精读5重点背诵段落
精读第5单元语言点

精读第5单元语言点Unit 5, Book 4Stripping Down to Bare Happiness1. Difficult Sentences1) Neither one of them, it turned out, was willing to restrictwhat they considered their “real life” into the brief timebefore work and the tired hours afterwards.What does “real life” here mean according to Sara and Michael?(= “Real life” here refers to a simple satisfying but not wasteful family life that the couple are after.)Translate this sentence into Chinese.(=他们俩谁都不愿意把他们视为生活中最重要的部分仅仅局限于上班前的一小段时间和下班后已疲惫不堪的那几个小时。
)2) They decided to spend their money only on things thatcontributed to their major goal, the construction of a world where family and friendship, work and play, were all of apiece, a world, moreover, which did not make wasteful useof the earth’s resources.According to this sentence, what kind of a world did Sara and Michael intend to build for themselves?(=Sara and Michael intended to build a world of their own where they could enjoy family life, social life and balance work and play all at the same time. Meanwhile, they wished to construct a world which did not make wasteful use of the earth’s resources.)Analyze the structure of this sentence.(=本句的主句是They decide to spend their money on things,后面携带的that从句是先行词things的定语从句,而在定语从句中又嵌套了分别以where 和which引导的定语从句,修饰the construction of a world中的world 一词,而短语the construction of a world其成分实际上是短语major goal的同位语。
现代大学英语精读5 重点paraphrase+单词总结

Lesson 1Paraphrase1...when I suggested that this behavior might be grounds for sending the student on a brief vacation. (Para 14)One student had some radical comments on the author's class and the author got a little bit angry so that he suggested the school should suspend the student's schooling. But the dean of students thought the author was just too annoyed.The story the speaker tells the audience here is hilarious, but not to be taken seriously. In the United States, university students do write about their professors on their blogs—and write evaluations of their courses, critiquing their professors' teaching skills. So a student could have criticized the speaker for teaching a boring class and the speaker might defend himself by saying that he had a cold. But the story is basically all fantasy. The speaker's serious point may be that students expect professors to entertain them; the professors who are good entertainers receive high evaluations, but the criterion is superficial. Less flashy teachers who think deeply can be the ones from whom the students learn the most.2.Black limousines pulled up in front of his office and disgorged decorously suited negotiators. (Para.16)These were obviously officials from that country's embassy sent to negotiate with the professor about this case. The whole thing had become a tough diplomatic issue.3. Did my pal fold? Nope, he's not the type. But he did not enjoy the process. (Para.16)Did my friend back down? No, he is not the type of person who will easily give up his principles under pressure. But he did not like the experience he had to endure. This again is an interesting anecdote, but not a very good example, because the student involved is too special.4. The idea that a university education really should have no substantial content, should not be about what John Keats was disposed to call Soul-making, is one that you might think professors and university presidents would be discreet about. (Para. 19)Professors and presidents do not think the content of the courses really matters much, because they are soon forgotten anyway. It shouldn't be about soul-making either. The speaker is surprised that professors and presidents are actually by and large quite frank about what they think are the aims of education. They do not hide their views because they do not feel embarrassed.soul-making: moral cultivation, character-building, and intellectual developmentdiscreet: careful about keeping/preventing something from being known or noticed by many people 言语谨慎的,说话小心不让人抓辫子的5. …and common sense is something to respect, though not quite—peace unto the formidable Burke—to revere. (Para. 28)常识是应该尊重的东西,但不一定崇拜希望其令人钦佩的伯克先生别生气。
现代大学英语精读五 后半学期小抄

7.1.It took me .. nobody but myself . = It took me a long time to get rid of illusion and realize the simple and apparent truth that I am nobody but myself . It was a painful process . I started with high expectations only to be deeply disappointed and thoroughly disillusioned .7.2.And yet I am no freak of nature .. eighty-five years ago. = (I am an invisible man) And yet I am physically normal as a human being and at the same time I am a natural product of history . when things seemed likely to happen to me , or when I was fated to be the man as described in the novel , other things had been equal eighty-five years ago .7.3.About eighty-five years ago .. like the fingers of the hand . = About eighty-five years ago , the blacks were told that they were no longer slaves , and shared with the whites everything industrial , civil and religious , and in everything social the blacks and the whites were separated . In other words , social inequality is accepted as a fact with which the blacks will live .7.4.In those pre-invisible days .. Washington . = In those days before I realized I was an invisible man , I imagined that I would become a successful man like Booker T. Washington .7.5.“I wanted at one and the same time to run .. murder her .” = I felt so embarrassed to see a naked white girl that I wanted to run away from the ballroom , to sink through the floor ;I took pity on the girl, so at the same time I wanted to protect the girl from the eyes of the man; I wanted to love her by caressing her because she was attractive; but at the same time I wanted to destroy the girl because she was the immediate cause of my embarrassment.7.6.Should I try to win against .. for nonresistance . = If I should try my best and win the flight, I would be winning against the best of the white man, who shouted “I got my money on the big boy.” In that case I would not behave with humility, and yet my speech advocated humility as the essence of success. So maybe I should let the big boy win without putting up resistance, for this was time for me to show humility.7.7.’Cast down .. are surrounded ..’ = Make full use of what you have and do the bestyou can . Take this attitude inmaking friends in everyhonourable way , making friendswith people of different racesamong whom we live .7.8.’You weren’t being smart .. atall time .’ = “You were not tryingto seem clever in a disrespectfulway , were you , boy ?” “Weintended to do the right thing bysetting you up as a role model ,but you must never forget whoyou are .”8.1. and I was conscious of hissuperiority .. trouble=I knew thatOppenheimer was a man of greattalent , but his way of showing histalent at my seminars causeduneasiness and resentment amongpeople , especially among hisfellow students .8.2.this did not seem to be the sortof anecdote= Since thoseattending the conference werepeople devoted to poetry , such ananecdote , though interesting ,might not be appreciated by theaudience .8.3. pitted against these excellentreasons .. carried the day=Therewere two reasons for my going tothe conference set against thereasons for my not going and theybecame decisive in my finaldecision .8.4. he is , for me , one of thosepeople=According to my view ,Spender belongs to the groupwhose writings about their lives ,experiences , that is whoseautobiographies , are moreinteresting than their literaryworks .8.5.Auden’s Dirac-like lucidity ..irresistible= Like Dirac , Audenwas outstanding in clarity . Hewas also outstanding in thepowerful use of the language andthe sense of fun about seriousissues . All these greatlyfascinated me .8.6.Spender’s journal entry .. doesnot say= Spender’s record of hisvisit is interesting not onlybecause of the things he mentionsbut also because of the things hedoes not say .8.7.Oppenheimer appears ..Spender’s life= In his book ,Spender fails to give a connected ,complete picture of Oppenheimerand does not mention thatOppenheimer’s background andsituation has quite a lot to do withSpender .8.8. the real thing was muchbetter = The real person lookedmuch better than the pictures .8.9.one probably should not readtoo mmuch into appearances =Maybe one should not attach toomuch importance to appearance .8.10.he had outlived them all..ofAuden = He had lived longer thanany of his more famous friendsbut traces or influences of thesefriends , especially those ofAuden , could still be found onhim .9.1.Your imagination comes tolife, and this, you think, is wherecreation was begun.