新高考英语时文积累《The Lesson of the Cliff (走一步,再走一步)》
说明：文章内容仅供预览，部分内容可能不全。下载后的文档，内容与下面显示的完全一致。下载之前请确认下面内容是否您想要的，是否完整无缺。
新高考英语读后续写语料积累系列之《走一步，再走一步》 The Lesson of the Cliff 走一步，再走一步 By Morton Hunt (USA) It was a sweltering July day（闷热的七月At some point, I looked back and was 某日）in I can feel it still, 56 years later. The five horrified. The ground at the base of the cliff boys I was with had grown tired of playing seemed very far below; one slip and I would fall, marbles and burning holes in dry leaves with a lens bouncing off the cliff face and ending on the rocks. and were casting about for（苦苦搜寻）something There, shattered and strangl(e)ing（窒息）else. on my own blood, I would gurgle, twitch a few “Hey!” said freckle-faced（满脸雀斑的）times and then expire（断气）, like the cat I had little Ned. “I got an idea. We haven't climbed the seen run over a few days earlier. cliff for a long while.” But the boys were chattering（喋喋不休）“Let’s go!” said someone else. And off they above me on an earthen ledge two thirds of the went, trotting and panting（气喘吁吁. pant for way to the top. It was 5 or 6 feet deep and some 15 breathe 上气不接下气）like a pack of stray dogs. feet long. I clawed my way up（攀爬）to them; I hesitated. I longed to be brave and active, then I crawled as far back on the ledge as I could, like them, but I'd been a sickly child most of my huddle against the rock face（靠在岩壁上）. The eight years and had taken heart to my mother's other boys stood close to the edge and boldly admonitions to remember that I wasn't as strong as urinated into space; the sight made me so queasythe other boys and not to take chances. （头晕的）that I surreptitiously（暗中地）“Come on!” Called Jerry, my best friend “Just clutched（紧抓）at the rocks behind me. because you've been sick is no reason to be a sissy.” In a few minutes they started up to the top. “I'm coming!” I yelled, and ran along after them. “Hey, wait!” I croaked. Through the park and into the woods we “So long! See you in the funny papers.” one went, finally emerging in a clearing. At the far of them said, and the others laughed. side, 40 or 50 feet away, loomed（赫然耸立）the “But I cannot, I” That spurred them on: cliff, a bristling, near vertical wall of jutting rocks, Jeering and catcalling back to me, they wriggled earth slides, scraggly bushes and ailanthus their way to the top, from where they would walk saplings. From the tumbled rocks at its base to the home by a roundabout route. Before they left, they fringe of sod at its top, it was only about 60 feet peered down at（仔细看）me. high, but to me it looked like the very “you can stay if you want to”, mocked Ned. embodiment of the Forbidden and Impossible“It is all yours.” Jerry looked concerned, but （看起来如同“禁忌”与“不可能”的化身）. he went with the others. One by one, the other boys scrabbled upward, I looked down and was overcome by finding handholds（放手之处）and toeholds on dizziness; a nameless force seemed to be impelling rock outcrops and earthen ledges. I hung back until me to fall off. I lay clinging to the rock as the world the others were partway up; then trembling and spun around. I could never climb back down. It sweating, I began to climb. A hand here, a foot was much too far to go, too hazardous; partway, I there, my heart thumping in my skinny chest, I would grow feeble or faint, lose my grip, fall and made my way up and up. die. But the way up to the top was even worse-2 新高考英语读后续写语料积累系列之《走一步，再走一步》 higher, steeper, more treacherous; I would never make it. I heard someone sobbing and moaning; I wondered who it was and realized that it was I. Time passed. The shadows gradually lengthened, the sun disappeared from the treetops beyond the clearing below, and dusk began to gather. Silent now, I lay on my stomach as if in a trance, stupef(y)ied by fear and fatigue（神志不清）, unable to move or even think of how to get back down to safety and home. Twilight, a first star in the sky, the ground below the cliff growing dim. But what can he do? Middle-aged and portly, he cannot climb up here. Even if he could, what good would that do? Staying well back from the foot of the cliff so that he can see me, he points the beam up and calls to me.” Come on down, now,” he says in a perfectly normal comforting tone. “Dinner is ready.” “I can’t!” I wail. I’ll fall, I could die!” “You got up,” he says. “You can get down the same way. I will light the way.” “No, I can’t,” I howl. “It’s too far, it is too hard, I can’t do it.” “Listen to me,” my father says. “Don’t think about how far it is. All you have to think about is taking one little step. You can do that. Look where I’ll shining the light. Do you see that rock?” The beam bounces around on a jutting outcrop just below the ledge. “See it?” he calls up. I inch over. “Yes,” I say. “Good,” he says.” Now just turn around so you can put your foot on that rock. That’s all you have to do. It’s just a little way below you. You can do that. Don’t worry about what comes next, and don’t look down any farther than that first step. Trust me.” It seems possible. I inch backward（我一寸寸挪动）, gingerly feel for the rock with my left foot and find it. “that’s good,” my father calls. “Now, a little bit to the right and a few inches lower, there’s another foothold. Move your foot down there very slowly, that’s all you have to do. Just think about that next step, nothing else.” I do so. “Good,” he says. Now let go of whatever you are holding onto with your left hand and reach back and grab that skinny tree just at the edge, where my light is. That’s all you have to do.” Again, I do so. That’s how it goes. One step at a time, one handhold at a time, he talks me down the cliff, stressing that I have only to make one simple move each time, never letting me stop to think of the long way down always telling me that the next thing I have to do is something I can do. Suddenly I take the last step down onto the tumbled rocks at the bottom and into my father’s strong arms, sobbing a little, and then, surprisingly, feeling a sense of immense accomplishment and something like pride. I have realized with the same surprise, time and again throughout my life, that, having looked at a far and frightening prospect and been dismayed（to one’s dismay 让某人丧气的是）, I can cope with it after all by remembering the simple lesson I learned so long ago. I remind myself to look not at the rocks far below, but at the first small and relatively easy step and, having taken it, to take the next one, felling a sense of accomplishment with each move, until I have done what I wanted to do, gotten where I wanted to be, and can look back, amazed and proud of the distance I have come. 【走近作者】莫顿·亨特（Morton Hunt），美国作家（1927～1983），早年曾在空军服役，做过空军飞行员。在二战时期，他曾驾机执行过对德国的侦察任务。是一位擅长写励志类文章的作家，同时也是一位专业的心理学家。他的代表作有：《痛击》、《心理学的故事》、《走一步，再走一步》（原名《悬崖上的一课》）等。 2 本文来源：https://www.wddqw.com/doc/cf85a404f605cc1755270722192e453611665b1e.html