The Swing
By Mary Gavell
As she grew old, she began to dream again. She had not dreamed much in her middle years; or, if she had , the busyness of her days, converging on her the moment she awoke, had pushed her dreams right out of her head, and any fragments that remained were as busy and prosaic as the day itself. She had only the one son, James, but she had also mothered her younger sister after their parents died, and she had done all of the office work during the years when her husband’s small engineering firm was getting on its feet. And Julius’s health had not been too good, even then; it was she who had mowed the lawn and had helped Jamie to learn to ride his bicycle and pitched balls to him in the backyard until he learned to hit them.
But she was dreaming again now, as she had when she was a child. Oh, not the lovely foolish dreams of finding oneself alone in a candy store, or the horrible dreams of being pursued through endless corridors without doors by nameless terrors. But as her days grew in quietness and solitude – for James was grown and gone, and Julius was drawing in upon himself, becoming every day more small and chill and dim –color and life and drama were returning to her dreams.
But on that first night when she heard the creak of the swing, she did not think that she was dreaming at all. She had been lying in bed quite awake, she thought, in the little room that used to be Jamie’s –for nowadays her reading in bed, and afterward her tossing and turning, disturbed Julius. The swing was not an ordinary one. Julius had put it up, in one of the few flashes of poetry in all his worrisome, hardworking life, when Jamie was only a baby and nowhere near old enough to swing in it. The ladder Julius had was not tall enough, and he had to buy a new one, for the tree was tremendous and the branch on which he proposed to hang the swing arched a full forty feet from the ground, and much thought and consideration and care were given to the chain, and the hooks, and the seat. The swing was suspended from so high, and its arc was so wide, that riding in it was like sailing through the air with the leisurely swoop of a wheeling bird. One seemed to travel from one horizon to the other. And how proud Julius had been of it when Jamie was old enough to swing in it, and the neighborhood children had stood around to admire and be given a turn, for there was no other swing like it.
The swing was hardly ever used now; it was only a treat, once in a while, for a visiting child, and occasionally when she was outside working in her flower border she would sit and rest in it for a moment or two, idling, pushing herself a little with a toe. But the rhythmic creak of the chains was so familiar that she could not mistake it, she thought. Could the wind be strong enough to move it, if it came from the right angle? She finally gave up thinking about it and went to sleep.
Nor did she think of it the next day, for they were due for Sunday dinner at James’s house. He lived in a suburb on the opposite side of the city – just the right distance away, she often thought, far enough so that aging parents could not meddle
and embarrass and interfere, but near enough so that she could see him fairly often. She loved him with all her heart, her dear, her only son. She was enormously proud of him, too; he was a highly paid mathematician in a research foundation, and expert in a field so esoteric that she had given up trying to grasp its point. But secretly she took some credit, for it was she – who had kept the engineering firm’s books balanced and done the income tax – who had played little mathematical games with him before he had ever gone to school and had sat cross-legged with him on the floor tossing coins to test the law of probability. Oh, they had had fun together in all sorts of ways; they had done crossword puzzles together, and studied the stars together, and read books together that were over his head and sometimes over hers too. And he had turned out well; he was a scholar, and a success, and a worthy citizen, and he had a pretty wife, a charming home, and two handsome children. She could not have asked for more. He was the light and the warmth of her life, and her heart beat fast on the way to his house.
She drove. She had always enjoyed driving, and nowadays Julius, who used to insist on doing it himself, let her do it without a word. They drove in silence mostly, but her heart was as light as the wind that blew on her face, and she hummed under her breath, for she was on her way to see James. Julius said querulously, “I could have told you you’d get into a lot of traffic this way and you’d do better to go by the river road, but I knew you wouldn’t listen,”but she was so happy that she forbore to mention that whenever she took the river road he remarked how much longer it was, and only answered, “I expect you’re quite right, Julius. We’ll come back that way.”
They did go home by the river road, and it seemed very long; she was a little depressed, as she often was when she returned from James’s house. “I love him with all my heart”– the words walked unbidden into her mind –“but I wish that when I ask him how he is he wouldn’t tell me that there is every likelihood that the Basic Research Division will be merged with the Statistics Division.” He had kissed her on the cheek, and Anne, his wife, had kissed her on the cheek, and the two children had kissed her on the cheek, and he had slipped a footstool under her feet and had seated his father away from drafts, and they had had a fire in the magnificent stone fireplace the architect had dreamed up and the builder added to the cost, and Anne had served them an excellent dinner, and the children had, on request, told her of suitable A’s in English and Boy Scout merit badges. They had asked her how she had been, and she told them, in a burst of confidence, that she had had the ancient piano tuned and had been practicing an hour a day. They looked puzzled. “What are you planning to do with it, Mother?” Anne asked. “Oh, well nothing, really,” she said, embarrassed. She said later on that she had been reading books on China for she was so terribly ignorant about it, and they asked politely how her eyes were holding up, and when she said that she was sick of phlox and was going to dig it all up and try iris, James said mildly, “You really shouldn’t do all that heavy gardening anymore, Mother.”They were loving, they were devoted, and it was the most pleasant of ordinary family Sunday afternoons. James told her that he had another salary increase, and that the paper he had delivered before the Mathematical Research Institute had been, he felt he could say without exaggeration, most well received, and that they were getting a new station
wagon. But what, she wondered, did he feel, what did he love and hate, and what upset him or made him happy, and what did he look forward to? Nonsense, she thought, I can’t expect him to tell me his secret thoughts. People can’t, once they’re grown, to their parents. But the terrible fear rose in her that these were his secret thoughts, and that was all there was.
