A little more than a hundred years ago, a number of European scholars began to record stories being told in peasant cottages and compile them into the first great collections of European folk tales. Written evidence exists to prove that the folk tales they recorded existed long before then though. Collections of sermons from the 12th to the 15th century show that medieval preachers knew of some of the same stories as those recorded by the 19th century folklorists.
The collections of folk tales made in the late 19th and early 20th centuries provide a rare opportunity to make contact with the illiterate masses who have disappeared into the pass without leaving a trace. To reject folk tales as historical evidence because they cannot be dated and situated with precision like other historical documents is to turn one’s back on one of the few points of entry into the previous centuries. But to attempt to penetrate that world is to face a daunting set of obstacles, the greatest of which is the impossibility of listening in on the story tellers. No matter how accurate they may be the versions of the tales recorded in writing cannot convey the effects that the storytellers must have used to bring the stories to life: the dramatic pauses, the sly glances, the use of gestures to set scenes, and the use of sounds to punctuate actions. All of those devices shaped the meaning of the tales, and all of them elude the historian. He cannot be sure that the limp and lifeless text he holds between the covers of a book provides an accurate account of the performance that took place in earlier times.
Question 30. The author believes that written versions of folk tales _____.
A. changed dramatically from the 19th to the 20th century.
B. are valid historical documents.
C. show how illiterate the masses were before the 19th century.
D. should be rejected as historical evidence.
Question 31. What problems of folk tale collections does the author discuss?
A. There is no way to tell which version of a story is the original system.
B. They contain historical inaccuracies.
C. They are used as historical evidence.
D. They don’t preserve the original performance style of the storytellers
Question 32. According to the passage, peasant folklore was recorded by _____.
A. 19th century folklorists. B. 19th century preachers.
C. historians in the 12th to 15th centuries. D. 19th century peasants.
Question 33. The word “He” refers to _______.
A. The author B. the storyteller
C. the reader D. the historian
Question 34. What do the collections of folk tales made in the late 19th and early 20th provide the historians?
A. lot of information about famous people in the past.
B. Kinds of stories and books that are popular then.
C. good chance to know the life of people in the past.
D. A rare opportunity to contact with the people who couldn’t read and write.
Đề thi thử THPT 2021 - Tiếng Anh - GV Vũ Thị Mai Phương - Đề 17 - có lời giải
