【综合文库】
Listen and Respond
Listen to a short passage entitled “An Invitation”. Task One Focusing on the Main Ideas
Choose the best answer to each of the following questions according to the information contained in the listening passage. 1) Where did the woman see the three old men? A) In front of her store. B) In her front yard. C) In her dream. D) In her doorway.
2) Who were the three old men respectively?
A) Success, Hope and Wealth. B) Faith, Hope, and Love. C) Wealth, Faith and Success. D) Love, Success and Wealth.
3) Whom did the family invite in?
A) Wealth. B) Love. C) Success. D) All of the above.
4) How many of the old men would like to go into the house? A) One. B) Two. C) Three. D) Four.
5) What is the main idea of the passage?
A) Where there is love, there is wealth and success. B) One cannot live without wealth, love and success. C) Love is as important as wealth and success.
D) Wealth and success are what people pursue most eagerly.
Task Two Zooming In on the Details
Listen to the passage again and fill in each of the blanks according to what you have heard.
1. The women thought that the three old men must be hungry , so she invited them to come in and have something to eat .
2. The old men said that they did not go into a house together .
3. The husband wished to invite Wealth , but the woman did not agree and wished to have Success , while their daughter suggested: ― Wouldn’t it be better to invite Love ?‖
4. The woman came out and asked: ―Which one of you is Love ? Please come in and be our guest .‖
5. The other two old men also got up and followed, which surprised the woman.
6. One old man told the woman: ―If you had invited Wealth or Success , the other two of us would have stayed out .‖
Read and Explore
Task One Discovering the Main Ideas
1 Answer the following questions with the information contained in Text A.
1) Is ―love‖ easy to define? Why or why not?
No. It is because love is a feeling that can only be felt but cannot be clearly described.
2) How does the author describe ―puppy loves‖?
―Puppy loves‖ are brief, silly, adventurous but harmless.
3) What does it take for love to develop into maturity?
Love takes time to blossom and it takes a lot of understanding, caring, sharing and affection to develop into maturity.
4) What helped preserve the holiness of love in the author’s parents’ generation?
It was the distance between men and women that helped preserve the holiness of love in the author’s parents’ generation.
5) What negative roles do the media play in forming the younger generation’s view of love?
The media have exposed the younger generation to things that have fast paced their sensibilities so much that taking things slow requires effort.
6) What do young people today tend to value in relationships? What does the author think they should value?
They tend to value physical beauty, closeness, passion and acquiring. The author thinks that they should value inner charm, intimacy, emotion and sharing.
2 Text A can be divided into four parts with the paragraph number(s) of each part provided as follows. Write down the main idea of each part.
Part Paragraph(s) Main Idea
One 1–2 Love is hard to define because it can only be felt but not described.
Two 3–7 The author discusses love of different depths from her own experiences.
Three 8–12 The two generations handle love and relationships differently. The younger generation tends to be more hasty and selfish in building relationships.
Four 13–14 The author advises young people to learn the essence of love and find ways to develop relationships into lifelong bonds.
Task Two Reading Between the Lines
Read the following sentences carefully and discuss in pairs what the author intends to say by the italicised parts.
1. Given the busy nature of our lives, it’s to be appreciated that we even find the time to indulge in matters of the heart. (Para. 3)
Love is still indispensable to us, even though we are so busy pursuing material things for our everyday life. For this we should feel grateful.
2. The long skirts, the quiet and unpretentious looks, the curled long hair, the calmness, the shy glance — these are all so frequently remindful of a bygone era. (Para. 8)
These often remind us of those days when people of our parents’ generation were courting. It was an era of constraints, restraints, respect, admiration, and plenty of romance. But such an era is gone for ever, for young people today tend to behave differently.
3. There is more of acquiring and less of sharing. (Para.12)
The younger generation is more selfish: they care too much about what they can get instead of what they can share.
