A WORLD ON FIRE Britain’s Crucial Role in the American Civil War. By Amanda Foreman. Random House, $35. Which side would Great Britain support during the Civil War? Foreman gives us an enormous cast of characters and a wealth of vivid description in her lavish examination of a second battle between North and South, the trans-Atlantic one waged for British hearts and minds.
おそらくWorld on Fireという本のタイトルは英検の長文にあった“wrap the whole world in flames”という国務長官の言葉からきたのでしょう。
War with Britain became a real possibility in November 1861, when the Union navy intercepted the Trent, a British mail ship, and seized two Southern diplomats headed to England. The seizure was a clear violation of Britain’s neutrality. Britain demanded an apology and insisted the men be released, backing up its position by dispatching troops to the northern border of the United States. Lincoln’s administration responded with fierce rhetoric; Secretary of State William Seward warned that the Union was prepared to “wrap the whole world in flames” if the British acted aggressively. As tensions escalated, hopes rose in the South. Even if Britain did not side with the South, the dispute raised the likelihood of a negotiated end to the war, which would leave the United States divided and the Southern states independent.
Quite early on in the planning of 'The Beloved', Rossetti wrote to the man who commissioned the picture (the Birkenhead banker, George Rae) of his wish to include a little black girl carrying a cup before the Bride. This was later changed to a black boy, when Rossetti spotted on the steps of a London hotel a slave boy travelling with his American master. He came to Rossetti's studio in Chelsea to pose. This was the period of the American Civil War and the questions of slavery and abolition were hot topics in the newspapers. Rossetti's brother William, his sister Christina and other artist friends came out on the abolitionist side but Rossetti's views on the issue are not clear. Was the black boy an attempt to allude obliquely to the slavery question in his picture? (Ford Madox Brown might well have been doing the same in 'The Coat of Many Colours' showing Joseph sold into slavery, painted at roughly the same time for the same patron, George Rae).
A hundred years ago, my country, the United States, was not one economy and culture, but two of them, so opposed to each other that ninety-five years ago they went to war against each other to test which one should prevail. My side, the South, lost that war, the battles of which were fought not on neutral ground in the waste of the ocean, but in our own homes, our gardens, our farms, as if Okinawa and Guadalcanal had been not islands in the distant Pacific but the precincts of Honshu and Hokkaido. Our land, our homes were invaded by a conqueror who remained after we were defeated; we were not only devastated by the battles which we lost, the conqueror spent the next ten years after our defeat and surrender despoiling us of what little war had left. The victors in our war made no effort to rehabilitate and reestablish us in any community of men or of nations. 百年前、私の国アメリカ合衆国は経済的にも文化的にも一つではなく、二つに分かれた国がお互いに激しく対立し、九十五年前どちらの側が勝っているかを試すために戦争になりました。私の側、南部はその戦争に負けました。戦争は広々とした海洋のような中立の場で戦われたのではなく、我々の家、庭、農場で戦われたのです。ちょうど沖縄とガダルカナルが、遠い太平洋上に位置している島ではなくて、本州とか北海道にあるようなものです。我々の土地も家も征服者によって侵入され、私たちが負けた後も彼らは居残りました。私たちは負けた戦争によって打ちのめされたばかりではありません。征服者は私たちの敗北と降伏の後十年も南部に滞まり、戦争が残した僅かなものまで略奪していきました。戦争の勝利者たちは、人々のコミュニティとしても、また民族のコミュニティとしても、南部を復興し再建するための、どんな努力もしませんでした。
下記の激励の部分は2011年を経験した今の我々にも響く部分ですね。
I believe it is war and disaster which remind man most that he needs a record of his endurance and toughness. I think that that is why after our own disaster there rose in my country, the South, a resurgence of good writing, writing of a good enough quality that people in other lands began to talk of a "regional" Southern literature even until I, a countryman, have become one of the first names in our literature which the Japanese people want to talk to and listen to. 人間が忍耐と強靭さの記録を必要としているということを、人間に最も強く思い起こさせるのは、戦争と災害であると私は信じています。だからこそ戦争による災害がもたらされた後で、私の国、南部において、優れた文学の復活が起こったのだと思うのです。それは、＜地方性＞豊かな南部文学のことを、外国の人々までが語り始めたほど十分優れた特質の文学で、ついに田舎者の私が、日本の方々が話をし、また耳を傾けたくなる最初のアメリカ作家たちの一人になったのです。
I believe that something very like that will happen here in Japan within the next few years - that out of your disaster and despair will come a group of Japanese writers whom all the world will want to listen to, who will speak not a Japanese truth but a universal truth. これからの数年のうちに日本でも、これに似たことが起こるだろうと私は信じています。つまり、あなたがたの災難と絶望の中から、世界中の人々が耳を傾けたくなるような、そして日本の真実ではなく、普遍的な真実を語るような、一群の日本の作家が登場してくるだろうと思います。
（ウィキペディア） The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex is a book on evolutionary theory by English naturalist Charles Darwin, first published in 1871. It was Darwin's second book on evolutionary theory, following his 1859 work, On the Origin of Species. In The Descent of Man, Darwin applies evolutionary theory to human evolution, and details his theory of sexual selection. The book discusses many related issues, including evolutionary psychology, evolutionary ethics, differences between human races, differences between sexes, the dominant role of women in choosing mating partners, and the relevance of the evolutionary theory to society.
