READING SECTION
Read the following magazine article about the history of the book as a medium of communication, and answer the questions below.
① My fingers stroke the vellum pages, which, made from calfskin, are smoother than paper, richer, almost oily. The black print is crisp, and every Latin sentence starts with a 1 lush red letter. One of the book's early owners has drawn a hand and index finger which points, like an arrow, to a passage to be remembered.
② In 44BC, the last year of his life, Cicero, the Roman Republic's great orator, wrote a book for his son Marcus called De Officiis ("On Duties"). It told him how to live a moral life, how to balance 2 rectitude with self-interest, how to have an impact on society. Not all his ideas were new. De Officiis draws on the views of various Greek philosophers whose works Cicero could consult in his library, most of which have since been lost. Cicero's works, however, remain. De Officiis was read and studied throughout the rise of the Roman Empire and survived its subsequent fall. It shaped the thought of Renaissance thinkers like the Dutch scholar Erasmus early in the sixteenth century; over two hundred years later during the French Enlightenment it was an inspiration to Voltaire, who said: "No one will ever write anything more wise."
③ The book's words themselves stay the same; the object that contains them, however, has gone through 3 relentless transformations and reincarnations. Cicero probably dictated De Officiis to his freed slave, Tiro, who copied it down on a scroll made from papyrus reed. From this first scroll other hand-written copies were made in turn. Within a few centuries some versions were transferred from scrolls into bound volumes of manuscript pages known as codices. A thousand years later medieval monks 4 meticulously made copies, still by hand and averaging only a few pages a day.
④ Then, in the fifteenth century, De Officiis was copied by a machine for the first time. The luxurious edition now in my hands - delightfully, and surprisingly, no gloves are needed to handle it — is one of the very first such copies. It was printed in Mainz, Germany, on a printing press owned by Johann Fust, an early partner of Johannes Gutenberg, the pioneer of European printing. It is dated 1466.
⑤ More than 500 years after it was printed, this beautiful volume sits in the Huntington Library in San Marino, California, its home since 1916. Few physical volumes survive five centuries. This one should last several more. Built in 1951, the strong-room that holds it and tens of thousands of other precious volumes, was originally meant to double as a nuclear-bomb shelter.
⑥ Although this particular copy of De Officiis is carefully hidden away, the text itself is freer than ever. In its printed forms it has long been a hardback and, more recently, a paperback. It has been published in all sorts of editions — as a component of a uniform library series, as a classic pitched at an affordable price, as a scholarly, 5 annotated text that only universities buy. And now it is available in all sorts of non-printed forms, too. You can read it free online or download it as an e-book in the original Latin, in English, and in any number of other tongues.
⑦ Many are worried about what such technology means for books, with big bookshops closing, new reading devices spreading, amateur authors flooding the market, and an online leviathan known as Amazon growing ever more powerful. Their anxieties cannot simply be written off as a reactionary fear of new technology. More than any development in their history, the digital revolution may well change the way books are written, sold, and read, and that will not be to everyone's advantage. Veterans and revolutionaries alike may go bankrupt; Gutenberg himself died almost penniless, having
lost control of his press to Fust and other 6 creditors .
⑧ But to see technology purely as a threat to books risks missing a key point. Books are not just "tree flakes encased in dead cow," as they were mockingly described twenty years ago by MIT professor William J. Mitchell, a 7 staunch advocate of digitalization. They are a technology in their own right, one developed and used for the refinement and advancement of thought. And this technology is a powerful, long-lived, and adaptable one. Books like De Officiis have not merely survived history; they have helped to shape it. The ability they offer to preserve, transmit, and develop ideas was taken to another level by Gutenberg and his colleagues. Being able to study printed material at the same time as others studied it and to exchange ideas about it 8 sparked off the Reformation; it was central to the Enlightenment and the rise of modern science. No army has accomplished more than printed textbooks; no priest has mattered as much as Darwin's On the Origin of Species; no prince has influenced hearts and minds as much as the first folio of Shakespeare's plays.
⑨ Books read in electronic form will boast the same powers and some new ones as well. The private joys of the book will remain; new public pleasures are there to be added. The printed book is an excellent means of channeling information from writer to reader; the e-book can send information back as well. Teachers will be able to learn of a pupil's progress and questions, publishers will be able to see which books are 9 gulped down, which sipped slowly. Already readers can see what other readers have thought worthy of note, and seek out like-minded people for further discussion of what they have read. Books will evolve online and off, and the definition of what counts as one will expand; the sense of the book as a fundamental channel of culture, flowing from past to future, will endure. People may no longer try to pass on wisdom to their children through slave-written scrolls, as Cicero did in De Officiis. It may even be that Voltaire was right, and that no one will write anything wiser than what was set down over 2000 years ago. But it will not be for want of effort, or of opportunity, or of an audience of future readers ready to seek out wisdom in the books left behind. What is the future of the book? It is much brighter than people think.
