TXET 1：2013年在职MPA英语阅读理解强化练习及答案
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In recent years, railroads have been combining with each other, mergingintosuper systems, causing heightened concerns about monopoly. As recently as 1995, the top four railroads accounted for under 70 percent of the total ton-miles moved by rails. Next year, after a series of mergers is completed, just four railroads will control well over 90 percent of all the freight moved by major rail carriers.
Supporters of the new super systems argue that these mergers will allow for substantial
cost reductions and better coordinated service. Any threat of monopoly, they argue, is removed by fierce competition from trucks. But many shippers complain that for heavy bulk commodities traveling long distances, such as coal, chemicals, and grain, trucking is too costly and the railroads therefore have them by the throat.
The vast consolidation within the rail industry means that most shippers are served by only one rail company. Railroads typically charge such "captive" shippers 20 to 30 percent more than they do when another railroad is competing for the business. Shippers who feel they are being overcharged have the right to appeal to the federal government's Surface Transportation Board for rate relief, but the process is expensive, time consuming, and will work only in truly extreme cases.
Railroads justify rate discrimination against captive shippers on the grounds that in the long run it reduces everyone's cost. If railroads charged all customers the same average rate, they argue, shippers who have the option of switching to trucks or other forms of transportation would do so, leaving remaining customers to shoulder the cost of keeping up the line. It's theory to which many economists subscribe, but in practice it often leaves railroads in the position of determining which companies will flourish and which will fail. "Do we really want railroads to be the arbiters of who wins and who loses in the marketplace?" asks Martin Bercovici, a Washington lawyer who frequently represents shipper.
Many captive shippers also worry they will soon be his with a round of huge rate increases. The railroad industry as a whole, despite its brightening fortuning fortunes, still does not earn enough to cover the cost of the capital it must invest to keep up with its surging traffic. Yet railroads continue to borrow billions to acquire one another, with Wall Street cheering them on. Consider the 2 billion bid by Norfolk Southern and CSX to acquire Conrail this year. Conrail's net railway operating income in 1996 was just million, less than half of the carrying costs of the transaction. Who's going to pay for the rest of the bill? Many captive shippers fear that they will, as Norfolk Southern and CSX increase their grip on the market.
1. According to those who support mergers railway monopoly is unlikely because .
A. cost reduction is based on competition
B. services call for cross-trade coordination
C. outside competitors will continue to exist
D. shippers will have the railway by the throat
2、What is many captive shippers' attitude towards the consolidation in the rail industry?
A. A.Indifferent.
B. Supportive.
C. Indignant.
D. Apprehensive.
3、It can be inferred from paragraph 3 that .
A. shippers will be charged less without a rival railroad
B. there will soon be only one railroad company nationwide
C. overcharged shippers are unlikely to appeal for rate relief
D. a government board ensures fair play in railway business
4. The word "arbiters" (line 6, paragraph 4)most probably refers to those .
A. who work as coordinators
B. who function as judges
C. who supervise transactions
D. who determine the price
5. According to the text, the cost increase in the rail industry is mainly caused by .
A. the continuing acquisition
B. the growing traffic
C. the cheering Wall Street
D. the shrinking market
参考答案：CDCBA
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When school officials in Kalkaska, Michigan, closed classes last week, the media flocked to the story, portraying the town's 2,305 students as victims of stingy (吝啬的) taxpayers. There is some truth to that; the property-tax rate here is one-third lower than the state average. But shutting their schools also allowed Kalkaska's educators and the state's largest teachers' union, the Michigan Education Association, to make a political point. Their aim was to spur passage of legislation Michigan lawmakers are debating to increase the state's share of school funding.
It was no coincidence that Kalkaska shut its schools two weeks after residents rejected a 28 percent property-tax increase. The school board argued that without the increase it lacked the $1.5 million needed to keep schools open.
But the school system had not done all it could to keep the schools open. Officials declined to borrow against next year's state aid, they refused to trim extracurricular activities and they did not consider seeking a smaller—perhaps more acceptable—tax increase. In fact, closing early is costing Kalkaska a significant amount, including $ 600,000 in unemployment payments to teachers and staff and $ 250,000 in lost state aid. In February, the school system promised teachers and staff two months of retirement payments in case schools closed early, a deal that will cost the district $ 275,000 more.
