自考英语二课文译文习题 Unit 13

13-A. Work, Labor, and Play

A工作、劳作和娱乐

So far as I know, Miss Hannah Arendt was the first person to define the essential difference between work and labor. To be happy, a man must feel, firstly, free and, secondly, important. He cannot be really happy if he is compelled by society to do what he does not enjoy doing, or if what he enjoys doing is ignored by society as of no value or importance. In a society where slavery in the strict sense has been abolished, the sign that what a man does is of social value is that he is paid money to do it, but a laborer today can rightly be called a wage slave. A man is a laborer if the job society offers him is of no interest to himself but he is compelled to take it by the necessity of earning a living and supporting his family.

就我所知，汉纳·阿伦特小姐是界定工作和劳作的本质区别的第一人。一个人要幸福就必须首先感觉到自由，其次感觉到自已重要、如果迫于社会的压力他不得不干他不愿意干的工作，或者说，如果社会忽视了他乐意做的事情，认为它们没有价值或者并不重要，此人是不会真正感觉到幸福的。在一个从严格意义上来说已废除了奴隶制的社会中，一个人所做事情具有社会价值的标志是他因为做了此事而得到了金钱；虽然如此，把今天的劳作者称作工资奴隶或许是比较合适的。如果一个人对社会提供给他的工作毫无兴趣，而迫于生计和养家糊口他又不得不接受，那么此人只能是一个劳作者。，

The antithesis to labor is play. When we play a game, we enjoy what we are doing, otherwise we should not play it, but it is a purely private activity; society could not care less whether we play it or not.

于劳作如对的是娱乐。玩游戏时，我们乐意做我们所做的事情，否则，我们就不会玩了。但玩纯粹是个人的活动：社会对你玩不玩游戏是决不在意的。

Between labor and play stands work. A man is a worker if he is personally interested in the job which society pays him to do; what from the point of view of society is necessary labor is from his own point of view voluntary play. Whether a job is to be classified as labor or work depends, not on the job itself, but on the tastes of the individual who undertakes it. The difference does not, for example, coincide with the difference between a manual and a mental job; a gardener or a cobbler may be a worker, a bank clerk a laborer. Which a man is can be seen from his attitude toward leisure. To a worker, leisure means simply the hours he needs to relax and rest in order to work efficiently. He is therefore more likely to take too little leisure than too much; workers die of coronaries and forget their wives’ birthdays. To the laborer, on the other hand, leisure means freedom from compulsion, so that it is natural for him to imagine that the fewer hours he has to

spend laboring, and the more hours he is free to play, the better.

在劳作和娱乐之间是工作。如果一个人对社会付钱让他做的工作感兴趣，他就是一个工作者；从社会的观点来看，工作是一件必不可少的劳作，但对他来说却是一种自觉自愿的娱乐。一件事情到底是劳作还是工作不在于事情本身，而在于承担这件事情的人的兴趣。举例来说，这种差异与脑力劳动和体力劳动之间的差异并不一样，一个花匠或者一个补鞋匠有可能是一个工作者，一个银行职员则有可能是一个劳作者、从一个人对待闲暇的态度可以引出他属于哪一类人。对一个工作者来说，闲暇仅仅指的是为了有效工作所需要的放松和休息的时间。因此，他所享受的闲暇很件可能是太少而不是大多；工作者会死于冠心病，会忘记妻子的生日。另一方面．对劳作者来讲，闲暇就是摆脱了强制的自由，所以他很自然就会想到，他被迫劳作的时间越少，他的娱乐时间也就会越多；当然也就越好。

What percentage of the population in a modern technological society are, like myself, in the fortunate position of being workers? At a guess I would say sixteen per cent, and I do not think that figure is likely to get bigger in the future.

在现代社会，象我这样有幸作为工作者的人在所有人之中所占的百分比会是多少呢？猜一猜，我会说占16％，我认为这一数字将来也不会上升。

Technology and the division of labor have done two things: by eliminating in many fields the need for special strength or skill, they have made a very large number of paid occupations which formerly were enjoyable work into boring labor, and by increasing productivity they have reduced the number of necessary laboring hours. It is already possible to imagine a society in which the majority of the population, that is to say, its laborers, will have almost as much leisure as in earlier times was enjoyed by the aristocracy. When one recalls how aristocracies in the past actually behaved, the prospect is not cheerful. Indeed, the problem of dealing with boredom may be even more difficult for such a future mass society than it was for aristocracies. The latter, for example, ritualized their time; there was a season to shoot grouse, a season to spend in town, etc. The masses are more likely to replace an unchanging ritual by fashion which it will be in the economic interest of certain people to change as often as possible. Again, the masses cannot go in for hunting, for very soon there would be no animals left to hunt. For other aristocratic amusements like gambling, dueling, and warfare, it may be only too easy to find equivalents in dangerous driving, drug-taking, and senseless acts of violence.

技术和分工完成了两件事；它们在消除许多领域对特殊体力和技巧的需求的同时，把很多从前付报酬的令人愉悦的工作变成了令人生厌的劳作；然而，它们又提高劳动效率，减少了必要劳作时间。我们已经可以想象出这样一个社会；在这个社会中，大多数人，也就是劳作者，拥有的闲暇几乎和从前的达官贵人享受的一样多。人们回想起达官贵人在过去的