王超非诚勿扰【视频】- 鲍勃·迪伦诺贝尔文学奖演讲 演讲-英语学习

【视频】| 鲍勃·迪伦诺贝尔文学奖演讲 演讲-英语学习双桥老太太

When I first received this Nobel Prize for Literature, I got to wondering exactly how my songs related to literature. I wanted to reflect on it and see where the connection was. I'm going to try to articulate that to you. And most likely it will go in a roundabout way, but I hope what I say will be worthwhile and purposeful.
刚获得诺贝尔文学奖时,我就在想,我的歌究竟和文学有什么关系。我想去认真思考,找到两者间的联系。现在我打算说说给你们听,可能有点拐弯抹角,但希望我说的值得一听,你们也有所收获。
If I was to go back to the dawning of it all, I guess I'd have to start with Buddy Holly. Buddy died when I was about eighteen and he was twenty-two. From the moment I first heard him, I felt akin. I felt related, like he was an older brother. I even thought I resembled him.
从头说起,我大概要从巴迪·霍利开始。巴迪去世那年,我18岁,他22岁。我听到他声音的那一刻,感觉就很亲切,心里为之一动,他就像我的哥哥,当时我甚至觉得我很像他。
Buddy played the music that I loved – the music I grew up on: country western, rock ‘n' roll, and rhythm and blues. Three separate strands of music that he intertwined and infused into one genre. One brand. And Buddy wrote songs – songs that had beautiful melodies and imaginative verses. And he sang great – sang in more than a few voices.
巴迪演奏的音乐我很喜欢,我听着那种音乐长大,乡村西部音乐、摇滚乐以及节奏布鲁斯。他将这三种音乐糅合起来,融为一派。巴迪也写歌,旋律优美,填词恣肆。他唱得也很好,他用的不止一种声线。
He was the archetype. Everything I wasn't and wanted to be. I saw him only but once, and that was a few days before he was gone. I had to travel a hundred miles to get to see him play, and I wasn't disappointed.
他是个楷模,拥有所有我当时没有并希望拥有的一切。我只见过他一次,就在他去世前几天。我跑了一百英里去看他的演出,他没让我失望。
He was powerful and electrifying and had a commanding presence. I was only six feet away. He was mesmerizing. I watched his face, his hands, the way he tapped his foot, his big black glasses, the eyes behind the glasses, the way he held his guitar, the way he stood, his neat suit. Everything about him. He looked older than twenty-two. Something about him seemed permanent, and he filled me with conviction. Then, out of the blue, the most uncanny thing happened. He looked me right straight dead in the eye, and he transmitted something. Something I didn't know what. And it gave me the chills.I think it was a day or two after that that his plane went down.
他充满力量,令人振奋,气场很强。我离他不过六英尺远,他真令人着迷。我看着他的脸、他的手、他跳舞的步法、大黑框眼镜,镜片后面的双眸以及他抱吉他的方式、站姿和整洁的西装。他一切的一切。他看上去不止22岁。他有种永恒的东西,这给了我信念。突然,最不可思议的事发生了,他死死盯着我,好想在传达着什么。我不知道那是什么,总之让我脊背发凉。一两天后,他的飞机掉了下来。
And somebody – somebody I'd never seen before – handed me a Leadbelly record with the song "Cottonfields" on it. And that record changed my life right then and there. Transported me into a world I'd never known. It was like an explosion went off. Like I'd been walking in darkness and all of the sudden the darkness was illuminated. It was like somebody laid hands on me. I must have played that record a hundred times.
有人给了我一盘莱德贝利的磁带,里面有《棉花田》,那人我从来没见过。磁带从此改变了我的生活,把我带到一个前所未知的世界,简直让人感觉炸开了,以前我一直走在黑暗之中,突然间一片光明;好像有人攫住了我,磁带我可能听了有一百遍。
It was on a label I'd never heard of with a booklet inside with advertisements for other artists on the label: Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee, the New Lost City Ramblers, Jean Ritchie, string bands. I'd never heard of any of them.But I reckoned if they were on this label with Leadbelly, they had to be good, so I needed to hear them. I wanted to know all about it and play that kind of music. I still had a feeling for the music I'd grown up with, but for right now, I forgot about it. Didn't even think about it. For the time being, it was long gone.
发片的公司我从没听说过,里边的小册子还介绍了其他艺术家:萨尼·特里和布朗尼·麦基、新迷城漫步者、让·芮特旭,弦乐团。歌手我也从未听说过,可既然和莱德贝利同属一家唱片公司,肯定错不了,因此我也得听听。我如饥似渴地听,想演奏那种音乐。我至今忘不了伴我长大的那些音乐,但当时,我将它们抛之脑后,甚至想都没有去想。一时间,它们都是明日黄花。
I hadn't left home yet, but I couldn't wait to. I wanted to learn this music and meet the people who played it. Eventually, I did leave, and I did learn to play those songs. They were different than the radio songs that I'd been listening to all along. They were more vibrant and truthful to life. With radio songs峪宏中学 , a performer might get a hit with a roll of the dice or a fall of the cards, but that didn't matter in the folk world. Everything was a hit. All you had to do was be well versed and be able to play the melody.
