Unit-6-Being-There.ppt

1、Unit 6 Being There,新世纪高等院校英语专业本科系列教材（修订版） 综合教程第六册(第2版) 电子教案,上海外语教育出版社 南京信息工程大学 刘杰海,Contents page,Contents,Learning Objectives Pre-reading Activities Global Reading Detailed Reading Consolidation Activities Further Enhancement,objectives,Learning Objectives,Rhetorical skill: transferred epithet and r

2、hetorical question Key language full name Sir Vidiadhar Surajprasad Naipaul (1932 ). His novels include A House for Mr. Biswas (1961) and A Bend in the River (1979). He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2001.,Text Introduction | Culture Notes | Author | Structure,G-R: CN-Graham Greene,Gr

3、aham Greene (Paragraph 16) (19041991) one of the most popular and critically acclaimed authors of the 20th century, a British editor, essayist, playwright and novelist. Greenes most famous works include Brighton Rock (1938), The Quiet Americane (1955), Our Man in Havana (1958) and The Honorary Consu

4、l (1973). He had a long association with the movies, and was involved in This Gun for Hire (1942), The Third Man (1949) and Loser Takes All (1956).,Text Introduction | Culture Notes | Author | Structure,G-R: CN-Phillip G,Philip Glazebrook (Paragraph 18) English novelist and travel writer. He is the

5、author of Journey to Kars (1985).,Text Introduction | Culture Notes | Author | Structure,G-R: CN-James Holman,James Holman (Paragraph 19) Known as the “Blind Traveler,” James Holman (17861857) was a British adventurer, author and social observer, best known for his writings on his extensive travels.

6、 Not only completely blind but suffering from debilitating pain and limited mobility, he undertook a series of solo journeys that were unprecedented both in their extent of geography and method of “human echolocation.” In 1866, the journalist William Jerdan wrote that “From Marco Polo to Mungo Park,

7、 no three of the most famous travellers, grouped together, would exceed the extent and variety of countries traversed by our blind countryman.”,Text Introduction | Culture Notes | Author | Structure,G-R: CN-Author bio,Anatole Broyard (19201990) African-American literary critic. He worked for The New

8、 York Times for forty years. His writings include Aroused by Books and Men, Women, and Other Anticlimaxes. He grew up in Brooklyn and attended the New School for Social Research. After serving in World War II, he taught fiction writing at New York University and Columbia.,Text Introduction | Culture

9、 Notes | Author | Structure,G-R: CN-Structure Analysis,Text Introduction | Culture Notes | Author | Structure,Part 1,(Para 1-11) an examination of primary motivation for traveling,Part 2,(Para 12-15) a discussion of travel writing that offers useful insights into the travelers psyche,Part 3,(Para 16

10、-20) a description of the peculiar approach held by some travelers today,DR-p1-text,BEING THERE Anatole Broyard 1.Travel is like adultery: one is always tempted to be unfaithful to ones own country. To have imagination is inevitably to be dissatisfied with where you live. There is in men a centrifug

11、al tendency. In our wanderlust, we are lovers looking for consummation.,Detailed Reading,DR-p2-3-text,2.Only while traveling can we appreciate age. At home, for Americans at east, everything must be young, new, but when we go abroad we are interested only in the old. We want to see what has been sav

12、ed, defended against time. 3.When we travel, we put aside our defenses, our anxiety, and invite regression. We go backward instead of forward. We cultivate our hysteria.,Detailed Reading,DR-p4-text,4.It is our best selves that travel, just as we dress in our best clothes. Only our passport reminds u

13、s how ordinary we actually are. We go abroad to meet our foreign persona, that thrilling stranger born on the plane. Were going to see in Europe everything we have eliminated or edited out of our own culture in the name of convenience: religion, royalty, picturesqueness, otherness and passion. We cl

14、ing to the belief that other peoples are more passionate than we are.,Detailed Reading,DR-p5-text,5.Theres an impostor in each of us why else would we put on dark glasses and try to speak and look like the natives of another place? At home, we impersonate ourselves; when were abroad, we can try to b

