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UNIT 13

The price of success

Reading

Paper 1, Part 3

1) Interview a partner using these questions.

1 What ambitions did you have when you were a young child?

2Are they the same as your ambitions now? If not, what made them change?

2)The following extract is from a novel by Amy Tan, a Chinese-American whose parents emigrated to the USA from China when she was a child. In the novel, she writes about a girl in a similar situation to herself. You will find some examples of non-standard English in some of the direct and reported speech, reflecting the influence of the mother’s Chinese background.

Read the main part of the text quickly and answer the following questions. Do not look at the jumbled paragraphs on page 183 yet.

1What does the woman want for her daughter?

2 How does her daughter feel about this at the beginning of the text?

3Do the daughter’s feeling change?

AMERICA was where all my mother’s hopes lay. She had come to San Francisco in 1949 after losing everything in China: her mother and father, her family home, her first husband and two daughters, twin baby girls. But she never looked back with regret. There were so many ways for things to get better.

1 …………………………………………………………………………………………………………

We didn’t immediately pick the right kind of prodigy. At first my mother thought I could be a Chinese Shirley Temple*. We’d watch Shirley’s old movies on TV as though they were training films. My mother would poke my arm and say ‘Ni kan’ – you watch. And I would see Shirley tossing her curls and singing a sailor song, or pursing her lips into a very round O while saying ‘Oh my goodness.’

‘Ni kan,’ said my mother as Shirley’s eyes flooded with tears. ‘You already know hoe. Don’t need talent for crying!’

2 …………………………………………………………………………………………………………

The instructor had to lop off these soggy clumps to make my hair even again. ‘Short hair is very popular these days,’ she assured my mother. I now had hair the length of a boy’s, with straight-across bangs that hung at a slant two inches above my eyebrows. I liked the haircut and it made me actually look forward to my future fame.

3 …………………………………………………………………………………………………………

In all my imaginings I was filled with a sense that I would soon become perfect. My mother and father would adore me. I would be beyond reproach. I would never feel the need to sulk for anything. But sometimes the prodigy in me became patient. ‘If you don’t hurry up and get me out of here, I’m disappearing for good,’ it warned. ‘And then you’ll always be nothing.’

4 …………………………………………………………………………………………………………

First she brought out a story about a three-year-old boy who knew the main cities in all the states in America and even most of the European countries. A teacher was quoted as saying the little boy could also pronounce the names of the foreign cities correctly. ‘What’s the capital of Finland?’ my mother asked me, looking at the magazine story. ‘Nairobi!’ I guessed, saying the most foreign word I could think of. She checked to see if that was possibly one way to pronounce ‘Helsinki’ before showing me the answer.

8 …………………………………………………………………………………………………………

One night I had to look at a page in the Bible for three minutes and then report everything I could remember. ‘Now Jehoshaphat had riches and honor in abundance and … that’s all I remember, Ma,’ I said. And seeing my mother’s disappointed face once again, something inside of me began to die. I hated the tests, the raised hopes and failed expectations.

6 …………………………………………………………………………………………………………

And then I saw what seemed to be the prodigy side of me – because I had never seen that face before. The girl staring back at me was angry, powerful. This girl and I were the same. I had new thoughts, willful thoughts, or rather thoughts filled with lots of won’ts. O won’t let her change me, I promised myself. I won’t be what I’m not.

7 …………………………………………………………………………………………………………

And the next day, I played a game with myself, seeing if my mother would give up on me before it sounded eight times. After a while I usually counted only one, maybe two at most. At last she was beginning to give us hope.

*Shirley Temple – a child film star the 1930s

3) Read the text again carefully. Choose from the paragraphs A-H the one which best fits each gap. There is one extra paragraph which you do not need to use. Remember to:

•look backwards and forwards

•check that you have not used the same paragraph twice.

A

So now on nights when my mother presented her tests, I performed listlessly, my head propped on one arms. I pretended to be bored. And I was. I got so bored I started counting the bellows of the foghorn out on the bay while my mother drilled me.

B

The tests hot harder – multiplying numbers in my head, finding the queen of hearts in a deck of cards, predicting the daily temperatures in Los Angeles, New York and London.

