首页
外语
计算机
考研
公务员
职业资格
财经
工程
司法
医学
专升本
自考
实用职业技能
登录
外语
Farewell, Libraries A)Amazon, corn’s recent announcement that sales of e-books at the online megastore had overtaken sales of ha
Farewell, Libraries A)Amazon, corn’s recent announcement that sales of e-books at the online megastore had overtaken sales of ha
admin
2015-07-31
32
问题
Farewell, Libraries
A)Amazon, corn’s recent announcement that sales of e-books at the online megastore had overtaken sales of hardcover books came as no surprise. It had to happen sometime. But the news did conjure quite an interesting mental image: libraries that from now on will look smaller and less crowded.
B)For the moment, let’s not argue with the proposition that people will read as much as they ever have, no matter whether they read an actual book or a book on a screen. The habits of readers may not change(if anything, people may read more, or at least buy more—several stories have quoted e-book owners who say they buy more titles for their e-readers than they did when they were buying hardcover books). But if readers aren’t changing, their environments will. Rooms that once held books will—well, whatever they hold from now on, it won’t be books, or not as many books. Theoretically, your space will be more spare, more serenely uncluttered. That’s the theory, at least. My experience is that stuff expands to fill the space available. But you can dream.
C)All of this has already happened big time in the music business, where downloads have gradually but surely replaced CDs. I don’t know how many people I’ve overheard crowing because they managed to transfer their entire music collections onto their computers. All those CDs taking up space on the wall have gone -All those CDs that travel from car to kitchen to bedroom to living room, with the CD and the case getting separated somewhere along the way—a problem no more in the digital age. From now on, we’ll own what might be described as the idea of stuff, since the actual physical things—records, tapes, photographs, CDs. and now books have been as good as vaporized, with the information contained therein stored away on a hard drive.
D)This, of course, is merely collateral damage(附带损害)in the digital revolution, if damage it is. There’s as yet no way to tell if this transition is good, bad, both, or neither, but surely the absence of a physical library, be it musical or literary, marks a fundamental shift in the way we live and think about things. In music, for example, the rise of iTunes, Pandora, YouTube. and all the other online music players has quickly eroded our devotion to the long-playing album as the principal means of organizing music. After a half century of neglect, the lowly single is back on top. Most immediately this has consequences for artists, maybe not so much for the people who buy their music. But who knows?
E)With books, the absence of packaging does nothing to the contents. I can buy a hardcover copy of Moby-Dick or download it onto an e-reader, and Melville is still Melville. But I grew up loving Rockwell Kent’s illustrations of that novel, and later Barry Moser’s. It’s hard to think of the book without them. I can do that, certainly, but some little thing is lost.
F)Paperbacks and public libraries made books cheap or free but certainly available to millions who might otherwise not have been able to afford them, and all that happened long before I was born. Nevertheless, I was brought up by people who had been taught- and who taught me—that books were valuable things, things to be cared for and cherished, and I have owned some volumes for close to half a century(almost none of them, I should point out, qualify as "collectible" or valuable to an antiquarian book collector; owning a rare book makes me nervous. I like books I can hold, read, and even here my mother is spinning in her grave— write in).
G)I come from a generation for whom the books and records on the shelf signaled, in some way, who you were(starting with the fact that you were a person who owned books or records or CDs). If you visited a friend, you took the first chance you had to secretly scan that friend’s shelves to get a handle on the person. I suppose I could sneak a peek at a friend’s Kindle, but is that the same? And try that kind of snooping on a bus or in a coffee shop and you’ll probably get arrested.
H)The stuff of our lives is a comfort. We look up at the shelves and we see old friends. Yes, there are books on my shelves that aren’t my friends, that I haven’t finished or even started, but someday I will, I promise—my home library is a physical manifestation of ambivalence. There is comfort in the continuity of seeing the same books year after year. I guess there might be some of the same pleasure in scrolling through a digital library or music playlist, but somehow I think something will be lost.
I)For years audiophiles(高保真度录音爱好者)have tried to persuade more casual music fans that a vinyl record played on a decent sound system sounds better than a digital record played on the same system. Digital sound is not as warm, not as seductive to the ear. The resurgence, albeit modest, of vinyl, especially among young listeners and musicians, proves that this argument is not generational. It’s not, in other words, just old fogies versus young hipsters.
J)Something of the same argument might be made for books, or for the tactile(触觉的)pleasure of holding and reading a well-made book. At its simplest, a book is a tool, or an information-delivery system, if you will, and it does what it does supremely well. To conceive of a world without physical books is to conceive of a world somehow diminished. It may be more efficient—yes, you can take a "stack" of books on vacation with an e-reader. It may spare quite a few forests from the ax. But efficiency is no substitute for pleasure. The future may be less cluttered. It may also be less fun.
There is something valuable lost in the e-books without the favorable illustrations.
选项
答案
E
解析
同义转述题。定位句提到,我喜欢Rockwell Kent与Barry Moser这两个人的插图,我无法想象没有插图的书会怎么样,会有东西缺失。题干是对定位句的同义转述.故答案为E)。
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/4rl7777K
0
大学英语四级
相关试题推荐
A、Kidswillneverplaywithfireagain.B、Kidswillbumthemselvesagainandagain.C、Peoplemaybecomemuchstronger.D、Humanb
WhyTeenagersReallyDoNeedanExtraHourinBed?A)"Makingteensstartschoolinthemorningis’cruel’,"braindoctorclaim
A、Mostpeoplecanbearthelosingoftheirwalletsbutnotcellphones.B、Mostpeopleadmitmobilephonesarethe"remotecontro
Graduatingseniorsmayfacehigherriskforjobburnout(筋疲力尽,枯竭)thantheirparents’generation,saybusinessandcareerexperts.
Mothersreallydofavourtheir"preciousfirstboms"overthechildrentheyhavelater,researchhasfound.Amongexampleso
Mostparents,Isuppose,havehadtheexperienceofreadingabedtimestorytotheirchildren.Andtheymusthave【B1】______howd
Newresearchshowsgirlswhoregularlyhavefamilymealsaremuchless【C1】______toadoptallkindsofextremeweightcontrol【C2】
Tosomeit’sadreamjob—eatingdeliciousmealsforfreeandthenwritingaboutthem.Butforsomefoodcritics,theireyesar
A、Gotosummerschool.B、Takeavacation.C、Stayathome.D、Earnsomemoney.D对话开始男士提到的Ican’taffordtojustsitaround,andther
A、Thecouplecanenjoyacoolsummerthere.B、Itwillcostthewomantheleast.C、Itisanexcellentplacefornewly-marriedcou
随机试题
试回答波形梁钢护栏工程质量检验评定标准的相关问题。波形梁钢护栏工程质量检验评定外观鉴定项目有()。
程序文件的作用和意义不包括
原发性肝癌病人不适宜手术的指征是
有效排出高度是指
下列关于承受大跨度拱结构拱脚处水平推力的方式的叙述,不恰当的是()。
学生渴望充分发挥自己的潜能,希望越来越成为自己所希望的人物,完成与自己能力相称的一切活动。根据马斯洛的需要层次理论,这属于()。
简述选举权的平等性原则。
WhenCarlyFiorinabecameHewlettPackardsfirstfemalechiefexecutiveofficer,theexistenceofherhousehusband,FrankFiorin
KevinRogersusedtobemyboss.Atthattimehewasahardworking,up-and-comingbusinessmanandarealslave-driver,alwayst
Inmostoftheuniversities,Englishisa(n)______subjectforthenon-EnglishmajorM.A.andM.S.students.
最新回复
(
0
)