考研第五篇真题及解析.doc

2000年 Passage 5 ①（27）If ambition is to be well regarded, the rewards of ambition—wealth, distinction, control over one’s destiny—must be deemed worthy of the sacrifices made on ambition’s behalf. ②If the tradition of ambition is to have vitality, it must be widely shared; and it especially must be highly regarded by people who are themselves admired, the educated not least among them. ③（28）In an odd way, however, it is the educated who have claimed to have given up on ambition as an ideal. ④What is odd is that they have perhaps most benefited from ambition—if not always their own then that of their parents and grandparents. ⑤There is a heavy note of hypocrisy in this, a case of closing the barn door after the horses have escaped—with the educated themselves riding on them. ①Certainly people do not seem less interested in success and its signs now than formerly. ②Summer homes, European travel, BMWs—the locations, place names and name brands may change, but such items do not seem less in demand today than a decade or two years ago.③（29）What has happened is that people cannot confess fully to their dreams, as easily and openly as once they could, lest they be thought pushing, acquisitive and vulgar. ④Instead, we are treated to fine hypocritical spectacles, which now more than ever seem in ample supply: the critic of American materialism with a Southampton summer home; the publisher of radical books who takes his meals in three-star restaurants; the journalist advocating participatory democracy in all phases of life, whose own children are enrolled in private schools. ⑤For such people and many more perhaps not so exceptional, the proper formulation is, “Succeed at all costs but avoid appearing ambitious.” ①The attacks on ambition are many and come from various angles; its public defenders are few and unimpressive, where they are not extremely unattractive. ②As a result, the support for ambition as a healthy impulse, a quality to be admired and fixed in the mind of the