高级英语第二册8-12课paraphrase

第八课

1….by the very fact of production, he has risen above the animal kingdom.

Because of the fact itself that man produces, he has developed far beyond all other animals.

2. Work is also his liberator from nature, his creator as a social and independent of nature.

Work also frees man from nature and makes him into a social being independent of nature.

3. …all are expressions of the creative transformation of nature by man’s reason and skill.

All the above-mentioned work shows how man has transformed nature through his reason and skill.

4. There is no split of work and play, or work and culture.

Therefore pleasure and work went together; so did the cultural development of the worker go hand in hand with the work he was doing.

5. Work became the chief factor in a system of “inner worldly asceticism”, an answer to man’s sense of aloneness and isolation.

Work became the chief element in a system that preached an austere and self-denying way of life. Work was the only thing that brought relief to those who felt alone and isolated leading this kind of ascetic life.

6. Work has became alienated from the working person.

In capitalist society the worker feels estranged from or hostile to the work he is doing.

7. Work is a means of getting money, not in itself a meaning human activity.

Work helps the worker to earn some money; and earning money only is an activity without much significance or purpose.

8. …a pay check is not enough to base one’s self-respect on.

Just earning some money is not enough to make a worker have a proper respect of himself.

9. …most industrial psychologists are mainly concerned with the manipulation of the worker’s psyche.

Most industrial psychologists are mainly trying to manage and control the mind of the worker.

10. It is going to pay off in cold dollars and cents to management.

Better relations with the public will yield larger profits to management. The management will earn larger profits if it has better relations with the public.

11. But this usefulness often serves only as a rationalization for the appeal to complete passivity and receptivity.

The fact that many gadgets are indeed useful is often used by advertisers as a more \"high-minded\" cover for what is really a vulgar, base appeal to idleness and willingness to accept things.

12. He has a feeling of fraudulency about his product and a secret contempt for it.

The businessman knows the quality or usefulness of his product is not what it should be. He despises the goods he produces, conscious of the deception involved.

第九课

1. With a clamor of bells that set the swallows soaring, the Festival of Summer came to the city Omelas.

The loud ringing of the bells, which sent the frightened swallows flying high, marked the beginning of the Festival of Summer in Omelas.

2. Their high calls rising like the swallows’ crossing flights over the music and singsing.

The shouting of the children could be heard clearly above the music and singing like the calls of the swallows flying by overhead.

3. Exercised their restive horses before the race.

The riders were putting the horses through some exercises because the horses were eager to start and stubbornly resisting the control of the riders.

4. Given a description such as this one tends to make certain assumptions.

After reading the above description the reader is likely to assume certain things.

5. These were not simple folk, not dulcet shepherds, noble savages, bland utopians.

The citizens of Omelas were not simple people, not kind and gentle shepherds, not savages of high birth, nor mild idealists dreaming of a perfect society.

6. This is the treason of artist: a refusal to admit the banality of evil and the terrible boredom of pain.

An artist betrays his trust when he does not admit that evil is nothing fresh nor novel and pain is very dull and uninteresting.

7. They were nature, intelligent, passionate adults whose lives were not wretched.

They were fully developed and intelligent grown-up people full of intense feelings and they were not miserable people.

8. Perhaps it would be best if you imagined it as your own fancy bids, assuming it will rise to the occasion.

Perhaps it would be best if the reader pictures Omelas to himself as his imagination tells him, assuming his imagination will be equal to the task.

9. The faint insistent sweetness of drooz may perfume the way of the city.

The faint but compelling sweet scent of the drug drooz may fill the streets of the city.

10. Perhaps it was born defective, or perhaps it has become imbecile through fear, malnutrition and neglect.

Perhaps the child was mentally retarded because it was born so or perhaps it has become very foolish and stupid because of fear, poor nourishment and neglect.

11. Its habits are too uncouth for it to respond to humane treatment.

The habits of the child are so crude and uncultured that it will show no sign of improvement even if it is treated kindly and tenderly.

12. Their tears at the bitter injustice dry when they begin to perceive the terrible justice of reality, and to accept it.

They shed tears when they see how terribly unjust they have been to the child, but these tears dry up when they realize how just and fair though terrible reality was.

第十课

1. The slightest mention of the decade brings nostalgic recollections to the middle-aged.

At the very mention of this post-war period, middle-aged people begin to think about it longingly.

2. The rejection of Victorian gentility was, in any case, inevitable.

In any case, an American could not avoid casting aside its middle-class respectability and affected refinement.

3. The war acted merely as a catalytic agent in this breakdown of the Victorian social structure.

The war only helped to speed up the breakdown of the Victorian social structure.

4. It was tempted, in America at least, to escape its responsibilities and retreat behind an air of naughty alcoholic sophistication.

In America at least, the young people were strongly inclined to shirk their responsibilities. They pretended to be worldly-wise, drinking and behaving naughtily.

5. Prohibition afforded the young the additional opportunity of making their pleasures illicit.

The young people found greater pleasure in their drinking because Prohibition, by making drinking unlawful added a sense of adventure.

6. Our young men began to enlist under foreign flags.

Our young men joined the armies of foreign countries to fight in the war.

7. They “wanted to get into the fun before the whole thing turned belly up”.

The young people wanted to take part in the glorious ad-venture before the whole war ended.

