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大英五翻译

大英五翻译
大英五翻译

1 Many who today hear me somewhere in person, or on television, or those who read something I’ve said, will think I went to school far beyond the eighth grade. This impression is due entirely to my prison studies.

今天,许多在什么地方直接听我讲话的人,或在电视上听我讲话的人,或读过我写的东西的人,都会以为我上学远不止只读到8年级。这一印象完全归之于我在监狱里的学习。

2 It had really begun back in the Charlestown Prison, when Bimbi first made me feel envy of his stock of knowledge. Bimbi had always taken charge of any conversation he was in, and I had tried to emulate him. But every book I picked up had few sentences which didn’t contain anywhere from one to nearly all of the words that might as well have been in Chinese[2 … the words that might as well have been in Chinese: … it would have made no difference if the English wor ds had been in Chinese, because I didn’t have the slightest knowledge of either.]2. When I just skipped those words, of course, I really ended up wit h little idea of what the book said. So I had come to the Norfolk Prison Colony still going through only book-reading motions. Pretty soon, I would have quit even these motions, unless I had received the motivation that I did.

其实这事要从查尔斯顿监狱说起,一开始宾比就让我对他的知识渊博羡慕不已。宾比总是主宰谈话话题,我总想效仿他。可是,我随便打开一本书,几乎没有一个句子不是少则一两个字,多则差不多所有的字都不认识。我只好跳过这些字,结果自然是对书上说的几乎一无所知了。因此,我被解送到诺福克拘留所时,读书还只是为了摆摆样子而已。要不是我真的获得了学习动力,我恐怕没多久就会连读书的样子也懒得去摆了。

3 I saw that the best thing I could do was get hold of a dictionary—to study, to learn some words. I was lucky enough to reason also that I should try to improve my penmanship. It was sad. I coul dn’t even write in a straight line. It was both ideas together that moved me to request a dictionary along with some tablets and pencils from the Norfolk Prison Colony school.

我认识到,最要紧的是得到一本字典好认字学字。幸好我还认识到得好好练习写字。说来悲伤,我写字都不能写得齐整成行。这两个想法促使我向诺福克拘留所学校要了字典,还有本子和笔。

4 I spent two days just riffling uncertainly through the dictionary’s pages. I’d never realized so many words existed! I didn’t know which words I needed to learn. Finally, just to start some kind of action, I began copying.

整整两天,我把字典一页页翻了个遍,不知该怎么学。我压根儿没想过会有那么多字。我不知道自己需要学哪些字。最后,总得有所行动吧,我便开始抄写。

5 In my slow, painstaking, ragged handwriting, I copied into my tablet everything printed on that first page, down to the punctuation marks.

我写字又慢又费劲,而且歪歪斜斜,但我在本子上抄写下了第一页上包括标点在内的所有印刷符号。

6 I believe it took me a day. Then, aloud, I read back, to myself, everything I’d written on the tablet. Over and over, aloud, to myself, I read my own handwriting.

记得我抄写了一天。然后,我把本子上抄写下的所有字大声朗读给自己听。一遍又一遍,我大声朗读自己抄写的字。

7 I woke up the next morning, thinking about those words—immensely proud to realize that not only had I written so much at one time, but I’d written words that I never knew were in the world. Moreover, with a little effort, I also could remember what many of these words meant. I reviewed the words whose meanings I didn’t remember. Funny thing, from the dictionary first page right now, that “aardvark” springs to my mind. The dictionary had a picture of it, a long-tailed, long-eared, burrowing African mammal, which lives off termites caught by sticking out its tongue as an anteater does for ants.

我第二天早上醒来,仍想着那些字——想到自己不仅一次写了那么多字,而且还写了以前根本不认识的字,不由得深感自豪。更何况,略加回想,我还能记住其中许多字的意思。没记住的字我都复习了一遍。有趣的是,此时此刻,那本字典第一页上“aardvark”这个字跃入了我的脑海。字典上有一幅画它的插图,那是一种长尾巴长耳朵会掘洞的非洲哺乳动物,像食蚁兽捕食蚂蚁那样伸出舌头捕食白蚁。

8 I was so fascinated that I went on—I copied the dictionary’s next page. And the same experience came when I studied that. With every succeeding page, I also learned of people and places and events from history. Actually the dictionary is like a miniature encycl opedia. Finally the dictionary’s A section had filled a whole tablet—and I went on into the B’s. That was the way I started copying what eventually became the entire dictionary. It went a lot faster after so much practice helped me to pick up handwriting speed. Between what I wrote in my tablet, and writing letters, during the rest of my time in prison I would guess I wrote a million words.

我完全着迷了,于是继续抄——我又抄写了字典的第二页。我学这一页上的字时体验到了同样的感受。每学一页字,我还学到了一点有关人物、地方和历史事件的知识。字典实际上就像是一部小型百科全书。最后,字典上A那部分字的条目抄满了整整一个本子——接着我抄写B字部。我就是这样开始抄写的,最后抄完了整本字典。大量的抄写帮助我提高了书写速度,以后抄写起来就快了许多。从在本子上抄写,到后来在那段余下的服刑时间里写信,我估

计自己在监狱里写了一百万字。

9 I suppose it was inevitable that as my word-base broadened, I could for the first time pick up a book and read and now begin to understand what the book was saying. Anyone who has read a great deal can imagine the new world that opened. Let me tell you something: from then until I left that prison, in every free moment I had, if I was not reading in the library, I was reading on my bunk. Y ou couldn’t have gotten me out of books with a wedge. Between Mr. Muhammad’s teachings, my correspondence, my visitors—usually Ella and Reginald—and my reading of books, months passed without my even thinking about being imprisoned. In fact, up to then, I never had been so truly free in my life.

想来也是自然而然的,随着词汇的增加,我第一次能够拿起一本书读下去,开始明白书上说的是什么。任何阅读广泛的人都想象得出在我面前展现的崭新世界。我不妨告诉你:从那时起,直到我离开那座监狱,在任何可以自由支配的时间里,我不是在图书室里,就是在自己的铺位上看书。真的是手不释卷。我的日常活动就是听穆罕默德先生传道,写写信,会会客——来探视的一般都是埃拉和雷金纳德——加上读书,几个月一晃而过,我甚至没想过自己是在坐牢。事实上,在这之前,我从来没觉得自己是如此自由。

10 The Norfolk Prison Colony’s library was in the school building. A variety of classes were taught there by instructors who came from such places as Harvard and Boston universities. The weekly debates between inmate teams were also held in the school building. Y ou would be astonished to know how worked up convict debaters and audiences would get over subjects like “Should Babies Be Fed Milk?”

诺福克拘留所的图书室在教学楼里。来自哈佛大学、波士顿大学等等院校的教员教授不同的课程。每周还在教学楼里举行囚犯间的辩论会。想必你听了会大吃一惊,那些囚犯辩手和听众会对诸如“该不该给婴儿喂牛奶”这类辩题争得面红耳赤。

11 A vailable on the prison library’s shelves were books on just about every general subject. Much of the big private collection that Parkhurst had willed to the prison[ Much of the big private collection that Parkhurst had willed to the pris on: Many of the books that had been bought and kept by Parkhusrt and later given to the prison according to his will] was still in crates and boxes in the library—thousands of old books. Some of them looked ancient: covers faded, old-time parchment-looking binding. Parkhurst, I’ve mentioned, seemed to have been principally interested in history and religion. He had the money and the special interest to have a lot of books that you wouldn’t have in general circulation. Any college libr ary would have been lucky to get that collection.

拘留所图书室架子上书的种类几乎包罗万象。帕克赫斯特遗赠给拘留所的为数可观的私人藏书中的大多数仍在图书室的板箱及盒子里搁着——成千上万本旧书。有些看上去年代久远:封面褪了色,像是用旧式的羊皮纸装订的。我刚才说过,帕克赫斯特的兴趣似乎主要在历史和宗教方面。他有财力,有与众不同的兴趣,得以收藏了许多外面一般见不到的书。任何一家大学图书馆若能得到这批收藏,都不失为一桩幸事。

12 As you can imagine, especially in a prison where there was heavy emphasis on rehabilitation, an inmate was smiled upon if he demonstrated an unusually intense interest in books. There was a sizable number of well-read inmates, especially the popular debaters. Some were said by many to be practically walking encyclopedias. They were almost celebrities. No university would ask any student to devour literature as I did when this new world opened to me, of being able to read and understand.

你可以想象,在一座着重强调改造罪犯的监狱里,一个囚犯要是表现出对书本不同寻常的强烈兴趣,自然会大受赞许。囚犯中有不少人读过许多书,尤其是那些最受欢迎的辩手。在不少人看来,有些简直称得上是活的百科全书。他们差不多就是名人。我能读书能读懂了,一个崭新的世界展现在我的面前;那时,我那么贪婪地阅读文学作品,没有一所大学能让其学生这么做。

13 I read more in my room than in the library itself. An inmate who was known to read a lot could check out more than the permitted maximum number of books. I preferred reading in the total isolation of my own room.

我在自己囚室里读书比在图书室里更快。爱读书的囚犯可以借走超出最大规定数量的图书。我更喜欢独自一人在自己囚室里读书。

14 When I had progressed to really serious reading, every night at about ten p.m. I would be outraged with t he “lights out.” It always seemed to catch me right in the middle of something engrossing.

当我水平提高到能阅读真正的严肃读物之后,每天晚上10点左右听到喊“熄灯”,我就非常气恼。似乎每次都是在我读得最入神的时候喊“熄灯”。

15 Fortunately, right outside my door was a corridor light that cast a glow into my room. The glow was enough to read by, once my eyes adjusted to it. So when “lights out” came, I would sit on the floor where I could continue reading in that glow.

幸好我门外正好有个过道灯,囚室透进一点灯光。眼睛适应后,那光线看书还可凑和。于是喊过“熄灯”后,我就坐在地板上借着微光继续阅读。

16 At one-hour intervals the night guards paced past every room. Each time I heard the approaching footsteps, I jumped into bed and feigned sleep. And as soon as the guard passed, I got back out of bed onto the floor area of that light-glow, where I would read for another fifty-eight minutes—until the guard approached again. That went on until three or four every morning. Three or four hours of sleep a night was enough for me. Often in the years in the streets I had slept less than that….

夜班看守每隔一小时在各个囚室外巡查。每次听到脚步声走近,我就跳到床上装睡。等看守一走,我就下床,回到照到灯光的地板上,再读上58分钟——直到看守又来巡查。这样一直持续到每天凌晨三四点钟。我晚上睡3、4个小时就够了。在流浪街头的岁月里,我常常睡得还要少贩贩贩

17 I have often reflected upon the new vistas that reading opened to me. I knew right there in prison that reading had changed forever the course of my life. As I see it today, the ability to read awoke inside me some long dormant craving to be mentally alive. I certainly wasn’t seeking any degree, the way a college confers a status symbol upon its students. My homemade education gave me, with every additional book that I read, a little bit more sensitivity to the deafness, dumbness, and blindness that was afflicting the black race in America. Not long ago, an English writer telephoned me from London, asking questions. One was, “What’s your alma mater?” I told him, “Books.” Y ou will never catch me with a free fifteen minutes in which I’m not studying something I feel might be able to help the black man.

我常常思忆阅读为我打开的新天地。还在狱中时,我就认识到阅读已经不可逆转地改变了自己的人生历程。今天想来,阅读唤醒了自己内心蛰伏已久的对精神生活的渴望。当然我不是想追求什么学位,像大学授予学生学位那样。我的自学经历使我每读一本书,就加深一点对美国黑人深受其苦的那种聋、哑、盲的认识。不久前,一位英国作家从伦敦打来电话问了一些问题。其中一个是:“你曾在哪所学校就读?”我回答说,“书本。”你不会看到我有一刻钟空闲着,而不去用来学习我觉得对黑人或许有所帮助的知识。

18 Every time I catch a plane, I have with me a book that I want to read—and that’s a lot of books these days. If I weren’t out here every day battling the white man, I could spend the rest of my life reading, just satisfying my curiosity—because you can hardly mention anything I’m not curious about. I don’t think anybody ever got more out of going to prison than I did. In fact, prison enabled me to study far more intensively than I would have if my life had gone differently and I had attended some college. I imagine that one of the biggest troubles with colleges is there are too many distractions, too much panty-raiding, fraternities, and boola-boola and all of that. Where else but in prison could I have attacked my ignorance by being able to study intensely sometimes as much as fifteen hours a day?

