新标准大学英语综合教程4——翻译答案

Unit 1

If you ask me, taking a second major isn’t good for every undergraduate. In my freshman year as an English major, I took economics as my minor. By all odds, I was the most hard-working student in my class. But try as I might to meet the requirements of the two different subjects, I still couldn’t do well enough to pass all the exams. Given that the study of economics required a good command of mathematics, I had to spend so much time on math that I neglected my English.

Failing English Literature and Macroeconomics in the second term sounded the alarm for me. This was the first time I did not pass a course in my life, which had greatly sapped my confidence. Although I was not a man who would easily bow to fate, as the summer bread came to a close, I decided to give up economics for fear that I would fail both subjects. Now that I had only one subject to attend to, everything seemed to be on the right track again.

Unit 2

It was not until after he had graduated from university and started to work that Zhang Lei became aware of the pleasure of reading. reflecting on his undergraduate studies, he lamented that he, unlike some of his classmates who had immersed themselves in various interesting books they were able to lay hands on from the library or bookshops, had only read textbooks, none of which was really worthwhile, or could be read in one sitting. He was deprived of the privilege of gaining access to the writers’ fantastic worlds through the windows their books have opened, so to speak.

Now he has become an avid and omnivorous reader. It is as if he wants to read all those marvelous books he hadn’t had a chance to read in his university days. By now, in his spare time, he had read several hundreds of books, including novels, biographies and travel notes. He realizes that books can not only reveal to him the vista of a hopeful future and help him withstand stresses and strains, they can also help him clear up some misconceptions and discover the true meaning of life.

Unit 3

What you wear seems to dictate your behavior. Take primary school and high school students for example. One of the hard and fast rules they have to observe is that they must wear uniforms at school. There is no doubt that school uniforms would not have achieved their currency without a symbolic correlation between the uniformity of clothes and the students’ conformity to some common code of conduct.

However, after years of school life, there is always a backlash secretly nursed in the students’ mind against the ubiquitous uniform which suppresses the expression of individuality. To compensate for this loss, students usually wear more casual and popular clothes on weekends. It is not until they start university, however, that they can really enjoy the freedom of dress, an anarchy associated with the cultivation of creativity and the encouragement of free expression of ideas and talents. But this situation won’t obtain for long. After a relatively short time of liberty, they may experience again the revived pressure of dress code as soon as they become professions.

Unit 4

When it comes to the effects of the current economic downturn, the decrease of student activities is a good case in point. To enliven campus life, the university is always willing to carve out some money for activities organized by student clubs and societies, but such sponsorships have been pared down this year because of huge budget cut. Apparently, student organizations need to weather their own financial crisis if they want to recover from their current state of inactiveness. Some suggest enrolling more club members, on the ground that the consequent increase of membership fees may help them get out of the difficulty.