当时我还在家住,可我迫不及待地想要离开。我想去学这种音乐,认识玩这种音乐的人。终于我离开了家,真的去玩这种音乐了。它们和我在电台里听到的音乐不一样,它们生气勃勃,直面生活。电台的音乐里,表演者想出彩,全凭运气,可在民谣里这根本不重要,民谣处处带感。你只需游刃有余地演奏旋律。
Some of these songs were easy, some not.I had a natural feeling for the ancient ballads and country blues, but everything else I had to learn from scratch. I was playing for small crowds, sometimes no more than four or five people in a room or on a street corner. You had to have a wide repertoire, and you had to know what to play and when. Some songs were intimate, some you had to shout to be heard.
有些歌很简单,有的就不容易。我对古谣和乡村布鲁斯感觉很好,可其他的却要从头学起。我参加小型演出,在房间或街角唱,有时只有四五个人听。你能唱的歌要很多,你得知道什么时候该表演什么。有些歌宛转和煦,有些却要铿锵激越。
By listening to all the early folk artists and singing the songs yourself, you pick up the vernacular. You internalize it. You sing it in the ragtime blues, work songs, Georgia sea shanties, Appalachian ballads and cowboy songs. You hear all the finer points, and you learn the details.
听所有早期民谣艺术家的演唱,并自己唱这些歌,你渐渐找到了门道,内化于心。你用繁音拍子蓝调、劳动号子、佐治亚船夫号子、阿巴拉契亚民谣和牛仔调。你竖起耳朵来,就学到了细节。
You know what it's all about. Takin' the pistol out and puttin' it back in your pocket. Whippin' your way through traffic, talkin' in the dark. You know that Stagger Lee was a bad man and that Frankie was a good girl. You know that Washington is a bourgeois town and you've heard the deep-pitched voice of John the Revelator and you saw the Titanic sink in a boggy creek.And you're pals with the wild Irish rover and the wild colonial boy. You heard the muffled drums and the fifes that played lowly. You've seen the lusty Lord Donald stick a knife in his wife, and a lot of your comrades have been wrapped in white linen.
你了解了一切。拔出手枪,又放回到口袋,在车流里穿梭,在黑暗中细语。你明白斯泰克·李是个坏蛋,弗兰基是个好姑娘。你明白华盛顿是个资产阶级城市,你听过“启示者约翰”低沉的嗓音,你看到泰坦尼克号在泥沟里沉没。你与不羁的爱尔兰漂泊者和殖民地男孩结伴而行,你听到闷闷作响的鼓声和呜呜低鸣的短笛。你看见强壮的唐纳德爵士在妻子身上插上一把刀,许多同道中人被裹在白亚麻布里。
I had all the vernacular down. I knew the rhetoric. None of it went over my head – the devices, the techniques, the secrets, the mysteries – and I knew all the deserted roads that it traveled on, too. I could make it all connect and move with the current of the day. When I started writing my own songs, the folk lingo was the only vocabulary that I knew, and I used it.
我弄清了所有的门道,明白了它的辞藻。没什么是我不懂的,配器、技巧、其中的秘密与神奇,我也认识民谣走过的每一条荒芜小路。我能把它打通,让当代的潮流淌在其间。我开始自己写歌时,唯一知道的词汇就是民谣的语言,于是我就使用它。
But I had something else as well. I had principles and sensibilities and an informed view of the world. And I had had that for a while. Learned it all in grammar school.Don Quixote,Ivanhoe,Robinson Crusoe,Gulliver's Travels,Tale of Two Cities,all the rest – typical grammar school reading that gave you a way of looking at life, an understanding of human nature, and a standard to measure things by.
可我会的可不止这些。我有原则,有感受力孔雀河家政 ,对世界有看法。我曾经学过这些,在文法学校了学的。《堂吉诃德》《艾凡赫》《鲁宾逊漂流记》《格列佛游记》《双城记》等,这些是文法学校里典型的读本,它们教会你一种看待生活的方式,一种对人类本性的理解以及衡量万物的尺度。

I took all that with me when I started composing lyrics. And the themes from those books worked their way into many of my songs, either knowingly or unintentionally. I wanted to write songs unlike anything anybody ever heard, and these themes were fundamental.
我开始写歌时,这些都在脑海之中,作品的主题渗透到许多歌曲中,或有意为之或无心成荫。我想写别人都没听过的歌,这些主题是绝对必要的。
Specific books that have stuck with me ever since I read them way back in grammar school – I want to tell you about three of them:Moby Dick, All Quiet on the Western FrontandThe Odyssey.