15、e what weve always wanted to be. In spite of all the recent talk about roots, many of us are tired of our roots, which may be shallow anyway, and so we travel in search of rootlessness.,Detailed Reading,DR-p6-text,6.Traveling began when men grew curious. The influence of the church, the traditional

16、pattern of life, the lack of money and leisure had all restrained curiosity until the seventeenth century, when under pressure of scientific discoveries, the physical world began to gape open. It was then that people began to travel in search of the profane.,Detailed Reading,DR-p7-8-text,7.Travel ar

17、rived together with sophistication, with the ability to see through or beyond ones own culture, with the modern faculty of boredom. Something of the Crusades survives in the modern traveler only his is a personal crusade, an impulse to go off and fight certain obscure battles of his own spirit. 8.Of

18、 course, one of the most common reasons for traveling is simply to get away. Freud said that we travel to escape father and the family, and we might add the familiar. There is a recurrent desire to drop our lives, to simply walk out of them.,Detailed Reading,DR-p9-10-text,9.When we travel, we are on

19、 vacation vacant, waiting to be filled. The frenzied shopping of some travelers is an attempt to buy a new life. To get away to a strange place produces a luxurious feeling of disengagement, of irresponsible free association. One is an onlooker, impregnable. 10.We travel in summer, when life comes o

20、ut of doors, and so we see only summery people, nothing of their sad falls, their long, dark winters and cruel springs. The places we visit are gold-plated by the sun. The flowers and trees are like bouquets thrown to history.,Detailed Reading,DR-p11-12-text,11.And language what a pleasure to leave

21、our own language, with its clichs stuck in our teeth. How much better things sound in another tongue! Its like having our ears cleaned out. So long as we dont understand it too well, every other language is poetry. 12.Because we travel for so many reasons some of them contradictory travel writing is

22、 like a suitcase into which the writer tries to cram everything. At its most interesting, its a continual tasting, the expression of a nostalgia for the particular. Its a childish game of playing countries, as we used to play house.,Detailed Reading,DR-p13-text,13.Travel writing describes a tragic a

23、rc: it begins with a rising of the spirit and ends in a dying fall. The earliest travelers went to see marvels, to admire the wonderful diversity of the world but the latest travelers are like visitors sitting at the bedside of dying cultures. Early travelers fell in love at first sight with foreign

24、 places but now we know only love at last sight, a kiss before dying, a breathing in of the last gasp. In some ancient societies, it used to be the custom for the son to inhale his fathers last breath, which contained his departing soul, and todays travelers do something like this, too.,Detailed Rea

25、ding,DR-p14-text,14.Travel writing has become a quintessentially modern thing, the present regretting the past. We travel like insurance appraisers, assessing the damage. Militantly opposed to any kind of ethnic distinctions at home, we adore ethnicity abroad. Ironically, Americans need Europe more

26、than Europeans do. To Parisians, for example, Paris is a place to live; for Americans, its a place to dream.,Detailed Reading,DR-p15-text,15.“I do not expect to see many travel books in the near future,” Evelyn Waugh wrote in 1946. He saw the world turning into a “monoculture,” the sense of place gi

27、ving way to placelessness. What Waugh didnt foresee was that travel books would change as novels and poetry have, that every slippage of culture would provoke its peculiar literature. He underestimated the variousness of our reasons for traveling.,Detailed Reading,DR-p16-text,16.There have always be

28、en travelers who went to look for the worst, to find rationalizations for their anxiety or despair, to cover their disillusionment with labels, as steamer trunks used to be covered with them. Why else would Paul Theroux go to South America, which he so obviously detested? Shiva Naipauls worst fears

29、were confirmed in Africa, just as his brothers were in Asia. Graham Greene spent four months traveling in the Liberian jungle as a private penance.,Detailed Reading,DR-p17-text,17.Even ruins have changed. Instead of the classical ruins of antiquity, we now have places that are merely “ruined.” And t

30、here are travelers who take a positive delight in them, who love awfulness for its own sake. For them, awfulness is the contemporary equivalent of the exotic. Its a negative sublime, a swoon or ecstasy of spoliation.,Detailed Reading,DR-p18-text,18.As other countries offer fewer exotic phenomena, th

