英语听力教程第三版张民伦主编Unit9RomancingtheStone听力原文Word格式.docx

1、1. The LouvreParis is an ancient city, witness to revolution, celebration and war. At its center stands the Louvre, once a royal palace and now one of the worlds greatest museums. The Louvre is home to the most famous painting in human history - The Mona Lisa. Her enigmatic smile is said to conceal

2、many secrets. 2. The Vatican MuseumIn the middle of Rome stands the Vatican, the epicenter of Catholicism. It is both a fortified city and a place the Pope calls home. （Gracias. Gracias.） It also houses one of the most famous museums in the world, full of timeless treasures, each one with a story to

3、 tell. Of all of these none are more famous than the Sistine Chapel. All who enter here gaze up at the luminous frescos of Michelangelo. 3. Torontos Royal Ontario MuseumIts an eye-popping Canadian landmark, a national treasure chest and a place of mystery. This is the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto

4、, the ROM. For every object on display, thousands more are hidden in backrooms far from public view. Enter the hall of Ancient Egypt, and the hair stand up on the back of your neck. You feel a presence of the ghosts. How did they live and how did they die? If only the mummies could speak. 4. Cairos

5、Egyptian MuseumEgypt, here the towering monuments of the Pharaohs stand silent amid the roar of a modern city. Cairo is the largest metropolis in Africa, home to more than 20 million people. But at its center is a refugee from urban chaos. This is the museum of Egyptian antiquities, the treasure che

6、st of Asian civilization and one of the most spectacular museums in the world. Visitors flock here by the millions to gaze into the eyes of long dead Pharaohs and marvel at their dazzling sarcophagi of silver and gold. 5. Londons Natural History Museum The Natural History Museum in London, England,

7、its a cathedral of nature housing over 70 million specimens. During the day, thousands of visitors tour the galleries. But at night, when theyve all gone home, this place seems to e alive with unforgettable stories about where we came from and where we are going. The galleries and dark passage ways

8、invite those who dare to venture behind the scenes. Take a closer look and discover secrets that are disturbing and sometimes brutal. Part II The ScreamPainting is a fascinating subject. Every time when you visit a museum, you will find something new even in the same painting. While looking at a pai

9、nting, you can enjoy it for its beauty alone. Its lines, forms, colors, and position may appeal to your senses and linger in your memory. Apart from that, you can also try to figure out what the painting describes. Does it describe the artists impression of a scene or a person? Or does it describe t

10、he artists feeling about the art of painting itself?Speaker 1: This picture is by Edvard Munch, and its a very powerful picture, its in black and white as, as you see it here. And um I think its particularly powerful because mainly because of that figure who um, who is, who seems to be running off t

11、his bridge here holding his or her head in her hands and screaming. And um, whats very interesting about the picture are the two, the two figures at the end of the bridge or further up this road. And its difficult to understand whether the person is running from them or whether theyre just er innoce

12、nt bystanders. Um, so the reason I, I like this picture, the reason I find it powerful is because I think that the person is not actually running from the two dark figures at the end of the bridge, but in fact the person is suffering er perhaps some kind of terrible loneliness or sadness, and is, ac

13、tually seems to be trying to hide that feeling from those people. And I think this is a mon feeling, I think this is something which we all do sometimes when, when we feel some feeling, usually a bad feeling, something like loneliness or terrible unhappiness, we dont want other people to see that, a

14、nd er so we, we have to try and hide that feeling from, from other members of the, of the public. And I feel thats what this man or woman is doing in the picture here. Speaker 2: As a design, the pictures very strong as well. The, the bridge or the street is a very strong diagonal line which goes th

15、rough the, the picture. And then to the, to the right of the screamers head theres a series of dark vertical lines - its difficult to know what that is, perhaps its a field or maybe it could be a wall, its difficult to know exactly what it is, but those dark vertical lines somehow depress the pictur