每次坐飞机,我都随身携带一本要读的书——到今天已读了不少书。要不是我每天都出来跟白人做斗争,我会在余生把时间都花在读书上,仅仅是为了满足自己的好奇心——因为你几乎说不出有什么东西是我不感到好奇的。我想没有人像我那样在狱中获得如此多的裨益。事实上,监禁使我得以一心读书,如果我有着不同的人生历程,如果我上过大学,我未必能如此专心致志。我想,大学生活最大的弊端之一在于分心的事太多,“抢短衬裤”闹个没完,联谊会活动太频繁,种种胡闹,不一而足。除了监狱,还有什么地方我能有时一天专心攻读15小时之多,借以攻克自己的无知?

Let's Go V eggie!

1 If there was a single act that would improve your health, cut your risk of food-borne illnesses, and help preserve the environment and the welfare of millions of animals, would you do it?

咱们吃素吧!

如果有一件事,既能增进健康、减少患上食物引起的疾病的危险,又有助于保护环境、保护千万动物安全生存,你做不做?

2 The act I'm referring to is the choice you make every time you sit down to a meal.

我说的这件事就是每次坐下来就餐时挑选菜肴。

3 More than a million Canadians have already acted: They have chosen to not eat meat. And the pace of change has been dramatic.

一百多万加拿大人已经行动起来:他们决定不吃肉。变化速度之快令人惊叹。

4 V egetarian food sales are showing unparalleled growth. Especially popular are meat-free burgers and hot dogs, and the plant-based cuisines of India, China, Mexico, Italy and Japan.

素食品的销售额大大增加,前所未有。尤受欢迎的是无肉汉堡包和热狗,以及以蔬为主的印度、中国、墨西哥、意大利和日本的菜肴。

5 Fuelling the shift toward vegetarianism have been the health recommendations of medical research. Study after study has uncovered the same basic truth: Plant foods lower your risk of chronic disease; animal foods increase it.

推动人们转向素食的是医学研究提出的关于如何增进健康的建议。一项又一项的研究都揭示了同样的基本事实:果蔬降低患慢性病的危险;肉类食品则增加这种危险。

6 The American Dietetic Association says: "Scientific data suggest positive relationships between a vegetarian diet and reduced risk for several chronic degenerative diseases."

美国饮食学协会指出,“科学资料表明,素食与降低多种慢性变性疾病的患病危险肯定有关系。”

7 This past fall, after reviewing 4,500 studies on diet and cancer, the World Cancer Research Fund flatly stated: "We've been running the human biological engine on the wrong fuel."

去年秋天,在检验了4500个饮食与癌症的研究报告之后,世界癌症研究基金会直截了当地指出:“我们一向利用不合适的养料来维持人类生理引擎的运转。”

8 This "wrong fuel" has helped boost the cost of degenerative disease in Canada to an estimated $400 billion a year, according to Bruce Holub, a professor of nutritional science at the University of Guelph.

据威尔夫大学营养科学教授布鲁斯?霍拉勃称,这一“不合适的养料”致使加拿大每年用于治疗变性疾病的费用高达4000亿(加)元。

9 Animal foods have serious nutritional drawbacks: They are devoid of fiber, contain far too much saturated fat and cholesterol, and may even carry traces of hormones, steroids and antibiotics. It makes little difference whether you eat beef, pork, chicken or fish.

肉类食品存在严重的营养缺陷:它们不含纤维,含有过多的饱和脂肪和胆固醇,甚至可能含有微量的激素、类固醇和抗菌素。牛肉、猪肉、鸡肉或鱼肉都一样。

10 Animal foods are also gaining notoriety as breeding grounds for E. coli, campylobacter and other bacteria that cause illness. According to the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, six out of ten chickens are infected with salmonella. It's like playing Russian roulette with your health.

肉类食品也是越来越广为人知的大肠杆菌、弯曲菌以及其他致病细菌的孳生地。据加拿大食品检验机构称,十分之六的鸡染有沙门氏菌。吃肉无异于玩俄式轮盘赌,拿你的健康做赌资。

11 So why aren't governments doing anything about this? Unfortunately, they have bowed to pressure from powerful lobby groups such as the Beef Information Center, the Canadian Egg Marketing Agency and the Dairy Farmers of Canada. According to documents retrieved through the Freedom of Information Act, these groups forced changes to Canada's latest food guide before it was released in 1993.

既然如此,政府为什么不采取任何措施?很遗憾,政府屈服于强有力的院外活动集团的压力,如牛肉信息中心、加拿大禽蛋营销公司、加拿大乳牛场场主协会等。根据信息自由法案获得的有关文件记载,这些集团迫使加拿大最新食品指南在1993年公布前作出修改。

12 This should come as no surprise: Even a minor reduction in recommended intakes of animal protein could cost these industries billions of dollars a year.

这并不奇怪。即使建议动物蛋白质的摄入量减少一丁点儿都会给这些企业带来每年数十亿元的损失。

13 While health and food safety are compelling reasons for choosing a vegetarian lifestyle, there are also larger issues to consider. Animal-based agriculture is one of the most environmentally destructive industries on the face of the Earth.

健康和食品安全是选择素食生活方式令人信服的理由,但此外还有更为重大的因素要考虑。以饲养动物为基础的农业是世界上对环境破坏最严重的产业之一。

14 Think for a moment about the vast resources required to raise, feed, shelter, transport, process and package the 500 million Canadian farm animals slaughtered each year. Water and energy are used at every step of the way. Alberta Agriculture calculates that it takes 10 to 20 times more energy to produce meat than to produce grain.

想一想培育、饲养、建牲畜栏、运输、加工和包装加拿大每年宰杀的5亿头牲畜所需的巨大资源。其中的每一个环节都耗费水和能源。阿尔伯达农业署估计,生产肉耗费的能源比生产谷物多10-20倍。

15 Less than a quarter of our agricultural land is used to feed people directly. The rest is devoted to grazing and growing food for animals. Ecosystems of forest, wetland and grassland have been decimated to fuel the demand for land. Using so much land heightens topsoil loss, the use of harsh fertilizers and pesticides, and the need for irrigation water from dammed rivers. If people can shift away from meat, much of this land could be converted back to wilderness.

用于直接为人们提供食物的土地还不到农业用地的四分之一。其余的都用来放牧和种饲料。森林、湿地和草原的生态系统遭受相当严重的破坏,以满足对土地的需求。土地的大量利用加剧了表土的流失,增加了会带来负面作用的化肥和杀虫剂的施用,增加了从筑有水坝的河流中引水灌溉的需求。如果人们能摒弃肉食,许多土地就能回复到未开垦状态。

16 The problem is that animals are inefficient at converting plants to edible flesh. It takes, for example, 8.4 kilograms of grain to produce one kilogram of pork, the U. S. government estimates.

问题在于,动物在把植物转化为可食用的肉类这方面的效率很低。举例来说,美国政府估测,生产1公斤猪肉需要耗费8.4 公斤的谷物。

17 After putting so many resources into animals, what do we get out? Manure —at a rate of over 10,000 kilograms per second in Canada alone, according to the government. Environment Canada says cattle excrete 40 kilograms of manure for every kilogram of edible beef. A large egg factory can produce 50 to 100 tonnes of waste per week, the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture estimates.

我们把这么多资源耗费在动物身上,又得到什么回报呢?粪肥——据官方资料,仅加拿大,就以每秒10,000多公斤的速度排出。加拿大环境部称,牛每产1公斤可食牛肉需排出40公斤粪便。安大略省农业部估测,一家大型禽蛋工厂每星期可产出50-100吨禽粪。

18 And where does it go? In the 1992 Ontario Groundwater Survey, 43 per cent of tested wells were contaminated with agricultural run-off containing fecal coliform bacteria and nitrates. Earlier this month, charges were laid against a large Alberta feedlot operator for dumping 30 million litres of cattle manure into the Bow River, "killing everything in its path," as a news story described it.

这些粪便都到哪儿去了?1992年安大略省地下水调查发现,43%的被测试水井都受到含有粪便大肠杆菌和硝酸盐等农业生产排出的废物的污染。本月初,阿尔伯达一家大型围栏肥育地经营者被指控将3千万升牛粪排入博河,“沿途生灵悉数被毁”,一则新闻这么报道。

19 And then there is methane, a primary contributing gas in global warming and ozone layer depletion. Excluding natural sources, 27 per cent of Canada's and 20 per cent of the world's methane comes from livestock.

此外还有沼气,那是促使全球气候变暖和臭氧层减少的主要气体。不把天然沼气资源包括在内,加拿大27%的沼气、全世界20%的沼气都来自牲畜。

20 John Robbins, author of the Pulitzer prize-nominated book Diet for a New America (Group West), said it best when he stated: "Eating lower on the food chain is perhaps the most potent single act we can take to halt the destruction of our environment and preserve our natural resources."

获普利策提名奖的《新美洲饮食》一书作者约翰?罗宾斯说得好:“食用食物链较低部分的食物或许是我们可用以阻止环境破坏、保护自然资源的最最有效的行动。”

21 Our environment also includes the animals killed for their meat. It has become an accepted fact that today's factory-farmed animals live short, miserable, unnatural lives.

我们的环境也包括为食其肉而被宰杀的动物。当今工厂化农场的牲畜寿命极短,过着悲惨的、不正常的生活,这已是公认的事实。

22 As part of my research at the University of Waterloo, I toured some of the country's largest "processing" plants. The experience has left me with recurring nightmares.

作为我在沃特卢大学研究工作的一部分,我参观过一些全国最大的“加工”厂。这个经历让我日后尽做噩梦。

23 I saw "stubborn" cows being beaten and squealing pigs chased around the killing floor with electric calipers.

我见到“固执”的牛被打、尖叫着的猪在屠宰室被人用电卡钳追逐。

24 I looked on in utter shock as a cow missed the stun gun and was hoisted fully conscious upside down by its hind leg and cut to pieces, thrashing until its last breath.

我万分震惊地目睹一头牛躲过了眩晕枪,结果被缚住后腿倒挂起来,惨遭活剐,一直挣扎到断气。

25 Noticing my shock, the foreman remarked: "Who cares? They're going to die anyway."

工头见我惊骇不已,便说:“管它呢!它们反正得死。”

26 Because it can cost hundreds of dollars per minute to stop the conveyor line, animal welfare comes second to profit. Over 150,000 animals are "processed" every hour of every working day in Canada, according to Agriculture Canada.

由于传送线停转一分钟就要损失好几百元,家畜的利益就变得不如利润重要。据加拿大农业署称,在加拿大,每个工作日,每小时有150,000多头家畜被“加工”。

27 The picture gets uglier still. En route to slaughter, farm animals may legally spend anywhere from 36 to 72 hours without food, water or rest. They're not even afforded the "luxury" of temperature controlled trucks in extreme summer heat or sub-zero cold.

情况变得甚至更可怕。家畜在宰杀前的运输途中,法律允许在36-72小时内不给进食、进水,不让休息。即使在炎夏或零度以下的严冬,它们连乘温控卡车的“奢侈”也不让享受。

28 Agriculture Canada has estimated that more than 3 million Canadian farm animals die slow and painful deaths en route to slaughter each year.

加拿大农业署估计,加拿大每年有3百多万头家畜在宰杀前的运输途中痛苦地慢慢死去。

29 I've also visited typical Canadian farms. Gone are the days when piglets snorted and roosters strutted their way about the barnyard. Most of today's modernized farms have long, windowless sheds in which animals live like prisoners their entire lives.

I have seen chickens crammed four to a cage, nursing pigs separated from their young by iron bars and veal calves confined to crates so narrow they couldn't turn around. Few of these animals ever experience sunlight or fresh air —and most of their natural urges are denied.

本人还参观过一些典型的加拿大农场。猪崽喷着鼻息、公鸡在粮仓的空场上昂首行走的日子已经一去不复返。而今大多数的现代化农场都有一个个狭长的、没有窗户的牲畜棚,牲畜一生关在棚里,如囚犯一般。我见到过四只鸡挤在一个笼里,喂奶的母猪与猪崽被铁条隔开,肉用小牛关在狭窄得转不过身来的板条箱里。这些牲畜几乎都终年不见阳光,呼吸不到新鲜空气——它们天生的欲望大都得不到满足。

30 Although it is difficult to face these harsh realities, it is even more difficult to ignore them. Three times a day, you make a decision that not only affects the quality of your life, but the rest of the living world. We hold in our knives and forks the power to change this world.

面对这种严峻的现实固然困难,置之不理更是难上加难。一日三次,你要做出不仅影响自身生活质量、更是事关整个有生命世界的决定。我们手里的餐刀餐叉拥有改变这个世界的力量。

31 Consider the words of Albert Einstein: "Nothing will benefit human health and increase the chances for survival of life on Earth as the Evolution to a vegetarian diet."

让我们想一想阿尔伯特?爱因斯坦的话吧:“没有什么比转向素食更有益于人类健康,更能增加世间万物的生存机会。”

32 Bon appetite.

祝君胃口好。

Where’s the Beef?

