第九届CASIO杯翻译竞赛英语组原文
【英语世界翻译赛往届赛题】-第九届原文及参考翻译
英译汉原文:The Whoomper FactorBy Nathan Cobb【1】As this is being written,snow is falling in the streets of Boston in what weather forecasters like to call“record amounts.”I would guess by looking out the window that we are only a few hours from that magic moment of paralysis,as in Storm Paralyzes Hub.Perhaps we are even due for an Entire Region Engulfed or a Northeast Blanketed,but I will happily settle for mere local disablement.And the more the merrier.【2】Some people call them blizzards,others nor’easters.My own term is whoompers,and I freely admit looking forward to them as does a baseball fan to ually I am disappointed,however;because tonight’s storm warnings too often turn into tomorrow’s light flurries.【3】Well,flurries be damned.I want the real thing,complete with Volkswagens turned into drifts along Commonwealth Avenue and the MBTA’s third rail frozen like a hunk of raw meat.A storm does not even begin to qualify as a whoomper unless Logan Airport is shut down for a minimum of six hours.【4】The point is,whoompers teach us a lesson.Or rather several lessons.For one thing,here are all these city folks who pride themselves on their instinct for survival,and suddenly they cannot bear to venture into the streets because they are afraid of being swallowed up.Virtual prisoners in their own houses is what they are.In northern New England, the natives view nights such as this with casual indifference,but let a whoomper hit Boston and the locals are not only knee deep in snow but also in befuddlement and disarray.【5】The lesson?That there is something more powerful out there than the sacred metropolis.It is not unlike the message we can read into the debacle of the windows falling out of the John Hancock Tower;just when we think we’ve got the upper hand on the elements,we find out we are flies and someone else is holding the swatter.Whoompers keep us in our place.【6】They also slow us down,which is not a bad thing for urbania these days.Frankly,I’m of the opinion Logan should be closed periodically,snow or not,in tribute to the lurking suspicion that it may not be all that necessary for a man to travel at a speed of600miles per hour.In a little while I shall go forth into the streets and I know what I will find.People will actually be walking,and the avenues will be bereftof cars.It will be something like those marvelous photographs of Back Bay during the nineteenth century,wherein the lack of clutter and traffic makes it seem as if someone has selectively airbrushed the scene.【7】And,of course,there will be the sound of silence tonight.It will be almost deafening.I know city people who have trouble sleeping in the country because of the lack of noise,and I suspect this is what bothers many of them about whoompers.Icy sidewalks and even fewer parking spaces we can handle,but please,God,turn up the volume.City folks tend not to believe in anything they can’t hear with their own ears.【8】It should also be noted that nights such as this are obviously quite pretty,hiding the city’s wounds beneath a clean white dressing.But it is their effect on the way people suddenly treat each other that is most fascinating,coming as it does when city dwellers are depicted as people of the same general variety as those New Yorkers who stood by when Kitty Genovese was murdered back in1964.【9】There’s nothing like a good whoomper to get people thinking that everyone walking towards them on the sidewalk might not be a mugger,or that saying hello is not necessarily a sign of perversion.You would think that city people,more than any other,would have a strongsense of being in the same rough seas together,yet it is not until a quasi catastrophe hits that many of them stop being lone sharks.【10】But enough of this.There’s a whoomper outside tonight,and it requires my presence.英译汉参考译文:最是那轰雪文/内森·科布译/韩子满【1】写下这些文字的时候,雪花儿正飘落在波士顿街头,气象预报员会说降雪量“创了纪录”。
第五届CASIO杯翻译竞赛英语组原文
