The Girl in the Fifth Row翻译.doc

Lesson 8On my first day as an assistant professor of education at the University of Southern California, I entered the classroom with a great deal of anxiety. My large class responded to my awkward laser cutting system smile and brief greeting with silence. For a few moments I fussed with my notes. Then I started my lecture, stammering; no one seemed to be listening.成为南加州大学教育助理教授的第一天，我十分紧张地走入教室。我笨拙地快速朝学生扫了一眼，笑了笑，算是问候，但是我所要教的一大班学生都无动于衷。一时间，我纠结着自己的笔记。接着，我结结巴巴地开始讲课，然而，似乎没有人在听。At that moment of panic I noticed in the fifth row a poised平静, attentive young woman in a summer dress. Her skin was tanned, her brown eyes were clear and alert, her hair was golden. Her animated expression and warm smile were an invitation for me to go on. When Id say something, she would nod, or say, Oh, yes! and write it down. She emanated散发 the comforting feeling that she cared about what I was trying so haltingly迟疑不决地to say.正当我不知所措的时候，我注意到第五排一位身着夏裙、姿势端正、聚精会神的女生。她皮肤黝黑，棕色的眼睛清澈明净，眼神机警，有着一头金发。她表情活泼、笑容温柔，似乎在请我继续讲下去。我讲课时，她会点点头或者说：“嗯，对！”并动手记笔记。她散发着一种令人宽慰的感觉，好像她很在乎我想讲但没讲出口的东西。I began to speak directly to her and my confidence and enthusiasm returned. After a while I risked looking about，The other students had begun listening and taking notes. This stunning young woman had pulled me through.我开始对着她讲课，让我重新找回了自己的信心和激情。过了一会，我鼓起勇气看了看四周，其他同学也已开始听课并做笔记了。这位女生帮我度过了难关。After class, I scanned the roll to find her name: Liani. Her papers, which I read over the subsequent weeks, were written with creativity, sensitivity and a delicate sense of humor.下课后，我浏览名册找到了她的名字：莉安妮。随后几周内我读遍了她的论文，这些论文写得富有创意、感性灵敏，而且充满细腻的幽默感。I had asked all my students to visit my office during the semester, and I awaited Lianis visit with special interest. I wanted to tell her how she had saved my first day, and encourage her to develop her qualities of caring and awareness.我曾经要求所有我的学生要在当本学期内到我办公室一趟，我特别期待莉安妮的到来。我很想告诉莉安妮，她是如何帮助我度过当教育助理教授的第一天，我还想鼓励她分发挥自己细心和灵敏的特点。Liani never came. About five weeks into the semester, she missed two weeks of classes. I asked the students seated around her if they knew why. I was shocked to learn that they did not even know her name. I thought of Albert Schweitzers poignant让人心酸的 statement: We are all so much together and yet we are all dying of loneliness.然而，莉安妮从未到过我的办公室。开学大约五周后，她缺课两周。我问了坐在她周围的同学是否知道她缺课的原因。但是，令我震惊的是：他们甚至不知道她的名字。这令我想到了阿尔伯特史怀泽一句让人心酸的话：“我们经常在一起，但却死于孤单。”I went to our dean of women. The moment I mentioned Lianis name, she winced怔了一下. Oh, Im sorry, Leo, she said. I thought youd been told.我找到了学校的女生系主任。一提到莉安妮的名字，她不由一怔，说：“哦，莱昂，非常抱歉，我还以为你已经知道了这件事了。”Liani had driven to Pacific Palisades, a lovely community near downtown Los Angeles where cliffs fall abruptly into the sea. There, shocked picnickers later reported, she jumped to her death.莉安妮开车去了太平洋海崖，那是一个美丽的地方，靠近洛杉矶，山崖陡峭，直落大海。就是从那儿传来让人震惊不已的野营者报道说：莉安妮跳崖自杀了。Liani was 22 years old! And her God-given uniqueness was gone forever.可她才22岁！她那独一无二的天赋也永远地随风而去了。I called Lianis parents. From the tenderness with which Lianis mother spoke of her, I knew that she had been loved. But it was obvious to me that Liani had not felt loved.我给莉安妮的父母打了电话。从莉安妮母亲谈到莉安妮时的温柔中，我知道莉安妮的家人很爱她。不过，很显然，我知道莉安妮并没有感受到爱。