大学英语综合教程5课文翻译.doc

狱 中 学 习今天，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 didnt contain anywhere from one to nearly all of the words that might as well have been in Chinese2 the words that might as well have been in Chinese: it would have made no difference if the English words had been in Chinese, because I didnt have the slightest knowledge of either.2. When I just skipped those words, of course, I really ended up with 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 dictionaryto study, to learn some words. I was lucky enough to reason also that I should try to improve my penmanship. It was sad. I couldnt 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 dictionarys pages. Id never realized so many words existed! I didnt 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 Id 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 wordsimmensely proud to realize that not only had I written so much at one time, but Id 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 didnt 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 onI copied the dictionarys 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 encyclopedia. Finally the dictionarys A section had filled a whole tabletand I went on into the Bs. 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. You couldnt have gotten me out of books with a wedge. Between Mr. Muhammads teachings, my correspondence, my visitorsusually Ella and Reginaldand 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 Colonys 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. You 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 Available on the prison librarys 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 prison: 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 librarythousands of old books. Some of them looked ancient: covers faded, old-time parchment-looking binding. Parkhurst, Ive 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 wouldnt have in general circulation. Any college library 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 the “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 minutesuntil 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 wasnt 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, “Whats your alma mater?” I told him, “Books.” You will never catch me with a free fifteen minutes in which Im 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 readand thats a lot of books these days. If I werent out here every day battling the white man, I could spend the rest of my life reading, just satisfying my curiositybecause you can hardly mention anything Im not curious about. I dont 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？Wheres the Beef?Alan Herscovici1 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.牛肉在哪里？阿伦泛兆瓤宋?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 excessive fats can be harmful, but todays 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. Yet 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 worlds 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 coaland 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。戴维房评捌浜献髡叻治隽松爰庸煌称匪姆训娜剂夏茉础H忌杖加徒寂湃氪笃悖四巳蚱虮渑闹饕尚住?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,