Alan Herscovici

1 With summer comes that most wonderful of North American traditions, the backyard barbecue. The succulent aroma of fresh grilled steak, sausages, chicken and fish draws family, friends and neighbours together for a communal feast. Inevitably, in these politically correct times the conversation may drift to the question of whether we really ought to be eating meat at all.

随夏日而来的是北美传统习俗中最美妙的一件事,后院烤肉餐。刚下烤架的牛排、香肠、鸡肉、鱼肉鲜美无比,引来了亲朋好友、左邻右舍,大家一起欢宴。不用说,在如今这个讲求政治正确的时代,聊着聊着就可能聊到我们究竟该不该吃肉的问题。

2 The following guide should help see you through until the burgers are done.

以下的指南想必会帮助你捱过等待汉堡牛排烤熟的那段时间。

3 Appealing to self-interest, a common opening line for proselytizing vegetarians is to claim that “eating meat is bad for us.” They have trouble explaining, however, why human health and longevity have improved steadily as animal products became more readily available throughout this century. In fact, meat is an excellent source of 12 essential nutrients, including protein, iron, zinc and B vitamins.

出于人们往往考虑自身利益这一点,那些劝人茹素的素食者通常一开口就声称“肉食有害健康”。然而,他们难以解释,为什么本世纪动物源性食品日益普及,人们的健康水平和寿命却持续上升。事实上,肉类富含12种人体必需的营养成分,其中包括蛋白质、铁、锌和各种维生素B。

4 It is true that e xcessive fats can be harmful, but today’s meats are lean. Based on equal-size servings, tofu has more fat than

a sirloin steak and only half the protein. (Tofu also makes a mess of the grill.)

不错,过多的脂肪有害健康,但如今的肉都是瘦肉。以同样大小的一份计,豆腐比一块后腿部牛排的脂肪含量多,而蛋白质含量仅是其一半。(何况豆腐会把烤架弄得一团糟。)

5 With the exception of certain religious sects, people have rarely been vegetarian by choice. Most often, vegetarianism is the unfortunate result of poverty. Y et the veggie crowd also claims that “humans are not natural meat-eaters.” Our teeth are not as sharp and our intestinal tracts not as short as those of cats and other pure carnivores. But we are not equipped to be herbivores,

either. Like other omnivores (such as bears or racoons), our digestive equipment allows us to tackle a wide range of foods.

除了某些宗教派别,很少有人自愿吃素。素食主义往往是贫穷的不幸产物。然而,那伙吃素的还说什么“人类并非天生的肉食者”。相比那些猫科动物及其他纯食肉动物,我们的牙齿不够锋利,我们的肠道又过长。但人类也并非理想的食草动物。如同其他杂食动物(如熊和浣熊)一样,我们的消化系统可以应付多种多样的食物。

6 If we were not designed to eat meat, why do we produce large quantities of the enzymes required to break down such foods? Why is vitamin B12 (found only in animal products) essential to human life? If we were not natural meat-eaters, or at least bug and grub eaters, our species would have died out long ago. If we did not develop as hunters, why are our eyes in the front to our heads like those of other predators (tigers, wolves or owls)? Why does the mere smell of a sizzling steak set my saliva glands watering?

如果我们生来不吃肉,那人体何以会产生大量分解肉食所必需的消化酶?为什么维生素B12(仅含于动物源性食品中)为人体不可或缺?如果人类并非天生的肉食者——至少要会吃昆虫——那人类这一物种早就灭绝了。如果人类不曾进化为猎食其他物种的动物,那为什么如其他食肉动物(如虎、狼或猫头鹰)一样,我们的眼睛长在头的前部?为什么一块烤得咝咝作响的牛排的香味就会让我的唾液分泌腺流出口水?

7 Shifting their ground, animal activists now charge that livestock threatens the environment. But much of the world’s arable land is best suited to be used as pasture. It is too hilly, fragile, dry or cold for cultivation. Cattle convert grass into nutrients that can be digested by humans. Those who promote organic agriculture understand that livestock completes the nutrient cycle by returning organic matter to the soil with manure.

动物保护主义者换了个进攻方向,指责牲畜威胁环境。然而,世界上许多可耕地用作牧场最适合。那些土地起伏不平,土质贫瘠,不是太干就是气候太冷,不宜耕种。牲畜把牧草转化为人类能够消化的食物。那些提倡有机农业的人深知,牲畜通过粪肥把有机物质返回土壤,以此完成食物循环的过程。

8 Other anti-meat myths can also be dismissed. For example: ? Whatever you may think about fast food hamburgers, eating them does not encourage the destruction of Amazon rainforests. Because of disease-control measures, no unprocessed South American beef products at all may be imported into Canada. ? Livestock do not use up grains that could otherwise feed starving people in Third World countries. The main diet of cattle is grass and hay. Pigs, chickens and other farm animals are generally fed corn and barley, while people eat mainly wheat and rice. Animals also consume pest-and weather-damaged grains, crop residues (corn stalks and leaves) and by-products from food processing, such as unusable grains (or parts of grains) left over from producing breakfast cereals and other human foods. Raising livestock in Canada does not prevent us from shipping emergency supplies to people in need. Hunger today, however, is usually the result of political, economic and distribution problems, not a lack of production capacity. ? The production of methane gas by livestock is not a major contributor to global warming. Methane gas is only one of many possible “greenhouse” gases. It is produced by all sorts of decomposition of organic matter, including normal digestion (even by vegetarians). Main sources of greenhouse gases include wetlands, forest fires, landfills, rice paddies, the extraction of gas, oil and coal—and even termites. ? Meat does not contain harmful pesticide, antibiotic or other residues. This is assured by stringent Agriculture Canada and Health Canada regulations and inspection. Concerns about dangerous bacteria are easily addressed by cooking your meat well. (Fruit and raw vegetables, in fact, present a more difficult problem.)

其他反对肉食的奇谈怪论也都不值一驳。如:l 无论你对快餐食品汉堡包好恶如何,食用汉堡包并不会加快对亚马孙雨林的破坏。由于采取了各种控制疾病的措施,未经加工的南美牛肉制品根本不能进入加拿大。l 牲畜并不曾消耗掉原本可用于赈济第三世界饥民的粮食。牲畜的主要饲料是青草和干草。猪、鸡和其他家畜通常用玉米和大麦饲养,而人食用的主要是小麦和稻米。动物还吃遭受虫灾和灾害气候的粮食、庄稼的残留物(如玉米的梗和叶),还有食品加工的副产品,如加工早餐谷类食品和其他人类食品的剩下的不能用的粮食(或部分粮食)。在加拿大,饲养牲畜毫不妨碍我们将紧急救援物资运送给急需的人。事实上,当今的粮荒往往是政治、经济、分配不公造成的结果,而非生产力不足所致。l 牲畜产生的沼气并非全球气候变暖的祸首。沼气只是许多潜在的“温室”气体中的一种。沼气由各种有机物在分解过程中生成,其中包括正常的(甚至包括素食者的)消化过程产生的部分。温室气体的主要来源包括湿地、森林火灾、垃圾埋填地、水稻田以及气体、石油和煤炭的开采,甚至包括白蚁。l 食用肉并不含有于健康有害的杀虫剂、抗菌素或其他残留物。这由加拿大农业部和加拿大卫生部严格的规定和检查制度所确保。至于对危险的细菌的担心,只需将肉煮熟煮透即可轻易解决。(事实上,水果和生食蔬菜带来的问题更不易解决。)

9 One study that is not often cited by animal activists is a recent report by the Centre for Energy and the Environment at the University of Exeter in England. David Coley and his associates analyzed how much fuel energy is used to produce and process different foods. Burning fuel releases carbon into the atmosphere, the major suspected cause of global warming.

动物保护主义者很少引用一项研究,那就是英格兰埃克塞特大学能源与环境中心最近的一份报告。

10 To the dismay of the politically correct set, meat scores far better than vegetables on this environmental-impact scale. It requires eight megajoules of fuel energy to produce enough beef or burgers to provide one megajoule of food energy. The fuel energy costs of chicken and lamb are seven megajoules and six megajoules respectively. Typical salad vegetables, however, require as much as 45 megajoules of fuel energy for each energy unit of food intake provided.

令那些讲求政治正确的人感到沮丧的是,在对环境的影响方面,肉要比蔬菜得分高得多。提供1兆焦耳食物能量的牛肉或汉堡牛排需耗费8兆焦耳的燃料能源。鸡肉和羊肉的耗能分别为7和6兆焦耳。而常见的色拉蔬菜却需要耗费多达45兆焦耳的燃料能源才能提供一个能量单位的食物摄入。

11 “Meat does well because it is not highly processed, provides a lot of calories and is often produced locally.” Coley reported in New Scientist last December.

“肉耗能少,因为肉加工程度不高,能提供大量的卡路里,而且常常是本地加工生产。”科利在去年12月的《新科学家》上著文说。

12 It would require more ink than is available to us here to respond to all the claims animal activists have made about the supposed evils of modern livestock husbandry methods, what they misleadingly label “factory farming.” For example, they criticize the caging of laying hens, while ignoring the fact that such systems improve hygiene, preventing disease and reducing the need for antibiotics.

我们在此无法花费过多的笔墨逐一反驳动物保护主义者指控现代家畜饲养方法,即他们误导性地称作的“工厂化养殖”的种种莫须有的危害。例如,他们抨击蛋禽的笼养化,却忽视了这样的事实,即此类系统能改善卫生,预防疾病,减少对抗生素的需求。

13 Detailed responses to animal-welfare concerns are provided in Food for Thought: Facts about Food and Farming, published by the Ontario Farm Animal Council.

安大略禽畜饲养会社发表的《应有的思考:食物与饲养业的基本情况》对有关动物生存状况的关注作了详细解答。

14 For debate around the barbecue, suffice it to say that animals cannot be productive unless they receive excellent nutrition and care. Farmers who do not provide good care for their animals will not remain in business for long.

至于围绕烤肉餐的争论,只需这样说就够了:动物得不到精良的食物和精心的照料就不长肉。饲养场主不精心饲养禽畜则无法长期经营。

15 Once fallacious claims about health, environment and animal welfare are stripped away, the heart of the animal-rights argument is exposed. What right, they ask, do we have to use animals at all?

一旦有关健康、环境以及动物生存状况的谬论被揭穿,有关动物权益的争论的核心便一清二楚了。他们质问道:我们究竟有什么权利去吃禽畜?

16 The central fallacy of this argument is that it ignores basic principles of biology and ecology. Every plant and animal species naturally produces far more offspring than their environment can support to maturity. This “surplus” provides food fo r other species. Aboriginal people called this “the cycle of life.” We now usually call it “the food chain.” We are part of this cycle, like every other living organism on the planet. The domestication of livestock has been a very successful survival strategy, not only for humans, but also for the other species involved.

这一论点的主要谬误在于忽视了生物学与生态学的基本原理。各类动植物物种自然而然地繁衍出大量后代,远远超出环境允许其长到成熟的数量。“过剩部分”则为其他物种提供了食物。土著人称其为“生命的循环”。我们现在通常名之曰“食物链”。如同地球上其他各种有机生命体一样,我们人类是这一循环的一个组成部分。驯养动物向来就是一种极为成功的生存策略,对人类如此,对有关的其他物种也如此。

17 The squeamishness some people now feel about eating animals does not represent a more evolved sensitivity to nature. It is a symptom of how cut off some people have become from nature.

如今有些人对吃肉觉得反感,这并不反映出他们对自然变得更加敏感。这表明了他们离开自然已经何等之远。

18 Thanks to modern agriculture, many city people now take our abundant food supply for granted. We forget that all our food must still be wrested from the land. Even our vegetables must be protected from other creatures. Even a carrot clings to the soil with all its strength. Like other animals, we kill to eat. But because we are human, we can also give thanks and treat the animals that feed us with respect.

多亏了现代农业,如今许多城镇居民对充足的食品供应习以为常,认为理当如此。我们已经忘却,凡人所食仍得靠土地出产。即便人类所食的蔬菜也必须加以守护,以防其他动物侵犯。即便生长中的胡萝卜也竭尽全力紧贴大地。一如其他动物,我们为吃肉而宰杀禽畜。然而,我们有幸为人,因而还能为此感恩,还能慎重地对待给我们提供肉食的动物。

19 I think those burgers should be ready about now…

我看那些汉堡牛排这会儿该烤熟了……

The Truth About Lying关于说谎的真相

1. I've been wanting to write on a subject that intrigues and challenges me: the subject of lying. I've found it very difficult to do. Everyone I've talked to has a quite intense and personal but often rather intolerant point of view about what we can — and can never never — tell lies about. I've finally reached the conclusion that I can't present any ultimate conclusions, for too many people would promptly disagree. Instead, I'd like to present a series of moral puzzles, all concerned with lying. I'll tell you what I think about them. Do you agree?

