题目内容

The works of Shakespeare and Wordsworth are “rocket-boosters” to the brain and better therapy than self-help books, researchers will say this week.
Scientists, psychologists and English academics at Liverpool University have found that reading the works of the Bard and other classical writers has a beneficial effect on the mind, catches the reader’s attention and cause moments of self-reflection.
Using scanners, they monitored the brain activity of volunteers as they read works by William Shakespeare, William Wordsworth, T.S Eliot and others.
They then “translated” the texts into more “straightforward”, modern language and again monitored the readers’ brains as they read the words.
Scans showed that the more “challenging” prose (散文)and poetry set off far more electrical activity in the brain than the more pedestrian versions.
Scientists were able to study the brain activity as it responded to each word and record how it “lit up” as the readers encountered unusual words, surprising phrases or difficult sentence structure.
This “lighting up” of the mind lasts longer than the initial electrical spark, shifting the brain to a higher gear, encouraging further reading.
The research also found that reading poetry, in particular, increases activity in the right hemisphere (半球)of the brain, an area concerned with “autobiographical memory”, helping the reader to reflect on and reappraise their own experiences in light of what they have read. The academics said this meant the classics were more useful than self-help books.
Philip Davis, an English professor who has worked on the study with the university’s magnetic resonance centre, will tell a conference this week: “Serious literature acts like a rocket-booster to the brain.
"The research shows the power of literature to shift mental pathways, to create new thoughts, shapes and connections in the young and the elderly alike.”
【小题1】How do classics such as Shakespeare and Wordsworth benefit the readers?

A.They set off far less electrical activity in the brain.
B.They light up the mind shorter than the initial electrical spark.
C.They shift physical pathways in the young and the elderly.
D.They draw readers’ attention and help make self-examination.
【小题2】Why does the author mention” They then” translated”… modern language“?
A.To prove that classics are more useful than ordinary versions.
B.To show self-help books act like rocket-boosters to the brain.
C.To tell serious literature sets off far less electrical activity.
D.To make known ordinary versions set off more electrical activity
【小题3】What can we conclude according to the researchers?
A.Self-help books are more valuable than classics.
B.Serious literature lights up the mind shorter than ordinary versions.
C.The right hemisphere of the brain is related to autobiographical memory.
D.Literature has a beneficial effect only on the mind of the young.
【小题4】Which of the following would be the best title for the passage?
A.Ordinary Versions Create New Thoughts
B.Modern Language Increases the Brain
C.Classics Help lmprove the Brain Activity
D.Self-help Books, Rocket-boosters


【小题1】D
【小题2】A
【小题3】C
【小题4】C

解析试题分析:本文介绍了最新研究的成果,作者引述了一些人的观点和研究成果来证明经典的文学对提高大脑的活动非常有益。
【小题1】细节题。从文章reading the works of the Bard and other classical writers has a beneficial effect on the mind, catches the reader’s attention and cause moments of self-reflection. 可知,读这些经典著作有助于自我的反省,故选D
【小题2】细节题。从文章Scans showed that the more “challenging” prose (散文)and poetry set off far more electrical activity in the brain than the more pedestrian versions.可知作者之所以提到以上的话是为了给我们说明经典的书要比普通的书要更加有用,故选A
【小题3】推断题。从文章The research also found that reading poetry, in particular, increases activity in the right hemisphere (半球)of the brain, an area concerned with “autobiographical memory”,可知,大脑的右半球与自传式记忆有关,故选C
【小题4】主旨题。从第一段The works of Shakespeare and Wordsworth are “rocket-boosters” to the brain and better therapy than self-help books, researchers will say this week.及最后一段可知,本文的标题应该为经典的东西能够提高大脑的活动,故选C
考点:科普类说明文
点评:本文文脉清晰,句意中生词有一定的难度。说明文是历年高考很常见的文体,对于科技类的说明文比较难。本文中,把握好一个中心即作者对读经典著作的好处进行了对比介绍。同时,此类文章中推断题要理解作者写作的意图,方可作答。

