高中英语人教版必修第三册14

[00:10.61]Reading

[00:11.65]A TALE OF TWO CITIES

[00:14.68]On a cold November night in 1775,

[00:19.04]Miss Lucie Manette,

[00:21.00]who had grown up in England,

[00:22.67]traveled to France to meet her father,

[00:25.13]whom she thought was dead.

[00:27.09]Eighteen year before, her father, Doctor Manette attended to a young peasant 1 boy and girl,

[00:34.85]who had been wounded 2 and died at the hands of two brothers of the Marquis St Evremonde.

[00:40.80]Dr 3 Manette wrote a letter about this crime 4 to the government,

[00:45.45]but instead of justice being done,

[00:48.09]the doctor was thrown in prison for more than eighteen years.

[00:52.17]Such was the situation in France before the revolution 5 of 1789.

[00:57.81]The rich could do so they liked,

[01:00.37]while the peasants 6 suffered.

[01:02.01]Freed from prison, Dr Manette stayed at the wine shop of Ernest Defarge,

[01:07.58]his former servant.

[01:09.33]he wine shop, in one of the poorest suburbs 7 of Paris,

[01:13.85]was the hot spot for the French revolution.

[01:17.01]Mr defarge and his wife, madame 8 defarge, were key leaders and officials of the revolution.

[01:24.17]Madame Defarge hated the Evremonde family and wanted revenge 9 for her sister and brother, who were murdered.

[01:32.40]Lucie brought her father to England.

[01:35.35]On the boat, she met Charles Darnay.

[01:38.38]Darnay, 30 years old, worked in London as a teacher of French.

[01:43.63]He had left France because he hated the cruel deeds of his family,

[01:48.07]the St Evremondes, and the way they treated the peasants.

[01:52.20]He gave up his fortune and tried to forget his roots.

[01:55.93]When Darnay met Lucie, they fell in love.

[01:59.07]Meanwhile Sydney carton, one of Darnay’s friends also loved Lucie.

[02:05.31]Strangely the two men looked so such alike 10 that people thought they were twins.

[02:11.47]Cartons, whose life was a failure, knew he could not marry Lucie.

[02:17.14]He promised that as a friend he would do anything for her.

[02:21.30]Lucie married Darnay the following year and they lived a happy life in London.

[02:26.76]Several years later, in 1792,

[02:31.12]Darnay received a letter from a former servant of the Evremondes,

[02:35.66]asking him for help.

[02:37.52]Darnay, who had been avoiding France for fear of what might happen to him there because of his background,

[02:44.60]realized that he must go.

[02:46.77]A revolution had taken place.

[02:49.40]The peasants were killing 11 many belonging to the old order.

[02:53.22]Upon arrival 12, Darnay was immediately arrested as an enemy of the people and thrown into prison.

[03:00.19]He tried to explain that he was not like his uncle and father,

[03:04.61]saying he was on the peasants’ side and wanted to help them.

[03:09.18]Dr Manette tried to use his influence to save him,

[03:12.71]but Ernest Deafarge produced a paper and read it to the court.

[03:18.06]It was an account 13, written by Dr Manette in the tenth year of his stay in prison,

[03:23.49]about the bed behaviour of Darnay’s uncle.

[03:26.13]He hid it in a chimney 14 and had forgotten all about it.

[03:30.39]In the letter Dr Manette said that all members of the St Evermondes must answer for the wrongs done to the peasant boy and girl.

[03:39.04]The court found Darnay guilty 15 and sentenced him to death for things his family had done.

[03:45.80]A few hours before he was put to death,

[03:48.96]Darnay was visited by Carton in prison.

[03:52.31]Carton changed clothes with Darnay to take his place.

[03:56.25]He made this final sacrifice to help Lucie and save his friend.

[04:01.11]Lucie, Dr Manette and Darnay escaped to London,

[04:05.76]while Carton was taken to the guillotine

[04:08.92]Just before he died, he thought to himself that his final act was far better than anything else he had ever done in his life.

[04:16.97]“It is a far, far better thing that I do,

[04:20.21]than I have ever done;

[04:22.35]it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known