C

You’re just not trying,’ said my mother. And she was neither angry nor sad. She said it as it to announce a fact that could never be disproved.

D

Soon after my mother got this idea, she took me to a beauty training school and put me in the hands of a student who could barely hold the scissors without shaking. Instead of shiny ringlets, I emerged with an uneven mass of crinkly black fuzz. My mother dragged me off to the bathroom and tried to wet it down to straighten it, complaining loudly as though I’d done it on purpose.

E

Every night after dinner my mother and I would sit at the kitchen table. She would present me with tests, taking her examples from stories of amazing children she had read in the magazines she got from people whose houses she cleaned.

F

You could open a restaurant. You could work for the government and get good retirement. You could become rich. You could become instantly famous.

‘Of course, you can be prodigy, too,’ my mother told me when I was nine. You can be best anything.’

G

In fact, in the beginning, I was just excited as my mother, maybe even more so. I pictured this prodigy part of me as many different images, trying each one on for size. I was a dainty ballerina standing by the curtains, waiting to hear the right music that would send me floating on my tiptoes. I was Cinderella stepping from her pumpkin carriage with sparkly cartoon music filling the air.

H

Before going to bed that night, I looked in the mirror above the bathroom sink and when I saw only my face staring back – and that it would always be this ordinary face – I began to cry. Such a sad, ugly girl! I made high-pitched noises like a crazed animal, trying to scratch out the face in the mirror.

4) Read through the whole text again.

1 In what order does the girl experience the following emotions? Find evidence from the text to support your answer.

disappointment and frustration rebellion

determination to be herself optimism and excitement

2How do you think the situation described at the end of the extract could have been avoided? Think of some advice you could give to a) the mother b) the daughter.

3In what ways have your family encouraged you to achieve your potential? In what ways have they left you free to make your own choices.

Listening

Paper 4, Part 1

1)Work in pairs. What is your definition of success? Write a short definition that you can both agree on.

2)You will hear four different extracts. For questions 1-8, choose the answer (A, B or D) which fits best according to what you hear.

Extract One

You hear a woman talking about how she became involved in sport.

1The speaker says she was successful in the triathlon because she A was talented.

B had little competition. C was lucky.

2She wanted to compete again because she enjoyed the A success.

B acclaim. C challenge.

Extract Two

You hear a contestant in a TV quiz show being interviewed after the show.

3Before Pete went on the show he felt A confident.

B nervous.

C determined.

4At the end of the show he

A was satisfied with his performance. B regretted losing the money.

C wished he had answered a different question.

Extract Three

You hear a man talking about his career.

5How did the speaker feel about his father when he was younger? A grateful for his support

B afraid of opposing him

C comfortable talking to him

6The speaker regrets

A not having tried acting. B becoming a lawyer.

C taking money from his father

Extract Four

You hear a motorcycling champion, Darren, talking about his sport.

7When he doesn’t win, Darren A makes the best of it.

B is devastated.

C hides his feelings.

8What does Darren suggest about motorcycling? A He prefers it to an ordinary job.

B It’s an unpleasant environment to work in. C Not all of the skills required can be taught.

3) Look back at the definition of success you came up with in exercise 1, and discuss it in relation to what you have heard. Which speaker do you consider has actually been the most successful?

Improving your writing

In Units 1, 3 and 9, you identified and corrected errors in the areas of writing listed below. This section gives further practice in these areas.

•accuracy, including grammatical accuracy, spelling punctuation

•range of grammatical structures used

•range and appropriacy of vocabulary used

•consistency and appropriacy of style and register

•organization and discourse management

1)The extracts below were written by Proficiency students. Match each extract A-H to one of the task types 1-5 below. Think about both content and style. Ignore the underlined mistakes for the moment.

1 argumentative essay

2 magazine article

3newspaper article

4 review

5report

A

Those providing financial backing always have to hold competitions in places where they can 1make a fortune. Professional sport is only for the rich not for the poor because the tickets 2have been so expensive that the poor can’t afford 3it. 4It’s not fair, is it? I recommend that entrance to the football stadium should be cheaper so that all the people who 5fancy the game can come and watch. I recommend to the committee an immediate reduction in ticket prices based on my finding.