4. There’s much more to being someone’s lover than gifting them red roses and fifty-cent cards. (Para. 13)
People in a relationship need to do much more than just sending gifts to their lovers. More importantly, they should devote themselves, heart and soul, to each other.
5. And we should not have become so tired by our frivolous acts that when it comes we aren’t able to receive it with open arms. (Para. 14)
After repeatedly experiencing hasty, casual and insensible relationships, we have become emotionally tired and confused, so when true love comes, we are unable to respond to it with due enthusiasm, passion and devotion.
Checking Your Vocabulary Word Detective
1 Put down the right word from Text B in the space provided according to the given definition. The first letter of each word is already given.
Example: icy: extremely cold; covered with ice 1) engaged: having agreed to marry
2) grief: great sorrow or feelings of suffering 3) manipulate: work with skilful use of the hands 4) agonizing: causing great pain or anxiety 5) maximum: the largest number, amount, etc.
6) fascinate: attract and hold the interest or attention of
7) complaint: a statement of dissatisfaction, unhappiness, pain, etc. 8) grace: a fine and attractive quality in movement or form, esp. when this seems effortless and natural
2 Fill in each blank with a word or phrase from Text B. Both the explanation and the number of the paragraph in which the target
word or phrase appears are given in brackets. Be sure to use the proper form.
Example: To gain more profit, they reduced the costs of the building to the
minimum .
(the smallest amount: Para. 7)
1) ―Lip Ice‖, a relief for dry lips, is applied to keep lips moist . (slightly wet: Para. 1)
2) Only three people could fit into the lift; it’s really too small. (have sufficient space in: Para. 5)
3) In the course of their investigation, they discovered various forms of political corruption (腐败). (during: Para. 6)
4) Helen was overjoyed to hear that she had got the job. (extremely pleased: Para. 9)
5) I often clip pictures of tourist spots from the magazine Travel Weekly. (cut: Para. 10)
6) Doctors tried in vain to save him; he passed away at dawn. (without a successful result: Para. 12)
7) During the war, they were forced to yield some of their farmland to the local farmers.
(give up one’s control of: Para. 12)
8) The twins resemble each other in appearance but their personalities are quite different.
(look like or be similar to sb. or sth.: Para. 13)
Checking Your Comprehension
1 Answer the following questions with the information contained in Text B.
1) What happened to the writer’s husband?
He was dying in bed of a serious disease.
2) What did her husband’s hands look like?
They were long and large. His fingers were long and square, laced with fine veins all the way to the tips. His nails squared off the ends of his fingers, with clearly defined white edges. He had always taken great care to keep them neat. They were not tough hands; nor soft, either.
3) What could she feel when her husband clasped her hands during the last four years when he was confined to the hospital bed?
She could feel pure and honest expressions of his love.
4) How did he treat his children when they were young?
He took very good care of them.
5) In what special moments did her husband hold her hands in the hospital?
Her husband held her hands in the most frightening moments of his illnesses and in the deepest, darkest moment of his life.
6) What did she discover in her husband’s dresser months after he died?
She discovered an opened pack of emery boards.
7) How did she react to the discovery?
At the sight of the emery boards, she could not control her grief any longer and broke into tears.
8) Who was Stephen?
He was her youngest son, who resembled her husband very much.
9) How did she feel when Stephen clasped her hand?
She felt the clasp was as reassuring as his father’s.
2 Read the following sentences carefully and discuss in pairs what the author intends to say by the italicised parts.
1) And whenever those hands sought mine in the final days of his life, he pressed them both together around one of my hands. (Para. 1)
Holding one of my hands tightly, he expressed his pure love for me as well as his wish to be together with me forever.
2) It was during that time, as I sat by his bed, that I tried to memorize his hands. (Para. 2)
I tried to bear in mind what his hands were like because I knew he would soon leave us forever.
3) Those hands clasped mine in the most frightening moments of his illnesses. (Para. 8)
When death was drawing near, he clasped my hands to seek comfort and support from me and to express his pure and deep love for me.