第五届CASIO杯翻译竞赛英语组原文OpticsManini Nayar When I was seven,my friend Sol was hit by lightning and died.He was on a rooftop quietly playing marbles when this happened.Burnt to cinders,we were told by the neighbourhood gossips.He'd caught fire,we were assured,but never felt a thing.I only remember a frenzy of ambulances and long clean sirens cleaving the silence of that damp October ter,my father came to sit with me.This happens to one in several millions,he said,as if a knowledge of the bare statistics mitigated the horror.He was trying to help,I think.Or perhaps he believed I thought it would happen to me.Until now,Sol and I had shared everything;secrets,chocolates, friends,even a birthdate.We would marry at eighteen,we promised each other,and have six children,two cows and a heart-shaped tattoo with'Eternally Yours'sketched on our behinds.But now Sol was somewhere else,and I was seven years old and under the covers in my bed counting spots before my eyes in the darkness.After that I cleared out my play-cupboard.Out went my collection of teddy bears and picture books.In its place was an emptiness,the oak panels reflecting their own woodshine.The space I made seemed almost holy,though mother thought my efforts a waste.An empty cupboard is no better than an empty cup,she said in an apocryphal aside.Mother always filled things up-cups,water jugs,vases,boxes,arms-as if colour and weight equalled a superior quality of life.Mother never understood that this was my dreamtime place.Here I could hide, slide the doors shut behind me,scrunch my eyes tight and breathe in another world. When I opened my eyes,the glow from the lone cupboard-bulb seemed to set the polished walls shimmering,and I could feel what Sol must have felt,dazzle and darkness.I was sharing this with him,as always.He would know,wherever he was, that I knew what he knew,saw what he had seen.But to mother I only said that I was tired of teddy bears and picture books.What she thought I couldn't tell,but she stirred the soup-pot vigorously.One in several millions,I said to myself many times,as if the key,the answer to it all,lay there.The phrase was heavy on my lips,stubbornly resistant to knowledge. Sometimes I said the words out of context to see if by deflection,some quirk of physics,the meaning would suddenly come to me.Thanks for the beans,mother,I said to her at lunch,you're one in millions.Mother looked at me oddly,pursed her lips and offered me more rice.At this club,when father served a clean ace to win the Retired-Wallahs Rotating Cup,I pointed out that he was one in a million.Oh,the serve was one in a million,father protested modestly.But he seemed pleased.Still, this wasn't what I was looking for,and in time the phrase slipped away from me,lost its magic urgency,became as bland as'Pass the salt'or'Is the bath water hot?'If Sol was one in a million,I was one among far less;a dozen,say.He was chosen.I was ordinary.He had been touched and transformed by forces I didn't understand.I was left cleaning out the cupboard.There was one way to bridge the chasm,to bring Sol back to life,but I would wait to try it until the most magical of moments.I would wait until the moment was so right and shimmering that Sol would have to come back. This was my weapon that nobody knew of,not even mother,even though she had pursed her lips up at the beans.This was between Sol and me.The winter had almost guttered into spring when father was ill.One February morning,he sat in his chair,ashen as the cinders in the grate.Then,his fingers splayed out in front of him,his mouth working,he heaved and fell.It all happened suddenly, so cleanly,as if rehearsed and perfected for weeks.Again the sirens,the screech of wheels,the white coats in perpetual motion.Heart seizures weren't one in a million. But they deprived you just the same,darkness but no dazzle,and a long waiting.Now I knew there was no turning back.This was the moment.I had to do it without delay;there was no time to waste.While they carried father out,I rushed into the cupboard,scrunched my eyes tight,opened them in the shimmer and called out 'Sol!Sol!Sol!'I wanted to keep my mind blank,like death must be,but father and Sol gusted in and out in confusing pictures.Leaves in a storm and I the calm axis.Here was father playing marbles on a roof.Here was Sol serving ace after ace. Here was father with two cows.Here was Sol hunched over the breakfast table.Thepictures eddied and rushed.The more frantic they grew,the clearer my voice became, tolling like a bell:'Sol!Sol!Sol!