单选题

A Tale of Scottish Rural Life

Lewis Grassic Gibbon"s Sunset Song (1932)was voted "the best Scottish novel of all time" by Scotland"s reading public in 2005. Once considered shocking for its frank description of aspects of the lives of Scotland"s poor rural farmers, it has been adapted for stage, film, TV and radio in recent decades.
The novel is set on the fictional estate of Kinraddie, in the farming country of the Scottish northwest in the years up to and beyond World War I. At its heart is the story of Chris, who is both part of the community and a little outside it.
Grassic Gibbon gives US the most detailed and intimate account of the life of his heroine (女主人公). We watch her grow through a childhood dominated by her cruel but hard-working father; experience tragedy (her mother"s suicide and murder of her twin children); and learn about her feelings as she grows into a woman. We see her marry, lose her husband, then marry again. Chris has seemed so convincing a figure to some female readers that they cannot believe that she is the creation of a man.
But it would be misleading to suggest that this book is just about Chris. It is truly a novel of a place and its people. Its opening section tells of Kinraddie"s long history, in a language that imitates the place"s changing patterns of speech and writing.
The story itself is amazingly full of characters and incidents. It is told from Chris"s point of view but also from that of the gossiping community a community where everybody knows everybody else"s business and nothing is ever forgotten.
Sunset Song has a social theme too. It is concerned with what Grassic Gibbon perceives as the destruction of traditional Scottish rural life first by modernization and then by World War I. Gibbon tried hard to show how certain characters resist the war. Despite this, the war takes the young men away, a number of them to their deaths. In particular, it takes away Chris"s husband, Ewan Tavendale. The war finally kills Ewan, but not in the way his widow is told. In fact, the Germans aren"t responsible for his death but his own side. He is shot because he is said to have run away from a battle.
If the novel is about the end of one way of life it also looks ahead. It is a "Sunset Song" but is concerned too with the new Kinraddie, indeed of the new European world. Grassic Gibbon went on to publish two other novels about the place that continue its story.

单选题 What is Sunset Song mainly about?

【正确答案】 C

【答案解析】[解析] 本题问的是《日落歌》主要是关于什么。根据第一段“Once considered shocking for its frank description of aspects of the lives of Scotland"s poor rural farmers”，《日落歌》主要描述的是苏格兰农民的生活。故选C项。A项“第一次世界大战”是故事发生的时间，不符合题意，排除。B项文中没有提及，因此排除。文章倒数第一段倒数第二句提到了“the new European”，但是这并非小说的主要内容，而是对于“Sunset”延伸意义的一种解读：旧的生活的终结意味着新的欧洲大陆的生活开始。因此D项不符合题意，故排除。

单选题 Which statement is NOT true of Chris?

【正确答案】 C

【答案解析】[解析] 本题问的是对Chris的表述不正确一项。第三段主要介绍了女主人公的经历，根据第三段第三句中“We see her marry, lose her husband, then marry again”可知，Chris只结了一次婚的说法是错误的。故选C。文章第三段第一句提到作者Grasses Gibbon描述了女主人公的生活(the life of his heroine)，并且在文章介绍完女主人公的主要经历后，便提到女主人公的名字为Chris，因此A项表述符合原文。通过第三段关于女主人公的描述，“grow through a childhood dominated by her cruel but hard-working father; experience tragedy...”可以知道，她的童年比较悲惨，因此B项符合原文，因此排除。在第三段最后文章提到，由于Chris这个人物这么有说服力，以致于许多女性读者不相信“she is the creation of a man. she is the creation of a man”，也就是说，与读者所认为的相反，事实上，她确实是由一名男性创造出来的角色，因此D项表述正确，排除。

单选题 What is the opening section of the novel mainly concerned with?

【正确答案】 A

【答案解析】[解析] 本题问的是这本小说的开始部分主要关注的是什么。根据第四段第三句“Its opening section tells of Kin Addie"s long history”可知，小说开头讲了Kin Addie的历史。故选A项。B项和C项文中均未提及，因此排除。文章第四段第三句中提至“in a language that imitates the place"s changing patterns of speech and writing”指的是作者描述Kin Addie的历史时使用的语言模仿了这个地方语言和文字的改变模式，而并不是说小说的开始部分的内容本身，因此D项不符合题意，排除。