1、英语翻译基础历年真题试卷汇编 93 及答案与解析英译汉1 The biographer should sternly confine himself to his functions as introducer; and should give no more discussion than is clearly necessary for making the book an independent whole. A little analysis of motive may be necessary here and there; when, for example, your hero
2、has put his hand in somebodys pocket and you have to demonstrate that his conduct was due to sheer absence of mind. But you must always remember that a single concrete fact, or a saying into which a man has put his whole soul, is worth pages of psychological analysis. We may argue till Doomsday abou
3、t Swifts character, his single phrase about “dying like a poisoned rat in a hole“ tells us more than all the commentators. The book should be the man himself speaking or acting, and nothing but the man. It should be such a portrait as reveals the essence of character; and the writer who gives anythi
4、ng that does not tell upon the general effect is like the portrait-painter who allows the chairs and tables or even the coat and cravat, to distract attention from the face. The really significant anecdote is often all that survives of a life; and such anecdotes must be made to tell properly, instea
5、d of being hidden away in a wilderness of the commonplace; they should be a focus of interest, instead of a fallible extract for a book of miscellanies. How much would be lost of Johnson if we suppress the incident of the penance at Uttoxter! It is such incidents that in books, as often in life, sud
6、denly reveal to us whole regions of sentiment but never rise to the surface in the ordinary routine of our day.2 The term genetically modified organism ( GMO) refers to plants, microbes and animals with genes transferred from other species in order to produce certain novel characteristics (for examp
7、le resistance to pests, or herbicides) and are produced by recombinant DNA technology. Four main sources of hazards of GMO are discussed by scientists worldwide: 1) those due to the new genes, and gene products introduced; 2 ) unintended effects inherent to the technology; 3) interactions between fo
8、reign genes and host genes; and 4) those arising from the spread of the introduced genes by ordinary cross-pollination as well as by horizontal gene transfer.GM crops contain material, which is not present in them under natural conditions, and they form a part of our daily diet. To understand what e
9、ffect they can have on us and on our animals, it is very important to study the influence of those GM plants in different organisms for several generations. At present, these studies are lacking from the scientific literature. Also, several detrimental effects of GM crops had been showed on the meta
10、bolism of animals. The hazard of GMO was shown for animals and the environment in many investigations. Earlier it was shown that consumption of GM food by animals led to the negative changes in their organisms. Experiments, conducted by A. Pusztai showed that potatoes modified by the insertion of th
11、e gene of snowdrop lectin (雪花莲凝集素 ), stunted the growth of rats, significantly affected some of their vital organs, including the kidneys, thymus (胸腺) , gastrocnemius muscles (腓肠肌) and others and damaged their intestines and their immune system.3 The misfortunes of human beings may be divided into t
12、wo classes: First, those inflicted by the non-human environment and, second, those inflicted by other people. As mankind has progressed in knowledge and technique, the second class has become a continually increasing percentage of the total. In old times, famine, for example, was due to natural caus
