Lesson 08 Beautiful Color

Text｜Ave • Curie

[Comment]What is the color of beauty? Questions that can be perceived for the article as a whole.

The happiest period of Marie Sklodowska's student life was spent in the top floor; Marie Curie is now in a dilapidated cottage Here, a new and great joy is tasted. It is a strange new beginning, this difficult and delicate pleasure (certainly no woman had experienced it before Mary), [note] "hard" Contrasted with "subtle happiness", it points out that Marie Curie's working environment is simple, but her spiritual world is extremely rich, and she finds great joy in her work. When teaching, you can start with "difficulty" and "subtle happiness" to conduct overall perception and better understand the spiritual quality of characters. Both times the humblest sets were picked.

The shanty on Loumeng Road can be said to be a typical example of discomfort. [Commentary] "Uncomfortable" already means that the condition of the house is not good, let alone "typical", it should be a house that is particularly unsuitable for living. Then from the extreme conditions of summer and winter, the condition of the house is poor. In summer, because the roof is made of glass, the inside of the shed is hot and dry like a greenhouse. In winter, one simply does not know whether to wish for frost or for rain. If it rained, the rain fell drop by drop with a tiresome soft sound on the ground, on the workbench, on the spot where the two physicists had marked that they would never put their instruments down; Frost, even people are frozen, there is no way to remedy it. That stove, even when it was fired to hot, was a complete disappointment. You can feel a little warmth when you walk to a place where you can almost touch it, but if you take a step away, you will immediately return to the frigid zone.

Marie and Pierre, however, are more used to enduring the cold outside. [Commentary] The conditions in the shed are already extremely poor, but the word "more" here shows that the conditions for the Curies to conduct experiments are even more difficult. The word "habit" points out the long hours of working in this severe cold weather. Their refining pitchblende equipment is extremely simple, since there is no "ventilation hood" to exhaust harmful gases, most of the refining work must be done in the open air in the yard in the field. Whenever storms hit, the two physicists hastily moved their equipment into the shed, leaving windows and doors wide open to allow air to circulate so they could continue working without choking on smoke .

This very special method of treating tuberculosis, Mary probably never bragged to Dr. Fortier!

Later she wrote such a passage: "We have no money, no laboratory, and almost no one to help us do this important and difficult job well. It's like It's about creating something out of nothing. If my student years were what Kasimir Dluski used to say were 'the heroic years of my aunt's life', I could say without exaggeration , now this period is a heroic period in the common life of my husband and I."[Comment]The original words of Marie Curie are quoted in a large part of the article, which increases the authenticity of this biography, and from In Madame Curie's language, you can also read the couple's love for science. It is not easy to persist in scientific research under such a difficult environment. And here is a echo of the school life mentioned in the first paragraph.

“…and yet the best and happiest years of our lives were spent in this shabby old shack, where we devoted ourselves entirely to work. I used to cook our meals right there, so that some particularly important process would not be interrupted. Sometimes I would stir a lot of boiling things all day long with an iron bar about my height. At night, it was almost It is exhausted.”[Comment]Note: This sentence points out that not only the working environment is poor, but also the work intensity is high, the word “exhausted” can It can be seen that the day's work has exhausted all Madame Curie's energy.

From 1898 to 1902, Mr. and Mrs. Curie worked under such conditions. [Annotation] "This kind of condition" can be used as a key word to guide students to find out what "this kind of condition" refers to in the text.

During their first year, they worked together on the chemical isolation of radium and polonium and studied the active products they obtained of radioactivity. Soon, they thought that the division of labor was more efficient, and Pierre tried to determine the characteristics of radium in order to become familiar with this new metal. Mary continued refining to extract pure radium salt.

In this division of labor, Mary chose the "man's job", [Comment] can see the intensity of Mary's work.

What you do is a strong job. Her husband was absorbed in meticulous experiments in the shed. Mary was out in the yard in old work clothes that were dusty and acid-stained, her hair blown by the wind, and the smoke around her irritated her eyes and throat.

She is a factory all by herself. [Commentary] This sentence uses metaphorical rhetorical techniques to compare Madame Curie to a factory, saying that she has a lot of work and is very tiring.

She writes: "I refine 20kg of material at a time, and the result is that the shed is full of large bottles of sediments and solutions. Handling It is a tiring job to remove the vessel, transfer the solution, and stir the boiling material in the melting pot for hours on end."

However, radium wants to maintain its mystery, and does not want humans to know it at all. Mary naively expected that the pitchblende residue contained 1 percent radium. Where is that estimate now? [Comment] The prediction that "the residue of pitchblende contains 1% of radium" is "naive". This is not to mock Mrs. Curie's prediction, but from this point of view, " The content of "radium" in the residue is very small, and the extraction process is very difficult. The side shows the greatness of this discovery. The radioactivity of this new substance is extremely strong, and a very small amount of radium is scattered in the ore, which is the source of some striking phenomena, which are easy to observe or measure. The most difficult, or almost impossible, thing is to isolate this minute amount of the substance from the impurities with which it is intimately mixed.

Workdays become workmonths and workmonths become workyears. Pierre and Marie did not lose their courage. The material that resists them fascinates them. The tenderness between them and their intellectual ardor united them; in this log cabin they lived an "unnatural" life for which they, like each other, were born. [Comment]Question: How to understand the "anti-natural" life? "Anti-natural" life means that their work is intense, long hours, far beyond the limits of human body, and at the same time they are exposed to radioactive elements, but without the necessary protection measures, it is an abnormal life compared with other people , so called "anti-natural" life. And the phrase "'anti-natural' life" also writes that the Curies are willing to live this kind of life of hardship and hardship, showing their love and enthusiasm for scientific research. During teaching, questions about knowledge points can be set here.

