高级英语课文翻译

青年人的四种选择

Lesson 2: Four Choices for Young People

在毕业前不久，斯坦福大学四年级主席吉姆?宾司给我写了一封信，信中谈及他的一些不安。Shortly before his graduation, Jim Binns, president of the senior class at Stanford University, wrote me about some of his misgivings.

他写道：“与其他任何一代人相比，我们这一代人在看待成人世界时抱有更大的疑虑……同时越来越倾向于全盘否定成人世界。”

“More than any other generation,”he said, “our generation views the adult world with great skepticism…there is also an increased tendency to reject completely that world.”

很明显，他的话代表了许多同龄人的看法。

Apparently he speaks for a lot of his contemporaries.

在过去的几年里，我倾听过许多年轻人的谈话，他们有的还在大学读书，有的已经毕业，他们对于成人的世界同样感到不安。

During the last few years, I have listened to scores of young people, in college and out, who were just as nervous about the grown world.

大致来说，他们的态度可归纳如下：“这个世界乱糟糟的，到处充满了不平等、贫困和战争。对此该负责的大概应是那些管理这个世界的成年人吧。如果他们不能做得比这些更好，他们又能拿什么来教育我们呢？这样的教导，我们根本不需要。”

Roughly, their attitude might be summed up about like this: “The world is in pretty much of a mess, full of injustice, poverty, and war. The people responsible are, presumably, the adults who have been running thing. If they can’t do better than that, what have they got to teach our generation? That kind of lesson we can do without.”

我觉得这些结论合情合理，至少从他们的角度来看是这样的。

There conclusions strike me as reasonable, at least from their point of view.

对成长中的一代人来说，相关的问题不是我们的社会是否完美（我们可以想当然地认为是这样），而是应该如何去应付它。

The relevant question for the arriving generation is not whether our society is imperfect (we can take that for granted), but how to deal with it.

尽管这个社会严酷而不合情理，但它毕竟是我们惟一拥有的世界。

For all its harshness and irrationality, it is the only world we’ve got.

因此，选择一个办法去应付这个社会是刚刚步入成年的年轻人必须作出的第一个决定，这通常是他们一生中最重要的决定。

Choosing a strategy to cope with it, then, is the first decision young adults have to make, and usually the most important decision of their lifetime.

根据我的发现，他们的基本选择只有四种：

So far as I have been able to discover, there are only four basic alternatives:

1）脱离传统社会

这是最古老的方法之一，任何年龄的人无论在任何地方，也无论是否使用迷幻剂都可以采用。This is one of the oldest expedients, and it can be practiced anywhere, at any age, and with or without the use of hallucinogens.

那些认为这个世界残酷、复杂得令人难以忍受的人通常会选择这个办法。

It always has been the strategy of choice for people who find the world too brutal or too complex to be endured.

实质上，这是一种寄生式的生活方式，采取此策略的人通过这样或那样的方式寄生于这个他们蔑视的社会，并且拒绝对这个社会承担责任

By definition, this way of life is parasitic. In one way or another, its practitioners batten on the society which they scorn and in which they refuse to take any responsibility.

我们中的一些人对此很厌恶——认为这种生活方式很不光彩。

Some of us find this distasteful –an undignified kind of life.

但对于那些卑微、懒惰又缺乏自尊的人来说，这也许是可行的最可以忍受的选择了。

But for the poor in spirit, with low levels of both energy and pride, it may be the least intolerable choice available.

2）逃避现实社会

2) Flee

这个策略早在远古就有先例。

This strategy also has ancient antecedents.

自文明诞生以来，就有人企图逃避文明社会，希望寻求一种更为朴素、更富田园风情、更为宁静的生活。

Ever since civilization began, certain individuals have tried to run away from it in hopes of finding a simpler, more pastoral, and more peaceful life.

与那些脱离传统社会的人不同，这些人不是寄生者。他们愿意自食其力，愿意为社会作出贡献，可是他们就是不喜欢这个文明世界的环境。确地说，不喜欢这充满丑恶和紧张的大都市。Unlike the dropouts, they are not parasites. They are willing to support themselves and to contribute something to the general community, but they simply don’t like the environment of civilization; that is, the city, with all its ugliness and tension.

这种方法的问题在于无法大规模地进行实践。

The trouble with this solution is that it no longer is practical on a large scale.

不幸的是，在我们的地球上，高尚的野蛮人和未被破坏的自然景色已越来越少；除了两极地区以外已经没有未开发的土地了。

Our planet, unfortunately, is running out of noble savages and unsullied landscaped; except for the polar regions, the frontiers are gone.

少数富有的乡绅还可以逃避现实去过田园生活——但总的说来，迁移的潮流是向相反的方向

流动。

A few gentleman farmers with plenty of money can still escape to the bucolic life –but in general the stream of migration is flowing the other way.

3）策划革命

Plot a Revolution

在对民主进程单调乏味的运作方式毫无耐心或相信只有武力才能改变基本社会制度的那些人中，这一策略颇受欢迎。

This strategy is always popular among those who have no patience with the tedious working of the democratic process or who believe that basic institutions can only be changed by force.

它吸引了每一代年轻人中那些更为活跃和更具理想主义的人。

It attracts some of the more active and idealistic young people of every generation.

对他们来说，这种策略具有浪漫的吸引力，通常以某位魅力非凡且令人振奋的人物为其象征。To them it offers a romantic appeal, usually symbolized by some dashing and charismatic figure.

这一策略简单明了并具有更大的吸引力：“既然这个社会已经无可救药，那就让我们砸碎它，在它的废墟上面建一个更好的社会。”

It has the even greater appeal of simplicity: “Since this society is hopelessly bad, let’s smash it and build something better on the ruins.”

我最好的朋友中有些是革命者，他们中的一些人过得相当满足。

Some of my best friends have been revolutionists, and a few of them have led reasonably satisfying lives.

这部分人其实是那些革命并未成功的人，他们可以继续兴高采烈地策划大屠杀，直至老态龙钟。

These are the ones whose revolutions did not come off; they have been able to keep on cheerfully plotting their holocausts right into their senescence.

另外一些人年纪轻轻就死了，死在监狱里或街垒旁。

Others died young, in prison or on the barricades.

但最不幸的是那些革命成功的人。

But the most unfortunate are those whose revolutions have succeeded.

他们极度失望，看到他们推翻的权力机构又被新机构所替代，而新机构依旧是那样冷酷，那样毫无生机。

They lived in bitter disillusionment, to see the establishment they had overthrown replaced by a new one, just as hard-faced and stuffy.

当然，我并不是说革命一无所成。

I am not, of course, suggesting that revolutions accomplish nothing.

一些革命（美国革命，法国革命）确实将事情变得越来越好。

Some (The American Revolution, the French Revolution) clearly do change things for the better.

我只是想说革命无论成败，那些策划革命的革命者们都注定要失望。

My point is merely that the idealists who make the revolution are bound to be disappointed in

either case.

因为胜利的曙光无论如何也不会照耀在他们梦想中的那个摆脱了人类一切卑劣的灿烂的新世界上。

For at best their victory never dawns on the shining new world they had dreamed of, cleansed of all human meanness.

相反，它照在了一个熟悉的平庸的地方，这个地方仍旧需要食品杂货和污水排放。Instead it dawns on a familiar, workaday place, still in need of groceries and sewage disposal.

无论贴着什么样的政治标签，革命后的国家都不是由激进的浪漫主义者来治理，而是由市场营销、卫生工程和管理官僚机构的专家来治理。

The revolutionary state, under whatever political label, has to be run-not by violent romantics-but by experts in marketing, sanitary engineering, and the management of bureaucracies.

对一些决心改造社会，但同时又希望能找到一种比武装革命更可行的方法的理想主义者来说，还有另外一种选择。

For the idealists who are determined to remake society, but who seek a more practical method than armed revolution, there remains one more alternative.

4）循序渐进，逐步改变社会

Try to Change the World Gradually, One Clod at a Time

乍一看，这一途径毫无吸引力。

At first glance, this course is far from inviting.

它缺乏魅力，并且见效很慢。

It lacks glamour. It promises no quick results.

它依靠劝说和民主决策这些令人恼火且不可靠的方法来实现。

It depends on the exasperating and uncertain instruments of persuasion and democratic decision making.

它需要耐心，可我们却总是缺乏耐心。

It demands patience, always in short supply.

它惟一的好处是有时这方法行得通——在这个特定的时间和地点，它比其他的任何策略都更有可能制止世界上的某些恶行。

About all that can be said for it is that it sometimes works –that in this particular time and place it offers a better chance for remedying some of the world’s outrages than any other available strategy.

至少历史事实似乎证明了这一点。

So at least the historical evidence seems to suggest.

我大学毕业的时候，我们这一代人也发现世界乱得一团糟。

When I was graduating from college, my generation also found the world in a mess.

几乎所有地方的经济机构都已崩溃，在美国几乎四分之一的人口失业。

The economic machinery had broken down almost everywhere: In this country nearly a quarter of the population was out of work.

一场大战似乎在所难免。

A major was seemed all too likely.

当时作为校报编辑，对这些我曾经猛烈地抗议过，像今天的学生积极分子一样。

As a college newspaper editor at that time, I protested against this just as vehemently as student activists are protesting today.

与此同时，我们这一代人渐渐发现改造世界有点像在亚平宁山区打仗一样。你刚刚占领一条山脉，另一条山脉又在前方隐现。

At the same time, my generation was discovering that reforming the world is a little like fighting a military campaign in the Apennines, as soon as you capture one mountain range, another one looms just ahead.

当20世纪30年代的大问题刚刚勉强得到控制，新的问题又出现了——富足社会中出现的崭新问题，如种族平等，保证城市环境适于居住，应付各种陌生伪装下的战争等等。

As the big problems of the thirties were brought under some kind of rough control, new problems took their place –the unprecedented problems of an, affluent society, of racial justice, of keeping our cities from becoming uninhabitable, of coping with war in unfamiliar guises.

最令人不安的是我们发现了人口爆炸这一问题。

Most disturbing of all was our discovery of the population explosion.

