专八改错历届真题及答案

.

. 以下答案以上外教师给出的答案为参考答案

PART IV PROOFREADING&ERRORCORRECTION [15 MIN]

The passage contains TEN errors. Each indicated line contains a maximum of ONE error. In each case, only ONE word is involved. You should proofread the passage and correct it in the following way:

For a wrong word, underline the wrong word and write the correct one in the blank provided at the end of the line.

For a missing word, mark the position of the missing word with a "^"sign and write the word

you believe to be missing in the blank provided at the end of the line.

For an unnecessary word, cross the unnecessary word with a slash "/" and put the word in the blank provided at the end of the line.

EXAMPLE

When ^ art museum wants a new exhibit, (1) an

It never buys things in finished form and hangs (2) never

them on the wall. When a natural history museum

wants an exhibition it must often build it. (3) exhibit

2012年专八完整真题，可到上海外语教育出版社四八级在线网站观看。

Proofread the given passage on ANSWER SHEET TWO as instructed.

The central problem of translating has always been whether to translate literally or freely. The argument has been going since at least the first (1) ______

century B.C. Up to the beginning of the 19th century, many writers

favored certain kind of “free” translation: the spirit, not the letter; the (2) _______ sense not the word; the message rather the form; the matter not (3) _______

the manner. This is the often revolutionary slogan of writers who (4) _______

wanted the truth to be read and understood. Then in the turn of 19th (5) _______

century, when the study of cultural anthropology suggested that

the linguistic barriers were insuperable and that the language (6) _______

was entirely the product of culture, the view translation was impossible (7) _______

gained some currency, and with it that, if was attempted at all, it must be as (8) _______ literal as possible. This view culminated the statement of the (9) _______

extreme “literalists” Walter Benjamin and Vladimir Nobokov.

The argument was theoretical: the purpose of the translation, the

nature of the readership, the type of the text, was not discussed. Too

often, writer, translator and reader were implicitly identified with

each other. Now, the context has changed, and the basic problem remains. (10) _____

参考答案：

1．going∧ since－加入on

题解：go on的意思是“继续”，符合句子表达的含义“争论一直在继续”。

2．certain－改为a certain

题解：此处要表达的意思是“很多作家喜欢一种自由的翻译方法”，第一次出现这种方法应该加上不定冠词。

3．rather－改为not

题解：根据原句的句子结构，rather应改为not。

4．is －改为was

题解：此句应该为过去时。

5．in －改为 at

题解：at the turn of 19th century“十九世纪之初”，是固定搭配。

6．the －删去第二个the

题解：这里并没有特指某种语言，所以不用定冠词。

7．view∧translation－加入that

题解：在view和translation之间加上that，可将“translation was impossible”看

成view的同位语。

8．was－删去was

题解：条件状语从句常可以省略主语和系动词。

9．culminated∧the－加入in

题解：culminate in是“以......告终”的意思，符合上下文含义。

10．and －改为but

题解：根据原句意思“现在背景变化了，但是基本问题依然存在”，两句话之间应该是转折关系。

From a very early age, perhaps the age of five or six, I knew

that when I grew I should be a writer. Between the ages of about 1__________ seventeen and twenty-four I tried to abandon this idea, but I did so

with the conscience that I was outraging my true nature and that 2___________ soon or later I should have to settle down and write books. 3___________ I was the child of three, but there was a gap of five years 4__________

on either side, and I barely saw my father before I was eight. For

this and other reasons I was somewhat lonely, and I soon developed

disagreeing mannerisms which made me unpopular throughout my 5_____________ schooldays. I had the lonely child's habit of making up stories and

holding conversations with imaginative persons, and I think from 6_________

the very start my literal ambitions were mixed up with the feeling of 7________

being isolated and undervalued. I knew that I had a facility with words

and a power of facing in unpleasant facts, and I felt that this created 8________

a sort of private world which I could get my own back for my failure 9________

in everyday life. Therefore, the volume of serious — i.e. seriously 10________ intended — writing which I produced all through my childhood and

boyhood would not amount to half a dozen pages. I wrote my first

poem at the age of four or five, my mother taking it down to dictation.

