unit13marriage课文翻译综合教程四

1、Unit 13MarriageRobert Lynd1“Conventional people,”says Mr. Bertrand Russell,“like to pretend thatdifficulties in regard to marriage are a new thing.”I could not help wondering, as I read thissentence, where one can meet these conventional people who think, or pretend to think, asconventional people d

2、o. I have known hundreds of conventional people, and I cannotremember one of them who thought the things conventional people seem to think. They wereall, for example, convinced that marriage was a state beset with difficulties, and that thesedifficulties were as old, if not as the hills, at least as

3、 the day on which Adam lost a rib and gaineda wife. A younger generation of conventional people has grown up in recent years, and it maybe that they have a rosier conception of marriage than their ancestors; but the conventionalpeople of the Victorian era were under no illusions on the subject. Thei

4、r cynical attitude tomarriage may be gathered from the enthusiastic reception they gave toPunchs a dvice tothose aboutto marry“Dont.”2I doubt, indeed, whether the horrors of marriage were ever depicted morecruelly than during the conventional nineteenth century. The comic papers and music- hallsmade

5、 the miseries a standing dish.“You can always tell whethera mans married or single from the way hes dressed,”said the comedian.“Look at the single man: no buttons on his shirt. Look at the married man: no shirt.”Thehumour was crude; but it went hometo the honest Victorian heart. If marriage were to

6、bejudged by the songs conventional people used to sing about it in the music-halls, it would seema hell mainly populated by twins and leech-like mothers-in-law. The rare experiences of Darbyand Joan were, it is true, occasionally hymned, reducing strong men smelling strongly ofalcohol to reverent si

7、lence; but, on the whole, the audience felt more normal when a comediancame out with an anti-marital refrain such as:O why did I leave my little back roomIn Bloomsbury,Where I could live on a pound a weekIn luxury(I forget the next line).But since I have married Maria,Ive jumped out of the frying-pa

8、nInto the blooming fire.3No difficulties Why, the very nigger-minstrels of my boyhood used to open their performancewith a chorus which began:Married! Married! O pity those whore married.Those who go and take a wife must be very green.4It is possible that the comedians exaggerated, and that Victoria

9、n wives were not all viragos withpokers, who beat their tipsy husbands for staying out too late. But at least they and theiraudiences refrained from painting marriage as an inevitable Paradise. Even the clergy would gono farther than to say that marriages were made in Heaven. That they did not belie

10、ve thatmarriage necessarily ended there is shown by the fact that one of them wrote a“best -seller”bearing the titleHow to Be Happy Though Married.5I doubt, indeed, whether common opinion in any age has ever looked on marriage as anuntroubled Paradise. I consulted a dictionary of quotations on the s

11、ubject and discovered thatfew of the opinions quoted were rose-coloured. These opinions, it may be objected, are theopinions of unconventional people, but it is also true that they are opinions treasured and keptalive by conventional people. Wehave the reputed saying of the henpecked Socrates, forex

12、ample, when asked whether it was better to marry or not:“Whichever you do, you willrepent.”Wehave Montaigne writing:“It happens as one sees in cages. The birds outsidedespair of ever getting in; those inside are equally desirous of getting out.”Bacon is no moreprenuptial with his caustic quotation:“

13、He was reputed one of the wise men that made answerto the question when a man should marry:A young man not yet; an elder man not at all.”Burton isfar from encouraging!“One was never married, and thats his hell; anotheris, and thats his plague.”Pepys scribbled in his diary:“Strange to saywhat delight

14、 we married people have to see these poor folk decoyed into our condition.”6The pious Jeremy Taylor was as keenly aware that marriage is not all bliss.“Marriage,”hedeclared,“hath in it less of beauty and more of safety than the single lifeit hath more carebut less danger; it is more merry and more s

15、ad; it is fuller of sorrows and fuller of joys.”Thesentimental and optimistic Steele can do no better than:“The marriage state, with and without1伯特兰罗素先生说：“凡人百姓喜欢假装说婚姻中遇到的困难是新鲜事。当我读到the affection suitable to it, is the completest image of Heaven and Hell weare capable of receiving inthis life.”7Rouss

16、eau denied that a perfect marriage had ever been known.“I have often thought,”hewrote,“that if only one could prolong the joy of love in marriage we should have paradise onearth. That is a thing which has never been hitherto .”Dr. Johnson is not quoted in thedictionary; but everyone will remember ho

17、w, devoted husband though he was, he denied thatthe state of marriage was natural to man.“Sir,”he declared,“it is so far from beingnatural for a man and woman to live in a state of marriage that we find all the motives whichthey have for remaining in that connexion and the restraints which civilised

18、 society imposes toprevent separation are hardly sufficient to keep them together.8When one reads the things that have been said about marriage from onegeneration to another, one cannot but be amazedat the courage with which theyoung go on marrying. Almost everybody, conventional and unconventional,

