第三篇 A Tale of Scottish Rural Life
Lewis Grassic Gibbon's Sunset Song (1932)was voted "the best Scottish novel of all time" by Scotland's reading public in 2005. Once considered shocking for its frank description of aspects of the lives of Scotland's poor rural farmers, it has been adapted for stage, film, TV and radio in recent decades.
The novel is set on the fictional estate of Kinraddie, in the farming country of the Scottish northwest in the years up to and beyond World War I. At its heart is the story of Chris, who is both part of the community and a little outside it.
Grassic Gibbon gives us the most detailed and intimate account of the life of his heroine. We watch her grow through a childhood dominated by her cruel but hard-working father; experience tragedy (her mother's suicide and murder of her twin children); and learn about her feelings as she grows into woman. We see her marry, lose her husband，then marry again. Chris has seemed so convincing a figure to some female readers that they cannot believe that she is the creation of aman.
But it would be misleading to suggest that this book is just about Chris. It is truly a novel of a place and its people. Its opening section tells of Kinraddie's long history, in a language that imitates the place's changing patterns of speech and writing.
The story itself is amazingly full of characters and incidents. It is told from Chris' point of view but also from that of the gossiping community, a community where everybody knows everybody else's business and nothing is ever forgotten.
Sunset Song has a social theme too. It is concerned with what Grassic Gibbon perceives as the destruction of traditional Scottish rural life first by modernization and then by World WarⅠ. Gibbon tried hard to show how certain characters resist the war. Despite this, the war takes the young men away, a number of them to their deaths. In particular, it takes away Chris' husband, Ewan Tavendale. The war finally kills Ewan, but not in the way his widow is told. In fact, the Germans aren't responsible for his death, but his own side. He is shot because he is said to have run away from a battle.
If the novel is about the end of one way of life it also looks ahead. It is a "Sunset Song" but is concerned too with the new Kinraddie, indeed of the new European world. Grassic Gibbon went on to publish two other novels about the place that continue its story.
41 What is Sunset Song mainly about?
A The First World War.
B The beauty of the sunset.
C The new European world.
D The lives of rural Scottish farmers.
42 Which statement is NOT true of Chris?
A She is the heroine of Sunset Song.
B She had a miserable childhood.
C She is the creation of a man.
D She married only once.
43 What is the opening section of the novel mainly concerned with?
A The climate of Kinraddie.
B The history of Kinraddie. C The geography of Kinraddie.
D The language spoken in Kinraddie.
44 Who are responsible for Evan's death, according to Chris?
A The Germans.
B The French army.
C The British troops.
D The Russian soldiers.
45 The word sunset occurring in the title of the novel most probably means________
A the end of the heroine's life.
B the end of one's life.
C the end of traditional life.
D the end of the day.
参考答案：
41 D 关于这部小说的主要内容文章一开始就讲得很清楚，即它是对苏格兰贫苦农民生活方方面面直白的描述（frank description of all aspects of the lives of Scotland?s poor ruyal famers ）
42 D 文章第三段对小说的主人公Chris作了介绍，对比一下这段的内容和四个选项便可得出D是正确答案，因为在这一段里说到We see he marry, lose her husband, then marry again.可见她有过两次婚姻。
43 B 根据第四段第三句话Its opening section tells of Kinraddie's long history, in a language that imitates the place's changing patterns of speech and writing.这部小说的开头部分介绍了Kinraddie这个地方的历史，作者所用的语言则模仿了该地口头和书面语言的变化模式。
44 C 文章倒数第二段讲到了Chris的丈夫Ewan的死因。他死于第一次世界大战。但他并非死于德国人之手，而是死于自己人之手（the Germans aren't responsible for his death, but his own side）。他被击毙，据说他试图逃脱一场战斗。
45 C Sunset字面意思是“落日”。但作为小说的标题他并非只是落日的意思。文章最后一段的第一句话说“如果该小说讲的是一种生活方式的结束，那么它也预示了未来”。随意这里的Sunset隐喻了一种传统生活方式的结束。
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