\'The cupboard rang with voices,some mine,some echoes,some from what seemed another place-where Sol was,maybe.The cupboard seemed to groan and reverberate,as if shaken by lightning and thunder.Any minute now it would burst open and I would find myself in a green valley fed by limpid brooks and red with hibiscus.I would run through tall grass and wading into the waters,see Sol picking flowers.I would open my eyes and he'd be there, hibiscus-laden,laughing.Where have you been,he'd say,as if it were I who had burned,falling in ashes.I was filled to bursting with a certainty so strong it seemed a celebration almost.Sobbing,I opened my eyes.The bulb winked at the walls.I fell asleep,I think,because I awoke to a deeper darkness.It was late,much past my bedtime.Slowly I crawled out of the cupboard,my tongue furred,my feet heavy. My mind felt like lead.Then I heard my name.Mother was in her chair by the window,her body defined by a thin ray of moonlight.Your father Will be well,she said quietly,and he will be home soon.The shaft of light in which she sat so motionless was like the light that would have touched Sol if he'd been lucky;if he had been like one of us,one in a dozen,or less.This light fell in a benediction,caressing mother,slipping gently over my father in his hospital bed six streets away.I reached out and stroked my mother's arm.It was warm like bath water,her skin the texture of hibiscus.We stayed together for some time,my mother and I,invaded by small night sounds and the raspy whirr of crickets.Then I stood up and turned to return to my room.Mother looked at me quizzically.Are you all right,she asked.I told her I was fine,that I had some cleaning up to do.Then I went to my cupboard and stacked it up again with teddy bears and picture books.Some years later we moved to Rourkela,a small mining town in the north east, near Jamshedpur.The summer I turned sixteen,I got lost in the thick woods there. They weren't that deep-about three miles at the most.All I had to do was cycle for all I was worth,and inminutes I'd be on the dirt road leading into town.But a stir in the leaves gave me pause.I dismounted and stood listening.Branches arched like claws overhead.The sky crawled on a white belly of clouds.Shadows fell in tessellated patterns of grey and black.There was a faint thrumming all around,as if the air were being strung and practised for an overture.And yet there was nothing,just a silence of moving shadows,a bulb winking at the walls.I remembered Sol,of whom I hadn't thought in years.And foolishly again I waited,not for answers but simply for an end to the terror the woods were building in me,chord by chord,like dissonant music.When the cacophony grew too much to bear, I remounted and pedalled furiously,banshees screaming past my ears,my feet assuming a clockwork of their own.The pathless ground threw up leaves and stones, swirls of dust rose and settled.The air was cool and steady as I hurled myself into the falling light.。
历届韩素音翻译大奖赛竞赛原文及译文
历届韩素音翻译大奖赛竞赛原文及译文历届韩素音翻译大奖赛竞赛原文及译文英译汉部分 (3)Hidden within Technology‘s Empire, a Republic of Letters (3)隐藏于技术帝国的文学界 (3)"Why Measure Life in Heartbeats?" (8)何必以心跳定生死? (9)美(节选) (11)The Literature of Knowledge and the Literature of Power byThomas De Quincey (16)知识文学与力量文学托马斯.昆西 (16)An Experience of Aesthetics by Robert Ginsberg (18)审美的体验罗伯特.金斯伯格 (18)A Person Who Apologizes Has the Moral Ball in His Court by Paul Johnson (21)谁给别人道歉,谁就在道义上掌握了主动保罗.约翰逊 (21)On Going Home by Joan Didion (25)回家琼.狄迪恩 (25)The Making of Ashenden (Excerpt) by Stanley Elkin (28)艾兴登其人(节选)斯坦利.埃尔金 (28)Beyond Life (34)超越生命[美] 卡贝尔著 (34)Envy by Samuel Johnson (39)论嫉妒[英]塞缪尔.