That night she heard the swing again, the gentle, regular creak of the chains. What can be making that noise, she wondered, for it was a still night, with surely not enough wind to stir the swing. She asked Julius the next day if he ever heard a creaking sound at night, a sound like the swing used to make. Julius peered out from his afghan and said deafly, “Hah?” and she answered irritably, “Oh, never mind.” The afghan maddened her. He was always chilly nowadays, and she had knitted the afghan for him for Christmas, working on it in snatches when he was out from under foot for a bit, with a vision of its warming his knees as they sat together in the evenings, companionably watching television, or reading, or chatting. But he sat less and less with her in the evenings; he went to bed very early nowadays, and he had taken to wearing the afghan daytimes around his shoulders like a shawl. She was sorry immediately for her irritation, and she tried to be very thoughtful of him the rest of the day. But he didn’t seem to notice; he noticed so little now.
Other things maddened her too. She decided that she should get out more and, heartlessly abandoning Julius, she made a luncheon date with Jessie Carling, who had once been a girl as gay and scatterbrained as a kitten. Jessie spent the entire lunch discussing her digestion and the problem of making the plaids match across the front in a housecoat she was making for herself. A couple of days later, she paid a call on Joyce Simmons, who had trouble with her back and didn’t get out much, and Joyce told her in minute detail about her son, dwelling, in full circumstantial detail, on the virtues of him, his wife, and his children. She held her tongue, though it was hard. My trouble, she thought wryly, is that I think my son is so really superior that a kind of noblesse oblige forces me not to mention it.
The next time she heard it was several nights later. She sat up in bed and, half aloud, said, “I’m not dreaming, and it certainly is the swing!” She threw on her robe and her slippers and went downstairs, feeling her way in the dark carefully, for though sounds seemed not to reach Julius, lights did wake him. Softly she unlocked the back door and, stepping out into the moonlight, picked her way through the wet grass and in sight of the big oak, she saw it swooping powerfully through the air in its wide arc, and the shock it gave her told her that she had not really believed it. There was a child in the swing, and she paused with a terrible fear clutching at her. Could it be a sleepwalking child from somewhere in the neighborhood? And would it be dangerous to call out to the child, or would it be better to go up and put out a hand to catch the swing gently and stop it? She walked nearer softly, afraid to startle the child, her heart beating with panicky speed. It seemed to be a little boy and, she noticed, he was dressed in ordinary clothes, not pajamas, as a sleepwalker might be. Nearer she came, still undecided what she should do, shaking with fear and strangeness.
She saw then that it was James. “Jamie?’she cried out questioningly, and immediately shrank back, feeling that she must be making some kind of terrible
mistake. But he looked and saw her, and, bright in the moonlight, his face lit up, as it had used to do when he saw her, and he answered gaily, “Mommy!”
She ran to him and stopped the swing – he had slowed down when he saw her –and knelt on the mossy ground and put her arms around him and he put his arms around her and squeezed tight. “I’m so glad to see you!” she cried. “It’s been such a long time since I’ve seen you!”
“I’m glad to see you too,” he cried, grinning, and kissed her teasingly behind the ear, for he knew it gave her goose bumps. “You know,” he said, “I like this airplane, and sometimes I go r-r-r-r- and that’s the engine.”
“Well,” she said, “it is sort of like flying. Like an airplane, or maybe like a bird. Do you remember, Jamie, when you use to want to be a bird and would wave your arms and try to fly?”
“That was when I was a real little kid,” he said scornfully.
She suddenly realized that she didn’t know how old he was. One tooth was out in front; could that have been when he was six? Or seven? Surely not five? One forgot so much. She couldn’t very well ask him; he would think that very odd, for a mother, of all people, should know. She noticed, then, his red checked jacket hanging on the nail on the tree; Julius had given him that jacket for his sixth birthday, she remembered now; he had loved it and had insisted on carrying it with him all the time, even when it was too warm to wear it, and Julius had driven a little nail in the oak tree for him to hang it on while he swung; the nail was till there, old and rusty.