我一直想写一个令我深感兴趣的话题:关于说谎的问题。我觉得这个题目很难写。所有我交谈过的人都对什么事情可以说谎——什么事情绝对不可以说谎——持有强烈的、常常不容别人分说的个人意见。最后我得出结论,我不能下任何定论,因为这样做就会有太多的人立即反对。我想我还是提出若干都与说谎有关的道义上的难题吧。我将向读者阐明我对这些难题的个人看法。你们觉得对吗?

Social Lies

2. Most of the people I've talked with say that they find social lying acceptable and necessary. They think it's the civilized way for folks to behave. Without these little white lies, they say, our relationships would be short and brutish and nasty. It's arrogant, they say, to insist on being so incorruptible and so brave that you cause other people unnecessary embarrassment or pain by compulsively assailing them with your honesty. I basically agree. What about you?

社交性谎言

和我交谈过的大多数人都说,他们认为旨在促进社会交际的谎言是可以接受的,也是必要的。他们认为这是一种文明的行为。他们说,要不是这类无关紧要的谎言,人与人之间的关系就会变得粗野不快,无法持久。他们说,如果你要做到十二分正直、十二分无畏,不由自主地用你的诚实使他人陷入不必要的窘境或痛苦之中,这只能说你是傲慢自大。对此,我基本赞同。你呢?

3. Will you say to people, when it simply isn't true, "I like your new hairdo," "Y ou're looking much better," "it's so nice to see you," "I had a wonderful time"?

你会不会跟人说:“我喜欢你的新发型,”“你气色好多了,”“见到你真高兴,”“我玩得很尽兴,”而实际上根本不是这么回事儿?

4. Will you praise hideous presents and homely kids?

你会不会对令人憎厌的礼物,或相貌平平的孩子称赞有加?

5. Will you decline invitations with "We're busy that night — so sorry we can't come," when the truth is you'd rather stay home than dine with the So-and-sos?

你婉辞邀请时会不会说“那天晚上我们正好没空——真对不起,我们不能来,”而实际上你是宁肯呆在家里也不想跟某某夫妇一起进餐?

6. And even though, as I do, you may prefer the polite evasion of "Y ou really cooked up a storm "instead of "The soup" —which tastes like warmed-over coffee — "is wonderful," will you, if you must, proclaim it wonderful?

虽然像我那样,你也想用“太丰盛了”这种委婉的托辞,而不是盛赞“那汤味道好极了”(其实味同重新热过的咖啡),但如果你必须赞美那汤,你会说它鲜美吗?

7. There's one man I know who absolutely refuses to tell social lies. "I can't play that game," he says; "I'm simply not made that way." And his answer to the argument that saying nice things to someone doesn't cost anything is, "Y es, it does —it destroys your credibility." Now, he won't, unsolicited, offer his views on the painting you just bought, but you don't ask his frank opinion unless you want frank, and his silence at those moments when the rest of us liars are muttering, "Isn't it lovely?" is, for the most part, eloquent enough. My friend does not indulge in what he calls "flattery, false praise and mellifluous comments." When others tell fibs he will not go along. He says that social lying is lying, that little white lies are still lies. And he feels that telling lies is morally wrong. What about you?

我认识一个人,他完全拒绝说这类社交性谎言。“我不会那一套,”他说,“我生来就不会那一套。”讲到对人家说几句好听的话并不失去什么,他的回答是:“不对,当然有损失——那会损害你的诚信度。”因此你不问他,他不会对你刚买来的画发表意见,但除非你想听老实话,否则你也不会去问他的真实想法。当我们这些说谎者轻声称赞着“多美啊”的时候,他的沉默往往是极能说明问题的。我的这位朋友从来不讲他所说的“奉承话、虚假的赞美话和动听话”。别人说些无伤大雅的谎言,他则不。他说社交性谎言还是谎言,无关紧要的小小谎言还是谎言。他认为说谎不合道德。

你呢?

Peace-Keeping Lies

8. Many people tell peace-keeping lies: lies designed to avoid irritation or argument, lies designed to shelter the liar from possible blame or pain; lies (or so it is rationalized) designed to keep trouble at bay without hurting anyone.

息事宁人的谎言

不少人为了息事宁人而说谎:那种意在避免生气或争吵的谎言,意在使说谎者免受可能的责备或烦恼的谎言;意在(或据认为理应)不伤害他人而又能帮助避免麻烦的谎言。

9. I tell these lies at times, and yet I always feel they're wrong. I understand why we tell them, but still they feel wrong. And whenever I lie so that someone won't disapprove of me or think less of me or holler at me, I feel I'm a bit of a coward, I feel I'm dodging responsibility, I feel...guilty. What about you?

我有时也说这种谎,不过我总觉得不该说。我知道为什么要说这种谎,但说这种谎终究不对。每当我为了不让别人讨厌自己、看轻自己、或冲着自己嚷嚷而说谎时,我总觉得自己有点像个懦夫,觉得自己是在逃避责任,觉得……愧疚。你呢?

10. Do you, when you're late for a date because you overslept, say that you're late because you got caught in a traffic jam?

你由于睡过头赴约会迟到了,会不会说是因为碰上堵车才晚到的?

11. Do you, when you forget to call a friend, say that you called several times but the line was busy?

你忘了给朋友打电话,会不会谎称打过好几次,可电话老占线?

12. Do you, when you didn't remember that it was your father's birthday, say that his present must be delayed in the mail?

你忘了父亲的生日,会不会说寄给他的礼物准是给耽搁了?

13. And when you're planning a weekend in New Y ork City and you're not in the mood to visit your mother, who lives there, do you conceal — with a lie, if you must — the fact that you'll be in New Y ork? Or do you have the courage — or is it the cruelty? — to say, "I'll be in New Y ork, but sorry — I don't plan on seeing you"?

你打算去纽约市度周末,但又不想去看望住在那里的母亲,你会——必要的话用谎言——隐瞒你将到纽约的事实,还是会勇敢地——或者说狠心地——说:“我要来纽约,可是抱歉,我不打算来看望你”?

14. (Dave and his wife Elaine have two quite different points of view on this very subject. He calls her a coward. She says she's being wise. He says she must assert her right to visit New Y ork sometimes and not see her mother. To which she always patiently replies: "Why should we have useless fights? My mother's too old to change. We get along much better when I lie to her.")

(戴夫和妻子伊莱恩正是在这个问题上有两种颇不相同的观点。他称她为懦夫。她说自己处理这事是明智的。他说她应该维护自己有的时候去纽约但不去看望母亲的权利。对此她总是耐心地回答说:“我们何必无谓地争吵呢?我母亲年纪大了,不会改了。我对她说个谎,我们相处得就更好。”)

15. Finally, do you keep the peace by telling your husband lies on the subject of money? Do you reduce what you really paid for your shoes? And in general do you find yourself ready, willing and able to lie to him when you make absurd mistakes or lose or break things?

最后一点,你会不会在钱的问题上对丈夫说谎,以求太平?你会不会少报买鞋子的钱?你出了什么荒唐的错误或丢失了物品打碎了器皿时是不是常常想对他撒谎,而且会对他撒谎?

16. "I used to have a romantic idea that part of intimacy was confessing every dumb thing that you did to your husband. But after a couple of years of that," says Laura, "have I changed my mind!"

“过去我往往不切实际地以为亲密关系的一个组成部分就是把自己做的每件蠢事都如实告诉丈夫。可这么过了几年之后,”劳拉说,“我就改了主意!”

17. And having changed her mind, she finds herself telling peacekeeping lies. And yes, I tell them too. What about you?

改主意后,她在不知不觉中说谎话求太平了。没错,我也说这种谎。你呢?

Protective Lies

18. Protective lies are lies folks tell —often quite serious lies —because they're convinced that the truth would be too damaging. They lie because they feel there are certain human values that supersede the wrong of having lied. They lie, not for personal gain, but because they believe it's for the good of the person they're lying to. They lie to those they love, to those who trust them most of all, on the grounds that breaking this trust is justified.

保护性谎言

保护性谎言就是因为人们认为事实真相危害性太大而说的谎言,这类谎言通常事关重大。他们说谎,因为他们认为,人的某些价值观念压倒了说谎这一错误行为本身。他们说谎不是为个人私利,而是因为他们相信,那是为他们对之说谎的人好。他们对自己所爱的人撒谎,对最信任自己的人撒谎,就是因为他们认为这样做是有正当理由的。19. They may lie to their children on money or marital matters.

他们会在金钱或婚姻问题上对子女说谎。

20. They may lie to the dying about the state of their health.

他们会对垂死者隐瞒真实病情。

21. They may lie to their closest friend because the truth about her talents or son or psyche would be — or so they insist —utterly devastating.

他们会对密友说谎,因为关于其才能、其爱子或其精神状态的实话会——不妨说他们坚持这么认为——使其身心受到极大伤害。

22. I sometimes tell such lies, but I'm aware that it's quite presumptuous to claim I know what's best for others to know. That's called playing God . That's called manipulation and control. And we never can be sure, once we start to juggle lies, just where they'll land, exactly where they'll roll.

有时我也说这种谎,可我明白,声称自己懂得什么事他人应该知道,这未免太自以为是了。这无异于充当上帝。这无异于操纵和控制他人。而我们一旦开始玩起谎言戏法,就再也无法知道谎言何时会收场,究竟会滑向何方。

23. And furthermore, we may find ourselves lying in order to back up the lies that are backing up the lie we initially told.

而且,我们会不知不觉地为了圆先前说的谎言而说谎。

24. And furthermore — let's be honest — if conditions were reversed, we certainly wouldn't want anyone lying to us.

而且——我们不妨直说——如果情形倒过来,我们当然不愿意别人对自己说谎。

25. Y et, having said all that, I still believe that there are times when protective lies must nonetheless be told. What about you?

不过,话虽如此,我还是觉得有时保护性谎言还非说不可。你呢?

Trust-Keeping Lies

26. Another group of lies are trust-keeping lies, lies that involve triangulation, with A (that's you) telling lies to B on behalf of

C (whose trust you'd promised to keep). Most people concede that once you've agreed not to betray a friend's confidence, you can't betray it, even if you must lie. But I've talked with people who don't want you telling them anything that they might be called on to lie about.

信守承诺的谎言

另一类谎言是信守承诺的谎言,涉及三方的谎言,即A(你)为了C(你答应为其信守承诺者)而对B说谎。大多数人承认,一旦你答应不背叛朋友的信任,你就不能背叛,哪怕你必须说谎。但我与之交谈过的人中也有人不想听那些他们也许得为之说谎的事。

27. "I don't tell lies for myself," says Fran, "and I don't want to have to tell them for other people." Which means, she agrees, that if her best friend is having an affair, she absolutely doesn't want to know about it.

“我不为自己说谎,”弗兰说,“我也不愿为别人说谎。”她承认,这就意味着如果她最好的朋友有风流韵事的话,她绝对不想知道。

28. "Are you saying," her best friend asks, "that you'd betray me?"

“你是说,”她最好的朋友问,“你会出卖我?”

29. Fran is very pained but very adamant. "I wouldn't want to betray you, so…don't tell me anything about it."

弗兰心里很为难,但态度十分坚决。“我不想出卖你,所以……别跟我说这事。”

30. Fran's best friend is shocked. What about you?

弗兰最好的朋友深感震惊。你呢?

31. Do you believe you can have close friends if you're not prepared to receive their deepest secrets?

你是不是认为,如果你不愿意了解朋友最深的隐密,你仍会有好朋友?

32. Do you believe you must always lie for your friends?

你是不是认为你必须一直为朋友说谎?

33. Do you believe, if your friend tells a secret that turns out to be quite immoral or illegal, that once you've promised to keep it, you must keep it?

你是不是认为,如果朋友透露的一个秘密是违反道德或法律的,而一旦你答应保密,你就得真的保密?

34. And what if your friend were your boss — if you were perhaps one of the President's men — would you betray or lie for him over, say, Watergate?

如果你的朋友正好是你的上司——如果你恰好就是总统班底的人——比如说在水门事件这个问题上,你是背叛他还是为他说谎?

35. As you can see, these issues get terribly sticky.

可以想见这些问题非常棘手。

36. It's my belief that once we've promised to keep a trust, we must tell lies to keep it. I also believe that we can't tell Watergate lies. And if these two statements strike you as quite contradictory, you're right — they're quite contradictory. But for now they're the best I can do. What about you?