= Thelandscape makes yourimagination vivid and lifelike, andyou believe that the creation ofthe whole universe was begunright here.9.2. But Warfare for the Kiowaswas preeminently a matter ofdisposition rather than of survival,and they never understood thegrim, unrelenting advance of theU.S.Cavalry. = The Kiowas oftenfought just because they weregood warriors, because theyfought out of habit, character,nature, not because they neededextra lands or material gains forthe sake of surviving and thriving.And they could not understandwhy the U.S.Cavalry never gaveup pushing forward even whenthey had won a battle.9.3. My grandmother was sparedthe humiliation of those high graywalls by eight or ten years… =Luckily, my grandmother did notsuffer the humiliation of being putinto a closure for holding animals,for she was born eight or ten yearsafter the event.9.4. It was a long journey towarddawn, and it led to golden age. =They moved toward the east,where the sun rises, and alsotoward the beginning of a newculture, which led to the greatestmoment of their history.9.5. They acquired horses, andtheir ancient nomadic spirit wassuddenly free of the ground. =Now they got horses. Reading onhorseback, instead of walking onfoot, gave them this new freedomof movement, thus completelyliberating their ancient nomadicspirit.9.6. From one point of view, theirmigration was the fruit of an oldprophecy, for indeed theyemerged from a sunless world. =In a sense, their migration confirmed the ancient myth that they entered the world from a hollow log, for they did emerge from the sunless world of the mountains.9.7. The Kiowas reckoned their stature by the distance they could see ,and they were bent and blind in the widerness. = Their stature was measured by the distance they could see. Yet , because of the dense forests, they could not see very far, and they could hardly stand straight.9.8. Clusters of trees and animals grazing far in the distance cause the vision to reach away and wonder to build upon the mind. = The earth unfolds and the limit of the land is far in the distance, where there are clusters of trees and animals eating grass. This landscape makes one see far and broadens one’s horizon.9.9. Not yet would they veer southward to the caldron of the land that lay below;they must wean their blood from the northern winter and hold the mountains a while longer in their views. = They would not yet change the direction southward to the land lying below which was like a large kettle. First, they must give their bodies some time to get used to the plains. Secondly, they didn’t want to lose sight of the mountains so soon.9.10. I was never sure that I had the right to hear, so exclusive were they of all mere custom and company. = I was not sure that I had any right to overhear her praying, which did not follow any customary way of praying, and which I guess she did not want anyone else to hear.9.11. Transported so in the dancing light among the shadows of her room she seemed beyond the reach of time. But that was illusion;I think I knew then that I should not see her again. = In this way she was entranced in the dancing light among the shadows of her room, and she seemed to be timeless(what she represented would last for ever).9.12. The women might indulge themselves; gossip was at once the mark and compensation of their servitude. = On these special occasions, women might make loud and elaborate jokes and talk among themselves. Their gossip revealed their position as servants to men and also a reward for theirservitude.10.1.we still remember…for thedead. = In your memory, thepre-9/11 world was peaceful,happy and safe(overlooking thefact that this was not the case)andwe will talk about those days witha feeling of deep respect and lovewhich ca only be found in talkingabout dead people.10.2.…the spoils of …andliberties. = In order to win the war,we might have to give up some ofour basic values and liberties wetreasure most.10.3.….who areattempting ……repressive agenda.= …who are planning to carry outthe plan to extend Americandomination into areas originallybeyond American reach, hence,the colonization of the future.10.4.…which assumesthe …multihued. = …whichthinks that the public is thinkingsimply and uniformly, in newpatriotism, but fails to recognizethat the emotions, ideas andopinions are as varied as thecountry itself?10.5.we too are mire near…safetyand security. = The terroristattacks put the Americans at thebottom of the pyramid accordingto Maslow’s scheme, trying toregain their sense of physicalsafety, the lowest type of safety.10.6.…it is somethingwe…participatory democracies. =American people hold that theypractice rule of law and protectsindividual rights and freedom. Tothem, violation of individualrights and suppression ofdissenting voices can only befound in repressive regimes.10.7.there was a relaxing …in thiscountry. = People began to putless emphasis on the pursuit ofwealth and possession of worldlygoods. And physical separationfrom others and irrationalbehavior as a result of impulse,the other two dangeroussymptoms that went in companywith materialism, also becameless serious. Materialism, togetherwith isolation and compulsion,had been the cause of the ruin ofcommunity in the country.10.8.…discourages national …bemost valuable. = Once you getinto the habit of earning andspending money, you will forgetthe fear and the sorrow that aretroubling you. At a time when it ishighly important for Americans tolook into ourselves and askourselves why “they hate us”, thisconcept direct our attention andthinking away from such analysis.10.9.…history is …crimes.= …history records many crimescommitted by human beingswhich are so horrible that theydefy analysis.10.10.we tend these in anightmare garden… = In spite ofthe fact that these images arehorrible images, images ofappalling atrocity, we still takecare to keep these images alive.11.1. My father would bringthe……like the sound of bells. =my father drove the horses tomove quickly down the roads,hitting their hind part with a light,quick blow with his whip. Thebells rang even more lightly andquickly over the snow, which inturn threw back a great brightnessthat was like the sound of bells.11.2. It always troubled meas……bite in their mouths. = Iwas puzzled as an eight-year-oldboy over the horses’ indifferenttowards their dead friend, whosehide had now turned into myfather’s overcoat. It was hard forme to understand why the horsesseemed to show no care to thatovercoat which came from theirrecently died friend and the manwho put a metal bar in theirmouths to control them, wearingit.11.3. There would be anoccasional……not here to stay. =occasionally on our way, wewould meet a car moving slowlyand carefully over the packedsnow. It had difficulty climbingup hills, which were slippery withthe snow, so it was often pulledup by a horse. When we passedby quickly on our sleigh, wewould shout loudly with a senseof triumph towards them, whichwere obviously clumsy and out ofplace, making trouble on the road.11.4. …the body heat ofmany……brown-sounding grunts.= the smell of quite a number ofbig and strong animals was verystrong. At the same time, since thebarn was filled with animals, itwas also warm. Pigs were utteringdeep, gloomy, and sonoroussounds…11.5. It gave him a better……nobody to it. = with so much contentand life in it, the rich odor of the barn appealed to my father much better than the freshest air, which, according to him, was weak and lacked substance.11.6. …and as my aunt hurried……from the oven. = my aunt had been baking bread for the purpose of making the oven ready for the cooking of the meat. As she passed by, I could smell the most delightful of allsmells-that of the freshly baked bread just out of the oven.11.7. For days after ……biting into a carrot. = while being kept inside the vegetable cellar, sitting in darkness and thinking about their wrong doings, they would help themselves to the carrots stored there. They had eaten so many that even several days after that, they would feel fed up with carrots and couldn’t have another bite.11.8. My aunt kept a……n ature of the day. = It was a state of confusion because various foods were kept going by my aunt. It would be inappropriate to the holy occasion and elated mood of Christmas to say no to any food passed to you.11.9. The man sat there……of their appetite. = with a stern and serious expression on their faces, the men sat there suffering from eating to the full capacity of their stomaches.11.10. …when already the crimson……sky like blood.= …the cardinals were deeply and vividly red, so when flying down onto the bird feeder, they were like drops of blood falling from the sky. Or:… the cardinals with deep and vivid red feather would be flying down like drops of blood falling from the sky.12.1. And truth is slippery, hard to establish. = truth is not easy to grasp and very difficult to prove.12.2. One of the more extraordinary……by the British press. = the scandals, sexual and other, involving members of the royal family, have in recent years outshone the television serials dealing with family problems. The most remarkable fact is that the characters of these individuals who are part of the scandals are largely invented by the British press.12.3. The creation of “characters”……stock in trade. = actually, the portrayal of fictioncharacters has quickly become amost important device employedby the press.12.4. …willingly drinking thepoisoned chalice of fame.= …these people are pleased andcontented when they are in thelimelight or in the newspaperheadlines although such famemay be an ill omen.12.5. For a n ovelist to be……acase of the biter bit. = I am awareof the fact that since I am anovelist and have used manydifferent types of people as rawmaterial for character creation, Imyself being rewritten intosomeone unrecognizable tomyself is a typical example of aperson good at tricking othersbeing tricked.12.6. In Britain, intrusion……ofprivacy laws. = in Britain, as aresult of exposure of private livesof famous people, certain groupsof influential people havedemanded the adoption of lawsprotecting privacy.12.7. …but where the powerfulcan hide behind……goundetected. = …but if the illegalactivities of those influentialpeople could be kept unknown tothe public as a result of privacyprotection laws, it is possible thata lot of other illegal activitiescould also be covered up by suchlaws.12.8. Many special-interestgroups……protection of thecensor. = many organized groupspursuing special policy goalswhich assert that they are morallysuperior to the rest of thepopulation are now demandingthat officials should be authorizedto control the content of printedmatters, TV programs and films.12.9.religious extremists, thesedays ……growing stridency. =those who hold fundamentalistreligious beliefs have recentlybeen making louder and louderdemands that their conservativebeliefs should be acceptedwithout question.12.10. …but mow we are asked toagree……the idea of respect.