“Mommy, how high does an airplane fly?” he asked.
“Oh, I don’t know,” she said, “two thousand feet, maybe.”
“How much is a foot?”
“Oh, about as long as Daddy’s foot – I guess that’s why they call it that.”
“Have people always been the same size?”
“Well, not exactly. They say people are getting a little bigger, and that most people are a little bigger than their great-granddaddies were.”
“Well [she saw the trap too late], then if feet used not to be as big, why did they call it a foot?”
“I don’t know. Maybe that isn’t why they call it a foot. We should look it up in the dictionary.”
“Does dictionary tell you everything?”
“Not everything. Just about words and what they mean and how they started to mean that.”
“But if there’s a word for everything, and if a dictionary tells you about every word, then how can it help but tell you about everything?”
“Well,” she said, “you’ve got a good point there. I’ll have to think that one over.”
Another time he would ask, “Why is it, if the world is turning round all the time, we don’t fall off?”
“Gravity. You know what a magnet is. The earth is just like a big magnet.”
“But where is the gravity? If you pick up a handful of dirt, it doesn’t have any gravity.”
“Well, I don’t know. The center of the earth, I guess. Well, I don’t really know,”
she said.
She felt as if the wheels of her mind, rusty from disuse, were beginning to turn again, as if she had not engaged in a real conversation, or thought about anything real, in so long that she was like a swimmer out of practice.
They talked for an hour, and then he said he had to go, with the conscientious keeping track of time he had used to show when it was time to go to school.
“See you later, alligator,” he said, and the answer sprang easily to her lips: “After a while, crocodile.”
He came every night or two after that, and she lay in bed in happy anticipation, listening for the creak of the swing. She did not go out in her robe again; she hastily dressed herself properly, and put on her shoes, for she had always felt that a mother should look tidy and proper. There by the swing they sat, and they talked about the stars and where the Big Dipper was, and about what you do about a boy who is sort of mean to you at school all the time, not just now and then, the way most children are to each other, only they don’t especially mean it, and about what you should say in Sunday school when they say the world was made in six days but your mother has explained it differently, and about why the days get shorter in winter and longer in summer.
She bloomed; she sang around the house until even Julius noticed it, and said, disapprovingly, “You seem to be awfully frisky lately.”And when Anne phoned apologetically to say that they would have to call off Sunday dinner because James had to attend a committee meeting, she was not only perfectly understanding – as she always tried to be in such instances – but she put down the phone with an utterly light heart, and took up her song where she had left it off.
Then one night, after they had talked for an hour, Jamie said, “I have to go now, and I don’t think I can come again, Mommy.”
“Okay,”she said, and whatever reserve had supplied the cheerful matter-of-factness with which she had once taken him to the hospital to have his appendix out, when he was four, came to her aid and saw to it that there was not a tremor in her voice or a tear in her eye. She kissed him, and then she sat and watched as he walked down the little back lane that had taken him to school, and off to college, and off to a job, and finally off to be married – and he turned, at the bend in the road, and waved to her, as he always used to do.
When he was out of sight, she sat on the soft mossy ground and rested her arms in the swing and buried her face in them and wept. How long she had sat there, she did not know, when a sound made her look up. It was Julius, standing there, frail and stooped, in the moonlight, in his nightshirt with the everlasting afghan hung around his thin old shoulders. She hastily tried to rearrange her attitude, to somehow make it look as if she was doing something quite reasonable, sitting there on the ground with her head pillowed on the swing in the middle of the night. Julius had always felt she was a little foolish and needed a good deal of admonishing, and now he would think she was quite out of her mind and talk very sharply to her.
But his cracked old voice spoke mildly. “He went off and left his jacket,” he said.
She looked, and there was the little red jacket hanging on the nail.