我们突然意识到我们这艘载人小飞船上的乘客数目大约每40年翻一倍。

It dawned on us rather suddenly that the number of passengers on the small spaceship we inhabit is doubling about every forty years.

只要地球上的人口持续地按这个可怕的速度增长，其他所有问题都将无法解决。

So long as the earth’s population keeps growing at this cancerous rate, all of the other problems appear virtually insoluble.

我们的城市会变得越来越拥挤，景色会变得更加杂乱，空气和水也会变得愈发肮脏。

Our cities will continue to become more crowded and noisome. The landscape will get more cluttered, the air and water even dirtier.

所有人的生活质量都会不断恶化。

The quality of life is likely to become steadily worse for everybody.

如果过多的人必须为了争夺日益减少的食物份额和生存空间而争斗的话，战争的升级看来是无法避免的。

And warfare on a rising scale seems inevitable if too many bodies have to struggle for ever-dwindling shares of food and living space.

因此吉姆?宾司这代人要承担一项艰巨的任务。

So Jim Binns’generation has a formidable job on its hands.

但我认为这并不是无法克服的困难。

But not, I think, an insuperable one.

过去的事实证明，处理这项艰巨任务完全可采用以前解决困难问外时使用的方法——从实际效果出发，一点一滴，通过大家不懈的努力来完成。

On the evidence of the past, it can be handled in the same way that hard problems have been coped with before-piecemeal, pragmatically, by the dogged efforts of many people

Lesson eight

做黑人胜过做女人

成为第一个在国会立足的黑人女性使我变成某种现象人物。国会中还有9个黑人和另外10位女性。我是第一个同时克服了两种阻碍（黑人，女人）的人。在这两种阻碍下，作为一个黑人的阻碍要大大低于作一个女人。

如果我说作为一个黑人的阻力远远大于作为一个女人，或许没有人会质疑我。为什么？因为“我们都知道”在美国存在对黑人的偏见。对女性存在偏见这样的想法在大多数男性看来——恐怕也包括大部分女性——是非常奇怪的。

许多年来对黑人的偏见对于大多数美国白人是隐形的。当黑人最终开始“关注”这个问题的时候，（发起了）入座运动、罢乘运动和自由骑车运动。美国人（对此）十分怀疑。“谁？我们？”白人用受伤的语调问。“我们歧视（黑人呢）？”（于是形成了）一个对美国白人长时间的、阵痛的再教育。（这个教育）花了白人许多年时间——包括那些自认为是自由主义者——去探索和根除他们已经作出的种族主义者的态度。

那么根除对女性的偏见有多难呢？我相信这是一个长时间的争斗。部分问题在于美国女性大多数被洗脑和适应了他们和黑人一样作为二等公民的角色。

让我解释一下。我从政超过20载。所有时间但尤其是最后六年，我做了如下工作：能影响竞选成败的所有的无聊的细节工作，这是大部分从政女性不可避免的命运。男性收获了胜利果实。

还是女性，大约有300万自愿者，在美国的政治世界中从事这样的工作。其中优秀者有望获得成为地区或者全国（竞选）副主席的荣耀。这个象征性的位置是一个女性多年忠心地（为竞选）做着邮政工作（回信之类）和组织卡牌聚会的奖赏。这样的一份工作，女性免费获得各州之间的旅行和时而的国家级会议。（会议上）女性也被认为是跟着他的男性上司进行投票。

在1963年，我尝试突破女性固有的角色，（于是）代表Brooklyn's Bedford-Stuyvesant（贫民窟）参加了纽约州议会竞选，反对声十分强烈。自从竞选开始，因为我的性别，我面对毫无掩饰的敌意。

不过四年后，当我竞选国会，性别成了最主要的问题。我所在的党内，也曾举行过秘密会议商讨如何阻止我。

我的对手，著名的民权领袖James Farmer试图塑造一个充满男性魅力的黑人形象。他的广播车在邻里间宣传，车上满是带着非洲式头发、穿着短袖套头衫和带着小胡子的年轻男性。当电视台那群人无视我的时候，他们也没意识到一个重要的数据，我和我的竞选经理Wesley MacD知道这个数。在我的选区，注册投票的女性是男性的2.5倍。而女性多数在学生家长和教师联谊会（PTAs）、教会、牌友和其他一些社会服务性组织中。我去找她们并且请求她们的帮助。Farmer先生一点都不知道是什么打败了他。

当一个聪明的女大学毕业生开始找工作的时候，为什么第一个问题总是：“你会打字吗？”藏在这个问题背后的是历史的偏见。为什么女性总被认为是该做秘书而不是领导者？被认为是图书管理员和老师而不是医生和律师？因为女性被认为是不同的、低等的。快乐的家庭主

妇和（对生活）满足的黑人的形象都是因为偏见。

女性甚至没达到黑人表面上的水平（没黑人好）。最高法院中没有女性一席。内阁中曾有两位女性，但是现在一个没有。大使地位级别的女性有两位。女性“支配”着低收入（档次），做着无聊的、没有奖金的、没有前途的工作，即使她们升到一个理想的职位，同样的工作，她们的薪水也常常少于男性。

如果这都不是歧视，那么你们怎么这种现象呢？

几年前，我和一位政治领袖谈论一个充满前途的年轻女候选人，“为什么投入那么时间和精力来捧起她？”他问我。“你知道，他只能退出竞选然后结婚生子，若我们没让他准备好参加市长竞选。”

大量的人对我抱有相同的看法。当我试图更进一步时，有许多人建议我回去教书，做回女性的本职工作，把政治留给男人。我热爱教书，并且准备好回去，只要我被说服说是这个国家不再需要一位女性的贡献。

不过在这种情况发生前——至少我们都知道今明几年是不会的——我们需要的是更多的女性参政。因为我们能做出十分特别的贡献。我希望我成功的事例能说服其他女性参政——不仅仅是一些邮政工作，管管办公室。

女性可以给政府带来共鸣，容忍，远见，耐心，坚韧这些天生就有的，也是在男性压迫之下不得不发展的品质。一国女性的生存状况塑造了这个国家的道德，宗教和政治。目前，我们国家需要女性的理想主义和决心，或者在其他地方更多地参与政治中来。

Lesson nine

要摆脱电视的影响是困难的。It is difficult to escape the influence of television. 假如统计的平均数字适用于你的话，那么你到20岁的时候就至少看过2万个小时的电视了，从那以后每生活10年就会增加1万小时。If you fit the statistical averages, by the age of 20 you will have been exposed to at least 20,000 hours of television. You can add 10,000 hours for each decade you have lived after the age of 20. 比起看电视，美国人只有在工作和睡眠上花时间更多。The only things Americans do more than watch television are work and sleep. 稍微计算一下，使用这些时间的一部分能够做些什么。

Calculate for a moment what could be done with even a part of those hours. 听说一个大学生仅用5000小时就可以获得学士学位。Five thousand hours, I am told, are what a typical college undergraduate spends working on a bachelor's degree. 在1万个小时内你能学成一个天文学家或工程师，流利掌握几门外语。In 10,000 hours you could have learned enough to become an astronomer or engineer. You could have learned several languages fluently. 如果你感兴趣的话，你可能读希腊原文的荷马史诗或俄文版的陀思妥耶夫斯基作品；如果对此不感兴趣，那你可以徒步周游世界，撰写一本游记。If it appealed to you, you could be reading Homer in the original Greek or Dostoyevsky in Russian. If it didn't, you could have walked around the world and written a book about it.

电视的毛病在于它分散了人们的注意力。The trouble with television is that it discourages concentration. 生活中几乎一切有趣的、能给人以满足的事都需要一定的建设性的、持之以恒的努力。Almost anything interesting and rewarding in life requires some constructive, consistently applied effort. 即使是我们中间那些最迟钝、最没有天才的人也能做出一些事

来，而这些事使那些从来不在任何事情上专心致志的人感到像是奇迹一般。The dullest, the least gifted of us can achieve things that seem miraculous to those who never concentrate on anything. 但电视鼓励我们不做出任何努力，它向我们兜售即时的满足，它给我们提供娱乐，使我们只想娱乐，让时间在毫无痛苦中消磨掉。But Television encourages us to apply no effort. It sells us instant gratification. It diverts us only to divert, to make the time pass without pain. 电视节目的多样化成了一种麻醉剂而不是促进思考的因素。

Television's variety becomes a narcotic, nor a stimulus. 它那系列的、多变的画面引着我们跟着它走。Its serial, kaleidoscopic exposures force us to follow its lead. 观众无休无止地跟着导游游览：参观博物馆30分钟，看大教堂30分钟，喝饮料30分钟，然后上车去下一个参观点，只是电视的特点是时间分配以分秒计算，而所选择的内容却多为车祸和人们的互相残杀。The viewer is on a perpetual guided tour:cathedral, 30 for a drink, then back on the bus to the next attraction —except on television, typically, the spans allotted are on the order of minutes or seconds, and the chosen delights are more often car crashes and people killing one another. 总之许多电视节目取代了人类最可贵的一种才能，即主动集中自己的注意力，而不是被动地奉送注意力。In short, a lot of television usurps one of the most precious of all human gifts, the ability to focus your attention yourself, rather than just passively surrender it. 吸引并抓住人们的注意力是大多数电视节目安排的主要目的，它加强了电视是有利可图的广告的载体的作用。

Capturing your attention —and holding it—is the prime motive动机of most television programming and enhances its role as a profitable advertising vehicle. 节目安排使人生活在无休止的恐惧之中，唯恐抓不住人们的注意力——不管是什么人的注意力都担心。Programmers live in constant fear of losing anyone's attention—anyone's. 避免造成这一局面的最有把握的办法就是使一切节目都保持简短，不要使任何人的注意力过于集中而受到损害，而要通过多样化、新奇性、动作和行动不断地提供刺激。The surest way to avoid doing so is to keep everything brief, not to strain the attention of anyone but instead to provide constant stimulation through variety, novelty, action and movement. 很简单，电视的运作原则就是迎合观众的注意力跨度短这一特点。Quite simply, television operates on the appeal to the short attention span. 这只是最简单的解决办法，但它逐渐被看作是电视这一宣传媒体特定的，内在固有的性质，是必须履行的职责，似乎是司令萨尔诺夫或另一个令人敬畏的电视创始人给我们传下了刻有铭文的石碑，命令电视上出现的一切节目均不得使观众需要片刻以上的注意力。

It is simply the easiest way out. But it has come to be regarded as a given, as inherent in the medium itself; as an imperative, as though General Sarnoff, or one of the other august pioneers of video, had bequeathed to us tablets of stone commanding that nothing in television shall ever require more than a few moments' concentration. 要是运用得恰当，这倒也无可厚非。

In its place that is fine. 如此出色地把使人忘却现实的娱乐作为大规模推销工具加以包装，谁又能反对这样一种宣传媒介呢？Who can quarrel with a medium that so brilliantly packages escapist entertainment as a mass-marketing tool? 但是我看到了它的价值现已充斥于这个国家及其生活之中。Rut I see its values now pervading this nation and its life. 认为快速思维和快餐食品一样影响着生活节奏很快、性情急躁的公众，这已成了时髦的看法。It has become fashionable to think that, like fast food, fast ideas are the way to get to a fast-moving, impatient public. 在新闻方面，我认为这种做法不能进行很好的交流。

In the case of news, this practice, in my view, results in inefficient communication. 我怀疑电视每晚的新闻节目真正能够被人吸收和理解的有多少。I question how much of television's

nightly news effort is really absorbable and understandable.