B

Modern life 1has both good and not good input, especially the young generation. Every day we live with high technology, 2smong them are television and cinema. Television and film producers are doing their best to attract people by presenting violence, and this is seen 3clear in this film.

C

By 14.00 1it was downpouring heavily and four inches of rain had 2increased in the 3past hour. People were

4informed to stay in their houses because the situation outside was getting worse. People were angry with the authorities. Why 5did the forecasters 6excluded this combination of 7the weather conditions? Many people were trapped in trees and others injured themselves by trying to save their homes.

D

To sum up, it is good to have dreams and to 1put goals in your life, and of course to fight to 2fulfil all of them, but even if you succeed, what will 3be their value if you don’t have you health. In short, health is clearly the most important thing in life.

E

So if someone commits a crime, he goes to prison ‘It’s fair’, said Judge Taylor, ‘provided that the prison has regulations and humane and sanitary conditions.’ But I can’t 1stop thinking that for some crimes another 2way of punishment might be better and more effective. 3I simply think about a place where they give criminals 4an obligatory work without payment, and provide them only with a place to sleep and something to eat for a period of time.

F

Some people questioned believe that apart from human rights there are also animal rights and consequently we should all be as sensitive to 1animals’ abuse as to humans’ abuse. In my investigation I saw that there is a large number of animals which are used as subjects 2to scientific experiments and unfortunately, nearly 3most of them die or those which manage to 4go through these experiments are left with some kind of permanent 5disability. So this raises another practical issue to address which has to do with the balance of nature, as 6the numbers of some animals due to these experiments is tending to 7diwndle. These findings lead me to my conclusion and recommendations which I outline below.

G

One of the most famous and 1interested museums on the world is the British Museum 2at London. It is a huge building 3overwhelmed with relics, and works of art that 4can impress every visitor.

H

As we all know, stress has always been a very negative factor in our lives because of 1it’s bad side effects. Today life is much more stressful. There are thousands of cities overcrowded with people and no jobs. Thus, a lot of people are out of work. Others, in order to 2bring home the bacon and educate their children, 3work like dogs ate any job they can find. So it life actually more stressful than ever before?

2)Work with a partner. Read through the extracts again, looking at the underlined words and phrases. Decide what type of mistake each one is (collocation, grammar, vocabulary or style) and correct each one.

3)The extract below range of vocabulary and structure. Work with a partner. Identify the task type. (Use the list in Exercise 1 to help you.) Then improve the range of vocabulary and structure.

I live in a small town with about 40,000 habitants. It is situated in the suburbs of Lyon. So it’s cleaner and there are more green places. With bus and underground it’s really easy to go in Lyon’s town centre. So I can have advantages of the town and the country.

4) The extract below is the introduction to an argumentative essay about what makes people happy. The paragraph is badly organized and the ideas are not well linked.

1 Work with a partner. Read the extract and discuss what changes you would like to make.

Happiness is related to many things such as health, family, career, which we consider to be the ones that give us happiness. Therefore, if money could help us to improve one of the things mentioned above and if we had the money to do so this would mean that money could help us attain happiness. However, hoe far is this actually true?

2 Read the two rewritten versions A and B on page 239. Discuss which version is better, and why.

Language Focus: Vocabulary

1) Phrasal verbs with get and go

1 Read through the text below. Then choose a phrasal verb from the box to replace each of the words or expressions in italics.

After (1) passing his final law exams with flying colours, Oscar (2) applied for a variety of highly-paid jobs, and soon found one he liked. It was hard work at first, but he soon found his feet and (3) concentrated on making as much money as possible. However, his money-making schemes were so complex that he did not (4) have enough time for making friends or building up a social life.

Feeling stressed, he went to his doctor who warned him that his lifestyle was leading him to a nervous breakdown. She said he’d (5) escaped it up to now, but needed to change his lifestyle. She advised him to (6) take part in some type of sport and recommended climbing, saying it would suit his drive to reach the top. She was right. He became so successful as a climber that he gave up his job and (7) managed to make a living with the money he earned writing about his exploits. When his third book was published he was asked whether he was happier now than when he was making a lot of money. ‘Of course,’ he replied. ‘There’s more to life than just (8) being successful financially.’

