北京邮2011年博士研究生入学考试题考试科目:英语Part I Reading Comprehension (40 points)Directions: In this part there are four passages for you to read. After each passage there are five questions, below each of which there are four answers marked A, B, C and D. Choose the best answer and mark the corresponding letter with a pencil on the Machine-Scoring ANSWER SHEET with a single line through the center.Passage OneThe aroma of chocolate perfumes the air of the Rue d‟Assas in Paris. Entering Christian Constant's state-of-the-art boutique, you find yourself in the kingdom of Paris's king of chocolate, where the humble cocoa bean is turned into mouth-watering chocolate Easter eggs.Constant, who is a chef, admits that chocolate is his passion and main interest in life. He first developed a fascination with chocolate when he was working for Gaston Lenotre, a famous French pastry chef.Every year he has a theme for decorating Easter eggs: this year his decorations are inspired by “Ar t No uveau”. Tonight h e has a dinner for 130 to organize and he has to prepare a three-foot-high Art Nouveau-style Easter egg by noon tomorrow. This, for Constant, is a normal schedule.Constant believes that his chocolate creations are as much of a work of art as other sculptures. It is, therefore, understandable that the restaurant, which he opened last month, is situated in the National Monuments Museum in Paris. During the day the restaurant is a tearoom and offers chocolate in every imaginable form. Customers can choose from a selection of sweet chocolate desserts or tries the more exotic spicy chocolates. Constant is also a professional “nose” working closely with the French Institute of Taste. He is capable of identifying 450 different tastes and flavors. Constant explains that the mouth, which can only taste four things --- salt, sweet, acid and bitter-is “stupid” in comparison to the no se. He believes that the nose is everything.In his book The Taste of Chocolate, he explains how in 1502 Christopher Columbus came across an island and went ashore. He was greeted by an Indian chief bearing gifts, among which were huge sacks of beans which Columbus thought was local currency. To his surprise, they prepared a drink for him. But Columbus, who disliked the odd bitter taste, continued onhis travels, ignorant of the fact that he had just tasted cocoa. Like Columbus, Constant travels those cocoa counties where he checks quality and works with local experts. Quality can vary depending on the region, year, and method of preparation. According to Constant, Venezuela and Trinidad have the best cocoa beans, which they export all over the world either as beans or as cocoa.Constant, who is a hard worker, only sleeps three hours a night. He talks long into the night with members of a club he has formed. The cl ub is called “The Chocolate Munch ers”. T heir main official activity is to get together for monthly dinners where they eat a very tiny dinner and tons of chocolate desserts.“I am an addict,” Constant admits, “and I don't want to be cured!”1. Which of the following is the most inclusive title for the passage?A. Chocolate—The Passion of a lifetime.B. T he Chocolate Munchers Club.C. Chocolate— A New Art Form.D. The Last Word in Good Taste.2. What does Constant do now?A. He works for a French pastry chef.B. He owns his own restaurant and tearoom.C. He is a sculptor for a museum in Paris.D. He is a chef in the Institute of Taste.3. Constant's newly-opened business______A. provides chocolates with various flavorsB. exhibits all of his chocolate sculpturesC. often needs to prepare a big Easter dinnerD. serves as a national monument in Paris4. The underlined part “Constant is also a ……nose‟”, means ___A. he believes he has the best nose in the worldB. his nose can taste salt, sweet, acid and bitterC. his nose can identify various tastes and flavorsD. he is capable of smelling flavors from a long distance5. According to Constant _____A. ancient Indians used cocoa beans as local currencyB. Columbus checked the quality of cocoa beans in different placesC chocolate addition makes people sleep lessD. the quality of cocoa beans varies from region to regionPassage TwoFrench are elegant people. They are artists in everyday life, having a very good taste in everything. They don‟t like American tourists wearing jeans to go into their luxurious and exquisite five-star restaurants, so one of the restaurants put a notice outside its front door. It read “No trouse rs, p lease!”A gourmet coffee was sold in Tokyo as an antidote to stress. Its name supposedly meant to people that it would soothe the troubled breast. Yet when it was printed in English, it turned out to be “Ease Your Bosoms”.Swedes started a promotion