年轻人必读的29本英文短篇小说，分分钟刷新你三观 本周，著名网站Buzzfeed 罗列了一份年轻人必读的29 篇短篇小说书单，这份书单的作者覆盖了英语世界，尤其是美国文学界最富盛名的小说家。《外滩画报》精选出10 篇已经翻译成中文的小说作重点推荐。 编辑：谭浩制图：唐卓人部分图片来自Buzzfeed 2013年，瑞典学院将诺贝尔文学奖颁给了以写作短篇小说见长的加拿大作家爱丽丝·门罗，这在某种程度上褒扬了中短篇小说为世界文学做出的重要贡献。阿根廷女作家萨曼塔·施维伯林甚至说：“门罗能够得到诺贝尔文学奖，让我们这些写作短篇的都松了一口气。”虽然很多人不一定赞同顾彬关于“长篇小说已经没落”的论调，但是短篇小说作为一种更为有力凝练的文学形式，确实更加符合如今这个时代的节奏。本周，著名网站Buzzfeed 罗列了一份年轻人必读的29 篇短篇小说书单，这份书单的作者覆盖了英语世界，尤其是美国文学界最富盛名的小说家。《外滩画报》精选出10 篇已经翻译成中文的小说作重点推荐： 1. 弗兰纳里·奥康纳：《流离失所的人》 《流离失所的人》选自小说集《好人难寻》在弗兰纳里·奥康纳的小说里，尽管大部分时间故事里的人物都被堕
落、自私、愚昧、自负、欺骗或冷漠所掌控，但是，总有那么一个时刻（往往在接近小说结尾处），奥康纳会安排上帝的恩惠（或曰天惠）降临到他们身上。在这圣灵显现的一瞬间，这些人物突然受到某种精神上的启迪，进而达到某种“顿悟”，他们也许会接受这一天惠，也许会拒绝它，但不管怎样，这一灵光闪现的“天惠时刻”会使他们的内心发生改变。——比目鱼，书评人 2. 朱诺?迪亚斯：《沉溺》 选自小说集《沉溺》《沉溺》里面的九个小短篇和一个准中篇都是以朱诺?迪亚斯自己和他的家庭的真实经历为蓝本书写出来的半自传作品，它所处理的是一个移民家族心灵史上最特殊的时段：移民前在多米尼加共和国的等待期和移民初期在美国的无望岁月。朱诺?迪亚斯在写这些“少作”的时候，还没有获得他后来的作品中罗伯特?波拉尼奥式的喷薄的语言强度，但这种语流清浅、句法简朴的写法与作者的青春期原型所附体的叙述者尤尼尔非常合拍：如此“低限度”的风格，恰好能够为那些在生理、心理与地理的转换交接处所蛰伏的晦暗不明的能量提供随机释放的可能性。——胡续东，作家 3. 米兰达·裘丽：《楼梯上的男人》
熊The Bear 他后来才明白，猎熊早在距离那个早晨很久之前就发生了。 这件事早就开始了，当他第一次把自己的年龄写作两位数字的时候，他的表姐麦克瑟琳第一次带他去大森林野营，好让他在在荒野中为自己赢得猎人的名声和地位，只要轮到他时他有足够的谦卑和忍耐力。 即使从未见过，他已经听过了祖辈传承下的传说，一只巨大年老的熊，一只脚被机关给压伤过，在几乎方圆百米内为它自己挣得了一个活人一般的固定名称。长长的传说故事中，玉米仓被撞毁搜劫了，猪仔，大猪和小牛被叼走到森林中吞吃了，陷阱圈套被推翻在地，狗被打得遍体鳞伤，被杀戮，鸟枪甚至步枪在直接瞄准的距离里发射出枪弹，效果同小孩子从管子里吹出豆子打在他身上一样。在这个男孩出生前，摧毁和重建的走廊就出现了。在这走廊之中，有什么疾行着，不是很快，但是相当不顾一切，难以阻挡，火车头般地蓄意前进——那是一个毛茸茸的巨大的形体。 他还没见过大熊的时候，它就奔跑在他的脑海中了。 甚至在他看到那些未砍伐的森林之前，他梦中就模糊得层叠地出现它在那里留下的扭曲的脚印，毛茸茸的，巨大的身体，赤红的眼睛，没有恶意，但是仅仅太大了，对于那些想阻挡它的狗是太大了，对于那些企图赶上他的马是太大了，对于那人们和他们所放射的炮弹是太大，对于这个区域想要限制他的范围来说，它的确是太过巨大了。 寒笛The Whistle 夜色降临，暮色稀薄，如同穿过许多个冬天的敝衣，难以抵挡彻骨的严寒。然后月亮升起来了，在一片枯叶失色的深林中，一处农庄月色下如同水中白石般清晰可见。如果有一双眼睛比月亮看得更为探究仔细，莫顿家的一切都叫他看见了，即使是最近房子的几排齐整的小小番茄田，它们黯淡的羽毛般，令人惊心地显露着它们的脆弱。月光照耀着一切，盖住了一切黑暗的轮廓，盖住了灯火刚熄的农庄。 屋内，在摆近壁炉的简陋小床上，杰森和萨拉莫顿躺在被子中。火苗在铁格子中跳动，不时发出催眠般的声响，那力竭的火光上下拍打着墙壁，穿过房椽，如同寻找生路的鸟一般，正映在老人们躺的旧板床上方。 杰森疲倦而长久停顿的鼾声是炉火跳动外唯一的噪声。他侧着身朝门，长豌豆般蜷缩在被子下。他的嘴唇在黑暗中微张，不断呼进呼出，缓慢地起伏着,如对话如故事，如疑问如叹息。萨拉嘴唇微张，仰面静卧，却未能入眠。她盯着黑暗中房椽之间难以辨认的角落，眼睛似乎睁得太大，眼皮软软的却绷紧，像两个过度拉伸而走形的开口，失去了它的用处。嘶嘶作响的黄色火焰带着亮蓝色的影音笔直地立在陈旧的木柴上，一下子她的脸，头发和捏住被单边缘的一只手都给照亮了。然后她拉过被单盖没头顶。 夜夜他们冷得发抖地躺着，然而困苦的生活中，他们的交流不比被风暴中扇动的两扇窗子更多。有时许多个日子，许多周没有交谈地过去了。他们并不是真的那么老，只有五十多岁。他们的生活仍被三样东西填满：疲倦，缺乏开口谈话的必要性，和太过巨大以至于难以谈论的贫困，它把他们相连结，却使他们仍旧彼此分离，而且不希望同情。这种沉默的习惯也许很多年前就开始了，可能始于一次剧烈的愤怒，现在谁能知道呢？
英语励志短文及翻译 梦想是一个可以离我们很近，又很远的东西。下面是我为大家搜集整理出来的有关于英语励志短文及翻译，希望可以帮助到大家！ Today is an excellent day for small improvements. Whatever is working for you, find a way to improve it just a little. There’s no need to make a huge change, just a small one, something you can do right now. If you called just one additional customer each day, over the course of the next month you would talk to about 20 new people. If you learned just one more new word each day, in the next year you would increase your vocabulary by more than 300 words. Small improvements can add up over time into big accomplishments. Look around you. Consider the work you do each day. Think about how you could do it just a little bit better. In a marathon race, each step the winner takes is just a little bit longer and a little bit faster than each stride taken by the 100th place finisher. Yet over the course of the race, that small difference adds up in a big way. Do just a little bit more today, and tomorrow too, and each day after that. Anyone can make just a small improvement, and that can make a big, big difference. 翻译：再多一点点
