蒙大综合英语课件Unit10-2background information

1、Part TwoBackground InformationENTERUnit 10PompeiiUnit 10PompeiiBackground informationContentsI. AuthorII. PompeiiIII. NaplesIV. Gladiators_I. Author Robert Silverberg Robert Silverberg (born January 15, 1935) is a prolific American author and editor, best known for writing science fiction. He is a m

2、ultiple winner of both Hugo and Nebula Awards, a member of the Science Fiction Hall of Fame, a Grand Master of SF.Robert SilverbergTo be continued on the next page.Unit 10PompeiiLiterary growth In the mid-1960s, science fiction writers were becoming more literarily ambitious. Frederik Pohl, then edi

3、ting three science fiction magazines, offered Silverberg carte blanche in writing for them. Thus inspired, Silverberg returned to the field that gave him his start, paying far more attention to depth of character development and social background than he had in the past and mixing in elements of the

4、 modernist literature he had studied at Columbia.I. AuthorUnit 10 PompeiiTo be continued on the next page.I. AuthorUnit 10 PompeiiTo be continued on the next page. That was followed by Downward to the Earth, a story containing echoes of material from Joseph Conrads work, in which the human former ad

5、ministrator of an alien world returns after the planets inhabitants have been set free. Other acclaimed works of that time include To Live Again, in which the memories and personalities of the deceased can be transferred to other people; The World Inside, a look at an overpopulated future; and Dying

6、 Inside, a tale of a telepath losing his powers.I. AuthorUnit 10 PompeiiTo be continued on the next page. Silverberg won a Nebula award in 1970 for the short story Passengers, two the following year for his novel A Time of Changes and the short story Good News from the Vatican, and yet another in 19

7、75 for his novella Born with the Dead.I. AuthorUnit 10 PompeiiTo be continued on the next page. Silverberg received a Nebula award in 1986 for the novella Sailing to Byzantium, which takes its name from the poem by William Butler Yeats; a Hugo in 1987 for the novella Gilgamesh in the Outback, set in

8、 the Heroes in Hell universe of Bangsian Fantasy; a Hugo in 1990 for Enter a Soldier. Later: Enter Another. The Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame inducted Silverberg in 1999, its fourth class of two deceased and two living writers, and the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America made h

9、im its 21st SFWA Grand Master in 2005.I. AuthorUnit 10 PompeiiTo be continued on the next page.NovelsThe 13th Immortal (1956)Master of Life and Death (1957)Invaders from Earth (1958)Stepsons of Terra (1958)Aliens from Space (1958) (as David Osborne)Invisible Barriers (1958) (as David Osborne)The Pla

10、net Killers (1959)Lost Race of Mars (1960)I. AuthorUnit 10 PompeiiNovelsTo Open the Sky (1967)Worlds Fair 1992 (1968)Short story collectionsLest We Forget Thee Earth (1958) written under the pen-name Calvin M. KnoxThe Cube Root of Uncertainty (1970)The end of Author. II. PompeiiUnit 10 PompeiiTo be

11、continued on the next page. The city of Pompeii was an ancient Roman town-city near modern Naples in the Italian region of Campania, in the territory of the comune of the Pompeii. Pompeii, along with Herculaneum and many villas in the surrounding area, was mostly destroyed and buried under 4 to 6 m

12、(13 to 20 ft) of ash and pumice in the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD. View into a narrow street of PompeiiII. PompeiiUnit 10 PompeiiTo be continued on the next page. Researchers believe that the town was founded in the seventh or sixth century BC and was captured by the Romans in 80 BC. By the

13、 time of its destruction, 160 years later, its population was probably approximately 20,000, with a complex water system, an amphitheatre, gymnasium and a port.II. PompeiiUnit 10 PompeiiTo be continued on the next page. The eruption was cataclysmic for the town. Evidence for the destruction original

14、ly came from a surviving letter by Pliny the Younger, who saw the eruption from a distance and described the death of his uncle Pliny the Elder, an admiral of the Roman fleet, who tried to rescue citizens. The site was lost for about 1500 years until its initial rediscovery in 1599 and broader redis

15、covery almost 150 years later by Spanish engineer Rocque Joaquin de Alcubierre in 1748. II. PompeiiUnit 10 PompeiiTo be continued on the next page. The objects that lay beneath the city have been well preserved for centuries because of the lack of air and moisture. These artifacts provide an extraor

16、dinarily detailed insight into the life of a city during the Pax Romana. During the excavation, plaster was used to fill in the voids between the ash layers that once held human bodies. This allowed one to see the exact position the person was in when he or she died.II. PompeiiUnit 10 PompeiiTo be c

17、ontinued on the next page. Pompeii has been a tourist destination for over 250 years. Today it has UNESCO World Heritage Site status and is one of the most popular tourist attractions of Italy, with approximately 2.5 million visitors every year. The ruins of Pompeii are located near the modern subur