31、e travel writer is forced to find the exotic in himself and the picturesque as well. The centrifugal tendency turns centripetal, and modern travel books may be about the absence of things just as the classic books are about their presence. In Journey to Kars, Philip Glazebrook seems to have visited

32、several unappealing villages in Turkey simply for the irony of being there. (Irony is the contemporary travelers drip-dry shirt.) One of the things a severely sophisticated traveler like Glazebrook seeks is a place where he himself can stand out in absolute relief.,Detailed Reading,DR-p19-text,19.Pe

33、rhaps in the future we shall have to travel like James Holman, who, after being invalided out of the British navy because he had gone blind, set out in 1819 to see the world. Traveling mostly alone, speaking no foreign languages, using only public transport, Holman got as far as Siberia and returned

34、 home to publish in several thick volumes all that he had experienced. He rarely felt, he said, that he had missed anything through being blind. (At one point, he met a deaf man and they traveled together.),Detailed Reading,DR-p20-text,20.Since he could not see, people often invited Holman to squeez

35、e things as a way of perceiving them and this is what todays traveler has to do. He has to squeeze the places he visits, until they yield something, anything.,Detailed Reading,DR:p1 Analysis,Paragraph 1 Analysis In order to catch his readers attention, the author starts the essay with an unusual sim

36、ile by comparing travel to “adultery” travelers are dissatisfied with their own countries and tempted to visit others for excitement.,Detailed Reading,DR:p2-3 Analysis,Paragraphs 2-3 Analysis In these two paragraphs the author provides the example of Americans, who are used to “young, new” things in

37、 their own country but who are only interested in the old when they are abroad.,Detailed Reading,DR:p4-5 Analysis,Paragraphs 4-5 Analysis In these paragraphs, the author points out that we tend to put on our best faade when we travel (“It is our best selves that travel .”),Detailed Reading,DR:p6-7 A

38、nalysis,Paragraphs 6-7 Analysis The author explains when and why travel became popular.,Detailed Reading,DR:p8-9 Analysis,Paragraphs 8-9 Analysis In these two paragraphs the author cites the Freudian theory to explain why we travel to “get away,” that is to escape the familiar for “a luxurious feeli

39、ng of disengagement.”,Detailed Reading,DR:p10-11 Analysis,Paragraphs 10-11 Analysis In these paragraphs the author cites two examples to show that travel could refresh people: to see summery people and to hear things said in another tongue.,Detailed Reading,DR:p12 Analysis,Paragraph 12 Analysis Afte

40、r enumerating some reasons for traveling, the author moves to the next related topic travel writing.,Detailed Reading,DR:p13 Analysis,Paragraph 13 Analysis In this paragraph the author compares “the earliest travelers” and “the latest travelers” in terms of their purposes.,Detailed Reading,DR:p14 An

41、alysis,Paragraph 14 Analysis In this paragraph we learn that travel books reveal many interesting aspects of our self-contradictions: we live today but miss the past; we oppose “ethnic distinctions” at home but value them abroad .,Detailed Reading,DR:p15-16 Analysis,Paragraphs 15-16 Analysis In thes

42、e two paragraphs the author argues against Evelyn Waughs idea that travel books will disappear because the world is becoming a “monoculture” by enumerating some of our various reasons for traveling.,Detailed Reading,DR:p17-18 Analysis,Paragraphs 17-18 Analysis In these paragraphs the author further

43、explains some of the reasons for traveling: the love of “awfulness for its own sake” and the quest for “the exotic” in the traveler himself. For the description of exotic phenomena, travel writers have turned their attention from something visible (presence of things) to something invisible (absence

44、 of things), when they find fewer new and alien things available for their books.,Detailed Reading,DR:p19-20 Analysis,Paragraphs 19-20 Analysis In these paragraphs the author points out what a traveler should do by citing the example of the blind traveler James Holman “to squeeze the places” we visi

