your last position on its own and keeps the words you translated. Each of the 8 chapter titles on this page opens the text at that chapter, for example VI, where the king and his guide slip past the sleeping cat.