蒙大综合英语课件Unit1-2-background information

1、Part TwoBackground InformationENTER Author Aristotle, Chaucer, Bach Dante, Homer, La RochefoucauldIV. Virgil, ShakespeareV. NeanderthalBackground InformationContentsJohn CiardiAmerican poet, editor, critic, author of books for children, nonfiction writer, and translator (of Dantes The Divine Comedy:

2、 “The Inferno”, “The Purgatorio”, and “The Paradiso”).I. Author To be continued on the next page.“The day will happen whether or not you get up.”“You do not have to suffer to be a poet. Adolescence is enough suffering for anyone.”“A university is what a college becomes when the faculty loses interes

3、t in students.”The end of Author. I. Author Author s quotesOne of the greatest thinkers of all time, an ancient Greek philosopher. His work in the natural and social sciences greatly influenced virtually every area of modern thinking.Aristotle threw himself wholeheartedly into Platos pursuit of trut

4、h and goodness. Plato was soon calling him the “mind of the school”. In later years he renounced some of Platos theories and went far beyond him in breadth of knowledge. II. Aristotle, Chaucer, BachTo be continued on the next page.AristotleII. Aristotle, Chaucer, BachIn the early Middle Ages the onl

5、y works of his known in Western Europe were parts of his writings on logic. They became the basis of one of the three subjects of the medieval trivium (三学科)logic, grammar, and rhetoric. Early in the 13th century other books reached the West. Some came from Constantinople; others were brought by the

6、Arabs to Spain. Medieval scholars translated them into Latin. To be continued on the next page.II. Aristotle, Chaucer, BachThe best known of Aristotles writings that have been preserved are Organon (工具论) (treatises on logic), Rhetoric, Poetics, History of Animals, Metaphysics (玄学), De Anima (on psyc

7、hology), Nicomachean Ethics, Politics and Constitution of Athens.To be continued on the next page.II. Aristotle, Chaucer, BachThe Father of the English Language as well as the Morning Star of Song, one of the three or four greatest English poets. Playfulness of mood and simplicity of expression. Mos

8、t famous work was the Canterbury Tales.To be continued on the next page.ChaucerII. Aristotle, Chaucer, Bach Bach is considered by many to have been the greatest composer in the history of western music. Bachs main achievement lies in his synthesis and advanced development of the primary contrapuntal

9、 idiom of the late Baroque, and in the basic tunefullness of his thematic material. Bach is also known for the numerical symbolism and mathematical exactitude which many people have found in his musicfor this, he is often regarded as one of the pinnacle geniuses of western civilization.The end of Ar

10、istotle, Chaucer, Bach.BachIII. Dante, Homer, La RochefoucauldTo be continued on the next page.One of the greatest poets in the history of world literature, Italian writer Alighieri Dante composed poetry influenced by classical and Christian tradition. Dantes greatest workepic poem: The Divine Comed

11、y, 1802. It includes three sections: the “Inferno” (Hell), in which the great classical poet Virgil leads Dante on a trip through hell; the “Purgatorio” (Purgatory), in which Virgil leads Dante up the mountain of purification; and the “Paradiso” (Paradise), in which Dante travels through heaven. The

12、 illustration shows Dante standing in front of the mountain of Purgatory, with hell on his right and heaven on his left.Dante Homer, name traditionally assigned to the author of The Iliad and The Odyssey, the two major epics of Greek antiquity.To be continued on the next page.The IliadThe OdysseyIII

13、. Dante, Homer, La RochefoucauldHomerThe literary reputation of La Rochefoucauld rests on one book: Maxims, published in 1665. These moral reflections and maxims are a collection of cynical epigrams, or short sayings, about human naturea nature that the author felt is dominated by self-interest.“We

14、always like those who admire us; we do not always like those whom we admire.” “We seldom find such sensible men as those who agree with us.”“Virtues are lost in self-interest as rivers are lost in the sea.”“The surest way to be deceived is to think oneself cleverer than the others.”The end of Dante,

15、 Homer, La Rochefoucauld.III. Dante, Homer, La RochefoucauldLa RochefoucauldThe greatest of the ancient Roman poetsHis works:“Eclogues” (牧歌)pastoral poems the “Georgics” (田园诗)a more serious work on the art of farming and the charms of country life (This established his fame as the foremost poet of h

16、is age.)his great epic, the “Aeneid” (叙事诗), which exercised a tremendous influence upon Latin and later Christian literatureIV. Virgil, ShakespeareTo be continued on the next page.VirgilThe end of Virgil, Shakespeare. English playwright and poet whose body of works is considered the greatest in Engl

17、ish literature. His plays, many of which were performed at the Globe Theatre in London, include historical works, such as Richard II, comedies, including Much Ado About Nothing (庸人自扰), The Merchant of Venice, Twelfth Night, and As You Like It, and tragedies, such as Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, Othello

18、, and King Lear. He also composed 154 sonnets. ShakespeareIV. Virgil, ShakespeareThe end of Neanderthal.V. NeanderthalThe Neanderthal was a species of genus Homo that inhabited Europe and parts of western Asia from about 230,000 to 29,000 years ago (the Middle Paleolithic and Lower Paleolithic, in the Pleistocene epoch).Neanderthals were adapted to cold, as shown by their larger brains, short but robust builds and large nose. These traits are promoted by natural selection in cold climates, and are also observed in modern sub-arc