Edgar Alan Poe was and is an abnormal figure among the major American writers of his period. It seems to have been true of Poe that no one could look at him without seeing more than they would wish.
Poe published The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket in 1838,his only novel. Its importance is suggested by the fact that his major work comes after it. The Narrative’s shortcomings are sometimes considered to be the fact that it was written for money, as it surely was, and as almost everything else Poe wrote was also. This is not exceptional among writers anywhere, though in the case of Poe it is often treated as if his having done so were disgraceful. Be that as it may, the Narrative makes its way to a peak as strange and powerful as anything to be found in his greatest tales.
The word that reoccurs most importantly in Poe's fictions is horror. His stories are often shaped to bring the narrator and the reader to a place where the use of the word is reasonable, where the word and the experience it arouses are explored or by implication defined. Perhaps it is because Poe's tales test the limits of mental health and good manners that he is both popular and criticized.
The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym has the grand scale of the nineteenth-century voyage of discovery, and a different and larger scale in the suggestions that appear as the voyage goes on. The Narrative is frequently compared with Moby-Dick, published thirteen years later, after Poe’s death. Poe uses whiteness as a highly ambiguous symbol, by no means to be interpreted as purity or holiness or by association with any other positive value. There is blackness, too, in The Narrative, specifically associated with the populations that live in the regions nearest the South Pole. The native people in Tasmania, the island south of Australia, were said by explorers and settlers to be black, and were in any case, with the word “black,” swept into the large category of those related to displacement, exploitation, and worse.
Something very like the occupation of Kentucky by white settlers lies behind the events that bring Pym to the far-sighted conclusion of his narrative. In the early years of the nineteenth century the British began what made the native people of Tasmania die out, who had tried to resist white invasion of their island. Such occupations were, of course, a major business of Europeans, or whites, almost everywhere in the world at the time Poe wrote. They, were boasted of as progress. It would have required unusual sensibility in Poe to have taken a different, very dark view of the phenomenon. But he was an unusual man. And the horror that fascinated him and gave such dreadful unity to his tales is often the unavoidable, conflict of the self by a perfect justice, the exposure of a guilty act in a form that makes its reveal a falling back of the mind against itself.
Young Pym is simply telling a story of a kind popular at the time, a voyage adventure lived out beyond the farthest reaches of exploration. The story is disturbed by its own deeper tendencies, the rising through this surface of the kind of recognition that must find expression in another form of literature. As his ship approaches the region of the South Pole, Pym notes the mildness of the climate, coolly listing the resources of the islands, which were assumed by such voyagers to be there for the taking.
If The Narrative were a conventional story, the immense roar and the towering flames might attract the notice of a passing sail—and there would be no need for a note explaining its lacking an ending. But the force of the narrative carries it beyond the fate of individuals, toward an engagement with a reality beyond any temporary human drama.
1.What does the underlined part in Paragraph 1 mean?
A. Allan Poe was a famous America writer of his period.
B. People expect too much of the American writer—Alan Poe.
C. Unlike other writers, Allan Poe is a unique and unusual writer.
D. People think Poe is a popular novelist like other famous writers.
2.Where is the novel The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym probably set?
A. In the South Pacific. B. In Australia.
C. At the South Pole. D. In Kentucky.
3.Which of the following can describe the characteristic of The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym?
A. Poverty is the main theme of the novel.
B. The novel is full of justice elements.
C. Blackness can possibly be felt in the novel.
D. Whiteness is the obvious symbol of the novel.
4.Which of the following might be taken from the novel The Narrative?
A. “One of these adventures was related by way of introduction to a longer narrative.”
B. “Gordon Pym’s father was a respectable trader at Nantucket, where Pym was born.”
C. “The wind, as I before said, blew freshly from the southwest. The night was very cold.”
D. “Pym at length hit upon the idea of working on the terrors and guilty conscience of the mate.”
5.Which of the following statements is True according to the passage?
A. The Narrative is an adventurous story written in a conventional way.
B. The Narrative is considered one of Alan Poe's famous novels.
C. Allan Poe was misunderstood to write The Narrative for money.
D. Readers might not understand why The Narrative ended so abruptly.
Culture can affect not just language and customs, but also how people experience the world on surprisingly basic levels.
Researchers, with the help of brain scans, have uncovered shocking differences in perception（感知）between Westerners and Asians, what they see when they look at a city street, for example, or even how they perceive a simple line in a square, according to findings published in a leading science journal.
In western countries, culture makes people think of themselves as highly independent individuals. When looking at scenes, Westerners tend to focus more on central objects than on their surroundings. East Asian cultures, however, emphasize inter-dependence. When Easterners look at a scene, they tend to focus on surroundings as well as the object.
