Robert Browning

Choose the best answer to the following questions, according to the information on the tape.

1. The narrator first read poems by Robert Browning

A. at school.

B. when she discovered him for herself.

C. when a schoolfriend lent her a book.

D. when her mother gave her some to read.

2. The message of the lecture was that

A. ambition led to social advancement.

B. hard work was necessary for successful studying.

C. time should not be wasted.

D. human beings should strive for excellence.

3. Browning's poem about grammarian puts forward the view that

A. knowledge is power.

B. too much studying leads to ill health.

C. intellectual pursuits can't bring pleasure.

D. people must work to achieve their aims,

4. A characteristic of Browning's that the narrator admires is

A. his inexhaustible thirst for knowledge.

B. his description of physical objects.

C. his studies of the insane.

D. his shrewd judgements.

5. One problem of biographers of Browning is that

A. they get the facts wrong.

B. they are dull.

C. they are less subtle than Browning himself.

D. they don't provide a balanced picture.

6. From the text we learn that Browning was married to

A. a feminist.

B. a writer.

C. a literary critic.

D. a complicated woman.

7. Which word best fits the narrator's view of Browning? He was

A. understanding.

B. generous.

C. committed.

D. demanding.

Read the article and complete the matching exercise.

1 chimera a a person easily fooled

2 quarry b no longer existing

3 whine с once well developed but now of little use

4 skeletal d a non-expert

5 joystick e a high-pitched noise

6 sucker f an imaginary monster

7 defunct g extremely thin

8 vestigial h a device for controlling direction

9 layman i an object being hunted

A Brief History of Time

For 60 years, since Einstein revolutionised our understanding of the cosmos and Planck and Heisenberg undid the certainties of par­ticle physics, scientists have been chasing a chimera - the Great Uni­fied Theory that would describe and relate all the forces of the un­iverse and, in the process, lay bare the secrets of nature. Now a pro­foundly disabled man has the quarry in sight; and it is no - chimera, but a real beast, waiting to tear our philosophies apart.

A dull bumping noise and a mechanical whine from the corridor announce that Professor Stephen Hawking is ready to start his day's work. A nurse comes into the office, followed by an electric wheel­chair with a large metal box on the back and a computer screen at­tached to the left arm. The seat is covered by a sheepskin mat on which rests what appears to be a bundle of clothes that have, by some extraordinary coincidence, formed themselves roughly into the shape of a man.

So the skeletal hands projecting from the crossed arms of the tweed jacket and the angled, alert head that emerges from the check shirt all come as a slight shock. The left hand is controlling the chair with a joystick on the right chair arm, while the right hand clicks away furiously at a computer control pad. Suddenly, a hard, inflectionless voice with a curious Scandinavian American accent issues

from the chair. «Hello. How are you?» The voice is emitted from speakers on the metal box. Hawking calls up words on the screen, then sends them to the computer to be spoken. The process is slow -he manages about 10 words a minute - but can be speeded up if you read the words straight off the screen. I look over his shoulder to see what is coming up next.

«I want a dove...» it says. His secretary, Sue Masey, seems baffled. We wait nervously. Suddenly the voice bursts forth again. «I want a dove-grey van».

He had just wanted to specify the colour of a specially equipped van he is buying with the money he will receive for the Israeli Wolf Prize in Physics. In addition, his secretary reveals, he wants power steering, a stereo cassette and any other gimmicks that might be available. The Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge University is a sucker for gadgets.

He is also the man most likely to produce an explanation for the entire history of the universe within the next few years. By his own estimate, there is a fifty-fifty chance mankind will soon come up with the answer and, by everybody else's estimate, you can substitute the name «Hawking» for «mankind». If, of course, he lives.

For the terrible fact is that the intellect of one of the two or three greatest physicists of the century is sustained by an almost defunct body. Over the past 25 years motor neurone disease has caused a slow but savage deterioration in his condition. At 21 he was stum­bling, by 30 he was in a wheelchair. He has some vestigial move­ment in his head and hands, and, disconcertingly, an immense, wide toothy grin.

Having dealt with his van problem, Hawking announces that he will have lunch at his College, Gonville and Caius. He then reverses out of the tiny office to have coffee in the shabby common room with the other members of the department.

Few people there pay any attention to the slumped, fragile figure with its whirring chair and the sudden loud interjections of its elec­tronic voice. The talk is of equations and theories. One neighbour is announcing that Einstein's relativity was incomprehensible to him when explained in the usual layman's terms of clocks and spaceships,

and it was only when he started doing the maths that it all became lt Hawking has now reversed this process by producing the best-filing book A Brief History of Time, a non-technical guide to his thought, entirely free of mathematics.

Suddenly he announces he must prepare for his lecture and

whirrs off.

(Bryan Appleyard, The Sunday Times)

Multiple-choice questions. Choose the best answer.

1. The writer suggests that a Great Unified Theory

A is only of interest to scientists.

В is a mirage that will never be reached.

С was formulated by Einstein.

D may force people to re-evaluate their values and beliefs.

2. The writer was shocked because

A he had thought there was no one in the wheelchair.

В the Professor's hands were very thin.

С the Professor had a very strange dress sense.

D Hawking was very alert.

3. Hawking wants a van that

A is practical and functional.

В is fast and powerful.

С is full of gadgets.

D has two shades of colour.

4. The writer suggests that a full explanation of the universe

A will be produced by scientists other than Hawking.

В is most likely to be found, if at all, by Hawking.

С will almost certainly not be found soon.

D will be too complex for most people to understand.

5. According to the article Hawking's disease

A began as a result of a fall.

В has left him unable to move his head.

С has had a detrimental effect on his capacity to think.

D has affected him physically but not mentally.

6. The people who are discussing equations

A are arguing about Hawking's theories.

В work in Hawking's office.

C work in the same department as Hawking.

D ignore Hawking completely.

Complete the missing words from the passage. The first letter of each word is given.

Jane Hawking met the man who was to become her husband in 1963, shortly before the beginning of his illness. They married two years later and, as Hawking got down to work, the disease pro­gressed (1) i...................tandem with his fame.

A string of academic positions and awards came his way (2)

a.................... did an increasing dependence on his wife and those

around him. For Mrs Hawking, (3) h..............., life became paradoxi­cally easier. An American philanthropic organization provided the (4) f............... for 24-hour nursing. For the first time in their mar­riage, she was no (5) I...............wholly (6) r..........for keeping him

alive, and could devote more time (7) t...................concentrating on

her own work and their three children.

Mrs Hawking has a neat, organized air, and a (8) v.................

that is high-pitched and genteel. (9) N................of which conceals

the fact that she regards the world's belief that her husband is about

to come up with an explanation for the universe (10) w..................

the deepest suspicion. It is ironic that his work threatens to under­mine the foundations of her strongly (11) h..................religious convictions, which have sustained her throughout the years of caring,

and (12) w................which he might not have been able to continue

his work.

«There's one aspect of his thought that I (13) f.................. increasingly upsetting and difficult to live (14) w.................,» she ex­plains It is the feeling that, because everything is reduced (15) t..................a rational, mathematical formula, that must be the truth.

He is now postulating a (16) t................ in which the universe is like

the shape of the earth with no beginning and no end and no need for God at all.

(17) W……….. I cant understand is whether his theory

allows (18) f………….other interpretations or not. I can never get an

answer and I find it very upsetting». What she does get, when the

conversation (19) r............. a point beyond which he will not go, is

the Hawking grin, which can clearly be infuriating. For Mrs Hawk ing, a devout Anglican, it seems like an agnostic slamming a (20; d..................in her face.