约翰逊著 (39)《中国翻译》第一届“青年有奖翻译比赛”(1986)竞赛原文及参考译文(英译汉) (41)Sunday (41)星期天 (42)四川外语学院“语言桥杯”翻译大赛获奖译文选登 (44)第七届“语言桥杯”翻译大赛获奖译文选登 (44)The Woods: A Meditation (Excerpt) (46)林间心语(节选) (47)第六届“语言桥杯”翻译大赛获奖译文选登 (50)第五届“语言桥杯”翻译大赛原文及获奖译文选登 (52)第四届“语言桥杯”翻译大赛原文、参考译文及获奖译文选登 (54) When the Sun Stood Still (54)永恒夏日 (55)CASIO杯翻译竞赛原文及参考译文 (56)第三届竞赛原文及参考译文 (56)Here Is New York (excerpt) (56)这儿是纽约 (58)第四届翻译竞赛原文及参考译文 (61)Reservoir Frogs (Or Places Called Mama's) (61)水库青蛙(又题:妈妈餐馆) (62)中译英部分 (66)蜗居在巷陌的寻常幸福 (66)Simple Happiness of Dwelling in the Back Streets (66)在义与利之外 (69)Beyond Righteousness and Interests (69)读书苦乐杨绛 (72)The Bitter-Sweetness of Reading Yang Jiang (72)想起清华种种王佐良 (74)Reminiscences of Tsinghua Wang Zuoliang (74)歌德之人生启示宗白华 (76)What Goethe's Life Reveals by Zong Baihua (76)怀想那片青草地赵红波 (79)Yearning for That Piece of Green Meadow by Zhao Hongbo (79)可爱的南京 (82)Nanjing the Beloved City (82)霞冰心 (84)The Rosy Cloud byBingxin (84)黎明前的北平 (85)Predawn Peiping (85)老来乐金克木 (86)Delights in Growing Old by Jin Kemu (86)可贵的“他人意识” (89)Calling for an Awareness of Others (89)教孩子相信 (92)To Implant In Our Children‘s Young Hearts An Undying Faith In Humanity (92)心中有爱 (94)Love in Heart (94)英译汉部分Hidden within Technology’s Empire, a Republic of Le tters 隐藏于技术帝国的文学界索尔·贝娄(1)When I was a boy ―discovering literature‖, I used to think how wonderful it would be if every other person on the street were familiar with Proust and Joyce or T. E. Lawrence or Pasternak and Kafka. Later I learned how refractory to high culture the democratic masses were. Lincoln as a young frontiersman read Plutarch, Shakespeare and the Bible. But then he was Lincoln.我还是个“探索文学”的少年时,就经常在想:要是大街上人人都熟悉普鲁斯特和乔伊斯,熟悉T.E.劳伦斯,熟悉帕斯捷尔纳克和卡夫卡,该有多好啊!后来才知道,平民百姓对高雅文化有多排斥。
卡西欧杯翻译竞赛历年赛题及答案
第九届卡西欧杯翻译竞赛原文(英文组)来自: FLAA(《外国文艺》)Meansof Delive ryJoshua CohenSmuggl ing Afghan heroin or womenfrom Odessa wouldhave been morerepreh ensib le, but more logica l. Youknowyou’reafoolwhenwhatyou’redoingmakeseven the post office seem effici ent. Everyt hingI was packin g into thisunwiel dy, 1980s-vintag e suitca se was availa ble online. Idon’tmeanthatwhenIarrive d in Berlin I couldhave ordere dmoreLevi’s510s for next-day delive ry. I mean, I was packin g books.Not just any books— thesewere all the same book, multip le copies. “Invali d Format: An Anthol ogy of Triple Canopy, Volume 1”ispublis hed, yes, by Triple Canopy, an online magazi ne featur ing essays, fictio n, poetry and all variet y of audio/visualcultur e, dedica ted — click“About”—“toslowin g down the Intern et.”Withtheirbook, the firstin a planne d series, the editor s certai nly succee ded. They were slowin g me down too, just fine.“Invali d Format”collec ts in printthe magazi ne’sfirstfour issues and retail s, ideall y, for $25. But the 60 copies I was courie ring, in exchan ge for a couchand coffee-pressaccess in Kreuzb erg, wouldbe givenaway. For free.Untillately the printe d book change d more freque ntly, but less creati vely, than any othermedium. If you though t“TheQuotab le Ronald Reagan”wastooexpens ive in hardco ver, you couldwait a year or less for the same conten t to go soft. E-books, whichmade theirdebutin the 1990s, cut costseven more for both consum er and produc er, though as the Intern et expand ed thoserolesbecame confus ed.Self-publis hed book proper tiesbeganoutnum berin g, if not outsel ling, theirtradeequiva lents by the mid-2000s, a situat ion furthe r convol utedwhen the conglo merat es starte d“publis hing”“self-publis hed books.”Lastyear, Pengui n became the firstmajortradepressto go vanity: its Book Countr y e-imprin t will legiti mizeyour “origin al genrefictio n”forjustunder$100. Theseshifts make small, D.I.Y.collec tives like Triple Canopy appear more tradit ional than ever, if not just quixot ic — a word derive d from one of the firstnovels licens ed to a publis her.Kenned y Airpor t was no proble m, my connec tionat Charle s de Gaulle went fine. My luggag e connec ted too, arrivi ng intact at Tegel. But immedi ately afterimmigr ation, I was flagge d. A smalle r wheeli e bag held the clothi ng. As a custom s offici alrummag ed throug h my Hanes, I