第一部分：课文朗读（30%）
Unit 1 The Tail of Fame
Para 1.
An artist who seeks fame is like a dog chasing his own tail who, when he captures it, does not know what else to do but to continue chasing it. The cruelty of success is that it often leads those who seek such success to participate in their own destruction.
Para 2.
"Don't quit your day job!" is advice frequently given by understandably pessimistic family members and friends to a budding artist who is trying hard to succeed. The conquest of fame is difficult at best, and many end up emotionally if not financially bankrupt. Still, impure motives such as the desire for worshipping fans and praise from peers may spur the artist on.
The lure of drowning in fame's imperial glory is not easily resisted.
Para 3.
Those who gain fame most often gain it as a result of exploiting their talent for singing, dancing, painting, or writing, etc. They develop a style that agents market aggressively to hasten popularity, and their ride on the express elevator to the top is a blur. Most would be hard-pressed to tell you how they even got there. Artists cannot remain idle, though. When the performer, painter or writer becomes bored, their work begins to show a lack of continuity in its appeal and it becomes difficult to sustain the attention of the public. After their enthusiasm has dissolved, the public simply moves on to the next flavor of the month. Artists who do attempt to remain current by making even minute changes to their style of writing, dancing or singing, run a significant risk of losing the audience's favor. The public simply discounts styles other than those for which the artist has become famous.
Para 4.
Famous authors' styles—a Tennessee Williams play or a plot by Ernest Hemingway or a poem by Robert Frost or T.S. Eliot—are easily recognizable. The same is true of painters like Monet, Renoir, or Dali and moviemakers like Hitchcock, Fellini, Spielberg, Chen Kaige or Zhang Yimou. Their distinct styles marked a significant change in form from others and gained them fame and fortune. However, they paid for it by giving up the freedom to express themselves with other styles or forms.
Para 5.
Fame's spotlight can be hotter than a tropical jungle—a fraud is quickly exposed, and the pressure of so much attention is too much for most to endure. It takes you out of yourself: You must be what the public thinks you are, not what you really are or could be. The performer, like the politician, must often please his or her audiences by saying things he or she does not mean or fully believe.
Para 6.
One drop of fame will likely contaminate the entire well of a man's soul, and so an artist who remains true to himself or herself is particularly amazing. You would be hard-pressed to underline many names of those who have not compromised and still succeeded in the fame game. An example, the famous Irish writer Oscar Wilde, known for his uncompromising behavior, both social and sexual, to which the public objected, paid heavily for remaining true to himself. The mother of a young man Oscar was intimate with accused him at a banquet in front of his friends and fans of sexually influencing her son. Extremely angered by her remarks, he sued the young man's mother, asserting that she had damaged his "good" name. He should have hired a better attorney, though. The judge did not second Wilde's call to have the woman pay for damaging his name, and instead fined Wilde. He ended up in jail after refusing to pay, and even worse, was permanently expelled from the wider circle of public favor. When things were at their worst, he found that no one was willing to risk his or her name in his defense. His price for remaining true to himself was to be left alone when he needed his fans the most.
Para 7.
Curiously enough, it is those who fail that reap the greatest reward: freedom! They enjoy the freedom to express themselves in unique and original ways without fear of losing the support of fans. Failed artists may find comfort in knowing that many great artists never found fame until well after they had passed away or in knowing that they did not sell out. They may justify their failure by convincing themselves their genius is too sophisticated for contemporary audiences.
Para 8.
Single-minded artists who continue their quest for fame even after failure might also like to know that failure has motivated some famous people to work even harder to succeed. Thomas Wolfe, the American novelist, had his first novel Look Homeward, Angel rejected 39 times before it was finally published. Beethoven overcame his father, who did not believe that he had any potential as a musician, to become the greatest musician in the world. And Pestalozzi, the famous Swiss educator in the 19th century, failed at every job he ever had until he came upon the idea of teaching children and developing the fundamental theories to produce a new form of education. Thomas Edison was thrown out of school in the fourth grade, because he seemed to his teacher to be quite dull. Unfortunately for most people, however, failure is the end of their struggle, not the beginning.
Para 9.
I say to those who desperately seek fame and fortune: good luck. But alas, you may find that it was not what you wanted. The dog who catches his tail discovers that it is only a tail. The person who achieves success often discovers that it does more harm than good. So instead of trying so hard to achieve success, try to be happy with who you are and what you do. Try to do work that you can be proud of. Maybe you won't be famous in your own lifetime, but you may create better art.
Unit 3 Longing for a New Welfare System
Para 1
A welfare client is supposed to cheat. Everybody expects it. Faced with sharing a dinner of raw pet food with the cat, many people in wheelchairs I know bleed the system for a few extra dollars. They tell the government that they are getting two hundred dollars less than their real pension so they can get a little extra welfare money. Or, they tell the caseworker that the landlord raised the rent by a hundred dollars.
