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1、2010年全国硕士研究生入学统一考试英语试题Text 1Of all the changes that have taken place in English-language newspapers during the past quarter-century, perhaps the most far-reaching has been the inexorable decline in the scope and seriousness of their arts coverage. It is difficult to the point of impossibility for th
2、e average reader under the age of forty to imagine a time when high-quality arts criticism could be found in most big-city newspapers. Yet a considerable number of the most significant collections of criticism published in the 20th century consisted in large part of newspaper reviews. To read such b
3、ooks today is to marvel at the fact that their learned contents were once deemed suitable for publication in general-circulation dailies.We are even farther removed from the unfocused newspaper reviews published in England between the turn of the 20th century and the eve of World War II, at a time w
4、hen newsprint was dirt-cheap and stylish arts criticism was considered an ornament to the publications in which it appeared. In those far-off days, it was taken for granted that the critics of major papers would write in detail and at length about the events they covered. Theirs was a serious busine
5、ss, and even those reviewers who wore their learning lightly, like George Bernard Shaw and Ernest Newman, could be trusted to know what they were about. These men believed in journalism as a calling, and were proud to be published in the daily press. “So few authors have brains enough or literary gi
6、ft enough to keep their own end up in journalism,” Newman wrote, “that I am tempted to define journalism as a term of contempt applied by writers who are not read to writers who are.”Unfortunately, these critics are virtually forgotten. Neville Cardus, who wrote for the Manchester Guardian from 1917
7、 until shortly before his death in 1975, is now known solely as a writer of essays on the game of cricket. During his lifetime, though, he was also one of Englands foremost classical-music critics, a stylist so widely admired that his Autobiography (1947) became a best-seller. He was knighted in 196
8、7, the first music critic to be so honored. Yet only one of his books is now in print, and his vast body of writings on music is unknown save to specialists.Is there any chance that Carduss criticism will enjoy a revival? The prospect seems remote. Journalistic tastes had changed long before his dea
9、th, and postmodern readers have little use for the richly upholstered Vicwardian prose in which he specialized. Moreover, the amateur tradition in music criticism has been in headlong retreat.Text 2Over the past decade, thousands of patents have been granted for what are called business methods. A r
10、eceived one for its one-click online payment system. Merrill Lynch got legal protection for an asset allocation strategy. One inventor patented a technique for lifting a box.Now the nations top patent court appears completely ready to scale back on business-method patents, which have been controvers
11、ial ever since they were first authorized 10 years ago. In a move that has intellectual-property lawyers abuzz the U.S. court of Appeals for the federal circuit said it would use a particular case to conduct a broad review of business-method patents. In re Bilski, as the case is known , is a very bi
12、g deal, says Dennis D. Crouch of the University of Missouri School of law. It has the potential to eliminate an entire class of patents.Curbs on business-method claims would be a dramatic about-face, because it was the federal circuit itself that introduced such patents with is 1998 decision in the
13、so-called state Street Bank case, approving a patent on a way of pooling mutual-fund assets. That ruling produced an explosion in business-method patent filings, initially by emerging internet companies trying to stake out exclusive rights to specific types of online transactions. Later, move establ
14、ished companies raced to add such patents to their files, if only as a defensive move against rivals that might beat them to the punch. In 2005, IBM noted in a court filing that it had been issued more than 300 business-method patents despite the fact that it questioned the legal basis for granting
15、them. Similarly, some Wall Street investment films armed themselves with patents for financial products, even as they took positions in court cases opposing the practice.The Bilski case involves a claimed patent on a method for hedging risk in the energy market. The Federal circuit issued an unusual
16、 order stating that the case would be heard by all 12 of the courts judges, rather than a typical panel of three, and that one issue it wants to evaluate is whether it should reconsider its state street Bank ruling.The Federal Circuits action comes in the wake of a series of recent decisions by the supreme Court that has narrowed the scope of protections for patent holders. Last April, for example the justices signaled that too many pat