What are we doing? I asked a colleague. Were so busy teaching things. Whats the value of teaching Liani to read, write, do arithmetic, if we taught her nothing of what she truly needed to know: how to live in joy, how to have a sense of personal worth and dignity?我问一位同事：“我们都在做些什么？我们成天忙着教书。如果我们不教莉安妮真正需要知道的东西： 教她如何幸福地生活，如何感受个人的价值和尊严，那么教她阅读、写作和算术又有什么价值呢？”I decided to do something to help others who needed to feel loved. I would teach a course on love.我决定要做一些事去帮助那些需要感受到爱的人。我打算开一门关于爱的课程。(would 译出时态，打算)I spent months in library research but found little help. Almost all the books on love dealt with sex or romantic love. There was virtually nothing on love in general. 我在图书馆里查阅了好几个月资料，但发现没有什么帮助的资料。几乎所有关于爱的书谈的都是性和浪漫的爱情。几乎没有资料探讨广义上的爱。But perhaps if I offered myself only as a facilitator帮助者, the students and I could teach one another and learn together. I called the course Love Class.不过，也许如果我自己仅仅成为帮助者，我和学生们便可以互相交流学习。我称这门课程为“爱”。It took only one announcement to fill this non-credit course. I gave each student a reading list, but there were no assigned指定的 texts, no attendance requirements, no exams. We just shared our reading, our ideas, our experiences.开设这个没有学分的课程，只要出个通知就行。我给每个学生发一份书单，但没有指定课文，没有出勤要求，也没有考试。我们只是分享自己读到的东西，想法和体验。My premise前提 is that love is learned. Our teachers are the loving people we encounter. If we find no models of love, then we grow up love-starved and unloving. The happy possibility, I told my students, is that love can be learned at any moment of our lives if we are willing to put in the time, the energy and the practice.我的前提是：爱可以学到。我们的“老师”是我们遇到的富有爱心的人。如果我们找不到爱的榜样，那么我们长大之后便缺乏爱、没有爱心。我告诉我的学生：如果我们愿意花时间、花精力并身体力行，那么，很幸福的可能性是：我们在一生中的任何时候都可以学到爱。Few missed even one session of Love class. I had to crowd the students closer together as they brought mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, friends, husbands, wives,even grandparents. Scheduled to start at 7 p.m. and end at 10, the class often continued until well past midnight.几乎没有人缺过一节“爱”这课。因为他们带来了自己的父亲、母亲、兄弟、姐妹、丈夫、妻子、朋友，甚至还有祖父母和外祖父母，我不得不让学生们挤一挤。课程本应在晚上7点开始，10点结束，但常常午夜过久还在继续。One of the first things I tried to get across was the importance of touching. How many of you have hugged someoneother than a girlfriend, boyfriend or your spousewithin the past week? Few hands went up. One student said, Im always afraid that my motives will be misinterpreted. From the nervous laughter, I could tell that many shared the young womans feeling.我首先想要让大家明白的事之一便是接触的重要性。“过去的一周内，除了女友、男友或者配偶外，你们中有多少人拥抱过某个人？基本没有人举手。一个学生说道：“我一直担心别人会误解我的动机。”从忐忑不安的笑声中可以看出，很多人与这位年轻的女士有同样的想法。Love has a need to be expressed physically, I responded.我说道：“爱需要身体上有所表现。”I feel fortunate to have grown up in a passionate, hugging Italian family. I associate hugging with a more universal kind of love. “成长在一个富有激情，乐于拥抱的意大利家庭，我感到很幸运。我把拥抱与更普遍的爱联系在一起。”But if you are afraid of being misunderstood, verbalize your feelings to the person youre hugging. And for people who are really uncomfortable about being embraced, a warm, two-handed handshake will satisfy the need to be touched.“不过，如果你怕造成误会，就用言语向你所拥抱的人表达出自己的情感。而对于那些确实对被拥抱感到不自然的人，热情地也能达到接触的需要。”We began to hug one another after each class. Eventually hugging became a common greeting among class members on campus.每节课下课后，我们便彼此拥抱。最后，拥抱成为我们班同学校在校园里常见的问候方式。