英汉翻译练习1-The Three New Yorks

The Three New Y orks

E. B. White

There are roughly three New Yorks. There is, first, the New York of the man or woman who was born here, who takes the city for granted and accepts its size and its turbulence as natural and inevitable. Second, there is the New York of the commuters ——the city that is devoured by locusts each day and spat out each night. Third, there is the New York of the person who was born somewhere else and came to New York in quest of something.

Of these three trembling cities the greatest is the last ——the city of final destination, the city that is a goal. It is this third city that accounts for New York's high-strung disposition, its poetical deportment, its dedication to the arts, and its incomparable achievements.

Commuters give the city its tidal restlessness, natives give it solidarity and continuity, but the settlers give it passion. And whether it is a farmer arriving from Italy to set up a small grocery store in a slum, or a young girl arriving from a small town in Mississippi to escape the indignity of being observed by her neighbors, or a boy arriving from the Corn Belt with a manuscript in his suitcase and a pain in his heart, it makes no difference: each embraces New York with the intense excitement of first love, each absorbs New York with the fresh eyes of an adventurer, each generates heat and light to dwarf the Consolidated Edison Company.

三方面看纽约

大致上可以从三个方面解读纽约。首先,出生在这里的纽约的男人或女人,他们把这座城市作为理所当然的存在并认为它的规模和动荡是自然和不可避免的。第二,有纽约的上班族——这个城市每天白天像被蝗虫吞噬进去然后每天晚上吐了出来。第三,出生在其他地方的纽约人带着追求来到纽约。

这三类纽约人中,最伟大的是最后一类人——纽约是对于他们是最终归宿的城市和目标与机遇的城市。是第三类人对纽约的紧张的秉性、诗人的涵养、对艺术的执着和无与伦比的成就做出了解释。

上班族给纽约带来了潮汐般的坐立不安,当地人给它团结和连续性,但是定居者给它的激情。不管是一个来自意大利农夫为了在贫民窟开设一个杂货店,还是一个来自密西西比州的年轻姑娘为了逃避邻居的对她的偷窥,或者一个来自玉米带的男孩用手提箱带着他的手稿和内心的痛楚,情况都没有什么区别:每个与纽约的拥抱都带着初恋般的激动,每次对纽约的接纳都带着冒险家的新奇目光,每份光和热,足以令爱迪生联合电气公司相形见绌。

英本1004班

王汉朝