Other signs suggest school authorities were at least as eager to make a political statement as to keep schools open. The Michigan Education Association. hired a public relations firm to stage a rally marking the school closings, which attracted 14 local and national television stations and networks. The president of the National Education Association, the MEA's parent organization, flew from Washington, D. C, for the event. And the union tutored school officials in the art of television interviews. School supervisor Doyle Disbrow acknowledges the district could have kept schools open by cutting programs but denies the moves were politically motivated.
Michigan lawmakers have reacted angrily to the closings. The state Senate has already voted to put the system into receivership (破产管理) and reopen schools immediately; the Michigan House plans to consider the bill this week.
1. We learn from the passage that schools in Kalkaska, Michigan, are funded .
A. mainly by the state government
B. exclusively by the local government
C. by the National Education Association
D. by both the local and state governments
2. One of the purposes for which school officials closed classes was .
A. to draw the attention of local taxpayers to political issues
B. to avoid paying retirement benefits to teachers and staff
C. to pressure Michigan lawmakers into increasing state funds for local schools
D. to make the financial difficulties of their teachers and staff known to the public
3. The author seems to disapprove of .
A. the shutting of schools in Kalkaska
B. the involvement of the mass media
C. the Michigan lawmakers' endless debating
D. delaying the passage of the school funding legislation
4. We learn from the passage that school authorities in Kalkaska are more concerned about .
A. making a political issue of the closing of the schools
B. the attitude of the MEA's parent organization
C. a raise in the property-tax rate in Michigan
D. reopening the schools there immediately
5. According to the passage, the closing of the schools developed into a crisis because of .
A. the strong protest on the part of the students' parents
B. the political motives on the part of the educators
C. the weak response of the state officials
D. the complexity of the problem
参考答案：DCAAB
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The United States is a country made up of many different races. Usually they are mixed together and can't be told from one another. But many of them still talk about where their ancestors came from. It is something they are proud of.
The original Americans, of course were the Indians. The so- called white men who then came were mostly from England. But many came from other countries like Germany and France.
One problem the United States has always had is discrimination. As new groups came to the United States they found they were discriminated against. First it was the Irish and Italians. Later it was the blacks. Almost every group has been able to finally escape this discrimination. The only immigrants who have not are the blacks. Surprisingly enough the worst discrimination today is shown towards the Indians.
One reason the Indians are discriminated against is that they have tried so hard to keep their identity. Of course they are not the only ones who have done so. The Japanese have their Little Tokyo in Los Angeles and the Chinese a Chinatown in New York. The Dutch settlement in Pennsylvania also stays separate from other people. Their towns are like something from the 19th century. They have a different reason from the other groups for staying separately. They live separately for religious reasons rather than keep together in a racial group.
Although some groups have kept themselves separate and others have been discriminated against, all groups have helped make the United States a great county. There is no group that has not helped in some way. And there is no group that can say they have done the most to make it a great country.
Many people still come from other countries to help the United States grow. A good example is the American project that let a man walk on the moon. It was a scientist from Germany who was most responsible for doing that. It is certain that in the future the United States will still need the help of people from all racial groups to remain a great country.
1. Which of the following statements can best describe the main idea of this passage?
A. The United States is a country made up of many different races.
B. Discrimination is the most serious problem in the United States.
C. All races in the United States have helped make the country a great one.
D. The prosperity of the United States is mainly due to the hard work of the most discriminated races.
2. In the first paragraph the word "told" means_________.
A. separated
B. distinguished
C. revealed
D. made known
3. This passage implies that discrimination is a problem which .
A. many races in the United States have experienced
B. will still be very serious in the United States in the future
C. has already been solved in the United States
D. is strongly opposed by many different races in the United States
4. The main reason why the Indians are most discriminated against is that .
A. they have tried hard to keep their religions
B. they have tried hard to live together to keep their Indian customs
C. they are the only ones who have tried to keep their identity
D. they discriminate many other races
5. The Dutch live separately in Pennsylvania .
A. to escape discrimination
B. to keep together in a racial group
C. to enjoy themselves in their own towns
D. for religious reasons
参考答案：CBABD
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It is said that in England death is pressing, in Canada inevitable and in California optional Small wonder. Americans' life expectancy has nearly doubled over the past century. Failing hips can be replaced, clinical depression controlled, cataracts removed in a 30-minuts surgical procedure. Such advances offer the aging population a quality of life that was unimaginable when I entered medicine 50 years ago. But not even a great health-care system can cure death—and our failure to confront that reality now threatens this greatness of ours.