Mary later wrote: "Thanks to this serendipitous discovery, during this period we were completely fascinated by the new field that opened before us. Although our working conditions It gave us many difficulties, but we were still very happy. Our time was spent in the laboratory. There was great peace in our very poor shack; sometimes we pacedLooking closely at some experiment in progress, we talked about our present and future work. When we felt cold, we were comfortable again with a cup of hot tea by the fire. We were absorbed in a unique way.Life in the situation is like a dream.[Commentary]In the eyes of Mrs. Curie, their life of experimenting in such a difficult environment is like a dream. Beautiful, they enjoy this quiet life immersed in scientific research. It reflects the Curies' indifference to fame and fortune, and their dedication to work.

“…we have very few guests in the lab. Occasionally a few physicists or chemists come, either to see our experiments, or to Ask Pierre Curie some questions, he is well known in many branches of physics. They talked at the blackboard, and the conversations are vividly remembered because they are of scientific interest and A refresher of work ethic, without interrupting the flow of thought or the air of calm concentration that is the true atmosphere of the laboratory."

Pierre and Marie sometimes leave the instrument and chat quietly for a while. They always talk about their obsession with radium, and their words range from extremely profound to extremelychildish , all of them. [Commentary] Scientists are all extremely rigorous. Is it inappropriate to describe them as "very childish" here? "Extremely deep" means that the content of their conversation is about the professional field of science, which is esoteric; "very childish" shows that they maintain a pure love for science, and the content of the conversation can also be simple and easy to understand .

One ​​day, Mary was like a child looking forward to a toy that someone else has promised. A child longing for toys, wrote about her eager anticipation for radium. Said with eager curiosity: "I really want to know what 'it' will look like, what it looks like. [Comment]The reason for adding quotation marks is because "Radium" is in Curie From Madam Curie's point of view, it looks like a child about to be born. Here teachers can guide students to read aloud, walk into the heart of Madam Curie, and feel the great qualities of scientists. Pierre, what shape does it have in your imagination? "

The physicist replied pleasantly, "I don't know... As you can imagine, I hope it has a beautiful color." [Comment]The ellipsis shows what kind of inner activities Bière has, which can guide students to read aloud their feelings.

…………

They worked very hard that day, logically these two scholars should rest now. But Pierre and Marie don't always play by reason. They put on their coats, told Dr. Curie that they were going out, and slipped away... They walked arm in arm, talking very little. Walk past factories, vacant lots and sleazy housing along the lively streets of this out-of-the-town neighborhood. They reached Rue Loumont, crossed the courtyard, Pierre put the key in the lock, and the door quacked (it had done so thousands of times), [ Note]Using the door "it has rang thousands of times like this" to explain how many times the Curies have entered and exited this house, and from the side, it shows the length of time and the number of times they have conducted research, and writes Their spirit of dedication to scientific research. They go into their realm, into their dreams. [Commentary] This simple hut contains all the results of their scientific research, so this is their whole world, and for them, scientific research is all they have. When walking into this shed, their spirits are content, like a happy, beautiful dream.

Marie said: "Don't light the lamp!" [Commentary]I can understand Madame Curie's inner activities. Then he smiled slightly and added, "Do you remember the day you said to me 'I wish it had a beautiful color'?"

The truth about Ra, which had captivated Pierre and Marie for months, was actually cuter than they had naively hoped. Radium not only has "beautiful colors", it also emits light automatically! In this dark shack with no cabinets, these odd treasures are housed in tiny glass containers on boards or tables nailed to the wall; their bluish fluorescent Silhouettes glow, hanging in the darkness of night.

"Look...behold!" the young woman whispered. [Comment] did not use an exclamation mark, just exclaimed like ordinary people. Instead, it is full of inner peace, full of quiet happiness and joy.

She cautiously walked forward to find a chair with a straw mat, and sat down. In the darkness, in the silence, both faces turned to these gleams, to the mysterious source of the rays, to radium, to their radium! Mary leaned forward, watching eagerly, in the same position she had been watching her sleeping child at the head of her sleeping bed an hour earlier. [Commentary] Describes Mary's posture, and writes that she treats Ra as her own child, so loving, so eager, and so worried. Allow students to experience Mary's mood at this time through imitation.

Her partner runs his hands gently through her hair.

She will always remember that night watching fluorescent lights, and always remember the spectacle of this magical world.

1. Pronunciation and glyph (copy 5 times, pinyin is also 5 times)

1. Subtle

2. Hot and dry

3. 火 hot (chì)

4. Refining

5. Asphalt

6. Uranium mine (yóu)

7. Ventilation hood

8. Showers

9. 把（cù）

10. Suffocation (zhì)

11. Tuberculosis syndrome (zhèng)

12. Blow boo (xū)

13. Exhausted

14. Polonium (pō)

15. Sour stain (zì)

16. Precipitation precipitation (diàn)

17. residue（zhā）

18. Segregation

19. pacing (duó)

20. Situation

21. Atmosphere Atmosphere (fēn)

22. ChildishChildish（zhì）

23. Be cheerful

24. 嘎（gā）

25. Fluorescence

26. Be careful

27. Grass mat (diàn)

2. Interpretation of words (copy 1 time)

1. Subtle: Profound and mysterious, elusive

2. hot: extremely hot

3. Suddenly:Suddenly, unexpectedly.

4. Bragging: Exaggerating or exaggerating the merits of oneself or others; boasting exaggeratedly.

5. Exhausted: Exhausted and extremely tired.

6. Segregation: Separation; discrete.

7. Circumstances: Situations; circumstances.

8. Harmony: Describes a kind and happy face. Also described as amiable.