reading across culture.doc

Rites of passageIs life just one damned thing after another, as the American author Elbert Hubbard wrote a hundred years ago, taking a rather fatalistic viewpoint? Or is it an obstacle race, in which the contestantshuman beings everywherehave to show their worth at certain crucial stages of their lives? 2The sad clown Jacques in Shakespeares play As You Like It suggests that there are seven ages to a persons existence, and the phenomenon of rites of passage in almost every society confirms that we prefer to think of life in terms of these stages, such as childhood, middle age and old age. 3A rite of passage is a formal recognition of change, imposed by society, of a move from one stage to another, the most universally recognized one being the transition between childhood and adulthood. This can take very different forms. For example, in Jewish tradition one of the most important moments in a persons life, marked by a religious ceremony and a family feast, is the Bar Mitzvah, when children become responsible for their actionsat the age of 13. This is roughly the same age that children can be held legally responsible in many countries. 4A very different rite of passage is the tradition of the prom at the end of American high school. This is a dance with a difference. Students have to wear formal clothesmany for the first time in their livesand it is usual to hire an expensive limousine to arrive at the prom. It is as if, for one night, they behave like adults twice their ageor at least look older than they really are. 5Perhaps one of the most interesting rites of passage is the walkabout of Australian aborigines, when adolescents would be required to spend about six months walking alone through the wilderness, following the paths of their ancestors along the age-old songlines which mapped out the country. In so doing they penetrated the heart of aboriginal culturethe oldest continuous culture in the worldand, in the process, discovered themselves too.通过仪式 生活是否如同对生活持宿命论看法的美国作家阿尔伯特哈伯德在一百年前所描述的那样，是“该死的事情一桩接着一桩”？抑或是一场障碍赛跑，其间每个参赛者，即世界各地的人们，不得不在生命的各个重要阶段展现自己的价值？ 莎士比亚的戏剧皆大欢喜中那个悲伤的小丑雅克认为，人的一生要经历“七个年龄段”，几乎每个社会都有的通过仪式也证明，我们往往是把生命分为这几个阶段来看待的，比如童年、中年和老年。 通过仪式是社会对个人从一个阶段走向另一阶段的正式的认可，其中被广泛认同的是由少年步入成年时举行的成年礼。 成年礼有多种形式。 例如，在犹太传统中，人生最重要的时刻之一就是“犹太男孩成人仪式”，人们为年满13岁的孩子举办宗教仪式和家宴，这标志着从此以后这个孩子要对自己的行为负责了。 13岁也恰恰是许多国家规定开始承担法律责任的年龄。 美国中学生活结束前的毕业舞会是另一种截然不同的通过仪式。 这次舞会非同寻常，学生们不仅穿着正式（许多学生平生第一次这么穿），他们通常还乘坐着一辆租来的豪华轿车到达舞会现场。 就在那一天晚上，他们似乎要表现得和年龄是他们两倍的成年人一样，至少是看上去要比自己的实际年龄老。 世界上最有趣的通过仪式之一或许就是澳洲原住民的“徒步旅行”了，还处于青春期的少年必须在野外独自行走六个月，沿着划定国土疆域的“歌之版图”追寻祖先的足迹。 通过这样的仪式，他们深入到土著文化这一世界上最古老而持久的文化的精髓之中，并在这一过程中发现自我。Childhood around the world1My Jewish grandmother used to live close by. She was a marvellous cook and there would always be something happening in the kitchen. When a religious festival was approaching, she used to be busy all day preparing a sumptuous family dinner for the evening. As a child, I would often stay with my grandparents and so I was her helper. I used to feel really proud going to the larder to fetch the eggs, carrying them back carefully so as not to drop them. The larder smelled of everything all at once, flour, spices, honey, oil, wood. I would watch her every move and she would describe everything she was doing in detail so that I would learn. Pass me that fella there, she would say, pointing to a frying pan or an onion. Everything was important. Deborah, England 2I spent my childhood with my grandmother. I have a funny memory of her. She used to smoke cigarettes that she rolled herself in a piece of newspaper. When she was not home, I decided to try the same. I rolled a piece of newspaper without tobacco inside. Then I lit the roll and tried to smoke it. It burned quickly all the way up to my nose. I was so embarrassed. Even now, my family talks about that incident. Myeong Ok Lee, South Korea 3When I was a child, I would play with stray cats and dogs in the neighbourhood. 