Death is normal; we are genetically programmed to disintegrate and perish, even under ideal conditions. We all understand that at some level, yet as medical consumers we treat death as a problem to be solved. Shielded by third-party payers from the cost of our care, we demand everything that can possibly be done for us, even if it's useless. The most obvious example is late-stage cancer care. Physicians—frustrated by their inability to cure the disease and fearing loss of hope in the patient—too often offer aggressive treatment far beyond what is scientifically justified.
In 1950, the U.S. spent 7 billion on health care. In 2002, the cost will be one hundred billion. Anyone can see this trend is unsustainable. Yet few seem willing to try to reverse it. Some scholars conclude that a government with finite resources should simply stop paying for medical care that sustains life beyond a certain age—say 83 or so. Former Colorado governor Richard Lamm has been quoted as saying that the old and infirm "have a duty to die and get out of the way", so that younger, healthier people can realize their potential.
I would not go that far. Energetic people now routinely work through their 60s and beyond, and remain dazzlingly productive. At 78, Viacom chairman Sumner Redstone jokingly claims to be 53. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor is in her 70s, and former surgeon general C.Everett Koop chairs an Internet start-up in his 80s. These leaders are living proof that prevention works and that we can manage the health problems that come naturally with age. As a mere 68-year-old, I wish to age as productively as they have.
Yet there are limits to what a society can spend in this pursuit. Ask a physician, I know the most costly and dramatic measures may be ineffective and painful. I also know that people in Japan and Sweden, countries that spend far less on medical care, have achieved longer, healthier lives than we have. As a nation, we may be overfunding the quest for unlikely cures while underfunding research on humbler therapies that could improve people's lives.
1. What is implied in the first sentence?
A. Americans are better prepared for death than other people.
B. Americans enjoy a higher life quality than ever before.
C. Americans are over-confident of their medical technology.
D. Americans take a vain pride in their long life expectancy.
2. The author uses the example of caner patients to show that .
A. medical resources are often wasted
B. doctors are helpless against fatal diseases
C. some treatments are too aggressive
D. medical costs are becoming unaffordable
3. The author's attitude toward Richard Lamm's remark is one of .
A. strong disapproval
B. reserved consent
C. slight contempt
D. enthusiastic support
4. In contrast to the U.S., Japan and Sweden are funding their medical care .
A. more flexibly
B. more extravagantly
C. more cautiously
D. more reasonably
5. The text intends to express the idea that .
A. medicine will further prolong people's lives
B. life beyond a certain limit is not worth living
C. death should be accepted as a fact of life
D. excessive demands increase the cost of health care
参考答案：CABDC
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Early in the age of affluence (富裕) that followed World War II, an American retailing analyst named Victor Lebow proclaimed, "Our enormously productive economy...demands that we make consumption our way of life, that we convert the buying and use of goods into rituals, that we seek our spiritual satisfaction, our ego satisfaction, in consumption... .We need things consumed, burned up, worn out, replaced and discarded at an ever increasing rate."
Americans have responded to Lebow's call, and much of the world has followed.
Consumption has become a central pillar of life in industrial lands and is even embedded in social values. Opinion surveys in the world's two largest economies—Japan and the United States—show consumerist definitions of success becoming ever more prevalent.
Overconsumption by the world's fortunate is an environmental problem unmatched in severity by anything but perhaps population growth. Their surging exploitation of resources threatens to exhaust or unalterably spoil forests, soils, water, air and climate.
Ironically, high consumption may be a mixed blessing in human terms, too. The time-honored values of integrity of character, good work, friendship, family and community have often been sacrificed in the rush to riches.