1，在grow后加up, 考固定短语

2，改consience为consciousness 考词语区别，consience翻译为“良心，道德心”, consiousness 翻译为“意识”

3，改soon为sooner，sooner or later是固定短语

4，在child前加middle, 考上下文理解。作者是三个孩子句中的那位

5，改disagreeing 为disagreeable ，disagreeing只能作动名词，不能作形容词。disagreeable mannernisms 令人讨厌的习惯

6，改imaginative为imaginary, 考词语区别 imaginative翻译为“有想象力的”，imaginary 翻译为“想象的，虚构的”

7，改literal 为literary , 考词义区别， literal翻译为“字面的”，literary 翻译为“文学方面的”

8，去掉face后的in，face接宾语时是及物动词。考动词的基本用法

9，在world后加in或者改which为where, 考定语从句

10，改Therefore为However或者Nevertheness, 考语境。

感悟：11专八改错相对前几年专八改错要简单一点。本人认为词义区别考得过多了。

So far as we can tell, all human languages are equally

complete and perfect as instruments of communication: that is,

every language appears to be well equipped as any other to say 1________________ the things their speakers want to say. 2________________

There may or may not be appropriate to talk about primitive 3________________ peoples or cultures, but that is another matter. Certainly, not all

groups of people are equally competent in nuclear physics or

psychology or the cultivation of rice . Whereas this is not the 4_____________ fault of their language. The Eskimos , it is said, can speak about

snow with further more precision and subtlety than we can in 5______________ English, but this is not because the Eskimo language (one of those

sometimes miscalled 'primitive') is inherently more precise and

subtle than English. This example does not come to light a defect 6______________

in English, a show of unexpected 'primitiveness'. The position is

simply and obviously that the Eskimos and the English live in similar 7____________ environments. The English language will be just as rich in terms 8____________

for different kinds of snow, presumably, if the environments in which

Englishwas habitually used made such distinction as important. 9_____________ Similarly, we have no reason to doubt that the Eskimo language

could be as precise and subtle on the subject of motor manufacture

or cricket if these topics formed the part of the Eskimos' life. 10____________ 2010年专八真题改错参考答案以及分词

1 be后插入 as; as…as引导的比较级

2 their改为its; its代替every language

3 There改为It; It此处作为形式主语，真正的主语是后面的不定式

4 Whereas改为But ；语境需要表示转折的连词，whereas表示对比

5 further 改为much further不能修饰比较级

6 come改为bring; (sth)come to light , bring sth to light

bring to light the defect of English =bring the defect of english to light 揭示英语的缺陷

7 similar改为different; 根据语境应该用different

8 will改为would; 虚拟语气

9 as important去掉as;

10 the part去掉the或者改the为a be/become/form (a) part of 是固定短语

09专八改错原题

The previous section has shown how quickly a rhyme passes

from one school child to the next and illustrates the further difference (1)___________

between school lore and nursery lore. In nursery lore a verse,

learnt in early childhood, is not usually passed on again when the (2)___________

little listener has grown up, and has children of their own, or even (3)____________

grandchildren. The period between learning a nursery rhyme and

transmitting it may be something from twenty to seventy years. With (4)_____________ the playground lore, therefore, a rhyme may be excitedly passed (5)___________ on within the very hour it is learnt; and in the general, it passes (6)_____________

between children of the same age, or nearly so, since it is uncommon

for the difference in age between playmates to be more than five

years. If ,therefore, a playground rhyme can be shown to have been

currently for a hundred years, or even just for fifty, it follows that it (7)__________

has been retransmitted over and over; very possibly it has passed (8)___________ along a chain of two or three hundred young hearers and tellers, and

the wonder is that it remains live after so much handling, (9)____________

to let alone that it bears resemblance to the (10)____________

答案分析：

(1) the further difference改为a further difference（此次应该用不定冠词表示泛指）

(2) 改when 为until, 结构not...until翻译为“直到……才”