For Love Class assignment we agreed to share something of ourselves, without expectation of reward. Some students helped disabled children. Others assisted derelicts无家可归的穷人on Skidrow贫民区. Many volunteered to work on suicide hot lines, hoping to find the Lianis before it was too late. 至于“爱”这门课的作业，我们一致同意彼此分享而不求回报。有些学生帮助残疾儿童，有些同学帮助贫民区的无家可归的穷人。很多人志愿参加自杀热线工作，希望能够及时帮助“莉安妮”这样的人。I went with one of my students, Joel, to a nursing home not far from U.S.C. A number of aged people were lying in beds in old cotton gowns, staring at the ceiling. Joel looked around and then asked, Whatll I do? I said, You see that woman over there? Go say hello,我和一位叫乔尔的学生一起，去了离南加州大学不远的一家护理院。那里，许多上了年纪的人穿着旧棉衣，躺在床上，两眼盯着天花板。乔尔看了看四周，问道：“我该怎么办？” 我回答道：“看到那边的那个女的没有？过去问候一下。”He went over and said, Uh, hello.She looked at him suspiciously for a minute. Are you a relative?No.Good! Sit down, young man.他走了过去，说道：“你好！”那个女的疑惑地看了看他一会儿，问道：“是亲戚吗？”“不是。”“那好！年轻人，坐下吧。”Oh, the things she told him! This woman knew so much about love, pain, suffering. Even about approaching death, with which she had to make some kind of peace. But no one had cared about listeninguntil Joel. He started visiting her once a week. Soon, that day began to be known as Joels Day. He would come and all the old people would gather.哦，这个女人告诉乔尔一些事情！这个女人对爱、痛苦和忍受有太多感受，她对自己不得不平静面对的即将到来的死亡也是这样。但是，在乔尔的出现前，没有人在乎她的讲话。之后，乔尔每周都去看她一次。很快，那一天开始被称做“乔尔来的那天。” 乔尔会去那里，而所有的老人都会聚在一起。Then the elderly woman asked her daughter to bring her in a glamorous dressing gown. When Joel came for his visit, he found her sitting up in bed in a beautiful satin gown, her hair done up stylishly. She hadnt had her hair fixed in ages: why have your hair done if nobody really sees you? Before long, others in the ward were dressing up for Joel.接着，这位老年妇女让她的女儿把美丽的长裙拿来。乔尔去看她时，发现她坐在床上，穿着一袭漂亮的绸缎连衣裙，头发扎得很时尚。她的头发之前好久都没有梳理了：如果没有人真的欣赏自己，为什么还要做发型呢？不久后，病房里的其他人也开始为乔尔而打扮起来。The years since I began Love Class have been the most exciting of my life. While attempting to open doors to love for others, I found that the doors were opening for me.自从开设“爱”这课以来，这些年一直是我人生中最令人激动的时刻。当我努力为他人打开爱的大门时，我发现那些门也为我敞开着。I ate in a greasy spoon低档餐馆 in Arizona not long ago. When I ordered pork chops, somebody said, Youre crazy. Nobody eats pork chops in a place like this. But the chops were magnificent.不久前，我在亚利桑那州一家低档餐馆里就餐。我点了猪排，有人说：“你疯啦。没有人在这种地方吃猪排。”可是，那里的猪排味道好极了。Id like to meet the chef, I said to the waitress.We walked back to the kitchen and there he was, a big, sweaty man. “我要见见主厨。”我对女服务生说。我们走到厨房，看到一个大块头，满身是汗的男人，那就是主厨。Whats the matter? he demanded.Nothing. Those pork chops were just fantastic.He looked at me as though I was out of my mind. Obviously it was hard for him to receive a compliment. Then he said warmly, Would you like another?主厨问道：“什么事？”。“没什么事。猪排味道太棒了。”主厨看着我，好像我有毛病似的。显然，有人赞美对他来说太不容易了。接着，他热情地问道：“要再来一份吗？”Isnt that beautiful? Had I not learned how to be loving, I would have thought nice things about the chefs pork chops, but probably wouldnt have told himjust as I had failed to tell Liani how much she had helped me that first day in class. Thats one of the things love is: sharing joy with people.这不是很美妙吗？如果我没有学过怎样表达爱，我可能会想到那位主厨所做的猪排好的方面，但我大概不会亲口告诉他就像我没能告诉莉安妮，第一天我上课时她对我的帮助有多大。那便是爱的一个方面：与人分享喜悦。Another secret of love is knowing that you are yourself special, that in all the world there is only one of you. If I had a magic wand and a single w