Thus many in the industrial lands have a sense that their world of plenty is somehow hollow—that, misled by a consumerist culture, they have been fruitlessly attempting to satisfy what are essentially social, psychological and spiritual needs with material things.
Of course, the opposite of overconsumption—poverty—is no solution to either environmental or human problems. It is infinitely worse for people and bad for the natural world too. Dispossessed (被剥夺得一无所有的) peasants slash-and-burn their way into the rain forests of Latin America, and hungry nomads (游牧民族) turn their herds out onto fragile African grassland, reducing it to desert.
If environmental destruction results when people have either too little or too much, we are left to wonder how much is enough. What level of consumption can the earth support? When does having more cease to add noticeably to human satisfaction?
1. The emergence of the affluent society after World War II .
A. led to the reform of the retailing system
B. resulted in the worship of consumerism
C. gave rise to the dominance of the new egoism
D. gave birth to a new generation of upper class consumers
2. Apart from enormous productivity, another important impetus to high consumption is______.
A. the people's desire for a rise in their living standards
B. the concept that one's success is measured by how much they consume
C. the imbalance that has existed between production and consumption
D. the conversion of the sale of goods into rituals
3. Why does the author say high consumption is a mixed blessing?
A. Because poverty still exists in an affluent society.
B. Because overconsumption won't last long due to unrestricted population growth.
C. Because traditional rituals are often neglected in the process of modernization.
D. Because moral values are sacrificed in pursuit of material satisfaction.
4. According to the passage, consumerist culture .
A. will not alleviate poverty in wealthy countries
B. will not aggravate environmental problems
C. cannot thrive on a fragile economy
D. cannot satisfy human spiritual needs
5. It can be inferred from the passage that .
A. human spiritual needs should match material affluence
B. whether high consumption should be encouraged is still an issue
C. how to keep consumption at a reasonable level remains a problem
D. there is never an end to satisfying people's material needs
参考答案：BBDDC
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If you intend using humor in your talk to make people smile, you must know how to identify shared experiences and problems. Your humor must be relevant to the audience and should help to show them that you are one of them or that you understand their situation and are in sympathy with their point of view. Depending on whom you are addressing, the problems will be different. If you are talking to a group of managers, you may refer to the disorganized methods of their secretaries; alternatively if you are addressing secretaries, you may want to comment on their disorganized bosses.
Here is an example, which I heard at a nurses' convention, of a story which works well because the audience all shared the same view of doctors. A man arrives in heaven and is being shown around by St. Peter. He sees wonderful accommodations, beautiful gardens, sunny weather, and so on. Everyone is very peaceful, polite and friendly until, waiting in a line for lunch, the new arrival is suddenly pushed aside by a man in a white coat, who rushes to the head of the line, grabs his food and stomps over to a table by himself. "Who is that?" the new arrival asked St. Peter. "On, that's God," came the reply, "but sometimes he thinks he's a doctor."
If you are part of the group which you are addressing, you will be in a position to know the experiences and problems which are common to all of you and it'll be appropriate for you to make a passing remark about the inedible canteen food or the chairman's notorious bad taste in ties. With other audiences you mustn't attempt to cut in with humor as they will resent an outsider making disparaging remarks about their canteen or their chairman. You will be on safer ground if you stick to scapegoats like the Post Office or the telephone system.
If you feel awkward being humorous, you must practice so that it becomes more natural. Include a few casual and apparently off-the-cuff remarks which you can deliver in a relaxed and unforced manner. Often it's the delivery which causes the audience to smile, so speak slowly and remember that a raised eyebrow or an unbelieving look may help to show that you are making a light-hearted remark.
Look for the humor. It often comes from the unexpected. A twist on a familiar quote "If at first you don't succeed, give up" or a play on words or on a situation. Search for exaggeration and understatements. Look at your talk and pick out a few words or sentences which you can turn about and inject with humor.