在文法学校读过的书里,一些始终萦绕在脑海间,我在这里说三本:《白鲸记》《西线无战事》和《奥德赛》。
Moby Dickis a fascinating book, a book that's filled with scenes of high drama and dramatic dialogue. The book makes demands on you. The plot is straightforward. The mysterious Captain Ahab – captain of a ship called the Pequod – an egomaniac with a peg leg pursuing his nemesis, the great white whale Moby Dick who took his leg.
《白鲸记》是一本引人入胜的书,故事高潮迭起,对话戏剧性强。这本书读来不容易。情节是直截了当的。神秘的船长亚哈是裴廓德号的船长,他装着一条木制假腿,是个自大狂,一心要追捕他的死敌、让他失去一条腿的大白鲸莫比·迪克。
And he pursues him all the way from the Atlantic around the tip of Africa and into the Indian Ocean. He pursues the whale around both sides of the earth. It's an abstract goal, nothing concrete or definite. He calls Moby the emperor, sees him as the embodiment of evil. Ahab's got a wife and child back in Nantucket that he reminisces about now and again. You can anticipate what will happen.
他绕过非洲之角,一路从大西洋追到印度洋,在地球两端追杀鲸鱼。那是个抽象的目标月下横笛 ,没有任何具体或确定的东西。他把白鲸称为”皇帝“,认为它是邪恶化身。亚哈把妻子和孩子留在楠塔基特岛,他时不时念叨着。你猜得出接下来会发生什么。
The ship's crew is made up of men of different races, and any one of them who sights the whale will be given the reward of a gold coin. A lot of Zodiac symbols, religious allegory, stereotypes. Ahab encounters other whaling vessels, presses the captains for details about Moby. Have they seen him?
船组成员种族不同,可只要谁看见白鲸,就会得到一枚金币作为奖赏。书中有许多星座的象征、宗教寓言和类型人物。亚哈船长遇到其他捕鲸船,吵着让船长们详细说说大白鲸。他问,有人看到过它吗?
There's a crazy prophet, Gabriel, on one of the vessels, and he predicts Ahab's doom. Says Moby is the incarnate of a Shaker god, and that any dealings with him will lead to disaster. He says that to Captain Ahab. Another ship's captain – Captain Boomer – he lost an arm to Moby. But he tolerates that, and he's happy to have survived. He can't accept Ahab's lust for vengeance.
一艘船上有个疯狂的预言家加百列,说亚哈下场注定不妙。他说大白鲸是撼动者之神的化身,他告诉亚哈船长,招惹它就等于招惹灾祸。还有一个船长叫布默,大白鲸咬掉他一条胳膊,可他认了,还庆幸自己活下来了,他理解不了亚哈复仇的欲望。
This book tells how different men react in different ways to the same experience. A lot of Old Testament, biblical allegory: Gabriel, Rachel, Jeroboam, Bildah, Elijah. Pagan names as well: Tashtego, Flask, Daggoo, Fleece, Starbuck, Stubb, Martha's Vineyard. The Pagans are idol worshippers. Some worship little wax figures, some wooden figures. Some worship fire. The Pequod is the name of an Indian tribe.
这本书讲述了同样境遇下不同的人,他们有不同的反应。其中有许多《旧约》里的圣经寓言:加百列、拉结、耶罗波安、比勒达,以利亚,也有异教徒:塔斯蒂哥、弗拉斯克、达古、弗里斯、斯塔巴克、斯塔布和马沙文雅岛。异教徒是偶像崇拜者,有人崇拜蜡像,有人崇拜木像,有人崇拜火,“裴廓德号”就来自一个印第安部落名。
Moby Dickis a seafaring tale. One of the men, the narrator, says, "Call me Ishmael." Somebody asks him where he's from, and he says, "It's not down on any map. True places never are." Stubb gives no significance to anything, says everything is predestined. Ishmael's been on a sailing ship his entire life. Calls the sailing ships his Harvard and Yale. He keeps his distance from people.
《白鲸记》是一个航海故事。其中一个人,也是叙述者,他说:“叫我以实马利。”有人问他来自哪里,他说,“任何地图上都找不到,真实的地方都是如此。”斯塔布什么都不在乎,认为一切都是天注定。以实马利一生在船上度过,他把船看作是他的哈佛和耶鲁,对人敬而远之。
A typhoon hits the Pequod. Captain Ahab thinks it's a good omen. Starbuck thinks it's a bad omen, considers killing Ahab. As soon as the storm ends, a crewmember falls from the ship's mast and drowns, foreshadowing what's to come. A Quaker pacifist priest, who is actually a bloodthirsty businessman, tells Flask, "Some men who receive injuries are led to God, others are led to bitterness."