练习册系列答案
相关题目

A.American & British Classics
A classic is a literary work which has stood the test of time. Generations of readers have turned to classics to discover that which is ever-lasting. Through both the works themselves and the people they mirror, we may better be able to see ourselves.
B. Creative Writing
Creating Writing does not only provide us with an opportunity to express ourselves, but also holds our attention to word choice, paragraph development, and other skills useful in writing.
C. Technical Writing
It's a course which can help you to improve your communication skills in, for arid through technology.
D. Journalism
It's a course for seniors, in which we will cover how 10 gather, write and report the news. We will discuss how information is, or can be organized.
E. Non-fiction
The course is a study of non-fiction through reading many different types of non-fiction. The course will also be about the possible changes in journalistic reporting and the sharing of personal stories of various people on various topics such as travel and adventure.
请阅读以下学生的相关信息,然后匹配和他/她拟要选择的课程:
【小题1】______. Lucy .wants to become a famous reporter in the world. She is eager to have the course which can help her to realize her dream.
【小题2】_____. Sally's vocabulary is very large, but she can not organize what she write well, which makes her writing illogically. She wants to get some more skill of it.
【小题3】_____. Lily can not know how to communicate with others as a. writer. She needs to improve the skill of it badly.
【小题4】_______. Jenny wants to become a writer of biography. Therefore, she wants to choose a course connected with it.
【小题5】_______. Mary is interested in Mark Twain, especially his novels which arc full of humors. She really want to know some other writers who were born in the same country as Mark Twain was.

Sir,

Just over six months ago, I saw an advertisement in the Morning Mail for a set of the complete works of William Shakespeare. Your company, Cosmo books Ltd., offered this set (eight books of plays and two books of poetry) at what was claimed to be a ‘remarkable’ price: fifteen pounds and fifty pence, including postage and packing. I had wanted a set of Shakespeare’s plays and poems for some time, and these books, in red imitation leather, looked particularly attractive; so I sent for them.

Two weeks later, the books arrived, together with a set of the complete works of Charles Dickens which I had not ordered. So I returned the Dickens books to you, with a cheque for fifteen pounds and fifty pence for the works of Shakespeare. Two more weeks passed. Then there arrived on my door step a second set of the works of Shakespeare, the same set of novels by Dickens and a six book set of the plays of Moliere, in French. Since I do not read French, these were of no use to me at all. However, I could not afford to post all these books back to you, so I wrote to you at the end of August of last year, instructing you to come and collect all the books that I did not want, and asking you not to send any other books until further notice.

You did not reply to that letter. Instead you sent me a bill for forty two pounds, and a set of the plays of Schiller, in German. Since then, a new set of books has arrived every two weeks, the works of Goethe, the poems of Milton, the plays of Strindberg; I hardly know what I have. The books are still all in their boxes, in the garage, and my car has to stand in the rain outside.

I have no room for any more books, and even if I read from now until the Last Judgment, I should not finish reading all the books that you have sent me.

Please send no more books, send no more bills, send no more angry letters demanding payment. Just send one large lorry and take all the books away, leaving me only with the one set of the complete works of Shakespeare for which I have paid.

Yours faithfully,

SIMON WALKER

1.Simon Walker wrote the letter to ________

A.urge for the final solution to the problem with the unwanted books

B.complain about getting books he didn’t want.

C.advise readers not to order books from Cosmo Books Ltd..

D.show his anger to Cosmo Books Ltd...

2.The advertisement that Mr. Walker saw in the Morning Mail was for ________

A.unlimited number of Cosmo Books.

B.fifteen pounds and fifty pence

C.a set of 10 books of the works of Shakespeare.

D.a book containing all the plays and poems of Shakespeare.

3.Mr. Walker answered the advertisement because ________

A.he claimed that the books were being offered at a remarkable price

B.he wanted a set of Shakespeare’s works which was a good bargain.

C.he had ordered the set and had been waiting for them to come for some time.

D.the set he already had was not particularly attractive.

 

第二节 信息匹配(共5小题,每小题2分,满分10分)

若选E项填涂AB :若选F项填涂CD

请根据A至F各课程的介绍和个各人的情况说明,选出符合各人要求的最佳选项。

A. A Look at American Literature(文学)

A Look at American Literature is a course(课程), which gives us a brief outline of American

Literature.

B. Works(作品) of Some Famous American Writers

Works of Some Famous American Writers show us the introductions to eleven famous writers

and their works and also give us some comments on the works.

C. Detailed Reading of American Literature

Detailed Reading of American Literature is a course which focuses on some important and  

moving details in the works of American literature. It will analyse the detail.

D. Story and Plot

It’s a course which analyses the setting of the main plots in some famous stories. The aim of this

course is to help those who want to become writers in the future.

E. Characters and Life

As you know, literature comes from our life, but it’s more than our life. This course will analyze

the personalities of some important characters in the world literature, and combine the analysis

with our life. It will help us gain wisdom from the characters.

F. Literature Comments

The course is a study of how to write literature comments through some vivid examples.

请阅读以下学生的相关信息,然后匹配他/她和拟要选择的课:

Helen wants to become a famous writer in the future. She is eager to take a course which can help her realize her dream.

Peter was ill last term and missed a lot of lessons in American literature. He wants to take a course which can give him an outline of it.

Kate likes to read literature works and she has many opinions after reading, but she doesn’t know how to express her ideas properly.

Tommy has the basic knowledge of American literature. He wants to take a course which can help him read more famous works about American literature.