[Adapted from "The future of the book," The Economist, October 11, 2014]
(1) Choose the best way to complete these sentences about Paragraphs ① to ⑨.
1 In Paragraph ① the writer
2 In Paragraph ② the writer
3 In Paragraph ③ the writer
4 In Paragraph ④ the writer
5 In Paragraph ⑤ the writer
6 In Paragraph ⑥ the writer
7 In Paragraph ⑦ the writer
8 In Paragraph ⑧ the writer
9 In Paragraph ⑨ the writer
A argues that, because they have reached a much wider audience, the evolutionary theories of Darwin have had a far greater impact on intellectual development than the comedies and tragedies of Shakespeare.
B claims that books will continue to be important media of communication, because electronic books both retain the power of paper books to send information from producer to consumer, and have the added advantage of allowing information to flow in the opposite direction.
C describes when and where Cicero's De Officiis first appeared as a printed book,
D emphasizes that, over its long history, the adaptations in the format of the physical book also involved changes in how ideas were generated and circulated.
E explains where a book that is more than five hundred years old has been held over the last century.
F gives an explanation of why many commentators fear that the digital revolution will have damaging effects on the production, distribution, and consumption of books.
G introduces the content of a work dating from before the Christian era, covering both the circumstances in which it was initially written and its later intellectual influence.
H lists the major formats and editions, both analog and digital, in which a work by a great Roman orator has appeared since the invention of Gutenberg's printing press.
I provides a personal evocation of how the pages of a book produced in the mid-fifteenth century feel and look.
J rejects the views of a professor at a prestigous American university who argues that electronic books are inferior to physical books in both practical and intellectual terms.
K runs over the different physical forms in which a work by a Roman orator appeared during the first thousand years and more after it was composed.
L suggests that translations of Cicero's De Officiis into English and other modern languages have badly distorted the argument made in the original version in classical Latin.
(2) Choose the FIVE statements below which DO NOT agree with what is written in the article. You must NOT choose more than FIVE statements.
A Because the copy of Cicero's De Officiis held in the Huntington Library is over five hundred years old, it cannot be handled without using gloves.
B Cicero died not long after writing De Officiis for the benefit of his son Marcus.
C Cicero's De Officiis was first written down in black and red ink on a scroll of smooth calfskin by one of the author's literate slaves.
D Cicero's De Officiis was originally composed in Latin though it makes use of a number of Greek sources.
E Despite being the pioneer of printing in Europe, Johannes Gutenberg accumulated a number of debts and died a poor man.
F Erasmus is mentioned in the article as a Renaissance thinker influenced in the 1500s by Cicero's De Officiis.
G The earliest copies of Cicero's De Officiis were stored in scrolls rather than bound volumes.
H The first mechanical reproductions of Cicero's De Officiis were created in Mainz by two pioneering printers in partnership, Johannes Gutenberg and his brother.
I The hand pointing towards a passage of text was drawn by an early owner of the first medieval manuscript version of Cicero's De Officiis.
J The Huntington Library has held a copy of the first printed edition of Cicero's De Officiis since World War I, but has only kept it in its current secure location since after World War II.
K The phrase "tree flakes encased in dead cow," attacking the physical limitations of books as a medium of communication, was penned by Charles Darwin in the late nineteenth century.
L Voltaire is mentioned in the article as a French Enlightenment thinker influenced in the 1700s by Cicero's De Officiis.
(3) Choose the best way to complete each of these sentences, which refer to the underlined words in the passage.
1 Here, lush suggests that the color of the printed letters is
A dirty.
B fading.
C rich.
D startling.
E unpleasant.
2 Here, rectitude refers to behavior that is
A arbitrary.
B instinctive.
C selfish.
D thoughtless.
E virtuous.
3 Here, relentless means without any
A authority.
B break.
C compromise.
D meaning.
E purpose.
4 Here, meticulously suggests that the monks worked
A at great cost.
B at great speed.
C under great pressure.
D with great care.
E with great ceremony.
5 Here, annotated indicates that the editions include
A ample space.
B colored illustrations.
C frequent updating.
D multiple errors.
E specialist commentary.
6 Here, creditors means those to whom someone owes
A gratitude.
B loyalty.
C money.
D obedience.
E respect.
7 Here, staunch means
A ignorant.
B occasional.
C old.
D uncompromising.
E unreliable.
8 Here, sparked off means
A abridged.
B assisted.
C diverted.
D initiated.
E prevented.
9 Here, gulped down suggests that books are read with great
A care.
B carelessness.
C rapidity.
D regularity.
E stupidity.
(4) Choose the most appropriate alternative title for the article from the list below.
A From ancient to modern
B From Athens to California
C From Erasmus to Darwin
D From Gutenburg to Google
E From papyrus to pixels
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