Transcript Saturday Review of Literature

Unit 12
Confessions of a Miseducated Man
Life Story
writer,
editor,
citizen diplomat,
promoter of holistic healing,
unflagging optimist
Life Story
born in New Jersey, on June 24, 1915.
a fine athlete and a fine writer.
writer and editor with brief stints at the
New York Evening Post and Current
History.
executive editor of the Saturday Review
of Literature (later Saturday Review)
"Inevitably, an individual is
measured by his or her largest
concerns."
-from Human Options, by Norman Cousins
Lifelong concerns
War and peace, world governance,
justice, human freedom, the human
impact on the environment, and health
and wholeness.
His primary platform for promoting his
views: editor of Saturday Review for the
better part of forty years.
Belief in world governance
During World War II Cousins was a
member of the editorial board for the
Overseas Bureau of the Office of War
Information and was cochairman of the
1943 Victory Book Campaign.
He also came to believe that enduring
world peace could only be achieved
through effective world governance.
Belief in World Governance
In Saturday Review, Cousins affirmed
that “The need for world government
was clear before August 6, 1945, but
Hiroshima(广岛) and Nagasaki（长崎）
raise that need to such dimensions that
it can no longer be ignored."
Belief in World Federalism
In Who Speaks for Man, Cousins expanded his arguments for
world federalism and for a world no longer based on the
supremacy of nationalism and other superficial differences: "The
new education must be less concerned with sophistication than
compassion. It must recognize the hazards of tribalism. It must
teach man the most difficult lesson of all—to look at someone
anywhere in the world and be able to see the image of himself.
The old emphasis upon superficial differences that separate
peoples must give way to education for citizenship in the human
community. "With such an education and with such selfunderstanding, it is possible that some nation or people may
come forward with the vital inspiration that men need no less
than food. Leadership on this higher level does not require
mountains of gold or thundering propaganda. It is concerned
with human destiny. Human destiny is the issue. People will
respond." He concluded the book with this hopeful affirmation:
"War is an invention of the human mind. The human mind can
invent peace with justice."
Contribution to Peace and
Human Well-being
His concern, for the victims of Hiroshima, following a
postwar visit to that devastated city, became quite personal.
He arranged, with funding from Saturday Review readers,
for medical treatment in the United States for twenty-four
young Japanese women who came to be known as the
"Hiroshima Maidens."
Saturday Review readers also supported the medical care
of 400 Japanese children orphaned by the atomic bomb.
In the 1950s Cousins and his wife legally adopted one of
the "Maidens."
A few years later, again with the support of Saturday
Review readers, Cousins helped create a program for the "
thirty-five Polish women who had been victims of Nazi
medical experiments during the war.
Criticism of Atmospheric
Nuclear Testing
During the 1950s Cousins was outspoken in his
criticism of atmospheric nuclear testing. In 1957 he
was among the founders and became the first
cochairman of the National Committee for a Sane
Nuclear Policy (SANE). In the early 1960s he
became an unofficial citizen diplomat, facilitating
communication between the Vatican, the Kremlin,
and the White House which helped to lead to the
Soviet-American nuclear test ban treaty. Upon
ratification of the treaty in 1963, President Kennedy
publicly thanked Cousins for his help with the treaty,
and Pope John XXIII awarded Cousins his personal
medallion.
Anti-war voice
oppose the American role in Vietnam;
oppose the nuclear arms race,
argue for a strengthened United Nations leading to
world government.
As he wrote: "The essential lesson most people
still resist is that they are members of one species.
It is this that we all share—the emergence of a
common destiny and the beginning of the
perception, however misty, that something beyond
the nation will have to be brought into being if the
human race is to have any meaning."
Attitude towards Disease
a regimen（养生法）:
high doses of vitamin C
positive emotions (including daily doses of
belly laughter)
"the life force may be the least understood force on
earth“
Books:
“Anatomy（剖析） of an Illness as Perceived by the Patient:
Reflections on Healing and Regeneration,”
“The Healing Heart: Antidotes to Panic and Helplessness.”
Reflection on Atomic Bomb
I wonder if we might go back to that day in
August when the world learned of the
dropping of the atomic bomb. As editor of a
leading magazine in the United States, what
was your reaction? What were your thoughts,
and what did you do?
•And one had a feeling, or at least I did, that a curtain had dropped
on human history and that a new curtain was going up, and that no
one quite knew what the new script would be. But the fact that the
old play had ended seemed rather clear. It also seemed to me that a
blanket of obsolescence(荒废，退化) had been thrown over human
history, because all the things that human beings did, in terms of
civilization, suddenly seemed to have no validity because there was
now no mechanism by which human beings could provide for a
reasonably secure future. We had always lived with the habits of
war, and now methods for fighting war represented an entirely new
dimension in warfare which threatened the species as a whole. But
the habits of war, and the habits of thinking about relations among
nations, hadn't changed, and so we were trapped. And so I say there
was a sense that the curtain had come down on one stage in human
history and a new curtain was going up, the script for which had not
been written.
Reflection on Atomic Bomb
And you became an even more intense an
advocate of world government and world
federalism as a way out.
Since I am opposed to anarchy, and since the
principle danger in the world was anarchy on
a world level, I couldn't take leave of my
convictions about the dangers of anarchy just
because nations created this situation.