4) Months later, I opened the top drawer of Paul’s dresser one Sunday and reached in for one of his clean, pressed handkerchiefs — I liked to use them now. (Para. 11)
Since my husband had been using them before he died, I like to use them now so that I could find myself mentally closer to him.
5) It was as though his father’s long, graceful hands clasped mine once again.
Still reassuring me. (Para. 13)
Even though he had died, my husband’s way of expressing love through his handclasp had been passed down to our son, which was a lasting comfort to me.
Optional Classroom Activities
Rhetorical devices such as simile (明喻) and metaphor (隐喻) are used in both Text A and Text B. Listed below are some examples. Discuss with your partner how and why the writers use such rhetorical devices. The explanation of the first one is provided.
1) Harmless puppy loves that are as brief as soap bubbles. (Para. 3, Text A)
Simile: ―Soap bubbles‖ is used to emphasize the brief period of time that puppy loves last.
2) Love was a magnificent building I built on the foundation of friendship. It took time to blossom. (Para. 7, Text A)
Metaphor: ―Magnificent building‖ is used to imply that love should be developed in the same way as we build or construct a building and that, like a building, love should be based on something. ―To blossom‖ is also a metaphor, which implies that love can be as beautiful as a flower but it takes time to have it develop or grow.
3) Our parents’ generation was fed lavishly with ideals. (Para. 8, Text A)
Metaphor: Here ―(be) fed (with)‖ is used metaphorically, meaning that, people of her parents’ generation were taught to pursue love and relationships strictly according to the ―ideals‖ of the time, these ideals nourishing their mental needs much as food does the body.
4) I am sorry to learn about the kind of emotional baggage school kids are carrying in what are purely unemotional relationships. (Para. 10, Text A)
Metaphor: ―Baggage‖ is used to indicate the heavy burden that school children have to shoulder when they pursue ―purely unemotional relationships.‖
5) What about giving ourselves, and others, time and space to forge relationships? (Para. 12, Text A)
Metaphor: ―To forge‖ implies that relationships are like iron and require plenty of tempering before they become as solid and strong as steel.
6) For seven-and-a-half months, my grief for my husband had been frozen within me like an icy presence that would not yield. (Para. 12, Text B)
Simile: ―Frozen‖ and ―icy presence‖ are used to imply that during the seven-and-a-half months after her husband died, the author had managed to bury the grief for her husband deep down in her heart as if it had turned into something like ice.
7) Then, this last Sunday of February, I was undone by the simple presence of emery boards. (Para. 12, Text B)
Metaphor: ―Was undone‖ emphasizes the sudden release or outbreak of her grief, as if a knot came loose or untied unexpectedly.
Enhance Your Language Awareness Words in Action
Working with Words and Expressions
1 In the boxes below are some of the words you have learned in this unit. Complete the following sentences with them. Change the form where necessary.
Text A acquire affection curl defy given haste interact preserve restraint Text B clip fascinate grief manipulate minimum presence yield
1) I don’t like my straight hair so I’m going to have it curled .
2) This price is her minimum ; she refuses to lower it any further.
3) I often clip recipes out of newspapers and magazines but never use them when I cook.
4) She yielded to temptation and had another chocolate even though she was going on a diet.
5) Given the fact that she loves children, I am sure teaching is the right career for her.
6) They try to preserve their interesting old customs against the impacts of the modern world.
7) Philip was fascinated to see how the old woman wove (编织) cloth with such simple tools.
8) Among all his relatives, he has an especially deep affection for his aunt who cares for him most.
9) Teaching is not a one-way activity; teachers and students should interact with each other in class.
10) After his wife died, he remarried with much haste , which caused a lot of gossip (闲话) among his acquaintances.
11) Without your love and support, he would have been weighed down (颓丧) with grief after his daughter died of a car crash.