Golden Riceという長文についても、そもそもそんなものがあるのも知りませんでした。NPRのレポートが分かりやすかったです。
The question of how to nourish two billion more people in a changing climate will prove one of the greatest challenges in human history. To meet it, we should embrace an agricultural approach that combines the best features of traditional farming with the latest technology.
Biotechnology offers an unparalleled safety record and demonstrated commercial success. Remarkably, however, biotechnology might not reach its full potential. In part, that's because outspoken opponents of GM crops in the U.S. have spearheaded a "labeling" movement that would distinguish modified food from other food on grocery store shelves. Never mind that 60%-70% of processed food on the market contains genetically modified ingredients. In much of Europe, farmers are barred from growing genetically modified crops. Even in Africa, anti-biotechnology sentiment has blocked its application. In Zambia, for example, the government refused donations of GM corn in 2002, even as its people starved.
Opponents of GM crops have been extremely effective at spreading misinformation. GM crops don't, as one discredited study claimed recently, cause cancer or other diseases. GM cotton isn't responsible for suicides among Indian farmers—a 2008 study by an alliance of 64 governments and nongovernmental organizations debunked that myth completely. And GM crops don't harm bees or monarch butterflies.
In fact, people have consumed billions of meals containing GM foods in the 17 years since they were first commercialized, and not one problem has been documented. This comes as no surprise. Every respected scientific organization that has studied GM crops—the American Medical Association, the National Academy of Sciences and the World Health Organization, among others—has found GM crops both safe for humans and positive for the environment.
Letters Our GM Food Fears Aren't Irrational A pre-eminent U.N. and World Bank assessment concluded that GE crops have very little potential to alleviate poverty and hunger. Nov. 8, 2013 4:42 p.m. ET
Marc Van Montagu's "The Irrational Fear of GM Food" (op-ed, Oct. 23) is flawed from its first sentence. Genetically engineered (GE) crops have failed to deliver the promises Mr. Van Montagu cites as fact.
Far from environmentally sustainable, the vast majority of GE crops are developed to resist and therefore promote pesticides, sharply increasing the amount of pesticides used in agriculture. Meanwhile, the overall increase in crop yields over the last half century is attributed to conventional breeding practices, not transgenic methods.
As to claims of lower costs for farmers, GE seed patents have, since 1995, led to a 325% spike in soybean prices and a 516% jump in cotton, at the same time forcing farmers to pay for more pesticides, not less. GE crops are limited to a handful of commodity crops grown solely for biofuels, animal feed and processed foods. This type of "monoculture" farming isn't a solution to global hunger and instead results in increased pesticide use, deforestation, loss of biodiversity and climate change.
Mr. Van Montagu argues that GE technology is essential to feeding a growing population in a time of increasing climate chaos. Yet a pre-eminent U.N. and World Bank assessment concluded that GE crops have very little potential to alleviate poverty and hunger, recommending instead for agroecological approaches.
Andrew Kimbrell Executive Director Center for Food Safety Washington
Yet a pre-eminent U.N. and World Bank assessment concluded that GE crops have very little potential to alleviate poverty and hunger, recommending instead for agroecological approaches.
（Webster） agroeocology an ecological approach to agriculture that views agricultural areas as ecosystems and is concerned with the ecological impact of agricultural practices
（ウィキペディア） Agroecology is the study of ecological processes that operate in agricultural production systems. The prefix agro- refers to agriculture. Bringing ecological principles to bear in agroecosystems can suggest novel management approaches that would not otherwise be considered. The term is often used imprecisely and may refer to "a science, a movement, [or] a practice."[1] Agroecologists study a variety of agroecosystems, and the field of agroecology is not associated with any one particular method of farming, whether it be organic, integrated, or conventional; intensive or extensive.