一场台风袭击了裴廓德号,亚哈船长认为这是个吉兆,斯塔巴克却认为这是一个凶兆,想要杀死亚哈。风暴一结束,有个船员从船桅上掉下来溺水了,这预示了接下来发生的事。一个信奉和平主义的贵格派牧师,实际上是嗜血的生意人,他告诉弗拉斯克说:“受伤之人去见上帝,其他人走向苦难。”
Everything is mixed in. All the myths: the Judeo Christian bible, Hindu myths, British legends, Saint George, Perseus, Hercules – they're all whalers. Greek mythology, the gory business of cutting up a whale. Lots of facts in this book, geographical knowledge, whale oil – good for coronation of royalty – noble families in the whaling industry. Whale oil is used to anoint the kings.
一切都交织起来。所有的神话,犹太基督圣经、印度神话、英国传奇、圣乔治、珀尔修斯和赫拉克利斯,他们都是捕鲸人。希腊神话中就有屠鲸的血腥生意。书中有许多事实,有地理知识,有国王加冕时用到的鲸油,他们是捕鲸业里的皇家贵胄。
History of the whale, phrenology, classical philosophy, pseudo-scientific theories, justification for discrimination – everything thrown in and none of it hardly rational. Highbrow触摸未来, lowbrow, chasing illusion, chasing death, the great white whale, white as polar bear饲魔 , white as a white man, the emperor, the nemesis, the embodiment of evil. The demented captain who actually lost his leg years ago trying to attack Moby with a knife.
还有鲸的历史,颅相学,古典哲学,伪科学理论和为歧视所做的辩护,一勺烩,却没有哪样是没有道理的。高山流水,下里巴人,追逐幻想,追求死亡,大白鲸,白若北极熊,白得像一个白种人,他是皇帝,是死敌,是邪恶的化身。多年前丢了一条腿的亚哈船长精神错乱,他想用一把刀就杀了大白鲸。
We see only the surface of things. We can interpret what lies below any way we see fit. Crewmen walk around on deck listening for mermaids, and sharks and vultures follow the ship. Reading skulls and faces like you read a book. Here's a face. I'll put it in front of you. Read it if you can.
我们只看到事物的表面,我们可以用我们认为合适的任何方式深入解读。在甲板上四处活动的船员在听美人鱼、鲨鱼和秃鹰的声音,他们尾随着捕鲸船。像读书一样阅读头骨和面相。这里有张脸,放在你面前,如果可以的话,试着读读。
Tashtego says that he died and was reborn. His extra days are a gift. He wasn't saved by Christ, though, he says he was saved by a fellow man and a non-Christian at that. He parodies the resurrection.
塔斯蒂哥说他曾死后重生,活着的日子皆属恩赐。可他并非被基督所救,他说自己是被同胞搭救,不是基督徒。这是对耶稣复活的滑稽演绎。
When Starbuck tells Ahab that he should let bygones be bygones, the angry captain snaps back, "Speak not to me of blasphemy, man, I'd strike the sun if it insulted me." Ahab, too, is a poet of eloquence. He says, "The path to my fixed purpose is laid with iron rails whereon my soul is grooved to run." Or these lines, "All visible objects are but pasteboard masks." Quotable poetic phrases that can't be beat.
斯塔巴克让亚哈别再纠结过去森林大第 ,愤怒的亚哈船长厉声反驳道:“别跟我说什么亵渎神明,伙计。就算太阳冒犯了我,我也一定要还击。”亚哈也是辩才了得的诗人。他说:“我的前路铺着铁轨,我的灵魂沿轨而行。”还有这句话:“所有可见的事物不过是纸糊的面具。”充满诗意的妙语名言,让我们甘拜下风。
Finally, Ahab spots Moby, and the harpoons come out. Boats are lowered. Ahab's harpoon has been baptized in blood. Moby attacks Ahab's boat and destroys it. Next day, he sights Moby again. Boats are lowered again. Moby attacks Ahab's boat again. On the third day, another boat goes in. More religious allegory. He has risen. Moby attacks one more time胡荣泉 , ramming the Pequod and sinking it. Ahab gets tangled up in the harpoon lines and is thrown out of his boat into a watery grave.
亚哈船长终于找到了大白鲸,他亮出鱼枪,放下小船。亚哈的鱼枪经受过血的洗礼。大白鲸袭击了亚哈的小船,撞沉了它。第二天,亚哈又看到了大白鲸。他又放下小船,莫比再次出击。第三天,又一艘小船上阵。这更像宗教寓言。他站起来,大白鲸又一次攻击他,猛沉了裴廓德号。渔枪线缠住了亚哈,把他掀出船去,就这样掉进了水中的坟墓。
Ishmael survives. He's in the sea floating on a coffin. And that's about it. That's the whole story. That theme and all that it implies would work its way into more than a few of my songs.
以实玛利活了下来。他在海里浮在一口棺材上。就是这样,这是全部的故事。这个主题和所有指涉,在我的许多歌中都有体现。

All Quiet on the Western Frontwas another book that did.All Quiet on the Western Frontis a horror story. This is a book where you lose your childhood, your faith in a meaningful world, and your concern for individuals. You're stuck in a nightmare.Sucked up into a mysterious whirlpool of death and pain. You're defending yourself from elimination. You're being wiped off the face of the map. Once upon a time you were an innocent youth with big dreams about being a concert pianist. Once you loved life and the world, and now you're shooting it to pieces.
