I have observed that the Americans show a less decided taste for general ideas than the Fr

Americans,there are innumerable aspects of African life which tend to take one by surprise. The unfamiliar lies hidden everywhere,and the presence of Western culture seems merely to emphasize this unfamiliarity. Basically, the essence of our reaction to the strange,the unfamiliar,is a sense of fear. Every country contains landscapes that arouse unease-whether it be some remote Alpine valley,the wild lavender fields of Upper Province,or a lonely Norwegian fjord at twilight. But in my own experience West Africa contains more weird and eerie regions-rain-forest,mangrove swamp,parched plains of red earth-than any other place that I have seen. It is not only in the foreigner that these landscapes evoke fear. A large part of all old African religions is devoted to soothing the unknown and the unseen-evil Spirits which live in a particular tree or a particular rock,a thousand varieties of ghosts and witches,the ever-present spirits of dead ancestors or relatives. I have myself been kept awake at night in Calabar by a friend from Lagos who was convinced that the witches of the east were out to get him,or that he was about to be kidnapped and eaten. During four and a half hours in a canoe along the creeks of the Niger delta, gliding over the still and colorless water beneath an equally still and colorless but burning sky,I,too,have experienced a sense of fear,or at least a sense of awe. Except for the ticking of the little outboard engine the silence was complete. On either hand stretched the silver-white swamps of mangrove,seeming,with their awkward exposed roots,to be standing knee-deep in the water. Where the creek narrowed you could peer deep into these thickets of mangroves-vistas secret, interminable and somehow meaningless. There was no sign of life except for the shrill screech of some unseen bird. I was on my way to the ancient slaving port of Bonny,which we reached in late afternoon. Scrambling up some derelict stone steps(slithery with slime and which had managed to detach themselves from the landing-stage so that you had to jump a two-foot gap to reach wet land),I found myself in an area of black mud and tumbled blocks of stone.

There are features of Western culture which are present in West Africa_____.

A．This fact makes it easier to accept the unfamiliarity of West Africa.

B．This fact makes West Africa seem even stranger.

C．This fact makes no difference to our reaction to West Africa.

D．This fact has been greatly overemphasized.

nsive laptops loaded【C1】______its new Windows Vista operating system. But the gifts generated controversy as well as good【C2】______,with some bloggers accusing Microsoft of bribery and their peers【C3】______ unethical behavior. Several bloggers reported last week that they had received Acer Ferrari laptops, which can sell【C4】______more than $ 2,200, from Microsoft. A spokeswoman for Microsoft confirmed Friday that the【C5】______had sent out about 90 computers to bloggers【C6】______wrote about technology and other subjects that could be【C7】______by the new operating system, like photography and, oddly, parenting. But while those on Microsofts mailing list initially greeted the machines with enthusiasm, many【C8】_______. bloggers soon objected-not because they had been left off the list but, they said, because bloggers are bound by the【C9】______rules as traditional journalists, who should not accept【C10】______gifts from companies they cover.

【C1】

caricatured frogs, wops, yids and goodness-gracious-me Pakis—are in clear breach of the codes of political correctness. His lewd disguises and overdone accents belong with black-and-white minstrel shows and clog-dancing—its the comedy of yesteryear. Have you tried listening to The Goon Show lately? It is a reworking of The Gang Show,excruciatingly bad and dated,and full of explosions,gunfire and jokes about Hitler and the War. Nonetheless,Sellers continues to obsess people. Hes already been the subject of biographies galore, including,back in 1994,a 1,200-page magnum opus by myself,which is now being turned into a biopic starring Geoffrey Rush. The appeal lies in the mythic dimensions of Sellersstory. He had everything and it wasnt enough. He was a comedian with a tragic inability to enjoy life. He was world-famous and desperately lonely. At the height of his fame,as Inspector Clouseau.his eccentricity tipped over the edge into genuine insanity. He was a basket case. This is irresistible material. Sellerssubversive and immoderate behavior. puts him in a class of his own. Picture my disappointment with Ed Skiovs tome,therefore. Heres a thick cook that tells us nothing new. For newcomers to Sellers,however,Mr. Strangelove is a perfect digest of the mans life and work, briskly told. Sellers was descended from a family of bare-knuckle East End prize-fighters, although his parents were music hall entertainers. His clinging,whining mother,Peg,was a quick-change artiste and his father, Bill, was a ukulele player and soft-shoe-shuffle merchant. The young Peter was raised in the ghostly,twilight world of shabby theatres and end-of-the-pier revues: dog acts,acrobatic midgets,incompetent conjurors and gypsy violinists. To go from these origins and become as big as The Beatles,as he was in the Sixties,is an amazing feat. Sellers spent the Second World War in the Air Force,impersonating officers and playing the drums to entertain the troops. When he was demobbed he worked in holiday camps and began getting spots on radio,culminating in The Goon Show. He dubbed the voices of Churchill and Humphrey Bogart on film soundtracks, and it was while hanging about the studios that he was offered walk-on roles. His breakthrough came with the part of a teddy boy in The Ladykillers.a film that improves with each viewing. This led to the role of Fred Kite,the shaven-headed,belligerent shop steward in Im All Right. Jack which won him British Academy Best Actor statuette. When Peter Ustinov dropped out of The Pink Panther on a Friday. Sellers flew to the set in Rome on Monday to replace him. The rest is history. Or notoriety. Sellers descent into madness was swift. He got rid of his wife and children and chased after Britt Ekland. whom he pounced on in The Dorchester and married ten days later. He took drugs to enhance his potency and this precipitated a heart attack. Having worked on Dr. Strangelove during the day. each evening he locked himself in the bathroom and threatened to commit suicide. Bryan Forbes and Nanette Newman had to come over and talk to him through the door. He then decided he wanted to marry Nanette. He also wanted to marry Sophia Loren, Princess Margaret and Liza Minnelli. His misbehavior. and unprofessionalism cost film studios millions of dollars. Sets had to be repainted and costumes remade if they were purple or green—colors of which he was morbidly superstitious. He enjoyed messing about during filming and blowing his lines;he pulled guns on people. He walked off Casino Royale and was discovered in Britt Eklands mothers house in Sweden. Meanwhile. Orson Welles and the rest of the cast were in full make-up and on full pay back at Pinewood. waiting for him to reappear. Sellers were happy only in the company of his gadgets,cameras and fast cars,which hed replace or a-bandon with manic frequency. Alone of his weddings.the maids of honor were the brides dogs. He was also selfish in the extreme:when his relationships broke up,hed send his henchmen round to retrieve his gifts.