prepar ed for what came next: the larger case, caster s broken, handle rusted—I’mpretty sure it had alread y been Used when it was givento me for my bar mitzva h.Before the offici al couldopen the clasps and startpoking inside, I presen ted him with the docume nt the Triple Canopy editor, Alexan der Provan, had e-mailed me — the nightbefore? two nights before alread y? I’dbeenuponeofthosenights scouri ng New York City for a printe r. No one printe d anymor e. The docume nt stated, inEnglis h and German, that thesebookswere books. They were promot ional, to be givenaway at univer sitie s, galler ies, the Miss Read art-book fair at Kunst-Werke.“Allaresame?”theoffici al asked.“Allegleich,”Isaid.An olderguardcame over, prodde d a spine, said someth ingIdidn’tget. The younge r offici al laughe d, transl ated,“Hewantsto know if you read everyone.”At lunchthe next day with a musici an friend. In New York he played twicea month, ate food stamps. In collap singEuropehe’spaid2,000 eurosa nightto play aquattr ocent o church.“Whereare you handin g the booksout?”heasked.“Atanartfair.”“Whyanartfair?Whynotabookfair?”“It’sanart-bookfair.”“Asoppose d to a book-bookfair?”I told him that at book-book fairs, like the famous one in Frankf urt, they mostly gave out catalo gs.Taking trains and tramsin Berlin, I notice d: people readin g. Books, I mean, not pocket-size device s that bleepas if censor ious, on whicheven Shakes peare scanslike a spread sheet. Americ ans buy more than half of all e-bookssold intern ation ally—unless Europe ans fly regula rly to the United States for the sole purpos e ofdownlo ading readin g materi al from an Americ an I.P. addres s. As of the evenin g I stoppe d search ing the Intern et and actual ly went out to enjoyBerlin, e-booksaccoun ted for nearly 20 percen t of the salesof Americ an publis hers. In German y, howeve r, e-booksaccoun ted for only 1 percen t last year. I beganasking themultil ingua l, multi¬ethnic artist s around me why that was. It was 2 a.m., at Soho House, a privat eclubI’dcrashe d in the former Hitler¬jugend headqu arter s. One instal latio nistsaid, “Americ ans like e-booksbecaus ethey’reeasier to buy.”Aperfor mance artist said, “They’realsoeasier not to read.”Trueenough: theirpresen ce doesn’tremindyouofwhatyou’remissin g;theydon’ttake up spaceon shelve s. The next mornin g, Alexan der Provan and I lugged the booksfor distri butio n, gratis. Questi on: If booksbecome mere art object s, do e-booksbecome concep tualart? Juxtap osing psychi atric case notesby the physic ian-noveli st RivkaGalche n with a dramat icall y illust rated invest igati on into the devast ation of New Orlean s, “Invali d Format”isamongthe most artful new attemp ts to reinve nt the Web by the codex, and the codexby the Web. Its texts“scroll”: horizo ntall y, vertic ally; titlepagesevoke“screen s,”refram ing conten t that follow s not unifor mly and contin uousl y but rather as a welter of column shifts and fonts. Its closes t predec essor s mightbe mixed-mediaDada (Ducham p’sloose-leafed, shuffl eable“GreenBox”); or perhap s“ICanHasCheezb urger?,”thebest-sellin g book versio n of the pet-pictur es-with-funny-captio ns Web site ICanHa sChee zburg ; or simila r volume s fromStuffW hiteP eople Like.com and Awkwar dFami lyPho . Theselatter booksare merely the kitsch iestproduc ts of publis hing’srecent enthus iasmfor“back-engine ering.”They’repseudo liter ature, commod ities subjec t to the samerevers ing proces s that for over a centur y has paused“movies”into“stills”— into P.R. photos and dorm poster s — and notate d pop record ingsfor sheetmusic.Admitt edlyIdidn’thavemuchtimetoconsid er the implic ation s of adapti ve cultur e in Berlin. I was too busy dancin gto“IchLiebeWie Du Lügst,”aka“LovetheWayYou Lie,”byEminem, and fallin g asleep during“Bis(s) zum Ende der Nacht,”aka“TheTwilig ht Saga: Breaki ng Dawn,”justafterthe dubbed Bellacriesover herunlike ly pregna ncy, “Dasistunmögl ich!”