Mark Twain has been called the inventor of the American novel. And he surely deserves additional praise: the man who popularized the clever literary attack on racism.

I say clever because anti-slavery fiction had been the important part of the literature in the years before the Civil War. H. B. Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin is only the most famous example. These early stories dealt directly with slavery. With minor exceptions, Twain planted his attacks on slavery and prejudice into tales that were on the surface about something else entirely. He drew his readers into the argument by drawing them into the story.

Again and again, in the postwar years, Twain seemed forced to deal with the challenge of race. Consider the most controversial, at least today, of Twain’s novels, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Only a few books have been kicked off the shelves as often as Huckleberry Finn, Twain’s most widely read tale. Once upon a time, people hated the book because it struck them as rude. Twain himself wrote that those who banned the book considered the novel “trash and suitable only for the slums (贫民窟).” More recently the book has been attacked because of the character Jim, the escaped slave, and many occurences of the word nigger. (The term Nigger Jim, for which the novel is often severely criticized, never appears in it.)

But the attacks were and are silly—and miss the point. The novel is strongly anti-slavery. Jim’s search through the slave states for the family from whom he has been forcibly parted is heroic. As J. Chadwick has pointed out, the character of Jim was a first in American fiction—a recognition that the slave had two personalities, “the voice of survival within a white slave culture and the voice of the individual: Jim, the father and the man.”

There is much more. Twain’s mystery novel Pudd’nhead Wilson stood as a challenge to the racial beliefs of even many of the liberals of his day. Written at a time when the accepted wisdom held Negroes to be inferior (低等的) to whites, especially in intelligence, Twain’s tale centered in part around two babies switched at birth. A slave gave birth to her master’s baby and, for fear that the child should be sold South, switched him for the master’s baby by his wife. The slave’s lightskinned child was taken to be white and grew up with both the attitudes and the education of the slave-holding class. The master’s wife’s baby was taken for black and grew up with the attitudes and intonations of the slave.

The point was difficult to miss: nurture (养育), not nature, was the key to social status. The features of the black man that provided the stuff of prejudice—manner of speech, for example— were, to Twain, indicative of nothing other than the conditioning that slavery forced on its victims.

Twain’s racial tone was not perfect. One is left uneasy, for example, by the lengthy passage in his autobiography (自传) about how much he loved what were called “nigger shows” in his youth—mostly with white men performing in black-face—and his delight in getting his mother to laugh at them. Yet there is no reason to think Twain saw the shows as representing reality. His frequent attacks on slavery and prejudice suggest his keen awareness that they did not.

Was Twain a racist? Asking the question in the 21st century is as wise as asking the same of Lincoln. If we read the words and attitudes of the past through the “wisdom” of the considered moral judgments of the present, we will find nothing but error. Lincoln, who believed the black man the inferior of the white, fought and won a war to free him. And Twain, raised in a slave state, briefly a soldier, and inventor of Jim, may have done more to anger the nation over racial injustice and awaken its collective conscience than any other novelist in the past century.

1. How do Twain’s novels on slavery differ from Stowe’s?

A．Twain was more willing to deal with racism.

B．Twain’s attack on racism was much less open.

C．Twain’s themes seemed to agree with plots.

D．Twain was openly concerned with racism.

2.Recent criticism of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn arose partly from its ______.

A．target readers at the bottom

B．anti-slavery attitude

C．rather impolite language

D．frequent use of “nigger”

3.What best proves Twain’s anti-slavery stand according to the author?

A．Jim’s search for his family was described in detail.

B．The slave’s voice was first heard in American novels.

C．Jim grew up into a man and a father in the white culture.

D．Twain suspected that the slaves were less intelligent.

4.The story of two babies switched mainly indicates that ______.

A．slaves were forced to give up their babies to their masters

B．slaves’ babies could pick up slave-holders’ way of speaking

C．blacks’ social position was shaped by how they were brought up

D．blacks were born with certain features of prejudice

5.What does the underlined word “they” in Paragraph 7 refer to?