4I trained them. We played games which could be called teachers and students, doctors and patients, sellers and buyers, robbers and their leader, and so on. 5One day when I came home with my friends following me, my mother was shocked. She shouted at me, and I promised that it would never happen again. However, she found me once again in my room with my dogs playing a game: the chorus and the orchestra. Olga, Russia 6When I was a small boy, we didnt have any money to buy toys. But one day we got a big toy without paying any money at all. A Russian plane, low on fuel, made an emergency landing in the sand on our playground. It was such exciting news for a small, sleepy village with a population of several hundred people. As no one had ever seen a plane before, the entire population of the village came to see the plane in our playground. My father and other town officials arrested the pilot, but his plane stayed in that sand forever. It became our favourite toy. We would sit in the pilots seat, and pretend that, unlike the Russian pilot, we were the best pilots in the world. Yildiz, Turkey 世界各地的童年 以前，我的犹太奶奶和我住得很近。 她做得一手好菜，厨房里从来没有消停的时候。 每逢宗教节日临近，她都要忙上一整天，为家人准备丰盛的晚宴。 小时候我一直和爷爷奶奶在一起，也就成了奶奶的帮厨。 那时我对自己能到储藏室把鸡蛋完好无损地取回来感到非常自豪。 储藏室里五味俱全，里面有面粉、香料、蜂蜜、食用油、柴禾。 我总在观察奶奶的动作，她会把手头的每一样活都细细地给我解释，教我怎么做。 她经常会说“把那东西递给我”，手指着一个炒菜锅或是一颗洋葱。 每件事都很重要。 黛博拉 英国 我的童年是跟奶奶过的，说起她就让我想起一段有趣的往事。 她经常用报纸卷烟抽。 有一天她不在家，我想学她的样，就用报纸卷了一个烟卷，但里面没放烟丝。 我点燃报纸卷，放到嘴里吸，报纸很快就烧到了我的鼻头上。 我觉得很丢脸，至今家里人还时常提起这件糗事。 李明宇 韩国 我小时候常和附近的流浪猫、流浪狗玩。 我训练它们，我们一起玩“老师和学生”、“医生和病人”、“售货员和顾客”、“抢劫犯和他们的头儿”等游戏。 一天，我回家时后面跟了一帮“朋友”，妈妈吓坏了。 她冲我直嚷嚷，我只好答应她以后再也不带它们回家了。 可是后来有一次，她又发现我在自己屋里和好几只狗一起玩“合唱队与乐团”的游戏。 奥尔加 俄罗斯 小时候，我们没钱买玩具。 有一天，我们没花一分钱就得到了一个大玩具。 一架俄罗斯飞机因为燃油耗尽迫降在操场的沙地上，这对我们这个只有几百号人的寂静的小村庄来说可是个激动人心的消息。 因为以前没见过飞机，全村的人都到操场围观。 我父亲和镇公所的几个官员逮捕了飞行员，那架飞机则永远地留在了沙地里，成了我们最喜爱的玩具。 我们常坐在驾驶座上，好像自己与那位糟糕的俄罗斯飞行员不同，是世界上最棒的飞行员。 意德兹 土耳其The top five paintings in Western art1Which are the greatest paintings of all time? Everybody has their favourites, and choosing a short list from the huge array of masterpieces in Western art is likely to be a frustratingand ultimately not very usefultask. But here are five paintings which would be high up on anybodys list. 2Perhaps the most famous, and instantly recognizable, of all is Leonardos Mona Lisa, now in the Louvre in Paris. The longer you look at this painting, the more the mystery grows. Who is this person, whose eyes follow us wherever we are? As a famous critic once said, she seems older than the rocks among which she sits. 3Las Meninas was painted in 1656 by Diego Velzquez. It hangs in the Prado Museum in Madrid, and is one of the most analyzed works in Western painting. Like a snapshot, it shows a large room in the palace of King Philip IV of Spain, and presents a number of people from the court: the kings daughter Margarita, surrounded by her maids, a bodyguard, two dwarfs and a dog. In the background is Velzquez himself, working on another painting and looking out towards the viewer. The picture seems to be telling us that art and life are an illusion. 