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《世界語文?美國語文》?目錄
第一章 感動美國
NO.1 Moving American Stories
非常故事
Special Stories
船難之后 004
After the Shipwreck 006
出租車司機和醫生 009
The Taxi Driver and the Doctor 012
在雞場 015
On the Chicken Farm 017
陌生女兒的來信 020
A Letter from a Strang er Daughter 023
非常老爸 026
Extreme Dad 028
超級市場 031
A&P 034
都是經驗惹的禍 038
Field of Error 040
獨角獸之年——圣誕禮物 042
This Year of the Unicorn 045
基達爾小姐的婚事 048
Keeldar’s Marriage 0 51
阿拉巴馬的夏天 0 55
Summers in Alabama 057
與大師相遇 0 60
The Presence of a Master 0 62
第一感覺 0 65
The First Sense 0 67
贈予丈夫生命禮物的妻子 070
A Wife Gives Her Husband the Gift of Life 0 74
名著新讀
Classical Masterpieces
巨翅老人 0 79
A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings 0 82
看得見風景的房間 0 85
A Room with a View 0 88
伯尼絲剪頭發 0 91
Bernice Bobs Her Hair 0 94
紐約客
New Yorker
一個女人的勇氣 097
One Woman’s Courage 0 99
淑女的困惑 10 2
To be a Lady or Not 10 5
漫漫樂土同化路 108
Assimilating in the Promised Land 110
我們的容身之地 113
Our Place in the World 115
生在“天堂” 117
Born in Paradise 120
第二章 壞童日記
NO.2 Diaries of Naughty Kids
寄宿生的少年情事 124
Buckthorne 127
人人愛卡瑞 130
Everybody Loves Kari 132
無聊的周日 134
Boring Weekend 135
一個壞男孩的故事——到北方去 137
The Story of a Bad Boy 140
第三章 萌寵約定
NO.3 Cute Animals
貓的語言 144
The Language of Cats 145
家鼠和田鼠的故事 147
The Mouse and the Rat 148
狼嗥叫的原因 149
Why Wolves Howl 151
披甲戰士犰狳 153
The Armored Armadillo 155
十二生肖的神話故事 157
Mythology of the Chinese Zodiac 159
第四章 心理檔案
NO.4 Psychological Profiles
沉默是一種勇氣和撫慰 164
A Story of Courage and Healing 166
為什么書呆子不受歡迎？ 169
Why Nerds Are Unpopular? 172
你不覺得羞愧嗎？ 175
Have You No Shame? 177
成功恐懼癥 179
Fear of Success 182
第五章 生存戰略
NO.5 Survival Strategies
野外生存的意義 186
The Lessons of Wilderness Living 189
家庭糾紛 192
Domestic Disputes 193
美國蔬菜工人 194
The United Vegetable Workers 195
醫療費用 196
Hospital Costs 197
砸彩罐的人 198
Playing with Pinata 200
自助洗衣店 202
Down at the Laundromat 204
第六章 緋聞美國
NO.6 Gossip America
魯西迪筆下的文化 20 8
Cultures in Rushdie’s Works 210
聲音和文字 213
Voices and Words 215
尋找外星生命 218
The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence 220
恒星的名字蘊含著什么意義？ 223
What’s in a Name? 224
準備好住海星旅館了嗎？ 226
Prepare for the Starfish Inn 228
不斷上升的海平面 230
The Rising Seas 232
鉤編成了我一大愛好 235
Crocheting Makes a Good Hobby 237
危險的來客 239
Dangerous Visitor 241
書摘
船難之后
After the Shipwreck
“讓那些死去的人安葬他們的死亡。”當男孩在荒涼的叢林里跋涉，藤蔓在他腳邊纏繞時，這句話在他的耳邊響起。一次又一次，他聽到船長喊：“全速前進，讓那些死去的人安葬他們的死亡。”現在船長不在了。男孩的同伴帶領著他穿越這片詭異的叢林，他感覺非常孤獨。他在想那句話到底是什么意思。死人能做什么呢？他們怎么能安葬自己呢？
這個想法在男孩的腦海里盤旋，與最后那段日子的記憶混雜在一起。他再次聽到暴風雨的咆哮聲，船就在他的腳下劇烈地晃動。臺風似乎無處不在，就連身經百
戰無所不知的船長，也被這突如其來的一切嚇到了。“抓緊主帆！”他對船員們喊道，“全速前進，讓死去的人安葬他們的死亡！”
男孩緊緊地抓住了船身，即便船身已經裂開。天空中的閃電像煙花一樣，在此之前，男孩只是聽說過，卻從未見過；雷霆撼動了空氣，船身在它的吼叫聲中不停地搖晃。大浪翻滾而來，打在甲板上，然后消退，片刻寧靜之后，大浪再次涌現，像黑黢黢的山巒將小船包圍。
在他意識到究竟發生了什么之前，這段記憶會在一瞬間侵占男孩的頭腦。然后它們慢慢消退，就像暴風雨終將消退那樣。他們又回到了叢林，日復一日單調地走著，身邊都是藤蔓和樹木，完全不像是以海為生的水手們的生活。有時，男孩會回想起在風暴之前，甚至是在上船之前，他在陸地上生活的時光，他在農場生活時，覺得“被陸地包圍著”，盡管他當時還不明白這個詞是什么意思。他想起自己的父母虛弱憔悴的面容。他相信他們盡了最大可能來為他創造一個家，但是母親悲傷的、布滿皺紋的臉，和父親皸裂的手，比他所有的童年記憶都要深刻。這些記憶就像毀滅性的風暴和閃電那樣，布滿了男孩的天空。對男孩來說，出生地的石頭路預示著他不會喜歡這種生活，也不會喜歡這個地方。但大海更加溫柔，變幻莫測，正適合一個有野心的小伙子去塑造自己。所以他來到了海上。他已經領略到了大海的冷酷，他想著，思緒又回到了叢林里。很快，他的思緒又飄回到了在船上的幸福的日子。盡管他是以偷渡者的身份上的船，但船長還是收留了他，并且每天都給他安排些課程——教他觀測星空、繪制船的航線。“無知是很危險的，不只是在船上，在生活中都是這樣的。”船長警告他說。很快，男孩就像了解自己一樣熟悉了夜晚的星空和船長房間的航海圖。在不斷學習的過程中，他感到安心。
但如果船長突然身陷困境，男孩又怎么能再次獲得安全感呢？他又怎么能相信船長所說的一切不會導致同樣的災難性的的結局呢？“讓死去的人安葬他們的死亡。”是的，他已經看到了暴風雨過后那些死去的人。幸存的船員提醒他離那些尸體遠點，最后不得不拽著他的胳膊將他拉走，那句“讓死去的人安葬他們的死亡”又出現在他的腦海中。這句話到底是什么意思？在記憶中搜索，男孩震驚地發現，在船難發生之后，他已無法將船長與其他人區分開來——廚師，最低等的船員，甚至是他的父親。這就是船長所說的“他們的死亡”的意思嗎，所有的死者都是屬于彼此的？
他一步一步地機械地走著，讓自己不要再去想自己的家，以及那個他唯一敬重過的男人。走去哪里呢？他不知道前方是什么。但他依然移動著腳步，似乎是按照自己的意愿。他的心依然在跳動，肺依然在吸入空氣。他的思緒繼續追溯著自己的生命，伴隨著自己的心跳與呼吸，他繼續向前走著。
After the Shipwreck
“Let the dead bury their dead.”
The words rang in the boy’s ears as he trudged through the inhospitable jungle,vines snarling around his ankles. Over and over again, he heard the captain shout, “Full speed ahead, let the dead bury their dead.”
Now the captain was gone and the boy felt alone despite his companions, now leading him through the alien jungle. He wondered what the words meant. How can the dead do anything? How can the dead have dead of their own?