其中许多被形象地描述为“机关枪不连贯地点射”。Much of it is what has been aptly described as "machine-gunning with scraps." 我认为这种技术是与连贯性作对的。I think the technique fights coherence. 我认为它最终会使事情变得枯燥乏味、无足轻重（除非伴以恐怖的画面），因为任何一件事，如果你对它几乎一无所知，那么它差不多总会是枯燥乏味、使人觉得无足轻重的。I think it tends to make things ultimately boring and dismissible (unless they are accompanied by horrifying pictures) because almost anything is boring and dismissible if you know almost nothing about it. 我认为，电视迎合观众注意力跨度短的做法不仅会造成交流不畅，而且还会降低文化水平。

I believe that TV's appeal to the short attention span is not only inefficient communication but decivilizing as well. 想一想电视要达到的那些极不慎重的原则吧：必须避免复杂性，用视觉刺激来代替思考，语言的精确早已是不合时宜的要求。Consider the casual assumptions that television tends to cultivate达到that complexity must be avoided, that visual stimulation is a substitute for thought, that verbal precision is an anachronism. 它可能已过时，但我所受的教育告诉我思想就是语言，是按准确的语法规则组织起来的。It may be old-fashioned, but I was taught that thought is words, arranged in grammatically precise. 在美国存在着读写能力的危机。

There is a crisis of literacy in this country. 据一项研究估计，约有3000万美国成年人是“功能性文盲”。他们的读写能力无法回答招聘广告，或读懂药瓶上的说明。

据一项研究估计，约有3000万美国成年人是“功能性文盲”。他们的读写能力无法回答招聘广告，或读懂药瓶上的说明。One study estimates that some 30 million adult Americans are "functionally illiterate" and cannot read or write well enough to answer the want ad or understand the instructions on a medicine bottle. 能读写可能算不上是一项不可剥夺的人权，但是我们学识渊博的开国元勋们并不感到它是不合理的或者甚至是达不到的。

Literacy may not be an inalienable human right, but it is one that the highly literate Founding Fathers might not have found unreasonable or even unattainable. 从统计数字上看，我们的国家不仅未达到人人能读写的程度，而且离这一目标越来越远。We are not only not attaining it as a nation, statistically speaking, but we are falling further and further short of attaining it.

尽管我不会天真到认为电视是造成这一情况的原因，但我却相信它起了一定的作用，是有影响的。And, while I would not be so simplistic as to suggest that television is the cause, 1 believes it contributes and is an influence.

美国的一切：社会结构、家庭组织形式、经济、在世界上的地位，都变得更为复杂，而不是相反。

Everything about this nation —the structure of the society, its forms of family organization, its economy and its place in the world—has become more complex, not less. 然而其占主导地位的传播媒介，全国联系的主要方式，却在人类存在的问题上推销简单的解决方式，而这些问题通常是没有简单的解决方式的。Yet its dominating communications instrument, its principal form of national linkage, is one that sells neat resolutions to human problems that usually have no neat resolutions.

在我的心目中，那30秒钟一个的商业广告：一位家庭主妇因选对了牙膏而感到幸福的那小小的戏剧性场面就是这一切的象征。电视已使这极其成功的艺术形式成为我们文化不可缺少的一个部分了。It is all symbolized in my mind by the hugely successful art form that television has made central to the culture, the 30-second commercial: the tiny drama of the earnest housewife who finds happiness in choosing the right toothpaste.

在人类历史上，几时曾有这样多的人共同把自己这样多的业余时间奉送给一件玩具，一项大众娱乐？When before in human history has so much humanity collectively surrendered so much of its leisure to one toy, one mass diversion? 几时曾有一个国家使自己整个地置于商品推销媒介的摆布之下？

When before has virtually an entire nation surrendered itself wholesale to a medium for selling? 几年前，耶鲁大学的法学教授小查尔斯?L?布莱克写道：“……被喂食本身并不是件琐碎小事。”

Some years ago Yale University law professor Charles L. Black. Jr. wrote: "... forced feeding on trivial fare is not itself a trivial matter." 我认为我们这个社会正在强行被喂食。我担心这一做法对我们的思维习惯，对我们的语言、我们努力的极限度及对复杂情况的兴趣等方面所造成的影响，这一点我们还只是极模糊地意识到。I think this society is being forced-fed with trivial fare, and I fear that the effects on our habits of mind, our language, our tolerance for effort, and our appetite for complexity are only dimly perceived. 就算我的看法不对，用怀疑和批判的眼光来分析这个问题，来考虑如何抵制它，也不会有任何害处。我希望你能加入我的行列。If I am wrong, we will have done no harm to look at the issue skeptically and critically, to consider how we should be resisting it. I hope you will join with me in doing so.

Lesson ten

Lesson Eleven On Getting off to Sleep

人真是充满矛盾啊! 毫无疑问，幽默是惟一帮助我们摆脱矛盾的办法，要是没有它，我们就会死于烦恼。

What a bundle of contradictions is a man! Surety, humour is the saving grace of us, for without it we should die of vexation.

在我看来，没有什么比睡眠更能说明事物间的矛盾。

With me, nothing illustrates the contrariness of things better than the matter of sleep.

比如，我打算写一篇文章，面前放好了笔、墨和几张白纸，准保没写几个字我就会困得要命，无论当时是几点都会那样。

If, for example, my intention is to write an essay, and I have before me ink and pens and several sheets of virgin paper, you may depend upon it that before I have gone very far I feel an overpowering desire for sleep, no matter what time of the day it is.

我瞪着那似乎在谴责我的白纸，直到眼前一片模糊，声音也难以辨清，只有靠意志力才能勉强坚持。

I stare at the reproachfully blank paper until sights and sounds become dim and confused, and it is only by an effort of will that I can continue at all.

即使这时，我也会迷迷糊糊地像在做梦一样继续坚持工作。

Even then, I proceed half-heartedly, in a kind of dream.

但是当深夜躺在床上，我什么事都能干，只有睡觉无法做到。

But let me be between the sheets at a late hour, and I can do any-thing but sleep.

随着时钟一遍一遍的报时，我可以完成大量的文章。

Between chime and chime of the clock I can write essays by the score.

极有吸引力的主题和崇高的思想纷纷出现在脑海，随之而来的还有恰如其分的意象和措辞。Fascinating subjects and noble ideas come pell-mell, each with its appropriate imagery and expression.

除了笔、墨和纸，什么也不能阻止我写出半打不朽的杰作。

Nothing stands between me and half-a-dozen imperishable masterpieces but pens, ink, and paper.

如果，我们的思想和主观意象对于来世的人来说真的就像我们的书本和图片一样是有形的、摸得着的，那么我在来世会比在今生获得更高的声誉。

If it be true that our thoughts and mental images are perfectly tangible things, like our books and pictures, to the inhabitants of the next world, then I am making for myself a better reputation there than I am in this place.

只要我躺在床上有一两个小时睡不着觉，我就能令自己满意地解决人类一切的疑虑。

Give me a restless hour or two in bed and I can solve, to my own satisfaction, all the doubts of humanity.

如果我有兴致的话，我可以谱写出宏伟的交响乐，描绘出壮丽的画卷。

When I am in the humour I can compose grand symphonies, and paint magnificent pictures.

我就是莎士比亚、贝多芬和米开朗基罗。但这一切仍无法令我满意，因为我还是无法入睡。

I am, at once, Shakespeare, Beethoven, and Michael Angelo; yet it gives me no satisfaction; for the one thing I cannot do is to go to sleep.

一旦到了上床睡觉时间，五个摄取知识的港口就要关闭的时候，我认识的大多数人似乎都能很容易就忘却了他们在尘世的作用，很快进入梦乡，而我却不能。

Once in bed, when it is time to close the five ports of knowledge, most folks I know seem to find no difficulty in plunging their earthly parts into oblivion.

对我来说，睡眼就像一个忸怩羞怯的情妇，喜欢反复无常地挑逗男人，让男人不停地向她求爱——“惟恐让男人得的太容易而显得自己身价太低。”

It is not so with me, to whom sleep is a coy mistress, much given to a teasing inconsistency and for ever demanding to be wooed —"lest too light winning make the prize light".

我曾诧异地读过一些大肆吹捧那些好战的超人、世界和平的巨大威胁者，诸如克伦威尔、拿破仑之类的文章，文章里说他们“钢铁般的意志”使他们一躺下就能熟睡，并在某一特定时间醒来，精神抖擞。

I used to read, with wonder, those sycophantic stories of the warlike supermen, the great troublers of the world's peace, Cromwell, Napoleon, and the like, who, thanks to their "iron wills", could lie down and plunge themselves immediately into deep sleep, to wake up, refreshed, at a given time.