4The Starry Night is without question one of Vincent van Goghs best-known paintings. It shows the view at night from the room in the mental hospital in Saint Rmy de Provence, in the south of France, where he was staying after a severe breakdown. It also reflects something of the mental turmoil from which he was suffering at the time. It can be viewed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. 5Another well-known modern masterpiece is The Scream by the Norwegian artist, Edvard Munch. It shows a figure in apparent agony in front of blood red sky. Its thought that he is not screaming himself, but protecting himself from a scream, struggling to keep out the distressing noise of nature. Some of this paintings notoriety is due to the number of times it has been stolen from its home in the Oslo National Gallery. 6Last but not least, Picassos Les Demoiselles dAvignon was completed in 1907, and shows five prostitutes in a brothel. Within the history of modern art, its held to be one of the most influential, and a precursor of the Cubist style, which featured geometric shapes and a plural viewpoint of features on different planes and which would otherwise be invisible. It can now be seen in the Museum of Modern Art in New York.西方艺术史上最好的五幅画作 史上最伟大的画作有哪些？每个人都有他自己最喜爱的作品，但要从数不胜数的西方艺术精品中选出几幅最好的，可能是一件费力不讨好的事情。 不过，下面这五幅画可能在任何人的选单上都会高居榜首。 其中最有名的、一眼就能认出来的可能就会是列奥纳多的蒙娜丽莎，现藏于巴黎的卢浮宫。 你看着这幅画越久，它就变得越神秘。 这位目光始终追随着我们的画中人到底是谁？正如一位著名评论家所说的，她看上去比她坐着的石头还要古老。 宫女是迪戈贝拉斯克斯1656年绘制的作品，它悬挂在马德里普拉多美术馆中。它是西方绘画史上被分析得最多的画作之一。 这幅画像一张快照，展示了西班牙腓力四世皇宫里的一间大屋子，还有屋里的许多宫廷人物：有国王的女儿玛格丽塔，簇拥着她的一群宫女，一名护卫，两个侏儒和一条狗。 后面是贝拉斯克斯本人，他正在画另一个作品，他把目光投向了观众。 这幅画好像在告诉我们，艺术和生活不过是一种幻觉。 星夜无疑是文森特凡高最著名的画作之一。 它展现了从法国南部圣雷米普罗旺斯的一家精神病院的房间里看到的夜空景象，凡高在一次严重的精神崩溃后住在了那里。 这幅画也反映了他当时所经历的精神混乱。 目前在纽约的大都会艺术博物馆里可以看到这幅画。 另一幅著名的现代杰作是挪威艺术家爱华德蒙克所画的呐喊。 它展示了血红色的天空下一位痛苦异常的人。 有人认为他并不是在呐喊，而是捂着耳朵，保护自己不受到喊声的伤害，他极力把自然界令人痛苦的声音挡在耳外。 这幅画名声远扬，部分是缘自它从奥斯陆国家艺术馆被盗的次数。 最后一幅重要画作是毕加索的阿维农少女，该画完成于1907年，描绘了妓院里的五个妓女。 该画被誉为现代艺术史上最有影响力的作品，也是立体主义画派的先锋之作。立体主义画派的特点是运用许多几何图形和多重视点，使画里的人物处于多个平面之中，展现出在单一平面中无法看见的特征。 该画现藏于纽约现代艺术博物馆。Britains Disappearing JobsUNDER a spreading chestnut-tree The village smithy stands; The smith, a mighty man is he, With large and sinewy hands; And the muscles of his brawny arms Are strong as iron bands. His hair is crisp, and black, and long, His face is like the tan; His brow is wet with honest sweat, He earns whateer he can, And looks the whole world in the face, For he owes not any man. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow1Times have changed since Longfellow wrote his poem about the village blacksmith. And so have the jobs people do for a living. Over the last century hundreds of traditional jobs and professions have all but disappeared. The village blacksmith, (or smith), is an obvious example. Once the focal point of village life, he made and repaired anything in iron, and did other odd jobs such as shoeing horses; today, there are fewer than a thousand smiths working in Britain. 2Meanwhile in the countryside, the rise of mechanized agriculture has led to a massive decline in the number of farm workers, especially those working with livestock. For example, just a handful of shepherds are left working today in the hills of northern England. 