= …but now we are expected toaccept the view that if we expressdisagreement with those beliefs, ifwe think that those beliefs mightbe unsound or out-of-date orwrong, that they therefore couldbe debated, we are showingdisrespect for their beliefs, we aregoing beyond the bounds ofdecent behavior.7.1.on his deathbed临终之际7.2.in spirit of myself不由自主地7.3.an example of desirableconduct品行端正的楷模7.4.portable boxing ring可拆卸的简易拳击比赛场7.5.anticipatory sweat由于期待而流汗7.6.it smelled even more stronglyof tobacco and whisky那里的烟味和酒气更加刺鼻7.7.beads of pearly perspirationgiostening like dew汗珠香露水珠一样晶莹发亮7.8.a sudden fit if blind trerror由于眼睛看不见而产生恐惧7.9.their heads pulled in shortagainst their shoulders他们耸着肩,缩着脖子7.10.coins of all dimension大小不一的硬币7.11.bass pocket tokensadvertisting a certain makeautomobile汽车广告用的通知硬币装纪念品7.12.To Whom It My Concern敬启者9.1. a single knoll rises out of theplain一座孤零零的小山拔地而起9.2. popping up like corn to stingthe flesh像玉米花一样爆裂开,刺得人痛9.3. to lose the sense ofproportion失去(正常的)比例感9.4. a matter of disposition出于本性,由于习惯9.5. Positively classified明确的归类9.6. The object and symbol oftheir worship他们的崇拜物和象征物9.7. the top of the world世界上最好的地方9.8. the sense of confinement受束缚,被禁锢的感觉9.9. the boy was struck dumb这男孩突然变成了哑巴9.10. forbidden without cause毫无理由地被禁止9.11. a lot of coming and going人来人往9.12. made of lean and leather精瘦11.1. A burst of speed风驰电掣11.2. Deep freezer冷冻冰箱11.3. Packaged food袋装食品11.4. Smoked pork 熏肉11.5. Remote uncle远方叔叔11.6. with a sniff in her voice语气中略带讽刺11.7. Dignifying term令人倍显尊贵的称呼11.8. A short man with a fine natural shyness天生腼腆的矮个子男人11.9. Heavy with odors浓香四溢11.10. Uneaten prospects of more goose and untouched pies更多的等待上桌的烤鹅和馅儿饼7.1.“live with your head in the lion’s mouth”→你要在虎口里求生,我要你对他们唯唯诺诺、笑脸相迎,只有让他们丧失理智,才能战胜他们。
大学英语精读第五册

大学英语精读第五册 Unit 2Translation Chinese to English1.我认为向他求助是不现实的。
事实上,他自己也需要帮助。
I don’t think it is realistic to turn to him for help.As a matter of fact, he himself is in need of help.2.越来越多的人正在意识到与空气污染作斗争的迫切需要。
More and more people are being awakened to the urgent need of combating air pollution.3.有明显的迹象表明一些古老的传统和价值观念采不再被年轻人珍视。
There are visible signs that some of the time-honored old traditions and values are no longer cherished by the young people.4.我们许多人觉得宇宙无限这一概念难以理解。
Many of us find the notion of a boundless universe hard to grasp.5. 因为法律和规章中有许多漏洞(loophole),一小撮投机倒把者一夜之间暴富就没有什么奇怪了。
There being so many loopholes in the laws and regulations, it is little wonder that a handful of speculators got rich overnight.6. 旅游事业的空前兴旺使这个从前只住有三百人的边境小镇突然繁荣起来。
An unprecedented boom in tourism brought sudden prosperity to the small border town, which was formerly inhabited by only three hundred people.7.根据这一信息,该国已经具有制造核武器的能力。
现代大学英语精读5课后句子解释和翻译

Lesson 11. A white lie is better than a black lie.一个无关紧要的谎言总比一个恶意的谎言要好。
1.To upset this homicide, ---Olympian manhood为了挫败这种蓄意培植的低人一等的心态,黑人必须直起腰来宣布自己高贵的人格。
2.with a spirit straining ---- self-abnegation黑人必须以一种竭尽全力自尊自重的精神,大胆抛弃自我克制的枷锁。
3.Striped of the right---- of this white power structure 被剥夺了决定自己生活和命运的权力,他只能听任这个白人权力结构所作出的决定的摆布。
这些决定是专断的,有时甚至是反复无常的。
4.what is needed is a realization---- sentimental and anemic: 必须懂得的是没有爱的权力是毫无节制,易被滥用的,而没有权力的爱则是多愁善感,苍白无力的。
5.It is precisely this collision --- of our times正是这种邪恶的权力与毫无权力的道义的冲突构成了我们时代的主要危机。
6.Now early in this century---and responsibility.在本世纪初,这种建议会受到嘲笑和谴责,认为它对主动性和责任感起负面作用。
7.Now we realize ---- against their will : 我们现在懂得,我们经济地的市场运作混乱,歧视盛行,迫使人们无事可作并违背他们的意愿,使他们长期失业或不断失业。
8.New forms of work--- are not available: 有必要创造对社会有好处的新的工作形式,提供给那些找不到传统工作的人。
9.It is not the work---necessity. animal necessity: Something necessary 必需品,The necessities of life include food, clothing, and shelter.生活必需品,包括食物,衣服,住处10.It is the work of men--- where want is abolished: 这是这样一类人的工作,他们通过某种方式找到了一种工作模式,这种模式出于自身需要,带来安全保障,并创造了一种废除了匮乏的社会形态。
英语精读笔记U5-1A Few Kind Words for superstition

P11,graveAdj:serious;{乐}slow Noun:坟墓,死亡,堆积处Life beyond the grave来世Dig one’s own~自掘坟墓As silent/quiet as the grave寂静无声Take the secret to the~至死保密2,renaissanceN:文艺复兴(文化/风格);复兴再生Cinema-going is enjoying sth of a renaissance。
去电影院看电影又有点流行了3,irrationalA:not logical or reasonableNot endowed with the power of reason失去理性的He had an~belief that everybody was his enemy荒谬的N:无理数,无理量,不尽根4,figureVi,(1)guess,think(2)~sth/sb out=understandI~ed on being there at95,meditationN,(1)冥思(2)默念,默想I left him in deep meditationThe book is a meditation on the morality of art.探讨His later letters are intense~s on man’s exploitation of his fellows他后期的书信深刻的思考了人对同类的剥削To practice meditation静坐默思Meditation posture can stimulate your body energyV,meditateto meditate on/upon sthA,meditative6,UFO=unidentified flying object7,enlightenmentN,启迪What~can you get from the text?V,enlighten~sb on/about sthan~ing program有启迪性的节目8,condemnVt,谴责~sb for sthWe all~cruelty to childrenIf children live with criticism,they learn to condemn.在指责中长大的孩子易于怨天尤人N Condemnation Deplore(1)Condemn(2)Regret strongly外交辞令中谴责用deploreDeplorable恶劣的极坏的What's the trait you most deplore in yourself?你最不喜欢你自己哪点?9,an unacknowledged hold on sb=an unrecognized control/influence on sbP21,admit to(介词)sth/being sth2,implyVt暗示,暗指,意指salesmen who use jargon to~superior knowledge用行业术语暗示自己知识高人一等的销售The report~ies that two million jobs might be lost.报告暗示可能会有200万人失业infer推断,推论inferable adj3,naivete n.=naive adjLack of sophistication or worldliness4,ignorance ignorant adjN,lake of knowledge or informationHe acted in~of basic procedures.他对基本程序一无所知就行动了5,flourishV,(1)(人,动植物)茂盛,繁荣Wild plants flourish on the banks of the lake.迅速发展,兴旺,成功The organization has continued to flourish.该机构继续发展壮大(人)处于事业鼎盛期of this century活跃在本世纪初的那位漫画家兼幽默家(2)人挥舞物以引起注意,炫耀“Happy New Year”he yelled,flourishing a bottle of whisky.他挥动着威士忌酒瓶喊着:新年好6,manifestationN:表现形式,化身The butterfly was one of the many~s of the goddess.蝴蝶是女神的众多化身之一。
现代大学英语精读5Paraphrase

Lesson 1Paraphrase1. The job of arousing manhood within a people that have been taught for so many centuries that they are nobody is not easy.It is no easy job to educate a people who have been told over centuries that they were inferior and of no importance to see that they are humans, the same as any other people.2. Psychological freedom, a firm sense of self-esteem, is the most powerful weapon against the long night of physical slavery.If you break the mental shackles imposed on you by white supremacists, if you really respect yourself, thinking that you are a Man, equal to anyone else, you will be able to take part in the struggle against racial discrimination.3. The Negro will only be free when he reaches down to the inner depths of his own being and signs with the pen and ink of assertive manhood his own emancipation proclamation.The liberation of mind can only be achieved by the Negro himself/herself. Only when a negro is fully convinced that he/she is a Man/Woman and is not inferior to anyone else, can he/she throw off the manacles of self-abnegation and become free.4. Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love.Power in its best form of function is the carrying out of the demands of justice with love and justice in the best form of function is the overcoming of everything standing in the way of love with power.5. At that time economic status was considered the measure of the individual’s ability and talents.At that time, the way to evaluate how capable and resourceful a person was to see how much money he had made (or how wealthy he was).6. …the absence of worldly goods indicated a want of industrious habits and moral fiber.A person was poor because he was lazy and not hard-working and lacked a sense of right and wrong.7. It is not the work of slaves driven to their tasks either by the task, by the taskmaster, or by animal necessity.This kind of work cannot be done by slaves who work because the work has to be done, because they are forced to work by slave-drivers or because they need to work in order to be fed and clothed.8. …when the unjust measurement of human worth on the scale of dollars is eliminated.... when the unfair practice of judging human value by the amount of moneya person has is done away with.9. He who hates does not know God, but he who has love has the key that unlocks the door to the meaning of ultimate reality.Those who harbor hate in their hearts cannot grasp the teachings of God. Only those who have love can enjoy the ultimate happiness in Heaven. 