Jerry wants to write some articles to show the significance of researching literature today. He is looking for a course which can help him.

待选课程学生                        课程名称

66. Helen                     A.  A Look at American Literature

67. Peter                      B.  Works of Some Famous American Writers

68. Kate                      C.  Detailed Reading of American Literature

69. Tommy                   D.  Story and Plot

70. Jerry                      E.  Characters and Life

F.  Literature Comments

 

The painter Georgia O’keeffe was born in Wisconsin in 1887 and grew up on her family’s farm. At seventeen she decided she wanted to be an artist and left the farm for schools in Chicago and New York, but she never lost her bond with the land. Like most painters, O’Keeffe painted the things that were most important to her, and nearly all her works are simplified portrayals of nature.

O’Keeffe became famous when her paintings were discovered and exhibited in New York by the photographer Levered Stieglitz, whom she married in 1924. During a visit to New York in 1929, O’Keeffe was so moved by the bleak(荒凉的) landscape and broad skies of the Western desert that she began to paint its images. Cows’ skulls and other bleached(变白的) bones found in the desert figured prominently(突出的) in her paintings. When her husband died in 1946, she moved to New Mexico permanently and used the horizon lines of the desert, colorful flowers, rocks, barren(贫瘠的) hills, and the sky as subjects for her paintings. Although O’Keeffe painted her best known works in the 1920’s, 1930’s and 1940’s, she continued to produce tributes(贡品、颂词) to the Western desert until her death in 1986.

O’Keeffe is widely considered to have been a pioneering American modernist painter. While most early modern American artists were strongly influenced by European art, O’Keeffe’s position was more independent. She established her own vision and preferred to view her painting as a private endeavor. Almost from the beginning, her work was more indentifiably American than that of her contemporaries in its simplified and idealized treatment of color, light, space, and natural forms.

1. Which of the following best tells what this passage is about ?

A.O’Keeffe was a distinctive modern American painter.

B.O’Keeffe was the best painter of her generation.

C.O’Keeffe liked to paint only what was familiar to her.

D.O’Keeffe used colors and shapes that are too reduced and simple.

2.Which of the following is NOT mentioned as an influence on O’Keeffe’s paintings ?

A.Her rural upbringing

B.Her life in the West

C.The works of European artists

D.The appearance of the natural landscape

3.Which of the following is most similar to O’Keeffe’s relationship with nature?

A.A photoghrapher’s relationship with a model.

B.A writer’s relationship with a publisher.

C.A student’s relationship with a teacher

D.A carpenter’s relationship with a hammer.

4.Why is O’Keeffe considered an artistic pioneer ?

A.Her work became influential in Europe.

B.She painted the American Southwest.

C.Her paintings had a definite American style.

D.She painted things that were familiar to her.

 

 

It is true that good writers rewrite and rewrite and then rewrite some more. But in order to work up the desire to rewrite, it is important to learn to like what you write at the early stage.  

I am surprised at the number of famous writers I know who say that they so dislike reading their own writing later that they even hate to look over the publishers’ opinions. One reason we may dislike reading our own work is that we’re often disappointed that the rich ideas in our minds seem very thin and plain when first written down. Jerry Fodor and Steven Pinker suggest that this fact may be a result of how our minds work. .  

Different from popular belief ,we do not usually think in the works and sentences of ordinary language but in symbols for ideas (known as “mentalese”), and writing our ideas down is an act of translation from that symbolic language . But while mentalese contains our  thoughts in the form of a complex tapestry (织锦),writing can only be composed one thread at a time . Therefore it should not be surprising that our first attempt at expressing ideas should look so simple. It is only by repeatedly rewriting that we produces new threads and connect them to get closer to the ideas formed in our minds.  

When people write as if some strict critics (批评家) are looking over their shoulder , they are so worried about what this critic might say that they get stuck before they even start. Peter Elbow makes an excellent suggestion to deal with this problem. When writing we should have two different minds. At the first stage, we should see every idea, as well as the words we use to express it ,as wonderful and worth putting down . It is only during rewrites that we should examine what we excitedly wrote in the first stage and check for weaknesses.  

1.What do we learn from the text about those famous writers? 

A  They often regret writing poor works 

B Some of them write surprisingly much.  

C Many of them hate reading their own works 

D They are happy to review the publishers’ opinions.  

2.What do people generally believe about the way human minds work? 

A People think in words and sentences.  

B Human ideas are translated into symbols 

C People think by connecting threads of ideas.  

D Human thoughts are expressed through pictures.  

3.What can we conclude from the text? 

A Most people believe we think in symbols.  

B Loving our own writing is scientifically reasonable.  

C The writers and critics can never reach an agreement.  

D Thinking and writing are different stages of mind at work.  

 

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