专门为英语专业本科低年级学生编写,选材精当,编排科学。
选用经典名著和21世纪*新作品,经典性和时代性兼顾。
涵盖政治、军事、历史、文化、文学、天文、地理等领域,有助于学生了解英语**的方方面面。
文章篇幅适中,难易适度,练习设计新颖,突出阅读理解能力的培养。
文章后附**书目,为学生提供更多的阅读选择。

Lost Oceans?
Most of what we now know about Venus comes from the successful Venera 13 and Venera 14 missions of 1982. On March 1 of that year, Venera 13 landed on a hilly area of Venus. Four days later,Venera 14 landed in a lowland area. Both spacecraft sent information to Earth for more than two hours. That marked a record for survival on Venus.
Each craft sent back picture images of its landing site and information about the surface and atmosphere there. And each showed a different picture of Venus.
According to Soviet scientists, Venera 13 landed in an area of weathered foothills. "One can see small potholes covered with hillside waste," they said.
Venera 13 provided eight color pictures of the area. Tass, the Soviet news agency, said the pictures showed "sharp rocks semicovered with fine dust and sand ... The rock is mostly brownish." One scientist said that a cloud of dust was kicked up as Venera 13 landed.
The landing of Venera 14 was different. No cloud of dust was produced. And photo images from the spacecraft showed layers of rock with some coarse6~ soil. Pieces of the layered rock seemed broken, showing layers of different colors--shades of gray and brown, with a touch of blue.
From information sent back by Venera 13 and Venera 14, scientists concluded that the surface of Venus was very hot and very dry. Most of it was fairly flat and smooth. But at least three mountain areas rise out of the smooth, level plain. And some of these mountains are active volcanoes.
Some scientists say that the smooth, level plain is like a dry sea floor. And they say the mountain areas are like large islands rising out of the dry sea.
This raises a question: Could there once have been oceans on Venus? 中国人民解放军外国语学院英语系一贯重视基础阶段的泛读教学,数十年来,不仅在泛读教学上积累了丰富的经验,而且在泛读教材的编写上也取得了丰硕的成果。早在1989年,曾肯干等教授编写的《英语泛读教程》由上海外语教育出版社出版,在我国英语教学界受到好评,被众多英语院系选作泛读教材。
十余年过后,该系在前任系主任程工教授和现任系主任王岚教授的策划、组织和指导下,决定对原有教材进行更新,由长期从事英语专业泛读和英语报刊选读教学的**教授唐慧心牵头,带领一批在泛读教学上已积累了丰富经验的教授、副教授、博士,自2003年9月开始,经过两年多的努力,编写出了这套《英语泛读新教程》。后来,本校英语系对本教材进行了一轮**,受到师生的欢迎和好评。2007年初,本教材被**给上海外语教育出版社,谢宇女士审阅后提出了宝贵的意见和建议,于是,教材编写组又用了几个月的时间,重新系统地调整了课文的难度,对练习也作了进一步的改进,使这套教材日臻完善。
本教程是根据《高等学校英语专业英语教学大纲》的要求而编写的英语基础阶段泛读教材,供英语专业一、二年级学生使用。《高等学校英语专业英语教学大纲》对阅读二级的要求是:能阅读难度相当于Thirty-Nine Steps(简写本)的材料以及Reader's Digest上的文章,本教程的第二册除了包含与Thirty-Nine Steps难度一致的浅显材料外,专门挑选了Reader's Digest的文章;同样,教程的第四册也根据大纲对阅读四级的要求选用了文学原著Sons and Lovers的章节,尽量做到贴近大纲的规定与要求。全套教程四册针对四个学期,本着循序渐进的精神,难度也逐渐加大。每册分成16个单元,足以满足一个学期的教学量。
就编写特色而言,本教材除继续延续《英语泛读教程》中一些行之有效的做法之外,还具有以下几个特点:
一、所选教材均出自当代英语刊物、英语小说及因特网,具有鲜明的时代感。文章题材广泛,语言流畅,文字规范,内容健康,融知识性与趣味性于一体,反映出当代西方社会的方方面面,如入学新生谈入学后的感受、孩提时代对父母的看法、体育明星的遭遇、美英两国的人文地理、西方人如何看中国、美国人的人生价值观、伟人们的成功之路等。另外,还有少量的评论性文字。

Unit 1 Part One A Dog from Nowhere
Part Two Welcome to Our Bank
Unit 2 How Cupid and Psyche Got Married
Unit 3 Web(I)
Unit 4 Web(II)
Unit 5 Web(III)
Unit 6 The False Burton Combs
Unit 7 What's Beyond? Solving Mysteries in Space (I)
Unit 8 What's Beyond? Solving Mysteries in Space (II)
Unit 9 Introducing the British
Unit 10 The Mixture Which Is British
Unit 11 The Dancers
Unit 12 The View
Unit l] Part One Bill Gates: Before Microsoft
Part Two Robert Frost
Unit 14. A Foreigner Encounters Chinese Food Culture
Unit 15 The Wise Wife
Cleverness and Courage (from Iraq)
Unit 16 Part One Good-Bye, Mr. Blib
Part Two Shoes in the Shower
Part Three The Thought Card
Part Four Swans Mate for Life
GLOSSARY
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