这些故事给了我很大的震动，我决心像他们那样做。于是上床后，我就紧咬牙关，在黑暗中尽可能显得意志坚定，命令睡眠立刻到来。

Taking these fables to heart, I would resolve to do likewise, and, going to bed, would clench my teeth, look as determined as possible in the darkness, and command the immediate presence of

但是，天哪！高度集中的精力让我比任何时候都清醒，我不得不在折磨人的失眠中捱过几个钟头。

But alas! The very act of concentration seemed to make me more wakeful than ever, and I would pass hours in tormenting sleeplessness.

我忽略了拥有“钢铁般意志”的必要性，我自己的意志力中很少或干脆没有这种特殊的金属性质。

I had overlooked the necessity of having an "iron will", my own powers of will having little or none of this peculiar metallic quality.

但是同这些具有钢铁般意志的人生活在一起会是多么不舒服啊！

But how uncomfortable it must have been living with these ironwilled folks!

谁愿意劝告他们，与他们争辩呢？

Who would want to remonstrate and argue with them?

那还不如用大铁锤打铁砧。

It would be worse than beating an anvil with a sledge hammer.

我承认我一直怀疑那些夸耀自己一上床就能睡着的人——那些“头一沾枕头就睡着”的家伙们。

I must confess that I always suspect the men who boast that they unvaryingly fall asleep as soon as they get into bed —those "as soon as my head touches the pillow" fellows.

我觉得这种习惯中有某种不近人情的、冷酷的、麻木的东西。

To me, there is something inhuman, something callous and almost bovine, in the practice.

我对这种人对较高级事物的鉴赏力表示怀疑。

I suspect their taste in higher matters.

抛开钢铁般意志不谈，那种把他清醒时的感觉及思想随同衣服抛在一边，并完全无视那些有时会从十年前隐藏的记忆中跳出来回忆和幻想的人，一定缺乏人类的同情心和造诣深度。Iron wills apart, there must be a lack of human sympathy or depth in a man who can thus throw off, with his clothes, his waking feelings and thoughts, and ignore completely those memories and fancies which

...will sometimes leap,

From hiding-places ten years deep.

与这种人同住一室会使人对人性丧失信心，因为即使是最重要的一天，同这种人也无法沟通交流，也没有什么午夜的密谈，更没有一同商议一天的痛苦和快乐究竟有多少。

To share a bedroom with one of these fellows is to lose one's faith in human nature, for, even after the most eventful day, there is no comparing notes with them, no midnight confidence, no casting up the balance of the day's pleasure and pain.

他们很快就进入了愚蠢的熟睡中，留下你一人在心里折腾，而且他们还都鼾声如雷，十分讨

They sink, at once, into stupid, heavy slumber, leaving you to your own mental devices. And they all snore abominably!

人工催眠的方法多不胜举，惟一的相同之处就是都不管用。

The artificial ways of inducing sleep are legion, and are only alike in their ineffectuality

在《拉文格罗》（或者是《吉卜赛男人》）一书中有一个无可救药的人，患有失眠症，他发现华尔华斯的一卷诗集是惟一有效的催眠剂，但那只不过是伯罗的恶作剧而已。

In Lavengro (or is it Romany Rye?) there is an impossible character, a victim of insomnia, who finds that a volume of Wordsworth's poems is the only sure soporific; but that was Borrow s malice.

那个有名的数跳过篱笆墙台阶的山羊的老办法对我从来都不起作用。

The famous old plan of counting sheep jumping over a stile has never served my turn.

我在想像中牧羊，一直想到它们不知怎地都变成了白熊和蓝猪。我倒想看看哪个有理智的人能在赶着一群天蓝色的猪的时候进入梦乡。

I have herded imaginary sheep until they insisted on turning themselves into white bears or blue pigs, and I defy any reasonable man to fall asleep while mustering a herd of cerulean swine.

前不久，我和一位老朋友谈到这个问题，她给了我一个治失眠的特别好用的方子，就是她想像自己一遍一遍地重复一些琐碎事，直到她对生活的单调感到厌烦而进入梦乡。Discussing the question, some times ago, with an old friend, she gave me her never-failing remedy for sleeplessness, which was to imagine herself performing some trivial action over and over again, until, her mind becoming disgusted with the monotony of life, sleep drew the curtain.

她最喜欢的方法就是想像墙上的一幅画没有挂正，然后着手将它摆正。

Her favourite device was to imagine a picture not hanging quite plumb upon the wall, and then to proceed to straighten it.

我尝试了这种方法——尽管把画挂正并不是我的习惯——但毫无效果。

This I tried —though putting pictures straight is no habit of mine—but it was of no avail.

我可以毫不困难地想像出墙上有一幅画，也可以很熟练地移动几下，但这么一来我想到了一般的画，然后我又想到了我和朋友T君一块参加的画展，他说了什么，我又说了什么，接着我又想到了T君最近过得如何，他的儿子是否还在上学。

I imagined the picture on the wall without difficulty, and gave it a few deft touches, but this set me thinking of pictures in general, and then I remembered an art exhibition I had attended with my friend T. and what he said, and what I said, and I wondered how T. was faring these days, and whether his son was still at school.

如此继续下去，直到我发现自己沉浸在奶酪、招魂术和落基山脉的遐想之中——但仍没有睡意！

And so it went on, until I found myself meditating on cheese, or spiritualism, or the Rocky Mountains—but no sleep!

然后又想像到在《解放的普罗米修斯》中描述的那个地狱边缘的某个地方，那个充满了人类梦想和愉快想像的模糊地带，有着阴沉可怕的幽灵，一幅画歪挂在鬼影般的墙上。Somewhere in that limbo which Earth describes in Prometheus Unbound, that vague region filled with Dreams and the light imaginings of men, is the dreary phantom of an unstraightened picture upon a ghostly wall.

就让它呆在那里吧，因为我再也用不着它了。

And there it shall stay, for I have no further use for it.

但我对能找到某种加速睡眠的方法没有完全放弃希望，还看到了一线希望。重读兰姆的书信集时（这不是第一次，但愿也不是最后一次），在他写给骚塞的便条中，我看到了下面这段话：“在我办公室里有一位H先生，他从早到晚不停地写啊说啊，但总也超不出肉体和物质现实那一套！当我晚上睡不着时，我就想像着和H先生就一假设的题目进行对话，在幻想中一直和他无聊地扯下去，直到我大笑或是睡着为止，我发现这方法很灵验……”。

But I have not yet given up all hope of finding some way of hastening the approach of sleep. Even yet there is a glimmer, for re-reading (not for the first, and, please Heaven! not the last time) Lamb's letters, I came upon the following, in a note to Southey; "But there is a man in my office, a Mr. H., who proses it away from morning lo night, and never gets beyond corporal and material verities! . . .

这方法可能行得通，我们都认识一些H先生式的人，他们的谈话毫无想像力，又缺乏智慧，听了就像服了鸦片一样。今天晚上我将不再进行诸如数跳篱笆的山羊和摆正挂歪了的画之类的毫无价值的想像，而去召唤一个极度无聊、乏味的家伙来对话。

When I can't sleep o'nights, I imagine a dialogue with Mr. H. , upon a given subject, and go prosing on in fancy with him, nil I either laugh or fall asleep. I have literally found it answer. . . “There is promise in this, and we all have our Mr. H. whose talk, bare of anything like fancy and wit, acts upon us like a dose of lau-danum . This very night I will dismiss such trivial phantasies as jumping sheep and crooked pictures, and evoke the phantom of a crushing, stupendous Bore.

Lesson twelve

究竟工作是幸福还是痛苦的源泉，这可能是一个难以回答的问题。

Whether work should be placed among the causes of happiness or among the causes of unhappiness may perhaps be regarded as a doubtful question.

毫无疑问有许多工作是非常令人厌烦的，而且过多的工作总是十分痛苦的事。

There is certainly much work which is exceedingly irksome，and an excess of work is always very painful.

然而我认为，只要不过量，对多数人来说即使是最枯燥的工作也比终日无所事事要好些。

I think，however，that，provided work is not excessive in amount，even the dullest work is to most people less painful than idleness.

工作给人的愉快的程度多种多样，从仅仅是消烦解闷到产生巨大的快乐，这会随工作的性质和工作者的能力而异。

There are in work all grades，from mere relief of tedium up to the profoundest delights，

according to the nature of the work and the abilities of the worker.

大多数人不得不从事的工作本身大都无乐趣可言，但即使是这样的工作也有一些很大的好处。

Most of the work that most people have to do is not in itself interesting，but even such work has certain great advantages.

首先，工作可将一天的许多时间占满，人们不必再费神来决定应干些什么，大多数人在可以自由地按自己的愿望打发时间时，常常会不知所措，想不起有什么令人愉快的事值得去做。To begin with，it fills a good many hours of the day without the need of deciding what one shall do. Most people，when they are left free to fill their own time according to their own choice，are at a loss to think of anything sufficiently pleasant to be worth doing.

而他们的决定又总是受到干扰，觉得干别的什么事也许会更令人愉快。

And whatever they decide on，they are troubled by the feeling that something else would have been pleasanter.

能够有意义地利用闲暇时间是文明发展到最高阶段的结果，而目前很少有人能达到这一层次。

To be able to fill leisure intelligently is the last product of civilization，and at present very few people have reached this level.

何况作出选择本身就是件令人厌烦的事。

Moreover the exercise of choice is in itself tiresome.

除了那些具有非凡主动性的人，其他的人肯定有人乐于被告诉一天中的每时每刻该做什么，当然命令他们做的事不能太令人厌烦。

time and of affording some outlet，however modest，for ambition，belongs to most work，and is sufficient to make even a man whose work is dull happier on the average than a man who has no work at all. But when work is interesting，it is capable of giving satisfaction of a far higher order than mere relief from tedium.

有兴趣的工作可以按其包含乐趣的大小顺序排列，我先谈小有乐趣的工作，最后谈那些值得伟大人物投入全部精力的工作。

The kinds of work in which there is some interest may he arranged in a hierarchy. I shall begin with those which are only mildly interesting and end with those that are worthy to absorb the whole energies of a great man.

两个使工作有趣的主要因素，一是需要运用技巧，二是有建设性。

Two chief elements make work interesting：first，the exercise of skill，and second，construction.

