值得背誦經典英語文章

　　英語不僅僅是一種語言了，它還是一種渠道和溝通的橋樑。下面是小編帶來的，歡迎閱讀!

　　1

　　Changing Roles of Public Education

　　One of the most important social developments that helped to make possible a shift in thinking about the role of public education was the effect of the baby boom of the 1950's and 1960's on the schools. In the 1920's, but especially in the Depression conditions of the 1930's, the United States experienced a declining birth rate --- every thousand women aged fifteen to forty-four gave birth to about 118 live children in 1920, 89.2 in 1930, 75.8 in 1936, and 80 in 1940. With the growing prosperity brought on by the Second World War and the economic boom that followed it young people married and established households earlier and began to raise larger families than had their predecessors during the Depression. Birth rates rose to 102 per thousand in 1946,106.2 in 1950, and 118 in 1955. Although economics was probably the most important determinant, it is not the only explanation for the baby boom. The increased value placed on the idea of the family also helps to explain this rise in birth rates. The baby boomers began streaming into the first grade by the mid 1940's and became a flood by 1950. The public school system suddenly found itself overtaxed. While the number of schoolchildren rose because of wartime and postwar conditions, these same conditions made the schools even less prepared to cope with the food. The wartime economy meant that few new schools were built between 1940 and 1945. Moreover, during the war and in the boom times that followed, large numbers of teachers left their profession for better-paying jobs elsewhere in the economy.

　　Therefore in the 1950's and 1960's, the baby boom hit an antiquated and inadequate school system. Consequently, the " custodial rhetoric" of the 1930's and early 1940's no longer made sense that is, keeping youths aged sixteen and older out of the labor market by keeping them in school could no longer be a high priority for an institution unable to find space and staff to teach younger children aged five to sixteen. With the baby boom, the focus of educators and of laymen interested in education inevitably turned toward the lower grades and back to basic academic skills and discipline. The system no longer had much interest in offering nontraditional, new, and extra services to older youths.

　　公共教育的角色變化

　　一項重要的、有可能促使人們對公共教育的角色的看法發生轉變的社會發展是本世紀五六十年代的生育高峰對學校的影響。在20年代，尤其是在30年代後的大蕭條中，美國經歷了一次出生率的下降--1920年每千名年齡在15歲至45歲的婦女生下大約118個存活嬰兒，1930年89.2個，1936年75.8個，1940年80個。隨著二戰帶來的持續繁榮以及隨之而來的經濟增長，年輕人比大蕭條中的同齡人更早地結婚成家，而且比前輩養育更大的家庭。 1946年出生率上升到102%，1950年達106%，1955年達118%。對於生育高峰，經濟有可能是最重要的決定因素，但它並不是唯一的解釋。不斷受到重視的家庭觀念也有助於解釋出生率的上升。到40年代中期為止，這些生育高峰出生的孩子們開始源源不斷地進入小學一年級。到了1950年，就形成了一股洪流。公共教育系統突然感到不堪重負了。由於戰時和戰後的狀況，使得學齡兒童人數增加，這些狀況使得學校面對這股洪流更加措手不及。戰時經濟意味著在1940年到1950年間幾乎沒有建立新學校。而且，在戰時和隨後的經濟增長時期，大量的教師離開崗位去別處從事報酬更為優厚的工作。因此，在五六十年代，生育高峰衝擊著陳舊而不完備的學校體系。這樣一來，30年代以及40年代早期，"監護理論"就不再有意義了。也就是說，通過使16歲以上的年輕人留在學校不進入勞動力市場的做法再也不是教育機構的優先考慮了。因為教育機構不再能找到場地和教師來教育那些更小的5-16歲的孩子。隨著生育高峰，教育者和圈外人士對教育的興趣和焦點，不可避免地轉向了更低的年級和基礎的學術技能和學科上。這個系統不再有濃厚的興趣給較年長的年輕人提供非傳統的新式的和額外的服務。

　　2

　　The piano

　　The ancestry of the piano can be traced to the early keyboard instruments of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries --- the spinet, the dulcimer, and the virginal. In the seventeenth century the organ, the clavichord, and the harpsichord became the chief instruments of the keyboard group, a supremacy they maintained until the piano supplanted them at the end of the eighteenth century. The clavichord's tone was metallic and never powerful; nevertheless, because of the variety of tone possible to it, many composers found the clavichord a sympathetic instrument for intimate chamber music. The harpsichord with its bright, vigorous tone was the favorite instrument for supporting the bass of the small orchestra of the period and for concert use, but the character of the tone could not be varied save by mechanical or structural devices.