1. To make your humor work, you should .
A. take advantage of different kinds of audience
B. make fun of the disorganized people
C. address different problems to different people
D. show sympathy for your listeners
2. The joke about doctors implies that, in the eyes of nurses, they are .
A. impolite to new arrivals
B. very conscious of their godlike role
C. entitled to some privileges
D. very busy even during lunch hours
3. It can be inferred from the text that public services .
A. have benefited many people
B. are the focus of public attention
C. are an inappropriate subject for humor
D. have often been the laughing stock
4. To achieve the desired result, humorous stories should be delivered .
A. in well-worded language
B. as awkwardly as possible
C. in exaggerated statements
D. as casually as possible
5. The best title for the text may be .
A. Use Humor Effectively
B. Various Kinds of Humor
C. Add Humor to Speech
D. Different Humor Strategies
参考答案：CBDDA
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It is said that the public and Congressional concern about deceptive (欺骗性的) packaging rumpus (喧嚣) started because Senator Hart discovered that the boxes of cereals consumed by him, Mrs. Hart, and their children were becoming higher and narrower, with a decline of net weight from 12 to 10-1/2 ounces, without any reduction in price. There were still twelve biscuits, but they had been reduced in size. Later, the Senator rightly complained of a store- bought pie in a handsomely illustrated box that pictured, in a single slice, almost as many cherries as there were in the whole pie. The manufacturer who increases the unit
price of his product by changing his package size to lower the quantity delivered can, without undue hardship, put his product into boxes, bags, and tins that will contain even 4-ounce, 8-ounce, one-pound, two-pound quantities of breakfast foods, cake mixes, etc. A study of drugstore (杂货店) and supermarket shelves will convince any observer that all possible sizes and shapes of boxes, jars, bottles, and tins are in use at the same time, and, as the package journals show, week by week, there is never any hesitation in introducing a new size and shape of box or bottle when it aids in product differentiation. The producers of packaged products argue strongly against changing sizes of packages to contain even weights and volumes, but no one in the trade comments unfavorably on the huge costs incurred by endless changes of package sizes, materials, shape, art work, and net weights that are used for improving a product's market position.
When a packaging expert explained that he was able to multiply the price of hard sweets by 2.5, from $1 to $ 2.50 by changing to a fancy jar, or that he had made a 5-ounce bottle look as though it held 8 ounces, he was in effect telling the public that packaging can be a very expensive luxury. It evidently does come high, when an average family pays about $ 200 a year for bottles, cans, boxes, jars and other containers, most of which can't be used for anything but stuffing the garbage can.
1. What started the public and Congressional concern about deceptive packaging rumpus?
A. Consumers' complaints about the changes in package size.
B. Expensive packaging for poor quality products.
C. A senator's discovery of the tricks in packaging.
D. The rise in the unit price for many products.
2. The word "undue" (Line 2, Para. 2) means " ".
A. improper
C. unexpected
B. adequate
D. excessive
3. Consumers are concerned about the changes in package size, mainly because .
A. they hate to see any changes in things they are familiar with
B. the unit price for a product often rises as a result
C. they have to pay for the cost of changing package sizes
D. this entails an increase in the cost of packaging
4. According to this passage, various types of packaging come into existence to .
A. meet the needs of consumers
C. enhance the market position of products
B. suit all kinds of products
D. introduce new products
5. The author is critical mainly of .
A. dishonest packaging
B. inferior packaging
C. the changes in package size
D. exaggerated illustrations on packages
参考答案：CDBCA
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Since the dawn of human ingenuity, people have devised ever more cunning tools to cope with work that is dangerous, boring, burdensome, or just plain nasty. That compulsion has resulted in robotics—the science of conferring various human capabilities on machines. And if scientists have yet to create the mechanical version of science fiction, they have begun to come close.
As a result, the modern world is increasingly populated by intelligent gizmos whose presence we barely notice but whose universal existence has removed much human labor. Our factories hum to the rhythm of robot assembly arms. Our banking is done at automated teller terminals that thank us with mechanical politeness for the transaction. Our subway trains are controlled by tireless robo-drivers. And thanks to the continual miniaturization of electronics and micro-mechanics, there are already robot systems that can perform some kinds of brain and bone surgery with submillimeter accuracy—far greater precision than highly skilled physicians can achieve with their hands alone.
