2013 DSE English Past Paper 閱讀材料 (中英翻譯 + MP3 配音) 免費版

2013 DSE English Past Paper

• (A) TERRA-COTTA WARRIORS IN COLOR

  
  

• (B1) Master teaches a much–loved instrument

  
  

• (B2) The Triumph of Dystopian Literature

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TERRA-COTTA WARRIORS IN COLOR - A

彩繪兵馬俑

[1] It was a dazzling spectacle: a life-size army of painted clay soldiers buried to guard an emperor’s tomb. Now archaeologists and artists, armed with the latest tools and techniques, are bringing that ancient vision back to life.

[2] In an earthen pit in central China, under what used to be their village’s persimmon orchard, three middle-aged women are hunched over an ancient jigsaw puzzle. Yang Rongrong, a cheerful 57-year-old turns over a jagged piece in her callused hands and fits it into the perfect spot. The other women laugh as if enjoying an afterncon amusement in their village near the city of Xian. What Yang and her friends are doing, in fact, is piecing together the 2,200- year-old mystery of the terra-cotta army, part of the celebrated (and still dimly understood) burial complex of China’s first emperor, Qin Shi Huang Di. 

[3] It usually takes Yang and her co-workers many days to transform a heap of clay fragments into a full-size warrior, but today they are lucky, accomplishing the task in a matter of hours. Yang has been solving such puzzles since 1974, when farmers from her village of Xiyang first unearthed pottery and a sculpted head while digging a well for their orchard. Having helped reassemble an army of a thousand warriors, Yang examines a clay head sheathed in protective plastic. Visible through the wrap are flashes of pink and red, brilliant hues that hint at the original glory of the terra-cotta warriors.

[4] The monochrome figures that visitors to Xian’s terra-cotta army museum see today actually began as the multicolored fantasy of a ruler whose grandiose ambitions extended beyond the mortal realm. The first emperor to unify China under a single dynasty, Qin Shi Huang Di packed a lot into his earthly reign, from 221 to 210 B.C. Aside from building the first lengths of the Great Wall, the tyrannical reformer standardized the nation’s writing system, currency, and measurements, and provided the source for the English word we now use for China (Qin is pronounced Chin).

[5] All the while, the emperor prepared for the afterlife, commanding the construction of the burial complex that covers 35 square miles. Qin’s army of clay soldiers and horses was not a somber procession but a supernatural display of bold colors: red and green, purple and yellow. Sadly, most of the colors did not survive the crucible of time — or the exposure to air that comes with discovery and excavation. In earlier digs, archaeologists often watched helplessly as the warriors’ colors disintegrated in the dry Xian air. One study showed that once exposed, the lacquer underneath the paint begins to curl after 15 seconds and flake off in just four minutes —vibrant pieces of history lost in the time it takes to boil an egg.

[6] Now a combination of serendipity and new preservation techniques is revealing the terra-cotta army’s true colors. three-year excavation in Xian’s most famous site, known as Pit 1, has yielded more than a hundred soldiers, some still adorned with painted features, including black hair, pink faces, and black or brown eyes. The best-preserved specimens were found at the bottom of the pit, where a layer of mud created by flooding acted as a sort of 2,000-year-long spa treatment.  

[7] Almost thirty years ago, Chinese researchers started working with experts from the Conservation Office in Germany to develop a preservative known as PEG to help save the warriors’ colors. During a recent excavation, the moment a painted artifact was unearthed, workers sprayed any bit of exposed color with the solution, then wrapped it in plastic to keep in the protective moisture. The most colorful pieces (and the earth surrounding them) have been removed to an on-site laboratory for further treatment. To everyone’s delight, the modern techniques for preserving ancient colors seem to be working.

[8] In a narrow trench on the north side of Pit 1, archaeologist Shen Maosheng leads me past what look like terra-cotta backpacks strewn across the reddish soil. They are, in fact, clay quivers still bristling with bronze arrows. Shen and I skirt the remnants of a freshly excavated chariot, then stop beside a plastic sheet. ‘Want to see a real find?’ he asks.

