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  3. Passage One (1) The Chestnut Tree was almost empty. A ray of sunlight s

Passage One (1) The Chestnut Tree was almost empty. A ray of sunlight s

游客2024-11-03  10
问题     Passage One
    (1)  The Chestnut Tree was almost empty. A ray of sunlight slanting through a window fell on dusty table-tops. It was the lonely hour of fifteen.  A tinny music trickled from the telescreens.
    (2)  Winston sat in his usual corner, gazing into an empty glass. Now and again he glanced up at a vast face which eyed him from the opposite wall. BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU, the caption said. Unbidden, a waiter came and filled his glass up with Victory Gin, shaking into it a few drops from another bottle with a quill through the cork. It was saccharine flavoured with cloves, the speciality of the cafe.
    (3)  Winston was listening to the telescreen. At present only music was coming out of it, but there was a possibility that at any moment there might be a special bulletin from the Ministry of Peace. The news from the African front was disquieting in the extreme. On and off he had been worrying about it all day. A Eurasian (欧 亚国的) army [ Oceania (大洋国) was at war with Eurasia: Oceania had always been at war with Eurasia] was moving southward at terrifying speed. The mid-day bulletin had not mentioned any definite area, but it was probable that already the mouth of the Congo was a battlefield. Brazzaville and Leopoldville were in danger. One did not have to look at the map to see what it meant. It was not merely a question of losing Central Africa: for the first time in the whole war, the territory of Oceania itself was menaced.
    (4)  A violent emotion, not fear exactly but a sort of undifferentiated excitement, flared up in him, then faded again. He stopped thinking about the war. In these days he could never fix his mind on any one subject for more than a few moments at a time. He picked up his glass and drained it at a gulp-As always, the gin made him shudder and even retch slightly. The stuff was horrible. The cloves and saccharine, themselves disgusting enough in their sickly way, could not disguise the flat oily smell; and what was worst of all was that the smell of gin, which dwelt with him night and day, was inextricably mixed up in his mind with the smell of those—
    (5)  He never named them, even in his thoughts, and so far as it was possible he never visualized them. They were something that he was half-aware of, hovering close to his face, a smell that clung to his nostrils. As the gin rose in him he belched (打嗝) through purple lips. He had grown fatter since they released him, and had regained his old colour—indeed, more than regained it. His features had thickened, the skin on nose and cheekbones was coarsely red, even the bald scalp (头皮) was too deep a pink. A waiter, again unbidden, brought the chessboard and the current issue of The Times, with the page turned down at the chess problem. Then, seeing that Winston’s glass was empty, he brought the gin bottle and filled it. There was no need to give orders. They knew his habits. The chessboard was always waiting for him, his corner table was always reserved; even when the place was full he had it to himself, since nobody cared to be seen sitting too close to him. He never even bothered to count his drinks. At irregular intervals they presented him with a dirty slip of paper which they said was the bill, but he had the impression that they always undercharged him. It would have made no difference if it had been the other way about. He had always plenty of money nowadays. He even had a job, a sinecure (闲职), more highly-paid than his old job had been.
    (6)  The music from the telescreen stopped and a voice took over. Winston raised his head to listen. No bulletins from the front, however. It was merely a brief announcement from the Ministry of Plenty. In the preceding quarter, it appeared, the Tenth Three-Year Plan’s quota for bootlaces had been over-fulfilled by 98 percent.
    (7)  He examined the chess problem and set out the pieces. It was a tricky ending, involving a couple of knights. "White to play and mate in two moves. " Winston looked up at the portrait of Big Brother. White always mates, he thought with a sort of cloudy mysticism. Always, without exception, it is so arranged. In no chess problem since the beginning of the world has black ever won. Did it not symbolize the eternal, unvarying triumph of Good over Evil? The huge face gazed back at him, full of calm power.  White always mates.
    (8)  The voice from the telescreen paused and added in a different and much graver tone: "You are warned to stand by for an important announcement at fifteen-thirty. Fifteen-thirty! This is news of the highest importance. Take care not to miss it.  Fifteen-thirty I" The tinking music struck up again.
    (9)  Winston’s heart stirred. That was the bulletin from the front; instinct told him that it was bad news that was coming. All day, with little spurts of excitement, the thought of a smashing defeat in Africa had been in and out of his mind. He seemed actually to see the Eurasian army swarming across the never-broken frontier and pouring down into the tip of Africa like a column of ants. Why had it not been possible to outflank them in some way? The outline of the West African coast stood out vividly in his mind. He picked up the white knight and moved it across the board. There was the proper spot. Even while he saw the black horde racing southward he saw another force, mysteriously assembled, suddenly planted in their rear, cutting their communications by land and sea. He felt that by willing it he was bringing that other force into existence. But it was necessary to act quickly. If they could get control of the whole of Africa, if they had airfields and submarine bases at the Cape, it would cut Oceania in two. It might mean anything: defeat, breakdown, the redivision of the world, the destruction of the Party! He drew a deep breath. An extraordinary medley of feeling—but it was not a medley, exactly; rather it was successive layers of feeling, in which one could not say which layer was undermost— struggled inside him.  [br] Which of the following statements about the mysterious army imagined by Winston can be concluded from the last paragraph?
选项 A、It belonged to Eurasia.
B、It appeared on the flanks of enemy units.
C、Its speed of action was of the essence.
D、Its control of Africa might split Oceania.
答案 C
解析 推断题。根据题干提示定位至最后一段。该段第四句提到温斯顿仿佛确实看到，欧亚国的军队像蚂蚁大军一样，蜂拥而至，越过从未被突破的前线，涌进非洲底端。该段第九句和第十句又指出，甚至当他目睹黑色大军快速南下时，他看见了另外一支大军，神秘地集结起来，突然插入他们的后方，切断了他们的陆海交通，他觉得通过意愿，自己正在把另一支大军变成现实。这三句表明与黑色大军敌对的另外一支大军是温斯顿所想象的神秘大军。紧接着第十一句提到这支神秘大军必须迅速采取行动。由此可知，这支军队的行动速度非常重要，故[C]为答案，同时排除[A]，该段第四句和第九句表明黑色大军才是欧亚国的军队，而神秘大军属于敌对方，即大洋国。第九句直接提及神秘大军突然插入黑色大军的后方，而不是出现在敌军侧翼，故排除[B]；第十二句提到如果他们控制了整个非洲，如果他们夺得了好望角的机场和潜艇基地，大洋国就要被一分为二了，该句中的they是指黑色大军，而不是神秘大军，[D]与原文表述不符，故排除。
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