Para 2.
I have opted to live a life of complete honesty. So instead, I go out and drum up some business and draw cartoons. I even tell welfare how much I make! Oh, I'm tempted to get paid under the table. But even if I yielded to that temptation, big magazines are not going to get involved in some sticky situation. They keep my records, and that information goes right into the government's computer. Very high-profile.
Para 3.
As a welfare client I'm expected to bow before the caseworker. Deep down, caseworkers know that they are being made fools of by many of their clients, and they feel they are entitled to have clients bow to them as compensation. I'm not being bitter. Most caseworkers begin as college-educated liberals with high ideals. But after a few years in a system that practically requires people to lie, they become like the one I shall call "Suzanne", a detective in shorts.
Para 4.
Not long after Christmas last year, Suzanne came to inspect my apartment and saw some new posters pasted on the wall. "Where'd you get the money for those? " she wanted to know.
Para 5.
"Friends and family."
Para 6.
"Well, you'd better have a receipt for it, by God. You have to report any donations or gifts."
Para 7.
This was my cue to beg. Instead, I talked back. "I got a cigarette from somebody on the street the other day. Do I have to report that? "
Para 8.
"Well, I'm sorry, but I don't make the rules, Mr. Callahan."
Para 9.
Suzanne tries to lecture me about repairs to my wheelchair, which is always breaking down because welfare won't spend money maintaining it properly."You know, Mr. Callahan, I've heard that you put a lot more miles on that wheelchair than average."
Para 10.
Of course I do.
I'm an active worker, not a vegetable.
I live near downtown, so I can get around in a wheelchair.
I wonder what she'd think if she suddenly broke her hip and had to crawl to work.
Para 11.
Government cuts in welfare have resulted in hunger and suffering for a lot of people, not just me. But people with spinal cord injuries felt the cuts in a unique way: The government stopped taking care of our chairs. Each time mine broke down, lost a screw, needed a new roller bearing, the brake wouldn't work, etc., and I called Suzanne, I had to endure a little lecture. Finally, she'd say, "Well, if I can find time today, I'll call the medical worker."
Para 12.
She was supposed to notify the medical worker, who would certify that there was a problem. Then the medical worker called the wheelchair repair companies to get the cheapest bid. Then the medical worker alerted the main welfare office at the state capital. They considered the matter for days while I lay in bed, unable to move. Finally, if I was lucky, they called back and approved the repair.
Para 13.
When welfare learned I was making money on my cartoons, Suzanne started "visiting" every fortnight instead of every two months. She looked into every corner in search of unreported appliances, or maids, or a roast pig in the oven, or a new helicopter parked out back. She never found anything, but there was always a thick pile of forms to fill out at the end of each visit, accounting for every penny.
Para 14.
There is no provision in the law for a gradual shift away from welfare. I am an independent businessman, slowly building up my market. It's impossible to jump off welfare and suddenly be making two thousand dollars a month. But I would love to be able to pay for some of my living and not have to go through an embarrassing situation every time I need a spare part for my wheelchair.
Para 15.
There needs to be a lawyer who can act as a champion for the rights of welfare clients, because the system so easily lends itself to abuse by the welfare givers as well as by the clients. Welfare sent Suzanne to look around in my apartment the other day because the chemist said I was using a larger than usual amount of medical supplies. I was, indeed: The hole that has been surgically cut to drain urine had changed size and the connection to my urine bag was leaking.
Para 16.
While she was taking notes, my phone rang and Suzanne answered it. The caller was a state senator, which scared Suzanne a little. Would I sit on the governor's committee and try to do something about the thousands of welfare clients who, like me, could earn part or all of their own livings if they were allowed to do so, one step at a time?
Para 17.
Someday people like me will thrive under a new system that will encourage them, not seek to convict them of cheating. They will be free to develop their talents without guilt or fear—or just hold a good, steady job.
Unit 5 Choose to Be Alone on Purpose
Para 1.
Here we are, all by ourselves, all 22 million of us by recent count, alone in our rooms, some of us liking it that way and some of us not. Some of us divorced, some widowed, some never yet committed.
Para 2.
Loneliness may be a sort of national disease here, and it's more embarrassing for us to admit than any other sin. On the other hand, to be alone on purpose, having rejected company rather than been cast out by it, is one characteristic of an American hero. The solitary hunter or explorer needs no one as they venture out among the deer and wolves to tame the great wild areas. Thoreau, alone in his cabin on the pond, his back deliberately turned to the town. Now, that's character for you.
Para 3.
Inspiration in solitude is a major commodity for poets and philosophers. They're all for it. They all speak highly of themselves for seeking it out, at least for an hour or even two before they hurry home for tea.
