英文 C1 聽力練習 第 1 回
English listening practice, C1, round 1 — 6 recordings, 30 questions
每一段都是母語錄音。建議先到網站聽、作答，再回來看逐字稿。
內容
第 1 段 你聽到兩個朋友在討論剛看完的展覽。
逐字稿（聽完再看）
旁白You hear two friends discussing an exhibition they have just visited.
你聽到兩個朋友在討論剛看完的展覽。
女Well, the reviews were right about the lighting — it was stunning. But I can't say the paintings themselves did much for me.
嗯，評論說燈光很棒，確實很驚豔。可是畫作本身，老實說沒讓我有什麼感覺。
男Really? I thought the later works were extraordinary. Though I agree they tried to cram far too much into such a small space.
真的嗎？我覺得後期的作品很了不起。不過我同意，他們在那麼小的空間塞了太多東西。
女Exactly. You couldn't step back to look at anything properly.
就是說啊，根本沒辦法退後好好看任何一件。
第 2 段 你聽到一位男士談在家工作。
逐字稿（聽完再看）
旁白You hear a man talking about working from home.
你聽到一位男士談在家工作。
男When my company let us work from home, I thought it would be a dream. And in some ways it is — no commute, no noisy office. But I hadn't realised how much I relied on bumping into people. Half my best ideas came from chats in the corridor. Now I make a point of going in twice a week, just for that.
公司讓我們在家工作時，我以為是美夢成真。某些方面確實是——不用通勤，沒有吵雜的辦公室。但我沒發現自己有多依賴和人不期而遇。我一半的好點子都來自走廊上的閒聊。現在我特意每週進公司兩次，就是為了這個。
第 3 段 你聽到一段關於語言學習 App 的廣播討論。
逐字稿（聽完再看）
旁白You hear part of a radio discussion about language learning apps.
你聽到一段關於語言學習 App 的廣播討論。
女The apps are excellent at what they do — building vocabulary, making practice a habit. The trouble is that people assume a daily streak means they're becoming fluent.
這些 App 在它們擅長的事上做得很好——累積單字、讓練習變成習慣。問題是大家以為每天連續打卡就代表自己越來越流利。
男And they're not?
那其實不是嗎？
女Not without real conversation. You can know three thousand words and still freeze when someone asks you a simple question. The apps are a starting point, not a substitute.
沒有真正的對話就不是。你可以認識三千個單字，別人問個簡單問題時還是會愣住。App 是起點，不是替代品。
第 4 段
逐字稿（聽完再看）
女Good afternoon. I'm going to talk about urban foxes, which have become a familiar sight in many British cities. Foxes first moved into towns in large numbers in the nineteen-thirties, when new suburbs with big gardens offered plenty of food and shelter. Today, researchers estimate that there are around one hundred and fifty thousand urban foxes in Britain. Contrary to popular belief, most of their diet isn't rubbish from bins — it's mainly worms, insects and small animals. Urban foxes are also surprisingly short-lived: the average fox survives only about eighteen months, and the biggest single cause of death is traffic. One question I'm often asked is whether foxes are dangerous to pets. In fact, conflicts with cats are rare, and the two animals usually ignore each other. Our current research uses tiny GPS collars to track foxes at night, and we've discovered that a single fox may cross more than twenty gardens in one evening. If you'd like to help, you can report sightings through our website.
午安。我要談談城市狐狸，牠們在英國很多城市已經很常見。狐狸大量搬進城鎮是在 1930 年代，當時有大花園的新郊區提供了充足的食物和藏身處。現在研究人員估計英國約有十五萬隻城市狐狸。和一般人的想法相反，牠們的食物大多不是垃圾桶裡的垃圾，主要是蚯蚓、昆蟲和小動物。城市狐狸的壽命也短得出人意料：平均只活十八個月左右，最主要的死因是車禍。常有人問我狐狸會不會傷害寵物。事實上，牠們和貓起衝突很少見，兩者通常互不理睬。我們目前的研究用小型 GPS 項圈在夜間追蹤狐狸，發現一隻狐狸一個晚上可能穿過二十多個花園。如果想幫忙，可以透過我們的網站回報目擊紀錄。
第 5 段
逐字稿（聽完再看）
男Joining me today is the novelist Helen Price, whose new book has just won a major prize. Helen, you were a lawyer for fifteen years before you published anything. What made you change?