(3)their改为his（代词与前文a little listener在单复数上保持一致）

(4)something 改为anything 此处指二十到七十的任何时段

(5)therefore改为however （根据上下文逻辑关系）

(6) in the general去掉the （习惯用法in general 表示总的来说，一般不用冠词）

(7) currently 改为current （这里起的是表语的作用，需要形容词而不是副词）

(8) it has passed改为 it has been passed （与分号前的被动保持一致）

(9) live 改为 alive alive翻译为“鲜活的”，一般作补语；live翻译为“现场转播的；活的”，一般作定语

(10) to let alone改为 let alone (let alone 为习惯搭配，意思是“更不用说

2008年专八真题短文改错

The desire to use language as a sign of national identity is a

very natural one, and in result language has played a prominent ____1____ part in national moves. Men have often felt the need to cultivate ____2____ a given language to show that they are distinctive from another ____3____ race whose hegemony they resent. At the time the United States ____4____ split off from Britain, for example, there were proposals that

independence should be linguistically accepted by the use of a ____5____ different language from those of Britain. There was even one ____6____ proposal that Americans should adopt Hebrew. Others favoured

the adoption of Greek, though, as one man put it, things would

certainly be simpler for Americans if they stuck on to English ____7____ and made the British learn Greek. At the end, as everyone ____8____ knows, the two countries adopted the practical and satisfactory

solution of carrying with the same language as before. ____9____ Since nearly two hundred years now, they have shown the world ____10____

that political independence and national identity can be complete

without sacrificing the enormous mutual advantages of a common

language.

2008

1. in result 改成in consequence，

2 moves改成movements.

3 distinctive改成distinct或different

4 在time后加when

5 accepted 改成realized

6 those改成that

7 删除on,

8 At 改成In

9 carrying with 改成 carrying on with

10 now改成 ago

07专八真题短文改错

From what has been said, it must be clear that no one can

make very positive statements about how language originated.

There is no material in any language today and in the earliest 1__________ records of ancient languages show us language in a new and 2__________

emerging state. It is often said, of course, that the language 3_________ originated in cries of anger, fear, pain and pleasure, and the 4__________ necessary evidence is entirely lacking: there are no remote

tribes, no ancient records, providing evidence of

a language with a large proportion of such cries 5__________

than we find in English. It is true that the absence

of such evidence does not disprove the theory, but in 6__________

other grounds too the theory is not very attractive.

People of all races and languages make rather similar

noises in return to pain or pleasure. The fact that 7___________

such noises are similar on the lips of Frenchmen

and Malaysians whose languages are utterly different,

serves to emphasize on the fundamental difference 8___________

between these noises and language proper. We may

say that the cries of pain or chortles of amusement

are largely reflex actions, instinctive to large extent, 9____________ whereas language proper does not consist of signs

but of these that have to be learnt and that are 10___________ wholly conventional.

1, 改and为or, any languagages today or recordsof ancient languages 是并列成分，在否定句中用or

2, 改show为showing, 现在分词作定语

3，删除the, 表示泛指

4，改and为but, 根据语境此处是转折

5，改 large为larger, 后面有than, 应该用比较级

6，改in为on, on other grounds “ 基于其它理由”，为固定搭配

7，改return为response , in response to “对……作出反应”

8，删除on, emphasize sth emphasize是及物动词

9，在large前加a, extent 是可数名词，前面要加冠词。 "to a large extent"翻译为“在很大程度上”

10，改 these为 those those that/who为固定形式

2006专八短文改错

We use language primarily as a means of communication with

other human beings. Each of us shares with the community in which we

live a store of words and meanings as well as agreeing conventions as 1_______ to the way in which words should be arranged to convey a particular 2_______ message: the English speaker has in his disposal vocabulary and a 3_______ set of grammatical rules which enables him to communicate his 4_______ thoughts and feelings, in a variety of styles, to the other English 5_______ speakers. His vocabulary, in particular, both that which he uses active-

ly and that which he recognises, increases in size as he grows

old as a result of education and experience. 6_________

But, whether the language store is relatively small or large, the system

remains no more than a psychological reality for the individual, unless

he has a means of expressing it in terms able to be seen by another 7_________ member of his linguistic community; he bas to give the system a

concrete transmission form. We take it for granted the two most 8____________ common forms of transmission-by means of sounds produced by our

vocal organs (speech) or by visual signs (writing). And these are 9_____________

among most striking of human achievements. 10____________

1, 改agreeing为agreed agreed conventions翻译为“习俗”

2，words前加the, 此处为特指

3，改in为at at one’s disposal为固定短语，翻译为“由某人做主”