凡是掌握了不同寻常的技巧的人都喜欢运用这种技巧，直至他感到太平常或他再也不能提高时为止。

Every man who has acquired some unusual skill enjoys exercising it until it has become a matter of course，or until he can no longer improve himself.

这种想要自我表现的动机从幼儿时代就开始了：一个能倒立的男孩总是不想用脚站立。This motive to activity begins in early childhood：a boy who can stand on his head becomes reluctant to stand on his feet.

许多工作同靠技艺取胜的游戏一样给人以快乐。

A great deal of work gives the same pleasure that is to be derived from games of skill.

律师或政治家的工作一定更愉快而且包含着许多和打桥牌同样的快乐。

The work of a lawyer or a politician must contain in a more delectable form a great deal of the

same pleasure that is to be derived from playing bridge.

当然这里不仅运用了技巧，而且还在智力较量上胜过了一个本领高超的对手。

Here of course there is not only the exercise of skill but the outwitting of a skilled opponent.

即使在不存在竞争因素的情况下，表演高难的绝技也是件令人惬意的事情。

Even where this competitive element is absent，however，the performance of difficult feats is agreeable.

能驾驶飞机进行特技飞行的人会从中获得极大的快乐，以至为此甘愿冒生命危险。

A man who can do stunts in an aero——plane finds the pleasure so great that for the sake of it he is willing to risk his life.

我想像尽管一个能干的外科医生工作时处在令人痛苦的气氛中，他还是能从精湛的手术中得到满足。

I imagine that an able surgeon，in spite of the painful circumstances in which his work is done，derives satisfaction from the exquisite precision of his operations.

从大量层次较低的工作中也能得到同样的，只是在程度上没有那么强烈的快乐。

The same kind of pleasure，though in a less intense form，is to be derived from a great deal of work of a humbler kind.

只要工作中需要的技巧不是一成不变的，或存在着不断提高的余地，那么一切需要熟练技巧的工作都会是令人愉快的。

All skilled work can be pleasurable，provided the skill required is either variable or capable of indefinite improvement.

但如不具备上述两个条件，在人们掌握的技巧达到顶峰以后，这种工作便不再有兴趣了。If these conditions are absent，it will cease to be interesting when a man has acquired his maximum skill.

一个从事3英里长跑的运动员到了不能再打破自己纪录的年龄以后，就不会再从这个职业中获得乐趣。

A man who runs three-mile races will cease to find pleasure in this occupation when he passes the age at which he can beat his own previous record.

幸而有相当数量的工作随新的情况出现而需要新的技巧，人们可以不断提高自己的技巧，至少可以一直继续到中年以后。

Fortunately there is a very considerable amount of work in which new circumstances call for new skill and a man can go on improving，at any rate until he has reached middle age.

从事某些技巧性工作的人，比如从政的人，似乎在60岁到70岁之间才达到颠峰状态，原因是在这些职业中，丰富的阅历至关重要。

In some kinds of skilled work，such as politics，for example，it seems that men are at their best between sixty and seventy，the reason being that in such occupations a wide experience of other men is essential.

因此有成就的政治家在70岁时往往会比其他同龄人幸福。

For this reason successful politicians are apt to be happier at the age of seventy than any other men of equal age.

在这一点上惟一能与他们相比的是大公司的首脑人物。

Their only competitors in this respect are the men who are the heads of big businesses.

然而最好的工作还具有另一因素，作为幸福的源泉它比运用技巧更为重要，这便是建设性。There is，however，another element possessed by the best work，which is even more important as a source of happiness than is the exercise of skill. This is the element of

constructiveness.

有些工作在完成后，结果会像纪念碑一样存在下去，尽管并非多数工作都能如此。

In some work，though by no means in most，something is built up which remains as a monument when the work is completed.

我们可以用下列标准区分是建设还是破坏。

We may distinguish construction from destruction by the following criterion.

如果是建设，则初始阶段事物较为缺少章法，而到最后阶段则体现出某个目标来；如为破坏，则正好相反，初始阶段体现出某个目标，而最后阶段则是缺少章法，也就是说，破坏者惟一的目的是制造出一个不具备某一目标的状态来。

In construction the initial state of affairs is comparatively haphazard，while the final stale of affairs embodies a purpose. In destruction the reverse is the case；the initial stale of affairs embodies a purpose，while the final state of affairs is haphazard，that is to say，all that is intended by the destroyer is to produce a state of affairs which does not embody a certain purpose.

适用这一标准的最具体最明显的一个例子，就是建造和拆除房屋。

This criterion applies in the most literal and obvious case，namely the construction and destruction of buildings.

在建造房屋时，预先制定好的方案得到实施，而在拆除房屋时没有人明确规定拆毁后残砖烂瓦应如何处置。

In constructing a building a previously made plan is carried out，whereas in destroying it no one decides exactly how the materials are to lie when the demolition is completed.

当然破坏常常是随之而来的建设的必要前提，在这种情况下它便成了整个建设的一部分。Destruction is of course necessary very often as a preliminary to subsequent construction，in that case it is part of a whole which is constructive.

但有时一个人从事的活动旨在破坏而不是考虑此后可能进行的建设活动，他常常会标榜自己是为了重新建设而扫平一切，但一般说来如果这是个借口，只要问他随后的建设是什么样就会揭穿他。人们会发现在这一问题上他会含糊其词，毫无热情，但对于作为准备工作的破坏他却津津乐道，谈得十分具体。

But not infrequently a man will engage in activities of which the purpose is destructive without regard to any construction that may come after. Frequently he will conceal this from himself by the belief that he is only sweeping sway in order to build afresh，but it is generally possible to unmask this pretense，when it is a pretense，by asking him what the subsequent construction is to he. On this subject it will be found that he will speak vaguely and without enthusiasm，whereas on the preliminary destruction he has spoken precisely and with zest.

不少的革命者、尚武分子及其他暴力的信徒们就是如此。

This applies to not a few revolutionaries and militarists and other apostles of violence.

他们为仇恨所驱使，但自己往往还没意识到这一点……他们的真正目的是毁灭他们所仇恨的事物，相对来说对随后应做什么的问题并不关心。

They are actuated，usually without their own knowledge，by hatred：the destruction of what they hate is their real purpose，and they are comparatively indifferent to the question what is to come after it.

我无法否认从事破坏性工作和从事建设性工作一样也可能有快乐。

Now I cannot deny that in the work of destruction as in the work of construction there may be joy.

这是一种更为狂暴的快乐，也许有时更为强烈，但却不能给人以那种更深的满足，因为从它的结果中几乎找不到什么满足。

It is a fiercer joy，perhaps at moments more intense，but it is less profoundly satisfying，since the result is one in which little satisfaction is to be found.

你杀死了敌人，他死了你的职业就不存在了，你从胜利中得来的满足很快就消失了。

You kill your enemy，and when he is dead your occupation is gone，and the satisfaction that you derive from victory quickly fades.

从另一方面来说，建设性的工作在完成后一回想起来就令人愉快，而且这种永远也不会做到再也无事可做的地步。

The work of construction，on the other hand，when completed，is delightful to contemplate，and moreover is never so fully completed that there is nothing further to do about it.

最令人满意的目标是那些能永远从一个成功通向另一个成功而从不会走进死胡同的目标，在这个方面人们会发现建设比破坏更能带给人幸福。

The most satisfactory purposes are those that lead on indefinitely from one success to another without ever coming to a dead end；and in this respect it will be found that construction is a greater source of happiness than destruction.

也许更准确的说法应该是，在建设中寻求满足的人得到的满足要比热衷破坏建设的人从破坏中得到的满足更大，因为你一旦变得满腔仇恨，就很难从建设中得到别的人从中得到的乐趣。Perhaps it would be more correct to say that those who find satisfaction in construction find in it greater satisfaction than the lovers of destruction can find in destruction，for if once you have become filled with hate you will not easily derive from construction the pleasure which another man would derive from it.

工作最好的情况下收入才不再被用作当然的衡量标准。

It is only where the best work is concerned that this measure ceases to be the natural one to apply.

人们想增加收入当然是出自钱多了可以获得更多的舒适享受这一愿望，但同样也出自想获得成功的愿望。

The desire that men feel to increase their income is quite as much a desire for success as for the extra comforts that a higher income can procure.

无论工作多么枯燥单调，如果它是能够使人逐渐成名的手段，无论是在世界上出名还是就在自己的圈子里出名，那么这工作就不再难以忍受了。

However dull work may be，it becomes bearable if it is a means of building up a reputation，whether in the world at large or only in one's own circle.

归根结底，幸福的最重要的因素之一是有始终如一的目的。而对多数人来说这样的目的主要来自他们的工作。

Continuity of purpose is one of the most essential ingredients of happiness in the long run，and for most men this comes chiefly through their work.

在这一点上，终日从事家务的妇女便远不如男子幸运，也没有走出家庭参加工作的妇女幸运。In this respect those women whose lives are occupied with housework are much less fortunate than men，or than women who work outside the home.

家庭妇女没有工资，无法改善自己的状况，她所干的一切在她的丈夫看来都是理所当然的（她的丈夫对此几乎是熟视无睹），丈夫欣赏的不是她干的家务活，而是她的其他品质。

The domesticated wife does not receive wages，has no means of bettering herself，is taken for granted by her hu and （who sees practically nothing of what she does），and is valued by him

not for her housework but for quite other qualities.

当然对那些有足够的钱可以把住宅和花园搞得十分漂亮而成为邻居们的羡慕对象的女人来说，情况就不一样，但这样的女人相对来说数量较少，对于大多数妇女，家务带给她们的满足远不如其他工作带给男子或职业妇女的满足。

Of course this does not apply to those women who are sufficiently well-to-do to make beautiful houses and beautiful gardens and become the envy of their neighbors；but such women are comparatively few，and for the great majority housework cannot bring as much satisfaction as work of other kinds brings to men and to professional women.

