A
(2020·成都第二次诊断)Author Walter Dean Myers died at the age of 76 after a brief illness. Walter Dean Myers was the author of more than 100 books for children and young adults and received many top awards.
The prolific author was loved for his vivid description of the lives of African American children, and for writing books for young people that covered different subjects. “Myers has written about all those subjects with deep understanding and a hardwon, qualified sense of hope，” said Leonard S. Marcus in 2008.
He was born in 1937 and was adopted by Florence Dean and Herbert after his mother died while giving birth to his younger sister. They loved him very much and his mother read to him from a very young age. Reading pushed him to discover worlds beyond his landscape.
He began writing at an early age. He wrote well in high school and an English teacher recognized this and advised him to keep on writing no matter what happened to him. “It’s what you do，” she said.
He dropped out of high school at 17 and joined the army. After finishing his service, he entered a dark period in his life. Myers began writing at night to pull himself through that miserable time.
In an essay published in The New York Times earlier this year, Myers described how a short story by James Arthur Baldwin helped change the course of his life. “I didn’t love the story, but I was lifted by it，” he wrote, “for it took place in Harlem, and it was a story concerned with black people like those I knew. By humanizing the people who were like me, Baldwin’s story also humanized me. The story gave me a permission that I didn’t know I needed, the permission to write about my own landscape, my own map.”
“I write books for the troubled boy I once was，” he wrote, “and for the boy who lives within me still.”
【解题导语】 本文是一篇记叙文，主要介绍了美国著名作家Walter Dean Myers的生平。
1．What does the second paragraph mainly talk about?
A．How popular Myers was.
B．How Myers became successful.
C．What makes Myers’ works popular.
D．What people think of Myers’ works.
C 解析：段落大意题。通读该段可知，该段首句“The prolific author...covered different subjects.”为该段主题句，结合该段其他内容可知，这位多产的作家因其对非裔美国儿童生活的生动描述，以及为年轻人写的涉及不同话题的书籍而深受喜爱。由此可知，该段主要介绍了他的作品受欢迎的原因，故C项正确。
2．Who discovered Myers’ writing talent?
A．James Arthur Baldwin.
B．His mother.
C．Leonard S. Marcus.
D．One of his teachers.
D 解析：细节理解题。根据第四段第二句“He wrote well in high school and an English teacher recognized this and advised him to keep on writing no matter what happened to him.”可知，他在高中时写作就很好，一位英语老师认识到这一点并建议他无论发生什么事都要坚持写下去。据此可知，他的写作天赋是他的一位老师发现的，故D项正确。
3．What does the underlined word “prolific” in Paragraph 2 probably mean?
A．Productive. B．Unfortunate.
C．Conservative. D．Humorous.
A 解析：词义猜测题。根据第一段第二句“Walter Dean Myers was the author of more than 100 books for children and young adults and received many top awards.”可知，Walter Dean Myers 写了100多本儿童和年轻人读物，并获得了许多最高奖项。由此可推知，他是一位多产的作家。productive意为“多产的”，故A项正确。B项意为“不幸的”，C项意为“守旧的”，D项意为“幽默的”，都与语境不符。
4．Why was the short story by James Arthur Baldwin so important for Myers?
A．It helped him survive the dark period.
B．It inspired him to pursue his writing career.
C．He learned many writing techniques from it.
D．The author of the story permitted him to write.
B 解析：细节理解题。根据倒数第二段第一句中的“how a short story...the course of his life”以及最后一句“The story gave me a permission that I didn’t know I needed, the permission to write about my own landscape, my own map.”可知，Baldwin写的故事鼓励了Myers追求他自己的写作事业，故B项正确。