But if robots are to reach the next stage of laborsaving utility, they will have to operate with less human supervision and be able to make at least a few decisions for themselves—goals that pose a real challenge. "While we know how to tell a robot to handle a specific error," says Dave Lavery, manager of a robotics program at NASA, "we can't yet give a robot enough 'common sense' to reliably interact with a dynamic world." Indeed the quest for true artificial intelligence has produced very mixed results. Despite a spell of initial optimism in the 1960s and 1970s when it appeared that transistor circuits and microprocessors might be able to copy the action of the human brain by the year 2010, researchers lately have begun to extend that forecast by decades if not centuries.
What they found, in attempting to model thought, is that the human brain's roughly one hundred billion nerve cells are much more talented—and human perception far more complicated—than previously imagined. They have built robots that can recognize the error of a machine panel by a fraction of a millimeter in a controlled factory environment. But the human mind can glimpse a rapidly changing scene and immediately disregard the 98 percent that is irrelevant, instantaneously focusing on the monkey at the side of a winding forest road or the single suspicious face in a big crowd. The most advanced computer systems on Earth can't approach that kind of ability, and neuroscientists still don't know quite how we do it.
1. Human ingenuity was initially demonstrated in .
A. the use of machines to produce science fiction
B. the wide use of machines in manufacturing industry
C. the invention of tools for difficult and dangerous work
D. the elite's cunning tackling of dangerous and boring work
2. The word "gizmos" (line 1, paragraph 2) most probably means .
A. programs
B. experts
C. devices
D. creatures
3. According to the text, what is beyond man's ability now is to design a robot that can .
A. fulfill delicate tasks like performing brain surgery
B. interact with human beings verbally
C. have a little common sense
D. respond independently to a changing world
4. Besides reducing human labor, robots can also .
A. make a few decisions for themselves
B. deal with some errors with human intervention
C. improve factory environments
D. cultivate human creativity
5. The author uses the example of a monkey to argue that robots are .
A. expected to copy human brain in internal structure
B. able to perceive abnormalities immediately
C. far less able than human brain in focusing on relevant information
D. best used in a controlled environment
参考答案：CCDBC
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If sustainable competitive advantage depends on workforce skills, American firms have a problem. Human-resource management is not traditionally seen as central to the competitive survival of the firm in the United States. Skill acquisition is considered an individual responsibility. Labour is simply another factor of production to be hired—rented at the lowest possible cost—much as one buys raw materials or equipment.
The lack of importance attached to human-resource management can be seen in the corporate hierarchy. In an American firm the chief financial officer is almost always second in command. The post of head of human-resource management is usually a specialized job, off at the edge of the corporate hierarchy. The executive who holds it is never consulted on major strategic decisions and has no chance to move up to Chief Executive Officer(CEO). By way of contrast, in Japan the head of human-resource management is central—usually the second most important executive, after the CEO, in the firm's hierarchy.
While American firms often talk about the vast amounts spent on training their work force, in fact they invest less in the skills of their employees than do either Japanese or German firms. The money they do invest is also more highly concentrated on professional and managerial employees. And the limited investments that are made in training workers are also much more narrowly focused on the specific skills necessary to do the next job rather than on the basic background skills that make it possible to absorb new technologies.
As a result, problems emerge when new breakthrough technologies arrive. If American workers, for example, take much longer to learn how to operate new flexible manufacturing stations than workers on Germany (as they do), the effective cost of those stations is lower in Germany than it is in the United States. More time is required before equipment is up and running at capacity, and the need for extensive retraining generates costs and creates bottlenecks that limit the speed with which new equipment can be employed. The result is a slower pace of technological change, And in the end the skills of the bottom half of the population affect the wages of the top half. If the bottom half can't effectively staff the processes that have to be operated, the management and professional jobs that go with these processes will disappear.