多数工作都能使人满意地消磨掉时间，而且给人们实现抱负提供某种令人满意的途径，虽然这途径不起眼。一般说来这种满足足以使一个即使工作枯燥无味的人也比无事可做的人感到快乐。但如果从事的是有趣的工作，就能给人带来比仅仅是解闷高级得多的满足。

大学高级英语课文翻译

第一课救赎 ----兰斯顿.休斯 在我快13岁那年，我的灵魂得到了拯救，然而并不是真正意义上的救赎。事情是这样的。那时我的阿姨里德所在的教堂正在举行一场盛大的宗教复兴晚会。数个星期以来每个夜晚，人们在那里讲道，唱诵，祈祷。连一些罪孽深重的人都获得了耶稣的救赎，教堂的成员一下子增多了。就在复兴晚会结束之前，他们为孩子们举行了一次特殊的集会——把小羊羔带回羊圈。里德阿姨数日之前就开始和我提这件事。那天晚上，我和其他还没有得到主宽恕的小忏悔者们被送去坐在教堂前排,那是为祷告的人安排的座椅。 我的阿姨告诉我说：“当你看到耶稣的时候，你看见一道光，然后感觉心里似乎有什么发生。从此以后耶稣就进入了你的生命，他将与你同在。你能够看见、听到、感受到他和你的灵魂融为一体。”我相信里德阿姨说的，许多老人都这么说，似乎她们都应该知道。尽管教堂里面拥挤而闷热，我依然静静地坐在那里，等待耶稣的到来。 布道师祷告，富有节奏，非常精彩。呻吟、喊叫、寂寞的呼喊，还有地狱中令人恐怖的画面。然后他唱了一首赞美诗。诗中描述了99只羊都安逸的待在圈里，唯有一个被冷落在外的情形。唱完后他说道：“难道你不来吗？不来到耶稣身旁吗？小羊羔们，难道你们不来吗？”他向坐在祷告席上的小忏悔者们打开了双臂，小女孩们开始哭了，她们中有一些很快跳了起来，跑了过去。我们大多数仍然坐在那里。 许多长辈过来跪在我们的身边开始祷告。老妇人的脸像煤炭一样黑，头上扎着辫子，老爷爷的手因长年的工作而粗糙皲裂。他们吟唱着“点燃微弱的灯，让可怜的灵魂得到救赎”的诗歌。整个教堂里到处都是祈祷者的歌声。 最后其他所有小忏悔者们都去了圣坛上，得到了救赎，除了一个男孩和依然静静地坐着等侯的我。那个男孩是一个守夜人的儿子，名字叫威斯特里。在我们的周围尽是祈祷的修女执事。教堂里异常闷热，天色也越来越暗了。最后威斯特里小声对我说：“去他妈的上帝。我再也坐不住了，我们站起来吧，就可以得到救赎了。”于是他就站了起来，也因此得到了救赎。 祈祷席上只剩下我一个人孤零零的。里德阿姨走过来，开始跪在我的旁边，小声哭泣。祷告者的诵诗充满了整个教堂。所有人都在为我一个人祈祷，时而呻吟时而呼号。我依然很平静的等待耶稣，等待等待——可是他没有来。我希望可以看见他，可是什么都没有发生。我希望有些事发生，可什么都没有变化。 我听见大主教说：“为什么你不来呢？我亲爱的孩子，为什么你不来到耶稣身边？他正等着你。他需要你。为什么你不来呢？里德修女，这个孩子叫什么名字？” “休斯顿。“我的阿姨啜泣着说。”休斯顿，你为什么不过来，得到救赎呢哦上帝的小羊羔啊，你为什么不过来呢？“现在天真的黑了。我开始惭愧，是自己把他们托得这么晚。我开始想上帝会怎么认为威斯特里。他当然也没有看见主，但现在正骄傲地坐在圣坛上，晃着灯笼裤的褪，露齿嘲笑我。周围围着一群跪着祈祷的老女人。上帝并没有因为他亵渎神灵或在教堂里撒谎而惩罚他。所以我决定也许为了省去更多的麻烦，我最好也撒谎，说耶稣已经来了，然后站起来，得到救赎。 于是我站了起来。 整个屋子突然成了欢呼的海洋，当她们看见我站起来时。欢呼声一阵接着一阵。女人们跳了起来。我的阿姨拥抱了我，大主教拉起我的手，把我牵到了主席台上。 当一切渐渐平息的时候，教堂安静了下来，只听见几声愉悦的阿门。所有的小羊羔们都得到了上帝的祝福。教堂里充满了欢悦的吟唱。 但那天晚上我却哭了。那是我一生倒数第二次哭泣，因为我已经是个12岁的大男孩了。我独自一人躺在床上，哭泣不已。担心里德阿姨会听到，我把头埋在被子下面。她还是醒了，告诉我的叔叔说：“我哭是因为神圣的上帝进入了我的生命，因为我看见了耶稣。但是我哭的真正原因是我羞于告诉她我撒谎了，我骗了教堂里所有人。我没有看见耶稣，我也不再相信有一个耶稣，因为他没有来拯救我。 第二课名字游戏 约翰·史密斯正朝我走过来。虽然他只是我的一个很平常的熟人，但按照美国人的问候习惯，我得说出那么几个字来（如：“你好！”或“早上好！”之类的话。）向他表示我的好意。然而，我该怎么叫他呢？叫他约翰？或是史密斯？或者史密斯医生？像这样的问题在平常，是不用思考的事情。 对于在美国土生土长讲美语的人来说，我们长大后，学会语法规则的同时也学会了称呼别人的规则。乍一想，我们会认为仔细去考察我们称呼的方式是一件不值得做的事情，然而正是这些称呼的方式揭示了我们对同一个语言社区的人们的主观看法。 首先，我们会用讲话者的年龄关系去判断使用的称呼是否合适。如果我们招呼的是个孩子，那么我们就可以毫无顾虑地忽略那些无意之中学来的规则，而简单地直呼其名（FN）。然而，孩子却要用“头衔+姓氏”的方式来招呼大人。

高级英语下lesson13课文翻译

Lesson Thirteen Work 工作 究竟工作是幸福还是痛苦的源泉，这可能是一个难以回答的问题。 Whether work should be placed among the causes of happiness or among the causes of unhappiness may perhaps be regarded as a doubtful question. 毫无疑问有许多工作是非常令人厌烦的，而且过多的工作总是十分痛苦的事。 There is certainly much work which is exceedingly irksome, and an excess of work is always very painful. 然而我认为，只要不过量，对多数人来说即使是最枯燥的工作也比终日无所事事要好些。 I think, however, that, provided work is not excessive in amount, even the dullest work is to most people less painful than idleness. 工作给人的愉快的程度多种多样，从仅仅是消烦解闷到产生巨大的快乐，这会随工作的性质和工 作者的能力而异。 There are in work all grades, from mere relief of tedium up to the profoundest delights, according to the nature of the work and the abilities of the worker. 大多数人不得不从事的工作本身大都无乐趣可言，但即使是这样的工作也有一些很大的好处。Most of the work that most people have to do is not in itself interesting, but even such work has certain great advantages. 首先，工作可将一天的许多时间占满，人们不必再费神来决定应干些什么，大多数人在可以自由地按自己的愿望打发时间时，常常会不知所措，想不起有什么令人愉快的事值得去做。 To begin with, it fills a good many hours of the day without the need of deciding what one shall do. Most people, when they are left free to fill their own time according to their own choice, are at a loss to think of anything sufficiently pleasant to be worth doing. 而他们的决定又总是受到干扰，觉得干别的什么事也许会更令人愉快。 And whatever they decide on, they are troubled by the feeling that something else would have been pleasanter. 能够有意义地利用闲暇时间是文明发展到最高阶段的结果，而目前很少有人能达到这一层次。To be able to fill leisure intelligently is the last product of civilization, and at present very few people have reached this level. 何况作出选择本身就是件令人厌烦的事。 Moreover the exercise of choice is in itself tiresome. 除了那些具有非凡主动性的人，其他的人肯定有人乐于被告诉一天中的每时每刻该做什么， 当然命令他们做的事不能太令人厌烦。 Except to people with unusual initiative it is positively agreeable to be told what to do at each hour of the day, provided the orders are not too unpleasant. 多数无所事事的阔佬免遭从事单调乏味工作之苦，但代价是莫名其妙的无聊。 Most of the idle rich suffer unspeakable boredom as the price of their freedom from drudgery. 有时他们去非洲猎取巨兽或环绕世界飞行来解闷，但这类刺激的数量有限，尤其到了中年以后更 是如此。 At times they may find relief by hunting big game in Africa, or by flying round the world, but the number of such sensations is limited, especially after youth is past. 因此较为明智的阔佬们工作起来几乎像穷人一样卖力，而有钱的女人则大多忙于她们自以为