10. Let us be dissatisfied until America will no longer have a high blood pressure of creeds and an anemia of deeds.Let us be dissatisfied until America no longer only talk about racial equality but is unwilling or reluctant to take action to end such evil practice as racial discrimination.Lesson twoParaphrase1. I pictured this prodigy part of me as many different images, trying each one on for size.2.I imagined myself as different types of prodigy, trying to find out which one suited me the best.3.I had new thoughts, willful thoughts, or rather thoughts filled with lots of won’ts.I had new thoughts, which were filled with a strong spirit of disobedience and rebellion.3. The girl had a sauciness of a Shirley Temple.The girl was somewhat like Shirley Temple, a bit rude, but in an amusing way.4. It felt like worms and toads and slimy things crawling out of my chest, but it also felt good, as if this awful side of me had surfaced, at last. When I said those words, I felt that some very nasty thoughts had got out of my chest and so I felt scared. But at the same time I felt good, relieved, because those nasty things had been suppressed in my heart for some time and they had got out at last.5. And I could sense her anger rising to its breaking point, I wanted to see it spill over.I could feel that her anger had reached the point where hex self-controlwould collapse, and wanted to see what my mother would do when the lost complete control of herself.6. The lid to the piano was closed, shutting out the dust, my misery, and her dreams.When the lid to the piano was closed, it shut out the dust and also put an end to my misery and her dreams.Lesson threeParaphrase1. Yet globalization…“is a reality, not a choice”. (Para. 2)Yet globalization is not something that you can accept or reject, it is already a matter of life which you will encounter and have to respond to every day.2. Popular factions sprout to exploit nationalist anxieties. (Para. 5) Political groups with broad support have come into being to take advantage of existing worries and uneasiness among the people about foreign "cultural assault".3. …where xenophobia and economic ambition have often struggled for the upper hand. (Para. 5)... in China, the two trends of closed-door and open-door policies have long been struggling for dominance.4. Those people out there should continue to live in a museum while we will have showers hat work. (Para. 6)The Chinese people should continue to live a backward life while we live comfortably with all modern conveniences.5. Westernization… is a phenomenon shot through with inconsistencies and populated by very strange bedfellows. (Para. 7)... westernization is a concept full of self-contradiction and held by people of very different backgrounds or views.6. You don’t have to be cool to do it; you just have to have the eye. (Para.10)In trying to find out what will be the future trend, you do not need to be fashionable yourself. All you need is awareness, that is to say, you need to be on the alert, to be observant.7. He…was up in the cybersphere far above the level of time zones. (Para.19)He was moving around, playing a game through the Internet with people living in different time zones, thus their activity on the computer broke down time zone limit.8. In the first two weeks of business the Gucci Store took in a surprising $100,000. (Para. 22)The Gucci store did not expert that in the first two weeks of its opening in Shanghai business could be so good.9. Early on I realized that I was going to need some type of compass to guide me through the wilds of global culture. (Para. 29)From the very beginning I know I need some theory as guideline to help me in my study of global cultures as globalization, to guide me through such a variety of cultural phenomena..10. The penitence may have been Jewish, but the aspiration was universal. (Para. 39)The way of showing repentance might be peculiar to the Jews, but the strong desire of gaining forgiveness from God is common, shared by all.Lesson fourParaphrase1. Pianos and models, Paris, Vienna and Berlin, masters and mistresses, are not needed by a writer. (Para. 1)If you want to be a musician or a painter, you must own a piano or hire models, and you have to visit or even live in cultural centers like Paris, Vienna and Berlin. And also you have to be taught by masters and mistresses. However, if you want to be a writer, you don't need all this.2. She would have plucked the heart out of my writing. (Para. 3) Those conventional attitudes would have taken away the most important part of my writing, the essence of my writing.3. Thus, whenever I felt the shadow of her wing or the radiance of her halo upon my page, I took up the inkpot and flung it at her. (Para. 3) Thus, whenever I felt the influence of the Victorian attitudes on my writing, I fought back with ail my power.4. For though men sensibly allow themselves great freedom in these respects, I doubt that they realize or can control the extreme severity with which they condemn such freedom in women. (Para. 5)It was a sensible thing for men to give themselves great freedom to talk about the body and their passions. But if women want to have the same freedom, men condemn such freedom in women. And I do not believe that they realize how severely they condemn such freedom in women, nor do I believe that they can control their extremely severe condemnation of such freedom in women,5. Indeed it will be a long time still, I think, before a woman can sit down to write a book without finding a phantom to be slain, a rock to be dashed against. (Para. 6)It will take a long time for women to rid themselves of false values and attitudes and to overcome the obstacle to telling the truth about their body and passions.6. Even when the path is nominally open —when there is nothing to preventa woman from being a doctor, a lawyer, a civil servant — there are many phantoms and obstacles, as I believe, looming in her way. (Para. 7) Even when the path is open to women in name only, when outwardly there is nothing to prevent a woman from being a doctor, a lawyer, a civil servant, inwardly there are still false ideas and obstacles impeding a woman's progress.7. You have won rooms of your own in the house hitherto exclusively owned by men. (Para. 7)(Through fighting against the Angel in the House, through great labor and effort,) you have gained a position or certain freedom in a society that has been up to now dominated by men.Lesson71. It took me a long time to get rid of illusions and realize the simpleand apparent truth that I am nobody but myself. It was a painful process.I started with high expectations only to be deeply disappointed andthoroughly disillusioned.2. I am perfectly normal physically and I am a natural product of history;my growth reflects history. When things seemed likely to happen to me,other things had been equal (or unequal) eighty-five years ago.3. About 85 years ago, they were told that they were freed from slaveryand became united with the white people in all the essential thingshaving to do with the common interests of our country, but in sociallife the blacks and whites still remain separated.4. In these days before I realized I was an invisible man, I imagined thatI would become a successful man like Booker T. Washington.5. On the one hand, I felt embarrassed that i wanted to run away from theballroom. On the other hand, I took pity on the girl and so wanted toprotect the naked girl from the eyes of the other men, I wanted to loveher tenderly because she was an attractive girl, but at the same timeI wanted to destroy her because after all she was the immediate causeof our embarrassment6. If I should try my best and win the fight, then 1 would be winning againstthe bet of that white man, who shouted "I got my money on the big boy."In that case I would not behave with humility, and yet my speech talkedabout humility as the essence of success. So maybe I should let thatbig boy win without putting up resistance, for this was time for me toshow humility.7. Make full use of what you have and do the best you can. Take this attitudein making friends in every honorable way, making friends with peopleof different races among whom we live.8. You were not trying to seem clever in a disrespectful way, were you,boy? We intend to do the right thing by setting you up as role model,but you must never forget who you are.Lesson 81. I knew that Oppenheimer was a man of great talent but his way of showinghis talent at my seminars caused uneasiness and resentment among people,especially among his fellow students.2. Since those attending the conference were people devoted to poetry, suchan anecdote, though interesting, might not be appreciated by theaudience.3. There were two reasons for my going to the conference set against thereasons for my not going and they became decisive in my final decision.4. According to my view, Spender belongs to the group whose writings abouttheir lives, experiences, that is whose autobiographies, are moreinteresting than their literary works.5. Like Dirac, Auden was outstanding in clarity. He was also outstandingin the powerful use of the language and the sense of fun about seriousissues. All these greatly fascinated me.6. Spender’s record of his visit is interesting not only because of thethings he mentions but also because of the things he does not say.7. In his book, Spender fails to give a connected, complete picture ofOppenheimer and does not mention that Oppenheimer’s background and situation has quite a lot to do with Spender.8. The real person looked much better than the pictures.9. Maybe one should not attach too much importance to appearance.10. He had live longer than any of his more famous friends but traces orinfluences of these friends, especially those of Auden, could still be found on him.Lesson 91. Your imagination comes to life, and this, you think,is where Creation was begun. The landscape makes your imagination vivid and lifelike, and you believe that the creation of the whole universe was begun right here.2. But warfare for the Kiowas was preeminently a matter of disposition rather than of survival, and they never understood the grim,unrelenting advance of the