London Olympics opening ceremony details revealed

 LONDON, June 12 (Xinhua) -- Danny Boyle, the artistic¹ director of the London Olympic Games opening ceremony, said on Tuesday that the July 27 ceremony will feature British countryside.

He said that the opening scene of the ceremony will be called "Green and Pleasant", adding that the show would create "a picture of ourselves as a nation."

The set will feature meadows, fields and rivers, with families taking picnics, people playing sports on the village green and farmers tilling the soil, the BBC said.

Real farmyard animals will be grazing in the "countryside", with a menagerie of 30 sheep, 12 horses, three cows, two goats, 10 chickens, 10 ducks, nine geese and three sheepdogs.

Europe's largest bell will ring inside the stadium to start the Shakespeare-inspired spectacle, featuring 900 children from the six Games host boroughs².

The stadium's 27-tonne bell was cast at London's Whitechapel Foundry, where 13.5-tonne Big Ben was cast in 1856, and is inscribed³ with a quote from The Tempest's Caliban: "Be not afeard, the isle⁴ is full of noises."

It will hang at one end of the stadium, and Boyle said he wanted people to hear it "for hundreds of years".

1 artistic   

adj.艺术(家)的，美术(家)的；善于艺术创作的

参考例句：

• The picture on this screen is a good artistic work.这屏风上的画是件很好的艺术品。
• These artistic handicrafts are very popular with foreign friends.外国朋友很喜欢这些美术工艺品。

2 boroughs   

（尤指大伦敦的）行政区( borough的名词复数 )； 议会中有代表的市镇

参考例句：

• London is made up of 32 boroughs. 伦敦由三十二个行政区组成。
• Brooklyn is one of the five boroughs of New York City. 布鲁克林区是纽约市的五个行政区之一。

3 inscribed   

v.写，刻( inscribe的过去式和过去分词 )；内接

参考例句：

• His name was inscribed on the trophy. 他的名字刻在奖杯上。
• The names of the dead were inscribed on the wall. 死者的名字被刻在墙上。 来自《简明英汉词典》

4 isle   

n.小岛，岛

参考例句：

• He is from the Isle of Man in the Irish Sea.他来自爱尔兰海的马恩岛。
• The boat left for the paradise isle of Bali.小船驶向天堂一般的巴厘岛。