CAE Reading and Use of English Part 8
You are going to read an article in which an illustrator of children’s books talks about other illustrators’ work. For questions 47-56, choose from the sections (A-D). The sections may be chosen more than once. When more than one answer is required, these may be given in any order.
Which illustrator’s work is described as
47 being more impressive when considered as a whole?
48 inspiring experimentation?
49 becoming simpler over time?
50 conveying contrasting moods in the same illustration?
51 using illustrations to indicate how to read the text out loud?
52 avoiding a weakness common in children’s books?
53 being the result of collaboration?
54 re-interpreting traditional material?
55 showing unusual events in ordinary contexts?
56 making fun of things that would normally be taken seriously?
Four inspiring illustrators
Illustrator Hannah Roberts talks about the work of other children’s book illustrators
A Judith Kerr
I loved The Tiger Who Came to Tea by Judith Kerr when I was a child. I remember being obsessed with the scene where the tiger came and drank all the water in the tap. I think it was the domesticity of it, that this person was at home and that this could actually happen. Nothing much happens, in fact, but it’s still magical. Kerr keeps the words very simple, and the pictures give you clues about what they should sound like when delivered. In her Mog books, you can look at the cat’s face to see how shocking or dramatic the action is. He is just a funny cat, with an expressive face. If you mention Mog or The Tiger Who Came to Tea to someone under the age of 40, they usually smile, which is the instinctive reaction a children’s book should provoke. I can think of illustrators who are technically better and books with richer textual content, but, with Kerr, there’s something about the way the entire package fits together that’s wonderful.
B Klaus Ensikat
I often feel that illustrators underestimate children. For some reason, pictures for them tend to be over-simple and brightly colourful. Klaus Ensikat’s illustrations, however, are very sophisticated. His drawing is absolutely exquisite, a little like engraving, and he covers large areas with fine, precise lines that give life to shadows, furniture, forests, clothes and soft fur. Those drawings are then washed over with fine watercolour paint, which makes them seem slightly melancholy. At the same time, they are funny and touching. My favourite of his books is a collection of old German children’s songs called Jeder nach seiner Art (To Each Their Own). The texts are handwritten in beautiful old-fashioned calligraphy, and next to them are tiny, perfect black-and-white drawings. Some of these songs about animals are really well known in the German-speaking world, and a less brilliant illustrator would render them visually as familiar, cheerful and superficial. But Ensikat has found new, surreal, romantic ways of illustrating them. I keep buying his books in the (so far vain) hope that I will discover his secret.
C Lane Smith
I first saw Lane Smith’s work when I was a young illustrator. His book The Stinky Cheese Man and other Fairly Stupid Tales was lively and irreverent. It had a fabulous sense of colour, and what especially appealed was the texture: I have always loved layered, dappled surfaces, and Lane Smith uses collage to create a wonderful, grungy feel. His artwork is innovative, and often reveals the absurdities in solemn, earnest attitudes and behaviour. His characters are striking and often staged on a flat plane like a theatre set. The overall design also marks out a Lane Smith look. His wife, Molly Leach, designs the text on every page and, ingeniously, its appearance shapes the way it should be spoken. Lately, Smith’s approach has been more minimal. In his recent book, Grandpa Green, the colour is muted, with drawn outlines against white backgrounds. The truth is that his art has never stood still.
D John Burningham
I recently came across a book by John Burningham, Mr Grumpy’s Outing, that instantly transported me back to my childhood. He can create the sense of a scorching hot summer’s day simply by using a few yellow dots and dashes to represent the sun; you can really feel the heat. His work looks almost haphazard, with smudges, scratches and splodges. But it doesn’t matter whether they were intended or just happy mistakes; they all come together in these wonderful, atmospheric images. You get the impression that he draws with whatever comes to hand. He builds the images with glorious blocks of colour which he then works on with cross-hatching and scribbles of pencil and crayon. The results are full of movement and life. More recently, he has used photography, worked over with paint and mixed with drawn characters, to make rich landscapes. I love the humour he gets into these pictures, the expressions he conjures up with just a few lines. I’ve learned to take risks myself from looking at his books; they leave me feeling less afraid of that blank expanse of white paper.
Answer Keys
Part 1
1 D — say. ‘Tell’ and ‘inform’ both require a direct object to work, e.g. ‘to inform somebody about something’. To relate something to something else means to show connection between these two things.
2 A — meaning. To add meaning here works best. B – implication means some idea or consequence that is not immediately evident. ‘To add essence’ doesn’t make much sense, since essence is something crucial, so it’s either there or it’s not. D – function doesn’t seem to be a good fit – art isn’t usually about functionality.
3 B — restriction. We are talking about the absence of any limitation when it comes to an artist’s work. ‘Boundary’ means certain ethical or cultural limitations – a rather specific word that might not be the best choice. ‘Regulation’ is a set of rules, usually imposed by a governing body such as the government.
4 C — wonder. A set phrase, we use ‘no wonder’ to show our lack of surprise, e.g.: ‘No wonder you flunked your exams and got expelled from college – you have been missing for an entire semester!’