《英语短篇小说选读》教学大纲 作为一门选修课，《英语短篇小说选读》主要面向英语专业本、专科学生，同时兼顾非英语专业各科英语成绩优异并对英语文学感兴趣的学生。本课程旨在通过引导学生仔细研读英语短篇小说，欣赏其精美的语言和深邃的思想，提高学生的语言素养，帮助学生了解西方的思想与文化，培养学生阅读、欣赏英语文学作品、撰写读后感和简短评论的能力。 课时安排：每周两次，每次两小时，共授课一学期。 使用教材：姜晓梅（编著）《英语小说名篇赏析》，世界图书出版公司，1999年10月，西安具体教学内容： Chapter 1 I Want to Know Why by Sherwood Anderson Chapter 2 The Darling by Anton Chekhov Chapter 3 A Rose for Emily by William Faukner Chapter 4 The Snows of Kilimanjaro by Ernest Hemingway Chapter 5 The Cap and the Anthem by O. Henry Chapter 6 Araby by Jamse Joyce Chapter 7 The Magic Barrel by Bernard Malamud Chapter 8 Life of Ma Parker by Katherine Mansfield Chapter 9 The Necklace by Guy de Maupassant Chapter 10 The Story of an Hour by Kate Chopin 参考书目： 叶华年《英语短篇小说导读—结构与理解》，华东师范大学出版社，1999 《英国短篇小说选》（上、下），上海译文出版社，1982 王佐良，刘承沛《美国短篇小说选》，商务印书馆，1984
The Romance of a Busy Broker by O. Henry Pitcher, confidential clerk in the office of Harvey Maxwell, broker, allowed a look of mild interest and surprise to visit his usually expressionless countenance when his employer briskly entered at half past nine in company with his young lady stenographer. With a snappy "Good-morning, Pitcher," Maxwell dashed at his desk as though he were intending to leap over it, and then plunged into the great heap of letters and telegrams waiting there for him. The young lady had been Maxwell's stenographer for a year. She was beautiful in a way that was decidedly unstenographic. She forewent the pomp of the alluring pompadour. She wore no chains, bracelets or lockets. She had not the air of being about to accept an invitation to luncheon. Her dress was grey and plain, but it fitted her figure with fidelity and discretion. In her neat black turban hat was the gold-green wing of a macaw. On this morning she was softly and shyly radiant. Her eyes were dreamily bright, her cheeks genuine peachblow, her expression a happy one, tinged with reminiscence. Pitcher, still mildly curious, noticed a difference in her ways this morning. Instead of going straight into the adjoining room, where her desk was, she lingered, slightly irresolute, in the outer office. Once she moved over by Maxwell's desk, near enough for him to be aware of her presence. The machine sitting at that desk was no longer a man; it was a busy New York broker, moved by buzzing wheels and uncoiling springs. "Well--what is it? Anything?" asked Maxwell sharply. His opened mail lay like a bank of stage snow on his crowded desk. His keen grey eye, impersonal and brusque, flashed upon her half impatiently. "Nothing," answered the stenographer, moving away with a little smile. "Mr. Pitcher," she said to the confidential clerk, did Mr. Maxwell say anything yesterday about engaging another stenographer?" "He did," answered Pitcher. "He told me to get another one. I notified the agency yesterday afternoon to send over a few samples this morning. It's 9.45 o'clock, and not a single picture hat or piece of pineapple chewing gum has showed up yet." "I will do the work as usual, then," said the young lady, "until some one comes to fill the place." And she went to her desk at once and hung the black turban hat with the gold-green macaw wing in its accustomed place. He who has been denied the spectacle of a busy Manhattan broker during a rush of business is handicapped for the profession of anthropology. The poet sings
