6月英语四级阅读段落匹配题真题及答案

1、最新 料推荐2014 年 6 月英语四级阅读段落匹配题真题及答案the end of the book?by john steele gordona). amazon, by far the largest bookseller in the count ry, reported on may 19 that it is now selling more books i n its electronic kindle format than in the old paper-and-i nk format. that is remarkable, considering that the ki

2、ndle has only been around for four years. e-books now account for 14 percent of all book sales in this country and are i ncreasing far faster than overall book sales. e-book sales are up 146 percent over last year, while hardback sales i ncreased 6 percent and paperbacks decreased 8 percent.b). does

3、 this spell the doom of the physical book? cer tainly not immediately, and perhaps not at all. what it do es mean is that the book business will go through a transf ormation in the next decade or so more profound than any it has seen since gutenberg introduced printing from moveab le type in the 145

4、0s.c). physical books will surely become much rarer in the marketplace. mass market paperbacks, which have been dec lining for years anyway, will probably disappear, as will1最新 料推荐hardbacks for mysteries, thrillers, romance fiction, etc.such books, which only rarely end up in permanent collections e

5、ither private or public, will probably only be available as e-books within a few years. hardback and trade paperbacks for serious nonfiction and fiction will surely last longer. perhaps it will become the mark of an author t o reckon with that he or she is still published in hard co py.d). as for ch

6、ildrens books, who knows? childrens boo ks are like dog food in that the purchasers are not the co nsumers, so the market (and the marketing) is inherently s trange.e). for clues to the books future, lets look at some examples of technological change and see what happened to the old technology.f). o

7、ne technology replaces another only because the new technology is better, cheaper, or both. thee greater th e differential, the sooner and more thoroughly the new tec hnology replaces the old. printing with moveable type on p aper reduced the cost of producing a book by orders of mag nitude compared

8、 with the old-fashioned ones handwritten onvellum, which comes from sheepskin. a bibleto be sure,2最新 料推荐a long book required vellum made from 300 sheepskins and untold man-hours of scribe labor. before printing arrived,a bible cost more than a middle-class house. there were p erhaps 50,000 books in

9、all of europe in 1450. by 1500 ther e were 10 million.g). but while printing quickly caused the handwritten book to go extinct, handwriting lingered on well into the 16th century in the practice of rubricating books, or ha nd drawing elaborate initial letters (often in red ink, he nce the term). ver

10、y special books are still occasionally p roduced on vellum, but they are one-of-a-kind show pieces.h). sometimes a new technology doesnt drive the old o ne extinct, but only parts of it while forcing the rest to evolve. the movies were widely predicted to drive live th eater out of the marketplace,

11、but they didnt, because the ater turned out to have qualities movies could not reprodu ce. equally, tv was supposed to drive movies extinct but, again, did not.i). movies did, however, fatally impact some parts of live theater, such as vaudeville. (ironically, tv gave vaudeville a brief revival in t

12、he 1950s in such shows as“the ed sullivan show” and brought many of the old vaudevill3最新 料推荐e starssophie tucker, jimmy durante, ben blueout of retirement.) and while tv didnt kill movies, it did kill bpictures, shorts, and, alas, cartoons.j). nor did tv kill radio. comedy and drama shows (“jack ben

13、ny, ” “amos and andy, ” “the shadow”) all migrated to television. but because you cant drive a car and watch television at the same time, radio prime time became rush hour, while music, talk, and news radio greatly enlar ged their audiences. radio is today a very different busin ess than in the late

14、 1940s and a much larger one.k). sometimes old technology lingers for centuries because of its symbolic power. mounted cavalry replaced the chariot on the battlefield around 1000 bc. but chariots maintained their place in parades and triumphs right up untilthe end of the roman empire 1,500 years lat

15、er. the swordhasnt had a military function for a hundred years, but isstill part of an officers full-dress uniform, preciselybecause a sword always symbolized an officer and a gentleman.l). sometimes new technology is a little cranky at first. television repairman was a common occupation in the 1950

16、s, for instance. and so the old technology remains as a4最新 料推荐back up. steam captured the north atlantic passenger business from sail in the 1840s because of its much greater speed. but steamships didnt lose their rigging and sails until the 1880s, because early marine engines had a nasty habit of b

17、reaking down. until ships became large enough (andengines small enough) to mount two engines side by side, they needed to keep sails. (the high cost of steam and thelesser need for speed kept the majority of the worlds ocean freight moving by sail until the early years of the 20th century.)m). then

18、there is the fireplace. central heating was ubiquitous in upper- and middle-class homes by the second half of the 19th century. but functioning fireplaces remainto this day a powerful selling point in a house or apartment. i suspect the reason is a deeply ingrained, atavisticlove of fire. fire was o

19、ne of the earliest major technological advances for humankind, providing heat, protection,and cooked food (which is much easier to eat and digest).human control of fire goes back far enough (over a millionyears) that evolution could have produced a genetic predisposition towards fire as a central as

20、pect of a human habitation (just consider the phrase hearth and home).5最新 料推荐n). books especially books the average person could a fford havent been around long enough to produce evoluti onary change in humans. but they have a powerful hold on m any people nonetheless, a hold extending far beyond th

21、eir literary content. at their best, they are works of art andthere is a tactile pleasure in books necessarily lost in e-book versions. the ability to quickly flip through pages is also lost. and a room with books in it induces, at lea st in some, a feeling not dissimilar to that of a fire inthe fir

22、eplace on a cold winters night.o). for these reasons i think physical books will havea longer existence as a commercial product than some curr ently predict. like swords, books have symbolic power. lik e fireplaces, they induce a sense of comfort and warmth. a nd, perhaps, similar to sails, they mak

23、e a useful backup f or when the lights go out.46. authors still published in printed versions will b e considered important ones.答案： d解析： d段末句。 printed versions( 版本 ) 对应 hardcopy( 印刷版本 ) ，be considered important ones(被 重要 )对应 become the mark to reckon( 是 志 ) 。6最新 料推荐47. some people are still in favo

24、r of printed books be cause of the sense of touch they can provide.答案： n解析：对应 n段第三句提到的tactile pleasure in books(书本的触觉上的愉悦 ) 。48. the radio business has changed greatly and now att racts more listeners.答案： j解析：对应 j 段最后两句。 changed greatly(巨大改变 ) 对应 avery different business(相当不同的行业 ) ，attracts more lis

25、teners( 吸引更多听众 ) 对应 enlarged their audience(扩大受众面) 。49. contrary to many peoples prediction of its death,the film industry survived.答案： h解析：对应 h 段第二句。 many people s prediction对应 widely predicted。50. remarkable changes have taken place in the book business.答案： a解析：这是对 a 段所描述的电子书在近几年内大幅增长的现象的概括。7最新 料推荐51. old technology sometime