U.S. Cavalry.The Kiowas often fought, just because they were good warriors, because they fought out of habit, character, nature, not because they needed extra land or material gains for the sake of surviving and thriving. And they could not understand why the U. S. Cavalry never gave up pushing forward even when they had won a battle.3. My grandmother was spared the humiliation of those high gray walls by eight or ten years.Luckily, my grandmother did not suffer the humiliation of being put into a closure for holding animals, for She was born eight or ten years after the event.4. It was a long journey toward dawn, and it led to a golden age.They moved toward the east, where the sun rises, and also toward the beginning of a new culture, which led to the greatest moment of their history.5. They acquired horses, and their ancient nomadic spirit was suddenly free of the ground.Now they got horses. Riding on horseback, instead of walking on football, gave them this new freedom of movement, thus completely liberating their ancient nomadic spirit.6. From one point of view, their migration was the fruits of an old prophecy, for indeed they emerged from a sunless world.In a sense, their migration confirmed the ancient myth that they entered the world from a hollow log,for they did emerge from the sunless world of the mountains.7. The Kiowas reckoned their stature by the distance they could see, and they were bent and blind in the wilderness.Their stature was measured by the distance they could see. Yet, because of the dense forests, they could not see very far, and they could hardly stand straight.8. Clusters of trees and animals grazing far in the distance cause the vision to reach away and wonder to build upon the mind.The earth unfolds and the limit of the land is far in the distance, where there are clusters of trees and animals eating grass.This landscape makes one see far and broadens one's horizon.9. Not yet would they veer southward to the caldron of the land that lay below;they must wean their blood from the northern winter and hold the mountains a while longer in their view.They would not yet change the direction southward to the land lying below which was like a large kettle. First, they must give their bodies some time to get used to the plains. Secondly, they did not wants to lose sight of the mountains so soon.10. I was never sure that I had the right to hear, so exclusive were they of all merely custom and company.I was not sure that I had any right to overhear her praying, which did not follow any customary way of praying, add which I guess she did not want anyone else to hear.11. Transported so in the dancing light among the shadows of her room she seemed beyond the reach of time.But that was illusion; I think I knew then that I should not see her again.In this way she was entranced in the dancing light among the shadows of her room, and she seemed to be timeless(what she represented would last forever).12. The women might indulge themselves; gossip was at once the mark and compensation of their servitude.On these special occasions, women might make loud and elaborate jokes and talk among themselves. Their gossip revealed their position as servants of men and also a reward for their servitude.。
现代大学英语精读5lesson2课文Two_Kinds

Two KindsAmy TanMy mother believed you could be anything you wanted to be in America. You could open a restaurant. You could work for the government and get good retirement. You could buy a house with almost no money down. You could become rich. You could become instantly famous.“Of course, you can be a prodigy1, too,” my mother told me when I was nine. “You can be best anything. What does Auntie Lindo know? Her daughter, she is only best tricky.”America was where all my m other’s hopes lay. She had come to San Francisco in 1949 after losing everything in China: her mother and father, her home, her first husband, and two daughters, twin baby girls. But she never looked back with regret. Things could get better in so many ways.We didn’t immediately pick the right kind of prodigy. At first my mother thought I could be a Chinese Shirley Temple2. We’d watch Shirley’s old movies on TV as though they were training films. My mother would poke my arm and say, “Ni kan.You watch.” And I would see Shirley tapping her feet, or singing a sailor song, or pursing her lips into a very round O while saying “Oh, my goodness.”“Ni kan,” my mother said, as Shirley’s eyes flooded with tears. “You already know how. Don’t need talent for crying!”Soon after my mother got this idea about Shirley Temple, she took me to the beauty training school in the Mission District and put me in the hands of a student who could barely hold the scissors without shaking. Instead of getting big fat curls, I emerged with an uneven mass of crinkly black fuzz3. My mother dragged me off to the bathroom and tried to wet down my hair.“You look like a Negro Chinese,” she lamented, as if I had done this on purpose.The instructor of the beauty training school had to lop off4 these soggy clumps to make my hair even again. “Peter Pan5is very popular these days” the instructor assured my mother. I now had bad hair the length of a boy’s, with curly bangs that hung at a slant two inches above my eyebrows. I liked the haircut, and it made meactually look forward to my future fame.In fact, in the beginning I was just as excited as my mother, maybe even more so.I pictured this prodigy part of me as many different images, and I tried each one on for size. I was a dainty ballerina girl standing by the curtain, waiting to hear the music that would send me floating on my tiptoes. I was like the Christ child lifted out of the straw manger, crying with holy indignity. I was Cinderella6stepping from her pumpkin carriage with sparkly cartoon music filling the air.In all of my imaginings I was filled with a sense that I would soon become perfect: My mother and father would adore me. I would be beyond reproach. I would never feel the need to sulk, or to clamor for anything. But sometimes the prodigy in me became impatient. “If you don’t hurry up and get me out of here, I’m disappearing for good,” it warned. “And then you’ll always be nothing.”Every night after dinner my mother and I would sit at the Formica7topped kitchen table. She would present new tests, taking her examples from stories of amazing children that she read in Ripley’s Believe It or Not or Good Housekeeping, Reader’s digest, or any of a dozen other magazines she kept in a pile in our bathroom. My mother got these magazines from people whose houses she cleaned. And since she cleaned many houses each week, we had a great assortment. She would look through them all, searching for stories about remarkable children.The first night she brought out a story about a three-year-old boy who knew the capitals of all the states and even the most of the European countries. A teacher was quoted as saying that the little boy could also pronounce the names of the foreign cities correctly. “What’s the capital of Finland?” my mother aske d me, looking at the story.All I knew was the capital of California, because Sacramento8 was the name of the street we lived on in Chinatown9. “Nairobi10!” I quessed, saying the most foreign word I could think of. She checked to see if that might be one way to pronounce “Helsinki11” before showing me the answer.The tests got harder - multiplying numbers in my head, finding the queen of hearts in a deck of cards, trying to stand on my head without using my hands, predicting the daily temperatures in Los angeles, New York, and London.One night I had to look at a page from the Bible for three minutes and then report everything I could remember. “Now Jehoshaphat had riches12 and honor in abundance and that’s all I remember, Ma,” I said.And after seeing, onc e again, my mother’s disappointed face, something inside me began to die. I hated the tests, the raised hopes and failed expectations. Before going to bed that night I looked in the mirror above the bathroom sink, and I saw only my face staring back---and understood that it would always be this ordinary face ---I began to cry. Such a sad, ugly girl! I made high-pitched noises like a crazed animal, trying to scratch out the face in the mirror.And then I saw what seemed to be the prodigy side of me---a face I had never seen before. I looked at my reflection, blinking so that I could see more clearly. The girl staring back at me was angry, powerful. She and I were the same. I had new thoughts, willful thoughts or rather, thoughts filled with lots of won’ts. I won’t let her change me, I promised myself. I won’t be what I’m not.So now when my mother presented her tests, I performed listlessly, my head propped on one arm. I pretended to be bored. And I was. I got so bored that I started counting the bellows of the foghorns out on the bay while my mother drilled me in other areas. The sound was comforting and reminded me of the cow jumping over the moon. And the next day I played a game with myself, seeing if my mother would give up on me before eight bellows. After a while I usually counted ony one bellow, maybe two at most. At last she was beginning to give up hope.Two or three months went by without any mention of my being a prodigy. And then one day my mother was watching the Ed Sullivan Show13 on TV. The TV was old and the sound kept shorting out. Every time my mother got halfway up from the sofa to adjust the set, the sound would come back on and Sullivan would be talking. As soon as she sat down, Sullivan would go silent again. She got up, the TV broke into loud piano music. She sat down, silence. Up and down, back and forth, quiet and loud. It was like a stiff, embraceless dance between her and the TV set. Finally, she stood by the set with her hand on the sound dial.She seemed entranced by the music, a frenzied little piano piece with a mesmerizing quality, which alternated between quick, playful passages and teasing,lilting ones.