18、ban town of Pompei (nowadays written with one i). It stands on a spur formed by a lava flow to the north of the mouth of the Sarno River.II. PompeiiUnit 10 Pompeii Today it is some distance inland, but in ancient times it would have been nearer to the coast. Pompeii is about 8 km (5.0 mi) away from

19、Mount Vesuvius. It covered a total of 64 to 67 hectares (170 acres) and was home to approximately 11,000 to 11,500 people on the basis of household counts. It was a major city in the region of Campania.Shown within ItalyThe end of Pompeii. III. NaplesUnit 10 Pompeii Naples is the capital of the Ital

20、ian region Campania and the third-largest municipality in Italy, after Rome and Milan. As of 2012, around 960,000 people live within the citys administrative limits. The Naples urban area has a population of between 3 million and 3.7 million, and is the 9th-most populous urban area in the European U

21、nion. Around 4 million people live in the Naples metropolitan area, one of the largest metropolises on the Mediterranean Sea.To be continued on the next page.III. NaplesUnit 10 Pompeii Naples is one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world. Bronze Age Greek settlements were establish

22、ed in the Naples area in the second millennium BC. A larger colony initially known as Parthenope developed on the Island of Megaride around the ninth century BC, at the end of the Greek Dark Ages. The city was refounded as Nepolis in the sixth century BC and became a lynchpin of Magna Graecia, playi

23、ng a key role in the merging of Greek culture into Roman society and eventually becoming a cultural centre of the Roman Republic. To be continued on the next page.III. NaplesUnit 10 Pompeii Naples remained influential after the fall of the Western Roman Empire, serving as the capital city of the Kin

24、gdom of Naples between 1282 and 1816. Thereafter, in union with Sicily, it became the capital of the Two Sicilies until the unification of Italy in 1861. During the Neapolitan War of 1815, Naples strongly promoted Italian unification.To be continued on the next page.III. NaplesUnit 10 Pompeii Naples

25、 historic city centre is the largest in Europe, covering 1,700 hectares and enclosing 27 centuries of history, and is listed by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site. Naples has long been a major cultural centre with a global sphere of influence, particularly during the Renaissance and Enlightenment eras.

26、 In the immediate vicinity of Naples are numerous culturally and historically significant sites, including the Palace of Caserta and the Roman ruins of Pompeii and Herculaneum. Culinarily, Naples is synonymous with pizza, which originated in the city. To be continued on the next page.III. NaplesUnit

27、 10 Pompeii Neapolitan music has furthermore been highly influential, credited with the invention of the romantic guitar and the mandolin, as well as notable contributions to opera and folk standards. Popular characters and historical figures who have come to symbolise the city include Januarius, th

28、e patron saint of Naples, the comic figure Pulcinella, and the Sirens from the Greek epic poem the Odyssey. The end of the Naples. Unit 10 Pompeii A gladiator was an armed combatant who entertained audiences in the Roman Republic and Roman Empire in violent confrontations with other gladiators, wild

29、 animals, and condemned criminals. Some gladiators were volunteers who risked their legal and social standing and their lives by appearing in the arena. Most were despised as slaves, schooled under harsh conditions, socially marginalized, and segregated even in death.IV. GladiatorsTo be continued on

30、 the next page.Unit 10 Pompeii Irrespective of their origin, gladiators offered spectators an example of Romes martial ethics and, in fighting or dying well, they could inspire admiration and popular acclaim. They were celebrated in high and low art, and their value as entertainers was commemorated

31、in precious and commonplace objects throughout the Roman world.IV. GladiatorsTo be continued on the next page.Unit 10 PompeiiIV. Gladiators The origin of gladiatorial combat is open to debate. There is evidence of it in funeral rites during the Punic Wars of the 3rd century BCE, and thereafter it ra

32、pidly became an essential feature of politics and social life in the Roman world. Its popularity led to its use in even more lavish and costly games.To be continued on the next page.Unit 10 PompeiiIV. Gladiators The games reached their peak between the 1st century BC and the 2nd century AD, and they

33、 finally declined during the early 5th century after the adoption of Christianity as state church of the Roman Empire in 380, although beast hunts continued into the 6th century.To be continued on the next page.Unit 10 PompeiiIV. Gladiators Gladiatorial games, usually linked with beast shows, spread

34、 throughout the Republic and beyond. Following Caesars assassination and the Roman Civil War, Augustus assumed Imperial authority over the games and formalized their provision as a civic and religious duty. To be continued on the next page.Unit 10 PompeiiIV. Gladiators Throughout the Empire, the greatest and most celebrated games would now be identified with the state-sponsored Imperial cult, which furthered public recognition, respect and approval for the Emperor, his law, and his agents. To be continued on the next page.Unit 10 PompeiiIV. Gladiators Two other sources of gladiators,