4，改enables为enable，定语从句与先行词vocabulary and a set of grammatical rules保持一致5，删除the, 此处需要泛指

6，改 old为older, 此处需要比较级

7，改seen为understood，system应该是被理解

8．，删除it take sth for granted take it for granted that…

9, 改 or为and ,语境需要并列关系而不需选择关系

10， most前加the, 形容词最高级中that一般不能省略

2005年专八真题短文改错

The University as Busines

A number of colleges and universities have announced steep

tuition increases for next year much steeper than the current,

very low rate of inflation. They say the increases are needed because

of a loss in value of university endowments heavily investing in common 1 ________

stock. I am skeptical. A business firm chooses the price that maximizes

its net revenues, irrespective fluctuations in income; and increasingly the 2 _________

outlook of universities in the United States is indistinguishable from those of 3 ___________

business firms. The rise in tuitions may reflect the fact economic uncertainty 4__________

increases the demand for education. The biggest cost of being

in the school is foregoing income from a job (this is primarily a factor in 5 __________

graduate and professional-school tuition); the poor one's job prospects, 6 ___________

the more sense it makes to reallocate time from the job market to education,

in order to make oneself more marketable.

The ways which universities make themselves attractive to students 7 ___________

include soft majors, student evaluations of teachers, giving students

a governance role, and eliminate required courses. 8 _________

Sky-high tuitions have caused universities to regard their students as

customers. Just as business firms sometimes collude to shorten the 9 ___________

rigors of competition, universities collude to minimize the cost to them of the

athletes whom they recruit in order to stimulate alumni donations, so the best

athletes now often bypass higher education in order to obtain salaries earlier

from professional teams. And until they were stopped by the antitrust authorities,

the Ivy League schools colluded to limit competition for the best students, by

agreeing not to award scholarships on the basis of merit rather than purely

of need-just like business firms agreeing not to give discounts on their best 10 ____________

customer.

1. investing应改为invested，过去分词作定语

2. 在irrespective和fluctuations之间加上介词of。irrespectiveOf是一固定用法，意指“不论，不管，不顾，”等，此处指公司不顾收入的波动变化。

3. 把those改为that， that此处代替outlook

4．在fact和economic之间力口上关系代词that。这是一个同位语从语，that在同位语从句中是不能省略的.

5．把定冠词the去掉, in school表示上学这个抽象意义

6．把形容词poor改为其比较级poorer。这句中的poor与后面的more形成一对比较关系，表示“越……越……”

7．在ways和which之间加上一个介词in。

8．这里应该用动词的—lng形式，即eliminating，以便使句型结构与前面的giving(students a governance role)保持一致，否则句子结构和意思都显得不正确。

9．将shorten(缩短；使变短)改为reduce/lesson/weaken。此处属于用词不当。

10．将to give discounts on改为to give discounts to their best customer。意为实业公司给最好的客户提供优惠。 Give discounts to sb为固定短语

One of the most important non-

is the power to investigate. This power is usually delegated to committees -

standing

future legislation, to test

groundwork for impeachment proceedings. Frequently, co

is th

to inform the citizenry and to arouse public interests in national issues.

Congressional commi

of Congress witnesses who refuse to testify and for perjury of

these who give false testimony. (10)____

1.,在set 后加up, set up“建立、成立”是固定短语

2.答案：consisted → consisting/composed

3.答案：in → on

【详细解答】固定搭配on ...occasions

4.答案 rely后加on

【详细解答】固定搭配rely on sb. to do something

5.答案：make out → make

【详细解答】make out 意思是“辨认出”，而此处意思是“对...做详细的研究”，故用“make detailed studies of...” 即可。

6.答案：its → their

【详细解答】此处指代的是“investigations”, 故用复数。

7.答案：public → the public

【详细解答】the +adj. 可表示某一类人，此处意思是“面向公众”，故应用“the public”。

8.答案：nevertheless → therefore/ thus

【详细解答】此处不是表示意思的转折，而是与前文构成因果关系，故可改为therefore 或thus。

9.答案：interests → interest

【详细解答】此处看成不可数名词为佳

10.答案：these → those

【详细解答】those 指代witnesses , 即指代名词复数做定语从句的先行词，而these不行

Demographic indicators show that Americans in the postwar

period were more eager than ever to establish families. They quickly

brought down the age at marriage for both men and women and brought

the birth rate to a twentieth century height after more than a hundred (1)__ years of a steady decline, producing the “baby boom.” These young (2)__ adults established a trend of early marriage and relatively large

