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Paraphrase using the active vocabulary of the unit.
1. All our friends and relatives came to our wedding. 2. It’s just a casual affair; I don’t want it to get serious. 3. After that incident we broke off all contacts with their company. 4. They are working together in order to achieve a common goal. 5. The Pilgrim Fathers sailed to the New World in search of religious freedom. 6. All-embracing changes in climate are expected to affect every country of the world. 7. She has achieved a great deal in the last few weeks. 8. She mentioned the subject several times during her speech. 9. What are you going to do about this? 10. It’s a little too early to talk about concluding a deal. 11. The playwright’s untimely death at the age of 29 was a great loss to English literature. 12. Although Deborah had a wild social life she had one or two close friends. 13. Upon his retirement, Greg wanted to work somewhere where he could serve society. 14. Catherine felt great sympathy for the sufferings of the sick children. 15. They were taken to the local hospital to be given medical care after the road accident. 16. It suddenly came to her mind that the child was afraid of being alone. 17. Unfortunately, computer errors are a frequent thing. 18. Police said that the accident happened at 9.25 a.m. 19. Visitors over the age of 60 can buy entrance tickets at a great discount. 20. Overuse of antibiotics may help to develop the spread of drug-resistant bacteria. 21. Senior citizens are likely to suffer from this disease. 22. This cold is really making me less active. 23. I’d like to finish the meeting soon. 24. I’ve read this book so often, it’s falling into pieces. 25. After three miles the Laura got tired and started moving more slowly than the other hikers. 26. I’m going to get this place completely clean and tidy.
42. Fill in the blanks with prepositions where necessary.
1. Anne Boleyn was pregnant ______ a daughter ______ Henry VIII when he decided to divorce his first wife. The future queen Elizabeth I was born ________ wedlock and later legitimized by an act of parliament. 2. William Caxton, the first English printer, was born _______ the family of a farmer. 3. At 70, she was ______ peace with herself and the world. 4. We are not distant ______ the time when computer technologies will be ruling the world. 5. The accident was due ________ part to the driver’s carelessness, but mainly to the bad weather. 6. Despite his family’s warnings, Edward VIII got deeply involved _______ an American divorcee. 7. Daniel was anxious not to involve his partners _______ his schemes. 8. To avoid a useless argument, he sought refuge _______ silence. 9. Some economists argue that self-interest is _____ the root of virtually all human motivation. 10. Veronica was persistent in being enrolled ______ a training programme for accountants. 11. In today’s programme we are going to focus _____ the existing barriers to social mobility. 12. The artist’s complicated relationships with women were shaped ______ large part by the premature death of his mother and elder sister. 13. Paul continued working at the project ______ the expense of sleep and rest.
43. Complete and add a sentence logically connected.
1. The colour of the car is secondary to ... 2. If Kevin doesn’t limit his appetite... 3. Mary should try to find a proper balance between... 4. ... is an inalienable right of every person. ... 5. People are more prone to make mistakes when... 6. High cholesterol and blood pressure as well as other other risk factors ... 7. Jane felt that at the root of her problems was... 8. When a person takes refuge in drugs or alcohol... 9. In the age of globalization national identity... 10. Pursuit of happiness is one of... 11. A person’s emotional well-being depends on... 12. Intimacy, compassion and altruism are feelings which...
| TEXT 2 |
Cross-cultural Notes:
1. Brave New World –a novel written in 1932 by the British writer Aldous Huxley, which imagines an advanced society of the future in which many people seem to have easy and pleasant lives, but in fact no one has any freedom. This phrase, originally used in Shakespeare’s play The Tempest, is now used to describe any society like this.
2. AF – a variation of the more usual AD which, in a Christian dating system, means ‘in the year of our Lord’. The F (here and in the phrase ‘Oh, Ford!’) is a reference to Henry Ford (1863-1947) who founded the first factory for the mass production of cars. Ford is the god of the New World and is used instead of Lord.
3. Alpha ['WlfR], Beta ['bi:tR], Gamma ['gWmR], Delta ['deltR] and Epsilon [ep'saIlRn] – the names of the first five Greek letters. When these letters are used as examination grades, Alpha is the highest.
4. What man has joined, nature is powerless to put asunder– a variation (with a total change of meaning) of the Gospel phrase “Those whom God hath joined together let no man put asunder’.
Brave New World
After Aldous Huxley
A squat grey building, of only thirty-four storeys. Over the main entrance the words CENTRAL LONDON HATCHING AND CONDITIONING CENTRE, and, in a shield, the World State’s motto, COMMUNITY, IDENTITY, STABILITY.
The enormous room on the ground floor was cold, a thin light glared through the windows finding only the glass and nickel of a laboratory. The light was frozen, dead, a ghost.
‘And this,’ said the Director, opening the door, ‘is the Fertilizing Room.’ A group of students followed nervously at the Director’s heels. It was a rare privilege. The DHC for Central London always made a point of personally conducting his new students round the various departments.
The Director advanced into the room. Old? Young? Thirty? Fifty? It was hard to say, and anyhow, in this year of stability, A.F. 632, it didn’t occur to you to ask it.
‘I shall begin at the beginning,’ said the DHC. ‘These are the incubators.’ And opening a door he showed them racks of numbered test tubes. He gave them a brief description of the modern fertilizing process.
‘Bokanovsky’s process,’ said the Director and the students underlined the words in their notebooks. ‘One egg, one embryo, one adult – normality. But a bokanovskified egg will divide. From eight to ninety-six – and every one will grow into a perfectly formed embryo, and every embryo into a full-sized adult. Making ninety-six human beings grow where only one grew before. Progress.’
But one of the students was fool enough to ask where the advantage lay. ‘My good boy! Can’t you see?’ The Director raised a hand. ‘Bokanovsky’s Process is one of the major instruments of social stability!’
