try this and see how much time u require

[confidant_1616]

“Masterpieces are dumb,” wrote Flaubert, “They have a tranquil aspect like the very products of nature, like large animals and mountains.” He might have been thinking of War and Peace, that vast, silent work, unfathomable and simple, provoking endless questions through the majesty of its being. Tolstoi’s simplicity is “overpowering (overpowering: adj.无法抵抗的, 压倒性的),” says the critic Bayley, “disconcerting,” because it comes from “his casual assumption that the world is as he sees it.” Like other nineteenth-century Russian writers he is “impressive” because he “means what he says,” but he stands apart from all others and from most Western writers in his identity with life, which is so complete as to make us forget he is an artist. He is the center of his work, but his egocentricity is of a special kind. Goethe, for example, says Bayley, “cared for nothing but himself. Tolstoi was nothing but himself.”
For all his varied modes of writing and the multiplicity of characters in his fiction, Tolstoi and his work are of a piece (of a piece: adj.一致的). The famous “conversion” of his middle years, movingly recounted in his Confession, was a culmination of his early spiritual life, not a departure from it. The apparently fundamental changes that led from epic narrative to dogmatic parable, from a joyous, buoyant attitude toward life to pessimism and cynicism, from War and Peace to The Kreutzer Sonata, came from the same restless, impressionable depths of an independent spirit yearning to get at the truth of its experience. “Truth is my hero,” wrote Tolstoi in his youth, reporting the fighting in Sebastopol. Truth remained his hero—his own, not others’, truth. Others were awed by Napoleon, believed that a single man could change the destinies of nations, adhered to meaningless rituals, formed their tastes on established canons of art. Tolstoi reversed all preconceptions; and in every reversal he overthrew the “system,” the “machine,” the externally ordained belief, the conventional behavior in favor of unsystematic, impulsive life, of inward motivation and the solutions of independent thought.
In his work the artificial and the genuine are always exhibited in dramatic opposition: the supposedly great Napoleon and the truly great, unregarded (unregarded: adj.不受注意的)little Captain Tushin, or Nicholas Rostov’s actual experience in battle and his later account of it. The simple is always pitted against (be pitted against: 被置于与…的对抗中) the elaborate, knowledge gained from observation against assertions of borrowed faiths. Tolstoi’s magical simplicity is a product of these tensions; his work is a record of the questions he put to himself and of the answers he found in his search. The greatest characters of his fiction exemplify this search, and their happiness depends on the measure of their answers. Tolstoi wanted happiness, but only hard-won happiness, that emotional fulfillment and intellectual clarity which could come only as the prize of all-consuming effort. He scorned lesser satisfactions.
21. Which of the following best characterizes the author’s attitude toward Tolstoi?
(A) She deprecates the cynicism of his later works.
(B) She finds his theatricality artificial.
(C) She admires his wholehearted sincerity.
(D) She thinks his inconsistency disturbing.
(E) She respects his devotion to orthodoxy.
22. Which of the following best paraphrases Flaubert’s statement quoted in lines 1-4?
(A) Masterpiece seem ordinary and unremarkable from the perspective of a later age.
(B) Great works of art do not explain themselves to us any more than natural objects do.
(C) Important works of art take their place in the pageant of history because of their uniqueness.
(D) The most important aspects of good art are the orderliness and tranquility it reflects.
(E) Masterpieces which are of enduring value represent the forces of nature.
23. The author quotes from Bayley (line 8-20) to show that
(A) although Tolstoi observes and interprets life, he maintains no self-conscious distance from his experience
(B) the realism of Tolstoi’s work gives the illusion that his novels are reports of actual events
(C) unfortunately, Tolstoi is unaware of his own limitation, though he is sincere in his attempt to describe experience
(D) although Tolstoi works casually and makes unwarranted assumption, his work has an inexplicable appearance of truth
(E) Tolstoi’s personal perspective makes his work almost unintelligible to the majority of his readers
24. The author states that Tolstoi’s conversion represented
(A) a radical renunciation of the world
(B) the rejection of avant-garde ideas
(C) the natural outcome of his earlier beliefs
(D) the acceptance of religion he had earlier rejected
(E) a fundamental change in his writing style
25. According to the passage, Tolstoi’s response to the accepted intellectual and artistic values of his times was to
(A) select the most valid from among them
(B) combine opposing viewpoints into a new doctrine
(C) reject the claims of religion in order to serve his art
(D) subvert them in order to defend a new political viewpoint
(E) upset them in order to be faithful to his experience
26. It can be inferred from the passage that which of the following is true of War and Peace?
(A) It belongs to an early period of Tolstoi’s work.
(B) It incorporates a polemic against the disorderliness of Russian life.
(C) It has a simple structural outline.
(D) It is a work that reflects an ironic view of life.
(E) It conforms to the standard of aesthetic refinement favored by Tolstoi’s contemporaries.
27. According to the passage, the explanation of Tolstoi’s “magical simplicity” (line 55) lies partly in his
(A) remarkable power of observation and his facility in exact description
(B) persistent disregard for conventional restraints together with his great energy
(C) unusual ability to reduce the description of complex situations to a few words
(D) abiding hatred of religious doctrine and preference for new scientism
(E) continuing attempt to represent the natural in opposition to the pretentious

i think this is a toughest passage.i completed this passage in 10 minutes.note how much time u require.
give ur answers with explanation and the time required to comp these passage