K e y s t o U n i t T w o (1) I. B. Singer: The Washwoman (2) Frank Sargeson: A Piece of Yellow Soap 1) Questions for Discussion: (Suggested answers for reference) (1) Does the piece of washing soap have the “power”as the narrator tells us? What is the “power” that forces him to take off? (The piece of yellow washing soap is, of course, an ordinary one. The narrator is a “na?ve narrator”who believed that it had some sort of mysterious “power,”while the readers are expected to know better. This power comes from the narrator’s deep sympathy for the tragic fate of the washing woman. Seeing the situation, he simply could not continue to demand the payment which he knew the woman was unable to produce.) (2) In this Unit, we have two stories about two washwomen. There are a lot of similar descriptions and common characteristics in the two stories. Find and list them. (They were both reduce to desperation, depending solely on washing for living. Both were hard-working and uncomplaining, quietly but almost heroically bore their burden and struggled for a hard existence. The author describes their common feature –the white and shrunken fingers –as symbol of suffering in the lives of the working people. They both were both dead by the end of the stories.) (3) The two first-person narrators tell two stories of two washwomen who shared similar tragic fate. Discuss the differences in the narrators that result in the differences in the way the two short stories are told. (Singer’s narrator knows more and tells more about the washing woman, often making direct comments and revealing his own feelings about the life of the woman whose story he is telling. He frequently emphasizes that what he is telling is real, and hints that the story has significance. The narrator’s voice is very close to the author’s. Please see more in “Reading Tips” on page 11. On the other hand, Sargeson’s narrator is a na?ve one, that is, the narrator’s understanding is purposely made shallow, and the reader need find by himself the real meaning in the situation. So the narrator stands at some distance from the author. Please see more in “Reading Tips” on page 15. Therefore, in Text I, we, as readers, are basically “given”or “received”the story, while in Text II, we need to participate imaginatively in the story to “dig out” the true meaning the na?ve narrator has left unexplained.) 2) Explanation and Interpretation:
励志英语文章及翻译 如果我们能够时常找一些带翻译的经典励志的英语文章来看看，也是挺好的，那么励志英语文章及翻译都有哪些呢?一起来看看吧。 To see the golden sun and the azure sky, the outstretched ocean, to walk upon the green earth, and to be lord of a thousand creatures, to look down giddy precipices or over distant flowery vales, to see the world spread out under one s finger in a map, to bring the stars near, to view the smallest insects in a microscope, to read history, and witness the revolutions of empires and the succession of generations, to hear of the glory of Simon and Tire, of Babylon and Susan, as of a faded pageant, and to say all these were, and are now nothing, to think that we exist in such a point of time ,and in such a corner of space, to be at once spectators and a part of the moving scene, to watch the return of the seasons, of spring and autumn, to hear--- The stock dove plain amid the forest deep, That drowsy rustles to the sighing gale. ---to traverse desert wilderness, to listen to the dungeon s gloom, or sit in crowded theatres and see life itself mocked, to feel heat and cold, pleasure and pain, right and wrong, truth and falsehood, to study the works of art and refine the sense of beauty to agony, to worship fame and to dream of immortality, to have read Shakespeare and Beloit to the same species as Sir Isaac Newton; to be and to do all this, and then in a moment to be nothing, to have it all snatched from one like a juggler s ball or a phantasmagoria [参考译文] 何为不朽--威廉赫兹里特 我们看到金色的太阳，蔚蓝的天空，广阔的海洋;我们漫步在绿油油的大地之上，做万物的主人;我们俯视令人目炫心悸的悬崖峭壁，远眺鲜花盛开的山谷;我们把地图摊开，任意指点全
