单选题
Long before the iPhone made him the god of gadgets, Steve
Jobs launched his tech career by hacking land lines to make free long-distance
calls. Bob Dylan's band, the Golden Chords, lost a high-school talent
competition to a tap dancing act. Behind every success story is an embarrassing
first effort, a stumble, a setback or a radical change of direction. It's these
first clumsy steps on the road to fame and fortune that fascinate writer Seth
Fiegerman, who edits the blog OpeningLines.org, a collection of case studies on
the origins of famous careers. "When you see someone who's very
successful, you almost imagine that it was an inevitable conclusion, that
they're a genius, that they were destined for great things," says Fiegerman, who
began the blog in 2009, after an early setback in his own career. "I think the
big {{U}}takeaway{{/U}} is failure and setbacks, far from being uncommon, are in
many ways essential." After Fiegerman, now 26, graduated from
New York University in 2008, he landed a first job as a research editor at
Playboy magazine. But he had worked there for just half a year when management
announced that most of the staff would soon be laid off. As unemployment loomed,
Fiegerman felt adrift. He began to explore the Playboy archives, discovering a
valuable wealth of interviews with celebrities ranging from Marion Brando to
Malcolm X. Many of these successful people shared tales of their less promising
early days, and Fiegerman quickly became obsessed with these origin
stories. He began reading biographies with great interest and
requesting interviews with writers and musicians he admired, using the blog to
document the fits and starts that began the careers of the famous and the
infamous. Success, he learned, was less a matter of innate talent and more the
product of perseverance, a willingness to stumble and stand up again and
again. "You kind of assume that great geniuses are like
Mozart," Fiegerman says. But few successful people were children of highly
unusual talent and these children don't necessarily find success. "Most people
don't stick to it." Like his subjects, Fiegerman found that his
own early setback wasn't permanent. He landed a new job in journalism, and today
he works at the tech news website Mashable, covering, appropriately enough,
start-up businesses. While he has less time for the blog, he hopes his
collection of origin stories will help other young people realize it's OK to
fail.
单选题
Steve Jobs and Bob Dylan are mentioned to show that ______.
A. a good beginning is important for a successful career
B. successful people share certain good qualities
C. setbacks are nothing unusual in successful careers
D. success is hard to achieve for most ordinary people
单选题
The underlined word "takeaway" (Para. 2) probably means "______".
A. some food to be eaten elsewhere
B. a barrier to a successful career
C. a point to be remembered
D. a threat to your good health
【正确答案】
C
【答案解析】第二段说2009年，费格曼在事业受挫后选择开博。他说：“当你看到某些成功人士时，你总会想象他们的成功是必然的，他们都是天才，注定建立丰功伟业。我认为最重要的一点是要记住失败与挫折不是偶然现象，在很多方面它们是必要的。”在这里takeaway的意思conclusions，impressions or action points，也就是“结论或要点”。
单选题
Fiegerman became interested in the origin stories ______.
A. after he set up a news website
B. when he was creating his blog
C. after he was laid off by a magazine
D. while he was working for a magazine
【正确答案】
D
【答案解析】第三段最后几句说面对裁员的危机，费格曼感到茫然无措。他开始研究《花花公子》杂志的档案，发现了大量有价值的名人采访内容，包括马龙·白兰度(美国最棒的男演员)、马尔科姆·X(非裔美国人权利提倡者)。这些成功人士早期都看似前途渺茫。他们最初的故事很快吸引了费格曼。从此他就开始认真地研究这些人物传记。本段第二句有would soon be laid off，而第三句还有unemployment loomed(有失业的风险)，均说明费格曼当时还没有被解雇。
单选题
According to Fiegerman, which of the following is critical to success?