《西线无战事》是另一本能让我着迷的书。《西线无战事》讲了一个恐怖故事。这本书中,你丢失了童年,在一个意味深长的世界丢失了信仰,失去了对人类的关切。你纠缠于噩梦之中,被吸进死亡和疼痛的神秘漩涡。你守卫着自己寿县丰华中学 ,免遭屠戮,地图上的你正被抹除。曾几何时,你还是纯真少年,有着远大梦想,想成为钢琴演奏家。你曾热爱生命,热爱世界,现在将这一切打成碎片。
Day after day, the hornets bite you and worms lap your blood. You're a cornered animal. You don't fit anywhere. The falling rain is monotonous. There's endless assaults, poison gas, nerve gas, morphine, burning streams of gasoline, scavenging and scabbing for food, influenza, typhus, dysentery. Life is breaking down all around you, and the shells are whistling. This is the lower region of hell. Mud, barbed wire, rat-filled trenches, rats eating the intestines of dead men, trenches filled with filth and excrement. Someone shouts, "Hey, you there. Stand and fight."
日复一日,黄蜂叮咬,爬虫舔血。你是一头困兽,没有容身之所。雨线簌簌,单调乏味。打不完的仗、毒气、神经瓦斯、吗啡、燃烧的汽油成河、死人堆里刨食、流感、伤寒、痢疾。周遭的生活分崩离析,可战斗的号角却在吹响。这里是十八层地狱:泥泞、铁丝网,老鼠乱窜的战壕谭凯欣 ,老鼠啃食死人的内脏,战壕里污秽不堪,粪便堆积特工狂妻 。有人喊:“嘿,就你张奀宁 ,站起来,打仗去。”
Who knows how long this mess will go on? Warfare has no limits. You're being annihilated, and that leg of yours is bleeding too much. You killed a man yesterday, and you spoke to his corpse. You told him after this is over, you'll spend the rest of your life looking after his family. Who's profiting here? The leaders and the generals gain fame, and many others profit financially. But you're doing the dirty work. One of your comrades says, "Wait a minute, where are you going?" And you say, "Leave me alone, I'll be back in a minute." Then you walk out into the woods of death hunting for a piece of sausage. You can't see how anybody in civilian life has any kind of purpose at all. All their worries, all their desires – you can't comprehend it.
谁知道混乱要持续多久?战争无极限。你正被彻底摧毁,你的腿失血过多。昨天你杀死个人,对着尸体说话。你告诉他这一切结束后,你将用余生来照顾他的家人。在这里谁真正获益呢?领导人和将军们成名,不少其他人赚钱,你却干着肮脏的勾当。有一个同志说:“等一下,你要去哪?”你回答说:“别管我,我很快就回来。”你就这样走进死亡的丛林,只为找一片香肠。你看不出文明生活中的任何人有任何目标。所有的忧虑,所有的欲望,你都理解不了。
More machine guns rattle, more parts of bodies hanging from wires, more pieces of arms and legs and skulls where butterflies perch on teeth, more hideous wounds, pus coming out of every pore, lung wounds, wounds too big for the body, gas-blowing cadavers, and dead bodies making retching noises. Death is everywhere. Nothing else is possible. Someone will kill you and use your dead body for target practice. Boots, too. They're your prized possession. But soon they'll be on somebody else's feet.
更多的机关枪突突作响,更多的尸身挂在铁丝网上,残肢断臂和头骨堆积,蝴蝶就落在牙齿之上,可怖的伤口越来越多,脓水从每一个伤口淌出来,肺部受伤,受伤很重,浮肿的尸体,发出令人作呕的声音。到处都是死亡,别无他选。有人会杀了你,用你的尸体打靶。靴子也是一样。它们是你宝贵的财产,但很快就会穿在别人的脚下。
There's Froggies coming through the trees. Merciless bastards. Your shells are running out. "It's not fair to come at us again so soon," you say. One of your companions is laying in the dirt, and you want to take him to the field hospital. Someone else says, "You might save yourself a trip." "What do you mean?" "Turn him over, you'll see what I mean."
高卢佬们穿过树林,无情的混球。炮弹用没了。“这不公平,这么快就又攻上来了。”你说。一位战友倒在土上,你想送他去战地医院。有人说:“别费事了。” “什么意思?”“让他翻个身,你就明白了。”
You wait to hear the news. You don't understand why the war isn't over. The army is so strapped for replacement troops that they're drafting young boys who are of little military use, but they're draftin' ‘em anyway because they're running out of men. Sickness and humiliation have broken your heart. You were betrayed by your parents, your schoolmasters, your ministers, and even your own government.