“Ni kan,” my mother said, calling me over with hurried hand gestures. “Look here.”I could see why my mother was fascinated by the music. It was being pounded out by a little Chinese girl, about nine years old, with a Peter Pan haircut. The girl had the sauciness of a Shirley Temple. She was proudly modest, like a proper Chinese Child. And she also did a fancy sweep of a curtsy, so that the fluffy skirt of her white dress cascaded to the floor like petals of a large carnation.In spite of these warning signs, I wasn’t worried. Our family had no piano and we couldn’t afford to buy one, let alone reams of sheet music and piano less ons. So I could be generous in my comments when my mother badmouthed14 the little girl on TV.“Play note right, but doesn’t sound good!” my mother complained “No singing sound.”“What are you picking on her for?” I said carelessly. “She’s pretty good. Mayb e she’s not the best, but she’s trying hard.” I knew almost immediately that I would be sorry I had said that.“Just like you,” she said. “Not the best. Because you not trying.” She gave a little huff as she let go of the sound dial and sat down on the sofa.The little Chinese girl sat down also, to play an encore of “Anitra’s Tanz,” by Grieg15. I remember the song, because later on I had to learn how to play it.Three days after watching the Ed Sullivan Show my mother told me what my schedule would be for piano lessons and piano practice. She had talked to Mr. Chong, who lived on the first floor of our apartment building. Mr.Chong was a retired piano teacher, and my mother had traded housecleaning services for weekly lessons and a piano for me to practice on every day, two hours a day, from four until six.When my mother told me this, I felt as though I had been sent to hell. I wished and then kicked my foot a little when I couldn”t stand it anymore.“Why don’t you like me the way I am? I’m not a genius! I can’t play the piano. And even if I could, I wouldn’t go on TV if you paid me a million dollars!” I cried.My mother slapped me. “Who ask you be genius.”she shouted. “Only ask you beyour best. For you sake. You think I want you be genius? Hnnh! What for! Who ask you!”“So ungrateful,”I heard her mutter in chinese. “If she had as much talent as she had temper, she would be famous now.”Mr. Chong, whom I secretly nicknamed Old Chong, was very strange, always tapping his fingers to the silent music of an invisible orchestra. He looked ancient in my eyes. He had lost most of the hair on top of his head and he wore thick glasses and had eyes that always thought, since he lived with his mother and was not yet married.I met Old Lady Chong once, and that was enough. She had a peculiar smell, likea baby that had done something in its pants, and her fingers felt like a dead person’s, like an old peach I once found in the back of the refrigerator: its skin just slid off the flesh when I picked it up.I soon found out why Old Chong had retired from teaching piano. He was deaf. “Like Beethoven!” he shouted to me “We’re both listening only in our head!” And he would start to conduct his frantic silent sonatas16.Our lessons went like this. He would open the book and point to different things, explaining, their purpose: “Key! Treble! Bass! No sharps or flats! So this is C major! Listen now and play after me!”And then he would play the C scale a few times, a simple cord, and then, as if inspired by an old unreachable itch, he would gradually add more notes and running trills and a pounding bass until the music was really something quite grand.I would play after him, the simple scale, the simple chord, and then just play some nonsense that sounded like a cat running up and down on top of garbage cans. Old Chong would smile and applaud and say “Very good! Bt now ou must learn to keep time!”So that’s how I discovered that Old Chong’s eyes were too slow to keep up with the wrong notes I was playing. He went through the motions in half time. To help me keep rhythm, he stood behind me and pushed down on my right shoulder for every beat. He balanced pennies on top of my wrists so that I would keep them still as I slowly played scales and arpeggios17. He had me curve my hand around an apple and keep that shame when playing chords. He marched stiffly to show me how to makeeach finger dance up and down, staccato18 like an obedient little soldier.He taught me all these things, and that was how I also learned I could be lazy and get away with mistakes, lots of mistakes. If I hit the wrong notes because I hadn’t practiced enough, I never corrected myself, I just kept playing in rhythm. And Old Chong kept conducting his own private reverie.19So maybe I never really gave myself a fair chance. I did pick up the basics pretty quickly, and I might have become a good pianist at the young age. But I was so determined not to try, not to be anybody different, and I learned to play only the most ear-splitting preludes, the most discordant hymns.Over the next year I practiced like this, dutifully in my own way. And then one day I heard my mother and her friend Lindo Jong both after church, and I was leaning against a brick wall, wearing a dress with stiff white petticoats. Auntie Linds daughter, Waverly, who was my age, was standing farther down the wall, about five feet away. We had grown up together and shared all the closeness of two sisters, squabbling over crayons and dolls. In other words, for the most part, we hated each other. I thought she was snotty. Waverly Jong had gained a certain amount of fame as “Chinatown’s Littlest Chinese Chess Champion.”“She bring home too many trophy.” Auntie Lindo lamented that Sunday. “All day she play chess. All day I h ave no time do nothing but dust off her winnings.” She threw a scolding look at Waverly, who pretended not to see her.“You lucky you don’t have this problem,” Auntie Lindo said with a sigh to my mother.And my mother squared her shoulders and bragge d “our problem worser than yours. If we ask Jing-mei wash dish, she hear nothing but music. It’s like you can’t stop this natural talent.”And right then I was determined to put a stop to her foolish pride.A few weeks later Old Chong and my mother conspired to have me play in a talent show that was to be held in the church hall. But then my parents had saved up enough to buy me a secondhand piano, a black Wurlitzer spinet with a scarred bench. It was the showpiece of our living room.For the talent show I was to play a piece called “Pleading Child” fromSchumann’s Scenes From Childhood. It was a simple, moody piece that sounded more difficult than it was. I was supposed to memorize the whole thing. But I dawdled over it, playing a few bars and then cheating, looking up to see what notes followed. I never really listed to what I was playing. I daydreamed about being somewhere else, about being someone else.The part I liked to practice best was the fancy curtsy: right foot out, touch the rose on the carpet with a pointed foot, sweep to the side, bend left leg, look up, and smile.My parents invited all the couples from their social club to witness my debut. Auntie Lindo and Uncle Tin were there. Waverly and her two older brothers had also come. The first two rows were filled with children either younger or older than I was. The littlest ones got to go first. They recited simple nursery rhymes, squawked out tunes on miniature violins, and twirled hula hoops20 in pink ballet tutus21, and when they bowe d or curtsied, the audience would sigh in unison, “Awww,” and then clap enthusiastically.When my turn came, I was very confident. I remember my childish excitement. It was as if I knew, without a doubt, that the prodigy side of me really did exist. I had no fear whatsoever, no nervousness. I remember thinking, This is it! This is it! I looked out over the audience, at my mother’s blank face, my father’s yawn, Auntie Lindo’s stiff-lipped smile, Waverly’s sulky expression. I had on a white dress, layere d with sheets of lace, and a pink bow in my Peter Pan haircut. As I sat down, I envisioned people jumping to their feet and Ed Sullivan rushing up to introduce me to everyone on TV.And I started to play. Everything was so beautiful. I was so caught up in how lovely I looked that I wasn’t worried about how I would sound. So I was surprised when I hit the first wrong note. And then I hit another and another. A chill started at the top of my head and began to trickle down. Yet I couldn’t stop playing, as though my hands were bewitched. I kept thinking my fingers would adjust themselves back, like a train switching to the right track. I played this strange jumble through to the end, the sour notes staying with me all the way.When I stood up, I discovered my legs were shaking. Maybe I had just beennervous, and the audience, like Old Chong had seen me go through the right motions and had not heard anything wrong at all. I swept my right foot out, went down on my knee, looked up, and smiled. The room was quiet, except fot Old Chong, who was beaming and shouting “Bravo! Bravo! Well done!” By then I saw my mother’s face, her stricken face. The audience clapped weakly, and I walked back to my chair, with my whole face quivering as I tried not to cry, I heard a little boy whisper loudly to his mother. “That was awful,” and mother whispered “Well, she certainly tried.”And now I realized how many people were in the audience, the whole world, it seemed. I was aware of eyes burning into my back. I felt the shame of my mother and father as they sat stiffly through the rest of the show.We could have escaped during intermission. Pride and some strange sense of honor must have anchored my parents to their chairs. And so we watched it all. The eighteen-year-old boy with a fake moustache who did a magic show and juggled flaming hoops while riding a unicycle. The breasted girl with white make up who sang an aria from Madame Butterfly22and got an honorable mention. And the eleven-year-old boy who was first prize playing a tricky violin song that sounded like a busy bee.After the show the Hsus, the Jongs, and the St. Clairs, from the Joy Luck Club, came up to my mother and father.