Read the following article and select the best answer. Article: Mark Twain is a name not usually connected with Broadway , but now his play "Is He Dead" will receive its first public performance on November 29. "Is He Dead" was written by Mark Twain in 1898 but was never performed. It was rediscovered in 2002 by Shelley Fisher Fishkin, an English professor and director of the American Studies Program at Stanford University. It was published the following year by the University of California Press. The story is about a group of poor artists who fake the death of their friend in order to increase the value of his work. "Is He Dead" is set in France in the 1840s and centers on the French painter Jean-Francois Millet. "Millet was probably the most popular European painter in the United States in Twain's lifetime," Fishkin said in a telephone interview. "Americans greatly admired him because he focused on the life of the common man and the common woman." According to Fishkin, "Is He Dead" is a satire about how value is created in the art world. Twain wrote the play when he was coming out of the hardest time of his life. Question: We can infer from the passage that Mark Twain _ . - had experienced several difficult times for no money - was a good novelist but a bad playwright - was a writer who only cared about ordinary people's life - was dissatisfied with some methods of creating the value of art work
was dissatisfied with some methods of creating the value of art work
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Read the following article and select the best answer. Article: On April 24th, another natural disaster-the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, happened. Millions of dollars have been used to help stop the spill and to clean up the animals, beaches, and land spoiled by the oil. Unfortunately, when many of these chemicals are used, more damage is caused to the environment, especially to lives in the sea. But governments seem to accept the _ of transporting mil-lions of tons of oil by ship every day so that we can fill up our cars and drive around and cause even more environmental damage. Interestingly, the biggest companies in the world produce cars, and the next biggest supply the gasoline to make them run. Of all of today's environmental disasters, an oil spill may actually be one of the least serious. Although oil is poisonous, it is a natural material. In the end, it breaks down naturally. In 1967 the tanker Torrey Canyon sank off the Scilly Isles near the coast of England and spilled 120,000 tons of oil into the ocean. If you go there today, you will find it hard to see any sign that it ever happened. However, we should be thinking more about reducing our dependency on oil. Governments should be encouraging research into new technologies, such as cars run by solar power, electricity, hydro-gen, and so on. Much of this research, in the past, was stopped by the oil, gas, and coal. If the world's millions of cars were 10% more efficient ,we would need many fewer tankers crossing the oceans each year. If this happened, the risks of oil spills would be reduced, and the air we breathe would be cleaner and fresher, too. Question: Where can you read this article? - In a story book. - In a science magazine. - In a novel. - In a brochure.
In a science magazine.
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Read the following article and select the best answer. Article: Scientists are learning new things about Antarctica, the coldest place on Earth. For example, the Antarctic ice sheet is shrinking. A new study found that summer ice loss in parts of Antarctica was at its highest level in 1,000 years. The study showed that Antarctic ice was melting mostly from below ice shelves, where the water is warmer than the ice. Eric Rignot is an earth system expert at the University of California, Irvine. He also works for the American space agency, NASA. There he serves as senior research scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, also in California. He says ice melting from below is responsible for 55 percent of the shelf loss from 2003 to 2008. That is a much higher rate than scientists thought earlier. Professor Rignot and his team used satellite observations, radar and computer models to measure features above the ice to learn what was going on below. The measurements show differences from one area to the next around the continent. The major ice shelves are called Ross, Filchner and Ronne. They make up two-thirds of Antarctica's ice shelves. But they are responsible for only 15 percent of the melting ice. The professor says even small changes, like changes in ocean flow driven by wind, can make a huge difference in the melting of the ice shelf. Sixty percent of the Earth's fresh water is held in the huge Antarctic ice sheet. Professor Rignot says the study will help experts predict how the continent reacts to warmer ocean waters and helps to cause rising sea levels around the world. The study was published in the journal Science. Question: What's the main idea of the passage? - the Antarctic ice sheet is shrinking - the coldest place on earth - the major Antarctica's ice shelves - the Atlantic Ocean are changing
the Antarctic ice sheet is shrinking
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Read the following article and select the best answer. Article: My husband Ollie had retired from teaching and we were making plans to travel together to Florida. Then he was terribly ill and became very weak, hardly able to speak. Weeks passed and it became clear that Ollie was near death, but I prayed day and night that he could get better. One of us was always in Ollie's hospital room--either me, or our grown children, Bruce and Karen. One day, in his broken and weak speech, Ollie told Bruce, "Go home. You should be with Gwen." Gwen was Bruce's wife. They had been married for six years and lived hundreds of miles away. Gwen was about to have a baby. We felt an extra sadness, knowing Ollie would never see his first grandchild. "I don't want to leave you, Dad," Bruce said. Ollie repeated, "You should be with Gwen." _ , Bruce left. "When the baby comes," he promised Ollie, "you will be the first to know." A few days later, around 2 p.m., Ollie awoke from a sleep. He turned and looked at me. I sat close to hear his weak words. "The baby is coming now. It's a boy," he said. For a moment his eyes were filled with tears. Then he went back to sleep again. Not long after that, Karen ran into the room. "Bruce called," she said, a smile lighting her face. "Gwen gave birth to a healthy baby boy around two o' clock." Ollie smiled; he had been the first to know. That night, Ollie died in his sleep. Question: What can we learn from the passage ? - Ollie and his wife had planned to settle in Florida. - Ollie cared for his son more than his daughter. - Ollie was sad about not being able to see his first grandchild. - Ollie died happy and in peace.
Ollie died happy and in peace.
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