These thoughts circled the boy’s head, intermingled with the events of the last days. Again he heard the roar of the storm, felt the ship bucking and braying beneath his feet. The typhoon had come out of nowhere, it had seemed; even the captain, who surely knew everything, was taken aback by its sudde n appearance. “Avast and hold the mainsail!” he shouted to the crew. “Stay fast and let the
dead bury their dead!”
The boy had held fast, even as the ship had come apart. Even as the lightning lit up the sky like the fireworks the boy had heard about, but never seen. Even as the thunder filled the air, shaking the very timbers of the ship with its bellowing ferocity. The walls of water rose up, crashing over the deck, then receded for an instant of calm before rising up as a dark mountain to once again besiege the small ship.
These memories would come to the boy in a split-second, filling his brain before he had a chance to consciously remember what had happened. Then they would recede,just as the storm had eventually receded, and the jungle would return, the monotonous trudging, day after day amid the vines and trees that were nothing like his second home on the ocean.
Sometimes, the boy would think back to before the storm, and even before the ship, to his life on land—the stultifying life on the farm where he felt landlocked before he even understood what that word signified. He thought of his mother and father, frail and worn-looking. He believed his parents did all they could to create a home for him,but his mother’s sad, creased face and his father’s cracked hands crowded out all other childhood memories. They filled the boy’s sky, just as the thunder had, and were just as devastating, in their own way, as the storm.
For the boy, his birthplace’s rocky ground yielded only a life he could not live and a place he could not love. But the sea was softer, a malleable place in which an enterprising lad could reinvent himself. So the boy had run off to sea. He had learned the hardness of the sea, he thought, as he jerked his mind back to the jungle.
Soon, his thoughts drifted back to his blissful days upon the ship. Although he had come aboard as a stowaway, the captain took him in and gave him daily lessons in reading the stars and plotting the ship’s course. “Ignorance is dangerous, not only aboard ship but also in life,” the captain warned. The eager boy soon grew familiar with the night’s sky and knew the maps in the captain’s quarters as well as he knew his own reflection. He had felt so secure in the captain’s knowledge and in his own growing understanding.
But if the captain could be caught unawares, how could the boy ever feel safe again? How could he trust that everything the captain had said wouldn’t lead to the same disastrous end?
“Let the dead bury their dead.” Well, he had seen the dead after the storm. As the remaining crew members had urged him away from the wreckage, finally having to pull him by his arms to force his legs to move, the words “ Let the dead bury their dead” appeared unbidden in his mind. But what did those words mean? Searching his memory, the boy was shocked to find that after the shipwreck, his mind’s eye could no longer distinguish the captain from any other man—the cook, the lowest deckhand, or even the boy’s father. Was that what the captain meant by “their dead”—that all the
dead belonged to one another?
He walked mechanically, pace after pace, leading him away from the remains of his home and the only man he had ever loved. Toward what? He had no knowledge
of what lay ahead. But still his legs moved, seemingly of their own accord, his heart continued to beat, his lungs continued to fill with air. His mind continued to retrace his life, and with the beating of his heart and the filling of his lungs, still he walked.
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