2Read the story again. Do you agree with Oscar’s changed attitude to success?

3Look at the phrasal verbs you didn’t use. Write a sentence about your own ambitions using each one.

2) Idioms with get and go

1 Read the following text. Then replace the words in italics with an idiom from the box. You may need to make other changes.

I’ve always believed there’s only one way to achieve success: you’ve just got to (1) put all your effort into it. Even if you seem to be (2) making no progress whatsoever, you have to (3) strive to get what you want. You may find you’ve got no-one to lend a helping hand, you may have to (4) struggle without help, but if you can

(5) achieve more than the rest, then you’ll make it to the top.

get up and go

get your act together get nowhere/somewhere go one better than … go for it

go all out for something/to do something go it alone

have a go at something

2What difference have these changes made to the style of the text?

3Look at the expressions you didn’t use. What do they mean? Write a sentence including each of them.

4 Do you agree that it is always possible to achieve success by individual effort?

3) Compound nouns formed from verbs

Χ it was downpouring heavily (text, p. 185)

√the rain was pouring down

√there was a heavy downpour

Complete the sentences below with a compound noun including the word given. You may need to change the form of the word.

1The students hardly cooked at all, but lived on …………… TAKE

2Finally, we’ll give you some …………… on the course and a few suggestions for how it could be improved. FEED

3We are anxiously waiting for the …………… of the negotiations. COME

4 We’ve got far too much rubbish in this house – it’s time we had a …………… CLEAR 5 In 1999 there were two major …………… in research into spinal injury. BREAK

6None of the …………… took any notice, in spite of his shouts. PASS

7 The …………… among the peasants was cruelly put down by the king’s army. RISE 8 The cat had numerous ……………, all of whom inherited her timid nature. SPRING

9There were a few ……………, but in general the project went well. SET

10The …………… of the disease was gradual, and at first they hardly noticed its effects. SET

4)Use of English: Paper 3, Part 3

Think of one word only which can be used appropriately in all three sentences.

1Insects such as mosquitoes and lice …………… many serious diseases.

He was required to …………… all the details in his head, as it was too dangerous to commit them to paper.

All our products are fully refundable in case of dissatisfaction and …………… a full twelve month guarantee.

2Pam’s husband has supported her every …………… of the way, in spite of the problems. As part of her job, Alison tries to keep in …………… with all new developments in fashion. He needed to be one …………… ahead of his opponent in order to win.

3He has an interesting …………… of videos and CDs, including several not usually available in this country.

They knew they were on great danger as the ship was within …………… of the enemy guns. We finally reached the top of the pass, only to find another mountain …………… facing us.

4He spent about an hour trying to explain it all to me but I still felt totally …………… - it just seemed impossible.

His kind words were completely …………… on her – she was too immersed in her own thoughts. Celia didn’t notice how long the flight took; she spent the whole time …………… in her book.

5Add the flour and sugar to the eggs and …………… them together until the mixture becomes light and fluffy.

The bird …………… its wings in a desperate effort to escape from the trap. The administration claim that they are about to …………… inflation

6She asked if I wanted a hand with the bags but I told her I could …………… them on my own. I honestly don’t know how we’re going to …………… now Keith’s lost his job.

I’ve really had enough, but I think I could …………… another of those delicious cakes if you insist.

Listening

Paper 4, Part 2

1)

1Look at the situations below. In which situation do you think mental attitudes might play the greatest part in succeeding or failing?

2Discuss the following questions

1 Have you ever been afraid of failing?

2 What caused this fear?

3How did it affect you?

4Did you overcome it? How?

2)You will hear a talk being given to a group of students by a businessman. Before you listen, look through the gapped sentences below. What can you predict about his talk.

3) Now listen and complete the sentences with a word or short phrase. When you have finished, check that the words you have written are spelled correctly and that they make sense in the sentence as a whole.

4)

1 Match the verbs and nouns to form phrases connected with achieving success.

2 Can you think of a time when you or someone you know did any of the things in the list above? Tell your partner what happened.

Use of English

Paper 3, Part 1

1) Look at the picture and discuss these questions.

1How is the man feeling?

2What kind of sacrifices do you think he might have had to make to achieve his success?