[9] Lifting the sheet, Shen unveils a jagged, three-foot-long shield. The wood has rotted away, but the shield’s delicate design and brilliant reds, greens, and whites are imprinted on the earth. A few steps away is an intact military drum whose leather surface has left another glorious pattern on the dirt, its crimson lines as fine as human hair. Together with the imprints of finely woven silk and linen textiles also found here, these artifacts offer clues about the distinctive artistry that flourished under the Qin dynasty and the vibrant palette that infused it.

[10] With so much color and artistry imprinted on the soil —the ancient paint, alas, adheres to dirt more readily than to lacquer —Chinese preservationists are now trying to preserve the earth itself. ‘We are treating the earth as an artifact,’ says Rong Bo, the museum’s head chemist, who helped develop a binding agent that holds the soil together so the color won’t be lost. The next challenge, Rong says, will be to find an acceptable method for reapplying this color to the warriors.

[11] With less than one percent of the vast tomb complex excavated so far, it may take centuries to uncover all that remains hidden. But the pace of discovery is quickening. In 2011 the museum launched two long-term excavation projects on the flanks of the 250-foot-high central burial mound. Exploratory digs in this area a decade ago uncovered a group of terracotta acrobats and strong men. More extensive excavations will yield ‘mind-boggling discoveries’ which will amaze _ everyone, predicts Wu Yongqi, the museum’s director.

[12] Down in Pit 1, Yang tightens the straps that hold her reconstructed warrior together. His head, still wrapped in plastic, is beaded with moisture. His lifelike pigment has been preserved, and his body will go on display at the museum with all of the cracks and fissures he received during his 2,200 years underground.

[13] In the early days of the Xian excavations, the fractures and imperfections of the terra-cotta warriors were plastered over. Now, reflecting the evolution of the museum’s views on historical accuracy, a new army is forming on the pit’s west end, cracks and all. In every statue Yang’s handiwork is plainly visible. ‘It’s nothing special,’ she says with a modest smile. And with that, she and her village friends get back to work, piecing together the puzzle beneath the roots of their old persimmon trees.

Master teaches a much–loved instrument - B1

老師教導備受喜愛的樂器

[1] The guzheng has been a _ popular Chinese instrument since ancient times. It originated during the Warring States period and first became popular during the Qin Dynasty.

[2] After surviving the turbulent times of the Cultural Revolution, its popularity was restored and today it is one of the most loved Chinese instruments, recognised as a representative of traditional Chinese culture around the world.

[3] ‘Chinese people are attracted to [learning] the guzheng because they have been exposed to its sound since childhood,’ says Zou Lunlun, guzheng artist and founder of the International Academy for Musical Arts.

[4] This assumption seems fair when applied to most people, especially those with low self-esteem. However, the findings of Forest’s research —titled ‘When Social Networking Is Not Working’ —suggest that isn’t so.

[5] Zou, bom into a family of guzheng musicians who go back four generations, has travelled the world as a master performer. She has played for celebrities and politicians who include the former prime ministers of Australia and New Zealand, and former president Jiang Zemin.

[6] Now based in Hong Kong, Zou founded the Jnternational Academy for Musical Aris in North Point in 2006. The school offers guzheng classes to children and adults taught by Zou. Students can choose from a group class, one-to-one tuition or lessons available via Skype.

[7] Group courses for beginners comprise eight weekly classes of 45 minutes and cost HK $1,680. Each focuses on the basic skills of string plucking, correct body posture while playing and proper use of both hands.

[8] One-to-one classes are available for beginner, intermediate and advanced students and cost HK$ 420, HK $480 and HK $550, respectively. Skype lessons are available for people who would find travelling to the school difficult.

[9] The music office of the Leisure and Cultural Services Department has courses at elementary, intermediate and advanced levels for students aged between six and 23. The beginners’ course runs for two years and involves weekly, one-hour lessons in a group setting and tuition costs HK $1,650.

[10] Acceptance is based on an interview and a music aptitude test with the next intake in August. All classes are conducted in Cantonese.

