【英语听和读】艾丽斯·芒罗

 Amber¹: Hello, I'm Amber, and you’re listening to bbclearningenglish.com.

In Entertainment today, we listen to an interview with the Canadian writer

Alice Munro about her latest collection of short stories, The View from Castle

Rock.

Alice Munro has some ‘big-name’ fans (some ‘famous’ fans). US novelist

Jonathan Franzen called her the ‘best fiction writer working in North America’,

and the British author A. S. Byatt went further, describing her as the ‘greatest

living short story writer’ anywhere!

The View from Castle Rock is a combination of autobiography², family history

and fiction. It begins back in the 19th century with Alice Munro’s great, great,

great grandfather’s boat journey from Scotland to Canada, and stories from her

family’s past eventually lead to stories about her own life in small-town

contemporary Canada. And, as always with Munro’s writing, stories about

small things soon open a window of understanding on the world ‘at large’, on

the world ‘in general’.

Here is Alice Munro talking to the BBC interviewer Mariella Frostrup about

how and when she first discovered the power and wonder of books.

As you listen, try to catch the way her family felt about books and reading.

Alice Munro

‘I discovered books when I was 7 years old. And I’d had my tonsils out and I couldn’t play

outside in the summer holidays and I started to read. I think though, in my family’s life, there

was a strong feeling about books being a form of self-indulgence – reading being selfindulgence

– (Frivolous, even!) and there were lots of stories about how women took to 

Great new Canadian short stories © BBC Learning English

Page 2 of 3

bbclearningenglish.com

reading and it was sort of like taking to drink – you neglected your house and your children

and there was dust under the beds and that kind of thing!’

Amber: Alice Munro says that her family saw reading as ‘self-indulgence’ – as

something you do only for your own pleasure or satisfaction. But, Alice Munro

went on to say that because her family didn’t encourage her to read books,

that’s probably why she enjoyed them so much!

Many of the stories in The View from Castle Rock are about ‘poverty’ – about

not having enough money even for basic needs such as food, clothing and

housing. They’re also about ‘hardship’ – about the difficulties caused by a lack

of money.

But Alice Munro explains that she grew up at a time in Canada when people

could ‘jump into the middle class’ if they had an education. As you listen to the

next part of the interview, try to catch the expression that Alice Munro uses to

describe what she was not.

Alice Munro

‘I must emphasise³ that this was not great poverty; it was the poverty of the area where I live. I

didn’t grow up as an outcast at all. I grew up in the same situation as most other people I

knew, but then, when it’s almost inevitable⁴ perhaps that you will jump into the middle class as

you would at that time in our country’s history if you got an education.’

Amber: So Alice Munro says she did not grow up ‘an outcast’ – ‘an outcast’ is somebody

who has been excluded by a particular group or by society as a whole.

However, Alice Munro is very interested in writing about the ‘tension’ – the anxious and

uneasy⁵ feelings – caused by differences in wealth between people and by differences in their

position in society. In a story called ‘A Hired Girl’, the servant girl narrating⁶ the story feels

angry about the carelessness of the wealthy family that she goes to work for. Alice Munro

explains that she remembers feeling angry about social injustice⁷ when she was growing up.

As you listen, try to catch the word she uses for ‘anger’. 

Great new Canadian short stories © BBC Learning English

Page 3 of 3

bbclearningenglish.com

Alice Munro

‘Oh no, I can remember it being a rage I felt at the time and it’s quite unreasonable⁸ because

all those people wanted was a servant, a good servant, and that’s what her job was, but she

wants to be a person in their lives and of course that isn’t possible – it’s not to be expected.

And this seemed to be a really interesting thing to write about. It’s a very autobiographical

story. And I just love exploring this kind of tension in people, in their lives.’

Amber: So Alice Munro says she remembers feeling ‘rage’, or extreme anger, at social

injustice when she was growing up. And she’s very interested in exploring the tension inside

people in different positions in society – inside a servant girl who wants to be ‘a person’ in the

lives of her employers, for example.

Now here’s a list of the language we focussed on in the programme today.

Big-name

Fiction

Autobiography

At large

Self-indulgence

Poverty

Hardship

An outcast

Rage 

1 amber   

n.琥珀；琥珀色；adj.琥珀制的

参考例句：

• Would you like an amber necklace for your birthday?你过生日想要一条琥珀项链吗？
• This is a piece of little amber stones.这是一块小小的琥珀化石。

2 autobiography   

n.自传

参考例句：

• He published his autobiography last autumn.他去年秋天出版了自己的自传。
• His life story is recounted in two fascinating volumes of autobiography.这两卷引人入胜的自传小说详述了他的生平。

3 emphasise   

vt.加强...的语气，强调，着重

参考例句：

• What special feature do you think I should emphasise? 你认为我该强调什么呢？
• The exercises heavily emphasise the required readings.练习非常强调必须的阅读。

4 inevitable   

adj.不可避免的，必然发生的

参考例句：

• Mary was wearing her inevitable large hat.玛丽戴着她总是戴的那顶大帽子。
• The defeat had inevitable consequences for British policy.战败对英国政策不可避免地产生了影响。

5 uneasy   

adj.心神不安的，担心的，令人不安的

参考例句：

• He feels uneasy today.他今天心里感到不安。
• She had an uneasy feeling that they were still following her.她有一种他们仍在跟踪她的不安感觉。

6 narrating   

v.故事( narrate的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• She entertained them by narrating her adventures in Africa. 她讲述她在非洲的历险来使他们开心。
• [Mike Narrating] Worm and I fall into our old rhythm like Clyde Frazier and Pearl Monroe. [迈克叙述] 虫子和我配合得象以前一样默契我们两好象是克莱德。弗瑞泽和佩尔。门罗。 来自电影对白

7 injustice   

n.非正义，不公正，不公平，侵犯（别人的）权利

参考例句：

• They complained of injustice in the way they had been treated.他们抱怨受到不公平的对待。
• All his life he has been struggling against injustice.他一生都在与不公正现象作斗争。

8 unreasonable   

adj.不讲道理的，不合情理的，过度的

参考例句：

• I know that they made the most unreasonable demands on you.我知道他们对你提出了最不合理的要求。
• They spend an unreasonable amount of money on clothes.他们花在衣服上的钱太多了。