8. They had outgrown towns and families.

These young people could no longer adapt themselves to lives in their home towns or their families.

9. The returning veteran also had to face the sodden, Napoleonic cynicism of Versailles, the hypocritical do-goodism of Prohibition.

The returning veteran also had to face Prohibition which the lawmakers hypocritically assumed would do good to the people.

10. Something in tension-ridden youth of America had to “give”.

(Under all this force and pressure) something in the youth of America, who were already very tense, had to break down.

11. It was only natural that hopeful young writers, their minds and pens inflamed against war, Babbittry, and “Puritanical” gentility, should flock to the traditional artistic center.

It was only natural that hopeful young Writers whose minds and writings were filled with violent anger against war, Babbitry, and \"Puritanical\" gentility, should come in great numbers to live in Greenwich Village, the traditional artistic centre.

12. Each town had its “fast” set which prided itself on its unconventionality.

Each town was proud that it had a group of wild, reckless people, who lived unconventional lives.

第十一课

1. Below the noisy arguments, the abuse and the quarrels, there is a reservoir of instinctive fellow-feeling.

The English people may hotly argue and abuse and quarrel with each other but there still exists a lot of natural sympathetic feeling for each other.

2. At heart they would like to take a whip to the whole idle troublesome mob of them.

What the wealthy employers would really like to do is to whip all the workers whom they consider to be lazy and troublesome people.

3. There are not many of these man, either on the board or the shop floor.

There are not many snarling shop stewards in the work-shop, nor are there many cruel wealthy employers on the board of managers (or governing board of a factory).

4. It demands bigness, and they are suspicious of bigness.

The contemporary world demands that everything be done on a big scale and the English do not like

or trust bigness.

5. Against this, at least superficially, Englishness seems a poor shadowy show.

At least on the surface, when Englishness is put against the power and success of Admass, Englishness seems to put up a rather poor weak performance.

6. While Englishness is not hostile to change, it is deeply suspicious of change for change’s sake.

Englishness is not against change, but it believes that changing just for changing and for no other useful purpose to be very wrong and harmful.

7. To put cars and motorways before houses seems to Englishness a communal change’s sake.

To regard cars and motorways as more important than houses seems to Englishness a public stupidity~

8. I must add that while English can still fight on, Admass could be winning.

I must further say that while Englishness can go on fighting, there is a great possibility of Admass winning.

9. It must have some moral capital to draw upon, and soon it may be asking for an overdraft.

Englishness draws its strength from a reservoir of strong moral and ethical principles, and soon it may be asking for strength which this reservoir of principles cannot supply.

10. They probably believe, as I do, that the Admass “Good Life” is a fraud on all counts.

These people probably believe, as I do, that the 'Good Life' promised by Admass is false and dishonest in all respects.

11. They can be found, too — though not in large numbers because the breed is dying out — among crusty High Tories who avoid the City and directors’ fees.

They can be found too though there are not many of them now because these kind of people are dying out -- among the curt, bad-tempered, extremely conservative politicians who refuse to accept high posts in big commercial enterprises.

12. They are inept, shiftless, slovenly, messy.

They are incompetent, lazy and inefficient, careless and untidy.

13. He will not even find much satisfaction in this scrounging messy existence, which does nothing for a man’s self-respect.

He will not even find much satisfaction in his untidy and disordered life where he manages to live as a parasite by sponging on people. This kind of life does not help a person to build up any self-respect.

14. To them the House of Commons is a remote squabbling-shop.

These people think of the House of Commons as a place rather far away where some people are always quarreling and arguing over some small matter.

15. Heavy hands can fall on the shoulders that have been shrugging away politics.

If a dictator comes to power, these people then will soon learn in the worst way that they were very wrong to ignore politics for they can now suddenly and for no reason be arrested and thrown into prison.

第十二课

1. It is a complex fate to be an American.

The fate of an American is complicated and hard to understand.

2. They were no more at home in Europe than I was.

They were uneasy and uncomfortable in Europe as I was.

3. We were both searching for our separate identities.

They were all trying to find their own special individualities.

4. I do not think that could have made this reconciliation here.

I don't think I could have accepted in America my Negro status without feeling ashamed.

5. Europe can be very crippling too.

Europe can also have a very frustrating or disabling effect.

6. It is easier to cut across social and occupational lines there than it is here.

It is easier in Europe for people of different social groups and occupations to intermingle and have social intercourse.

7. A man can be as proud of being a good waiter as of being a good actor, and in neither case feel threatened.

In Europe a good waiter and a good actor are equally proud of their social status and position. They are not jealous of each other and do not live in fear of losing their position.

8. I was born in New York, but have lived only in pockets of it.

I was born in New York but have lived only in some small areas of the city.

9. This reassessment, which can be very painful, is also very valuable.

The reconsideration of the significance and importance of many things that one had taken for granted in the past can be very painful, though very valuable.

10. On this acceptance, literally, the life of a writer depends.

The life of a writer really depends on his accepting the fact that no matter where he goes or what he does he will always carry the marks of his origins.

11. American writers do not have a fixed society to describe.

American writers live in a mobile society where nothing is fixed, so they do not have a fixed society to describe.

12. Every society is really governed by hidden laws, by unspoken but profound assumptions on the part of the people.

Every society is influenced and directed by hidden laws, and by many things deeply felt and taken for granted by the people, though not openly spoken about.