1997年英语专业八级考试真题及答案1-TEM专业英语四八级考试-优易学

1997年英语专业八级考试真题及答案1

来源：优易学 2010-1-12 14:17:30 【优易学：中国教育考试门户网】资料下载外语书店

Part Ⅲ
Reading Comprehension (40 min)
SECTION A READING COMPREHENSION (30 min)
In this section there are four reading passages followed by a total of fifteen multiple-choice questions. Read the passages and then mark your answers on your Coloured Answer Sheet.

 TEXT A

A magazine’s design is more than decoration, more than simple packaging. It expresses the magazine’s very character. The Atlantic Monthly has long attempted to provide a design environment in which two disparate traditions—literary
and journalistic—can co-exist in pleasurable dignity. The redesign that we in
troduce with this issue—the work of our art director, Judy Garlan—represents, we think, a notable enhancement of that environment.
Garlan explains some of what was in her mind as she began to create the new design: “I saw this as an opportunity to bring the look closer to matching the
elegance and power of the writing which the magazine is known for. The overall
design has to be able to encompass a great diversity of styles and subjects—urgent pieces of reporting, serious essays, lighter pieces, lifestyle-oriented pieces, short stories, poetry. We don’t want lighter pieces to seem too heavy, and we
don’t want heavier pieces to seem too petty. We also use a broad range of art
and photography, and the design has to work well with that, too. At the same time
, the magazine needs to have a consistent feel, needs to underscore the sense that everything in it is part of one Atlantic World.
The primary typefaces Garlan chose for this task are Times Roman, for a more readable body type, and Bauer Bodoni, for a more stylish and flexible display
type(article titles, large initials, and so on). Other aspects of the new design
are structural. The articles in the front of the magazine, which once flowed in
to one another, now stand on their own, to gain prominence. The Travel column, now featured in every issue, has been moved from the back to the front. As noted
in this space last month, the word “Monthly” rejoins “The Atlantic” on the cover, after a decade long absence.
Judy Garlan came to the Atlantic in 1981 after having served as the art director of several other magazines. During her tenure here The Atlantic has won more than 300 awards for visual excellence, from the Society of illustrators, the American Institute of Graphic Arts, the Art Directors Club, Communication Arts, and elsewhere. Garlan was in various ways assisted in the redesign by the entire art-department staff: Robin Gilmore, Barnes, Betsy Urrico, Gillian Kahn, and Is a Manning.
The artist Nicholas Gaetano contributed as well: he redrew our colophon (the figure of Neptune that appears on the contents page)and created the symbols that will appear regularly on this page(a rendition of our building) ,on the Puzzler page, above the opening of letters, and on the masthead. Gaetano, whose work manages to combine stylish clarity and breezy strength, is the cover artist for this issue.
16. Part of the new design is to be concerned with the following EXCEPT ___.
A. variation in the typefaces
B. reorganization of articles in the front
C. creation of the travel column
D. reinstatement of its former name
17. According to the passage, the new design work involves ___.
A. other artists as well
B. other writers as well
C. only the cover artist
D. only the art director
18. This article aims to ___.
A. emphasize the importance of a magazine’s design
B. introduce the magazine’s art director
C. persuade the reader to subscribe to the magazine
D. inform the reader of its new design and features

TEXT B

WHY SHOULD anyone buy the latest volume in the ever-expanding Dictionary of
National Biography? I do not mean that it is bad, as the reviewers will agree.
But it will cost you 65 pounds. And have you got the rest of volumes? You need the basic 22 plus the largely decennial supplements to bring the total to 31. Of course, it will be answered, public and academic libraries will want the new volume. After all, it adds 1,068 lives of people who escaped the net of the original compilers. Yet in 10 year’s time a revised version of the whole caboodle, called the New Dictionary of National Biography, will bbe published. Its editor, Proessor Colin Matthew, tells me that he will have room for about 50,000 lives, some 13,000 more than in the current DNB. This rather puts the 1,068 in Missing Persons in the shade.
When Dr. Nicholls wrote to The Spectator in 1989 asking for name of peoplewhom readers had looked up in the DNB and had been disappointed not to find, she says that she received some 100,000 suggestions. (Well, she had written to ’ot her quality newspapers’ too. )As soon as her committee had whittled the numbersdown, the professional problems of an editor began. Contributors didn’t file copy on time; some who did sent too much: 50,000 words instead of 500 is a record, according to Dr. Nicholls.
There remains the dinner-party game of who’s in, who’s out. That is a game that the reviewers have played and will continue to play. Criminals were my initial worry. After all, the original edition of the DNB boasted: Malefactors whose crimes excite a permanent interest have received hardly less attention than benefactors. Mr. John Gross clearly had similar anxieties, for he complains that, while the murderer Christie is in, Crippen is out. One might say in reply that the injustice of the hanging of Evans instead of Christie was a force in the repeal of capital punishment in Britain, as Ludovie Kennedy (the author of Christies entry in Missing Persons ) notes. But then Crippen was reputed as the first murderer to be caught by telegraphy(he had tried to escape by ship to America).
It is surprising to find Max Miller excluded when really not very memorable names get in. There has been a conscious effort to put in artists and architects from the Middle Ages. About their lives not much is always known.
Of Hugo of Bury St Edmunds, a 12th-century illuminator whose dates of birth and death are not recorded, his biographer comments: ‘Whether or not Hugo was a wall-painter, the records of his activities as carver and manuscript painter attest to his versatility’. Then there had to be more women, too( 12 percent, against the original DBN’ s 3), such as Roy Strong’ s subject, the Tudor painterLevina Teerlinc, of whom he remarks: ‘Her most characteristic feature is a head attached to a too small, spindly body. Her technique remained awkward, thin and often cursory’. Doesn’t seem to qualify her as a memorable artist. Yet it may be better than the record of the original DNB, which included lives of people who never existed(such as Merlin) and even managed to give thanks to J. W. Clerke as a contributor, though, as a later edition admits in a shamefaced footnote, ‘except for the entry in the List of Contributors there is no trace of J. W. Clerke’.
19. The writer suggests that there is no sense in buying the latest volume ___.
A. because it is not worth the price
B. because it has fewer entries than before
C. unless one has all the volumes in the collection
D. unless an expanded DNB will come out shortly
20. On the issue of who should be included in the DNB, the writer seems to suggest that ___.
A. the editors had clear roles to follow
B. there were too many criminals in the entries
C. the editors clearly favoured benefactors
D. the editors were irrational in their choices
21. Crippen was absent from the DNB ___.
A. because he escaped to the U.S.
B. because death sentence had been abolished
C. for reasons not clarified
D. because of the editors’ mistake
22. The author quoted a few entries in the last paragraph to ___.
A. illustrate some features of the DNB
B. give emphasis to his argument
C. impress the reader with its content
D. highlight the people in the Middle Ages
23. Throughout the passage, the writer’s tone towards the DNB was ___.
A. complimentary B. supportive C. sarcastic D. bitter