16、e, which is exactly what the artist wanted. And then at the, at the top, you have the sky, which the artist has, has er made in the form perhaps of clouds, which are very strong horizontal lines, very, very bold black lines which again seem to push the whole picture down, and add to the depression o

17、f the, the experience which the, the screamer is er, is feeling. Part III Taj Mahal The Taj Mahal is a white marble mausoleum located in Agra, Uttar Pradesh, India. It was built by Mogul emperor Shah Jahan in memory of his third wife, Mumtaz Mahal. The Taj Mahal is widely recognized as the jewel of

18、Muslim art in India and one of the universally admired masterpieces of the worlds heritage.Theres no building more romantic or more tragic than the Taj Mahal. On June the 17th, 1631, Mumtaz Mahal, the wife of the Mogul Emperor, Shah Jahan, died while giving birth to her fourteenth child. So, in resp

19、onse to the death of his wife, Shah Jahan created one of the most famous buildings in the world, the Taj Mahal, a vision of perfection, of paradise on Earth. The emotional power of the Taj Mahal es not just from its ruthless symmetry and its dazzling white material, but also from the purity and simp

20、licity really of its forms. In line with Islamic thinking, it is not loaded with images of living beings, banned in the Koran, but by simple abstract decoration, lettering. In this sense very much less ornamentation gives more emotional power. As you approach nearer, the Taj Mahal, its scale, its cr

21、aftsmanship bee almost overwhelming. It took twenty thousand people twenty years to plete this great structure and its white marble is inlaid with twenty-eight different sorts of precious and semi-precious stones. But, this isnt a palace or a mosque. Its a mausoleum. Its a monument to grief. At this

22、 level and so near, I can see just how exquisite and subtle the Taj Mahal is. The inlay is amazing, like a jewel box. And the white marble is carved and the surface is mottled in architectural detail. It was a great surprise, being inside the Taj Mahal is like being inside a living being. It moans a

23、nd it groans. Theres no question about it, as a monument to grief and to heartbreak and the expression of agony and pain that lost all that was precious in this world and longing for the next, the Taj Mahal has no equal. Its unsurpassed. The twist to the story of the Taj Mahal is in the nearby Red F

24、ort where the final tragic episode of Shah Jahans life was played out. Its here that the myth of the Taj was born, where it enters the world of legend. Shah Jahan, the great emperor, became ill. He suffered a stroke and this provoked a ruthless, vicious struggle for power among his four sons. They f

25、ought, they battled and Aurangzeb, the most skilful, the most vicious I suppose of the four sons, prevailed. He killed his three brothers in battle and by treachery and when he had his father, Shah Jahan in his power, he imprisoned him here in the Fort. So for Shah Jahan his great empire had been re

26、duced to the area of this courtyard, and he would stand where I am standing now, contemplating the view, looking at the great mausoleum over there. This is a spectacular view, but it could have been more spectacular still. It is said that Shah Jahan, if he hadnt lost control of his empire, would hav

27、e built himself a mausoleum opposite that of his wife, and his one would have been clad in black marble, to match the white marble of the Taj Mahal. The story of the black Taj is an invention of the 18th century, but one that reflects, reinforces the fantasy surrounding a building dedicated to love

28、and to what could have been. Part IV More about the topic: British Sculptures Now and Then Sculpture has changed more radically in the past 100 years than in the preceding 30 000. British sculptors have led the way thanks to their restless originality. Today British sculpture is a hugely expressive

29、medium with almost limitless possibilities. Sometimes that sheer variety can be a bit bewildering but in British sculptures long history, this may turn out to be the greatest chapter yet.Wele to the British Museum, London, home to ancient art, and the unlikely birthplace of modern sculpture. Through

30、out the 19th century, British sculptors came here to study the famous ancient Greek marbles that once adorned the Parthenon in Athens. They went on show at the British Museum at the start of 1817 and were soon considered the epitome of what sculpture could and should be. Classical, heroic forms, theyre naturalistic, harmoniously proportioned, pletely devoid of distortion. They offer a vision of a highly sophisticated soc