今天的來賓是小說家海倫·普萊斯，她的新書剛得了一個大獎。海倫，你出版作品前當了十五年律師，是什麼讓你轉換跑道？
女I'd always written in secret, but I never thought of it as a career. Then I was on a long case that collapsed after two years, and I remember thinking: I've spent two years of my life on something that came to nothing. I didn't want to feel that way about my writing, so I took it seriously for the first time.
我一直偷偷在寫，但從沒想過當成職業。後來我接了一個拖了兩年的案子，結果不了了之，我記得當時想：我花了兩年生命在一件毫無結果的事上。我不想對寫作也有這種感覺，所以第一次認真看待它。
男Did your legal background help?
你的法律背景有幫助嗎？
女Enormously, though not in the way people assume. It's not about knowing the law. It's that I spent years listening to people tell their stories, and noticing what they left out. That's what fiction is really about — the gaps.
幫助非常大，但不是大家以為的那樣。不是因為懂法律，而是我多年來聽人講述他們的故事，並注意他們略過了什麼。小說真正在寫的就是這些——空白之處。
男The book is set in a small fishing town. Why there?
這本書以一個小漁港為背景，為什麼選那裡？
女I grew up somewhere very similar, but I deliberately avoided my own town. I wanted the freedom to invent. Real places come with real neighbours, and I didn't want anyone recognising themselves.
我在很類似的地方長大，但刻意避開了自己的家鄉。我想要自由虛構的空間。真實的地方就有真實的鄰居，我不希望有人認出自己。
男And what's next?
接下來呢？
女I'm superstitious about discussing work in progress. All I'll say is that it's shorter, and that I'm enjoying it more than I should be.
我對談正在寫的作品有點迷信。只能說它比較短，而且我寫得比應該的還要開心。
第 6 段 說話者 1
逐字稿（聽完再看）
旁白Speaker 1
說話者 1
女I took up long-distance swimming after my doctor said my back problems would improve with exercise. I was hopeless at first, and I failed to finish my first open-water race. Oddly, that was the best thing that could have happened — it showed me exactly what I needed to work on.
醫生說運動能改善我的背痛，我才開始長泳。一開始我很差，第一次公開水域比賽沒游完。奇怪的是，那是最好的事——它讓我清楚知道該加強什麼。
旁白Speaker 2
說話者 2
男My brother bet me I couldn't cycle from London to Paris, so of course I had to do it. The training took over my life for months. What I learnt, more than anything, was that I couldn't do it alone — the moment I joined a club and let others help me, everything got easier.
我哥打賭我騎不完倫敦到巴黎，我當然非騎不可。訓練佔據了我好幾個月的生活。我學到最多的是，我沒辦法一個人做到——一加入車隊、讓別人幫我，一切就變簡單了。
旁白Speaker 3
說話者 3
女I started gardening because my job in finance was so intense — I needed something slow. What it's taught me is that you can't hurry anything. Plants grow at their own pace, and I've become much calmer with my team at work as a result.
我開始種花是因為金融工作太緊繃，我需要慢一點的東西。它教會我任何事都急不得。植物照自己的速度長，結果我對工作上的團隊也變得有耐心多了。
旁白Speaker 4
說話者 4
男A friend dragged me along to a chess club, and I only went to keep him company. I assumed I'd hate it. But I've learnt to rely on my own instincts — there's no one to ask in the middle of a game, and that's been useful in every part of my life.
一個朋友硬拉我去西洋棋社，我只是去陪他。我以為會討厭它。但我學會了相信自己的直覺——下棋到一半沒人可以問，這在我生活的每個方面都很有用。
旁白Speaker 5
說話者 5
女I read an article about people who walk the whole coastline of Wales, and decided on the spot to try. I'd always been someone who planned everything in detail, but you can't plan for the weather or for blisters. I learnt that a few small adjustments each day matter far more than a perfect plan.
我讀到一篇文章，寫有人走完整條威爾斯海岸線，當場就決定也要試試。我一直是凡事詳細計畫的人，可是天氣和腳起水泡是沒辦法計畫的。我學到，每天做一點小調整，比完美的計畫重要得多。