When you turn on the radio, you hear an advertisement. When you watch television, you hear and see an advertisement. If you turn the pages of a newspaper or magazine, again you find an advertisement. If you walk down the street, you see one advertising board after another. All day, every day, people who want to sell you something compete to catch your attention. As a result, advertisements are almost everywhere. In the West, advertisements are the fuel that makes mass media work. Many TV stations, newspapers, magazines, radio stations are privately owned. The government does not give them money. So where does the money come from? From advertisements. Without advertisements, there would not be these private businesses. Have you ever asked yourself what advertising is? Through the years, people have given different answers to the question. For some time it was felt that advertising was a means of "keeping your name before the public." And some people thought that advertising was "truth well told." Now more and more people describe it in this way: Advertising is the paid, non-personal, and usually persuasive description of goods, services and ideas by identified sponsors through various media. First, advertising is usually paid for. Various sponsors pay for the advertisements we see, read, and hear over the various media. Second, advertising is non-personal. It is not face to face communication. Although you may feel that a message in a certain advertisement is aimed directly at you, in reality, it is directed at large groups of people. Third, advertising is usually persuasive. Directly or indirectly it tells people to do something. All advertisements try to make people believe that the product, idea, or service advertised can do good to them. Fourth, the sponsor of the advertisement must be identified. From the advertisement, we can see if the sponsor is a company, or an organization, or an individual. Fifth, advertising reaches us through traditional and nontraditional mass media. Included... The existence of the privately-owned mass media depends financially on _ . A) the government B) advertisements C) their owners' families D) the audience
B
Jane arrives at Thornfield, having been met at the George Inn. Mrs. Fairfax confuses her a little at first, because _ is so informal and welcoming. But in due course Jane discovers that Mrs. Fairfax is the housekeeper. Jane's pupil, Adele Varens, is the eight-year-old French child under the legal protection of Mr. Edward Rochester, the owner of the house. (We learn later that her mother had claimed she was his illegitimate daughter. Mr. Rochester is not convinced by this claim, but felt he could not leave the little girl poor when her mother died.) Adele is a pleasant little girl, even if she is not a particularly eager student. Life goes on very peacefully for three months, until the return of Mr. Rochester. Jane first meets him on his horse, and her description of him is quite fanciful. He takes a fall and Jane helps him, although she does not know who he is until they are both back at Thornfield. It is obvious to the reader, although not to Jane, that the reason why Mr. Rochester stays at Thornfield much longer than usual is that he finds her company enjoyable. Jane, unknowingly at first, falls in love with him. Their closeness is very apparent. There is something about Thornfield that is mysterious. Jane is encouraged to focus her attention on the servant Grace Poole, who is Mr. Rochester's mad wife Bertha Mason's keeper at Thornfield, and whose drunken carelessness frequently allows Bertha to escape and do something violent. It is clear to the reader, though, that Mr. Rochester's emotional engagement is immense. When his bed is set on fire, Jane rescues him, but does not understand why the matter is not pursued, despite Mr. Rochester assuring her the criminal is Grace. The next morning Grace behaves as though she has done nothing wrong. Eventually, Mr. Rochester leaves, to go to a house party. He brings everyone at the party back with him, transforming the atmosphere in the house, and delighting Adele. One of the guests is Blanche Ingram, whom Mr. Rochester is confidently expected to marry. However, it... Which of the following is true according to the passage? A) Mr. Rochester expects Blanche to marry him. B) Mr. Rochester plays the role of a fortune teller to attract Jane. C) Jane and Mr. Rochester enjoy each other's company in Thornfield. D) Grace Poole often gets drunk and does something violent.
C
Characters in novels don't always do what the writer wants them to do. Sometimes they cause trouble, take on lives of their own, or even work against the writer. It's not just a problem for inexperienced authors: famed children's novelist Roald Dahl said he got the main character in his bookMatildaso "wrong"that when he'd finished his first version, he threw it away and started again. Of course it's not the characters' fault. The problem lies with the author. Take Stephen King, who admitted that writing working-class characters is more difficult nowadays because his own circumstances have changed. "It is definitely harder,"King said."When I wroteCarriemany years ago, I was one step away from physical labour." This is also true for characters' ages, added King."When you have small children, it is easy to write young characters because you observe them and you have them in your life all the time. But your kids grow up, it's been harder for me to write about this little 12-year-old girl in my new book because my models are gone." For other authors, such as Karen Fowler, there's one quality that can stop a character in its tracks: boredom."I had particular problems with the main character in my historical novelSister Noon,"she says."She had attitudes about race and religion that seemed appropriate to me for her time and class, but they were not attitudes I liked. Eventually I grew quite bored with her. You can write a book about a character you dislike or a character you disagree with, but I don't think you can write a book about a character who bores you." According to Neel Mukherjee, it was Adinath, a character inThe Lives of Others, who made him work the hardest."I think I struggled because it's difficult to write a character whose most prominent personal feature is weakness, as Adinath's is, without making that feature define him,"Mukherjee says. But a troublesome character is far from an unwelcome guest, he continues, arguing that "when characters work against the author they come alive and become... What can we infer about Stephen King's bookCarrie? A) It was his most difficult book to write. B) It was the first successful novel King wrote. C) There were few children featured in the story. D) Some of its main characters were working class.
D