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1、2014 年 6 月英语四级阅读段落匹配题真题及答案 The End of the Book? By John Steele Gordon A). Amazon, by far the largest bookseller in the count ry, reported on May 19 that it is now selling more books i n its electronic Kindle format than in the old paper-and-i nk format. That is remarkable, considering that the Kindl
2、e has only been around for four years. E-books now account for 14 percent of all book sales in this country and are i ncreasing far faster than overall book sales. E-book sales are up 146 percent over last year, while hardback sales i ncreased 6 percent and paperbacks decreased 8 percent. B). Does t
3、his spell the doom of the physical book? Cer tainly not immediately, and perhaps not at all. What it do es mean is that the book business will go through a transf ormation in the next decade or so more profound than any i t has seen since Gutenberg introduced printing from moveab le type in the 1450
4、s. C). Physical books will surely become much rarer in th e marketplace. Mass market paperbacks, which have been dec lining for years anyway, will probably disappear, as will hardbacks for mysteries, thrillers, “romance fiction,“ etc. Such books, which only rarely end up in permanent collect ions ei
5、ther private or public, will probably only be avail able as e-books within a few years. Hardback and trade pap erbacks for “serious“ nonfiction and fiction will surely l ast longer. Perhaps it will become the mark of an author t o reckon with that he or she is still published in hard co py. D). As f
6、or childrens books, who knows? Childrens boo ks are like dog food in that the purchasers are not the co nsumers, so the market (and the marketing) is inherently s trange. E). For clues to the books future, lets look at so me examples of technological change and see what happened to the old technolog
7、y. F). One technology replaces another only because the n ew technology is better, cheaper, or both. Thee greater th e differential, the sooner and more thoroughly the new tec hnology replaces the old. Printing with moveable type on p aper reduced the cost of producing a book by orders of mag nitude
8、 compared with the old-fashioned ones handwritten on vellum, which comes from sheepskin. A Bibleto be sure, a long book required vellum made from 300 sheepskins and untold man-hours of scribe labor. Before printing arrived, a Bible cost more than a middle-class house. There were p erhaps 50,000 book
9、s in all of Europe in 1450. By 1500 ther e were 10 million. G). But while printing quickly caused the handwritten book to go extinct, handwriting lingered on well into the 16th century in the practice of “rubricating“ books, or ha nd drawing elaborate initial letters (often in red ink, he nce the te
10、rm). Very special books are still occasionally p roduced on vellum, but they are one-of-a-kind show pieces. H). Sometimes a new technology doesnt drive the old o ne extinct, but only parts of it while forcing the rest to evolve. The movies were widely predicted to drive live th eater out of the mark
11、etplace, but they didnt, because the ater turned out to have qualities movies could not reprodu ce. Equally, TV was supposed to drive movies extinct but, again, did not. I). Movies did, however, fatally impact some parts of live theater, such as vaudeville. (Ironically, TV gave vau deville a brief r
12、evival in the 1950s in such shows as “Th e Ed Sullivan Show” and brought many of the old vaudevill e stars Sophie Tucker, Jimmy Durante, Ben Blueout of re tirement.) And while TV didnt kill movies, it did kill B pictures, shorts, and, alas, cartoons. J). Nor did TV kill radio. Comedy and drama shows
13、 ( “J ack Benny, ” “Amos and Andy,” “The Shadow ”) all migrat ed to television. But because you cant drive a car and w atch television at the same time, radio prime time became rush hour, while music, talk, and news radio greatly enlar ged their audiences. Radio is today a very different busin ess t
14、han in the late 1940s and a much larger one. K). Sometimes old technology lingers for centuries bec ause of its symbolic power. Mounted cavalry replaced the c hariot on the battlefield around 1000 BC. But chariots mai ntained their place in parades and triumphs right up until the end of the Roman Em