　　The piano was perfected in the early eighteenth century by a harpsichord maker in Italy ***though musicologists point out several previous instances of the instrument***. This instrument was called a piano e forte ***sort and loud***, to indicate its dynamic versatility; its strings were struck by a recoiling hammer with a felt-padded head. The wires were much heavier in the earlier instruments. A series of mechanical improvements continuing well into the nineteenth century, including the introduction of pedals to sustain tone or to soften it, the perfection of a metal frame, and steel wire of the finest quality, finally produced an instrument capable of myriad tonal effects from the most delicate harmonies to an almost orchestral fullness of sound, from a liquid, singing tone to a sharp, percussive brilliance.

　　鋼琴

　　鋼琴的家系可以追溯至15至16世紀早期的鍵盤樂器，包括小型撥絃琴、洋琴和維金娜琴。 17世紀時風琴、敲絃琴和撥絃琴成為鍵盤樂器類的主要成員。這種至高無上的地位一直為它們所保持，直到18世紀末期鋼琴將它們取代。敲弦古鋼琴的音調有金屬的音質，缺乏雄勁。然而由於它的音調變化多，許多作曲家發現對於親切的室內樂是一種得體的樂器。人們最喜歡用具備明快有力音調的撥絃古鋼琴來配合當時小型管弦樂團的低音樂器以及在演奏會上演奏。但它的音調難以變化，除非使用機械或構件裝置。

　　18世紀早期的義大利，鋼琴在一位撥琴鋼琴製造者手中得到完善***儘管音樂理論家們指出有更早的例子***。這種樂器被稱為piano e forte ***義大利語，柔和而響亮的***，以顯示它有力的多樣性。演奏者用一個頭部帶皮氈的彈擊樂錘敲擊琴絃。更早的這種樂器之上的金屬絲要重得多。從此，持續到19世紀的一系列機械上的改進，包括引入踏板以維持音調或使其柔和，改善金屬框架，以及使用最佳效能的鋼絲，最終產生了一種具備無數音調效果的樂器。這些效果涵蓋了從最精緻的和聲到幾乎全部的管絃樂音響，從明快流暢的吟唱的音調到尖銳的打擊樂器的清晰動人的恢巨集氣勢。

　　3

　　The Origin of Sports

　　When did sport begin if sport is, in essence, play, the claim might be made that sport is much older than humankind, for, as we all have observed, the beasts play. Dogs and cats wrestle and play ball games. Fishes and birds dance. The apes have simple, pleasurable games. Frolicking infants, school children playing tag, and adult arm wrestlers are demonstrating strong, transgenerational and transspecies bonds with the universe of animals – past, present, and future. Young animals, particularly, tumble, chase, run wrestle, mock, imitate, and laugh ***or so it seems*** to the point of delighted exhaustion. Their play, and ours, appears to serve no other purpose than to give pleasure to the players, and apparently, to remove us temporarily from the anguish of life in earnest.

　　Some philosophers have claimed that our playfulness is the most noble part of our basic nature. In their generous conceptions, play harmlessly and experimentally permits us to put our creative forces, fantasy, and imagination into action. Play is release from the tedious battles against scarcity and decline which are the incessant, and inevitable, tragedies of life. This is a grand conception that excites and provokes. The holders of this view claim that the origins of our highest accomplishments ---- liturgy, literature, and law ---- can be traced to a play impulse which, paradoxically, we see most purely enjoyed by young beasts and children. Our sports, in this rather happy, nonfatalistic view of human nature, are more splendid creations of the nondatable, transspecies play impulse.

　　體育的起源

　　體育運動開始於何時如果體育運動的本質就是遊戲的話，我們就可以宣稱體育運動比人類古老，因為正如我們所觀察到的，野獸也進行嬉戲。狗和貓會扭抱玩球，魚和鳥翩翩起舞，猿類會進行一些簡單的、愉快的遊戲。雀躍的幼兒，捉迷藏的學童和成年摔跤者展示出人與動物界的有力的跨越世代與物種的永恆的聯絡--特別是幼獸，它們翻筋斗、追逐、奔跑、扭打、模仿、嬉笑***或者看起來是***，直到愉快地筋疲力盡。他們的玩耍，同我們的一樣，似乎並沒有別的目的而只是給遊戲者以愉悅，暫時把我們從嚴肅生活的痛苦中拉出來。一些哲學家稱我們的嬉戲是我們本質中最崇高的部分。依他們這些隨意性很大的見解，遊戲無害而且實驗性地允許我們的創造力、幻想和想象發揮作用。遊戲讓人們從永不間斷亦不可避免的生活悲劇- 與乏匱和衰退進行的枯燥抗爭中得到一種解脫。

　　這是一個令人興奮、給人啟發的偉大見解。這種見解的持有者宣稱，我們的最高成就如宗教典禮、文學、法律的起源可以追溯到遊戲的衝動。但令人不解的是我們看到只有幼獸和小孩子才最純粹地享受著這種衝動。從這種比較豁達和非宿命的人性觀來看，我們的運動是超時代、跨物種的輝煌的創造。