你等着听新闻。你不明白怎么战争还不结束。人困马乏,军队亟待更替,他们就招募毫无战斗经验的年轻男孩,男人不够了,男孩就要上阵。疾病和屈辱令人心碎。你被背叛,他们是你的父母、校长、牧师甚至政府。
The general with the slowly smoked cigar betrayed you too – turned you into a thug and a murderer. If you could, you'd put a bullet in his face. The commander as well. You fantasize that if you had the money, you'd put up a reward for any man who would take his life by any means necessary. And if he should lose his life by doing that, then let the money go to his heirs. The colonel, too, with his caviar and his coffee – he's another one. Spends all his time in the officers' brothel. You'd like to see him stoned dead too. More Tommies and Johnnies with their whack fo' me daddy-o and their whiskey in the jars. You kill twenty of ‘em and twenty more will spring up in their place. It just stinks in your nostrils.
那个悠悠地抽雪茄的将军也背叛了你,他把你变成暴徒和杀手。如果可以,你会朝他脸上开一枪,你也想朝你的司令官开上一枪。你幻想着自己有了钱,你会悬赏哪个人不管通过什么手段,只要把他干掉汇源肾宝 。如果因此丢命,赏钱就留给他的后人。上校也该死,那个吃鱼子酱、喝咖啡的家伙,整天混在军人妓院里,你想看到他被石头砸死。还有那些英国和美国的大头兵,手里拎着瓶威士忌。杀他们二十个,还会有二十个冒出来,真是臭不可闻。
译注:Tommy Atkins泛指英国士兵,Johnny Reb泛指美国士兵。“whack fo' me daddy-o”是爱尔兰歌曲中的歌词,可能指瓶中的威士忌。
You've come to despise that older generation that sent you out into this madness, into this torture chamber. All around you, your comrades are dying. Dying from abdominal wounds, double amputations, shattered hipbones, and you think, "I'm only twenty years old, but I'm capable of killing anybody. Even my father if he came at me."
你怨恨上一代人,让你陷入疯狂,遭受折磨。你周围的同志们都死了,死于腹部枪伤、双腿截肢、髋骨骨折。你就在想,“我才二十岁,却会杀一切人,就算我亲爹冲上来,我也敢杀。”
Yesterday, you tried to save a wounded messenger dog, and somebody shouted, "Don't be a fool." One Froggy is laying gurgling at your feet. You stuck him with a dagger in his stomach, but the man still lives. You know you should finish the job, but you can't. You're on the real iron cross, and a Roman soldier's putting a sponge of vinegar to your lips.
昨天,你想去救一条受伤的通信犬,有人朝你大喊,“别犯傻了。”一个高卢佬躺在你脚边呻吟,你拿起匕首朝他肚子来上一刀,可这人还活着。你明白应该了结了他,可你做不到。你被绑在铁十字架上,一个罗马士兵把蘸醋的海绵放到你的唇边。
译注:蘸醋的海绵典出《约翰福音》。“那里放着一个装满酸酒的容器。他们就把蘸满了酸酒的海绵套在牛膝草上,送到他的嘴边。”
Months pass by. You go home on leave. You can't communicate with your father. He said, "You'd be a coward if you don't enlist." Your mother, too, on your way back out the door, she says, "You be careful of those French girls now." More madness. You fight for a week or a month, and you gain ten yards. And then the next month it gets taken back.
几个月过去了,你请假回家。你没法和父亲交流,他说:“如果你不参军,你就是个懦夫。”你的母亲也一样,在你出门前,她说:“你要小心那些法国姑娘。”真是疯了。你打了一周或是一个月,只推进了十码。下个月,又被夺走了。
All that culture from a thousand years ago, that philosophy, that wisdom – Plato, Aristotle乡村小电工 , Socrates – what happened to it? It should have prevented this. Your thoughts turn homeward. And once again you're a schoolboy walking through the tall poplar trees. It's a pleasant memory. More bombs dropping on you from blimps. You got to get it together now. You can't even look at anybody for fear of some miscalculable thing that might happen. The common grave. There are no other possibilities.
千年的文化、哲学和智慧坐壁观宅斗 ,柏拉图、亚里士多德、苏格拉底,告诉我到底怎么了?本该阻止这一切的。你思归心切,你还是那个走在高高的白杨树下的男生,多么美妙的记忆。可飞艇把更多炸弹扔向你,你甚至没法看别人,就担心他们有什么不测。这是所有人的坟墓,别无他选。
Then you notice the cherry blossoms, and you see that nature is unaffected by all this. Poplar trees, the red butterflies, the fragile beauty of flowers, the sun – you see how nature is indifferent to it all. All the violence and suffering of all mankind. Nature doesn't even notice it.
然后,你看到樱花绽放,大自然丝毫未受影响。白杨树、红蝴蝶、花朵脆弱的美、太阳,大自然如此漠然。全人类的暴行和苦难,大自然根本未加留意。
You're so alone. Then a piece of shrapnel hits the side of your head and you're dead.You've been ruled out, crossed out. You've been exterminated. I put this book down and closed it up. I never wanted to read another war novel again, and I never did.