A．The attacks.                            B．Slavery and prejudice.

C．White men.                            D．The shows.

6.What does the author mainly argue for?

A．Twain had done more than his contemporary writers to attack racism.

B．Twain was an admirable figure comparable to Abraham Lincoln.

C．Twain’s works had been banned on unreasonable grounds.

D．Twain’s works should be read from a historical point of view.

Mark Twain has been called the inventor of the American novel. And he surely deserves additional praise: the man who popularized the clever literary attack on racism.
I say clever because anti-slavery fiction had been the important part of the literature in the years before the Civil War. H. B. Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin is only the most famous example. These early stories dealt directly with slavery. With minor exceptions, Twain planted his attacks on slavery and prejudice into tales that were on the surface about something else entirely. He drew his readers into the argument by drawing them into the story.
Again and again, in the postwar years, Twain seemed forced to deal with the challenge of race. Consider the most controversial, at least today, of Twain’s novels, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Only a few books have been kicked off the shelves as often as Huckleberry Finn, Twain’s most widely read tale. Once upon a time, people hated the book because it struck them as rude. Twain himself wrote that those who banned the book considered the novel “trash and suitable only for the slums (贫民窟).” More recently the book has been attacked because of the character Jim, the escaped slave, and many occurences of the word nigger. (The term Nigger Jim, for which the novel is often severely criticized, never appears in it.)
But the attacks were and are silly—and miss the point. The novel is strongly anti-slavery. Jim’s search through the slave states for the family from whom he has been forcibly parted is heroic. As J. Chadwick has pointed out, the character of Jim was a first in American fiction—a recognition that the slave had two personalities, “the voice of survival within a white slave culture and the voice of the individual: Jim, the father and the man.”
There is much more. Twain’s mystery novel Pudd’nhead Wilson stood as a challenge to the racial beliefs of even many of the liberals of his day. Written at a time when the accepted wisdom held Negroes to be inferior (低等的) to whites, especially in intelligence, Twain’s tale centered in part around two babies switched at birth. A slave gave birth to her master’s baby and, for fear that the child should be sold South, switched him for the master’s baby by his wife. The slave’s lightskinned child was taken to be white and grew up with both the attitudes and the education of the slave-holding class. The master’s wife’s baby was taken for black and grew up with the attitudes and intonations of the slave.
The point was difficult to miss: nurture (养育), not nature, was the key to social status. The features of the black man that provided the stuff of prejudice—manner of speech, for example— were, to Twain, indicative of nothing other than the conditioning that slavery forced on its victims.
Twain’s racial tone was not perfect. One is left uneasy, for example, by the lengthy passage in his autobiography (自传) about how much he loved what were called “nigger shows” in his youth—mostly with white men performing in black-face—and his delight in getting his mother to laugh at them. Yet there is no reason to think Twain saw the shows as representing reality. His frequent attacks on slavery and prejudice suggest his keen awareness that they did not.
Was Twain a racist? Asking the question in the 21st century is as wise as asking the same of Lincoln. If we read the words and attitudes of the past through the “wisdom” of the considered moral judgments of the present, we will find nothing but error. Lincoln, who believed the black man the inferior of the white, fought and won a war to free him. And Twain, raised in a slave state, briefly a soldier, and inventor of Jim, may have done more to anger the nation over racial injustice and awaken its collective conscience than any other novelist in the past century.
【小题1】 How do Twain’s novels on slavery differ from Stowe’s?

Mark Twain has been called the inventor of the American novel. And he surely deserves additional praise: the man who popularized the clever literary attack on racism.

I say clever because anti-slavery fiction had been the important part of the literature in the years before the Civil War. H. B. Stowe’s Uncle Toms Cabin is only the most famous example. These early stories dealt directly with slavery. With minor exceptions, Twain planted his attacks on slavery and prejudice into tales that were on the surface about something else entirely. He drew his readers into the argument by drawing them into the story.