— indeed!Transl ating medium s can seem just as unmögl ich as transl ating betwee n unrela ted langua ges: therewill be confus ions, distor tions, techni cal limita tions. The Web ande-book can influe nce the printbook only in matter s of styleand subjec t — no links, of course, just theirmetaph or. “Theghostin the machin e”can’tbeexorci sed, onlyturned around: the machin e inside the ghost.As for me, I was haunte d by my suitca se. The extraone, the empty. My last day in Kreuzb erg was spentconsid ering its fate. My wheeli e bag was packed. My laptop was stowed in my carry-on. I wanted to leavethe pleath er immens ity on the corner of Kottbu sserDamm, down by the canal,butI’ve neverbeen a waster. I brough t it back. It sits in the middle of my apartm ent, unreve rtibl e, only improv able, hollow, its lid floppe d open like the coverof a book.传送之道约书亚·科恩走私阿富汗的海洛因和贩卖来自敖德萨的妇女本应受到更多的谴责,但是也更合乎情理。
第九届“语言桥杯”英语大赛汉语译文
约翰〃列侬生来就有音乐和喜剧方面的天赋,这种天赋让他告别故土,远离家乡,并且比他曾经梦想的可能性还要远。
在他年轻时,他受到那些看似无限的魅力和机会的引诱,离开了英伦三道,远渡大西洋。
作为一个身怀罕见技艺的英国人,他实现了使美国人开始喜欢美式音乐,而且他的表演如同任何一个美国本土的艺人那样令人信服,甚至还要更好。
几年来,他的乐队在整个国家巡回演出,他们那炫目的服饰、异样的发型,以以及那富有感染力的快乐的微笑为一个又一个城市的听众带去了欢乐。
当然,他并不是披头士乐队的约翰〃列侬,而是和约翰〃列侬同名的如同慈父般的祖父,也就是生于1855年,更被大多数人所熟知的杰克。
列侬是一个爱尔兰姓氏——从O'Leannain到O’Lonain——尽管有证据显示,先前时候他的家庭已经渡过爱尔兰海,成为利物浦广大的爱尔兰人社区的一户人家,但是杰克还是习惯性的认为自己的出生地在都柏林。
他由一个文员开始了自己的职业生涯,但是,在19世纪80年代,他随着同胞的那阵潮流迁移到了纽约。
尽管来到这座城市的其他的爱尔兰移民能够进入劳工行业或者当上警察局长,但是杰克却激动地成了安德鲁〃罗伯顿的彩色歌剧院肯塔基艺人团的一员。
然而,正是他这一短暂和偶然的参与,使得他成为第一批横渡大西洋的流行音乐行业的一员。
美国艺人表演团——在这里白人将自己的脸弄黑,并且穿有特大号的衣领和有条纹的马裤,唱着那些充满柔情的关于斯尼旺河、“黑鬼”和“黑人”的合唱曲——在19世纪晚期变得极其流行,而且全部成为这些红极一时的歌曲的表演者和创作者。
当罗伯顿的彩色歌剧院肯塔基艺人团于1897年在爱尔兰巡回演出时,《利默里克纪事报》称他们为“举世公认的优雅乐曲大师”,而《都柏林纪事报》称赞他们是“前所未有最优秀的”。
一个同时代的小册子记录称这支演出团为三强,他给了那些真正的黑人演艺家和那些模仿黑人的艺人以显著的地位,并且,当这支演出团出现在每一个城镇的大街上时,他们的游街已成为一种特色。
卡西欧翻译比赛
How Writers Build the Brand By Tony PerrottetAs every author knows, writing a book is the easy part these days. It’s when the publication date looms that we have to roll up our sleeves and tackle the real literary labor: rabid self-promotion. For weeks beforehand, we are compelled to bombard every friend, relative and vague acquaintance with creative e-mails and Facebook alerts, polish up our Web sites with suspiciously youthful author photos, and, in an orgy of blogs, tweets and YouTube trailers, attempt to inform an already inundated world of our every reading, signing, review, interview and (well, one can dream!) TV -appearance. In this era when most writers are expected to do everything but run the printing presses, self-promotion is so accepted that we hardly give it a second thought. And yet, whenever I have a new book about to come out, I have to shake the unpleasant sensation that there is something unseemly about my own clamor for attention. Peddling my work like a Viagra salesman still feels at odds with the high calling of literature. In such moments of doubt, I look to history for reassurance. It’s always comforting to be reminded that literary whoring — I mean, self-marketing — has been practiced by the greats. The most revered of French novelists recognized the need for P.R. “For artists, the great problem to solve is how to get oneself noticed,” Balzac observed in “Lost Illusions,” his classic novel about literary life in early 19th-century Paris. As another master, Stendhal, remarked in his autobiography “Memoirs of an Egotist,” “Great success is not possible without a certain degree of shamelessness, and even of out-and-out charlatanism.” Those words should be on the Authors Guild coat of arms. Hemingway set the modern gold standard for inventive self-branding, burnishing his image with photo ops from safaris, fishing trips and war zones. But he also posed for beer ads. In 1951, Hem endorsed Ballantine Ale in a double-page spread in Life magazine, complete with a shot of him looking manly in his Havana abode. As recounted in “Hemingway and the Mechanism of Fame,” edited by Matthew J. Bruccoli and Judith S. Baughman, he proudly appeared in ads for Pan Am and Parker pens, selling his namewith the abandon permitted to Jennifer Lopez or LeBron James today. Other American writers were evidently inspired. In 1953, John Steinbeck