SPOILER: OA FOR THIS ARE CBACEAE

[asterias]

I am not sure of the answers but acc to me i wd have marked the following .. (Can be wrong also :-) )

21.c
22.b
23.a
24.c
25.e
26.a
27.b

[confidant_1616]

Originally Posted by asterias

I am not sure of the answers but acc to me i wd have marked the following .. (Can be wrong also :-) )

21.c
22.b
23.a
24.c
25.e
26.a
27.b

ur only last one is wrong.the ans for last one is e.how did u approach the passage.can u explain ur answers

bye

[asterias]

i ll try to explain ...


The passage took me 8:30 minutes to finish. I think i spent a little more time on reading the passage since not only was it a bit tought for comprehension but also the lay out was not upto the mark and so there were a few regressions in my reading.

21. c

While reading the passage itself u will feel that the author's attitude is positive and not negative. And the attitude is positive towards all the works of the the author. This will help u eliminate a,b,d.

Now we are left with c and e.

I think that the word orthodoxy is derived from orthodox and we know for sure that the author's works are hardly orthodox so e cant be the correct option and that leaves us with c ... and c does "appear" to be correct.

So basically for this question you wd not have had required to go back and refer to the passage.

22 b.

For this question i went back to the first few lines and then i began eliminating the ans options. Frankly i dint understand the "tranquil aspects" that the author was talking abt. I was not even sure of the meaning. But i proceeded.

a,c and e are def wrong. The author is def not tryin to make those comparisons. He doesnt talk abt age or history or enduring ... nothing of that sort.

Coming to option d. The d option is verbose, usually those are not the ans. So i went with option b, if u read that option u will feel that, thats what the author is tryin to convey. So i answered b.

23.a

Based on these lines :

Like other nineteenth-century Russian writers he is “impressive” because he “means what he says,” but he stands apart from all others and from most Western writers in his identity with life, which is so complete as to make us forget he is an artist. He is the center of his work, but his egocentricity is of a special kind. Goethe, for example, says Bayley, “cared for nothing but himself. Tolstoi was nothing but himself.”

These lines lead u to believe that he was not away from his experiences. The options c,d,e talk of some truth which doesnt make sense as per what Bailey wanted to say. So they can be straight away eliminated. Again in option b there was this realism which i cdnt fit into what was being tried to said and so i eliminated that also.

24.c

This was perhaps the most direct till now, because one cd actually find the line which gave the ans.

The famous “conversion” of his middle years, movingly recounted in his Confession, was a culmination of his early spiritual life, not a departure from it.

It was a culmination and not departure. Even without elimination u cd have found the correct option.

25.e

Found this one a bit tough. But once i found these lines,

Tolstoi reversed all preconceptions; and in every reversal he overthrew the “system,” the “machine,” the externally ordained belief, the conventional behavior in favor of unsystematic, impulsive life, of inward motivation and the solutions of independent thought.

the ans. was obvious. Other options can be eliminated easily. For eg there is not political view point per se mentioned. Its more of an example, a support to the author's believes.

26.a

It was direct.

The apparently fundamental changes that led from epic narrative to dogmatic parable, from a joyous, buoyant attitude toward life to pessimism and cynicism, from War and Peace to The Kreutzer Sonata, came from the same restless, impressionable depths of an independent spirit yearning to get at the truth of its experience.

But one has to be careful to know for sure that the author is trying to tell the chronological order when he says "from War and Peace to The Kreutzer Sonata". Once that is clear the first option can be acception as the correct without even bothering abt the rest.

27. ?

I had two options left b and e. However may be my comprehension was not good enough and i eliminated e option coz it dint make much sense to me. So I was left with the wrong ans.


My reading speed is abt 180-200. If i try to read faster my comprehension will suffer. I can cross 250 wpm in newspaper articles where i am aware of the subject. But for unknown topics this is the limit. But i try to hurry a bit through the questions in order to make up for the lost time.

The knowledge that i have gained from my experiences is that its better to und the passage then to go back and forth, scrolling up and down and finally losing track of what the question was. Since time is really a limitation its very easy to get bogged down and screw up the RC. I do realize that some of my methods to get to the ans might not be "correct". But thats the way i have been doing and its difficult to change it. Plus frankly speaking i dont know any other way.

Hope I have made myself clear. :-)

Bye ..

[seagull]

nice explanation, asterias

[confidant_1616]

thanx asterias

[asterias]

hey .. its not enough to say thanks ....

keep on posting difficult RC's ... :-)

Cheers