2013年6月英语六级考试备考深度阅读试题模拟与解析（8）_大学英语阅读

2013年6月英语六级考试备考深度阅读试题模拟与解析（8）

　　The Cyclops

　　In this context, we would do well to recall the Cyclops--the race of one-eyed giants in Greek myth. The following is Hamiltons description of the encounter between the adventurer Odysseus and Polyphemus, a Cyclops.

　　As Odysseus was on his way home, he and his crew found Polyphemus cave. They stayed in it as a shelter and waited for the owner to come back. At last he came, hideous and huge, tall as a great mountain crag. Driving his flock before him he entered and closed the eaves mouth with a ponderous slab of stone. Then looking around he caught sight of the strangers. He roared out and stretched out his mighty arms and in each great hand seized one of the men and dashed his brains out on the ground. Slowly he feasted off them to the last shred, and then, satisfied, stretched himself out across the cavern and slept. He was safe from attack. None but he could roll back the huge stone before the door, and if the horrified men had been able to summon courage and strength enough to kill him they would have been imprisoned there forever.

　　What I find particularly appropriate about this myth as it applies today is that first, the Cyclops imprisons these men in darkness, and that, second, he beats their brains out before he devours them. It doesnt take much imagination to apply this to the effects of TV on us and our children.

　　Quite literally, TV affects the way people think. In Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television , Jerry Mander quotes from the Emery Report that when we watch television our usual processes of thinking and discernment are semi-functional at best. The study also argues that while television appears to have the potential to provide useful information to viewers, the technology of television and the inherent nature of the viewing experience actually inhibit learning as we usually think of it.