我以为,一旦我们答应信守承诺,我们就是说谎也得信守承诺。同时我也认为,在水门事件这类事情上我们不能说谎。如果你觉得这两点自相矛盾,那你就对了——这两者的确自相矛盾。但目前我只能如此。你呢?

37. There are those who have no talent for lying.

有些人不擅说谎。

38. "Over the years, I tried to lie," a friend of mine explained, "but I always got found out and I always got punished. I guess

I gave myself away because I feel guilty about any kind of lying. It looks as if I'm stuck with telling the truth."

“许多年来,我一直试图说谎,”一位朋友解释说,“可我总是露馅,总是为此受罚。我想人家看出我说谎是因为我一说谎就觉得内疚。看来我只能说真话了。”

39. For those of us, however, who are good at telling lies, for those of us who lie and don't get caught, the question of whether or not to lie can be a hard and serious moral problem. I liked the remark of a friend of mine who said, "I'm willing to lie. But just as a last resort — the truth's always better."

可是,对我们这种擅于说谎的人来说,对我们这种说谎又不露馅的人来说,说谎还是不说谎会成为一个严肃的道德难题。我颇为赞同一位朋友的话,他说,“我愿意说谎。但只把这作为最后一手——真话总比谎话好。”

40. "Because," he explained, "though others may completely accept the lie I'm telling, I don't."

“因为,”他解释说,“哪怕别人对我的谎话完全信以为真,我自己可无法相信。”

41. I tend to feel that way too.

本人也有同感。

42. What about you?

你呢?

White Lies无伤大雅的小谎

1 White lies are at the other end of the spectrum of deception from lies in a serious crisis. They are the most common and the most trivial forms that duplicity can take. The fact that they are so common provides their protective coloring. And their very triviality, when compared to more threatening lies, makes it seem unnecessary or even absurd to condemn them. Some consider all well-intentioned lies, however momentous, to be white; in this book, I shall adhere to the narrower usage: a white lie, in this sense, is a falsehood not meant to injure anyone, and of little moral import. I want to ask whether there are such lies; and if there are, whether their cumulative consequences are still without harm; and, finally, whether many lies are not defended as “white” which are in fact harmful in their own right.

无伤大雅的小谎处于欺骗这个范畴的另一端,与重大时刻撒谎大不一样。它们是最常见的、最轻微的欺骗行为。这类小谎经常听到,这一事实本身就使之披上一层保护色。相比那些更具危害性的谎言,小谎的无关紧要使得对其进行谴责都显得没有必要甚至荒唐。有人把所有用心良善的谎言,无论多么事关重大,都看作是无伤大雅的小谎。在本书中,笔者取的是较为狭窄的意义:在这一意义上,无伤大雅的小谎指的是无意伤害他人的、没有道德含义的谎言。我想问, 是否真有这类谎言;如果有的话,其日积月累的最终结果是否果然不具有伤害性;最后,许多实际上原本就具有伤害性的谎言是否没有被说成“无伤大雅”。

2 Many small subterfuges may not even be intended to mislead. They are only “white lies” in the most marginal sense. Take, for example, the many social exchanges: “How nice to see you!” or “Cordially yours.” These and a t housand other polite expressions are so much taken for granted that if someone decided, in the name of total honesty, not to employ them, he might well give the impression of an indifference he did not possess. The justification for continuing to use such accepted formulations is that they deceive no one, except possibly those unfamiliar with the language.

许多无关紧要的遁词也许根本就无意误导他人。它们不过勉强算是无伤大雅的小谎。如许多客套话:“见到你真高兴!”或信末写的“你至诚的”。这些和许许多多其他礼貌用语并无不妥,理当使用。要是有人为了要绝对诚实决定不用的话,他很可能给人一种为人冷漠的印象,而实际上此人并非如此。一直使用这些公众认可的套语的理由是它们骗不

了人,那些并不通晓这一语言的人或许是例外。

3 A social practice more clearly deceptive is that of giving a false excuse so as not to hurt the feelings of someone making an invitation or request: to say one “can’t” do what in reality one may not want to do. Once again, the false excuse may prevent unwarranted inferences of greater hostility to the undertaking than one may well feel. Merely to say that one can’t do someth ing, moreover, is not deceptive in the sense that an elaborately concocted story can be.

一种显然更具有欺骗性质的社会惯例是假造一个理由,以便不伤害邀请人或请求者的感情:对自己其实不欲为的事推托说“不能为”。同样的,这一假造的理由或许会防止他人莫须有地推断自己对所说之事抵触多多。再者,仅仅说一句自己不能做某事,不像煞费苦心编造的一通谎话那样带有欺骗性。

4 Still other white lies are told in an effort to flatter, to throw a cheerful interpretation on depressing circumstances, or to show gratitude for unwanted gifts. In the eyes of many, such white lies do no harm, provide needed support and cheer, and help dispel gloom and boredom. They preserve the equilibrium and often the humaneness of social relationships, and are usually accepted as excusable so long as they do not become excessive. Many argue, moreover, that such deception is so helpful and at times so necessary that it must be tolerated as an exception to a general policy against lying. Thus Bacon observed: Doth any man doubt, that if there were taken out of men’s minds vain opinions, flattering hopes, false valuations, imaginations as one would, and the like, but it would leave the minds of a number of men poor shrunken things, full of melancholy and indisposition, and unpleas ing to themselves?

还有一些无伤大雅的小谎旨在讨好他人、对令人沮丧的境况做出使人高兴的解释,或者对别人赠送的无用礼物表示感谢。在许多人看来,这类无伤大雅的小谎没有害处,给人以必要的支持和安慰,有助于驱除忧郁和厌烦。它们保障人际关系的平衡,而且常常帮助人们在交往中保住人情味。只要不过分,这类谎话一般被看作是可以原谅的。更有甚者,许多人认为,这类欺骗行为裨益良多,有时还必不可少,故应作为反对撒谎这一总原则的例外加以容忍。培根曾这样说:如果把自视过高的看法、奢望、不实的评价、一厢情愿的想法等等都从人们的脑海里赶走,那会使一些人感到空虚、悲哀、不舒服、讨厌自己,对此有人怀疑过吗?

5 Another kind of lie may actually be advocated as bringing a more substantial benefit, or avoiding a real harm, while seeming quite innocuous to those who tell the lies. Such are the placebos given for innumerable common ailments, and the pervasive use of inflated grades and recommendations for employment and promotion.

另一种谎言,实际上人们也许认为,既能带来更为实在的好处,或能避免真正的伤害,而对那些撒谎者又看似无害。比如对无数常见疾病开的并无药效的安慰剂,以及为了求职或提升而普遍拔高的成绩和多有溢美之词的推荐信。

6 A large number of lies without such redeeming features are nevertheless often regarded as so trivial that they should be grouped with white lies. They are the lies told on the spur of the moment, for want of reflection, or to get out of a scrape, or even simply to pass the time. Such are the lies told to boast or exaggerate, or on the contrary to deprecate and understate; the many lies told or repeated in gossip; Rousseau’s lies[1 Rousseaus’ lies: Rousseau /ru:s/ 卢梭(Jean Jacques Rousseau, 1712-1778),法国启蒙思想家、哲学家、教育家和文学家. In Reveries of the Solitary Stroller, Jean Jacques Rousseau says:“Never have I lied in my own interest; but often I have lied through shame in order to draw myself from embarrassment in indifferent matters…when, having to sustain discussion, the slowness of my idea s and the dryness of my conversation forced me to have recourse to fictions in order to say something.”]1 told simply “in order to say something”; the embroidering on fa cts that seem too tedious in their own right; and the substitution of a quick lie for the lengthy explanations one might otherwise have to provide for something not worth spending time on.

然而,许多谎言并不像上述那样尚有好处可言,但人们常常认为它们无关紧要,所以应归为无伤大雅的谎言一类。那都是些脱口而出、不假思索的谎言,或是为了摆脱窘境、甚或仅仅是为了打发时间而说的谎言。这类谎言有的出于溢美夸大,有的则相反,出于有意贬低或缩小事态;许多来自流言蜚语;而卢梭式的谎言仅仅是“为有话可说”;有的则是对本身太乏味的事实添油加醋;还有的则是因为与其为了不足道的事情费过多口舌还不如找个简短的托词了事。

7 Utilitarians often cite white lies as the kind of deception where their theory shows the benefits of common sense and clear thinking. A white lie, they hold, is trivial; it is either completely harmless, or so marginally harmful that the cost of detecting and evaluating the harm is much greater than the minute harm itself. In addition, the white lie can often actually be benefic ial, thus further tipping the scales of utility. In a world with so many difficult problems, utilitarians might ask: Why take the time to weigh the minute pros and cons in telling someone that his tie is attractive when it is an abomination, or of saying to a guest that a broken vase was worthless? Why bother even to define such insignificant distortions or make mountains out of molehills by seeking to justify them?

功利主义者常称,说无伤大雅的小谎说明你思维清晰、明白事理,他们的理论表明,这样的欺骗有好处。他们

认为,无伤大雅的小谎无关紧要;这种谎言没有丝毫害处,即使有也是微乎其微,若去探究、估计它的害处,其代价比微小的害处本身要大得多。再者,无伤大雅的小谎其实常常会有助益,这就使它的实用性显得更加突出。尘世间本已烦恼多多,功利主义者或许会问:在恭维一个人领带很漂亮其实很难看时,或宽慰客人说那个打破的花瓶并不值钱时,又何苦去耗费时间衡量这样做的微不足道的得失?何苦为了试图证明说无伤大雅的小谎是合理的就费心去解释这类无关紧要的失实,去使并不重要的事显得那么重要?

8 Triviality surely does set limits to when moral inquiry is reasonable. But when we look more closely at practices such as placebo-g iving, it becomes clear that all lies defended as “white” cannot be so easily dismissed. In the first place, the harmlessness of lies is notoriously disputable. What the liar perceives as harmless or even beneficial may not be so in the eyes of the deceived. Second, the failure to look at an entire practice rather than at their own isolated case often blinds liars to cumulative harm and expanding deceptive activities. Those who begin with white lies can come to resort to more frequent and more serious ones. Where some tell a few white lies, others may tell more. Because lines are so hard to draw, the indiscriminate use of such lies can lead to other deceptive practices. The aggregate harm from a large number of marginally harmful instances may, therefore, be highly undesirable in the end—for liars, those deceived, and honesty and trust more generally.

事物的琐碎性质的确限制了什么时候作道德质询是理智的。但如果我们仔细观察说安慰话这样的行为,很显然,不是所有被辩解为无伤大雅的小谎都能轻易开脱的。首先,众所周知,谎言的无害性大可商榷。说谎者认为无害甚或有益的在被欺骗者看来未必如此。第二,对某种行为不看整体效果,只看孤立的个案常常使说谎者对日积月累的伤害、日渐加剧的欺骗行为视而不见。那些起初撒些无伤大雅的小谎的人渐渐地可能会经常说谎,谎言越发出格。只要有人撒几个无伤大雅的小谎,其他人就可能说更多这类谎。由于界限如此难以划分,随意撒这类谎能导致其他的欺骗行为。最终,大量微小伤害合在一起形成的总的伤害会招致相当大的麻烦——对说谎者、被欺骗者是如此,更笼统地说,对诚实、信任也是如此。

9 In the post-Watergate period, no one need regard a concern with the combined and long-term effects of deception as far-fetched. But even apart from political life, with its peculiar and engrossing temptations, lies tend to spread. Disagreeable facts come to be sugar-coated, and sad news softened or denied altogether. Many lie to children and to those who are ill about matters no longer peripheral but quite central, such as birth, adoption, divorce, and death. Deceptive propaganda and misleading advertising abound. All these lies are often dismissed on the same grounds of harmlessness and trivia lity used for white lies in general.

在水门事件之后的年代里,谁也不会对欺骗行为造成的多方面的、长远的影响表示忧虑看作很离奇。可是即使不把政治生活考虑在内,由于说谎具有独特的诱惑力,谎言也呈现蔓延之势。令人不快的事实被裹上了糖衣,使人伤心的消息被粉饰,或干脆被掩盖。许多人对孩子撒谎,对那些有疑难问题的人撒谎,且涉及的问题已并非无关紧要,而是关系到出生、收养孩子、离婚等大事。骗人的宣传以及误导的广告比比皆是。所有这些谎言,如同普通无伤大雅的小谎一样,往往以无害和不值一提为理由而听之任之了。

10 It is worth taking a close look at practices where lies believed trivial are common. Triviality in an isolated lie can then be more clearly seen to differ markedly from the costs of an entire practice—both to individuals and to communities.