also began shilling for Ballantine, recommending a chilled brew after a hard day’s labor in the fields. Even Vladimir Nabokov had an eye for self-marketing, subtly suggesting to photo editors that they feature him as a lepidopterist prancing about the forests in cap, shorts and long socks. (“Some fascinating photos might be also taken of me, a burly but agile man, stalking a rarity or sweeping it into my net from a flowerhead,” he enthused.) Across the pond, the Bloomsbury set regularly posed for fashion shoots in British Vogue in the 1920s. The frumpy Virginia Woolf even went on a “Pretty Woman”-style shopping expedition at French couture houses in London with the magazine’s fashion editor in 1925. But the tradition of self-promotion predates the camera by millenniums. In 440 B.C. or so, a first-time Greek author named Herodotus paid for his own book tour around the Aegean. His big break came during the Olympic Games, when he stood up in the temple of Zeus and declaimed his “Histories” to the wealthy, influential crowd. In the 12th century, the clergyman Gerald of Wales organized his own book party in Oxford, hoping to appeal to college audiences. According to “The Oxford Book of Oxford,” edited by Jan Morris, he invited scholars to his lodgings, where he plied them with good food and ale for three days, along with long recitations of his golden prose. But they got off easy compared with those invited to the “Funeral Supper” of the 18th-century French bon vivant Grimod de la Reynière, held to promote his opus “Reflections on Pleasure.” The guests’ curiosity turned to horror when they found themselves locked in a candlelit hall with a catafalque for a dining table, and were served an endless meal by black-robed waiters while Grimod insulted them as an audience watched from the balcony. When the diners were finally released at 7 a.m., they spread word that Grimod was mad — and his book quickly went through three -printings. Such pioneering gestures pale, however, before the promotional stunts of the 19th century. In “Crescendo of the Virtuoso: Spectacle, Skill, and Self-Promotion in Paris During the Age of Revolution,” the historian Paul Metzner notes that new technology led to an explosion in the number of newspapers in Paris, creating an array of publicity options. In “Lost Illusions,” Balzac observes that it wasstandard practice in Paris to bribe editors and critics with cash and lavish dinners to secure review space, while the city was plastered with loud posters advertising new releases. In 1887, Guy de Maupassant sent up a hot-air balloon over the Seine with the name of his latest short story, “Le Horla,” painted on its side. In 1884, Maurice Barrès hired men to wear sandwich boards promoting his literary review, Les Taches d’Encre. In 1932, Colette created her own line of cosmetics sold through a Paris store. (This first venture into literary name-licensing was, tragically, a flop). American authors did try to keep up. Walt Whitman notoriously wrote his own anonymous reviews, which would not be out of place today on Amazon. “An American bard at last!” he raved in 1855. “Large, proud, affectionate, eating, drinking and breeding, his costume manly and free, his face sunburnt and bearded.” But nobody could quite match the creativity of the Europeans. Perhaps the most astonishing P.R. stunt — one that must inspire awe among authors today — was plotted in Paris in 1927 by Georges Simenon, the Belgian-born author of the Inspector Maigret novels. For 100,000 francs, the wildly prolific Simenon agreed to write an entire novel while suspended in a glass cage outside the Moulin Rouge nightclub for 72 hours. Members of the public would be invited to choose the novel’s characters, subject matter and title, while Simenon hammered out the pages on a typewriter. A newspaper advertisement promised the result would be “a record novel: record speed, record endurance and, dare we add, record talent!” It was a marketing coup. As Pierre Assouline notes in “Simenon: A Biography,” journalists in