【心灵鸡汤】高中英语 增加词汇量 圣诞颂歌Christmas素材.doc

心灵鸡汤:圣诞颂歌christmaschristmas: adefensein defending christmas i have nothing to say about jesus christ, aterrifyingandinfluentialhistoricalfigurewho, iconfess, has had littleimpacton my life.2 my christmas, the christmas i have known,revolves centrally aroundobjectsmostcruciallyaround presents and thensecondarilyaround things like christmas trees,ornaments, decorations,advent calendars, etc.3i have a particularlyvividmemoryof a childhood christmas during which my sister wouldstalk4 the christmas tree day after day counting presents. on the final day she made astack5 in the middle of the room. on one side were the presents with her name on them and on the other, those withmine. shetallied them up6. the number was not to her liking. i can still picture thestunned calm7 as shecountedand counted again. it was clear that my pile was two presents larger than hers. i think it was the “two” that really bothered her. a difference of one is one thing, a difference of two is quite another.when there was nothing more to be done she gathered herself up, collected her faculties, and then proceeded to throw anepicandviolentfit.8 right there. she screamed andraged, she tore paper andhurledobjects.9 shedashedher head, as only she could, on thekitchenfloor, her beautifulblond curlsbouncing upand down against thetileand mixing with the tears andsaliva.10 shegrunted11 things that couldnt be understood. i say again that this is one of the clearest memories of my childhood.in my 20s, living in that odd no mans land of williamsburg, brooklyn, istumbled onto12 the l train station in the evening during a snow storm. asmatteringof people stood on theplatformwaiting for the train.13 a hearty woman was singingchristmas carolsinhigh operatic fashionas a rather moregnarledgentleman accompanied on hisaccordion.14 it was probably the exacttemperaturein the air, and the way it carried her voice, and the sound of the accordion around and around theunderground chamber15. the train came and no one got on it. no one said anything. we just stood there, we could do no other.walter benjaminonce wrote about his fear of clocks and themarching homogenous units of timethey represent.16 he wrote of fighters during thejuly revolution17 who suddenly turned their guns on the clock towers, trying tofreezethe day, to get as much as they possibly could from those moments beyond thenormalflow of history. there is nofigurewith a greaterholdon the childhood imagination thansanta claus.18 we have given himextraordinarypowers. he hasmastery, for a night, that isnt exactly a night really, over space and time itself, the veryfundaments19 for the possibility of anything else. the greek god of time, chronos, is anelementalgod, more powerful than theolympians, moreprimalthan thedeitieswhocontrolthings on land and sea and earth and sky.20 but santa is his ownlogicand purpose for oneinfinitenight every year.i remember that there were always advent calendars. they were their own form of torture in that they seemed to progress so very, very slowly. after the 15th, it was as if each day refused to end, refused to give way to the next morning. we wanted to destroy the night. opening each door in the morning was a pleasure. my sister and i would do it slowly, with a sense of thesacred21. when i went away to college apackagecame at the end of november. i opened it. there was an adventcalendarinside. i called my sister. she had one too. later, my parentssplitup and then divorced andcertainthings from the past seemed now sealed in the past forever. but then late november would come and a package would come. it was only then that i noticed that the packages were from my father. i had an image suddenly of my sister and me crouched in front of the advent calendar slowly opening one of the doors as my father stood behind us,unnoticed, silently looking on. every late november for years and years now, there is a package. and there is an advent calendar from my father.vocabulary1.defense: = defence，辩护，支持。动词形式为defend。2.terrifying:令人恐惧的；influential:有影响力的；confess: 承认。3.revolve around:围绕，以为重要目的；crucially: 关键性地，及其；secondarily:其次；ornament:装饰物，点缀品；adventcalendar:圣诞日历，是一种可以吃的日历，共有24个小格子，里面装有巧克力，从12月1日起，小孩子每天打开一格，吃掉一块巧克力，全部吃完了以后，就到圣诞节了。4.stalk: 跟踪，此处指姐姐悄悄点数圣诞树上的礼物。5.stack:垛，堆。6.tally up:计算，合计。7.stunned calm:指吃惊后强忍保持镇静。8. 确认再没什么可做之后，她重振精神，镇定下来，开始了一场壮阔的狂怒大爆发。9.rage:发怒；hurl:扔，甩。10.dash:使猛烈撞击；blond curls:金黄色的卷发；bounce:弹起；tile:瓷砖；saliva:口水。11.grunt:嘟哝。12.stumble onto:碰巧走到。13.smattering: 寥寥几个；platform:站台。14.christmas carol:圣诞颂歌；in high operatic fashion:带着浓重的戏剧腔；gnarled:（皮肤、手等）多皱纹的，饱经风霜的；accordion:手风琴。15.underground chamber:此处应指火车站的地下通道。16.walter benjamin:瓦尔特本杰明（18921940），德国文艺评论家；marching homo