families that went for more than two decades and caused a major (3)__ but temporary reversal of long-term demographic patterns. From

the 1940s through the early 1960s, Americans married at a high rate (4)__ and at a younger age than their Europe counterparts. (5)__ Less noted but equally more significant, the men and women who (6)__

formed families between 1940 and 1960 nevertheless reduced the (7)__

divorce rate after a postwar peak; their marriages remained intact to

a greater extent than did that of couples who married in earlier as well (8)__

as later decades. Since the United States maintained its dubious (9)__ distinction of having the highest divorce rate in the world, the

temporary decline in divorce did not occur in the same extent in (10)__ Europe. Contrary to fears of the experts, the role of breadwinner and

homemaker was not abandoned.

1. 答案：height→high， high 作为名词翻译为“最高水平”，又如reach an all-time high

2．答案：删除a

【详细解答】此处steady decline指稳定下降的行为、过程而不是其结果，为不可数名词，故应去掉定冠词a。

3．答案：went后加on

【详细解答】 go on为固定搭配，意为“持续”。

4．答案：high→higher

【详细解答】后面有than，此处应为比较级。

5．答案：Europe→European

【详细解答】根据上下文，此处应用形容词作定语修饰名词counterparts。

6．答案： more

【详细解答】由上下文可知，more与equally矛盾，故应去掉。

7．答案：nevertheless→also

【详细解答】由上下文可知，此处讲的内容与前部分内容之间为递进关系，而非转折关系。

8．答案：that→those

【详细解答】由上下文可知，此处所指代的应为前面复数形式的marriages，故指示代词也应该用复数形式。

9．答案：Since→Although（或While）

【详细解答】从逻辑上讲，此处应表达让步关系，而非因果关系。

10．答案：in→to

【详细解答】 to．．．extent为固定搭配，意为“到……程度”

2002改错

There are great impediments to the general use of a standard in pronunciation

comparable to that existing in spelling (orthography). One is the fact that pronunciation is learnt‘naturally’ and unconsciously, and orthography is learnt 1._____

deliberately and consciously. Large numbers of us, in fact, remain

throughout our lives quite unconscious with what our speech sounds 2______

like when we speak out, and it often comes as a shock when 3______

we firstly hear a recording of ourselves. It is not a voice we recognize at once, 4_______ whereas our own handwriting is something which we almost always know. 5_____

We begin the ‘natural’ learning of pronunciation long before we start learning

to read or write, and in our early years we went on unconsciously 6.___ imitating and practicing the pronunciation of those around us

for many more hours per every day than we ever have to spend 7.___ learning even our difficult English spelling. This is ‘natural’, 8.___ therefore, that our speech-sounds should be those of our immediate circle;

after all, as we have seen, speech operates as a means of holding a community 9.___ and giving a sense of'belonging'. We learn quite early to recognize a ‘stranger’,someone who speaks with an accent of a different community-perhaps only a few miles far.

答案与详解

1.答案：

【详细解答】前半句意为“发音是在无意识之中学成的”，后半句意为“拼写是有意识地学成的”，它们之间是对比关系，故应该用连词while来连接。

2.答案：

【详细解答】be unconscious of是固定搭配，意为“无意识地，未意识到”。即“我们之中很多人一辈子都不知道自己的话听起来是什么样的”。

3.答案：speak后加it

【详细解答】speak out意为“大胆地说出”，在这里句意不通。在speak out中加上it，指代前面的speech，意为“当我们说出话后，自己听起来像什么”。

4.答案：

【详细解答】firstly表示顺序中的“第一”，first则表示时间上的“第一次，首次”。这里是说“当我们第一次听到自己的录音时，通常会震惊”。故应将firstly改为first才合乎句意。

5.答案：

【详细解答】在定语从句中，如果先行词是代词something，everything，nothing，little，few等时，关系词应用that而不是which，故此处应将which改为that。