stunt to promote the sales of their vacuum cleaner named Electro. Their origin al ad slogan was translated as “Nothing sucks like Electro”.The General Motors' selling of Chevrolet was very bad in South America. And what is the reason? The translation of this brand sounds l ike “no va”- which means “It doesn't go” in Spanish.When Pepsi-cola invaded the huge Chinese and German markets, the efforts initially fizzled. The product's slogan, “Come alive with the Pepsi generation”, was rendered i nto German as “come out of the grave with Pepsi”. Coca-Cola also discovered something had gone wrong in Taiwan. The Chinese characters chosen for the world-famous product sound like “Bite the Wax Tadpole.”A beer co mpany's slogan “Turn it loose”became, in Spanish, eq uivalent to “suffer from diarrhea.”A company translated its sticky tape slogan into Japanese and came up with a sticky problem. The slogan “Sticks like crazy” became literally “it sticks foolishly” in Japanese.A tonic produc of royal jelly and is supposed to be very effective for some chronic diseases. Yet it was translated as “oral liquid”, which means “saliva” in English, In the brochure, it was described in this way:“it tastes like medicine”, when the language i n the original meant to use it as a food therapy.Even the wrong nonverbal cue can bring havoc to a product. A baby food company initially packaged their African products just the same as in the U.S.—with a cute baby picture on the jar. They didn't realize that because so many Africans cannot read, nearly all packaged products sold in Africa carry pictures of what is inside. Pureed baby! How horrible!In an Asian city, where traffic is really very bad, to secure people's safety, the municipal government has built underground passageways. Pedestrians are asked to use them whenever they need to cross the main street. A sign was posted once on the roadside, pointing to the entrance to an underground passageway, intending to notify English-speaking passengers, “Go Undergro und”.We chuckled at such clumsy translations. Is there anything wrong in the language? We must be aware that few words and idioms can be literally translated. It's best to hire the best for translation. Don't take it for granted that as long as one speaks a little English, he is autonomously able to do the translation. It takes a while to learn to be a good translator.6. "No trousers, please!" sounds funny on the front door of a five-star restaurant, because could mean “ ”, in English,A. Take off your trousers, then come in please.B. We don‟t sell any trousers here.C. W e don‟t have any pairs of trousers hereD. Anyone who does not wear trousers is not welcome.7. From the passage, you may guess that Chevrolet is most probably____A. shoes of some kinds that South American likeB. the brand name of a kind of vehicleC. a pet animal which runs fastD. a word in Spanish which has a very bad meaning8. Any product with a cute baby picture on the jar will most probably ___ in Africa,A. sell wellB. receive favorable attentionC. cause great interestD. bring an end to the product9. The Chinese characters chosen for Coca-Cola____ in Taiwan first.A. were well receivedB. had a wrong nameC sounded terrible in the language D. were all terrible words10. Which of the following is NOT true according to the passage?A. Clumsy translations can sometimes produce the desired effect.B. We should not take it for granted that anything can be translated.C. Few words and idioms can be literally translated.D. Clumsy translation could mean more than just a laughing matter.Passage Three“Vit amins are a group of substances found in food. The body needs them for life and health. So naturally, many people are concerned with the question: Am I getting enough vitamins, and am I getting the right kind?Even though very small amounts of each vitamin are enough for the needs of the body, the worry people have about vitamins has some bases. And this has something to do with their diet —the food they take in. A person eating a good variety of foods gets all the vitamins now known to be needed (with the possible exception of vitamin D).The problem is that there are many people who don't choose foods wisely, don't get enough variety, and don't eat the basic foods they need to get their vitamins. So the answer to this question is: No extra vitamins are needed, providing you eat proper foods: In fact, many of the vitamins cannot be stored in the body, so when extra vitamins are taken in, the body simply gets rid of them. It is even harmful to put too much of certain vitamins into the body. This has been found to be true of vitamin A and D, when large amounts are taken in.本资料由博宸考博英语辅导收集并整理编辑,更多系统化的考博英语辅导资料或服务请百度搜索博宸考博。