🔍 Comprehension
📖 Reading Passage
Read aloud
—:—
There is a stone called opalite. It is not a natural gemstone. It is made by human hands — shaped from glass, polished until it glows with a soft, shifting light that moves between blue and peach and white depending on how you hold it. A real opal forms over thousands of years, deep underground, under pressure and heat. An opalite is made in an afternoon. And yet, when you hold one in your palm, it is beautiful. It shimmers. It catches the light. No one looking at it would say it was worthless simply because it was made rather than found. This is the question that Taylor Swift's song 'Opalite' quietly asks: does something need to be natural to be real? Can happiness be built, the way a gemstone can be built? The song says yes. It uses the image of a sky turning opalite — shifting from the darkness of an onyx night into something iridescent and hopeful — to describe what it feels like when two people who have both been through difficult times find each other and decide to make something good together. The bridge of the song puts it plainly: hard times are a storm in a teacup, a temporary speed bump. Failure, it suggests, is not the end of the road — it is the thing that eventually brings freedom. The message is optimistic without being naive. It does not pretend that pain was not real. It simply argues that light can be made, not just found — and that there is nothing less genuine about a sky full of man-made brightness.
1. According to the comprehension passage, what does the narrator compare the opalite stone to in terms of happiness?
A
She compares it to a valuable antique that must be found
B
She uses it as a metaphor for happiness that can be deliberately made rather than simply discovered
C
She argues that happiness is always natural and cannot be constructed
D
She uses it to describe the colour of the night sky
2. What does the phrase 'making your own sunshine' suggest about the kind of person the song is addressed to?
A
Someone who has never experienced any difficulty
B
Someone who inherited good fortune without effort
C
Someone who has had to create their own happiness rather than waiting for it to arrive
D
Someone who works outdoors in good weather
3. In the passage, what is the function of darkness or 'onyx night'?
A
To describe the literal weather conditions outside
B
To represent the sadness and difficult periods that come before healing
C
To show that the narrator dislikes the night-time
D
To suggest the narrator is afraid of the dark
4. The passage mentions that the song's bridge offers reassurance. What does the bridge argue about failure?
A
That failure is permanent and should be avoided at all costs
B
That failure is someone else's fault
C
That failure is a necessary step on the way to freedom and growth
D
That failure is something to be ashamed of
5. How does the connection between opalite and a 'man-made opal' make the song's central message more interesting?
A
It proves that artificial things are always better than natural ones
B
It suggests that beauty and happiness deliberately built are just as genuine as those that occur naturally
C
It shows that the narrator prefers science to nature
D
It means the narrator is interested in geology
6. Think about this song alongside The Wild Robot. How does 'Opalite' help us think about whether Roz's love for Brightbill is real?
A
It proves Roz cannot truly love because she is synthetic
B
It suggests that being made rather than born does not make love less genuine — just as opalite is no less beautiful for being man-made
C
It argues that all robots should be reprogrammed to feel emotions
D
It has no connection to The Wild Robot at all