现代大学英语精读第四册课文原文.docVIP

Lesson 1 Thinking as a Hobby William Golding While I was still a boy, I came to the conclusion that there were three grades of thinking;and that I myself could not think at all. It was the headmaster of my grammar school who first brought the subject of thinkingbefore me. He had somestatuettes in his study. They stood on a high cupboard behind his desk. One was a lady wearing nothing but a bath towel. She seemed frozen in an eternal panic lest the bath towel slip down any farther, and since she had no arms, she was in an unfortunate position to pull the towel up again. Next to her, crouched the statuette of a leopard, ready to spring down at the top drawer of a filing cabinet. Beyond the leopard was a naked, muscular gentleman, who sat, looking down, with his chin on his fist and his elbow on his knee. He seemed utterly miserable. Some time later, I learned about these statuettes. The headmaster had placed them where they would face delinquent children, because they symbolized to him to whole of life. The naked lady was the Venus. She was Love. She was not worried about the towel. She was just busy being beautiful. The leopard was Nature, and he was being natural. The naked, muscular gentleman was not miserable. He was Rodins Thinker, an image of pure thought. I had better explain that I was a frequent visitor to the headmasters study, because of the latest thing I had done or left undone. As we now say, I was not integrated. I was, if anything, disintegrated. Whenever Ifound myself in a penal position before the headmasters desk, I would sink my head, and writhe one shoe over the other. The headmaster would look at me and say, What are wegoing to do with you? Well, what were they going to do with me? I would writhe my shoe some more and staredown at the worn rug. Look up, boy! Cant you look up? Then I would look at the cupboard, where the naked lady was frozen in her panic and themuscular gentleman contemplated the hindquarters of the leopard in endless gloom. I ha