Childhood was an illusion (错觉) and the illusion was this: everything was bigger. No, Imean everything, not just houses and shops and grown-ups, but colors and flowers and journeys, especially journeys which seemed endless. “Are we there yet, Daddy?”
Funfairs (游乐场) were huge things that spread for miles around you with noise and lights and exciting danger. Rainy days at home when you were ill seemed to last for ever. Being a grown-up yourself was an unthinkable distant possibility. Every sound was louder, every game was grander, every pain unbearable.
As I’ve grown old, life has become smaller. Tastes have bulled. Surprises have lurned into shocks. Days go by unnoticed. How can I regain childhood when it was an illusion?
I have only one repeatable and wonderful way and even in this way I can regain only part of that larger world. I can play upon the stage like a child and make the crowd laugh and laugh with them, sometimes helplessly like a child, and then, even though I’m a sixty-one-year-old man, I can almost catch the colors and sounds and stillness of those bigger years when I was little.
72. How does the author feel about his childhood?
A. It was endless. B. It was unpleasant.
C. He is glad that it is over. D. He misses it as a grown-up
73. The author thinks that everything was bigger in childhood because .
A. children could not make proper judgments.
B. children were curious and eager about life
C. things appeared really big in children’s eyes
D. to grow up seemed so long for children
74. The world seems to have become smaller to the author because .
A. life is disappointing B. time goes by too fast
C. he has had too many surprises D. foods no longer taste delicious
75. The author enjoys playing on the stage so as to .
A. act like a child B. live an unusual life
C. make the crowd laugh D. regain his childhood