听力第三册十单元

Part B How to get a Laugh

Gene Perret has been a joke writer for twenty years and has taken hundreds of flights. So he was only half listening when the air steward began going over the safety instructions. Suddenly Perret‟s ear stood up. “There may be 50 ways to leave your lover,‟ the steward said, „but there are only five ways to leave this airplane.‟ And then he added: „Please return your seat to its upright and most uncomfortable position. Later you may learn back and break the knees of the passenger behind you.‟

Perret uses the air steward story to make a serious point: humor can catch someone‟s attention and get a message across. „Some people can‟t tell a joke to save their lives,‟ says Perret, „but everyone can learn to use humor effectively. The secret is developing your own style, learning a few tricks and taking the time to practice .‟

The first step Perret recommends is to build up a „comedy collection‟. Note down 25 jokes or stories that you find funny. Then work out whether you are better with stories or one-lines. Don‟t try to be what you‟re not. „Matching people with the wrong material is like teaching a pig to sing,‟ Perret says. „It not only wastes your time, it annoys the pig.‟

Look out for humor on a regular basis, not just before you intend to use it. Joke books are OK, but Perret suggests liking for material from your own experience. He tells a story about helping his little daughter prepare to perform a poem at her school. When he offered to write one for her, she said, „No, Dad, this is in front of the whole school. I‟d rather it was good.‟ Nothing makes people feel more comfortable than self-critical humor.

Material should also fit the audience. „The more humor fits a particular situation, the funnier it is,‟ Perret says. But Perret advises people to forget the idea that a speech should open and close with a joke. When a closing joke falls flat, it is almost impossible to recover.

Text 2 You’re Under Arrest!

Fritz Kreisler, a world-famous Austrian –born American violinist, was once in Hamburg, Germany, waiting for a bout to take him to London, where he was to give a concert the folloeing evening. With an hour until sailing time, he decided to stop and browse for a few minutes in a music shop he has noticed earlier in the day while roaming the streets of the city. In his comfortable old clothes for travel, he would have been difficult to recognize, except for the violin he carried under his arm.

When he entered the music shop the owner asked to see his violin, he examined it closely, and then disappeared. A few minutes later, he returned, accompanied by two policemen. “You‟re under arrest,” one of the policemen told Kreisler. “Under arrest? What for?”

“You have Fritz Kreisler‟s violin.” “Of course I do. I am Fritz Kreisler.”

“You Fritz Kreisler in those shabby clothes?” jeered the policeman. “You phony! You‟re no more Fritz Kreisler than I am. You‟re nothing but a crook who has stolen Kreisler‟s violin. Come with us to the station.” He began to tug at the violinist‟s arm.

Kreisler‟s boat would sail within the hour, and there was no time to dawdle. The violinist had to think fast.

Looking around he saw a record player in the shop. “Do you have any of Kreisler recordings?”

he asked the proprietor.

Luckily, one was handy___ “The Old Refrain”, and the man put the recording on the machine. When the recording ended, Kreisler picked up his violin and played the same number. “Now are you satisfied?” he asked.

The red-faced proprietor and the two policemen began to apologize as Kreisler rushed from the shop and headed for his ship.

Part C A Hectic Monday Morning

It was a hectic Monday morning. Everyone at our 1) employment agency was busy working on the 2) job-matching program. Suddenly the computers in our office 3) broke down. And we couldn‟t run the program which we knew was 4) essential to the counselors and their clients. As the „down‟ time went form minutes to half an hour and to an hour, we were all 5) frustrated. „Look‟, shouted a colleague of mine, pointing at the screens. 6) There on the terminal screens appeared a single sentence typed in by an annoyed counselor. It read: „May the fleas of the thousand camels spread all over your circuit box!‟ 7) Before the laughter in the office could die down, the computers blinked and went back into action. We were all amazed. 8) It seemed that the power of the Middle East extended far beyond the old fields.