世界经典短篇小说选读目录 《一碗清汤荞麦面》[日本] 栗良平 《法律门前》[德国] 卡夫卡 《免费》［美］雪莉·凯撒 《一天的等待》[美国] 厄内斯特·海明威 《没有锁上的门》[美国] 罗伯特·斯特恩德力 《小公务员之死》[俄国] 契诃夫 《穷苦人》[俄] 列·托尔斯泰 《“诺曼底”号遇难记》[法国] 雨果 《雨伞》[日本] 川端康成 《陈小手》汪曾祺 《陈奂生上城》高晓声 《没有完的故事》[美国] 欧·亨利 《热爱生命》[美国] 杰克.伦敦 《小丑》[俄国] 屠格涅夫 《半张纸》[瑞典] 斯特林堡 《饥饿艺术家》[奥地利] 卡夫卡 《罗生门》[日本] 介川龙之介 《桔子》[日本] 介川龙之介 《鱼服记》[日本] 太宰治 《柏林之围》 [法国] 都德 《夜》 [意大利]；路·皮兰德娄 《阿拉比》 [爱尔兰] 詹姆斯·乔伊斯 《羊脂球》 [法国] 莫泊桑
正文 一、推介原因 这个在日韩广为流传的真实故事，感动了亿万人，成为在逆境中奋起，决不向命运低头的精神象征。在日本，该书的出版被形容为掉进了“一亿泪的海”；《读者》总编彭长城认为《一碗清汤荞麦面》是该刊创刊以来刊出的最感人的作品之一。 二、作者简介 栗良平.本名伊藤贡，日本著名作家、演讲家。1943年5月生于日本北海道。曾经从事过十多种职业。在综合医院任职十年，高中时代曾翻译安徒生童话而引起对口述童话的创作兴趣.。他利用业余时间收集四百多篇民间故事以各地方言亲自巡回讲述。主要作品有《纺织公主》《又听到二号汽笛》《穿越战国时代的天空》，而以《一碗清汤荞麦面》而成为儿童类畅销作家。 [思考] 母子三人为什么要在顾客都散尽后，才去北海亭面馆吃面? 那女人购买清汤荞麦面时，为什么“怯生生地问……”“可以吗? ” [参考答案] 命运的不幸，生活的艰难，在母亲心中刻上了深深的伤痕，每当除夕夜来临，他都有一种难以述说的复杂心情，既要与孩子过年又不愿在人前表现家境的窘迫，以至伤害孩子的自尊心，只得在顾客散尽时候去。 三人要一碗面的尴尬，这样晚的时间因吃一碗面而麻烦人的歉疚，使得母亲每次都怯生生的发问。 推介理由 有人曾说鲁迅是中国最痛苦的文人，那么卡夫卡也许可以称作奥匈帝国最痛苦的文人了。卡夫卡短暂的一生是在痛苦和孤独中度过的。“孤独感”与“死亡意识”几乎成了他创作的永恒主题。无论主人公如何抗争努力，强大无形的外来力量始终控制着一切，
The Chrysanthemum Elisa Allen, a woman approaching middle age, is at a point in her life when she has begun to realize that her energy and creative drive far exceed the opportunities for their expression. Her marriage is reasonably happy—when she notices that her husband is proud of selling thirty head of steers he has raised, she gives him the compliment he hopes for, while he, in turn, appreciates her ability to grow flowers of exceptional quality. There is an easy banter between them, and while they have settled into a fairly familiar routine, they are still responsive to each other’s moods, and eager to celebrate an achievement in each other’s company with a night on the town. On the other hand, their marriage is childless, and Elisa generally wears bland, bulging clothes that tend to de-sex her. Their house is described as “hard-swept” and “hard-polished”; it is the only outlet for her talents and it is an insufficient focus for her energy. She has begun to sense that an important part of her is lying dormant and that the future will be predictable and rather mundane.
《英语短篇小说教程》练习参考答案
Unit Seven James Joyce: Araby 1)Opinions of Understanding: (1) Which adjective is NOT proper to describe the style of the short story? A. Dreamlike. B. Poetic. C. Matter-of-fact. D. Sentimental. (2) Why does the boy want to go to the bazaar, or the “Araby,” so desperately? A. He wants to find some romantic fulfillment. B. He wants to see exotic and exciting things. C. He wants to have new experience. D. He wants to “do something” for the girl. (3) What do you think can be the theme of the story? A. Real beauty is illusory and unattainable. B. Growing up leads to loss of youthful idealism. C. True love can not survive the cruel world. D. Disillusion always accompanies romanticism. (4) Which is probably true about Mangan’s sister? A. She is a young girl of rare beauty. B. She has all the elegance because of her family and religious background. C. She is angel-like both in appearance and in nature. D. She is an ordinary girl but the narrator places his romantic fantasies on her. (5) The short story ends with the sentence: “Gazing up into the darkness I saw myself as a creature driven and derided by vanity; and my eyes burned with anguish and anger.” What possibly has the boy suddenly realized? A. He has been behaving foolishly. B. The girl does not deserve so much of his affection. C. His uncle and aunt are heartless people. D. True beauty can not be obtained at any cost.