高级英语上册第五课翻译范文

关于希特勒入侵苏联的讲话 二十二日星期天早晨，我一醒来便接到了希特勒入侵苏联的消息。这就使原先意料中的事变成了无可怀疑的事实。我完全清楚我们对此应该承担何种义务，采取何种政策。我也完全清楚该如何就此事发表声明。尚待完成的只不过是将这一切形成文字而已。于是，我吩咐有关部门立即发表通告，我将于当晚九点钟发表广播讲话。不一会儿，匆匆从伦敦赶到的迪尔将军走进我的卧室，为我带来了详细情报。德国人已大规模入侵苏联，苏联空军部队有很大一部分飞机都没来得及起飞便遭到德军的突袭。德军目前似乎正以凌厉的攻势极为迅猛地向前推进。这位皇家军队总参谋长报告完毕后又补了一句，“我估计他们将会大批地被包围。” 一整天我都在写讲稿，根本没有时间去找战时内阁进行磋商，也没有必要这样做。我知道我们大家在这个问题上的立场是完全一致的。艾登先生、比弗布鲁克勋爵，还有斯塔福德?克里普斯爵士——他是十号离开莫斯科回国的——那天也同我在一 起。 那个周末值班的是我的私人秘书科维尔先生。由他执笔记述的下面这段关于那个星期天里切克 尔斯首相官邸发生的情况的文字，也许值得一提： “六月二十一日，星期六。晚饭前我来到切克尔斯首相官邸。怀南特夫妇、艾登夫妇和爱德华?布里奇斯等几位均在那儿。晚饭席上，邱吉尔先生说，德国人人侵苏联已是必然无疑的了。他认为希特勒是想指望博取英美两国的资本家和右冀势力的同情和支持。不过，希特勒的如意算盘打错了。 我们英国将会全力以赴援助苏联。维南特表示美国也会采取同样的态度。 晚饭后，当我同邱吉尔先生在槌球场上散步时，他又一次谈到了这一话题。我当时问他，对于他这个头号反共大将来说，这种态度是否意味着改变自己的政治立场。‘绝非如此。我现在的目标只有一个，即消灭希特勒。这使我的生活单纯多了。假使希特勒入侵地狱，我至少会在下议院替魔 鬼说几句好话的。’ 次日清晨四点钟，我被电话铃惊醒，原来是外交部来的电话，内容是报告德国已开始进攻俄国的消息。首相一向吩咐，只有当英国遭到入侵时才可以叫醒他。因此，我等到八点钟才向他报告这一消息。他听完消息后只说了一句话：‘通知英国广播电台，我今晚九点要发表广播讲话。’他从上午十一点开始撰写讲稿，中间除与斯塔福德．克里普斯爵士、克兰伯恩勋爵和比弗布鲁克勋爵共进午餐外，这一天的全部时间都花在写讲稿上了……讲稿直到九点差二十分才写好。” 在这次广播讲话中，我说道： “纳粹政体与共产主义的最糟糕之处毫无两样。除了贪欲和种族统治外，它没有任何指导思想和行动准则。它在残酷压迫和疯狂侵略过程中所犯下的滔天罪行在人类历史上可谓空前绝后。在过去的二十五年中，我比任何人都更坚定而始终如一地反对共产主义。过去对共产主义所作的批评我仍然一句也不想收回。但现在展现在我们面前的景象已经将那一切冲得烟消云散了。过去的一切，连同它的种种罪恶、蠢行和悲剧全都从眼前乍然消失。此刻我眼前看到的是俄国的士兵昂然挺立于自己的国土，英勇地捍卫着他们祖祖辈辈自古以来一直辛勤耕耘着的土地。我看到他们正在守卫着自己的家园，在那里母亲和妻子正在向上帝祈祷——是啊，任何人都总有祈祷的时候——祈求上帝保佑她们的亲人的平安，并保佑她们的壮劳力、她们的勇士和保护者凯旋归来。我看见成千上万的俄国村庄，那儿的人们虽然要靠在土地上辛勤耕作才能勉强维持生计，却依然能够享受到天伦之乐，那儿的姑娘在欢笑，儿童在嬉戏。我看到这一切正面临着凶暴的袭击，正杀气腾腾地扑向他们的是纳粹的战争机器同它的那些全副武装、刀剑当当有声、皮靴咚咚作响的普鲁士军官以及它的那些奸诈无比、刚刚帮它征服并奴役了十多个国家的帮凶爪牙。我还看到那些呆头呆脑、训练有素、既驯服听话又凶残野蛮的德国士兵像一群蝗虫般地向前蠕动着。我看见天空中那些屡遭英军痛击、余悸未消的德国轰炸机和战斗机此时正庆幸终于找到他们以为是无力反抗、可手到即擒的猎物。“在

自考高级英语上册11课课文翻译

Lesson Eleven On Getting off to Sleep谈睡眠 人真是充满矛盾啊! 毫无疑问，幽默是惟一帮助我们摆脱矛盾的办法，要是没有它，我们就会死于烦恼。 What a bundle of contradictions is a man! Surety, humour is the saving grace of us, for without it we should die of vexation. 在我看来，没有什么比睡眠更能说明事物间的矛盾。 With me, nothing illustrates the contrariness of things better than the matter of sleep. 比如，我打算写一篇文章，面前放好了笔、墨和几张白纸，准保没写几个字我就会困得要命，无论当时是几点都会那样。 If, for example, my intention is to write an essay, and 1 have before me ink and pens and several sheets of virgin paper, you may depend upon it that before I have gone very far I feel an overpowering desire for sleep, no matter what time of the day it is. 我瞪着那似乎在谴责我的白纸，直到眼前一片模糊，声音也难以辨清，只有靠意志力才能勉强坚持。 I stare at the reproachfully blank paper until sights and sounds become dim and confused, and it is only by an effort of will that I can continue at all. 即使这时，我也会迷迷糊糊地像在做梦一样继续坚持工作。 Even then, I proceed half-heartedly, in a kind of dream. 但是当深夜躺在床上，我什么事都能干，只有睡觉无法做到。 But let me be between the sheets at a late hour, and I can do any-thing but sleep. 随着时钟一遍一遍的报时，我可以完成大量的文章。 Between chime and chime of the clock I can write essays by the score. 极有吸引力的主题和崇高的思想纷纷出现在脑海，随之而来的还有恰如其分的意象和措辞。Fascinating subjects and noble ideas come pell-mell, each with its appropriate imagery and expression. 除了笔、墨和纸，什么也不能阻止我写出半打不朽的杰作。 Nothing stands between me and half-a-dozen imperishable masterpieces but pens, ink, and paper. 如果，我们的思想和主观意象对于来世的人来说真的就像我们的书本和图片一样是有形的、摸得着的，那么我在来世会比在今生获得更高的声誉。 If it be true that our thoughts and mental images are perfectly tangible things, like our books and pictures, to the inhabitants of the next world, then I am making for myself a better reputation there than I am in this place. 只要我躺在床上有一两个小时睡不着觉，我就能令自己满意地解决人类一切的疑虑。 Give me a restless hour or two in bed and I can solve, to my own satisfaction, all the doubts of humanity. 如果我有兴致的话，我可以谱写出宏伟的交响乐，描绘出壮丽的画卷。 When I am in the humour I can compose grand symphonies, and paint magnificent pictures. 我就是莎士比亚、贝多芬和米开朗基罗。但这一切仍无法令我满意，因为我还是无法入睡。

大学高级英语下册翻译.pdf

Lesson One 1.This picture brings back many pleasant memories of her Spanish holiday. 2.News and weather forecasts reports are staples of radio programmes. 3.By mere accident Tom met in a bar his long-lost brother who was thought to have been killed in action during the war. 4.Bill intuited something criminal in their plan. 5.They think that obsessive tidiness in factory is a bad sign . 6.Yesterday his mother sold several years’ worth of paper and magazines. 7.His heartening speech impelled us to (work with) greater efforts. 8.Those who enjoy pulling off a miracle often fail. 9.As language students we should have a sense of nuances of plain words and expressions. 10.The rude behavior of Mrs. Taylor’s ado pted son is driving her into a nervous breakdown. 11.I like to see films in general, and American Western and horrors in particular. 12.In some sense Mary saw in her aunt a surrogate of her mother. 13.My father never equivocated, and he always gave some brief but poignant opinions. 14.Though he disabled, he never tries of helping people. 15.In any country, those who are remiss in their duty must be severely punished. 16.Awareness of the fact that the child was in danger impelled the policeman to action. Lesson 2 1. A. The chances are that they will be held up by traffic on their way to the airport. B. the plane takes off at 6:35. It would be a pity if they couldn’t make it. 2.Another popular notion which is in fact a misconception is that expensive clothes invariably raise one’s status. 3.Can you imagine what kind of life a man has lived who aspires to excellence and abhors mediocrity? 4. A copy of our latest product catalogue will be sent free of charge if you will fill up the form on the reverse of this card and post it. 5.It will be an absurdity, if not a catastrophe. If half of the population of this city abandons their posts and goes in for business. 6.Because they want their kids to be somebodies, some well-intentioned parents exercise enormous pressures on their children and the results all too often prove the reverse. 7.The revered professor predicted that these brilliant young people would surely make their way in the scientific-technical realm in a few years. 8.Many writers have quitted writing stories because, as they say there is no market for them. Yet Lessing sticks and she would go on even if there really wasn’t any home for them but a private drawer. 9.Satire under his pen is only a means to an end, a form to expose social evils. 10.It seemed no body at the party, not even the reporters, made special note of the general’s absence which might have aroused the suspicion of his rivals.

自考英语本科高级英语上下册课后短文翻译

1 Rock music began in America in the late 1950’s . It was not only a new musical form , but a forum for the American youth to express their ideas of the world and life . In this forum , the stars sang out the attitudes of the youth towards civil rights , war and peace ,the disaffection of their society , and a range of emotions between love and hate . Allin all , in this forum , the American youth redefined the beliefs and feelings of their society . The typical representatives of the early rock music were Elvis Presley , singer and poet Bob Dylan , the Bealtles , the rolling Stones and so on . They were the culture heroes whom the young people worshipped . 2 The American young people in 1960’s were a generation of rebellion . They found that the affluent American society was filled with poverty , injustice and gypocrisy . They didn’t trust the adult world that didn’t belong to them and refused to take their beliefs and values . Many young people took active part in the struggle which protested against poverty , racial discrimination and Vietnam War . Some young people even tried to overthrow this world by armed revolution. Many other young took passive ways to show their disaffections . They took drugs , refused to take any responsibilities and lived a parasitic way of life . Or they escaped to the frontiers and lived a primitive way of life . 3 Mathilda had been ill for three days . Her mother had given her some medicine, but it did n’t do any good . So they had to ask the doctor to come . There had been a number of cases of diphtheria in Mathilda’s school and two of them had been dead . When the doctor arrived at Olson’s home , he wanted to examine Mthilda’s throat first . But no mat ter how he coaxed ,,She wouldn’t open her mouth . So the doctor had to get the tongue depressor into her mouth . But Mathilda reduced it to splinters . In order to protect Mathilda herself and other children , the doctor had to make sure

