高三英语名著阅读题

高三英语文学名著阅读题

1. Rocky relationship

Jane Austen(1775-1817), UK

Other famous works: Sense and Sensibility《理智与情感》Emma 《爱玛》《傲慢与偏见》呈现英国等级制度下的爱情观。

ROMANCES are among the most popular kinds of stories. It isn’t difficult to see why, as finding a man or woman to spend the rest of one’s life with is something almost all people want. Stories about relationships can be tragedies (悲剧), like Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. They can al so be comedies, like Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice (1813). This novel is certainly one of the funniest and most charming romances in world literature.

But Pride and Prejudice also has a sad message. In the novel there is a clear sense of the unequal opportunities men and women enjoy in life.

It is a story about the rich but snobbish (自命不凡的) Mr Darcy and the smart, but difficult and proud Elizabeth Bennet. Elizabeth is one of five daughters who live with their parents in respectable (尚可的) but rather poor conditions in Hertfordshire, near London. They belong to a class of people in England called the landed gentry. Members of the landed gentry can be rich, or they can be not so rich. The Bennets are not so rich. The money difficulties of the family drive the story of the novel.

Many people know the famous opening sentence of the book: “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.” This is of course a very ironic (讽刺的) remark. What is really true in the time of the novel is this: Single women from poorer families are very interested in a man with a good fortune, or even just a little money. Since they cannot pay their own way in life, they must find a husband.

Because of this, Mrs Bennet is desperate to find husbands for her daughters. They will then no longer be a burden on her.

In the end, Elizabeth and Darcy overcome the obstacles in their way to end up together. Elizabeth teaches Darcy to be less prejudiced (怀有偏见的), and she herself learns to be a little less proud. Jane, the oldest Bennet daughter, and her lover, Charles Bingley, also get engaged (订婚). Lydia finds herself a husband too – the good-for-nothing George Wickham. These marriages give Austen’s novel a happy ending.

But if this humorous entertainment ends with marriages, as all romances do, we should also not forget those who do not find husbands, like the Bennet daughters Kitty and Mary. Nor should we forget Charlotte Lucas, who marries the horrible William Collins simply because she has to and wants to help her parents financially.

Pride and Prejudice shows that for every lucky Jane and Elizabeth Bennet, who marry happily in the novel, there were a dozen other women in Austen’s time who lived without their contentment (满意).

1. What is the main purpose of this text?

A. To analyze why romances are among the most popular kinds of stories.