People are still obsessed with Peter Sellers because____.

A．he was a genius

B．he was as big as The Beatles

C．his life was full of drama and contradiction

D．he led a very austere life

M2】But Detective Harold Gannon of the New Britain police said today that the job involved more policy as police work, and did not include the authority to charge or chide criminals.【M3】The gold badge was mere a university award.【M4】The governor said he would not ask for a resignation because Mr. Judd had made a "misiudgment" and had written a letter of apologizing. 【M5】Later, Mr. Judds lawyer, Paul J. McQuillan, issued a long apology from his superior, whom he described as "the best thing to happen to New Britain."【M6】"My experience and instinct as an E. M. T. and former police commissioner prompted me to involve myself with this matter," Mr. Judd said in the statement.【M7】"In hindsight, I see it was mine to manage."

【M1】

.("Paraphrase" means "to explain the meaning in your own English".)(75%) America Loses a Great Public Thinker Arthur Millers death last week meant more than the loss of an outstanding playwright. It was the loss of a great public thinker who believed strongly that the essence of America—its greatness was in its promises.【P1】Miller knew what ignorance and fear and the madness of crowds, especially when exploited by sinister leadership, could do to those promises.【P2】His greatest concerns, "were with the moral corruption brought on by bending ones ideals to societys dictates, buying into the values of a group when they conflict with the voice of personal conscience."【P3】The individual in Millers view, had an abiding moral responsibility for his or her own behavior, and for the behavior. of society as a whole. He said that "I felt that as improbable as it might seem, there were moments when an individual conscience was all that could keep a world from falling." Miller saw some of the differences in two sharply defined eras: the Depression-wracked 1930s and the prosperous postwar 1950s. It was perhaps around 1936, people who used to mind no polities began thinking for the first time of common action as a way out of their impossible conditions.【P4】By the early 50s the agony of the Depression was gone. McCarthvism was in flower. After the 50s, however, Americans became more practical and pragmatic. The dean of the University of Michigan was complaining that his students highest goal was to fit in with corporate America rather than to separate truth from falsehood.【P5】"They become experts at grade-getting, but theres less speculating about the wrongs of the world and ideal solutions something no employer was interested in." Now Miller is gone, and if we are not wise enough to pay attention, his uncomfortable truths will die with him.

【P1】

I must leave now._____, if you want that book I II bring it next time.

A．Accidentally

B．Incidentally

C．Eventually

D．Naturally

h has existed for at least six thousand years. It was always wicked and usually foolish,but in the past the human race managed to live with it. Modern ingenuity has changed this. Either Man will abolish war,or war will abolish Man. For the present.it is nuclear weapons that cause the gravest danger,but bacteriological or chemical weapons may,before long,offer an even greater threat. If we succeed in abolishing nuclear weapons,our work will not be done. It will never be done until we have succeeded in abolishing war. To do this,we need to persuade mankind to look upon international questions in a new way,not as contests of force,in which the victory goes to the side which is most skillful in massacre,but by arbitration in accordance with agreed principles of law. It is not easy to change age-old mental habits,but this is what must be attempted. There are those who say that the adoption of this or that ideology would prevent war. I believe this to be a profound error. All ideologies are based upon dogmatic assertions which are,at best,doubtful,and at worst,totally false. Their adherents believe in them so fanatically that they are willing to go to war in support of them. The movement of world opinion during the past two years has been very largely such as we can welcome. It has become a commonplace that nuclear war must be avoided. Of course very difficult problems remain in the international sphere, but the spirit in which they are being approached is a better one than it was some years ago. It has began to be though,even by the powerful men who decide whether we shall live or die,that negotiations should reach agreements even if both sides do not find these agreements wholly satisfactory. It has begun to be understood that the important conflict nowadays is not between East and West,but between Man and the H-bomb.

