Louis Sullivan favored simple, straightforward buildings. Other architects preferred fancier buildings with details like Greek columns and Gothic arches. Which style do you prefer?

 

8. Give the main points of the article “Buildings that scrape the sky” in 6-10 sentences. Use the following clichés:

 

The text deals with …. The author points out that.... Attention is drawn to the fact that …. It should be noted that …. The importance of … is stressed. There is no doubt that …. The author comes to the conclusion that …. I find the text rather / very ….

 

Look at these four newspaper headlines. What do you think the story is behind each one? Discuss your ideas with your partner, and then tell the group.

Reading Task D

 

Read the dialogue and fill in the blanks using the words from the box below.

 

antenna gargoyles marshy elevator excavated architecture skyscrapers decorated observatory tallest population

 

John: Hey, it's really nice of you to show me round New York like this, Uncle Harry.

Uncle Harry: It's my pleasure, John. I thought our next stop could be the Empire State Building.

J: But what's so special about it? It isn't even the highest in New York any more.

U.H.: Maybe not, but I think you'll be surprised to find out quite how interesting it is... Here we are!

J: O.K., then, let's go to the top!

U.H.: Right, here's the _____(1). We have to change at the 86th floor, and then we can go straight on up to the 102nd floor _____(2). The Empire State Building was finished in 1931. It was the highest building in the world then.

J.: Until 1972! That's when they built the World Trade Center.

U.H.: Hey, I didn't know you were an expert!

J.: Well actually, I've just done it in Civic Studies at school!

U.H.: Right then, let's see if we can find a few more facts to impress your teacher. Foundations, for example? They're only 20 meters deep, but nearly 400,000 tons of dirt and rock had to be _____(3). That's more than the weight of the whole building!

J.: Wow, we're here already. I didn't expect it to be so quick.

U.H.: Don't forget, there are 73 elevators in the building, and their speed can reach 360 meters a minute!

J.: Just look at the view! How high is the tower?

U.H.: Where we're standing, it's 381 meters, but right to the top of the TV _____(4) it's 443 meters from the ground.

J.: And look, there's the World Trade Center over there!

U.H.: Yes, you're looking to the south, and that tiny little dot in the distance is the Statue of Liberty. All the ages of American _____(5) are under your feet. Just down there is the Woolworth Building. It was the _____(6) in the world from when it was built in 1913 until the Chrysler Building was finished in 1930.

J.: Oh yeah, I can see it there to the east. Is it true that the top is _____(7) with the different symbols of Chrysler cars?

U.H.: Almost! In fact the _____(8) you can see up there reproduce the 1929 Chrysler radiator caps. And to its right you can see the United Nations Building.

J.: Oh yeah, Le Corbusier's building that they call “The Matchbox”.

U.H.: Hey, you've been reading the guide books too!

J.: I can't get over how many _____(9) there are, and how close they are together.

U.H.: That's why the _____(10) of Manhattan is so dense: there are thousands of people to the square meter! But don't forget that New York isn't all skyscrapers. The buildings are much lower in the areas which were _____(11), like in Greenwich Village.

J.: And have a look over there, north to Central Park. Then you'll see a bit of green!

 

Skyscraper

by Rachel Field

Do skyscrapers ever grow tired
Of holding themselves up high?
Do they ever shiver on frosty nights
With their tops against the sky?

Do they feel lonely sometimes

Because they have grown so tall?

Do they ever wish they could lie right down

And never get up at all?

 

Diagrams

by Thom Gunn

Downtown, an office tower is going up.

And from the mesa of unfinished top

Big cranes jut, spectral points of stiffened net:

Angled top-heavy artefacts, and yet

Diagrams from the sky, as if its air

Could drop lines, snip them off, and leave them there.

On girders round them, Indians pad like cats,

With wrenches in their pockets and hard hats.

They wear their yellow boots like moccasins,

Balanced where air ends and where steel begins,

Sky men, and through the sole's flesh, chewed and pliant,

They feel the studded bone-edge of the giant.

It grunts and sways through its whole metal length.

And giving to the air is sign of strength.

Skyscraper

by Paul Sutton

Shaft of steel and stone standing forbidding

Dark and dead pointing to a brilliant moon

Black and brooding so bleak and unbending

Peak of the island, a gigantic tomb.

That tip of the shaft, a column of fire

A flame between earth and the moons cold light

Below cement swaths the island entire

The catacombs of man in dead of night.

The rock sea swells, avenue and canyon

And wave crests of agitated neon,

Flesh-filled capsules crawl and beetles surge on

Remote from this pinnacle of cold stone.

What are you? Sign of that which will have gone

Or blade of shining steel, symbol of dawn?

Skyscraper

by Jerome Dehnert

A driver pounds a pile of steel down
Until the alloy strikes a rock below.
No farther does the steal alloy go,
Since bedrock checks the progress of Motown.
A Lattice-work of steel embraces dawn,
While heavy cables, winches, and men work
To lift up slabs of cement like clockwork,
As metal, stone, and glass give way to brawn.
Amid the blood and sweat and cheers goes up
A building raised by those who understand
That from the ravages of time and sand,
A race that takes a part builds up and up.
God bless America and keep her safe,
The skies above her free from sin vouchsafe.

Reading task E