19、 seems to havepainted the troubles of marriage in the darkest colours. So pessimistic were the conventionalnovelists of the nineteenth century about marriage that they seldom dared to prolong theirstories beyond the wedding bells. Married people in plays and novels are seldom enviable, and,as time g

20、oes on, they seem to get more and more miserable. Even conventional peoplenowadays enjoy the story of a thoroughlyunhappy marriage. It is only fair to say, however, thatin modern times we like to imagine that nearly everybody, single as well as married, is unhappy.As social reformers we are all for

21、happiness, but as thinkers and aesthetes we are on the side ofmisery.9The truth is that we are a difficulty-conscious generation. Whether or not we make life evenmore difficult than it would otherwise be by constantly talking about our difficulties I do notknow. I sometimes suspect that half our dif

22、ficultiesare imaginary and that if we kept quietabout them they woulddisappear. Is it quite certain that the ostrich by burying his head in the sand never escapes hispursuers I look forward to the day when a great naturalist will discover that itis to thispractice that the ostrich owes his survival.

23、婚姻罗伯特林德这句话的时候， 不禁觉得奇怪： 上哪儿去找这些像凡人百姓那样思考、 或假装那样思考的凡 人百姓。我认识数以百计的凡人百姓， 我想不起来他们当中任何人看似有那些凡人百姓的想 法。举例来说吧，他们都坚信， 婚姻是一种充满困扰的状态， 这些困扰即使不像山脉那样古 老，也如同上帝从亚当身上取下一根肋骨给他创造一个妻子的历史那么古老。近年来， 新一代凡人百姓成长了起来， 可能他们对婚姻的想法比先祖来得美好， 但维多利亚时代的凡人百 姓对这个问题不抱任何幻想。 笨拙杂志给那些即将步入婚姻殿堂的人们的建议是“别结 婚”，而他们对此建议反响热烈，由此可以看出他们对于婚姻的愤世嫉俗的态度。2传统的

24、19世纪对于恐怖婚姻的描写异常残酷，我真怀疑有没有出其右者。漫画报纸和 音乐厅的表演将婚姻的苦难作为永恒不变的话题。 “你总是很容易从一个男人的穿着打扮看 出他是否已婚， ”喜剧演员如是说。“你看那些单身汉：他们衬衫上没有纽扣。看看那些已 婚人士：他们索性不穿衬衫。”这种幽默很粗鄙， 但深得维多利亚时代的诚实人士赞许。假 如婚姻用传统人士在音乐厅里过去经常唱的歌来衡量， 那么婚姻就像地狱， 主要由双胞胎和 如同水蛭一般恶毒的岳母或婆婆组成。 生活平淡但彼此恩爱的老夫妻并不多见， 然而， 这样 的故事如果偶尔在歌中吟唱， 倒是会令满嘴酒气的硬汉肃然起敬。 这一点是毫无疑问的。 但 总体说来，观众

25、们如果看到一位喜剧演员唱着反婚姻的副歌出现会觉得比较正常。歌曰： 哦，为何我离开位于 布卢姆斯伯里的小房间， 那里我一周只花费区区一英镑便可丰衣足食（下一行我忘了。）但自从我娶了玛丽亚， 我跳出油锅 又落入熊熊火坑。3没有困难吗你看， 我小时候的黑人歌手们通常以一首合唱开始表演。 这首歌开头是这样 的：结了婚!结了婚!哦，可怜那些结了婚的。 那些去找老婆的人可真青涩。4有可能这些喜剧演员夸张了，有可能维多利亚时代的悍妇们并不都是挥舞着拨火棍教训 深夜迟归、醉生梦死的老公的。 但至少这些喜剧演员和他们的观众不会将婚姻描绘成无人可 免的人间天堂。 即使是教士们最多也就会说婚姻只应天上有。 他们当中

26、的一员甚至写了一本 题为如何身陷婚姻却依然快乐 的畅销书， 这便说明他们不相信夫妻一定会在幸福天堂白 头终老。5我真的怀疑是否有哪个时代的普遍观点视婚姻为万事顺利的天堂。 我查阅了一本关于婚 姻的引语词典， 几乎没发现有什么乐观的看法。 也许有反对意见说， 这些看法来自那些不循 规蹈矩的人们， 但确定的是这些观点被传统人士视若珍宝。 比方说， 怕老婆的苏格拉底被问 及到底结婚好还是不结好，他留下了著名的论断： “无论结不结婚，你都会后悔。 ”蒙田曾 写道： “看看鸟笼就知道是什么情况了。外面的鸟因为不能飞进鸟笼而充满绝望；里面的鸟 也同样渴望飞出去。”培根同样也不支持结婚。他曾尖刻地写道： “昔有智者答人问何时可 婚，曾云：青年未到时，老年不必矣。”伯顿的说法也很让人沮丧：“张三没结婚，像 呆在地狱里；李四结了婚，生活在灾祸中。”佩皮斯在日记中信笔写道：“说来也怪，我们 这些已婚人士看到那些可怜的家伙像我们一样被诱进婚姻这个火坑时，我们是多么高兴 啊。”6虔