你是如此孤单,接着榴弹片从你脑壳一侧射进来,你就死了。你被清除,被划掉,被彻底消灭了。我把书放下,合上,再也不想看战争小说了,我再也没看过。
Charlie Poole from North Carolina had a song that connected to all this. It's called"You Ain't Talkin' to Me,"and the lyrics go like this:
北卡罗来纳州的查理·普尔写过一首歌《你不和我说话了》歌词是这样的:
I saw a sign in a window walking up town one day.Join the army, see the world is what it had to say.You'll see exciting places with a jolly crew,You'll meet interesting people, and learn to kill them too.Oh you ain't talkin' to me, you ain't talking to me.I may be crazy and all that, but I got good sense you see.You ain't talkin' to me, you ain't talkin' to me.Killin' with a gun don't sound like fun.You ain't talkin' to me.
一天,我走在镇上,一块窗户上有个告示,说的是参军吧,去看看世界。有欢乐的战友,一起去令人激动的地方,你会遇到有趣的人,并学会杀掉他们。你不和我说话了,你不和我说话了。我可能疯了,但是你看我正常的很。你不和我说话了,你不和我说话了,拿枪杀人听来并不好玩,你不和我说话了。
The Odysseyis a great book whose themes have worked its way into the ballads of a lot of songwriters: "Homeward Bound, "Green, Green Grass of Home," "Home on the Range," and my songs as well.
《奥德赛》是一本伟大的书,许多作曲者的民谣中都有提到了它。《回家》、《故乡的青草地》、《牧场是我家》等,我的歌里也有。
The Odysseyis a strange, adventurous tale of a grown man trying to get home after fighting in a war. He's on that long journey home, and it's filled with traps and pitfalls. He's cursed to wander. He's always getting carried out to sea, always having close calls. Huge chunks of boulders rock his boat. He angers people he shouldn't. There's troublemakers in his crew. Treachery. His men are turned into pigs and then are turned back into younger, more handsome men. He's always trying to rescue somebody. He's a travelin' man, but he's making a lot of stops.
《奥德赛》讲述了一个怪异的冒险故事,一个成年人战后想要回家。回家的道路很漫长狼吞虎咽造句 ,遍布陷阱。他受到诅咒要游荡四方。他总被带向大海上,又每每侥幸逃生。巨石撞击船只。他得罪了不该得罪的人。船员里还有人制造麻烦,有人叛变。他的手下被变成了猪,又变成更加年轻英俊的男子。他总是想去救助他人。他是个漂泊的人,却总要驻足。
He's stranded on a desert island. He finds deserted caves, and he hides in them. He meets giants that say, "I'll eat you last." And he escapes from giants. He's trying to get back home, but he's tossed and turned by the winds. Restless winds, chilly winds, unfriendly winds. He travels far, and then he gets blown back.
他被困荒岛。他发现并藏身于废弃的山洞中,他遇见巨人,巨人们说,“我要把你吃干净。”他从巨人手里逃走,他想回家,又被大风颠来倒去。风不停歇,冰冷刺骨,害人不浅。他走了一程,又被风吹了回来。
He's always being warned of things to come. Touching things he's told not to. There's two roads to take, and they're both bad. Both hazardous. On one you could drown and on the other you could starve. He goes into the narrow straits with foaming whirlpools that swallow him. Meets six-headed monsters with sharp fangs. Thunderbolts strike at him. Overhanging branches that he makes a leap to reach for to save himself from a raging river.
他总是受到警告,他去碰不该碰的东西。有两条路可以走,都不容易,全都危机重重。其中一条会让人溺水,另一条要饿肚子。他驶进狭窄的海峡,水沫横飞的旋涡要吞没他。他遇到牙锋齿利的六头怪物。闪电劈了他。他纵身一越,抓到树枝才免于被咆哮的河水卷走。
Goddesses and gods protect him, but some others want to kill him. He changes identities. He's exhausted. He falls asleep新英雄虎胆 , and he's woken up by the sound of laughter. He tells his story to strangers. He's been gone twenty years. He was carried off somewhere and left there. Drugs have been dropped into his wine. It's been a hard road to travel.
有男女神明保护他,也有神要杀了他。他变换身份王超非诚勿扰 ,疲惫不堪,他沉沉睡去,又被笑声惊醒。他向陌生人讲述自己的故事,他一走二十年,被带到这里,被丢在那里。还有人在他的酒里下毒。真是一条艰辛的路。
In a lot of ways, some of these same things have happened to you. You too have had drugs dropped into your wine. You too have shared a bed with the wrong woman. You too have been spellbound by magical voices, sweet voices with strange melodies. You too have come so far and have been so far blown back. And you've had close calls as well. You have angered people you should not have. And you too have rambled this country all around. And you've also felt that ill wind, the one that blows you no good. And that's still not all of it.