13、es, and although people did their best to combat it, large numbers of them died of starvation. At the present moment large parts of the world are faced with the threat of famine, but although natural causes have contributed to the situation , the principal causes are human. For six years the civiliz
14、ed nations of the world devoted all their best energies to killing each other, and they find it difficult suddenly to switch over to keeping each other alive. Having destroyed harvests, dismantled agricultural machinery, and disorganized skipping , they find it no easy matter to relieve the shortage
15、 of crops in one place by means of a superabundance in another, as would easily be done if the economic system were in normal working order. As this illustration shows, it is now man that is mans worst enemy. Nature, it is true, still sees to it that we are mortal, but with the progress in medicine
16、it will become more and more common for people to live until they have had their fill of life. We are supposed to wish to live forever and to look forward to the unending joys of heaven, of which, by miracle, the monotony will never grow stale. But in fact, if you question any candid person who is n
17、o longer young, he is very likely to tell you that, having tasted life in this world, he has no wish to begin again as a new boy in another. For the future, therefore, it may be taken that the most important evils that mankind have to consider are those which they inflict upon each other through stu
18、pidity or malevolence or both.4 What was the origin of the oil which now drives our motor-cars and aircraft? Scientists are confident about the formation of coal, but they do not seem so sure when asked about oil. They think that the oil under the surface of the earth originated in the distant past,
19、 and was formed from living things in the sea. Countless billions of minute sea creatures and plants lived and sank to the sea bed. They were covered with huge deposits of mud, and by processes of chemistry, pressure and temperature were changed through long ages into what we know as oil. For these
20、creatures to become oil it was necessary that they should be imprisoned between layers of rock for an enormous length of time. The statement that oil originated in the sea is confirmed by a glance at a map showing the chief oilfields of the world; very few of them are far distant from the oceans of
21、today. In some places gas and oil come up to the surface of the sea from its bed. The rocks in which oil is found are of marine origin too. They are sedimentary rocks, rocks which were laid down by the action of water on the bed of the ocean. Almost always the remains of shells, and other proofs of
22、sea life, are found close to the oil. A very common sedimentary rock is called shale, which is a soft rock and was obviously formed by being deposited on the sea bed. And where there is shale there is likely to be oil.Geologists, scientists who study rocks, indicate the likely places to the oil dril
23、lers. In some cases oil comes out of the ground without any drilling at all and has been used for hundreds of years, In the island of Trinidad the oil is in the form of asphalt, a substance used for making roads. Sir Walter Raleigh visited the famous pitch lake of Trinidad in 1595; it is said to con
24、tain nine thousand million tons of asphalt. There are probably huge quantities of crude oil beneath the surface.5 High-speed ground transportation ( HSGT) technologies with vehicle speeds exceeding 150 mph can be divided into two basic categories;High-speed rail (HSR) systems, with top speeds betwee
