Unit 3 Computers reading课时作业

一、 阅读理解

　　About 15 years ago，I taught A Problem from Hell，a book on genocide (大屠杀)，to a group of 18-and 19-year-olds in a mid-west university in the US. In my class there was a young man who had spent his boyhood in Bosnia as NATO bombed his hometown. My other students，amazed by his connection to the genocide in the textbook，asked him what it was like to grow up in a war-zone. "A pretty normal childhood as you had here，"he said. "We played cards inside a lot，and when there was no bombing we kicked a ball in the street. "

　　In the past few years，the world has seen a rapid increase in refugees (难民)，with the number hitting 60 million. Viet Thanh Nguyen's story collection The Refugees reminds us that literature is news that stays news. Set in the Vietnamese communities in California as well as in Vietnam，the stories do not aim to surprise us with new twists or shock us with wonderful details，as war and refugee stories could easily choose to do. Rather，like the young man from Bosnia，Nguyen's characters tell these stories because they are the only ones known to them.

　　Included in the collection are two of the most touching pieces，both about siblings (兄弟或姊妹) separated by geography and history. In Black-Eyed Women，the narrator (讲述人)，a young Vietnamese woman，is visited by the ghost of her elder brother，who died young on the boat when the family took flight from the war. The tale of love and loss，violence and violation，may not be unfamiliar to the reader，but the determination of the brother's ghost (he has taken decades to swim across the Pacific to reach America) and the sister's abandoning herself to a half death make the story lasting.

As an echo，the closing story，Fatherland，explores a more complex situation between two siblings. The narrator，a young Vietnamese woman，meets her half-sister，visiting from the US for the first time. Adding to the tension is the fact that her father has named the narrator and her siblings after his first set of children. Two sisters，one American and one Vietnamese，yet named the same by the father-it may sound