被认为无关紧要的谎言时常能够听到,这种说谎行为值得仔细研究一下。一经研究,我们就可以更加清楚地看到,在一个孤立的谎话中看到的极轻微伤害,与整个欺骗行为付出的代价之间有着明显的差异——对个人和对社会都如此。

Unforgettable Miss Bessie难忘恩师贝西小姐

1 She was only about five feet tall and probably never weighed more than 110 pounds, but Miss Bessie was a towering presence in the classroom. She was the only woman tough enough to make me read Beowulf and think for a few foolish days that I liked it. From 1938 to 1942, when I attended Bernard High School in McMinnville, Tenn., she taught me English, history, civics—and a lot more than I realized.

难忘恩师贝西小姐

卡尔?T?罗旺

她身高不过5英尺上下,体重可能从来不超过110磅,但贝西小姐在教室里形象极其高大。她是个厉害女人,只有她能逼得我去读《贝奥武甫》,而且有那么几天,我还真傻乎乎地觉得自己挺喜欢这首史诗。从1938年到1942年,我在田纳西州麦克敏维尔的伯纳德高中上学,她教我英语、历史、公民学,还有许多当时我未能领悟的东西。

2 I shall never forget the day she scolded me into reading Beowulf.

我永远忘不了她训斥着要我读《贝奥武甫》的那一天。

3 "But Miss Bessie," I complained, "I ain't much interested in it."

"可是,贝西小姐,"我抱怨说,"我对它不怎么感兴趣。"

4 Her large brown eyes became daggerish slits. "Boy," she said, "how dare you say 'ain't' to me! I've taught you better than that."

她那双褐色的眼睛眯成一条缝,射出的目光犀利如刀。"小伙子,"她说,"你竟敢对我说'ain't'!我教过你该怎么说。"

5 "Miss Bessie," I pleaded, "I'm trying to make first-string end on the football team. And if I go around saying 'it isn't' and 'they aren't,' the guys are gonna laugh me off the squad."

"贝西小姐,"我恳求道,"我正在努力争取当上橄榄球队的正式边锋。要是我老是说'it isn't'和'they aren't',那帮人会嘲笑我,把我撵出球队的。"

6 "Boy," she responded, "you'll play football because you have guts. But do you know what really takes guts? Refusing to lower your standards to those of the crowd. It takes guts to say you've got to live and be somebody fifty years after all the football games are over."

"小伙子,"她回答说,"你打橄榄球是因为你有勇气。可你是不是知道什么事情真正需要勇气?那就是决不把你的做人标准降低到和那帮子人一样。你要鼓起勇气对他们说,橄榄球比赛全部结束后你还想出人头地生活50年呢。"

7 I started saying "it isn't" and "they aren't," and I still made first-string end—and class valedictorian—without losing my buddies' respect.

我开始说"it isn't"和"they aren't"了,而且照样当上了正式边锋——还成为班级里致告别辞的毕业生代表——却一点也没有失去伙伴们的尊重。

8 During her remarkable 44-year career, Mrs. Bessie Taylor Gwynn taught hundreds of economically deprived black youngsters—including my mother, my brother, my sisters and me. I remember her now with gratitude and affection—especially in this era when Americans are so wrought-up about a "rising tide of mediocrity" in public education and the problems of finding competent, caring teachers. Miss Bessie was an example of an informed, dedicated teacher, a blessing to children and an asset to the nation.

在她44年不平凡的教学生涯中,贝西?泰勒?格温太太教过许多穷困的黑人孩子——其中有我的母亲、兄弟、姐妹,还有我本人。今天,我怀着热爱和感激之情记住她——尤其在今天这个时代,在国人对公共教育"日益平庸化",对称职的、有爱心的教师难觅等问题深感不安之时,我更是忘不了她。贝西小姐有见识、有奉献精神,堪称教师楷模,有她这样的老师是孩子们的福分,对国家来说她是宝贵的人才。

9 Born in 1895, in poverty, she grew up in Athens, Ala., where there was no public school for blacks. She attended Trinity School, a private institution for blacks run by the American Missionary Association, and in 1911 graduated from the Normal School (a "super" high school) at Fisk University in Nashville. Mrs. Gwynn, the essence of pride and privacy, never talked about her years in Athens; only in the months before her death did she reveal that she had never attended Fisk University its elf because she could not afford the four-year course.

她于1895年出生在贫苦人家,在亚拉巴马的阿森斯长大。当时那里没有黑人公立学校。她上的是三一学堂,一所美国传教士协会为黑人开设的私立学校。1911年她毕业于纳什维尔的菲斯克大学附属师范学校(一所"极棒的"高级中学)。格温太太是个自尊心很强、很想维护隐私的人,从来不提她在阿森斯读过的岁月。直到她去世前几个月,她才透露说,她从来没上过菲克斯大学本部,因为她付不起4年的学费。

10 At Normal School she learned a lot about Shakespeare, but most of all about the profound importance of education—especially, for a people trying to move up from slavery. "What you put in your head, boy," she once said, "can never be pulled out by the Ku Klux Klan, the Congress or anybody."

在师范学校求学时,她学到许多关于莎士比亚的知识,但更重要的是她认识了教育的极端重要性——对一个正试图摆脱奴隶地位的民族尤为重要。"你装进脑袋的东西,小伙子,"她说过,"三K党夺不走,国会夺不走,谁都夺不走。"

11 Miss Bessie's bearing of dignity told anyone who met her that she was "educated" in the best sense of the word. There was never a discipline problem in her classes. We didn't dare to mess with a woman who knew about the Battle of Hastings, Magna Carta and the Bill of Rights—and who could also play the piano.

见过贝西小姐的人都从她端庄的举止中看出她是绝对"有学识的"。她任课的班上从来没有纪律问题。我们不敢跟一个知道黑斯廷斯战役、英国大宪章、权利法案——又能弹钢琴的女教师捣乱。

12 This frail-looking woman could make sense of Shakespeare, Milton, V oltaire, and bring to life Booker T. Washington and W. E. B. DuBois. Believing that it was important to know who the officials were that spent taxpayers' money and made public

policy, she made us memorize the names of everyone on the Supreme Court and in the President's Cabinet. It could be embarrassing to be unprepared when Miss Bessie said, "Get up and tell the class who Frances Perkins is and what you think about her."

这位看似弱不禁风的女子能读懂莎士比亚、弥尔顿、伏尔泰的作品,能把布克尔?T?华盛顿和W?E?B?杜波伊斯说得栩栩如生。她深信了解花纳税人的钱并制定维护公共利益政策的官员是非常重要的,因此她要我们记住最高法院全体法官以及总统内阁全体成员的名字。要是贝西小姐说:"站起来,告诉大家弗朗西丝?珀金斯是谁,你觉得她怎么样",而你却毫无准备,那真够窘的。

13 Miss Bessie knew that my family, like so many others during the Depression, couldn't afford to subscribe to a newspaper. She knew we didn't even own a radio. Still, she prodded me to "look out for your future and find some way to keep up with what's going on in the world." So I became a delivery boy for the Chattanooga Times. I rarely made a dollar a week, but I got to read a newspaper every day.

贝西小姐知道,跟大萧条时期许多人家一样,我家订不起报纸。她知道我家连收音机也没有。但她还是敦促我"要为自己的未来着想,设法了解天下大事。"于是我成了查塔努加《时报》的送报员。我一星期挣不满1美金,但我每天都能读到报纸。

14 Miss Bessie noticed things that had nothing to do with schoolwork, but were vital to a youngster's development. Once a few classmates made fun of my frayed, hand-me-down overcoat, calling me "Strings." As I was leaving school, Miss Bessie patted me on the back of that old overcoat and said, "Carl, never fret about what you don't have. Just make the most of what you do have—a brain."

贝西小姐十分关注某些虽与功课无关,但对孩子的成长却至关重要的事。一次几个同学拿我那件穿烂了的旧大衣开玩笑,叫我"破烂"。放学回家时,贝西小姐拍拍我穿着那件旧大衣的背部说:"卡尔,千万别为你没有的东西而烦恼。要充分利用你拥有的东西——脑子。"

15 Among the things that I did not have was electricity in the little frame house[ frame house: a house constructed from a wooden skeleton, typically covered with timber boards 木板屋] that my father had built for $400 with his World War I bonus. But because of her inspiration, I spent many hours squinting beside a kerosene lamp reading Shakespeare and Thoreau, Samuel Pepys and William Cullen Bryant.

我没有的东西包括我家小木板屋没有电,那屋是父亲从他一战退伍军人补助金里拿出400美元盖的。但由于她的鼓励,我花了大量时间在煤油灯下眯着眼阅读莎士比亚、梭罗、塞缪尔?佩皮斯和威廉?科伦?布赖恩特的作品。

16 No one in my family had ever graduated from high school, so there was no tradition of commitment to learning for me to lean on. Like millions of youngsters in today's ghettos and barrios, I needed the push and stimulation of a teacher who truly cared. Miss Bessie gave plenty of both, as she immersed me in a wonderful world of similes, metaphors and even onomatopoeia. She led me to believe that I could write sonnets as well as Shakespeare, or iambic-pentameter verse to put Alexander Pope to shame.

我家从来没有过高中毕业生,因此没有用功读书的先例供我学习。如同今天贫民窟里和西裔聚居区里千百万的孩子一样,我需要一个真正关心人的老师的督促和激励。贝西小姐既随时督促我,又经常激励我,她让我沉浸在一个由明喻、暗喻,甚至拟声词构成的奇妙世界里。她使我相信,我能写出不比莎士比亚逊色的十四行诗,能写出让亚历山大?蒲柏感到羞愧的抑扬格五音步诗。

17 In those days the McMinnville school system was rigidly "Jim Crow," and poor black children had to struggle to put anything in their heads. Our high school was only slightly larger than the once-typical little red schoolhouse, and its library was outrageously inadequate—so small, I like to say, that if two students were in it and one wanted to turn a page, the other one had to step outside.

在那个时代,麦克敏维尔所有的学校对黑人实行严格的种族歧视,穷苦的黑人小孩要想学到一点东西得发奋努力。我们的高中只比南方曾经特有的那种红色小校舍稍大一点,它的图书馆差透了——它是如此之小,我可以说,要是有两个学生在里面看书,一个学生想翻一下书页,另一个学生就得让开。

18 Negroes, as we were called then, were not allowed in the town library, except to mop floors or dust tables. But through one of those secret Old South[3 Old South: the South before the Civil War]3 arrangements between whites of conscience and blacks of stature, Miss Bessie kept getting books smuggled out of the white library. That is how she introduced me to the Bront?s, Byron, Coleridge, Keats and Tennyson. "If you don't read, you can't write, and if you can't write, you might as well stop dreaming," Miss Bessie once told me.

那时候,我们这些黑人(当时人们称我们"Negro")是不准进市图书馆的,除非是去拖地板或擦桌子。但是,贝西小姐利用南北战争前有良知的白人和有影响的黑人之间所达成的某种秘密安排,设法不断地将书从白人图书馆偷运过

来。她用这个办法使我读到勃朗特三姐妹、拜伦、科勒律治、济慈和丁尼生的作品。"你要是不读书,你就不会写,要是你不会写,那你就不要再有什么梦想了,"贝西小姐曾经这样告诫我。

19 So I read whatever Miss Bessie told me to, and tried to remember the things she insisted that I store away. Forty-five years later, I can still recite her "truths to live by," such as Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's lines from "The Ladder of St. Augustine": The heights by great men reached and kept Were not attained by sudden flight. But they, while their companions slept, Were toiling upward in the night.

所以,贝西小姐要我读什么,我就读什么,并努力记住她要我一定要记住的东西。到现在45年了,我仍背得出她推崇的"立身至理名言",譬如亨利?沃兹华斯?朗费罗写的《圣奥古斯丁的梯子》中的诗句:伟人们登上高山之顶,并非一蹴而就。而是当同伴们酣睡时,他们仍不辞辛劳摸黑向上攀爬。

20 Y ears later, her inspiration, prodding, anger, cajoling and almost osmotic infusion of learning finally led to that lovely day when Miss Bessie dropped me a note saying, "I'm so proud to read your column in the Nashville Tennessean."

许多年之后,她的激励和敦促、她的发怒、她的劝诱,她那差不多是潜移默化式的知识传授,终于化作一个美好的日子,那天贝西小姐给我写了封短信:"我在纳什维尔出版的《田纳西人》上读到你的专栏文章,我深感骄傲。"

21 Miss Bessie was a spry 80 when I went back to McMinnville and visited her in a senior citizens' apartment building. Pointing out proudly that her building was racially integrated, she reached for two glasses and a pint of bourbon. I was momentarily shocked, because it would have been scandalous in the 1930s and '40s for word to get out that a teacher drank, and nobody had ever raised a rumor that Miss Bessie did.

