Unit 3 A taste of English humour
第三单元 感受英语幽默
Part 1 Text Explanation 单元内容详解
Reading
NONVERBAL HUMOUR
Do you find it funny to see someone sliding on a banana skin, bumping into someone else round a corner, or falling down a hole in the road①? If you do②, you are not alone. Some humour can be cruel but some people seem to enjoy seeing other people’s bad luck at times③. Perhaps it makes us feel more content with ④our life because we feel there is someone else worse off ⑤than ourselves.
However, some actors can astonish⑥ us with the deep feelings they can inspire in us for a character they are playing. Charlie Chaplin was just such ⑦an actor. He was born in poverty⑧ in 1889 and at that time films were silent. He became famous for using a particular⑨ form of acting, including⑩ mime and farce. His entertaining⑾ silent movies are still popular today. His charming character The Little Tramp is well known throughout the world⑿. He played a poor and homeless⒀ person, who wore large trousers, worn-out⒁ shoes and a small round black hat and carried a walking stick⒂. This character was a social failure⒃ but he was loved by all who watched the films for his determination⒄ in overcoming difficulties ⒅and being kind even when people were unkind to him. So how did he make a sad situation entertaining? Imagine⒆ you are hungry and all there is to eat is a boiled shoe⒇. How would you make eating a boiled shoe funny? That was the problem facing(21) Charlie Chaplin in one of his most famous films The Gold Rush. He solved it by using nonverbal humour and this(22)is how it was done |