1. Which of the following applies to the management of human resources in American companies?
A. They hire people at the lowest cost regardless of their skills.
B. They see the gaining of skills as their employees' own business.
C. They attach more importance to workers than to equipment.
D. They only hire skilled workers because of keen competition.
2. What is the position of the head of human-resource management in an American firm?
A. He is one of the most important executives in the firm.
B. His post is likely to disappear when new technologies are introduced.
C. He is directly under the chief financial executive.
D. He has no say in making important decisions in the firm.
3. The money most American firms put in training mainly goes to .
A. workers who can operate new equipment
B. technological and managerial staff
C. workers who lack basic background skills
D. top executives
4. According to the passage, the decisive factor in maintaining a firm's competitive advantage is .
A. the introduction of new technologies
B. the improvement of workers' basic skills
C. the rational composition of professional and managerial employees
D. the attachment of importance to the bottom haft of the employees
5. What is the main idea of the passage ?
A. American firms are different from Japanese and German firms in human-resource management.
B. Extensive retraining is indispensable to effective human-resource management.
C. The head of human-resource management must be in the central position in a firm' s hierarchy.
D. The human-resource management strategies of American firms affect their competitive capacity.
参考答案：B D B B D
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One silly question I simply cannot tolerate is "How do you feel?" Usually the question is asked of a man in action—a man walking along the street, or busily working at his desk. So what do you expect him to say? He'll probably say, "Fine, I 'm all right." But you have put a bug a his ear-maybe now he is not sure. If you are his good friend, you may have seen something on his face, or in his walk, that he overlooked that morning. It makes him worrying a little. He looks in a mirror to see if everything is all right, while you go merrily on your way asking someone else, "How do you feel?"
Every question has its time and place. It's perfectly acceptable, for instance, to ask "How do you feel?" if you are visiting a close friend in the hospital. But if the fellow is walking on both legs, hurrying to take a train or sitting at his desk working, it's no time to ask him that silly question.
When George Bernard Shaw, the famous British writer of plays was in his eighties, someone asked him, "How do you feel?" Shaw put him in his place. "When you reach my age," he said, "either you feel all right or you are dead."
1. According to the writer, greetings, such as "How do you feel?" .
A. show one's consideration for others
B. are a good way to make friends
C. are proper to ask a man in action
D. generally make one feel uneasy
2. The question "How do you feel?" seems to be correct and suitable when asked of .
A. a friend who is ill
B. a person who has lost a close friend
C. a stranger who looks somewhat worried
D. a man who is working at his desk
3. George Bernard Shaw's reply in this passage shows his .
A. silliness
B. cleverness
C. carelessness
D. politeness
4. "You have put a bug in his ear" means that you have .
A. made him laugh
B. shown concern for him
C. made fun of him
D. given him some kind of warning
5. This passage can be entitled .
A. A Silly Question
B. Don't Trouble a Busy Man
C. What Are Good Greetings
D. George Bernard Shaw's Reply
参考答案：D A B D A
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The biographer has to dance between two shaky positions with respect to the subject (研究对象) . Too close a relation, and the writer may lose objectivity. Not close enough, and the writer may lack the sympathy necessary to any effort to portray a mind, a soul—the quality of life. Who should write the biography of a family, for example? Because of their closeness to the subject, family members may have special information, but by the same token, they may not have the distance that would allow them to be fair. Similarly, a king's servant might not be the best one to write a biography of that king. But a foreigner might not have the knowledge and sympathy necessary to write the king's biography—not for a readership from within the kingdom, at any rate.
There is no ideal position for such a task. The biographer has to work with the position he or she has in the world, adjusting that position as necessary to deal with the subject. Every position has strengths and weaknesses: to thrive, a writer must try to become aware of these, evaluate them in terms of the subject, and select a position accordingly.
When their subjects are heroes or famous figures, biographies often reveal a democratic motive: they attempt to show that their subjects are only human, no better than anyone else. Other biographies are meant to change us, to invite us to become better than we are. The biographies of Jesus (耶稣) found in the Bible are in this class.
Biographers may claim that their account is the "authentic" one. In advancing this claim, they are helped if the biography is "authorized" by the subject; this presumably allows the biographer special access to private information. "Unauthorized" biographies also have their appeal, however, since they can suggest an independence of mind in the biographer. In book promotions, the "unauthorized" characterisation usually suggests the prospect of juicy gossip that the subject had hoped to suppress. A subject might have several biographies, even several "authentic" ones. We sense intuitively that no one is in a position to tell "the" story of a life, perhaps not even the subject, and this has been proved by the history of biography.