Evaluation Only. Created with Aspose.Words. Copyright 2003-2015 Aspose Pty Ltd.英语励志短文带翻译 英语励志短文：A New Day （崭新的一天） The sun has begun to set and I hang up the smile I’ve worn all day, though I will make sure it is the first thing I put back on in the mo rning just in case it is “that day.” I want her to see me at my very best. 太阳将要下山，我收起挂了一天的微笑，不过我会确保明天早上第一件事就是将它又挂回去，以防这天就是“那一天”。我希望她看到我的最佳状态。 I do the normal routine, eat dinner, clean the house, write—the usual stuff. And then I lay down hoping to fall asleep quickly so my new day will hurry up and arrive. A new day with a brand new sun. But as I lay there and wait for the world to turn half way around, I think about her. And sometimes I smile, and sometimes that smile will turn into asnicker, and then often that snicker will turn into a burst of laughter. 我按平时的规律吃晚餐、打扫屋子、写作——做着日常事务。然后我躺下，希望能快点入睡，新的一天就能快点到来——拥有新生太阳的崭新的一天。可当我躺在那儿，等待着世界的日夜回转时，我想到了她。有时我会笑起来，有时那微笑变成了窃笑，然后窃笑又常常变成爆笑。 And then there are times I get that lump in my throat and that tight feeling in my chest, and sometimes that feeling overwhelms me and begins to turn into a tear, and often that tear multiplies itself and I can no longer fight the feeling and I lose the battle. Then somehow through either the joy or the sadness I drift and find myself asleep. Then the dreams begin and keep me company until my new day arrives. 也有些时候，我的喉咙像是被一块东西哽住了，胸口发闷;有时那种伤感席卷 而来，我开始流泪，眼泪常常越流越多，我再也无力抵抗悲伤，败下阵来。然后不知怎的，我在或喜悦或悲伤中飘荡，逐渐入眠。然后梦境开始伴我左右，直至新的一天到来。 When I awake it’s with such excitement because I tell m yself this could be the day that every other day has led up to and the first day of the rest of my life. I quickly don my smile because I do so want her to see me at my very best. Then I look out the window because, even though I know it’s dawn, I still have to confirm I’ve been given another chance to find her.
宁波大学考核答题纸 （2014—2015学年第一学期） 课号：063W22A09 课程名称：英语短片小说选读改卷教师：阿德尔 学号：116070035 姓名：石佳得分： The Epiphany for Love Dubliners is often considered as the reflection of ethnic history in Dublin which, is stuffed by the ubiquitous “paralysis”. The corruption in social life, in politics even in people’s spirit is said to have made great impression in reader’s mind. However, with the skinny experience for no more than twenty years, I dare not conclude the thesis or the main idea of this opus in haste, while I could also not just allow myself to follow those comments and opinions made by “they”. Among the chapters I have read, Araby s eems to appeal to me most, because I have once had the same feeling of that little boy. This kind of feeling, literally, the epiphany for love, is the sweetest emotion and the most endurable torture I’ve ever experienced. There seems to be three periods of time during the process of the epiphany for love but to summarize with suitable words is undoubtedly a knotty issue. What comes first must be the admiration for the one who possesses neat skin, delicate facial features or slim figure, or even just a special nice odor. Since an occasion even you yourself cannot remember for sure, a figure has inserted into your little world and driven you to do crazy things. The shadow turned to the base to watch her; the hall witnessed numerous bumping into each other and in that corner the light from the lamp opposite the door caught the white curve of her neck, lit up her hair that rested there and, falling, lit up the hand upon the railing. What a magic feeling! But as you gradually sank in this dramatic journey, the inexplicable confusion and loneliness began to kidnap you. You found that you were not only the idle but also the weirdo nobody understands including yourself. Her name was like a summons to all your foolish body and her words and gestures were like fingers running upon the wires. With this confused adoration, sometimes even an unnoticeable movement or sentence would annihilate the sunshine and the hesitation between “do” or “do not” always brought heavy rain. Asking help seems to be of no sense because adults were going to acting lightly even sometimes with contempt. So the only way is to lie on the floor in a dark evening murmuring her name. I believe that sex or the thoughts about sex must accompany though there is no such description between the lines. And this kind of confusion and loneliness cannot be removed until she refuses which is sure to leave the unbearable pain for you to learn from, or luckily, accepts, which means you are going to exploring the sealed world together. Then the epiphany for love seems to be accomplished. No one can bypass the enlightenment of love to achieve the epiphany. And only by experiencing the sweetest emotion and the most endurable torture at the same time can people really get to know the original taste of love.