3But jobs in towns have changed too. Nobody would argue that some of this is change for the better: Improved sanitary conditions mean less work for rat-catchers, and legislation about the minimum age for working has taken the shoeshine boys off the streets. But small one-person businesses, such as cobblers (who mend shoes) or watch repairers are hard to come by nowadays, and many small shopkeepers have had to close down because of the competition from supermarkets. 4Twenty years or so ago the milkman was still a familiar sight in the early morning, delivering milk door to door on his electrically-powered float. But since then demand has dropped by over 60 per cent. People who want milk delivered today can order it on the Internet with the rest of their groceries from the local supermarket. 5Sometimes jobs disappear almost overnight. A hundred years ago Britain was the largest producer of coal in the world, with 600,000 miners producing 200 million tons of coal per year. Then, in the 1980s, almost all the mines were closed, and most miners lost their jobs. But the clean fuel which replaced coal was expensive, and in recent years many people have opened up fireplaces which had been closed for years, to return to traditional fuels. 6This, in turn, has led to the return of a profession which most people had thought was extinct: the chimney sweep, whose job is to clean chimneys. Once the symbol of a traditional and dangerous job in a bygone age, the chimney sweep is now back in demand, and (judging by some of the websites advertising their services) technological too. 英国正在消失的职业 一株繁茂的栗树下面 乡村铁匠铺兀立； 铁匠是个健壮的汉子， 双手硕大而有力； 他那两臂的鼓鼓肌肉 有如铁条般坚实。 他的头发硬、黑而长， 他的脸色像黑炭； 他额上是诚实的汗水， 他卖力挣钱吃饭， 且坦然直面整个世界， 因为他谁也不欠。 亨利沃滋沃斯朗费罗（傅浩译）自朗费罗写下这首关于乡村铁匠的诗以来，时代变了，人们营生的手段也变了。 在过去的一百年间，成百上千的传统职业几乎销声匿迹了。 乡村铁匠即是个明显的例子。 铁匠曾是乡村生活的中心，他用铁来打制东西，修理东西，还时常干点零活，比如给马上马蹄铁等；而今，在英国，铁匠不到一千人了。 同时，乡村农业机械化的兴起使农夫的数量急剧减少，尤其是饲养牲口的人。 比如，现在仍在英格兰北部山区放牧的人也就剩下寥寥几个了。 城里的工作也发生了变化。 没人会去否认有些是变得更好了：卫生条件的改善使抓耗子的工作大量减少，关于最低工作年龄的立法使得擦鞋的童工从大街上迅速消失，但个体经营者，如补鞋的皮匠或修理手表的表匠如今也很难看到了。许多小商贩也因难敌超市的竞争不得不关门大吉。 大约20年前，每天清晨还能见到送奶工熟悉的身影，他们骑着小电瓶车挨家挨户送奶。 从那时到现在，需求已经下降了60%。 如今订奶的人可以在网上下单，当地超市会把牛奶连同其他商品一起送到家门口。 有时某些职业几乎在一夜之间就消失了。 一百年前，英国是世界上最大的产煤国，60万名矿工每年生产两亿吨煤。 到了20世纪80年代，几乎所有的煤矿都关闭了，大多数矿工失去了工作。 可是因为取代煤炭的“清洁燃料”太贵了，近年来有很多人重新启用尘封多年的壁炉，并回归到传统的燃料上来。 这使得大多数人认为已经消失的一个职业烟囱清扫工又有活干了。 清扫烟囱在那个逝去的年代里曾是传统的危险工作的代名词，现在又有了需求。根据网络广告公布的服务项目，这个工种的技术含量还挺高。Destination Europe1For many Africans its their first glimpse of Europe: a tiny island in the Mediterranean, between Tunisia and Sicily. Technically Lampedusa is part of Italy, and therefore the European Union. But it is closer to the shores of North Africa, and as such is the first unplanned stop for thousands of Africans on a desperate journey to seek a better life in Europe. At best, the journeyfor which they have paid up to 2,000 to the gangs which control the illegal tradeis uncomfortable, in appalling hygienic conditions and under a merciless sun. But sometimes the horrendously overcrowded boats do not make it, and days later bodies are washed ashore along Europes southern coastlines. 2Those people who arrive in Lampedusa are promptly rounded up and sent to a detention centre where the authorities decide whether or not to grant asylum, which gives the immigrant the right to stay. Many are sent back to where they come from. Some manage to land secretly, avoiding immigration officialsbut they do not always realize they are on a tiny island, and surprise local inhabitants by asking for the railway station. 