Again and again, in the postwar years, Twain seemed forced to deal with the challenge of race. Consider the most controversial, at least today, of Twain’s novels, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Only a few books have been kicked off the shelves as often as Huckleberry Finn, Twain’s most widely read tale. Once upon a time, people hated the book because it struck them as rude. Twain himself wrote that those who banned the book considered the novel “ trash and suitable only for the slums (贫民窟).” More recently the book has been attacked because of the character Jim, the escaped slave, and many occurences of the word nigger. (The term Nigger Jim, for which the novel is often severely criticized, never appears in it.)

But the attacks were and are silly—and miss the point. The novel is strongly anti-slavery. Jim’s search through the slave states for the family from whom he has been forcibly parted is heroic. As J. Chadwick has pointed out, the character of Jim was a first in American fiction—a recognition that the slave had two personalities, “the voice of survival within a white slave culture and the voice of the individual: Jim, the father and the man.”

There is much more. Twain’s mystery novel Pudd’nhead Wilson stood as a challenge to the racial beliefs of even many of the liberals of his day. Written at a time when the accepted wisdom held Negroes to be inferior (低等的) to whites, especially in intelligence, Twain’s tale centered in part around two babies switched at birth. A slave gave birth to her master’s baby and, for fear that the child should be sold South, switched him for the master’s baby by his wife. The slave’s lightskinned child was taken to be white and grew up with both the attitudes and the education of the slave-holding class. The master’s wife’s baby was taken for black and grew up with the attitudes and intonations of the slave.

The point was difficult to miss: nurture (养育),not nature, was the key to social status. The features of the black man that provided the stuff of prejudice—manner of speech, for example— were, to Twain, indicative of nothing other than the conditioning that slavery forced on its victims.

Twain’s racial tone was not perfect. One is left uneasy, for example, by the lengthy passage in his autobiography (自传)about how much he loved what were called “nigger shows” in his youth—mostly with white men performing in black-face—and his delight in getting his mother to laugh at them. Yet there is no reason to think Twain saw the shows as representing reality. His frequent attacks on slavery and prejudice suggest his keen awareness that they did not.

Was Twain a racist? Asking the question in the 21st century is as wise as asking the same of Lincoln. If we read the words and attitudes of the past through the “wisdom” of the considered moral judgments of the present, we will find nothing but error. Lincoln, who believed the black man the inferior of the white, fought and won a war to free him. And Twain, raised in a slave state, briefly a soldier, and inventor of Jim, may have done more to anger the nation over racial injustice and awaken its collective conscience than any other novelist in the past century.

65. How do Twain’s novels on slavery differ from Stowe’s?

A. Twain was more willing to deal with racism.

B. Twain’s attack on racism was much less open.

C. Twain’s themes seemed to agree with plots.

D. Twain was openly concerned with racism.

66. Recent criticism of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn arose partly from its ______.

A. target readers at the bottom

B. anti-slavery attitude

C. rather impolite language

D. frequent use of “nigger”

67. What best proves Twain’s anti-slavery stand according to the author?

A. Jim’s search for his family was described in detail.

B. The slave’s voice was first heard in American novels.

C. Jim grew up into a man and a father in the white culture.

D. Twain suspected that the slaves were less intelligent.

68. The story of two babies switched mainly indicates that ______.

A. slaves were forced to give up their babies to their masters

B. slaves’ babies could pick up slave-holders’ way of speaking

C. blacks’ social position was shaped by how they were brought up

D. blacks were born with certain features of prejudice

69. What does the underlined word “they” in Paragraph 7 refer to?

A. The attacks.                                        B. Slavery and prejudice.

C. White men.                                          D. The shows.

70. What does the author mainly argue for?

A. Twain had done more than his contemporary writers to attack racism.

B. Twain was an admirable figure comparable to Abraham Lincoln.

C. Twain’s works had been banned on unreasonable grounds.

D. Twain’s works should be read from a historical point of view.

Thomas Edison, the inventor of the first successful practical light bulb, created the very first strand (串) of electric lights. During the Christmas season of 1880, these strands were put around the outside of his Menlo Park Laboratory. Railroad passengers traveling by the laboratory got their first look at an electric light display. But it would take almost forty years for electric Christmas lights to become the tradition that we all know and love.

