2018年自学考试《英语(一)》提升练习（十五）

 　Grandma Moses is among the most celebrated twentieth-century painters of the United States, yet she had barely started painting before she was in her late seventies. As she once said of herself : "I would never sit back in a rocking chair, waiting for someone to help me." No one could have had a more productive old age.

　　She was born Anna Mary Robertson on a farm in New York State, one of five boys and five girls.( "We came in bunches, like radishes.")at twelve she left home and wasin domestic service until, at twenty-seven, she married Thomas Moses, the hired hand of one of her employers. They farmed most of their lives, first in Virginia and then in New York State, at Eagle Bridge, She had ten children, of whom five survived; her husband died in 1927.

　　Grandma Noses painted a little as a child and made embroidery (绣花) pictures as a hobby, but only switched to oils in old age because her hands had become to stiff to sew and she wanted to keep busy and pass the time. Her pictures were first sold at the local drugstore and at a fair, and were soon spotted by a dealer who bought everything she painted Three of the pictures were exhibited in the Museum of Modern Art , and in 1940 she had her first exhibition in New York. Between the 1930's and her death she produced some 2,000 picture: detailed and lively description of the rural life she had known for so long, with a marvelous sense of color and form. "I think real hard till I think of something real pretty, and then I paint it ,"she said.

　　56. Which of the following would be the best title for the passage?

　　a. Grandma Moses; A Biographical Sketch

　　b. The Children of Grandma Moses

　　c. Grandma Moses: Her Best Exhibition

　　d. Grandma Moses and Other Older Artists

　　57. According to the passage, Grandma Moses began to paint because she wanted to ______.

　　a. decorate her home

　　b. keep active

　　c. improve her salary

　　d. gain an international reputation

　　58. From Grandma Moses' description of herself in the first paragraph, it can be inferred that she was_______.

　　a. independent

　　b. wealthy

　　c. pretty.

　　d. timid

　　59. Grandma Moses spent most of the life______.

　　a. nursing

　　b. painting

　　c. embroidering

　　d. farming

　　60. In line 18 the word 'spotted' could best be replaced by _____.

　　a. speckled

　　b. featured

　　c. noticed

　　d. damaged