[11] The Gu Zheng Artist Association offers two-month courses for elementary to professional level students. Each comprises eight, one-hour lessons and costs from HK$680 to HK$980 depending on student level.

[12] The elementary course focuses on the basic fingering techniques for both hands and students learn to play traditional Chinese songs, ‘Swordsman’ and ‘Fengyang Flower’.

[13] The association has designed a 10 grade-examination system in which the level 1 exam is suitable for elementary students and level 10 is for students able to perform at a professional level.

What your updates say about you

[1] Social media is great for deepening bonds, making friends, or finding that special someone. Or is it?

[2] New research suggests that so-called power users, who contribute much more content than the average Facebook user, are unwittingly revealing undesirable personal traits to their peers. The recent study also suggests that Facebook is not good for those suffering from low self-esteem.

[3] ‘We had this idea that Facebook could be a fantastic place for people to strengthen their relationships,’ says Amanda Forest of the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada.

[4] This assumption seems fair when applied to most people, especially those with low self-esteem. However, the findings of Forest’s research —titled ‘When Social Networking Is Not Working’ —suggest that isn’t so.

[5] The study revealed that people with low self-esteem were more negative than people with high self-esteem and liked less by strangers who rated the participants’ status updates.

[6] The study also found that people with low self-esteem got more responses from their Facebook positive updates, friends compared when they to less posted positive highly ones. People with high self-esteem, on the other hand, used Facebook less and got more ‘like’ replies after posting something negative, perhaps because these responses are rarer for them.

[7] So people with low self-esteem may feel that Facebook is a risk-free forum for making personal disclosures, but they may not be helping themselves.

[8] ‘If you’re talking to somebody in person and you say something negative, you might get an indication that they don’t like it,’ says Forest. But when people have a negative reaction to a post on Facebook, they seem to keep it to themselves. ‘On Facebook, you don't see most of the reactions’

[9] Is Facebook about popularity or desperation? It may often edge towards the latter, with evidence that Facebook is as addictive as cigarettes and alcohol. A study of the activities and desires of 200 adults by the University of Chicago showed that although the strongest desires were for sleep, checking work e-mails and updating a Facebook status are this generation’s actual nocturnal activities. 

[10] In theory, social networking websites like Facebook could be great for people with low self-esteem. Sharing is important for improving friendships. But in practice, people with low self-esteem seem to behave counter productively, bombarding their friends with negative tidbits about their lives and making themselves less likeable.

The Triumph of Dystopian Literature - B2  

反烏托邦文學的勝利

What’s behind the boom in dystopian fiction for young readers?

[1] Dystopia is an imaginary place or condition in which everything is bad, and in dystopian fiction, this has traditionally been characterized by an authoritarian government or some kind of oppressive control. For young readers, dystopia isn’t a future to be averted; it is a version of what’s already happening in the world they inhabit.

[2] Rebecca Stead chose to set her children’s novel When You Reach Me —winner of the 2010 Newbery Medai - in nineteen-seventies New York partly because that’s where she grew up, but also because she wanted ‘to show a world of kids with a great deal of autonomy.’ Her characters, middle-class middie-school students, routinely walk around the Upper West Side by themselves, a rare freedom in today’s city, despite a significant drop in New York’s crime rate since Stead’s footloose youth. The world of our hovered-over teens and preteens may be safer, but it’s also less conducive to adventure, and therefore to adventure stories.

[3] Perhaps that’s why so many of them are reading The Hunger Games, atrilogy of novels by Suzanne Collins, which depicts a futuristic North America broken up into twelve districts. Every year, two children from each district are forced to fight to death in a televised contest called the Hunger Games, which are held in a huge outdoor arena. The winner of the contest is the last child left alive. The fervently awaited third installment in the trilogy, Mockingjay, will be published by Scholastic in August, and there are currently in print more than 2.3 million copies of the previous two books, The Hunger Games and Catching Fire.