1. According to the author, an ideal biographer would be one who .
A. knows the subject very well and yet maintains a proper distance from him
B. is close to the subject and knows the techniques of biography writing
C. is independent and knows the techniques of biography writing
D. possesses special private information and is sympathetic toward the subjeet
2. The author cites the biographies of Jesus in the Bible in order to show that .
A. the best biographies are meant to transform their readers
B. biographies are authentic accounts of their subjects' lives
C. the best biographies are those of heroes and famous figures
D. biographies can serve different purposes
3. Which of the following statements is true, according to the passage?
A. An authentic biography seldom appeals to its readers.
B. An authentic biography is one authorized by the subject.
C. No one can write a perfect biography.
D. Authorized biographies have a wider readership.
4. An unauthorized biography is likely to attract more readers because .
A. it portrays the subject both faithfully and vividly
B. it contains interesting information about the subject s private life
C. it reveals a lot of accurate details unknown to outsiders
D. it usually gives a sympathetic description of the subject's character
5. In this passage, the author focuses on .
A. the difficulty of a biographer in finding the proper perspective to do his job
B. the secret of a biographer to win more readers
C. the techniques required of a biographer to write a good biography
D. the characteristics of different kinds of biographies Questions
参考答案：A D C B A
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Whether the eyes are "the windows of the soul" is debatable, that they are intensely important in interpersonal communication is a fact. During the first two months of a baby's life, the stimulus that produces a smile is a pair of eyes. The eyes need not be real: a mask with two dots will produce a smile. Significantly, a real human face with eyes covered will not motivate a smile, nor will the sight of only one eye when the face is presented in profile. This attraction to eyes as opposed to the nose or mouth continues as the baby matures: In one study, when American four-year-olds were asked to draw people, 75 percent of them drew people with mouths, but 99 percent of them drew people with eyes. In Japan, however, where babies are carried on their mother's back, infants do not acquire as much attachment to eyes as they do in other cultures. As a result, Japanese adults make little use of the face either to encode or decode meaning. In fact, Argyle reveals that the "proper place to focus one's gaze during a conversation in Japan is on the neck of one's conversation partner."
The role of eye contact in a conversational exchange between two Americans is well defined: speakers make contact with the eyes of their listener for about one second, then glance away as they talk; in a few moments they re-establish eye contact with the listener or reassure themselves that their audience is still attentive, then shift their gaze away once more. Listeners, meanwhile, keep their eyes on the face of the speaker, allowing themselves to glance away only briefly. It is important that they be looking at the speaker at the precise moment when the speaker re-establishes eye contact: if they are not looking, the speaker assumes that they are disinterested and either will pause until eye contact is resumed or wild terminate the conversation. Just how critical this eye maneuvering is to the maintenance of conversational flow becomes evident when two speakers are wearing dark glasses: there may be a sort of traffic jam of words caused by interruption, false starts, and unpredictable pauses.
1. The author is convinced that the eyes are .
A. of extreme importance in expressing feelings and exchanging ideas
B. something through which one can see a person's inner world
C. of considerable significance in making conversations interesting
D. something the value of which is largely a matter of long debate
2. Babies will not be stimulated to smile by a person .
A. whose front view is fully perceived
B. whose face is covered with a mask
C. whose face is seen from the side
D. whose face is free of any covering
3. According to the passage, the Japanese fix their gaze on their conversation partner's neck because .
A. they don't like to keep their eyes on the face of the speaker
B. they need not communicate through eye contact
C. they don't think it polite to have eye contact
D. they didn't have much opportunity to communicate through eye contact in babyhood
4. According to the passage, a conversation between two Americans may break down due to .
A. one temporarily glancing away from the other
B. eye contact of more than one second
C. improperly-timed ceasing of eye contact
D. constant adjustment of eye contact
5. To keep a conversation flowing smoothly, it is better for the participants .
A. not to wear dark spectacles
C. not to glance away from each other
B. not to make any interruptions
D. not to make unpredictable pauses
参考答案：A C D C A