Para 4.
Consider Dorothy Wordsworth, for instance, helping her brother William put on his coat, finding his notebook and pencil for him, and waving as he sets forth into the early spring sunlight to look at flowers all by himself. "How graceful, how benign, is solitude," he wrote.
Para 5.
No doubt about it, solitude is improved by being voluntary.
Para 6.
Look at Milton's daughters arranging his cushions and blankets before they silently creep</10> away, so he can create poetry. Then, rather than trouble to put it in his own handwriting, he calls the girls to come back and write it down while he dictates.
Para 7.
You may have noticed that most of these artistic types went outdoors to be alone. The indoors was full of loved ones keeping the kettle warm till they came home.
Para 8.
The American high priest of solitude was Thoreau. We admire him, not for his self-reliance, but because he was all by himself out there at Walden Pond, and he wanted to be—all alone in the woods.
Para 9.
Actually, he lived a mile, or 20 minutes' walk, from his nearest neighbor; half a mile from the railroad; three hundred yards from a busy road. He had company in and out of the hut all day, asking him how he could possibly be so noble. Apparently the main point of his nobility was that he had neither wife nor servants, used his own axe to chop his own wood, and washed his own cups and saucers. I don't know who did his laundry; he doesn't say, but he certainly doesn't mention doing his own, either. Listen to him: "I never found the companion that was so companionable as solitude."
Para 10.
Thoreau had his own self-importance for company. Perhaps there's a message here: The larger the ego, the less the need for other egos around. The more modest and humble we feel, the more we suffer from solitude, feeling ourselves inadequate company.
Para 11
If you live with other people, their temporary absence can be refreshing. Solitude will end on Thursday. If today I use a singular personal pronoun to refer to myself, next week I will use the plural form. While the others are absent you can stretch out your soul until it fills up the whole room, and use your freedom, coming and going as you please without apology, staying up late to read, soaking in the bath, eating a whole pint of ice cream at one sitting, moving at your own pace.
Those absent will be back. Their waterproof winter coats are in the closet and the dog keeps watching for them at the window. But when you live alone, the temporary absence of your friends and acquaintances leaves a vacuum; they may never come back.
Para 12
The condition of loneliness rises and falls, but the need to talk goes on forever. It's more basic than needing to listen. Oh, we all have friends we can tell important things to, people we can call to say we lost our job or fell on a slippery floor and broke our arm. It's the daily succession of small complaints and observations and opinions that backs up and chokes us. We can't really call a friend to say we got a parcel from our sister, or it's getting dark earlier now, or we don't trust that new Supreme Court justice.
Para 13
Scientific surveys show that we who live alone talk at length to ourselves and our pets and the television. We ask the cat whether we should wear the blue suit or the yellow dress. We ask the parrot if we should prepare steak, or noodles for, dinner. We argue with ourselves over who is the greater sportsman: that figure skater or this skier. There's nothing wrong with this. It's good for us, and a lot less embarrassing than the woman in front of us in line at the market who's telling the cashier that her niece Melissa may be coming to visit on Saturday, and Melissa is very fond of hot chocolate, which is why she bought the powdered hot chocolate mix, though she never drinks it herself.
Para 14.
It's important to stay rational.
Para 15.
It's important to stop waiting and settle down and make ourselves comfortable, at least temporarily, and find some grace and pleasure in our condition, not like a self-centered British poet but like a patient princess sealed up in a tower, waiting for the happy ending to our fairy tale.
Para 16.
After all, here we are. It may not be where we expected to be, but for the time being we might as well call it home. Anyway, there is no place like home.
Unit 10 How to Cultivate EQ
Para 1.
What is the most valuable contribution employees make to their companies, knowledge or judgment? I say judgment. Knowledge, no matter how broad, is useless until it is applied. And application takes judgment, which involves something of a sixth sense—a high performance of the mind.
Para 2.
This raises interesting questions about the best training for today's business people. As Daniel Goleman suggests in his new book, Emotional Intelligence, the latest scientific findings seem to indicate that intelligent but inflexible people don't have the right stuff in an age when the adaptive ability is the key to survival.
Para 3.
In a recent cover story, Time magazine sorted through the current thinking on intelligence and reported, "New brain research suggests that emotions, not IQ, may be the true measure of human intelligence." The basic significance of the emotional intelligence that Time called "EQ" was suggested by management expert Karen Boylston: "Customers are telling businesses, 'I don't care if every member of your staff graduated from Harvard. I will take my business and go where I am understood and treated with respect.'"
Para 4.
If the evolutionary pressures of the marketplace are making EQ, not IQ, the hot ticket for business success, it seems likely that individuals will want to know how to cultivate it. I have a modest proposal: Embrace a highly personal practice aimed at improving these four adaptive skills.