我回到麦克敏维尔前往一个老年公寓看望她的时候,她已八十高龄了,但仍精神矍铄。她自豪地告诉我,这个公寓里黑人白人都有,说着她取出两个杯子和一品脱波旁威士忌酒。我顿时感到震惊,因为在二十世纪三、四十年代,要是有传言说当老师的喝酒,那就会成为丑闻,那时候也从来没有谁说过贝西小姐会喝酒。

22 I felt a new sense of equality as she lifted her glass to mine. Then she revealed a softness and compassion that I had never known as a student.

她和我碰杯,我不由产生一种从未有过的平等感。当时她流露出的温柔和怜爱是我当学生时从未感受过的。

23 "I've never forgotten that examination day," she said, "when Buster Martin held up seven fingers, obviously asking you for help with question number seven, 'Name a common carrier,' I can still picture you looking at your exam paper and humming a few bars of 'Chattanooga Choo Choo.' I was so tickled, I couldn't punish either of you."

"我一直记得那天考试,"她说,"巴斯特?马丁伸出七根手指,显然是问你怎么回答第七题,'说出一种常见的运输工具',我现在还能想象,当时你看着自己的试卷,哼了《查塔努加车--车》中的几节 艺娓 豪至耍 懔┪夷母龆济环ǚ!!?

24 Miss Bessie was telling me, with bourbon-laced grace, that I never fooled her for a moment.

贝西小姐是借着威士忌的酒力在告诉我,我什么事都没能蒙过她。

25 When Miss Bessie died in 1980, at age 85, hundreds of her former students mourned. They knew the measure of a great teacher: love and motivation. Her wisdom and influence had rippled out across generations.

1980年,贝西小姐以85岁高龄辞世时,她教过的许多学生前来哀悼。他们知道衡量一位杰出教师的标准:爱与动力。她的智慧和影响惠及几代人。

26 Some of her students who might normally have been doomed to poverty went on to become doctors, dentists and college professors. Many, guided by Miss Bessie's example, became public-school teachers.

她的一些学生,原本也许注定要一生贫困,但后来成长为医生、牙医、大学教授。贝西小姐的不少学生受她榜样的影响,都成为公立学校教师。

27 "The memory of Miss Bessie and how she conducted her classroom did more for me than anything I learned in college," recalls Gladys Wood of Knoxville, Tenn., a highly respected English teacher who spent 43 years in the state's school system. "So many times, when I faced a difficult classroom problem, I asked myself, How would Miss Bessie deal with this? And I'd remember that she would handle it with laughter and love."

"对贝西小姐以及她的课堂教学方式的回忆,比我在大学里所学到的任何东西都更有帮助,"在公立学校系统任教43年、备受尊敬的英语教师,来自田纳西州诺克斯维尔的格拉迪斯?伍德回忆道。"多少次,当我在课堂上遇到难题时,我就自问,贝西小姐对这事会怎么处理?我总记起她总是用笑声,用爱来解决问题。"

28 No child can get all the necessary support at home, and millions of poor children get no support at all. This is what makes

a wise, educated, warm-hearted teacher like Miss Bessie so vital to the minds, hearts and souls of this country's children.

孩子不可能从家里得到所有必要的帮助,千百万穷孩子根本得不到帮助。正因为如此,像贝西小姐那样有智慧、有知识、有热情的教师对我国儿童智力、心灵的发展有着重大的意义。

Why Marriages Fail婚姻何以失败

1 These days so many marriages end in divorce that our most sacred vows no longer ring with truth. “Happily ever after” and “Till death do us part” are expressions that seem on the way to becoming obsolete. Why has it become so hard for couples to stay together? What goes wrong? What has happened to us that close to one-half of all marriages are destined for the divorce courts? How could we have created a society in which 4

2 percent of out children will grow up in single-parent homes? Even though each broken marriage is unique, we can still find the common perils, the common causes for marital despair. Each marriage has crisis points and each marriage tests endurance, the capacity for both intimacy and change. Outside pressures such as job loss, illness, infertility, trouble with a child, care of aging parents and all the other plagues of life hit marriage the way hurricanes blast our shores. Some marriages survive these storms and others don’t. Marriages fail, however, not simply becaus e of the outside weather but because the inner climate becomes too hot or too cold, too turbulent or too stupefying.

如今,以离婚告终的婚姻如此之多,我们最神圣的誓约听上去都不再真实了。“婚后永远幸福”和“直到死神将我们分开”这类话语似乎快过时了。夫妻长相守何以变得如此困难?哪儿出了问题?我们到底怎么了,竟然有差不多半数的婚姻注定要为离婚走进法庭?有42%的儿童将在单亲家庭中长大,我们怎么把社会弄成这样了呢?虽然破裂的婚姻各有其独特的情况,但我们还是能找到致使婚姻无法维持下去的共同因素、共同原因。凡婚姻都有其危机时刻,都要经受对持久力的考验,经受对既能亲密相处又善应对变化这种能力的考验。外部压力,如失业、疾病、不育、抚育孩子、赡养年迈的父母,以及生活中其他种种烦恼,都会如飓风横扫海岸那样对婚姻带来打击。有些婚姻经受住了这些风暴,有些则不然。但婚姻失败并不是简单地由外部天气造成的,而是由于内部气候变得过热或过冷,变得过于狂暴或过于麻木造成的。

2 When we look at how we choose our partners and what expectations exist at the tender beginnings of romance, some of the reasons for disaster become quite clear. We all select with unconscious accuracy a mate who will recreate with us the emotional patterns of our first homes. Dr. Carl A. Whitaker, a marital therapist and emeritus professor of psychiatry at the University of Wisconsin, explains, “From early childhood on, each of us carried models for marriage, femininity, masculinity, motherhood, fatherhood and all the other family roles.” Each of us falls in love with a mate who has qualities of our parent s, who will help us rediscover both the psychological happiness and miseries of our past lives. We may think we have found a man unlike Dad, but then he turns to drink or drugs, or loses his job over and over again or sits silently in front of the TV just the way Dad did. A man may choose a woman who doesn’t like kids just like his mother or who gambles away the family savings just like his mother. Or he may choose a slender wife who seems unlike his obese mother but then turns out to have other addictions that destroy their mutual happiness.

如果我们来看一下自己如何挑选配偶,看一下在爱情最初的甜蜜阶段有着怎样的期待,婚姻触礁的一些原因便显而易见了。无意中我们都精确地选中了能和我们一起重建我们第一个家庭的情感模式的伴侣。婚姻心理治疗专家、威斯康星大学精神病学荣誉教授卡尔?A?威塔科尔解释说:“从幼年起,我们每一个人心里就对婚姻、女子气质、男子气质、为人母、为人父,以及其他各种家庭角色有了自己的样板。”我们每一个人都爱上具有自己父母气质的伴侣,能帮助我们在心理上重温以往生活中的欢乐与苦难的伴侣。我们或许会以为自己找的男人与爸爸不同,可是到头来,就像爸爸那样,他酗酒,或者吸毒,或者一次又一次失业,或者就像爸爸那样一言不发地坐在电视机前。男人或许会选择一个像自己母亲一样不喜欢孩子的女人,一个像自己母亲一样把家里的钱全都赌光的女人。或者他会选择一个苗条的妻子,与体态臃肿的母亲看上去似乎不一样,可结果发现那女子有其他的嗜好,这就毁了双方的幸福。

3 A man and a woman bring to their marriage bed a blended concoction of conscious and unconscious memories of their parents’ lives together. The human way is to compulsively repeat and recreate the patterns of the past. Sigmund Freud so well described the unhappy design that many of us get trapped in: the unmet needs of childhood, the angry feelings left over from frustrations of long ago, the limits of trust and the recurrence of old fears. Once an individual senses this entrapment, there may follow a yearning to escape, and the result could be a broken, splintered marriage.

男女双方都把意识到的和未意识到的对父母共同生活的混杂记忆带上婚床。人类总会不由自主地去重复并再现过去的生活模式。西格蒙德?弗洛伊德入木三分地描述了我们许多人所陷入的自设的不幸罗网:童年时期未能满足的欲望,多年前的挫折留下的愤怒情绪,信任受到限制以及旧日恐惧的重现。一个人一旦意识到自己陷入这样的困境,就可能渴望逃脱,其结果可能是婚姻破裂、分崩离析。

4 Of course people can overcome the habits and attitudes that developed in childhood. We all have hidden strengths and amazing capacities for growth and creative change. Change, however, requires work—observing your part in a rotten pattern, bringing difficulties out into the open—and work runs counter to the basic myth of marriage: “When I wed this person all my problems will be over. I will have achieved success and I will become the center of life for this other person and this person will be my center, and we will mean everything to each other forever.” This myth, wh ich every marriage relies on, is soon exposed.

The coming of children, the pulls and tugs of their demands on affection and time, place a considerable strain on that basic myth of meaning everything to each other, or merging together and solving all of lif e’s problems.

当然,人们能够改变童年时期养成的习惯和形成的看法。我们都有潜在的活力,都有令人惊叹的能力使自己得以成长和创造性地变化。然而,变化需要有所行动——观察自己在糟糕的模式中的作用,公开遇到的难处——而行动却有悖于关于婚姻的神话:“我与此人结了婚,我所有的烦恼就会烟消云散。到了那时我算是获得成功了,我将成为此人生活的中心,此人也将成为我生活的中心,我们将永远视对方为自己生活的全部。”这一维系所有婚姻的神话不久就被打破。孩子降生了,需要有人爱、需要有人花时间照料,这些拖累在相当程度上打击了那个说什么视对方为自己生活之全部,或者说什么夫妇融为一体解决生活中所有问题的神话。

5 Concern and tension about money take each partner away from the other. Obligations to demanding parents or still-depended-upon parents create further strain. Couples today must also deal with all the cultural changes brought on in recent years by the women’s movement and the sexual revolution. The altering of roles and the shifting of responsibilities have been extremely trying[ trying: difficult or annoying; hard to deal with] for many marriages.

对金钱的关心以及由金钱造成的紧张关系使夫妻产生隔阂。对苛求的父母或仍需赡养的父母应尽的责任进一步加剧了紧张关系。如今,夫妻双方还必须应对近几年来妇女解放运动和性革命所带来的各种文化变革。角色的改变、责任的变更对相当一部分婚姻都是极其严峻的考验。

6 These and other realities of life erode the visions of marital bliss the way sandstorms eat at rock and the ocean nibbles away at the dunes. Those euphoric, grand feelings that accompany romantic love are really self-delusions, self-hypnotic dreams that enable us to forge a relationship. Real life, failure at work, disappointments, exhaustion, bad smells, bad colds and hard times all puncture the dream and leave us stranded with our mate, with our childhood patterns pushing us this way and that, with our unfulfilled expectations.

就像沙尘暴侵蚀岩石、海浪蚕食沙丘,这一切以及生活中其他现实问题逐渐毁灭对幸福婚姻的幻想。那些伴随着浪漫爱情而来的欣喜若狂的美妙感觉实际上都是自我欺骗、自我催眠的梦幻,而这种自欺、这种梦幻使我们得以去缔结良缘。现实生活、工作中的失败、失望、劳累、体臭、重感冒以及艰难时世都会打破幻想,使我们与配偶间的关系陷入困境,使我们面对以这种或那种方式左右我们的儿时行为方式时毫无办法,使我们面对无法实现的种种期望时一筹莫展。

7 The struggle to survive in marriage requires adaptability, flexibility, genuine love and kindness and an imagination strong enough to feel what the other is feeling. Many marriages fall apart because either partner cannot imagine what the other wants or cannot communicate what he or she needs or feels. Anger builds until it erupts into a volcanic burst that buries the marriage in ash.

维系婚姻的努力要求有适应能力、灵活性、真挚的爱和亲切和善,还要有足够强的想象力,去感受对方的感情。许多婚姻破裂是因为男女双方都不能想像对方需要什么,也不会表达自己的需要和感情。于是怒气越积越多,最后如火山一样爆发出来,其灰烬终将婚姻埋葬。

8 It is not hard to see, therefore, how essential communication is for a good marriage. A man and a woman must be able to tell each other how they feel and why they feel the way they do; otherwise they will impose on each other roles and actions that lead to further unhappiness. In some cases, the communication patterns of childhood—of not talking, of talking too much, of not listening, of distrust and anger, or withdrawal—spill into the marriage and prevent a healthy exchange of thoughts and feelings. The answer is to set up new patterns of communication and intimacy.