同样的事,以很多方式,发生在你我身上。也有人在你的酒里下药。你也会和某个错的女人同眠共枕。你也被那些魔幻甜美、旋律怪异的声音迷惑。你也走了很远,邹智文 却又被吹回原点。你也曾泰山压顶。也得罪过不该得罪的人。你也在这个国家流浪。你也感觉得到那股有害无益的邪风,还不止这些。
When he gets back home夏县吧, things aren't any better. Scoundrels have moved in and are taking advantage of his wife's hospitality. And there's too many of ‘em. And though he's greater than them all and the best at everything – best carpenter, best hunter, best expert on animals, best seaman – his courage won't save him, but his trickery will.
他回家后,也没有万事大吉。流氓利用妻子的好客,赖在家里。他们人还挺多,尽管他比他们都强,他是最棒的木匠、猎手、动物专家和水手,可勇气救不了他,要使诈才行。
All these stragglers will have to pay for desecrating his palace. He'll disguise himself as a filthy beggar, and a lowly servant kicks him down the steps with arrogance and stupidity. The servant's arrogance revolts him, but he controls his anger. He's one against a hundred, but they'll all fall, even the strongest. He was nobody. And when it's all said and done, when he's home at last, he sits with his wife, and he tells her the stories.
所有这些散兵游勇必须为亵渎他的宫殿付出代价。他假扮成肮脏的乞丐,一个卑贱的仆人傲慢愚蠢,一脚把他踢下台阶去。仆人的傲慢让他心生愤怒,可他压住怒火。他以一敌百,他们都被打倒了,最强壮的那个也是如此。他只当自己是个无名小卒。全都搞定后,他终于回到了家,他和妻子坐下来,讲述他的故事。
So what does it all mean? Myself and a lot of other songwriters have been influenced by these very same themes. And they can mean a lot of different things. If a song moves you, that's all that's important. I don't have to know what a song means. I've written all kinds of things into my songs. And I'm not going to worry about it – what it all means. When Melville put all his old testament, biblical references, scientific theories, Protestant doctrines, and all that knowledge of the sea and sailing ships and whales into one story, I don't think he would have worried about it either – what it all means.
这一切意味着什么呢?我和其他许多作曲者都受到相同的主题的影响。它们可能意味着许多不同的事。如果某一首歌打动了你,那就够了,我不需要知道这首歌是什么意思。我在歌里写过很多东西,我也不去细想其中的含义。梅尔维尔把旧约、圣经、科学理论、新教教义以及所有关于航海和鲸鱼知识写进一个故事里,我想他不会担心究竟意味着什么。
John Donne as well, the poet-priest who lived in the time of Shakespeare, wrote these words, "The Sestos and Abydos of her breasts. Not of two lovers, but two loves, the nests." I don't know what it means, either. But it sounds good. And you want your songs to sound good.
约翰·唐恩也是如此,他是莎士比亚时代的诗人和牧师。他这么说:“塞斯托斯和阿拜多斯是她的双峰,栖息其上的不是两个爱人,而是两种爱”。我不知道那是什么意思,可听起来很棒,你希望你的歌听起来也很棒。
When Odysseus inThe Odysseyvisits the famed warrior Achilles in the underworld – Achilles, who traded a long life full of peace and contentment for a short one full of honor and glory – tells Odysseus it was all a mistake. "I just died, that's all."There was no honor. No immortality. And that if he could, he would choose to go back and be a lowly slave to a tenant farmer on Earth rather than be what he is – a king in the land of the dead – that whatever his struggles of life were, they were preferable to being here in this dead place.
《奥德赛》里的奥德修斯在地狱拜访了大名鼎鼎的战士阿喀琉斯,阿喀琉斯用和平美满的长寿换来了转瞬即逝的光荣,他告诉奥德修斯一切都错了。“我就是死了,仅此而已。”没有荣耀,没有不朽。如果可能,他会从头来过,做一个人世间佃农的低贱奴仆,而不是像现在这样,一个死亡世界的王,不管生活多辛苦,也好过待在死人的地方。
That's what songs are too. Our songs are alive in the land of the living. But songs are unlike literature. They're meant to be sung, not read. The words in Shakespeare's plays were meant to be acted on the stage. Just as lyrics in songs are meant to be sung, not read on a page. And I hope some of you get the chance to listen to these lyrics the way they were intended to be heard: in concert or on record or however people are listening to songs these days. I return once again to Homer, who says, "Sing in me, oh Muse, and through me tell the story."
歌曲也是这样。我们的歌植根于生命的土地。可是歌和文学不同,它们要被唱出来,不是去读。莎士比亚戏剧中的语言要在舞台上演,歌曲中的词也要去唱,而非在纸上读。我希望你们当中一些人,用歌曲的表达方式去欣赏歌词,在音乐会上校园邪主 ,或是在唱片里,还是如今任何听歌的方式。我再一次引用荷马:“在我体内歌唱吧,缪斯!用我来讲述这个故事。”
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