Quotes by Norman Cousins
Hearty laughter is a good way to jog
internally without having to go outdoors.
The more serious the illness, the more
important it is for you to fight back,
mobilizing all your resources-spiritual,
emotional, intellectual, physical.
Your heaviest artillery will be your will
to live. Keep that big gun going.
Hope is independent of the apparatus of
logic.
Quotes by Norman Cousins
History is a vast early warning system.
Life is an adventure in forgiveness.
A library, to modify the famous
metaphor of Socrates, should be the
delivery room for the birth of ideas - a
place where history comes to life.
If something comes to life in others
because of you, then you have made an
approach to immortality.
Quotes by Norman Cousins
Just as there is no loss of basic energy
in the universe, so no thought or action
is without its effects, present or
ultimate, seen or unseen, felt or unfelt.
Wisdom consists of the anticipation of
consequences.
Summary of his life
"In June 1983 Cousins told the graduating class of Harvard
Medical School that the "conquest of war and the pursuit of
social justice... must become our grand preoccupation and
magnificent obsession." These certainly were the concerns that
obsessed him throughout his life, and over the years he battled
through his writings and actions to make them matters of more
general concern. Driven by the shock and portent of Hiroshima,
he worked to combat unchecked nationalism, promote
federalism, and build a sense of world citizenship, in the belief
that people as a whole might yet construct a new world order of
peace and justice. His optimism, intellectual curiosity, and
commitment to the preservation of human life were equally
unquenchable."
Words
-ship
表示“情况”, “状态”, “性质”, 如:hardship,
friendship，sportsmanship运动员的风度，精
神
表示“身分”, “职业”,如:kingship，王权，王
位，君主政体；professorship; internship实习
医生；apprenticeship学徒身份、期限;
dictatorship独裁，专政；membership成员资
格/身份
表示“技巧”, “技能”, 如:marksmanship枪法；
craftsmanship技艺，技能；
MisMisapply, misaim, misinform, misinterprete曲解,
misunderstanding, mislead误导
Secure a. v.
Free from danger or attack:安全的没有危险或免受
攻击的：
a secure fortress.
Reliable, dependable 可靠的；可依赖的：
secure investments.可靠的投资
They ___ (Compression) two-month’s work
into one.
On the top of very high mountains snow ___
throughout the year. (Persistence)
The boy tried to ___ the scene it was
described. (visual)
Some people fail to see the fallacy of “white
___” . (supreme)
What is the difference between “____” and
“publicize”? (propaganda)
A teacher should not show ___ for any one of
his pupils. (prefer)
According to the treaty, some countries can
enjoy ___ tariff rates. (prefer)
Paraphrase
The differences were all but wiped out
by the similarities.
The differences became so insignificant
compared with the similarities, they were
almost completely pushed aside and
forgotten.
Wipe out:
All but: almost, nearly
This larger unity was the most
important central fact of our time –
something on which people could build
at a time when hope seemed misty,
almost unreal.
What can we build?
our hope in the future of the mainkind
What is “this larger unity”?
The human community as a whole
But to stop there was like clearing the
ground without any idea of what was to
be built on it.
If we only respect differences but pay no
attention to similarities, it will be
aimless/unconstructive.
It was the mark of a rounded man to be
well traveled.
Rounded man: someone who has received
a well-rounded education. Not one-sided,
but complete and varied.
For tribalism had persisted from earliest
times, though it had taken refined forms
Tribalism: nationalism if also a enlarged
form of it.部落主义 民族主义
The universe itself does not hold life
cheaply. Life is a rare occurrence…
The earth is the only place where life can
be found, so the universe seems to favor
life more/take life seriously. And the
respect of life is the very basis on which
we must build the future world community.
Leadership on this higher level does not
require mountains of gold or thundering
propaganda.
This higher level: spiritual/moral level
Leadership on the spiritual/moral level is
not based on money or propaganda.
Discussion
What does the author think of the
differences between races and nations?
What do you think?
Do you agree that tribalism is standing
in our way to progress today?
1. Obviously, the Chairman’s remarks at the conference were
___ and not planned.
a. Substantial
b. spontaneous
c. Simultaneous
d. synthetic
2. For the success of the project, the company should ___ the
most of the opportunities at hand.
a. obtain
b. grasp
c. catch
d. make
3. Failure to follow the club rules ___ him from the volleyball
team.
a. disfavoured
b. dispelled
c. disqualified
d. dismissed
Vocabulary
4. The discovery of new oil-fields in various parts of the
country filled the government with ____ hope.
a. eternal
b. infinite
c. ceaseless
d. everlasting
5. At first the company refused to purchase the equipment, but
this decision was ____ revised.
a. subsequently
b. successively
c. Predominantly
d. preliminarily
6. The local police are authorized to ___ anyone’s movements
as they think of it.
a. pause
b. halt
c. repel
d. keep
Vocabulary
7. The local authorities realized the need to make ___ for elderly
people in their housing programs.
a. Preparation
b. requirement
c. Specification
d. provision
8. Twelve is to three __ four is to one.
a. what
b. as
c. that
d. like
9. Things went well for her during her early life but in her middle
age her ___ seemed to change.
a. affair
c. event
b. luck
d. chance
Vocabulary