This passage implies that war is now_____.

A．more wicked than in the past

B．as wicked as in the past

C．less wicked than in the past

D．what people try to live with

child. How does spoiling occur,and what are the consequences of spoiling;they have always included concepts of a child s nature and concepts of the ideal child and the ideal adult. The many mothers of the 1820s who belonged to the early"matemal associations"struggled to uphold the ideals about child raising that had been prevalent in the 18th century. They had always been told that the spoiled child stood in danger of having trouble later in life(when exposed to all the temptations of the world)and, more importantly .stood in danger of spiritual ruin. At first.the only approach these mothers knew was to "break the wilf"of the child. This approach,com-ing initially from the theology of Calvin,the French Protestant reformer,was inherited from the stern outlook of the Puritans. As one mother wrote, "No child has ever been known,since the earliest period of the world,destitute of an evil disposition—however sweet it appears. "Infant depravity,by which was meant the childs impulses, could be curbed only by breaking the will so that the child submitted completely to parental guidance. In 1834,a mother described this technique:Upon the fathers order,her 16-month-old daughter had refused to say "Dear Mama"so the toddler was left alone in a room where she screamed wildly for ten minutes. After the ten minutes,the child was commanded again,and again she refused,so she was whipped and ordered again. This continued for four hours until the child finally obeyed. Parents commonly reported that after one such trial of "will",the child became permanently submissive. In passing,we can note that knowledge about a childs "No"period might have moderated the disciplining of little children and the application of the saying"Spare the rod and spoil the child". By freeing the child from its evil nature,parents believed they could then guide the child into acquiring the fight character traits,such as honesty,industriousness,and sobriety. These moral principles,fixed in the childs character,were to govern it throughout life,in a society where free enterprise,individual effort,and competition were believed to be the ruling forces.

When the author talks about ideas considered in"the spoiling of children",he does not include the____.

A．nature of a child

B．reasons why spoiling occurs

C．images of an ideal adult and child

D．attitudes of spoiled children when they become adults

opment by putting the final touches on plans to: 1. Build the nation s first system that will heat all major downtown buildings with waste heat now being dumped into the Mississippi River by electric utilities. 2. Create a & 9-million "energy bank"to lend money to improve the energy efficiency of homes at low 9-to-11-percent interest rates. 3. Construct the nations first "energy park". The area will include only those commercial, residential, and industrial facilities that are doing something energy-related. More than & 150-million worth of commitments has already been lined up. These developments did not just happen. They resulted when Mayor George Latimer asked volunteers to chart a new future for a city that is twice as cold as New York. "We cannot any longer look to foreign nations,old companies or the federal government to solve our energy crisis,"Latimer told his constituents. "We must look to ourselves to find the answers. "

The reason why these developments did not happen before was(that)_____.

A．the city imported enough foreign oil for its major downtown buildings

B．the federal government didn"t approve the necessary money for the construction

C．not given

D．St. Paul is colder than New York

ecause there were【C2】______sins he had not committed. But when he woke up in the next【C3】______he found that conditions were not as bad【C4】______he had feared. In fact they were quite good. He had an extremely luxurious room【C5】______himself. The room was air-conditioned—【C6】______a trace of the excessive heat he had feared. He【C7】______food and a smiling waitress immediately【C8】______with a delicious banquet. He felt【C9】______drinking and a large choice of wines was in front of him【C10】______. A couple of weeks of this pleasant life went by and the man began to get【C11】______restless. It was all very nice【C12】______he had been an active man in the other life and he felt he【C13】______like to do somet-hing. He lifted the housephone and a(n) 【C14】______voice came on the line: "Yes,sir,what can we do for you? No【C15】______with room service, I hope? " "Oh,certainly not! The service here is excellent,quite【C16】______my expectations. It is just that I would like to be given an opportunity to do something. " "Im sorry,sir,"came the【C17】______reply,"thats the one thing management cant【C18】______here. " The man began to get annoyed and he said,"In that ease I might【C19】______in Hell! " "Why,sir. "came the surprised voice,"【C20】______did you think you were? "

【C1】

A．trying

B．preparing

C．fearing

D．getting