3And yet, in spite of everythingthe dangers of the journey, the ambivalent attitudes of governments, and the hostility of many local peoplesome of them do manage to start a new life. The fact is, without immigrants Europes economy would come to a standstill. Immigrants do the jobs that Europes ageing population no longer wants to do; and some of them integrate quickly, learning the local language, taking an active role in society and, ultimately, acquiring citizenship. 4Italy is a comparatively recent destination for immigrants from developing countries; four million immigrants account for about seven per cent of the total population. In Europe as a whole the figure is closer to 12 per cent; northern countries such as Germany, France and the UK have been experiencing the phenomenon of mass immigration for around 50 years. Successive governments in different countries have tried to control the flow, but have been unable to stop it. Migration is, quite simply, a fact of life, and the old continent (as Europeans sometimes refer to it) is today a multi-ethnic community, as well as the multicultural society it has always been. 目的地欧洲 对许多非洲人来说，这里是他们第一眼看到的欧洲：一个位于地中海的突尼斯和西西里岛之间的岛屿。 从技术层面上说，蓝佩杜萨岛是意大利的领土，因而属于欧盟。 但是该岛离北非海岸更近些，因而也成了成千上万的非洲人第一个计划外的停靠站。他们不顾一切，去欧洲寻求更好的生活。 他们向从事此项非法生意的黑帮支付高达两千欧元的费用，可是旅途极不舒服，卫生条件极其恶劣，而且还要遭受烈日的暴晒。这还算好的了，有时候，那些严重超载的船只到不了对岸，几天之后海水会把他们的尸体冲到欧洲南部的海滩上。 那些到达蓝佩杜萨岛的人则被迅速集中起来，押送到拘留中心，由那里的官员决定是否允许他们“避难”，允许避难就是给移民居住权。 许多人会被遣送回家，有些人则偷偷地登陆，躲开了移民官但他们往往没有意识到他们是在一个小岛上，当他们去向当地人打听火车站的位置时，当地人会感到很吃惊。 然而，即便有诸多的问题旅途的危险、政府模棱两可的态度、许多当地岛民的敌意有些人还是开始了新的生活。 事实上，如果没有移民，欧洲的经济就会停滞不前。 移民从事的工作都是欧洲日益老龄化的人口不愿意干的。有些移民很快就融入了当地文化，学会了当地的语言，积极投身社会活动，并最终获得了公民权。 意大利是来自发展中国家的新移民的目的地；那里四百万的移民大概占了全国总人口的7%。 而在整个欧洲，这个数字接近12%；一些北部的国家，例如德国、法国和英国，接纳大规模移民已经有50年之久。 虽然各国的历届政府都试图控制移民的流入，但收效甚微。 简而言之，移民是无法改变的现实，“旧大陆”（欧洲人有时候这样称呼它）不仅历来都是多元文化的社会，如今也是个多种族、多民族的社区。Heroes in Western Literature1Every culture has its heroes. The earliest heroes inhabit the shadowy area of mythology, occupying a middle space between human experience and superhuman power and knowledge. They were considered neither human nor divine, and the Greek word from which hero derives actually means demigod and refers to someone one of whose parents was a god, the other a human being. Often, in the oldest mythologies, the hero succeeded in changing the world, by discovery, invention, or trickeryfor example by discovering or inventing fire, or tricking the gods into giving it to humans. 2In Western culture, however, and particularly in Western literature, heroes are traditionally recognized by their bravery, their selflessness, and their ability to rise to the occasion in a desperate or dangerous situation. But they are human, not superhuman, and it is the fact that they are only human which makes it possible for us to identify with them; this is a point made more than two thousand years ago by the Greek philosopher Aristotle in his definition of tragic hero. 3Since then, the adventures of heroes have filled the pages of countless plays and novels; in fact, one of the definitions of the word hero today is the main character of a book. In more recent times, especially from the Romantic period on, many heroes have shown unconventional characteristics, making them anti-heroes such as the bad-tempered Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights or Yossarian in Catch-22, the air force pilot who does not want to fly. We can understand the motives of these characters, of course, but the real hero remains the person who is a force for good in the struggle against evil. 4Heroes come in all shapes and sizes. Harry Potter is a schoolboy with geek-like qualities, whi