5 . Long ago, poems were recited loud instead of being written down. Back when the Greeks first started the Olympics, they held poetry _________ as well as athletic competitions.

Now, poetry competitions have been revived. This year 120,000 high school students competed in the first Poetry Out Loud national recitation competition,_________ poems from memory for $100,000 in prize money.

The first competitions were held in classrooms. The winners went on to school wide contests, and then they competed in city and state competitions. _________, the 50 state champions, along with the _________ of the District of Columbia came to Washington D.C. last week for the last showdown. After the 51 champions competed _________ another, 12 went on to the _________. Then the field was narrowed to five. The final five had one last chance to “perform” a poem. The overall champ, Jackson Hille, a high school senior from Ohio,_________ a $20,000 scholarship. The National Endowment for the Arts and the Poetry Foundation _________ Poetry Out Loud, because they realized that hearing a poem performed is a different experience from _________ it on a page.

It’s not just a matter of saying the words in the right order. It’s the tone of __________, the pauses, the gestures and the attitude of the person performing that bring the__________ to life. “Each time we hear somebody recite a poem, we understand again what we found __________ and interesting about it,” said National Public Radio Broadcaster Scott Simon, master of ceremonies for the finals. Hearing it in a new voice offers something new to the listeners.

Not only do the people hearing poems have a(n) __________ experience, but__________ and presenting poems helps the participants understand those poems in a new way. Another __________ of a competition such as Poetry Out Loud is that the participants learn public speaking skills that can help them for life.

9 . The Poets Weave is a weekly program of poetry reading hosted by local poet Dorsey. The following poets are especially for poetry-lovers.

Poet Lloyd Van Brunt. Brunt has written several volumes of poetry. His latest is Poems New and Selected 1962-1992. He’s currently working on his memoir(回忆录), I fall in Love with Nancy Drew: Tales of Childhood.

Poet James Merrill. His memoir A Different Person detailed his two and a half years in Europe in 1950. Merrill wrote eleven books of poems, and was the winner of two National Book Awards, the Bollingen Prize for Poetry, and the Pulitzer Prize.

Poet and novelist Paul Monette. His book Borrowed Time: An Aids Memoir was the first such memoir to be published about AIDS, and won a National Book Award. In it, Monette told the story of his “beloved” friend and lover’s two-year struggling with AIDS. The book was called “a courageous love story”.

Poet Li-Young Lee. He’s written two volumes of poetry, Rose, and The City in Which I Love You. Lee’s won many awards for his work, including the Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship. He’s just completed a memoir about his family’s refugee(难民) experience in America, The Winged Seed.

For more information, please click here: https://www.npr.org/templates/story.

10 . Mark Twain, born in Florida     1     November 30th, 1835,     2    (bring) up in Hannibal, Missouri, along the Mississippi River. He is best known for his     3    (novel) set in his boyhood world on the river, such as The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. So much     4     he love the river that even his pen name was about the river. The phrase “mark twain” means that the water is two fathoms in     5    (deep). The play in this unit is adapted from The Million Pound Bank Note     6    (write) by Mark Twin. It was the summer of 1903,     7    two wealthy brothers made a bet. One of them doubted     8     a man could survive a month in London with a million pound bank note. At this moment, they saw a penniless man     9    (wander)on the pavement. It was Henry,     10     American businessman, who was lost in London.