5 C — against. You take against something, it means you begin to dislike something, especially if you have no good reason to dislike it (or them). ‘To take over’ is to gain control over something, especially if you take it from or after someone else. ‘To take after’ is to inherit something, either material (such as money) or things like talents, traits of character, appearance and so on.
6 D — large. ‘To a large degree’ is a collocation with the meaning ‘mostly’.
7 B — process. Here it is important to remember what ‘interactive’ means. Simply put, it means that you can take part in it and see effect of your actions. Making public art is an interactive process – you are not an idle spectator, you are an artist too, you make your contribution.
8 D — background. ‘Background’ here has the meaning of something you barely notice, something that simply doesn’t stand out. According to the text, this is what art should avoid at all costs.
Part 2
9 for. If you raise money for something, it means you look for people who could provide it for you without expecting anything in return. Money is usually raised for non-profit purposes.
10 it. ‘It’ shows the connection that it is the people who are into extreme sports who can be reckless. ‘There’ works grammatically, but doesn’t establish the connection as clearly and looks more like a general statement.
11 to. Leaving things to chance, meaning not attending to them, not giving them the attention they deserve as they are important. Normally used negatively.
12 until/till/before/unless. A wide selection of conjunctions with slightly different meanings – the choice here doesn’t matter much because all of the meanings here work in the given context.
13 as. To do something as you do something else means doing these things at the same time, or one thing can be a result of the other. For example, you learn many cultural nuances of the language as you study it.
14 is. Inversion is used here – that’s when the verb and the subject swap places for emphatic effect. What we have here is an inverted sentence: ‘a sense of trust in oneself is crucial to this’.
15 not. A tricky one – context is very important to get this gap right. The idea is that the previously mentioned qualities do not find encouragement in nowaday’s society. To make things more difficult, there is a bit omitted: ‘… a sense of trust in oneself and the environment, (which is) not something that is encouraged nowadays’.
16 when. Be careful not to write ‘a time of health and safety rules’, as you would need something like ‘being dominant’ at the end to make a structure like this work.
Part 3
17 beneficial. A noun-to-adjective transformation with one tricky bit – changing’c’ in the noun to ‘t’ in the adjective form.
18 developments. ‘Countless’ requires plurality here, make sure to make it plural, or it won’t get you a point even if you get the word form itself correctly.
19 relatively. The improvements of space food are relatively slow in comparison to other aspects of space exploration, which apparently have had higher pace of advancement.
20 provision. A good example of how you should almost never use the gerund-forming suffix ‘-ing’. This is a common mistake in CAE Use of English Part 3 – be careful there. There is almost always a ‘proper’ (for the lack of a better term) noun, not just a ‘-ing’ derivative.
21 inedible. The context suggests that the food would be considered unappetizing by today’s astronauts, so it all comes down to choosing the correct negative prefix.
22 inhabitants. ‘Have’ further down the sentence calls for a plural form of the noun. The only challenge remaining then is getting the spelling right. Keep in mind that incorrectly spelled words will be counted as a mistake.
23 enables. To enable is to provide the ability to do something. ‘Spacecraft’ is the subject in the singular, so the verb has to agree to it in number.
24 ongoing. ‘Going’ is incorrect as it is not normally an adjective. An ongoing process is one that is currently taking place, also with the meaning that it hasn’t been completed yet.
Part 4
25 in the habit of buying. Getting the verb pattern right is key here. ‘To be in the habit of doing something’ – this is the most challenging part in this particular key word transformation.
26 will result in it being/getting called. If you call something off, it means you cancel something that had been previously planned.
27 would rather he did not drive. When you are rather somebody did (or didn’t do) something, you are either expressing your preference or giving an advice, depending on the context. Don’t forget that active to passive speech transformation calls for changing the tenses, but this is not always the case.
28 who made the suggestion to. We reorder the words here to focus on the actor (Peter) rather than the action (making the suggestion).
29 found it hard/difficult to follow/following. ‘To find something difficult to do/doing’ is the structure you have to be familiar with to make this one work. Unfortunately, there is no way around this particular phrase.
30 into consideration/account that Joe is not. A simple paraphrase of ‘to consider’ to ‘take into consideration’, accompanied by a negative structure as suggested by the context.
Part 5
31 B. Both our reasoning and decision-making are made worse by the much greater amount of information that we are exposed to through information technology, namely the Internet. The text states the opposite of answer A – ‘there is little debate’ that it helped to organise the data and the knowledge. Nothing of significance can be found relating to answers C and D.
32 A. There is a direct comparison between reading and the so-called ‘visual media’ – simply put, pictures and, more often, videos. Focusing on one thing is no longer the focus. There is nothing about the connection between multitasking and the declining popularity of reading, nor can we see anything relating to growing popularity of reading online. The opposite of answer C is stated – people read less, and as a result, they become less capable of critical thinking.