12) I have never seen a house like that — its untidiness defies description; I think she ought to learn how to keep a house.
13) These days more and more pregnant (怀孕的) women want the presence of their husbands at the birth of their children.
14) It is quite possible for a student to master English grammar and acquire a large vocabulary without the help of a teacher.
15) She watched him manipulate all the handles and gears [(汽车上的)排挡] in his automobile until she thought she could run it herself.
16) Lack of money and lack of machinery are the two major restraints on the growth of this factory; that’s why it remains the same as it was ten years ago.
2 In the boxes below are some of the expressions you have learned in this unit. Do you know how to use them in the proper context? Now check for yourself by doing the blank-filling exercise. Change the form where necessary.
Text A state of affairs build … on give and take hold on in short let … loose on Text B fit into in the course of in vain reach for
1) Don’t let the little boy loose on the garden; he’ll pull up all the flowers.
2) The refrigerator I bought last week is too large to fit into our new kitchen.
3) When the flood broke out, the little girl clung to a tree and managed to hold on .
4) Her parents are divorced and her brother is in prison — it is a sad state of affairs , indeed.
5) It is said that in no country other than Britain can one experience four seasons in the course of a single day.
6) The moment my father came in I could see from his worried face that his effort to find a job had been in vain once again.
7) Do you think it wise for a person to build his hopes on the economic strength of his country? Or should he base them on his own efforts?
8) He’s disorganized; he’s inefficient; he’s never been there when you want him.
In short , he is hopeless.
9) Seeing his neighbour’s house on fire, he quickly reached for the phone and dialled 110.
10) You can’t always insist on your own way — there has to be some give and take .
Increasing Your Word Power
1 The prefix over- can be added to nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs, meaning “above”, “outside”, “across”, or “too much”. Study
the words given in the box and choose the proper word to fill in each of the blanks in the following sentences. Change the form where necessary.
overcoat n. overconfident a. overcrowded a. overdo v. overdue a. overflow v. overhead a. / ad. overjoyed a. overland a. / ad. overload v. over-rich a. oversleep v. overtime n. / ad. overweight a. overwork n. / v.
1) It’s cold outside. Put on your overcoat .
2) He liked to look at planes flying overhead .
3) We were overjoyed to learn that they were safe.
4) I overslept this morning and was late for work.
5) My luggage was overweight by five kilos. I had to pay extra.
6) These bills are overdue . They should have been paid earlier.
7) They’re working overtime to finish the task ahead of schedule.
8) You’ve been overworking and you look exhausted; why don’t you take a week off?
2 Many words in English can be used both as nouns and as verbs. Listed in the following table are some of these words that you have learned in Unit One and Unit Two. Study them carefully and then complete each of the following sentences with one of them as you see fit. Change the form where necessary. crush
n.
a strong but short-lived feeling of love that a young person has for someone older(对年长者产生的)短暂的迷恋；热恋
v.
press with great force so as to break, damage, etc. 压碎，压坏 fancy
n.
a liking, especially one formed without the help of reason; imagination, esp. in a free and undirected form(尤指一时兴起的) 喜爱；迷恋；胡思乱想
v.
have a liking for; wish for; be sexually attracted to 喜欢，想要；(男女间)爱上 bubble
n.
a hollow ball of air or gas in a liquid (or sometimes in a solid) 泡；气泡；泡沫
v.
form, produce, or rise as bubbles 起泡，冒泡；沸腾 yield
n.
that which is produced or the amount that is produced(生)产量
v.
produce, bear, or provide, esp. as a result of work or effort; give up control (of); surrender 生产；产生(效果等)；放弃；投降，屈服 label
n.
a piece of paper or other material on or beside an object and describing its nature, name, owner, destination, etc. 标签；标记
v.
fix or tie a label on 贴标签于
attribute
n.
a quality forming part of the nature of a person or thing 特性，属性
v.
believe (sth.) to be the result or work of 把(某事)归因于 drizzle
n.
