内容正文:
2021届巴蜀中学新高考英语
《经济学人》外刊讲义第01篇 [02]
(适合学有余力的学霸或英语爱好者、教师使用)
(含词汇讲解、长难句解析、翻译技巧、背景知识、写作积累:均由阿满编写)
原文(续第01篇始[01])
That is why you can see scaffolding and other signs of a building boom dotted around Caracas, the capital of a country that has endured an economic collapse. Businesses need to park their earnings where they will not be wiped out by inflation. A smaller-scale response to galloping prices is the emerging “egg economy”. Eggs hold their value better than cash, for a while at least. They make for a convenient currency, too. It is easier to carry around a half-dozen eggs than a trunkful of banknotes. And many tradespeople would be happier to receive the eggs.
因此,在这个经济业已崩溃的国家的首都加拉加斯 (Caracas) ,脚手架等建筑业蓬勃发展的迹象随处可见。企业需要将收入暂存在不会被通货膨胀抹杀掉的地方。另一种规模较小的应对物价飞涨的方法是新兴的‘鸡蛋经济”。鸡蛋比现金更能保值,至少在一段时间内是这样。鸡蛋还是一种方便的货币。带六个鸡蛋可比带一箱钞票容易多了。而且许多商贩也更乐意接受鸡蛋。
表达积累
· building boom
表示“建筑热潮” (a time or situation when a lot of new buildings are being built),举例:
· The summit would bring Okinawa a huge building boom. 此次峰会将给冲绳带来巨大的建设热潮。
可以积累到“城市化”相关的写作语料中。
· ... endured an economic collapse
economic collapse表示“经济崩溃”,同义于economic bust。英国《卫报》在谈论房地产崩盘将使英国经济陷入衰退的文章中,即提及类似的House boom, economic bust
collapse本义表示建筑物等突然倒塌,比如The whole building collapsed.“整个建筑倒塌了”。文中这里既做比喻义用于表示经济萧条,又和前文中的building boom相呼应:经济“坍塌”了,但建筑业却蓬勃发展。
· ... to park their earnings ...
park的常见动词用法是表示“停车”,文中这里和earnings搭配则表示“暂时存放” (to place or leave temporarily),再举两个例子:
· parking cash in a local bank account “将现金存入当地银行账户”
· parked the baby with neighbors “把孩子暂交给邻居”
· ... will not be wiped out by inflation
这里涉及常用词组wipe out表示“彻底消灭” (to destroy or be destroyed completely)
· galloping prices
马有两种跑法,一种叫canter“慢跑”,一种叫gallop“疾驰”。
gallop指马的自然的三步跑法,在每次迈步时马的四蹄都同时离开地面,该字面义用法举例:He rode off at a gallop. “他骑着马飞奔而去”。
gallop还可以做比喻使用,用法举例:to work at a gallop“工作速度快”。该比喻义保留在gallop的衍生词galloping中。galloping常用来描述inflation“通货膨胀”、consumption“肺痨”等疾病“迅速恶化” (increasing or developing very quickly)。文中这里则用来描述“飞涨的价格”galloping prices。
语法讲解:长难句解析
That is // why you can see scaf