45、t, “until they yield something, anything.” And that is probably the purpose of “being there.”,Detailed Reading,DR-Question-p1-3a,Paragraphs 1-3: Question What is the primary motivation for traveling and what is the unique approach held by some travelers today?,Detailed Reading,The primary motivation

46、 for traveling is peoples boredom with their own places and their desire to see something different and new. In this sense, traveling can fulfill ones desire to drop familiar life and temporarily make one an onlooker, so that one can feel disengaged and impregnable.,DR-Question-p1-3b,Some travelers

47、hold a peculiar approach. They want to look for the worst, to find rationalizations for their anxiety or despair, to cover their disillusionment with labels. For them the significance of ruins has changed. Instead of the classical ruins of antiquity, now they have places that are merely “ruined.” Th

48、ey take a positive delight in them and love awfulness for its own sake. In their eyes, awfulness is the contemporary equivalent of the exotic. It is a negative sublime, a swoon or ecstasy of spoliation.,Detailed Reading,DR-Question-p5,Detailed Reading,Paragraph 5: Question What does the author mean

49、by “roots” and “rootlessness”?,By “roots” the author means the cultural or ethnic origin one can identify with, or what one belongs to; by “rootlessness” he means ones psychological need to be free.,DR-Question-p6,Detailed Reading,Paragraph 6: Question Why was peoples curiosity about other countries

50、 restrained until the 17th century?,Traveling was not popular before the 17th century because the influence of the church, the traditional pattern of life, the lack of money and leisure had all restrained curiosity. The scientific discoveries in and after the 17th century began to exert certain pres

51、sure on people to explore the physical world.,DR-Question-p7,Detailed Reading,Paragraph 7: Question Why does the author compare travel to a personal crusade?,By definition, a crusade can be interpreted as a continual effort or struggle for a particular cause. Here the author finds that travel is, in

52、 some way, a battle to find “the profane” and to get away from boredom in modern society.,DR-Question-p8-9,Detailed Reading,Paragraphs 8-9: Question How does the author explain ones desire “to get away” in Paragraphs 8 and 9?,The author uses the Freudian theory to explain one of the most important r

53、easons for traveling, that is, “to escape father and family,” or our psychological urge for “disengagement” from “the familiar,” for “irresponsible free association.”,DR-Question-p11,Detailed Reading,Paragraph 11: Question What, according to the author, is the travelers possible reaction to an alien

54、 language?,According to the author, it is a pleasure to leave their own clich-filled language and hear things said in another tongue,DR-Question-p13,Detailed Reading,Paragraph 13: Questions 1. What, according to the author, is the main difference between the earliest travelers and todays travelers?,

55、“The earliest travelers went to see marvels, to admire the wonderful diversity of the world,” and they were fascinated with foreign places at first sight; while the latest travelers go to catch a last sight of what is disappearing, to mourn “dying cultures.”,DR-Question-p13,Detailed Reading,Paragrap

56、h 13: Questions 2. What does the author hope to convey when he mentions the custom in some ancient societies for the son to inhale his fathers last breath?,The author suggests that todays travelers are trying to “inhale” the “departing soul” of “dying cultures,” that is, to get hold of what is still

57、 left of ancient civilizations.,DR-Question-p20a,Detailed Reading,Paragraph 20: Question Why does the author entitle his essay “Being There”?,On the surface, the title “Being There” means “traveling to other places,” which is opposite to “being here.” What the author drives at is our psychological m

58、otivations for traveling: our dissatisfaction with our own countries, our desire “to be what weve always wanted to be,” our curiosity about antiquity and other countries and cultures, our desire “to get away” from “father and the family,”,DR-Question-p20b,even “to leave our own language” . The autho

59、r also suggests that it is not enough just to be “there” we should “squeeze the places” we visit until “they yield something.”,Detailed Reading,LPT-travel is like adultery,“Travel is like adultery: one is always tempted to be unfaithful to ones own country.”,Detailed Reading,Paraphrase, Travel is like infidelity between married people, but here one is always lured into going out to see other countries.,LPT-adultery,adultery n. (adulterous adj.) sex