单选题 Martha Graham's territory of innumerable dances and a self-sufficient dance technique is a vast but closed territory, since to create an art out of one's experience alone is ultimately a self-limiting act. If there had been other choreographers with Graham's gifts and her stature, her word might have seemed a more balanced part of the story of American dance. But as she built her repertory, her own language seemed to shut out all other kinds. Even when an audience thinks it discerns traces of influence from other dance styles, the totality of Graham's theatrical idiom, its control of costumes, lights, and every impulse of the dance makes the reference seen a mirage. Dance is not her main subject. It is only her servant.
Graham had achieved her autonomy by 1931. By that time, three giant figures who had invented the new twentieth-century dance were dead: Serger Diaghilev, Anna Pavlova, and Isadora Duncan. Their era ended with them, and their dance values nearly disappeared. Their colleagues Michel Fokine and Ruth St. Denis lived on in American like whales on the beach. During the twenties, Martha Graham and her colleagues had rescued art-dance from vaudeville and movies and musical comedy and all the resonances of the idyllic mode in the United States, but in so doing they closed the channels through which different kinds of dance could speak to one another and these stayed closed for half a century. Modern dance dedicated itself to deep significance. It gave up lightness, it gave up a wealth of exotic color, it gave up a certain kind of theatrical wit and that age-old mobile exchange between a dancer and the dancer's rhythmical and musical material. No material in modern dance was bodies. Modern dance excluded its own theatrical traditions of casual play, gratuitous liveliness, the spontaneous pretense, and the rainbow of genres that had formed it. But all these things survived in the public domain, where they had always lived, and they have continued to surface in American dance, if only by accident.

单选题 What is the main purpose of the passage?

A. To discuss Martha Graham's influences to modern dance.
B. To trace the origins of different dance techniques.
C. To argue the role of modern dance as an artistic form of expression.
D. To compare several famous women choreographers of the twentieth century.

【正确答案】 A

【答案解析】纵观全文易知，本文主要在讨论Martha Graham对现代舞蹈的影响。应选A。

单选题 According to the passage, which of the following most influenced Martha Graham's dance and techniques?

A. Her own experiences.
B. Exotic and idyllic themes.
C. Familiar classical stories.
D. The works of St. Denis and Duncan.

【正确答案】 A

【答案解析】文章第一句就指出了Martha Graham “create an art out of one's experience alone”。A项符合题意。

单选题 It can be inferred from the passage that Martha Granam had become famous by ______.

A. the beginning of the nineteenth century
B. the end of the nineteenth century
C. the early 1920's
D. the early 1930's

【正确答案】 D

【答案解析】从文中第二段第一句可知Graham在1931年实现了自主。因此，D项是正确答案。

单选题 The author uses the phrase "like whales on the beach" to indicate that Fokine and St. Denis were ______.

A. good swimmers
B. physically large
C. out of place
D. very sick

【正确答案】 C

【答案解析】从第二段可看出，创造了20世纪的舞蹈三巨头时代已结束，她们的舞蹈价值也就消失了(Their era ended with them，and their dance values nearly disappeared)。据此可判断C项正确。

单选题 What criticism does the author make of Martha Graham and he colleagues?

A. They patterned much of their choreographic style after vaudeville.
B. They insisted that all dancers learn the same foreign language.
C. They adopted the same dance values of the previous era without interjecting any new ideas.
D. They prevented modern dance from expanding beyond their personal interpretations.

【正确答案】 D

【答案解析】文中第二段指出，Graham与她的同事关闭了艺术舞蹈与其他艺术形式的通道“but in so doing they closed the channels…”。因此，D项符合题意。