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【阅读理解】Reading: The Bookshop on the Side Street
The rain came down in dense grey columns, and Li Wei stood in the doorway of Page One Books, watching it overfill the gutter.
She was thirty-four, a former IELTS candidate from Chengdu, and she had just signed a lease on this shop on a side street off Renmin Road.
The previous tenant had sold mobile phone cases.
The shelves were bare.
A single glossy poster still clung to the window, advertising a gadget that no longer existed.
"You know," her friend Zhang Lei said, stepping in with a wet umbrella, "the academy across town charges 8,800 yuan for a twelve-week course."
He was a part-time coordinator at a language bureau, and he had an airtight plan.
"We don't compete on price. We compete on something they can't copy."
So they did.
In March 2019, they began hosting free bilingual reading nights every Thursday.
The format was simple: one essay, one short story, one hour.
Li Wei would stand at the front, barely moving, and decipher each paragraph slowly, teasing out the underlying logic.
She had failed IELTS writing twice, scoring 5.5 both times, before a scholarship to Leeds had slipped away.
That failure had left a chip on her shoulder.
She was determined not to spoil another person's chance.
Zhang Lei handled the logistics; he would enrol students, maintain the bibliography, and liaise with a retired examiner named Margaret Doyle, sixty-one, who had once worked for the British Council in Chongqing.
Margaret's criterion was brutal.
"If the grammar is pliable but the argument is inactive," she said, "it is a demerit, not a virtue."
By the summer of 2020, ninety-two students had passed through.
The shop's turnover had doubled.
But a sinister pattern crept in.
Some students became accustomed to the free sessions, treating them as a distraction rather than a commitment.
Attendance at the paid weekend workshops — 380 yuan for four hours — began to dwindle.
"They want the incentive without the strain," Margaret admitted.
Li Wei felt a familiar jerk of sorrow.
She had built a sanctuary, and it was mutating into a waiting room.
The interrelationship between generosity and dependency was not something she had anticipated.
She had to steer the project, or it would shatter.
In January 2021, she made a sweeping modification.
The reading nights would remain free — but only for those who submitted a weekly essay.
"No essay, no seat," she announced.
Twelve students left immediately.
Another twenty-four stayed, and their output improved.
The atmosphere turned less materialistic, more intellectual.
A chemistry student named Zhou Kai, twenty-two, began to conduct experiments in English, narrating each step aloud.
His presentation on molecular structure earned him a 7.5 in speaking.
"I used to freeze," he said.
"Now I grab the microphone."
Margaret smiled for the first time in months.
"Fertile ground," she said.
"You have finally enacted a real solution."
Yet the cost arrived quietly.
In April 2021, Li Wei's father suffered a stroke in Chengdu.
She took the high-speed train — 1,842 kilometres, seven hours — and stayed for three weeks.
During her absence, the shop stagnated.
Two staff members quit.
A pipe burst and spilled water across the fiction section.
When she returned, the air smelled of damp paper and curry from the noodle shop next door.
Zhang Lei had kept the Thursday sessions alive, but only eight people came.
"I can't cosset them forever," she whispered.
"Nor can I abandon them."
In the autumn of 2022, a former student named Chen Yuran, now a postgraduate at Edinburgh, sent a letter.
She had been impoverished as an undergraduate, she wrote, and the free library had given her a lifeline.
"You taught me that English is not a transaction," she wrote.
"It is a reconstruction of how I see the world."
Li Wei read the letter twice, then pinned it beside the poster of the dead gadget.
Outside, the rain had stopped.
A student was practising a speaking test in the corner, her voice calm, her consonants crisp.
Li Wei listened.
She did not know if the shop would survive another year.
She only knew that tomorrow, at seven, she would unlock the door, and someone would come.
Questions
1. What did Li Wei do before opening the bookshop?
A. She worked as a language coordinator. B. She taught at a British Council office. C. She was an IELTS candidate who failed writing twice. D. She sold mobile phone cases.
2. What change did Li Wei make in January 2021?
A. She started charging for the reading nights. B. She hired more staff to handle the increasing number of students. C. She required students to submit a weekly essay to attend free sessions. D. She moved the bookshop to a larger location.
3. What does the word 'dwindle' in the passage mean?
A. Increase rapidly B. Remain steady C. Become more popular D. Decrease gradually
4. Why did Li Wei pin Chen Yuran's letter beside the poster?
A. To remember a former student who had moved away. B. To remind herself of the shop's financial success. C. To advertise the shop to potential students. D. To show that the free library had made a difference.
5. What is the best title for this passage?
A. The Story of a Successful Businesswoman in Chengdu B. How to Improve IELTS Scores Through Reading Nights C. The Challenges of Running a Free Language School D. A Bookshop's Fight to Balance Generosity and Commitment