[4] Collins’s trilogy is only the most visible example of a recent boom in dystopian fiction for young people. Many of these books come in series, spinning out extended narratives in intricately imagined worlds. In the popular Uglies series, for example, all sixteen-year-olds undergo surgery to conform to a universal standard of prettiness determined by evolutionary biology; in The Maze Runner, teenage boys awaken, all memories of their previous lives wiped clean, in a walled compound surrounded by a monster-filled labyrinth. The books tend to end in cliff-hangers that provoke their readers to post half-mocking protestations of agony (SUZANNE, ARE YOU PURPOSELY TORTURING YOUR FANS !?!?!?’!?!?’) in Internet discussion boards.

[5] Dystopian novels for young-adult readers have been around for decades. Readers of a certain age may remember having their young minds blown by House of Stairs, the story of five teenagers imprisoned in a seemingly infinite M. C. Escher-style network of staircases that ultimately turns out to be a gigantic Skinner box designed to condition their behavior. The White Mountains, in which alien overlords install mind-control caps on the heads of all those over the age of thirteen, tore through my own sixth-grade classroom like a wicked strain of the flu. Depending on the anxieties and preoccupations of its time, a dystopian young-adult novel might speculate about the aftermath of nuclear war (Z for Zachariah) or the drawbacks of engineering a too harmonious social order (The Giver) or the consequences of resource exhaustion (The Carbon Diaries 2015). And, of course, most American schoolchildren are at some point also assigned to read one of the twentieth century's dystopian classics for adults, such as Brave New World or 1984. 

[6] The typical arc of the dystopian narrative mirrors the course of adolescent disaffection. First, the fictional world is laid out. It may seem pleasant enough. Tally, the heroine of Uglies, looks forward to the surgery that will transform her into a Pretty and allow her to move to the party enclave of New Pretty Town. Eleven-year-old Jonas, in The Giver, has no problem with the blandly tranquil community where he grows up. Then somebody new, a misfit, turns up, or the hero stumbles on an incongruity. A crack opens in the facade. If the society is a false utopia, the hero discovers the lie at its very foundation: the Pretties have their brains removed when they receive their plastic surgery; the residents of Jonas’s community have been drained of all passion. If the society is frankly miserable or oppressive, the hero will learn that, contrary to what he’s been told, there may be an alternative out there, somewhere. Conditions at home become more and more unbearable until finally the hero decides to make a break for it, heading out across dangerous terrain.

[7] The youth-centered versions of dystopia part company with their adult predecessors in some important respects. For one thing, the grownup ones are grimmer. The British academic Kay Sambell argues that 'the protagonist's final defeat and failure is absolutely crucial to the admonitory nature of the classic adult dystopia.' The adult dystopia extrapolates from the present to show readers how terrible things will become if our deplorable behavior continues unchecked. Because authors of children's fiction are 'reluctant to depict the extinction of hope within their stories,' Sambell writes, they equivocate when it comes to delivering a moral. Yes, our errors and delusions may lead to catastrophe, but if — as usually happens in dystopian novels for children — a new, better way of life can be assembled from the ruins, would the apocalypse really be such a bad thing? 

[8] Sambell’s observation implies that dystopian stories for adults and children have essentially the same purpose — to warn us about the dangers of some current trend. That’s certainly true of books like 1984 and Brave New World; they detail the consequences of political authoritarianism and feckless hedonism. This is what will happen if we don’t turn back now, they scold, and scolding makes sense when your readers have a shot at getting their hands on the wheel.

[9] Children, however, don’t run the world, and teenagers, especially, feel the sting of this. Dystopian fiction may be the only genre written for children that’s routinely Jess didactic than its adult counterpart. The Hunger Games could be taken as an indictment of reality TV, but it is not an argument. It operates like a fable or a myth, a story in which outlandish and extravagant figures and events serve as conduits for universal experiences.

[10] While some parents disapprove of their children reading dystopian fiction, kids continue to read the books, and some of them will surely grow up to write dystopian tales of their own, incited by technologies or social trends we have yet to conceive. By then, reality TV and privacy on the Internet may seem like quaint, outdated problems. But the part about the world being broken or intolerable, about the need to sweep away the past to make room for the new? That part never gets old.