Standard men and women. The whole of a small factory staffed with the products of a single bokanovskified egg.
Noticing a fair-haired young man who happened to be passing at the moment, the Director called to him. ‘Mr. Foster. Come along with us and give these boys the benefit of your expert knowledge by explaining the processes the embryos go through.’ Mr. Foster smiled. ‘With pleasure’. They went.
As they walked round, he described the various methods of treatment according to the sex an embryo was to possess and the place which it was to fill in the Community. He told the students how the babies emerged from these processes already graded as Alphas or Epsilons, as future factory workers or ‘future World Controllers’, he was going to say, but corrected himself and said ‘future Directors of Hatcheries’ instead. The Director smiled.
And now Mr. Foster went on, ‘I’d like to show you some very interesting conditioning for Alpha-Plus Intellectuals.’ But the Director had looked at his watch. ‘No time for intellectual embryos, I’m afraid. We must go up to the Nurseries before the children had finished their afternoon sleep.’
* * *
The DHC and his students stepped into the nearest lift and were carried up to the fifth floor.
INFANT NURSERIES. NEO-PAVLOCIAN CONDITIONING ROOMS, announced the notice board.
The Director opened a door. Half a dozen nurses were engaged in setting out bowls of roses in a long row across the floor when the DHC came in.
‘Set out the books,’ he said. Between the rose bowls the books were duly set out – opened invitingly each at some gaily-coloured image of beast or fish or bird.
‘Now bring in the children.’
They hurried out of the room and returned in a minute or two with eight-month-old babies, all exactly alike (a Bokanovsky Group, it was evident), and all (since they were Deltas) dressed in khaki.
‘Put them down on the floor. Now turn them so that they can see the flowers and the books.’
Turned, the babies at once fell silent, then began to crawl towards those clusters of bright colours, those brilliant shapes on the white pages. Small hands reached out uncertainly, touched, grasped, unpetalling the roses, crumpling the pages of the books. The director waited until all were happily busy and, lifting his hand, he gave the signal.
The Head Nurse pressed down a little lever. There was a violent explosion. Alarm bells maddeningly sounded. The children screamed. Their faced were distorted with terror.
The Director waved his hand again and the Head Nurse pressed a second lever. The screaming of the babies suddenly changed its tone. There was something desperate about their sharp yelps. ‘We can electrify that whole strip of floor,’ shouted the Director in explanation. ‘But that’s enough,’ he signaled to the nurse. ‘Offer them the flowers and the books again.’
At the mere sight of the roses and the pictures, the infants shrank away in horror; the volume of their howling suddenly increased. Books and loud noises, flowers and electric shocks – already in the infant mind these couples were linked, and repeated lessons would make the connection permanent. What man has joined, nature is powerless to put asunder.
One of the students held up his hand; and though he could see why you couldn’t have lower-caste people wasting the Community’s time over books, and that there was always the risk of their reading something that might decondition one of their reflexes, yet he couldn’t understand about the flowers. Why go to the trouble of making it impossible for Deltas to like flowers?
Patiently the DHC explained. Not so very long ago (a century or thereabouts) Gammas, Deltas and Epsilons had been conditioned to like flowers and wild nature. The idea was to make them want to be going out into the country at every available opportunity, and so force them to consume transport. But a love of nature keeps no factories busy. It was decided to abolish the love of nature, but not the tendency to consume transport.
‘We condition the masses to hate the country,’ concluded the Director. ‘But at the same time we condition them to love all country sports. We see to it that country sports shall entail the use of elaborate equipment. So that they consume manufactured articles as well as transport. Hence those electric shocks.’
* * *
The students followed the DHC to the lift. ‘Silence, silence,’ whispered a loudspeaker as they stepped out at the fourteenth floor.
The students and even the Director himself rose automatically to the tips of their toes. They were Alphas, of course; but even Alphas have been well conditioned.
‘What’s the lesson this afternoon?’ the Director asked quietly.
‘We had Elementary Sex for the first 40 minutes,” the nurse answered, ‘ but now it’s switched over to Elementary Class Consciousness.’
The Director walked down the long line of cots. Rosy and relaxed with sleep, eighty little boys and girls lay there softly breathing. There was a whisper under every pillow.
‘Let’s have it repeated a little louder.’ The Director pressed a switch.
‘Alpha children wear grey,’ said a soft voice. ‘They work much harder than we do, because they’re so frightfully clever. I’m really awfully glad I’m Beta, because I don’t work so hard. And then we are much better than the Gammas and Deltas. Gammas are stupid. They all wear green, and Delta children wear khaki. Oh no, I don’t want to play with Delta children. And Epsilons are still worse. They are too stupid to be able...’
The Director pushed back the switch.
‘Sleep-teaching is the greatest moralizing and socializing force of all time.’
The students took it down in their little books. Straight from the horse’s mouth.
‘They’ll have these suggestions repeated forty or fifty times more before they wake. A hundred and twenty times three times a week for thirty months till at last the child’s mind is these suggestions, and the sum of the suggestions is the child’s mind. And not the child’s mind only. The adult’s mind too – all his life long. The mind that judges and desires and decides – made up of these suggestions. But all these suggestions are our suggestions!’ The Director almost shouted in his triumph. ‘Suggestions from the State.’
A noise made him turn round.
‘Oh, Ford!’ he said in another tone, ‘I’ve woken the children.’
| COMPREHENSION EXERCISES |
44. Give the Russian for:
Hatching and Conditioning Centre; Community, Identity, Stability; Fertilizing Room; to give sb the benefit of one’s knowledge; graded as Alphas or Epsilons; small hands reached out; sleep-teaching; loudspeaker; to entail sth.