1.Absent-minded Professors 1
2.A Dialogue on the Telephone 4
3.Make a Fool 5
4.Newspapers 8
5.Learn to Drive 10
6.The Extraordinary Advertisers 13
7.Clever or Stupid 16
8.Marco Polo 18
9.The Man From the Government 21
10.The Goose Laying Golden Eggs 25
11.The Value of Books 28
12.A Disappointing Answer 30
13.The Man Who Never Put a Foot Wrong 32
14.Educating TV Children 36
15.Flying Saucers 39
16.The Brother and the Sister 42
17.Bell’s Voice 44
18.Look What They Are Doing to You！ 47
19.The City Blacksmith 50
20.A Book Causing a Civil War 53
21.Bike for a Better City 57
22.No Title 60
23.Such a Millionaire 64
24.The Perfect Pearl 67
25.The Underground Railroad 69
26.Big Ben 72
27.Geography of Australia 76
28.Narcissuss 78
29.Is Your Temperature Rising 81
30.Androcles and the Lion 84
31.“Eureka！” 87
32.Prefer to Die 92
33.The World’s Population 95
34.Sir Philip Sidney 99
35.The World-Famous Hyde Park 103
36.The Nobel Prize 107
37.Cover the Shadow With Sand 111
38.Who Is Uncle Sam？ 114
39.The Best Age to Be 118
40.A Terrible Dream 123
阅读理解试题选载 129
一、一九八五年全国高等学校招生统一考试英语试题（阅读理解部分） 129
二、广东省一九八五年高等学校英语专业入学试题（阅读理解部分） 131
三、一九八六年全国高等学校招生统一考试英语试题（阅读理解部分） 141
四、一九八六年全国高等学校统一招生考试英语标准化试题（阅读理解部分） 148
五、一九八六年全国高等学校统一招生考试英语标准化试题（样题）（阅读理解部分） 158
练习答案 169
Ⅰ.Key to the Exercises 169
Ⅱ.Key to the Test Papers 173