Before electric Christmas lights, families would use candles to light up their Christmas trees. This practice was often dangerous and led to many home fires. Edward H. Johnson put the very first string of electric Christmas tree lights together in 1882. Johnson, Edison's friend and partner in the Edison Illumination Company (灯具公司), hand wired 80 red, white and blue light bulbs and wound them around his Christmas tree. Not only was the tree illuminated (照亮) with electricity, it also revolved (转动). However, the world was not quite ready for electrical illumination. There was a great mistrust(不信任) of electricity and it would take many more years for society to decorate its Christmas trees and homes with electric lights. In 1895, President Cleveland requested that the White House family Christmas tree be illuminated by hundreds of multi?colored electric light bulbs.

On Christmas Eve 1923, President Calvin Coolidge began the country's celebration of Christmas by lighting the National Christmas Tree with 3,000 electric lights on the Ellipse located south of the White House.

Until 1903, when General Electric began to offer pre?assembled kits (组装好的设备)of Christmas lights, stringed lights were reserved for the wealthy and electrically savvy (有见识的). The wiring of electric lights was very expensive and required the hiring of the services of a wireman, our modern?day electrician. According to some, to light an average Christmas tree with electric lights before 1903 would have cost $2000 in today's dollars.

While Thomas Edison and Edward H. Johnson may have been the first to create electric strands of lights in 1880 / 1882, it was Albert Sadacca who saw a future in selling electric Christmas lights. The Sadacca family owned a different and unusual lighting company and in 1917 Albert, a teenager at the time, suggested that its store offer brightly colored strands of Christmas lights to the public. By the 1920s Albert and his brothers organized the National Outfit Manufacturer's Association (NOMA), a trade association. NOMA soon became NOMA Electric Co, with its members cornering the Christmas light market until the 1960s.

A. campaign　　　　　 B. noted　　　　　　　　　 C. focus　　　　　　　　　　　　　 D. careful　　 E. released

F. fall　　　　　　　　　　 G. trend　　　　　　　 H. dead　　　　　　　　 I. major　　　　　　　　 J. extended

WASHINGTON (Reuters) — The U.S. unemployment rate probably rose in October as employers stepped up hiring only slightly, underscoring President Barack Obama’s vulnerability in next week’s presidential election.

Employers likely added 125,000 jobs to their payrolls last month, according to a Reuters survey of economists. That would be up from 114,000 in September, but would 　 41　 short of what is needed to quickly cut the jobless rate.

Indeed, economists expect the unemployment rate — a key 　　42　 in the neck-and-neck race for the White House ——to tick up by a tenth of a percentage point to 7.9 percent, reversing part of a surprise drop seen in September.

The Labor Department's closely watched report, which will be 　 43 at 8:30 a.m. (12:30 GMT) on Friday, will be the last 　44 report card on the economy before Tuesday's presidential election, which pits (使竞争）President Obama against Republican Mitt Romney.

If economists are right, it will show the eighth straight month of dull job growth, a worrisome　 45 that would likely reinforce the Federal Reserve's resolve to keep easy money policies in place until the economy shows more vigor.

"The weakness in overall economic growth momentum has 　 46 into the last quarter of the year," said Millan Mulraine, an economist at TD Securities in New York.

Romney has made the nation's feeble jobs market, which has caused Obama a lot of trouble since he took office in 2009, the centerpiece of his 　 47 . The last Reuters/Ipsos daily tracking poll showed Obama and Romney in a 　 48　 heat.

Still, the report could provide fodder for both candidates. Some economists have 　 49　 an increase in the jobless rate might have a silver lining if it is driven by Americans pouring into the labor market to restart job hunts.