Using an experiment involving two tasks, Dr Hedden asked subjects to look at a line simply to estimate its length, a task that is played to American strengths. In another, they estimated the line’s length relative to the size of a square, an easier task for the Asians.
The level of brain activity, by tracking blood flow, was then measured by Brain Scanners. The experiment found that although there was no difference in performance, and the tasks were very easy, the levels of activity in the subjects’ brains were different. For the Americans, areas linked to attention lit up more, when they worked on the task they tended to find more difficult—estimating the line’s size relative to the square. For the Asians, the attention areas lit up more during the harder task also—estimating the line’s length without comparing it to the square. The findings are a reflection of more than ten years of previous experimental research into East-West differences.
In one study, for instance, researchers offered people a choice among five pens; four red and one green, Easterners were more likely to choose a red pen while Westerners were more likely to choose the green one.
Culture is not affecting how you see the world, but how you choose to understand and internalize（使内化）it.
But such habits can be changed. Some psychological studies suggest that when an Easterner goes to the West or vice versa, habits of thought and perception also begin to change. Such research gives us clues on how our brain works and is hopeful for us to develop programs to improve our memory, memory techniques and enhance and accelerate our learning skills.
1.According to the passage, Chinese people are most likely to ________.
A. more emphasize independent thinking
B. always focus more on their surroundings
C. focus on the context as well as the object
D. think of Westerners as highly independent units
2.We know from the passage that people’s brains will be more active when ________.
A. the task is much easier B. the blood flow is tracked
C. people begin to choose colors D. the task is more difficult
3.What does Dr Hedden’s experiment in Paragraph 4-5 indicate?
A. Culture has a great impact on the way people talk and behave.
B. Easterners and Westerners perceive the world differently.
C. People’s perception of the world can be changed.
D. Americans are better at calculating than the Asians.
Every Sunday morning I take a light walking around a park near my home. There’s a lake ________ in one corner of the park. Each time I ________ by this lake, I see the same elderly woman sitting at the water’s ________ with a small metal cage sitting beside her.
This past Sunday my ________ got the best of me, so l stopped jogging and walked ________ to her. ________ I got closer, I realized that the metal cage was ________ a small trap. There were three turtles, unharmed, slowly walking around the base of the trap. She had a fourth turtle in her lap ________ she was ________ scrubbing with a spongy brush.
“Hello,” I said. “If you don’t mind my ________, I’d love to know what you’re doing with these turtles.”
She smiled. “I’m cleaning off their shells,” she replied. “________ on a turtle’s shell, like algae or scum, ________ the turtle’s ability to absorb heat and impedes its ability to swim. It can also ________ and weaken the shell over time.”
She went on: “I spend a couple of hours each Sunday morning ,relaxing by this lake and helping these little guys out. It’s my own ________ way of making a difference.”
“But don’t most freshwater turtles live their whole lives with algae and scum ________ from their shells?” I asked.
“Yep, ________, they do,” she replied.
“Well then, don’t you think your time could be better spent? And 99% of these turtles don't have kind people like you to help them clean off their shells. So, no ________...but how exactly are your localized ________ here truly making a difference?”
The woman giggled aloud.
She then ________ at the turtle in her lap, scrubbed off the last piece of algae from its shell, and said, “Sweetie, if this little guy ________ talk, he’d tell you I just made all the difference in the world.
1.A. being located B. locating C. located D. having located
2.A. reach B. hike C. wander D. jog
3.A. surface B. bottom C. position D. edge
4.A. curiosity B. passion C. enthusiasm D. caution
5.A. down B. over C. up D. around
6.A. Until B. As C. While D. After
7.A. in particular B. in return C. in chaos D. in effect
8.A. that B. where C. which D. what
9.A. attentively B. gradually C. directly D. alternatively
10.A. request B. permission C. doubt D. nosiness
11.A. Something B. Anything C. Nothing D. Everything
12.A. broadens B. strengthens C. lowers D. enlarges
13.A. weather B. address C. choke D. split
14.A. common B. unique C. explicit D. potential
15.A. attached B. tied C. hanging D. potential
16.A. fortunately B. basically C. sadly D. absolutely
17.A. wonder B. problem C. offense D. excuse
18.A. contributions B. efforts C. sacrifices D. arrangements
19.A. looked down B. drove away C. tore up D. thought back
20.A. would B. might C. shall D. should
A good competitor will cause you to grow. He will ________ you beyond your former skill level. If you want to get good at chess, play against somebody better at chess than you are.
A. serve B. shelter
C. stretch D. support
It was such a beautiful expression of being the change-a celebration of self-responsibility that rarely is ________ in young people’s lives today.
A. polished B. portrayed
C. progressed D. proposed
The company lost $7 million this quarter ________ a profit of $6.2 million a year earlier.
A. in contrast to B. with regard to
C. in favor of D. at the sacrifice of