所以,不难看出,婚姻要美满,交流是多么重要。不管是丈夫还是妻子,必须能告诉对方他/她的感受,以及他/她为什么会有这种感受。不然的话,他们就会把导致进一步不幸的角色和行为强加给对方。有时候,儿时的交流模式——不讲话、讲得太多、不听对方讲话、不信任、生气、与对方相处时的冷漠等——会注入婚姻关系,阻止健康的思想和感情交流。解决的办法是建立新的交流和亲近模式。

9 At the same time, however, we must see each other as individuals. “To achieve a balance between separateness and closeness is one of the major psy chological tasks of all human beings at every stage of life,” says Dr. Stuart Bartle, a psychiatrist at the New Y ork University Medical Center.

然而与此同时,我们必须把对方看作是独立的个人。“在亲与疏之间取得平衡是所有人在人生的每一个阶段都要遇到的主要心理任务之一,”纽约大学医学中心的精神病学家斯图尔特?巴特尔博士如是说。

10 If we sense from our mate a need for too much intimacy, we tend to push him or her away, fearing that we may lose our identities in the merging of marriage. One partner may suffocate the other partner in a childlike dependency.

如果我们意识到配偶要求过多的亲密,我们往往会将他/她推开,担心自己会在融为一体的婚姻中失去自身独立性。夫妻一方孩子般地依赖对方会使对方感到透不过气来。

11 A good marriage means growing as a couple but also growing as individuals. This isn’t easy. Richard gives up his interest in carpentry because his wife, Helen, is jealous of the time he spends away from her. Karen quits her choir group because her husband dislikes the friends she makes there. Each pair clings to each other and are angry with each other as life closes in on them. This kind of marital balance is easily thrown as one or the other pulls away and divorce follows.

理想的婚姻意味着不但夫妻情感与日俱增,而且各自要作为独立的个人同时发展。这不是件容易事。理查德放弃了对木工活的兴趣,因为妻子海伦对他撇下自己心生嫉妒。凯伦不去歌唱队了,因为她丈夫不喜欢她在歌唱队里的那些朋友。每对夫妻都朝朝暮暮守在一起,当他们感受到生活的压力时,彼此就生对方的气。当夫妻中任何一个不打算继续厮守时,这种婚姻平衡就很容易被打破,紧接着便是离婚。

12 Sometimes people pretend that a new partner will solve the old problems. Most often extramarital sex destroys a marriage because it allows an artificial split between the good and the bad—the good is projected on the new partner and the bad i s dumped on the head of the old. Dishonesty, hiding and cheating create walls between men and women. Infidelity is just a symptom of trouble. It is a symbolic complaint, a weapon of revenge, as well as an unraveler of closeness. Infidelity is often that proverbial last straw that sinks the camel to the ground.

有时人们自以为找个新伴侣就能解决老问题。婚外性关系常常破坏婚姻,因为它使好与坏人为地分裂开来——好的记在新人名下,坏的倒在旧人头上。不诚实、隐瞒、欺骗等行为在夫妻之间筑起屏障。不忠乃婚姻出现问题的症状。不忠象征抗议,是复仇的武器,也是拆散亲密关系的工具。不忠行为常常成为谚语中所说的把骆驼压垮的那最后一根稻草。

13 All right—marriage has always been difficult. Why then are we seeing so many divorces at this time? Y es, our modern social fabric is thin, and yes, the permissiveness of society has created unrealistic expectations and thrown the family into chaos. But divorce is so common because people today are unwilling to exercise the self-discipline that marriage requires. They expect easy joy, like the entertainment on TV, the thrill of a good party.

确实——婚姻从来就很难处理。那为什么偏偏如今会发生如此之多的离婚呢?没错,我们现代的社会结构相当薄弱;没错,社会的宽容放任使人们产生了不切实际的期望,使家庭陷入混乱。但离婚如此普遍是因为今天的人们不愿意运用婚姻所需的自我约束力。他们希望不花力气就能过上悠闲愉快的日子,就像看电视节目那么快乐,就像参加精彩的晚会那么兴奋。

14 Marriage takes some kind of sacrifice, not dreadful self-sacrifice of the soul, but some level of compromise. Some of one’s fantasies, some of one’s legitimate desires have to be given up for the value of the marriage itself. “While all marita l partners feel shackled at times it is they who really choose to make the marital ties into confining chains or supporting bon ds,” says Dr. Whitaker. Marriage requires sexual, financial and emotional discipline. A man and a woman cannot follow every impulse, cannot allow themselves to stop growing or changing.

婚姻需要某种牺牲,不是那种可怕的刻骨铭心的自我牺牲,而是某种程度上的妥协。为了婚姻,一个人不得不放弃某些幻想、某些合理的欲望。“每对夫妻都会有时感到婚姻的束缚,但恰恰正是他们自己决定把男婚女嫁变成束缚人的羁绊或相互扶持的纽带的,”威塔科尔博士说。婚姻需要夫妻双方在性、经济、情感等方面自律。夫妻都不能一味凭冲动行事,不能听任自己停滞不前或不思改变。

15 Divorce is not an evil act. Sometimes it provides salvation for people who have grown hopelessly apart or were frozen in patterns of pain or mutual unhappiness. Divorce can be, despite its initial devastation, like the first cut of the surgeon’s knife, a step toward new health and a good life. On the other hand, if the partners can stay past the breaking up of the romantic myths into the development of real love and intimacy, they have achieved a work as amazing as the greatest cathedrals of the world. Marriages that do not fail but improve, that persist despite imperfections, are not only rare these days but offer a wondrous shelter in which the face of our mutual humanity can safely show itself.

离婚并非邪恶的行动。有时离婚能解救那些已经没有希望重归于好的夫妻,解救那些深深陷入凄楚痛苦之中的夫妻。如同外科医生动的第一刀,离婚最初固然带有破坏性,但那可能就是走向健康走向美好生活的必要一步。从另一方面来说,如果夫妻双方能共同度过那些爱情神话破灭的危机,进而培养真正的爱情与发展亲密关系,他们就完成了一项与世界上最宏伟的大教堂一样神奇的伟业。没有破裂而是改善了的婚姻,不尽完美却长久维持着的婚姻,如今不仅弥足珍贵,而且构筑成一个绝妙的庇护所,在其间夫妻双方可以安全地展示共同的人性。

大英3课后翻译

UNIT 1 Translation 1. We have a problem with the computer system, but I think it’s fairly minor. 2. My father died when I was too young to live on my own. The people of my hometown took over (responsibility for) my upbringing at that point. 3. The toys have to meet strict/ tough safety requirements before they can be sold to children. 4. Radio and television have supplemented rather than replaced the newspaper as carriers of news and opinion. 5. When it comes to this magazine, it is/ carries a digest of articles from many newspapers and magazines around the world. A decade ago,Nancydid what so many Americans dream about. She quit an executive position and opened/ set up a household device store in her neighborhood. People likeNancymade the decision primarily for the improvement in the quality of their lives. But, to run a small business on a small scale is by no means an easy job. Without her steady income,Nancyhad to cut back on her daily expense. Sometimes she did not even have the money to pay the premium for the various kinds of insurance she needed. Fortunately, through her own hard work, she has now got through the most difficult time. She is determined to continue pursuing her vision of a better life. UNIT 2 Translation 1. Though greatly affected by the consequences of the global financial crisis, we are still confident that we can face up to the challenge and overcome the crisis. 2. Under threat of constant sand storms, we were compelled to leave our cherished village and move to the new settlement. 3. According to a recent online survey, a lot of consumers say they may be motivated to consider buying products shown in TV commercials. 4. Having spotted a truck driver dumping contaminated waste alongside the river, the old man reported to the police at once. 5. Some scientists hold to the firm conviction that people will come to like genetically modified crops someday since they can increase yields and help combat hunger and disease in the developing world. Shortly after he achieved freedom Henson became intent on assisting fugitive slaves. He secretly returned to theUnited StatesfromCanadaseveral times to help others to travel the Underground Railroad to freedom. Once some slave catchers closed in on the escaping slaves and Henson when they were on the run. He disguised them and successfully avoided capture. Later he built a small settlement inDresdeninCanadafor escaped slaves, setting up a chapel and a school. He held to the conviction that slavery would be abolished, and the day was bound to come when racial discrimination no longer existed. UNIT 3 Translation 1.

大英四翻译

Unit1(fighting with the force of nature) 1) Mr. Doherty and his family are currently engaged in getting the autumn harvest in on the farm. 2) We must not underestimate the enemy. They are equipped with the most sophisticated weapons. 3) Not having had a job for 3 months, Phil is getting increasingly desperate. 4) Sam, as the project manager, is decisive, efficient, and accurate in his judgement. 5) Since the chemical plant was identified as the source of pollution, the village neighborhood committee decided to close it down at the cost of 100 jobs. Translation The offensive had already lasted three days, but we had not gained much ground. The division commander instructed our battalion to get around to the rear of the enemy at night and launch a surprise attack. To do so, however, we had to cross marshland and many of us were afraid we might get bogged down in the mud. Our battalion commander decided to take a gamble. Lucky enough, thanks to the severely cold weather which made the marchland freeze over, we arrived at our destination before dawn and began attacking the enemy from the rear. This turned the tide of the battle. The enemy, caught off guard, soon surrendered. Unit2 1)There was an unusual quietness in the air, except for the sound of artillery in the distance. 2)The expansion of urban areas in some African countries has been causing a significant fall in living standards and an increase in social problems. 3)The research shows that atmospheric carbon dioxide levels are closely correlated with global temperatures. 4)The frequency of the bus service has been improved from 15 to 12 minute recently. 5)The diver stood on the edge of the diving board, poised to jump at the signal from the coach. translation Automobiles have, since their invention, revolutionized transportation, changing forever the way people live, travel, and do business. On the other hand, they have brought hazards, especially highway fatalities. However, today the application of computer technology and electronic sensors in designing and manufacturing cars makes it possible to eliminate most of traffic accidents. For example, electronic sensors mounted in your car can detect alcohol vapor in the air and refuse to start up the engine. They can also monitor road conditions by receiving radio signals sent out from orbiting satellites and greatly reduce your chances of getting stuck in traffic jams. Unit3 1) Despite the inadequate length of the airstrip in this emergency landing, the veteran pilot managed to stop the plane after taxiing for only a short while. 2) Grilled by the reporters, the movie star eventually blurted (out) that she had undergone two plastic surgeries. 3) We have the technology and our partner has the capital. Working together, we’ll have the future in our hands. 4) If I had known beforehand that you would bring so many friends home, I would have made

新视野大学英语第三版翻译

BOOK TWO Unit 5 丝绸之路(Silk Road)是我国古代一条连接中国和欧亚大陆(Eurasia)的交通线路,由于这条商路以丝绸贸易为主,故称"丝绸之路"。作为国际贸易的通道和文化交流的桥梁,丝绸之路有效地促进了东西方经济文化交流和发展,对世界文明进程有着深远影响。当前,在新的历史条件下,我国提出了"一带一路"(One Belt, One Road)(即"丝绸之路经济带"和"21世纪海上丝绸之路")的战略构想。"一带一路"以合作共赢为核心,强调相关各国的互利共赢和共同发展。这一战略一经提出即受到沿线各国的积极响应。 The Silk Road is a traffic route in the ancient times connecting China and Eurasia. This trade route focuses on the trade of silk, hence the name "the Silk Road". As an international trade channel and a bridge of cultural exchanges, the Silk Road effectively improved the economic and cultural exchanges and development between the East and the West, exerting a profound impact on the progress of the world civilization. Nowadays, under the new historical circumstances, our country proposes the strategy of "One Belt, One Road" (namely the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st-century Maritime Silk Road). The strategy of "One Belt, One Road" focuses on cooperation and mutual benefits, emphasizing mutual benefits, win-win, as well as common development of the related countries. Once proposed, the strategy has received positive responses from the related countries along the road. Unit 6 国民幸福指数(National Happiness Index,NHI)是衡量人们幸福感的一种指数,也是衡量一个国家或地区经济发展、居民生活与幸福水平的指标工具。随着中国经济的高速增长,中国政府越来越重视人民群众生活质量和幸福指数的提升。政府注重改善民生,努力改善人民群众的经济状况,满足人民群众日益增长的物质文化需求。当前,中国政府提倡释放改革红利,让人民群众得到更多实惠。所有这些都将有效促进我国国民幸福指数不断提升。 National Happiness Index (NHI) is an index that measures how happy people are. It is also a tool that measures the levels of economic development and people's livelihood and happiness in a country or region. With the fast growth of Chinese economy, the Chinese government has been paying more and more attention to people's living quality and the increase of happiness index. The government stresses improvement of its people's livelihood, striving to improve their economic conditions and meet their growing material and cultural needs. Currently, the Chinese government advocates the unleashing of more reform dividends, with the aim of offering more real benefits to its people. All these measures will combine to effectively increase the NHI of our people.

新视野大学英语课后习题翻译答案

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