(a) fine misty rain 毛毛雨，细雨
v.
rain in very small drops or very lightly 下毛毛雨 grasp
n.
a firm hold with the hands or arms(用手或臂)紧握；紧抱
v.
take or keep a firm hold of, esp. with the hands 抓牢，抓紧
1) Don’t crush the box, there are eggs inside!
2) She attributes her success to hard work and a bit of luck.
3) Did I really hear someone come in, or was it only a fancy ?
4) The coffeepot bubbled , filling the room with fragrance (香味).
5) Mike took her arm in a firm grasp and led her through the gate.
6) When I left home it was just drizzling , but now it’s pouring down.
7) He was busy labeling all the bottles of wine he’d made the year before.
1) 无论是友情还是爱情，你都不可能期待自己付出最少而得到最多。(maximum; minimum)
In either friendship or love / In both friendship and love, you should never expect to take / receive the maximum while you give the minimum.
2) 我把全部希望寄托在他的承诺上，结果却发现他根本不是个真诚的人。(build on; sincerity)
I built all my hopes on his promise(s), only to find that he was not a man of sincerity at all.
3) 我们带母亲去了所有我们能找到的最好的医院，但一切努力都是徒劳的，母亲还是没能熬过那次疾病。(in vain)
We took Mother to all the best hospitals we could find, but all our efforts were in vain; she failed to survive the disease.
4) 情人节(Valentine’s Day)是个一年一度在2月14日庆祝的节日，一个向自己心仪的对象表达爱意的好日子。(affection)
Valentine’s Day is an annual holiday celebrated on February 14, a perfect day to express love to the object of your / one’s affection.
5) 在信息时代，通过电子邮件方式跟远方的朋友交流几乎可以是同步的(simultaneous)。(era; via)
In the information era, communications with far-away friends via e-mail can be almost / virtually simultaneous.
6) 爱情需要培育，我们梦想拥有的―永恒的爱情‖只有在双方学会欣赏对方，包容对方之后才可能缔造。(nurture; forge)
Love needs to be nurtured, and the ―eternal / everlasting love‖ that we all dream to have is not forged until we learn to appreciate and tolerate the other.
2 Translate the following paragraph into English, using the words and expressions in the box below.
affection; complaint; engage; fascinate; given; grief; horrified; ideal; overjoyed; pursue; in the course of
晚饭后，我们大家围坐在壁炉(hearth)旁。苏珊姨妈还沉浸在失去罗伯特姨父的悲伤之中。她轻声讲起了他俩从前的岁月。订婚不久，姨父就去参军了。考虑到当时的严峻形势，许多军人无法生还，你就可以想象姨妈每天有多恐惧。而当姨父从欧洲战场平安返回时姨妈甭提有多开心了。之后，他们结婚成家，抚育了五个孩子。这么多年来，在共同克服生活的艰辛磨难的过程当中，夫妻间的感情越来越深。我被姨妈的故事深深迷住了，这完全不同于我理想中的爱情。在日常生活中，他们并不追求激情浪漫，并没有牢骚满腹，而是实践着―付出‖和―分享‖。令人感慨的是，这样的爱延续了一辈子。
After dinner, we all sat around the hearth. Aunt Susan was still in the grief of losing Uncle Robert. In her soft voice she told us about their past years. Uncle Robert joined the army shortly after they were engaged. Given the critical situation at the time when lots of army men didn’t return alive, you can imagine how horrified Aunt Susan was every day, and how overjoyed she was to see Uncle Robert back safe and sound from the European battlefield. Then they got married and brought up five children. For all those years, their affection for each other grew stronger in the course of overcoming difficulties and hardships in life. I was fascinated by Aunt Susan’s story, which was totally different from my ideal of love. They practiced, in their daily life, giving and sharing instead of pursuing passion and romance, or making complaints. Amazingly, such love lasted through their whole life.
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