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II. La sombra
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An A2 adaptation of Barrie’s novel
Peter Pan Peter Pan
J. M. Barrie
This is a retelling of J. M. Barrie’s novel Peter and Wendy in simple Spanish, not the original text: a MovaReader adaptation for readers who already know the past tenses. In the catalog it is A2: about 4,700 words, 9 words per sentence on average. 10 short chapters follow the story from the nursery in London and the lost shadow to the flight to the Neverland, the mermaids’ lagoon, Captain Hook and the return home.
- A2
- 4 740 words
- 1 hour
Will this text hold?
A1
Earlier
At A1 the past tenses will stop you: the story runs in the pretérito indefinido and imperfecto (cosió, dijo, vivía, tenía), at 9 words per sentence on average.
A1A2
This text
You can manage it at A2: sentences are short, the story stays in the past tenses you know, and plenty of dialogue keeps the pace.
Check this passageB1
With room to spare
At B1 the adaptation reads with room to spare, in about an hour, and you can move on to the longer B1 adaptations or to the full Spanish texts, which start at B2 in the catalog.
Start readingThe average sentence has 9 words, and a word of 9 letters or more comes up about once in 43 words (2.3%). The story is told in the pretérito indefinido and imperfecto, and about one word in seven sits inside the characters’ quotation marks. The long words are few and they repeat: Campanilla (the fairy Tinker Bell) and cocodrilo make up about a quarter of them. All 10 chapters stay at 9-10 words per sentence. Next to the catalog’s other Spanish adaptations: the A1 tales run at 5-7 words per sentence, the A2 books at 9-10 (Hansel y Gretel and Pinocho have 9, La sirenita 10), the B1 ones at 11-12, and full Spanish texts start at B2 (Unamuno’s Niebla has 13 words per sentence and about 7% long words). Hence A2. This is the catalog’s assessment, not a certificate.
- 4 740
- words
- 9
- words in an average sentence
- 1
- hour of reading
MovaReader. Project Gutenberg
What it is about, without the ending
One night in London, a boy flies into the Darlings’ nursery to look for his lost shadow. Wendy sews it back on, and the boy, Peter Pan, invites her and her two brothers to the Neverland, where he lives with the fairies and a band of lost boys who have no mother. They fly there with fairy dust and happy thoughts. On the island Wendy finds a house built round her, mermaids in a lagoon and a brave Indian princess, and also Captain Hook, a pirate with an iron hook who is afraid of one thing: a crocodile that swallowed a clock. When the pirates carry off the children, Peter has to save them. How the story ends is not revealed here.
Compare two places
Peter Pan
VI. La laguna de las sirenas
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«¡ !»
Choose an underlined word.
Events and background
Single events use the pretérito indefinido: cosió, dolió, lloró, bailó, each one begins and ends. What was going on around them uses the imperfecto: Peter le contaba cosas muy raras, “Peter was telling her very strange things”. Había huido is “he had run away”, a past before the other past events. Se le pasó pronto: “it soon passed”.
Plans with vamos a
Vamos a dejarla en la roca is vamos a + infinitive: “we are going to leave her”; la, “her”, is attached to the end of dejar. Cuando suba el agua, se ahogará: “when the water rises, she will drown”; suba is the subjunctive after cuando about the future, and se ahogará is the future simple. Sin hacer nada: “without doing anything”.
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
Reader translates whole sentences, and here that helps most with Peter’s explanations, such as: Los niños perdidos son los que se caen del cochecito cuando la niñera mira para otro lado.
ReaderIf this book is not the one
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Is this the original or a learner adaptation?
A learner adaptation, not the original: MovaReader retold J. M. Barrie’s novel Peter and Wendy in simple Spanish, following the novel of 1911 (Barrie died in 1937), not any film. The source is the Project Gutenberg text of the novel. The language and length have changed: modern Spanish, mostly in the past tenses, 9 words per sentence on average, 10 chapters and about 4,700 words. The main episodes stay in the novel’s order: the lost shadow that Wendy sews back, the flight to the Neverland, the lost boys and the house built round Wendy, the mermaids’ lagoon, Tiger Lily (Lirio Tigre), Captain Hook and the crocodile with the clock, Tinker Bell (Campanilla) and the poisoned medicine, and the fight on the ship. The ending is told briefly, and many smaller episodes are left out.
Is there an audiobook?
There is no audio version of this adaptation: MovaReader gives you the text, not a recording. The text is read on screen, and tapping an unfamiliar word shows its translation next to it; here that will mostly be everyday words of the story, such as aguja, bellota or tabla.
Can I translate a whole sentence?
The Reader plan translates whole sentences. Here they are short, 9 words on average, so you will seldom need one translated: mostly turns of phrase, like Los niños perdidos son los que se caen del cochecito cuando la niñera mira para otro lado, or Si nadie los busca en siete días, vienen a mi isla. The free plan also translates single words, up to a daily limit.
How many hours does it take?
The whole adaptation takes about 1 hour at the pace of someone who still translates new words. A chapter averages about 470 words, or 5-8 minutes of reading, so one evening easily covers the whole book.
Where does the text get easier?
The difficulty is even: each of the 10 chapters averages 9-10 words per sentence, so there is no easier stretch. Only long words vary: in chapters I and II one word in 100 has 9 letters or more, and in chapter VIII, “Campanilla”, one in 24, mostly the fairy’s own name.
Will my place in the book be saved?
Yes, once you sign in: the reader keeps your last place and the words you opened, so next time you carry on from there. The contents on this page also take you straight to any chapter, say VI, “La laguna de las sirenas”, where the pirates leave a girl on a rock in the lagoon.