“Lots of talented kids,” Auntie Lindo said vaguely, smiling broadly. “That was something else,” my father said, and I wondered if he was referring to me in a humorous way, or whether he even remembered what I had done.Waverly looked at me and shrugged her shoulders. “You aren’t a genius like me,” she said matter-of-factly. And if I hadn’t felt so bad, I would have pulled her braids and punched her stomach.But my mother’s expression was what devastated me: a quiet, blank look that said she had lost everything. I felt the same way, and everybody seemed now to be coming up, like gawkers at the scene of an accident to see what parts were actually missing. When we got on the bus to go home, my father was humming the busy-bee tune and my mother kept silent. I kept thinking she wanted to wait until we got homebefore shouting at me. But when my father unlocked the door to our apartment, my mother walked in and went straight to the back, into the bedroom. No accusations, No blame. And in a way, I felt disappointed. I had been waiting for her to start shouting, so that I could shout back and cry and blame her for all my misery.I had assumed that my talent-show fiasco meant that I would never have to play the piano again. But two days later, after school, my mother came out of the kitchen and saw me watching TV.“Four clock,” s he reminded me, as if it were any other day. I was stunned, as though she were asking me to go through the talent-show torture again. I planted myself more squarely in front of the TV.“Turn off TV,” she called from the kitchen five minutes later. I didn’t budge. And then I decided, I didn’t have to do what mother said anymore. I wasn’t her slave. This wasn’t China. I had listened to her before, and look what happened she was the stupid one.She came out of the kitchen and stood in the arched entryway of the living room. “Four clock,” she said once again, louder.“I’m not going to play anymore,” I said nonchalantly23. “Why should I? I’m not a genius.”She stood in front of the TV. I saw that her chest was heaving up and down in an angry way.“No!” I said, and I now felt stronger, as if my true self had finally emerged. So this was what had been inside me all along.“No! I won’t!” I screamed. She snapped off the TV, yanked me by the arm and pulled me off the floor. She was frighteningly strong, half pulling, half carrying me towards the piano as I kicked the throw rugs under my feet. She lifted me up onto the hard bench. I was sobbing by now, looking at her bitterly. Her chest was heaving even more and her mouth was open, smiling crazily as if she were pleased that I was crying.“You want me to be something that I’m not!” I sobbed. “I’ll never be the kind of daughter you want me to be!”“Only two kinds of daughters,” she shouted in Chinese. “Those who are obedient and those who follow their own mind! Only one kind of daughter can live in thishouse. Obedient daughter!”“Then I wish I weren’t your daughter, I wish you weren’t my mother,” I shouted. As I said these things I got scared. It felt like worms and toads and slimy things crawling out of my chest, but it also felt good, that this awful side of me had surfaced, at last.“Too late to change this,” my mother said shrilly.And I could sense her anger rising to its breaking point. I wanted see it spill over. And that’s when I remembered the babies she had lost in China, the ones we never talked about. “Then I wish I’d never been born!” I shouted. “I wish I were dead! Like them.”It was as if I had said magic words. Alakazam!-her face went blank, her mouth closed, her arms went slack, and she backed out of the room, stunned, as if she were blowing away like a small brown leaf, thin, brittle, lifeless.It was not the only disappointment my mother felt in me. In the years that followed, I failed her many times, each time asserting my will, my right to fall short of expectations. I didn’t get straight As24. I didn’t become class president. I didn’t get into Stanford. I dropped out of college.Unlike my mother, I did not believe I could be anything I wanted to be, I could only be me.And for all those years we never talked about the disaster at the recital or my terrible delarations afterward at the piano bench. Neither of us talked about it again, as if it were a betrayal that was now unspeakable. So I never found a way to ask her why she had hoped for something so large that failure was inevitable.And even worse, I never asked her about what frightened me the most: Why had she given up hope? For after our struggle at the piano, she never mentioned my playing again. The lessons stopped The lid to the piano was closed shutting out the dust, my misery, and her dreams.So she surprised me. A few years ago she offered to give me the piano, for my thirtieth birthday. I had not played in all those years. I saw the offer as a sign of forgiveness, a tremendous burden removed. “Are you sure?” I asked shyly. “I mean, won’t you and Dad miss it?” “No, this your piano,” she said firmly. “Always your如有帮助欢迎下载支持piano. You only one can play.”“Well, I probably can’t play anymore,” I said. “It’s been years.” “You pick up fast,” my mother said, as if she knew this was certain. “You have natural talent. You could be a genius if you want to.”“No, I couldn’t.”“You just not trying,” my mother said. And she was neither angry nor sa d. She said it as if announcing a fact that could never be disproved. “Take it,” she said.But I didn’t at first. It was enough that she had offered it to me. And after that, everytime I saw it in my parents’living room, standing in front of the bay wi ndow, it made me feel proud, as if it were a shiny trophy that I had won back.Last week I sent a tuner over to my parent’s apartment and had the piano reconditioned, for purely sentimental reasons. My mother had died a few months before and I had been bgetting things in order for my father a little bit at a time. I put the jewelry in special silk pouches. The sweaters I put in mothproof boxes. I found some old chinese silk dresses, the kind with little slits up the sides. I rubbed the old silk against my skin, and then wrapped them in tissue and decided to take them hoe with me.After I had the piano tuned, I opened the lid and touched the keys. It sounded even richer that I remembered. Really, it was a very good piano. Inside the bench were the same exercise notes with handwritten scales, the same sedcondhand music books with their covers held together with yellow tape.I opened up the Schumann book to the dark little piecce I had played at the recital. It was on the left-hand page, “Pleading Child” It l ooked more difficult than Iremembered. I played a few bars, surprised at how easily the notes came back to me. And for the first time, or so it seemed, I noticed the piece on the right-hand side, It was called “Perfectly Contented” I tried to play this on e as well. It had a lighter melody but with the same flowing rhythm and turned out to be quite easy. “Pleading Child” was shorter but slower; “Perfectly Contented” was longer but faster. And afterI had played them both a few times, I realized they were two halves of the same song.11。
