大学英语（三）¶

What makes it rather disturbing was the arbitrary circumstances both of my arrest and my subsequent fate in court.

Arbitrary: based on one's own opinion only, not on reason

But as soon as my father found out what had happened, he hired a very good solicitor.（初级）律师
Given the obscure nature of the charge, I feel sure that if I had come from a different background, and had really been unemployed, there is every chance that I would have been found guilty.

Obscure: not clearly seen or understood

Presumably that I should have looked outraged and said something like, "Look here, do you know who you're talking to? I am a highly successful student with a brilliant academic record."

Presumably: probably

The oldest didn't take more than a second to deliver his smug answer.
Not to be outdone by his younger siblings, the 9-year-old said, "It could also be the orange because the other two grow on vines."

Outdo: do more or better than sb.

He found that they'd all contracted a similar but milder disease, cow pox, which vaccinated them against the deadly smallpox.

Contract: catch or develop (an illness)

They were refocusing the parameters.

Parameter: limiting factor or characteristic; limit

This is not meant to be a critique of schools. 评论、评论文章
Businesses must be able to download volumes of data instantaneously. 即时的，瞬间的
Nor do I teach because I think I know answers, or because I have knowledge I feel compelled to share.

Compel: force
I teach because I enjoy finding ways of getting myself and my students out of the ivory tower and into the real world. 象牙
But we also set up a corporation, borrowed money, purchased a run-down house and practiced self-reliance by renovating it. old and broken or in bad condition
There is Jacqui, a cleaning woman who knows more by intuition than most of us learn by analysis. 直觉
It took me to task for my comments on the Los Angeles Dodgers and argued that I had got everything wrong.

Take sb. to task: criticize severely (for sth.)
Because I have a physical handicap, it took me five years to complete my associate's degree. 大专文凭
This was obviously an elaborate hoax. carefully planned and organized
Who, in her supposed condition, could cover a baseball team without the best equipment and help?
I was shocked into stillness by what I saw.
Some years before, when we sold our ranch and moved to town, Mother had decided to open a day nursery. a very large farm for raising horses, cattle or sheep
"I know you do," Dad said evenly. calmly; peacefully
My shock and embarrassment at finding Mother in tears on Wednesday was a perfect index of how little I understood the pressures on her. sign or indication
He lay still in the bed and seemed very detached from what was going on. show no interest in, be indifferent to
We flushed a covey of quail under a high clay bank with overhanging brush and I killed two as they went out of sight over the top of the bank.

Flush（使）（鸟）惊飞；Covey a small flock or group (of small birds)；Quail 鹌鹑；Overhang hang over or stand out over
Coming out while you were poised unsteadily on the icy, springy brush they made difficult shooting and I killed two, missed five, and started back pleased to have found a covey close to the house and happy there were so many left to find on another day. flexible 有弹性的
The important thing is, Gig, that now I can teach you because you have the tools. And, in all modesty, I know a lot about the trade. 谦虚的说，毫不夸张的说
The siren also reaches its top and then suddenly goes off and there is absolute dead silence for a long moment. penetrating whistle as a warning
Well, you can understand why we blew our tops a little—explode with anger
She wasn't used to having Paula talk to her in such an intimate tone. 亲密的，个人的
He stood there with the keen, unrevealing smile on his face.
Not for love or money. Not by any means.
You'll never amount to anything if you spend your time that way!

Never amount to anything: never become successful in life；Amount to: develop into; be equal to 达到，等于，相当于
Or it was considered an unhealthy escape from real life and its duties.
He maintained that "you can imagine your future." 断言
Picture yourself as winning, and that will contribute immeasurably to success.
The resulting memory traces will supposedly start affecting your everyday life. They will help lead you to the attainment of your goals. presumably; probably
Song of Defiance

Defiance: open disobedience or resistance; refusal to give way to authority or opposition
When you walk the cobbled mist-shrouded streets of Terezin in the Czech Republic, your mind fills with images of the village sixty years ago, when it was a Nazi concentration camp packed with desperate and dying Jews.

Shroud: cover and hide
Terezin had been a perverse kind of showcase. In contrast to Auschwitz, Treblinka and other extermination camps, the Nazis designed the town near Prague to fool the world. For much of World War II, Nazi propaganda suggested that Jews there enjoyed a life of leisure, even using captive Jewish filmmakers to craft a movie showing "happy" Jews listening to lectures and basking in the sun.

Perverse behaving in an unreasonable way；Extermination 消灭，灭绝，根除；Propaganda ideas, false or true information, etc. spread about officially esp. by a government
Yet the camp made concessions for propaganda purposes. 妥协、让步
Charismatic, with a striking face and wavy, dark hair, Schaechter was just beginning to make a name for himself in the rich cultural mix of prewar Prague. establish one's reputation
Everything that Schaechter wanted to say lay camouflaged within the Latin words of the Requiem, with its themes of God's wrath and human liberation. Schaechter had access to no musical instruments except a broken harmonium found in a rubbish heap.

Wrath extreme anger；Heap number of things or mass of material lying piled up
Since there was only one single score, the singers had to memorize their parts, in Latin, a language that few besides Schaechter understood. 乐谱
The first performance took place for prisoners gathered in a former gymnasium. gym
They gnawed at it from sheer hunger.

Gnaw bite sth. hard continually until it is worn away；Sheer complete; thorough; utter
The day of wrath, the day shall dissolve the world in ash. … What trembling there shall be when the judge shall come. … Nothing shall remain unavenged.

Unavenged 未得报仇的，未得雪耻的；Avenge take or get revenge for
After he retired, a curious thing happened. 退下、离开
But in the meantime, for a brief spell, now that…
To most people the term technology conjures up images of smoky steel mills or noisy machines. factory or workshop
But we have, with the passage of time, invented all sorts of social devices to hasten the process.