【推荐3】It is often said that dogs are “man’s best friends”. But for some children in China, this idea has taken on an even deeper meaning.

Wu Qi, a dog trainer（驯养师）in Shanghai, started the Paw for Heal（PFH）program in China about eight years ago. The program trains dogs for animal-assisted therapy（动物辅助治疗）. These animals help elderly people feel calm and less stressed. They also help people with mental illnesses（精神疾病）.

In Shanghai, the dogs have been trained to help kids with autism（孤独症）. Autistic children are easily confused（困惑的）or scared by their environments. But when the PFH dogs are around, they feel much more calm.

Pet owners can train their pets to become therapy dogs through PFH. Although this training is difficult（only 20 percent of dogs end up passing the program）, it also helps a lot of people.

“She（my dog）makes me happy every day, and I think she can bring happiness to other people in need as well,” pet owner Wang Rui said in a report by Sixth Tone.

Animal-assisted therapy is new to China. But Wu has high hopes for the future, as he is now working together with a Scottish（苏格兰的）university to improve his program.

“Through learning from the European team, China may shorten the time to catch up with Western countries in this field（领域）by several decades.” Wu said in the Sixth Tone report.

Lu Xun’s real name is Zhou Shuren. He was born on September 25, 1881. This year is the 140th anniversary of his birth. People still remember and talk about this great writer.

Pick up the pen

    1     He went to study in a Japanese college. However, in the early 20^th century, Lu Xun found that there were many problems in Chinese society. The minds of Chinese were numb（麻木的）. Most Chinese were just followers without thinking. So he gave up medical study and started writing.     2     “He changed his dream to save the country. This encouraged me a lot,” said Zhao Zhihan, l3, from Beijing. “When we make choices, we should think about what they are for.”

A warrior-writer

    3     Famous writer Lin Yutang called him a “warrior”. His works show the dark side of society and tradition in a special way. For example, in the story A Madman’s Diary, the madman sees a “man-eating” society. Another story, Kong Yiji, is about a man who fails the imperial exam（科举）again and again.     4     “Reading one story by him is more useful than reading many by others. His care for society and his sharp words are so different,” a reader under the name of Mian told The Paper.

A changer of writing

Lu Xun is called the “Father of Modern Chinese Literature（中国现代文学之父）”. He wrote A Madman’s Diary in spoken language. It is a first in modern works. Before this, people wrote in wenyanwen.     5     Lu Xun’s writings opened a new page for modern literature. More writers followed him to write in spoken language.

【推荐3】The great US writer, J.D. Salinger was one of the most influential writers of the last century. His writing interests all age groups, but young people are especially big fans of his.

He is famous for his novel The Catcher in the Rye. The hero of this story is named Holden Caulfield. Holden is a troublemaker at school and has difficulty getting along with others.

And yet Holden has a heart of gold. Many readers have been moved by the attitude（态度）he has toward young children, especially to his little sister Phoebe. He always tries his best to protect the young. Millions of people all over the world have taken the troubled 17-year-old Holden into their hearts.

In fact, Salinger didn’t write all that much over the course of his life. Besides The Catcher in the Rye, he published（出版）a few other shorter works, and then, after 1965, nothing at all. The reason for this seems to be that he hated public attention. He had become famous with the success of his novel and didn’t care about what people thought of him. He refused to give interviews and did not allow anyone to write about him.

But Salinger still kept on writing. It’s said that he wrote eight other novels. Fans of his works hope that one day they will be able to read these “lost” Salinger books.

J. K. Rowling is the writer of Harry Potter, which is now one of the best-selling book series in the world.

J. K. Rowling was born in Bristol on July 31st, 1965. She has one sister who is two years younger than her. Both girls loved listening to their father read them stories. They especially loved stories about magical words. Rowling wrote her first story called Rabbit, at the age of six.

After she graduated (毕业) from university, Rowling worked as a translator in London. During this time on a long train trip in the summer of 1990, the idea of a boy who had magic but doesn’t know it came to her. In 1992, Rowling began to teach English. She lived with her baby daughter, Jessica, and spent much time finishing the first Harry Potter book for young readers. It came out in June, 1997. To her surprise, the book was very greatly successful. The film came out in November, 2001. Now Harry Potter is popular with people of all ages and about sixty million books have been sold in 200 countries and areas.

Why has the series been such a great success? There are a few reasons. Many other magical stories take place in faraway lands or in the past or in the future. But Harry lives in Modern England. He is also a very normal boy: polite, friendly, brave and clever. So, when other children read about Harry, they can imagine being like him.

J. K. Rowling is very happy with the success, and she is writing full time and is really enjoying life. She says she will go on living a normal life with her daughter and go on writing children’s books.

【推荐2】If you love reading books, you must know about the book The Little Prince. It’s a famous novel written by a French writer. As one of the best-selling books in history, it has been sold as many as 200 million copies in 253 languages and dialects（方言）. Now, around seventy years after the birth of the book, an American director has found a way to make it into a 3-D animated film.

The book tells the story of pilot, called The Aviator, who crashes（坠毁）into the desert and meets a young prince who is kind and hopeful there. However, in the film, the story starts years after the crash when The Aviator is much older. He has got a new neighbor called The Little Girl, whose mother wants her to get ready to enter the grown-up world. Slowly, The Aviator shares his story with The Little Girl by writing it down and sending her a page at a time. The pages are complete with the pictures in the book, speaking about his time in the desert and taking The Little Girl to an amazing world where anything is possible.

China is the first country in the world to see the film in two versions（版本）-in Chinese and English. The film shows The Little Girl’s life and tells The Little Prince’s story at the same time in a beautiful way.

Huang Lei, a famous Chinese actor, says the film is like a childhood dream which is lost by most adults in this stressed-out society.

“The most touching（感人的）part is that everyone of us was a good-natured kid like The Little Prince, and it’s a pity that this good characteristic（品质）goes away as time flies,” he says.