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Where do we go from hereBeyond these advantages, a host of positive psychological changes inevitably will result from widespread economic security. The dignity of the individual will flourish when the decisions concerning his life are in his own hands, when he has the means to seek self-improvement. Personal conflicts among husbands, wives and children will diminish when the unjust measurement of human worth on the scale of dollars is eliminated .I must confess, my friends, the road ahead will not always be smooth. There will still be rocky places of frustration and meandering points of bewilderment. There will be inevitable setbacks here and there. There will be those moments when the buoyancy of hope will be transformed into the fatigue of despair. Our dreams will sometimes be shattered and our ethereal hopes blasted. We may again with tear-drenched eyes have to stand before the bier of some courageous civil-rights worker whose life will be snuffed out by the dastardly acts of bloodthirsty mobs. Difficult and painful as it is, we must walk on in the days ahead with an audacious faith in the future. And as we continue our charted course, we may gain consolation in the words so nobly left by that great black bard who was also a great freedom fighter of yesterday, James Weldon Johnson:Stony the road we trod,Bitter the chastening rodFelt in the daysWhen hope unborn had died.Yet with a steady beat,Have not our weary feetCome to the placeFor which our fathers sighed?We have come over the wayThat with tears hath been watered.We have come treading our pathsThrough the blood of the slaughtered,Out from the gloomy past,Till now we stand at lastWhere the bright gleamOf our bright star is cast.Let this affirmation be our ringing cry. It will give us the courage to face the uncertainties of the future. It will give our tired feet new strength as we continue our forward stride toward the cityof freedom. When our days become dreary with low hovering clouds of despair, and when our nights become darker than a thousand midnights, let us remember that there is a creative force in this universe, working to pull down the gigantic mountains of evil, a power that is able to make a way out of no way and transform dark yesterdays into bright tomorrows. Let us realize the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice.professions for womenWhat could be easier than to write articles and to buy Persian cats with the profits? But wait a moment. Articles have to be about something. Mine, I seem to remember, was about a novel by a famous man. And while I was writing this review, I discovered that if I were going to review books I should need to do battle with a certain phantom. And the phantom was a woman, and when I came to know her better I called her after the heroine of a famous poem, The Angel in the House. It was she who used to come between me an my paper when I was writing reviews. It was she who bothered me and wasted my time and so tormented me that at last I killed her. You who come off a younger and happier generation may not have heard of her--you may not know what I mean by The Angel in the House. I will describe her as shortly as I can. She was intensely sympathetic. She was immensely charming. She was utterly unselfish. She excelled in the difficult arts of family life. She sacrificed herself daily. If there was chicken, she took the leg; if there was a draft she sat in it--in short she was so constituted that she never had a mind or a wish of her own, but preferred to sympathize always with the minds and wishes of others. Above all--I need not say it--she was pure. Her purity was supposed to be her chief beauty--her blushes, her great grace. In those days--the last of Queen Victoria--every house had its Angel. And when I came to write I encountered her with the very first words. The shadow of her wings fell on my page; I heard the rustling of her skirts in the room. Directly, that is to say, I took my pen in my hand to review that novel by a famous man, she slipped behind me and whispe red:“My dear, you are a young woman. You are writing about a book that has been written by a man. Be sympathetic; be tender; flatter; deceive; use all the art and wiles of our sex. Never let anybody guess that you have a mind of our own. Above all, be pure.” And she made as if to guide my pen. I now record the one act for which I take some credit to myself, though the credit rightly belongs to some excellent ancestors of mine who left me a certain sum of money--shall we say five hundred pounds a year? --so that it was not necessaryfor me to depend solely on charm for my living. I turned upon her and caught her by the throat. I did my best to kill her. My excuse, If I were to be had up in a court of law, would be that I acted in self-defense. Had I not killed her she would have killed me. She would have plucked the heart out of my writing. For, as I found, directly I put pen to paper, you cannot review even a novel without having a mind of your own, without expressing what you think to be the truth about human relations, morality, sex. And all these questions, according to the Angel of the House, cannot be dealt with freely and openly by women; they must charm, they must conciliate, they must—to put it bluntly-—tell lies if they are to succeed. Thus, whenever I felt the shadow of her wing or the radiance of her halo upon my page, I took up the inkpot and flung it at her. She died hard. Her fictitious nature was of great assistance to her. It is far harder to kill a phantom than a reality. She was always creeping back when I thought I had dispatched her. Though I flatter myself that I killed her in the end, the struggle was severe; it took much time that had better have been spent upon learning Greek grammar; or in roaming the world in search of adventures. But it was a real experience; It was an experience that was bound befall all women writers at that time. Killing the Angel in the House was part of the occupation of a woman writer.Love Is a FallacyI had long coveted Polly Espy. Let me emphasize that my desire for this young woman was not emotional in nature. She was, to be sure, a girl who excited the emotions, but I was not one to let my heart rule my head. I wanted Polly For a shrewdly calculated, entirely cerebral reason.Heartened by the knowledge that Polly was not altogether a cretin, began a long, patient review of all I had told her. Over and over and over again I cited instances, pointed out flaws, kept hammering away without letup. It was like digging a tunnel. At first, everything was work, sweat, and darkness. I had no idea when I would reach the light, or even if I would. But I persisted.I pounded and clawed and scraped, and finally I was rewarded. I saw a chink of light. And then the chink got bigger and the sun came pouring in and all was bright.the way to the rainymoutainA single Knoll rises out of the plain in Oklahoma, north and west o the WIchita Range. For my people , the Kiowas ,it is an old landmark,and they gave it the name Rainy Mountain. The hardest weather in the world is there . Winter brings blizzards, hot tornadic winds arise in the spring,and in summer the prairie is an anvil's edge. The grass turns brittle and brown,and it cracks beneath your feet. There are green belts along therivers and crees, linear groves of hickory and pecan, wilow and witch hazel. At a distance in July or August the steaming foliage seems almost to writhe in fire. Great green-and-yellow grasshoppers are everywhere in the tall grass, popping up like corn to sting the flesh,and tortoises crawl about on the red earth, going nowhere in the plenty of time. Loneliness is an aspect of the land. All things in the plain are isolate; ther is no confusion of objects in the eye, but one hill or one tree or one man. To look upon that landsdcape in the early morning , with the sun at your back,is to lose the sense of proportion. Your imagination comes to life,and this , you think , is where Creatiion was begun.Now there is a funeral silence in the rooms, the endless wake of some final word. The walls have closed in upon my grandmother's house. When I returned to it in mourning, I saw for the first time in my life how small it was. It was late at night, and there was a white moon, nearly full. I sat for a long time on the stone steps by the kitchen door. From there I could see out across the land; I could see the long row of trees by the creek, the low light upon the rolling plains, and the stars of the Big Dipper. Once I looked at the moon and caught sight of a strange thing. A cricket had perched upon the handrail, only a few inches away from me. My line of vision was such that the creature filled the moon like a fossil. It had gone there, I thought, to live and die, for there, of all places, was its small definition made whole and eternal. A warm wind rose up and purled like the longing within me.The next morning I awoke at dawn and went out on the dirt road to Rainy Mountain. It was already hot, and the grasshoppers began to fill the air. Still, it was early in the morning, and the birds sang out of the shadows. The long yellow grass on the mountain shone in the bright light, and a scissortail hied above the land. There, where it ought to be, at the end of a long and legendary way, was my grandmother's grave. Here and there on the dark stones were ancestral names. Looking back once, I saw the mountain and came away.911前后Since our economy is dependent upon mass consumerism, however, it wasn't long before government and big business invented the concept of "economic patriotism". This Frankensteinian creation asserts that consumption is an American value, extols the nepenthean powers of the dollar and in effect, discourages national introspection at a time when it would be most valuable. Presidential exhortations to get backto normal assumed we would want to restore the world we had as quickly as possible. But not everyone is content to shut up and shop. The pre-9/11 world cannot be restored, not with a credit card, not with a new car. Many of us want to build on that nascent community. Many citizens concerned about the deteriorating economy are resisting the consumption orgy and are exploring alternatives that would make our country more self-sufficient and prepare us for the tough times that may lie ahead.How do we move from anxiety to action? From insecurity to confidence, from national paranoia to collective poise? Is our democracy so fragile that four airplane bombs can erode 225 years of liberty?' It has never been more clear that we will only have true and lasting security when the rest of the world has true and lasting security, That is the challenge of this particular conflict, the struggle for the soul of the 21st century.。