高级英语下lesson 13课文翻译

Lesson Thirteen Work工作 究竟工作是幸福还是痛苦的源泉，这可能是一个难以回答的问题。 Whether work should be placed among the causes of happiness or among the causes of unhappiness may perhaps be regarded as a doubtful question. 毫无疑问有许多工作是非常令人厌烦的，而且过多的工作总是十分痛苦的事。 There is certainly much work which is exceedingly irksome, and an excess of work is always very painful. 然而我认为，只要不过量，对多数人来说即使是最枯燥的工作也比终日无所事事要好些。 I think, however, that, provided work is not excessive in amount, even the dullest work is to most people less painful than idleness. 工作给人的愉快的程度多种多样，从仅仅是消烦解闷到产生巨大的快乐，这会随工作的性质和工作者的能力而异。 There are in work all grades, from mere relief of tedium up to the profoundest delights, according to the nature of the work and the abilities of the worker. 大多数人不得不从事的工作本身大都无乐趣可言，但即使是这样的工作也有一些很大的好处。 Most of the work that most people have to do is not in itself interesting, but even such work has certain great advantages. 首先，工作可将一天的许多时间占满，人们不必再费神来决定应干些什么，大多数人在可以自由地按自己的愿望打发时间时，常常会不知所措，想不起有什么令人愉快的事值得去做。To begin with, it fills a good many hours of the day without the need of deciding what one shall do. Most people, when they are left free to fill their own time according to their own choice, are at a loss to think of anything sufficiently pleasant to be worth doing. 而他们的决定又总是受到干扰，觉得干别的什么事也许会更令人愉快。

(完整版)高级英语2第三版_张汉熙_课文翻译

Unit 1 Pub Talk and the King’s English 人类的一切活动中，只有闲谈最宜于增进友谊，而且是人类特有的一种活动。动物之间的信息交流，不论其方式何等复杂，也是称不上交谈的。 闲谈的引人人胜之处就在于它没有一个事先定好的话题。它时而迂回流淌，时而奔腾起伏，时而火花四射，时而热情洋溢，话题最终会扯到什么地方去谁也拿不准。要是有人觉得“有些话要说”，那定会大煞风景，使闲聊无趣。闲聊不是为了进行争论。闲聊中常常会有争论，不过其目的并不是为了说服对方。闲聊之中是不存在什么输赢胜负的。事实上，真正善于闲聊的人往往是随时准备让步的。也许他们偶然间会觉得该把自己最得意的奇闻轶事选出一件插进来讲一讲，但一转眼大家已谈到别处去了，插话的机会随之而失，他们也就听之任之。 或许是由于我从小混迹于英国小酒馆的缘故吧，我觉得酒瞎里的闲聊别有韵味。酒馆里的朋友对别人的生活毫无了解，他们只是临时凑到一起来的，彼此并无深交。他们之中也许有人面临婚因破裂，或恋爱失败，或碰到别的什么不顺心的事儿，但别人根本不管这些。他们就像大仲马笔下的三个火枪手一样，虽然日夕相处，却从不过问彼此的私事，也不去揣摸别人内心的秘密。 有一天晚上的情形正是这样。人们正漫无边际地东扯西拉，从最普通的凡人俗事谈到有关木星的科学趣闻。谈了半天也没有一个中心话题，事实上也不需要有一个中心话题。可突然间大伙儿的话题都集中到了一处，中心话题奇迹般地出现了。我记不起她那句话是在什么情况下说出来的——她显然不是预先想好把那句话带到酒馆里来说的，那也不是什么非说不可的要紧话——我只知道她那句话是随着大伙儿的话题十分自然地脱口而出的。 “几天前，我听到一个人说‘标准英语’这个词语是带贬义的批评用语，指的是人们应该尽量避免使用的英语。” 此语一出，谈话立即热烈起来。有人赞成，也有人怒斥，还有人则不以为然。最后，当然少不了要像处理所有这种场合下的意见分歧一样，由大家说定次日一早去查证一下。于是，问题便解决了。不过，酒馆闲聊并不需要解决什么问题，大伙儿仍旧可以糊里糊涂地继续闲扯下去。 告诉她“标准英语”应作那种解释的原来是个澳大利亚人。得悉此情，有些人便说起刻薄话来了，说什么囚犯的子孙这样说倒也不足为怪。这样，在五分钟内，大家便像到澳大利亚游览了一趟。在那样的社会里，“标准英语”自然是不受欢迎的。每当上流社会想给“规范英语”制订一些条条框框时，总会遭到下层人民的抵制。 看看撒克逊农民与征服他们的诺曼底统治者之间的语言隔阂吧。于是话题又从19世纪的澳大利亚囚犯转到12世纪的英国农民。谁对谁错，并没有关系。闲聊依旧热火朝天。 有人举出了一个人所共知，但仍值得提出来发人深思的例子。我们谈到饭桌上的肉食时用法语词，而谈到提供这些肉食的牲畜时则用盎格鲁一撒克逊词。猪圈里的活猪叫pig，饭桌上吃的猪肉便成了pork(来自法语pore)；地里放牧着的牛叫cattle，席上吃的牛肉则叫beef(来自法语boeuf)；Chicken用作肉食时变成poultry(来自法语poulet)；calf加工成肉则变成veal(来自法语vcau)。即便我们的菜单没有为了装洋耍派头而写成法语，我们所用的英语仍然是诺曼底式的英语。这一切向我们昭示了诺曼底人征服之后英国文化上所存在的深刻的阶级裂痕。 撒克逊农民种地养畜，自己出产的肉自己却吃不起，全都送上了诺曼底人的餐桌。农民们只能吃到在地里乱窜的兔子。兔子肉因为便宜，诺曼底贵族自然不屑去吃它。因此，活兔子和吃的兔子肉共用rabbit 这个词表示，而没有换成由法语lapin转化而来的某个词。 当我们今天听着有关双语教育问题的争论时，我们应该设身处地替当时的撒克逊农民想一想，新的统治阶级把法语用来对抗撒克逊农民自己的语言，从而在农民周围筑起一道文化障碍。当英国人在像觉醒者赫里沃德这样的撒克逊领袖领导下起来造反时，他们一定深深地感受到了文化上的屈辱。“标准英语”——如果那时候有这个名词的话——已经变成法语。而九百年后我们在美国这儿仍然继承了这种影响。 那晚闲聊过后，第二天一早便有人去查阅了资料。这个名词在16世纪已有人使用过。纳什作于1593年的《截获信函奇闻》中就有过“标准英语”(Queen’s English)的提法。1602年德克写到某人时有句话说：

大学高级英语下册翻译

Lesson One 1. This picture brings back many pleasant memories of her Spanish holiday. 2. News and weather forecasts reports are staples of radio programmes. 3. By mere accident Tom met in a bar his long-lost brother who was thought to have been killed in action during the war. 4. Bill intuited something criminal in their plan. 5. They think that obsessive tidiness in factory is a bad sign . 6. Yesterday his mother sold several years’ worth of paper and magazines. 7. His heartening speech impelled us to (work with) greater efforts. 8. Those who enjoy pulling off a miracle often fail. 9. As language students we should have a sense of nuances of plain words and expressions. 10. The rude behavior of Mrs. Taylor’s adopted son is driving her into a nervous breakdown. 11. I like to see films in general, and American Western and horrors in particular. 12. In some sense Mary saw in her aunt a surrogate of her mother. 13. My father never equivocated, and he always gave some brief but poignant opinions. 14. Though he disabled, he never tries of helping people. 15. In any country, those who are remiss in their duty must be severely punished. 16. Awareness of the fact that the child was in danger impelled the policeman to action. Lesson 2 1. A. The chances are that they will be held up by traffic on their way to the airport. B. the plane takes off at 6:35. It would be a pity if they couldn’t make it. 2. Another popular notion which is in fact a misconception is that expensive clothes invariably raise one’s status. 3. Can you imagine what kind of life a man has lived who aspires to excellence and abhors mediocrity 4. A copy of our latest product catalogue will be sent free of charge if you will fill up the form on the reverse of this card and post it. 5. It will be an absurdity, if not a catastrophe. If half of the population of this city abandons their posts and goes in for business. 6. Because they want their kids to be somebodies, some well-intentioned parents exercise enormous pressures on their children and the results all too often prove the reverse. 7. The revered professor predicted that these brilliant young people would surely make their way in the scientific-technical realm in a few years.

高级英语课文翻译

青年人的四种选择 Lesson 2: Four Choices for Young People 在毕业前不久，斯坦福大学四年级主席吉姆?宾司给我写了一封信，信中谈及他的一些不安。 Shortly before his graduation, Jim Binns, president of the senior class at Stanford University, wrote me about some of his misgivings. 他写道：“与其他任何一代人相比，我们这一代人在看待成人世界时抱有更大的疑虑 ,, 同时越 来越倾向于全盘否定成人世界。” “More than any other generation, ” he said, “ our generation views the adult world with great skepticism, there is also an increased tendency to reject completely that world. ”很 明显，他的话代表了许多同龄人的看法。 Apparently he speaks for a lot of his contemporaries. 在过去的几年里，我倾听过许多年轻人的谈话，他们有的还在大学读书，有的已经毕业，他 们对于成人的世界同样感到不安。 During the last few years, I have listened to scores of young people, in college and out, who were just as nervous about the grown world. 大致来说，他们的态度可归纳如下：“这个世界乱糟糟的，到处充满了不平等、贫困和战争。 对此该负责的大概应是那些管理这个世界的成年人吧。如果他们不能做得比这些更好，他们又能拿 什么来教育我们呢？这样的教导，我们根本不需要。” Roughly, their attitude might be summed up about like this:“ The world is in pretty much of a mess, full of injustice, poverty, and war. The people responsible are, presumably, the adults who have been running thing. If they can’ t do better than that, what have they got to teach our generation? That kind of lesson we can do without. ” 我觉得这些结论合情合理，至少从他们的角度来看是这样的。 There conclusions strike me as reasonable, at least from their point of view. 对成长中的一代人来说，相关的问题不是我们的社会是否完美（我们可以想当然地认为是这 样），而是应该如何去应付它。 The relevant question for the arriving generation is not whether our society is imperfect (we can take that for granted), but how to deal with it. 尽管这个社会严酷而不合情理，但它毕竟是我们惟一拥有的世界。 For all its harshness and irrationality, it is the only world we’ ve got. 因此，选择一个办法去应付这个社会是刚刚步入成年的年轻人必须作出的第一个决定，这通 常是他们一生中最重要的决定。 Choosing a strategy to cope with it, then, is the first decision young adults have to make, and usually the most important decision of their lifetime. 根据我的发现，他们的基本选择只有四种： So far as I have been able to discover, there are only four basic alternatives: 1）脱离传统社会