25、n 150 and 200 mph, use steel wheels on steel rails, as with traditional railroads, but can achieve higher speeds because of the design of both the rail bed and cars.High-speed magnetic levitation (MAGLEV) systems, with top speeds between 250 and 300 mph, use forces of attraction or repulsion from po
26、werful magnets placed in either the vehicle or the guideway beneath it both to lift the vehicle above the guideway and to propel it forward. A MAGLEV vehicle can be likened to a flying train or a guided aircraft.If linked effectively with highways and air service, HSGT technologiesparticularly MAGLE
27、Vcould have a significant impact on congestion in the future.When comparing HSR with MAGLEV technologies, MAGLEV appears to be the technology of choice. Though the new generation of HSR technology can reach commercial speeds of up to 186 mph, additional increases in speed pose great engineering prob
28、lems, suggesting that rail transportation is a mature technology. MAGLEV technology, on the other hand, is in its infancy and will improve substantially with additional engineering.英语翻译基础历年真题试卷汇编 93 答案与解析英译汉1 【正确答案】 传记作家应当严格地将自己限定在介绍人的角色，没有明显的必要，不应当给予太多讨论，应当让书成为独立的整体。当然，偶尔加人一些动机分析，是有必要的。例如，当你的作品中的主角
29、将手伸入别人的口袋时，你必须要解释他的行为纯粹是因为心不在焉。但是你必须要记住当一个人用全部灵魂去完成一件具体的事情或一生都在践行一句承诺时，这种行为值得大量的心理分析。我们一直在讨论斯威夫特笔下的人物，他的那一句“像中毒的老鼠一样在洞中慢慢死去”比所有的评论家告诉我们的都多。传记应当是书中人物本人在讲述或者表演，只有他自己，绝无他人。人物描写应当表现出人物的精髓，作家可以给出一些不会影响总体效果的描述，就像是肖像画家允许桌子椅子甚至是衣服或领结分散人们对肖像面部的注意力。真正重要的事件通常与生存相关，轶事必须恰当地讲出来，而不是淹没在平凡无奇的琐事中。这些轶事应当是公众兴趣的焦点，而不是从各
30、种杂集中摘录的不可靠的信息。如果我们隐瞒了约翰逊曾在 Uttoxter 大学受苦受难的经历，那将会是莫大的损失。不管是在书中还是在现实生活中，是这些小事件向我们展现了所有的情感，但是在日常生活中这些小事件却从来不为人所道。2 【正确答案】 转基因生物是指利用基因重组的方法，引入其他物种基因所产生的包含某些新特性(如抗虫或抗除草剂)的植物、微生物和动物。全球科学家列出了转基因生物危害的四大主要来源：(1)新基因以及被引进的基因产品存在的不可预测的隐患；(2)固有的技术产生的非预期效果；(3) 外源基因和宿主基因的相互作用；(4)通过普通的异体授粉和水平基因转移所引人的基因的传播。转基因作物包含在
31、自然状态下不存在的物质，这些作物组成了我们日常饮食的一部分。为了更好地了解转基因植物对人类及其他动物的影响，研究转基因植物对不同生物连续几代的影响尤为重要。当前对转基因植物影响的研究缺乏科学文献的参考。同时某些转基因作物对动物新陈代谢的不利影响已经显现。早期研究发现，动物消费转基因食物之后它们的机体内会发生负面变化。A Pusztai 主导的实验表明，老鼠食用注入了雪花莲凝集素基因的土豆后，生长受到阻碍，它们的主要器官(包括肾、胸腺、排肠肌等)受到极大影响，同时它们的肠和免疫系统也受到损伤。3 【正确答案】 人的不幸可分为两类：第一类，由非人为的客观环境所造成；第二类，由他人所造成。当人类在知
32、识与技术上取得巨大进步之后，第二类不幸在总数中所占的比例正在不断增大。比如在古代，饥荒是由自然原因造成的，尽管人们努力与自然抗争，许多人还是死于饥饿。目前，世界的大部分地区仍然面临着饥荒的威胁，尽管这种情况部分是由天灾所引起，但主因还是人祸。在过去的六年间，世界上的文明国家倾尽全力互相残杀，他们也蓦然发现，要转变到彼此共存的境地已然很难。他们破坏了收割、拆毁了农机、打乱了货运，同时发现依靠一地的丰裕来缓解另一地的粮食紧缺绝非易事。而倘若经济系统正常运转，这便不难做到。这个例子说明，现今人类最大的敌人恰恰是人类自身。诚然，以自然的眼光来看，我们仍难逃一死，但随着医药上的进步，人们能活到寿终正寝之
33、日的情况将变得越来越常见。我们本应希望长生不死，也盼望着天堂中的无尽欢娱依靠神迹我们可永不厌倦。然而事实上，如果你对任何一个不再年轻的诚实之人发出质询，则他很可能告诉你，品尝过这个世界上的酸甜苦辣之后，他已不愿在另一个世界中再度超生。因此，在将来，很可能人类必须考虑的最重大的罪恶将是他们对彼此犯下的罪行或是出于愚蠢，或是出于恶意，或者两者兼而有之。4 【正确答案】 我们现在开汽车、飞机使用的石油是怎样形成的呢?科学家对解释煤的成因已很有把握，但若是被问到石油是怎样形成的，他们似乎就不那么有把握了。他们认为地底下的石油在远古时期就已经开始形成，而且是由海中生物形成的。无数亿个微小动物和植物在海水
34、中生长并沉人海底，上面覆盖着大量沉积的泥沙。由于化学变化、压力和温度等因素影响，经过漫长的岁月，就形成了我们现在所说的石油。这些小动物必须在一层层岩石之间密封起来，经过极长的一段时间才能变成石油。“ 石油是在海里形成的 ”这一说法，只要看一下世界主要油田的分布图，就可以得到证实：只有极少数大油田是远离今天的海洋的。在有些地方，天然气和石油从海底升上海平面。含有石油的岩层也是在海里形成的。这种岩层是沉积岩，是在海水的作用之下沉积在洋底的。在有石油的地方附近，几乎总可以发现贝类的残骸以及海洋生物的其他遗迹。有一种非常常见的沉积岩叫做页岩，这种页岩非常柔软，而且很明显是由于长期沉积在海底而形成的。有
35、页岩的地方就很有可能存在石油。地质学家，也就是研究岩石的科学家，为石油钻探者指明了可能的地点。有时候石油会直接渗出地面，无需钻探。石油的使用已经有上百年的历史了。在特立尼达拉岛，石油以沥青的形式呈现，沥青是用来铺路的材料。瓦尔特?罗里爵士曾经于1595 年参观过特立尼达拉岛著名的沥青湖，据说湖中贮有九亿吨沥青。地下可能还有大量的原油。5 【正确答案】 车速超过每小时 150 英里的高速地面交通系统技术，可以分为两个基本类别： 一种是最高速度可以达到每小时 150 到 200 英里的高速铁路系统。与传统铁路相同的是，这种铁路在钢轨上用钢轮，但是由于铁路路床和车厢的设计，可以达到更高的速度。另外一
36、种是最高速度可以达到每小时 250 到 300 英里的高速磁悬浮系统。这种系统利用安装在列车内部或者是下面导轨内的强大的磁铁吸引力或排斥力，将列车抬起来，使其悬浮在导轨之上，以此推动列车前进。可以把磁悬浮列车比作飞行的火车或制导的飞机。如果同公路运输和空中运输有效地连接起来，高速地面交通系统技术，尤其是磁悬浮技术，对解决未来的交通拥挤问题可能发挥重大作用。如果将高速铁路技术和磁悬浮技术作比较，磁悬浮技术似乎是更佳选择。虽然新一代的高速铁路技术能够实现每小时 186 英里的商业速度，但是额外提高速度会带来巨大的工程问题。这表明，铁路运输技术已经成熟。相反，磁悬浮技术则处于幼年阶段，并将随着工程技术的发展而大大改善。
