2011Äê³ûÑãÓ¢ÓÊÔÕæÌâ(4)

First, it will reaffirm the notion that it is each individual s¡ªnot society s¡ª responsibility to look after his parents. Singapore is still conservative enough that most people will not object to this idea. It reinforces the traditional values and it doesn t hurt a society now and then to remind itself of its core values.ª¥

Second, and more important, it will make those who are inclined to shirk their responsibilities think twice. Until now, if a person asked family elders, clergymen or the Ministry of Community Development to help get financial support from his children, the most they could do was to mediate. But mediators have no teeth, and a child could simply ignore their pleas.

But to be sued by one s parents would be a massive loss of face. It would be a public disgrace. Few people would be so thick-skinned as to say, ¡°Sue and be damned¡±. The hand of the conciliator would be immeasurably strengthened. It is far more likely that some sort of amicable settlement would be reached if the recalcitrant son or daughter knows that the alternative is a public trial.ª¥

It would be nice to think Singapore doesn t need this kind of law. But that belief ignores the clear demographic trends and the effect of affluence itself on traditional bends. Those of us who pushed for the bill will consider ourselves most successful if it acts as an incentive not to have it invoked in the firs t place.ª¤

10. The Maintenance of Parents Bill ___.ª¤

A. received unanimous support in the Singapore Parliamentª¤

B. was believed to solve all the problems of the elderly poorª¤

C. was intended to substitute for traditional values in Singaporeª¤

D. was passed to make the young more responsible to the oldª¤

11. By quoting the growing percentage points of the aged in the populatio n, the author seems to imply that ___.ª¤

A. the country will face mounting problems of the old in futureª¤

B. the social welfare system would be under great pressureª¤

C. young people should be given more moral educationª¤

D. the old should be provided with means of livelihoodª¤

12. Which of the following statements is CORRECT?

A. Filial responsibility in Singapore is enforced by law.

B. Fathers have legal obligations to look after their children.ª¤

C. It is an acceptable practice for the old to continue working.

D. The Advisory Council was dissatisfied with the problems of the old.

13 The author seems to suggest that traditional values ___.ª¤

A. play an insignificant role in solving social problems

B. are helpful to the elderly when they sue their children

C. are very important in preserving Asian uniquenessª¤

D. are significant in helping the Bill get approvedª¤

2011Äê³ûÑãÓ¢ÓÊÔÕæÌâ

14. The author thinks that if the Bill becomes law, its effect would be ___.ª¤

A. indirect B. unnoticed C. apparent D. straightforwardª¤

15. At the end of the passage, the author seems to imply that success of the Bill depends upon ___.ª¤

A. strict enforcement B. public supportª¤ C. government assurance D. filial awareness

Passage 4

WHY SHOULD anyone buy the latest volume in the ever-expanding Dictionary of National Biography? I do not mean that it is bad, as the reviewers will agree. But it will cost you 65 pounds. And have you got the rest of volumes? You need the basic 22 plus the largely decennial supplements to bring the total to 31. Of course, it will be answered, public and academic libraries will want the new volume. After all, it adds 1,068 lives of people who escaped the net of the original compilers. Yet in 10 year s time a revised version of the whole caboodle, called the New Dictionary of National Biography, will be published. Its editor, Professor Colin Matthew, tells me that he will have room for about 50,000 lives, some 13,000 more than in the current DNB. This rather puts the 1,068 in Missing Persons in the shade. When Dr. Nicholls wrote to The Spectator in 1989 asking for name of people whom readers had looked up in the DNB and had been disappointed not to find, she says that she received some 100,000 suggestions. (Well, she had written to other quality newspapers too.)As soon as her committee had whittled the numbers down, the professional problems of an editor began. Contributors didn t file copy on time; some who did sent too much: 50,000 words instead of 500 is a record, according to Dr. Nicholls. There remains the dinner-party game of who s in, who s out. That is a game that the reviewers have played and will continue to play. Criminals were my initial worry. After all, the original edition of the DNB boasted: Malefactors whose crimes excite a permanent interest have received hardly less attention than benefactors. Mr. John Gross clearly had similar anxieties, for he complains that, while the murderer Christie is in, Crippen is out. One might say in reply that the injustice of the hanging of Evans instead of Christie was a force in the repeal of capital punishment in Britain, as Ludovie Kennedy (the author of Christies entry in Missing Persons) notes. But then Crippen was reputed as the first murderer to be caught by telegraphy(he had tried to escape by ship to America).ª¥It is surprising to find Max Miller excluded when really not very memorable names get in. There has been a conscious effort to put in artists and architects from the Middle Ages. About their lives not much is always known. Of Hugo of Bury St Edmunds, a 12th-century illuminator whose dates of birth and death are not recorded, his biographer comments: Whether or not Hugo was a wall-painter, the records of his activities as carver and manuscript painter attest to his versatility . Then there had to be more women, too (12 percent, against the original DBN s 3), such as Roy Strong s subject, the Tudor painter Levina Teer ¡­¡­ ´Ë´¦Òþ²Ø£º5870×Ö£¬È«²¿ÎĵµÄÚÈÝÇëÏÂÔغó²é¿´¡£Ï²»¶¾ÍÏÂÔØ°É ¡­¡­