33 D. Clearly, the author can’t mean something good by a term like ‘mushy swamp’. Ambiguity is a case when something can confusingly have more than one meaning or be interpreted in more than one way. Critical thinking has become more complicated because of the sheer amount of information one has to process to make an informed decision.
34 B. Simply put, according to the author, hyperlinks act as a distractor that easily takes the reader’s attention from the topic at hand. Instead, the reader is often tempted to chase other topics that they can click within the body of the original text – that is what hyperlinks are – doorways to other information. As a result, it makes it more difficult to maintain focus.
35 C. Visual media does not promote analysis and deeper thinking, because it happens in real time, leaving us no chance to take our time and think it over. This is not the case with reading. Ultimately, the last sentence sums it up perfectly – younger people are likely not to fully realise their potential.
36 B. Videogames have great capacity to teach us something and to promote thinking, they are ‘a good tool’ for it. There is nothing relating to conflict resolution ability that answer C suggests.
Part 6
37 C. Both speakers are sceptical about the technical aspect of the judging system in football. Arada: ‘I also have my reservations about goal-line technology in football.’ Wick: ‘In team sports like football, the role of the referee is intended to be based on the interpretation of rules, on personal discretion and instincts, and this is clearly undermined here.’
38 B. While Pumbaide says that the improvements mostly ‘favour the elite’, Arada approaches the issue from the opposite angle. They say that certain improvements in aero modelling lowered the skill ceiling – that is, it enabled less experienced participants to have more control, effectively requiring less experience to achieve similar results.
39 D. Expert D is the only one convinced that technology ensures higher safety standards and improved injury protection. All other speakers are adamant that perceived increases in safety actually encourage recklesness, create an illusion of being protected and lead to more serious traumas as a result.
40 C. Benbow cites cycling as the type of sports the general public partakes in and how technological advances keep it alive, they make sure it does not stagnate. Wick works in a different field, shuttlecocks for badminton, which amateurs often play outdoors. Both benefit and promote public participation in those sports.
Part 7
41 E. The ‘defeatist thoughts’ mentioned at the beginning of paragraph E refer to the possibility that the cave doesn’t even exist. ‘Defeatist’ means readily admitting your defeat. The paragraph that comes next contrastingly states that they seem to have found what they were looking for way too easily, practically at the beginning of their journey (and the text).
42 A. This paragraph introduces contrast between thinking that they had found the cave so easily and the sobering fact that they hadn’t (‘I realised it was naive to have imagined that the ice cave would relinquish its secrets so readily.’)
43 B. Paragraph B goes ‘… if we did that, we would be met by further barriers…’ – ‘it’ referring to going straight up the northwest river bank. The same paragraph also mentions the dangers of injury as it was getting darker and the explorers were growing increasingly tired.
44 G. ‘Fortunately, this didn’t happen’ (Paragraph G) – this is a reference to slippery boulders – the idea of danger is expanded upon here. The same paragraph then mentions a stream of water that they had to cross somehow. It takes them an hour to find a way to cross it – that is mentioned in the paragraph that comes after the gap.
45 C. The very beginning of the paragraph after the gap helps us here: ‘Dillon, thank goodness, had other ideas…’. This refers to the author’s doubts of whether they would be able to continue their journey.
46 F. Probably the easiest paragraph to choose form, here they finally see the opening from afar, which proves to be exactly the cave they had been searching for. ‘Something almost frightening’ is the ‘sheer white wall’ from the beginning of paragraph F.
Part 8
47 A. The last sentence mentions ‘the entire package’ being more impressive’ – meaning that the text and the illustrations work together to a better effect.
48 D. Burningham’s books inspired the writer ‘to take risks’ themselves – that is, they promote experimenting and courage.
49 C. The second half of the text: ‘Lately, Smith’s approach has been more minimal’.
50 B. The illustrations evoke an array of different feelings – melancholy on the one hand, while at the same time being ‘funny and touching’.
51 A. Roughly in the middle of the text we have this: ‘… the pictures give you clues about what they should sound like when delivered’. There can be a question – why go with this one and not take the one from C: ‘… its appearance shapes the way it should be spoken’? Simply put, when we talk about delivering of a text, we mean reading it aloud.
52 B. Many children’s books’ illustrators tend to make the pictures overly primitive, but Ensikat’s art is different – his pictures ‘are very sophisticated’.
53 C. Both Smith and his wife took part in illustrating The Stinky Cheese Man and other Fairly Stupid Tales.
54 B. The traditional material mentioned here is the collection of old German children’s songs ‘Jeder nach seiner Art’.
55 A. The tiger drinking all the water from the tap is the unusual event shown in an ordinary context (as if ‘this person was at home and that this could actually happen’).
56 C. The answer lies in the middle of the paragraph, most importantly in understanding the word ‘Irreverent’. An irreverent individual disregards and jokes about things that are accepted as extremely important, serious, or even holy. This task is a great example of how your right answer hinges on a single word – an illustration how important it is to expand your vocabulary in preparation for your CAE exam.
Click to download this CAE Reading and Use of English worksheet in PDF