BRUSSELS (22 June 2010) – “Governments and international agencies urgently need to boost ecological farming techniques to increase food production and save the climate,” said UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, Olivier De Schutter, while presenting the findings at an international meeting on agroecology held in Brussels on 21 and 22 June.
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“Today, most efforts are made towards large-scale investments in land – including many instances of land grabbing – and towards a ‘Green Revolution’ model to boost food production: improved seeds, chemical fertilisers and machines,” the Special Rapporteur remarked. “But scant attention has been paid to agroecological methods that have been shown to improve food production and farmers’ incomes, while at the same time protecting the soil, water, and climate.”
On October 16th, World Food Day will call attention to the crucial role that family farmers play in creating a more sustainable global food system – and it couldn’t come at a more opportune time. As the global population approaches nine billion by the year 2050, nourishing the world and preserving diminishing environmental resources presents a daunting challenge.
Today, nearly one billion people go to bed hungry each night. By 2030, it’s estimated that 47 percent of the world will live in areas of high water stress. The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) estimates that 25 percent of all global land has already been highly degraded and can no longer be used to grow food.
The focus of World Food Day 2013 will be on “Sustainable Food Systems for Food Security and Nutrition.” More and more evidence is mounting to show that family farmers are at the center of sustainable food production. Smallholder farmers can use agroecological or environmentally friendly farming practices to produce more nutritious foods with often greater yields than conventional farming operations.
「英検問題はコピペできる」で最初の長文The End of Maya Civilizationをしょうかいさせていただきました。 同じような内容の記事が昨年11月の雑誌Natureに登場しているのを知りました。助かることに、日本語翻訳雑誌Natureダイジェストのサイトで無料公開記事として出ていました。（ただし、閲覧には読者登録が必要です。）
By analysing a 2,000-year-old stalagmite from a cave in southern Belize and studying archaeological records, palaeoclimatologist Douglas Kennett of Pennsylvania State University in University Park and his colleagues argue that unusual rainfall patterns shaped the fate of the Maya people1. Other researchers have proposed that dry climate conditions hastened the Maya collapse2, 3, but the latest data provide one of the most complete and detailed rainfall records from the geographic centre of the Mayan territory.
英検の問題の一部が以下ですが、By analysing a 2,000-year-old stalagmite from a cave in southern BelizeというNatureの説明がBy analyzing a rock formation in a cave in Belizeとrock formationと比較的簡単な表現に書き換えられていますね。
It appears that during their civilization’s peak period especially from AD 300 to AD 700 the Maya were completely dependent on a particular phenomenon. By analyzing a rock formation in a cave in Belize to obtain information about weather patterns over the centuries, Kennett found that the peak period of Maya culture coincided with years of heavy precipitation. During this time, the Maya made remarkable advances in agriculture, which enabled the rapid growth of the population and the development of complex political structures. The centuries that followed were characterized by a drying trend including periods of severe drought that crippled agricultural systems. By AD 800, most major Maya cities were in decline, and within two centuries they had been abandoned.
“I think one of the biggest contributions of this study is the real precision and accuracy of dating of this record,” says David Hodell, a palaeoclimatologist at the University of Cambridge, UK, who presented some of the first data to support climate change as a factor in the Maya decline3. He marvelled at Kennett’s error margins of 1–17 years — compared to about 100 years in many previous carbon-dating efforts.
Meigs Field, once the busiest single-runway airport in the United States, served downtown Chicago for more than 50 years. Its operations came to an end on March 30, 2003, when Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley, citing public safety concerns, ordered bulldozers to destroy the runway. Since then, the once-bustling airport has stood vacant, pending ambitious plans for conversion into a park.
1問目のマヤ文明のときはsomething that is relevant to modern timesとありましたが、２問目の空港の話は2003年の市長の行動がどういう意義があるのだろうとふと思ったのです。
Ten years ago as Mayor Richard M. Daley worked through political channels to accelerate federal approval to build new runways at the airport his father had dearly called "O'Hara," the mayor also issued an infamous order to destroy Chicago's little lakefront airport.
The mastermind behind it has moved to rural North Carolina to raise goats and make cheese. The field general works for an electrical contractor after being jailed for public corruption. And the boss who ordered it is now a retired mayor with a lucrative career in the private sector.
Ten years ago Saturday, Richard M. Daley sent in bulldozers under cover of darkness to carve giant X’s into Meigs Field’s only runway.
どちらの記事も書き出しにはTen years agoという表現が入っていますよね。英検の文章にも入っていれば、これは振り返りの記事なのだなと分かってよかったのではないかと思いました。自分は最後まで、どんな観点から書こうとした記事なのかピンときませんでしたから。