6.答案：

【详细解答】本文通篇用的都是一般现在时，所以此处也应用一般现在时，使上下文保持时态一致。7.答案：删除per或

【详细解答】per和every都是“每”的意思，在此属重复错误，故将两者去掉一个即可。

8.答案：

【详细解答】根据句子结构，句中缺少一形式主语，而作形式主语的只能是代词it，this是“这”的意思，不能用做形式主语，所以应将this改为it。

9.答案：community后加

【详细解答】hold意为“抓住，占据，包含”。此处想表达的意思是“语言用作使社区具有凝聚力、给人归属感的一种方式”，用hold a community不能表达此意；hold sth．together表示“使结合在一

起不破，使团结一致”的意思，符合句意。

10.答案：

【详细解答】要表达距离上的远近，在英语中通常用副词away。far表示“远，从（到）很远距离”，不合句意。

2001改错

During the

the yields and the price of wheat in almost as much feeling as if

they were growers. The marketing of wheat became an increasing

Wheat prices were generally low in the autumn, so farmers could

they sold their wheat soon shortly after harvest when farm debts

were coming due, just to see prices rising and speculators getting rich.

On various occasions, producer groups, asked firmer control,

but the government had no wish to become involving, at

least not until wartime when wheat prices threaten

Anxious to check inflation and rising life costs, the federal

trading was suspended, and

board. To handle with the crop of 1919, the government

appointed the first Canadian Wheat Board, with total authority to

buy, sell, and set prices.

1.答案：as→so

此处不是比较，so 翻译为“如此”

2.答案：increasing→increasingly

【详细解答】 increasing可用来修饰名词，表示“正在增加”，修饰名词topic不合题意。本句中应该用副词作状语修饰形容词favorite，所以应该改用副词increasingly。

3.答案：so→but

【详细解答】根据上下文判断，小麦价格在秋天不断下降，但是农民不能等着市场提升价格。这里应该是转折关系，而不是因果关系。

4.答案：soon或shortly

【详细解答】要表达“不久以后”，要么用soon after，要么用shortly after，就是没有soo n shortly after这种搭配。

5.答案：rich→richer

【详细解答】根据上下文，这里是说由于价格上涨，投机商们变得更加富有，故应该改用形容词的比较级形式。

6.答案：asked后加for

【详细解答】ask for为固定搭配，意为“要求，请求”。

7.答案：involving→involved

【详细解答】be involved in为一固定搭配，意为“被卷入…”，这里的be为连系动词，可用 become 替换。

8.答案：1ife→living

【详细解答】根据上下文，这里要表达的意思是“生活费用”，应为living costs。life则意为“生命”，不能修饰costs。

9.答案：删除with

【详细解答】handle为及物动词，应直接带宾语。

10.答案：total→full

【详细解答】total意为“总体的，全体的”，指一种整体的概念。而这里要表达的是“全部的权威”，英语中常用full authority。

2000改错

The grammatical words which

1.___

meaning”, b

Although a word like the is not the n

M

“little words”. But size is by no mean a good criterion fo

people say: we certainly do crea

Robert Browning but in the prose of telegrams and newspaper headlines.

1.答案：删除seem后的the

【详细解答】本句中的most为副词，不是最高级形式，故不用定冠词the。翻译为“极其”

2.答案：but→and

【详细解答】根据文章内容判断，but后面的陈述与前文并不是相反之意，而是并列关系。

3.答案：in→to

【详细解答】as opposed to为固定搭配，意为“与……对照，与……相比”。

4.答案：misled→misleading

【详细解答】根据句意，这里的方式（way）是对他人有误导，不是被他人误导。所以应该用m islead 的现在分词表示主动的含义。

5.答案：away

【详细解答】far away from意为“距离某处很远”，而far from being则意为“远不是，远够不上”。根据上下文，这里是说“远非毫无意义”，故应该用短语far from being。

6.答案：single→only

【详细解答】此处用only修饰vehicle比用single更符合习惯用法。

7.答案：as→in

【详细解答】本句中的介词in表示“在……方面”，as则无此意。

8.答案：mean→means

【详细解答】by no means为固定搭配，意为“丝毫不，绝不”。

9.答案：have后加such

【详细解答】such … as是常见表达方式，用来举例说明。

10.答案：number改为deal/amount