Para 5.
Raising consciousness. I think of this as thinking differently on purpose. It's about noticing what you are feeling and thinking and escaping the conditioned confines of your past. Raise your consciousness by catching yourself in the act of thinking as often as possible. Routinely take note of your emotions and ask if you're facing facts or avoiding them.
Para 6.
Using imagery. This is what you see Olympic ski racers doing before entering the starting gate.
With their eyes closed and bodies swaying, they run the course in their minds first, which improves their performance. You can do the same by setting aside time each day to dream with passion about what you want to achieve.
Para 7.
Considering and reconsidering events to choose the most creative response to them. When a Greek philosopher said 2,000 years ago that it isn't events that matter but our opinion of them, this is what he was talking about. Every time something important happens, assign as many interpretations to it as possible, even crazy ones. Then go with the interpretation most supportive of your dreams.
Para 8.
Integrating the perspectives of others. Brain research shows that our view of the world is limited by our genes and the experiences we've had. Learning to incorporate the useful perspectives of others is nothing less than a form of enlarging your senses. The next time someone interprets something differently from you—say, a controversial political event—pause to reflect on the role of life experience and consider it a gift of perception.
Para 9.
The force of habit—literally the established wiring of your brain—will pull you away from practicing these skills. Keep at it, however, because they are based on what we're learning about the mechanism of the mind.
Para 10.
Within the first six months of life the human brain doubles in capacity.
It doubles again by age four and then grows rapidly until we reach sexual maturity. The body has about a hundred billion nerve cells, and every experience triggers a brain response that literally shapes our senses. The mind, we now know, is not confined to the brain but is distributed throughout the body's universe of cells. Yes, we do think with our hearts, brains, muscles, blood and bones.
Para 11.
During a single crucial three-week period during our teenage years, chemical activity in the brain is cut in half. That done, we are "biologically wired" with what one of the nation's leading brain researchers calls our own "world view". He says it is impossible for any two people to see the world exactly alike. So unique is the personal experience that people would understand the world differently.
Para 12.
However, it is not only possible to change your world view, he says, it's actually easier than overcoming a drug habit. But you need a discipline for doing it. Hence, the method recommended here.
Para 13.
No, it's not a curriculum in the sense that an MBA is. But the latest research seems to imply that without the software of emotional maturity and self-knowledge, the hardware of academic training alone is worth less and less.
第二部分：简答题（30%）
Unit 1
1. How do you understand “for most people, failure is the end of struggle, not the beginning”?
2. Is fame something you will strive to seek? Give your reasons.
3. What do famous writers, painters and moviemakers have to give up in order to maintain their fame and fortune?
4. In which way is the performer similar to the politician?
Unit 3
1. What should an effective welfare system be like?
2. If you were a caseworker, what would you do when faced with welfare clients cheating?
3. How could Mr. Callahan get his wheelchair repaired?
Unit 5
1. Do you think solitude can give rise to inspiration? Give your reasons.
2. Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of solitude or living alone.
3. How will the temporary absence of friends affect a person?
4. What can be learned from Thoreau’s choice of the solitary way of life?
5. Why do poets and philosophers like solitude?
Unit 10
1. Why is the adaptive ability the key to survival in this age?
2. What should people do to raise their consciousness?
3. What is the suggestion for people who want to develop their emotional intelligence?
4. Do you have any advice to improve emotional intelligence?
第三部分：话题（40%）
1. Describe your ideal job.
2. Describe an important success in your life.
3. Describe your favorite mode of transport.
4. What should we learn in our college life?
5. Should people be promoted according to their ability?
6. Work to live or live to work?
7. Can you mention the most important three factors that matter in your life? And why?
8. Describe a place which is near water and you enjoyed visiting.
9. What are the differences between Chinese music and western music? Which do you prefer?
10. Describe a gift you have received and tell us why you think it is special for you.
11. Education is the single most important factor in the development of a country. Do you agree?
12. What are the advantages of Chinese education that you think should be passed on to the next generation?
13. Do you want to be a celebrity, why or why not?
14. What is the thing you will strive to seek? Give your reasons?
15. What are the most important qualities to be successful in your own field?
16. Conceive (构想)an effective social welfare system for your own old age.
17. Distinguish “solitary” and “lonely” or distinguish “solitude” and “loneliness”. Do you often feel Lonely? Why?
18. What qualities are essential for a right decision-making as far as you are concerned?
19. What do you think are your obligations for the moment?
20. Exemplify(举例说明) your standards for choosing friends.
备注：口语考试分三个部分：第一部分 朗读一段课文（30%） ；第二部分 简答题 简单回答两个问题（30%）；第三部分 话题 就所给的话题阐述你的看法和观点（40%）。