15、pire 1,500 years later. The sword hasnt had a military function for a hundred years, but is still part of an officers full-dress uniform, precisely because a sword always symbolized “an officer and a gentle man.“ L). Sometimes new technology is a little cranky at fir st. Television repairman was a c
16、ommon occupation in the 19 50s, for instance. And so the old technology remains as a back up. Steam captured the North Atlantic passenger busin ess from sail in the 1840s because of its much greater spe ed. But steamships didnt lose their rigging and sails unt il the 1880s, because early marine engi
17、nes had a nasty hab it of breaking down. Until ships became large enough (and engines small enough) to mount two engines side by side, t hey needed to keep sails. (The high cost of steam and the lesser need for speed kept the majority of the worlds oc ean freight moving by sail until the early years
18、 of the 20 th century.) M). Then there is the fireplace. Central heating was u biquitous in upper- and middle-class homes by the second h alf of the 19th century. But functioning fireplaces remain to this day a powerful selling point in a house or apartm ent. I suspect the reason is a deeply ingrain
19、ed, atavistic love of fire. Fire was one of the earliest major technolo gical advances for humankind, providing heat, protection, and cooked food (which is much easier to eat and digest). Human control of fire goes back far enough (over a million years) that evolution could have produced a genetic p
20、redi sposition towards fire as a central aspect of a human habi tation (just consider the phrase “hearth and home“). N). Books especially books the average person could a fford havent been around long enough to produce evoluti onary change in humans. But they have a powerful hold on m any people non
21、etheless, a hold extending far beyond their literary content. At their best, they are works of art and there is a tactile pleasure in books necessarily lost in e-book versions. The ability to quickly flip through pages is also lost. And a room with books in it induces, at lea st in some, a feeling n
22、ot dissimilar to that of a fire in the fireplace on a cold winters night. O). For these reasons I think physical books will have a longer existence as a commercial product than some curr ently predict. Like swords, books have symbolic power. Lik e fireplaces, they induce a sense of comfort and warmt
23、h. A nd, perhaps, similar to sails, they make a useful backup f or when the lights go out. 46. Authors still published in printed versions will b e considered important ones. 答案：D 解析：对应 D段末句。 printed versions(纸质版本 )对应 hard copy( 印刷版本 )，be considered important ones(被认为重要 ) 对应 become the mark,to recko
24、n(认为是标志) 。 47. Some people are still in favor of printed books be cause of the sense of touch they can provide. 答案： N 解析：对应 N段第三句提到的 tactile pleasure in books(书 本的触觉上的愉悦 )。 48. The radio business has changed greatly and now att racts more listeners. 答案： J 解析：对应 J 段最后两句。 changed greatly(巨大改变 ) 对应 a v
25、ery different business(相当不同的行业 ) ，attracts more li steners( 吸引更多听众 )对应 enlarged their audience(扩大受众 面)。 49. Contrary to many people s prediction of its death, the film industry survived. 答案： H 解析：对应 H段第二句。 many peoples prediction对应 wi dely predicted。 50. Remarkable changes have taken place in the bo
26、ok bu siness. 答案： A 解析：这是对 A段所描述的电子书在近几年内大幅增长的现象 的概括。 51. Old technology sometimes continues to exist becaus e of its reliability. 答案： L 解析：对应 L 段第三句。 continues to exist(继续存在 ) 对应 remain( 保持) ，reliability(可靠)对应 backup( 支持、后盾 ) 。 52. The increase of e-book sales will force the book b usiness to make
27、changes not seen for centuries. 答案： B 解析：对应 B段第三句。 ma ke changes( 做出改变 ) 对应 go through a transformation(经历转 变)，not seen for centuries是对该句后部分时间表达的概括。 53. A new technology is unlikely to take the place of an old one without a clear advantage. 答案： F 解析：对应 F段第一句。 a clear advantage(明显优势 ) 岁对 b etter, che
28、aper or both的概括。take the place of(代替) 对应 r eplace( 代替) 。 54. Paperbacks of popular literature are more likely t o be replaced by e-books. 答案： C 解析：完全对应 C段第二句。 55. A house with a fireplace has a stronger appeal to buyers. 答案： M 解析： 对应 M段第三句。has a stronger appeal to buyers(对 购买者有很强吸引力 )对应 a powerful selling point(强劲卖点 ) 。