Paris “talked of nothing else.” As it happens, Simenon never went through with the glass-cage stunt, because the newspaper financing it went bankrupt. Still, he achieved huge publicity (and got to pocket 25,000 francs of the advance), and the idea took on a life of its own. It was simply too good a story for Parisians to drop. For decades, French journalists would describe the Moulin Rouge event in elaborate detail, as if they had actually attended it. (The British essayist Alain de Botton matched Simenon’s chutzpah, if not quite his glamour, a few years ago when he set up shop in Heathrow for a week and became the airport’s first “writer in residence.” But then he actually got a book out of it, along with prime placement in Heathrow’s bookshops.) What lessons can we draw from all this? Probably none, except that even the mostegregious act of self--promotion will be forgiven in time. So writers today should take heart. We could dress like Lady Gaga and hang from a cage at a Yankees game — if any of us looked as good near-naked, that is. On second thought, maybe there’s a reason we have agents to rein in our P.R. ideas.How Writers Build the Brand By Tony PerrottetAs every author knows, writing a book is the easy part these days. It’s when the publication date looms that we have to roll up our sleeves and tackle the real literary labor: rabid self-promotion. For weeks beforehand, we are compelled to bombard every friend, relative and vague acquaintance with creative e-mails and Facebook alerts, polish up our Web sites with suspiciously youthful author photos, and, in an orgy of blogs, tweets and YouTube trailers, attempt to inform an already inundated world of our every reading, signing, review, interview and (well, one can dream!) TV -appearance. In this era when most writers are expected to do everything but run the printing presses, self-promotion is so accepted that we hardly give it a second thought. And yet, whenever I have a new book about to come out, I have to shake the unpleasant sensation that there is something unseemly about my own clamor for attention. Peddling my work like a Viagra salesman still feels at odds with the high calling of literature.In such moments of doubt, I look to history for reassurance. It’s always comforting to be reminded that literary whoring — I mean, self-marketing — has been practiced by the greats. The most revered of French novelists recognized the need for P.R. “For artists, the great problem to solve is how to get oneself noticed,” Balzac observed in “Lost Illusions,” his classic novel about literary life in early 19th-century Paris. As another master, Stendhal, remarked in his autobiography “Memoirs of an Egotist,” “Great success is not possible without a certain degree of shamelessness, and even of out-and-out charlatanism.” Those words should be on the Authors Guild coat of arms. Hemingway set the modern gold standard for inventive self-branding, burnishing his image with photo ops from safaris, fishing trips and war zones. But he also posed for beer ads. In 1951, Hem endorsed Ballantine Ale in a double-page spread in Life magazine, complete with a shot of him looking manly in his Havana abode. As recounted in “Hemingway and the Mechanism of Fame,” edited by Matthew J. Bruccoli and Judith S. Baughman, he proudly appeared in ads for Pan Am and Parker pens, selling his name with the abandon permitted to Jennifer Lopez or LeBron James today. Other American writers were evidently inspired. In 1953, John Steinbeck also began shilling for Ballantine, recommending a chilled brew after a hard day’s labor in the fields. Even Vladimir Nabokov had an eye for self-marketing, subtly suggesting to photo editors that they feature him as a lepidopterist prancing about the forests in cap, shorts and long socks. (“Some fascinating photos might be also taken of me, a burly but agile man, stalking a rarity or sweeping it into my net from a flowerhead,” he enthused.) Across the pond, the Bloomsbury set regularly posed for fashion shoots in British Vogue in the 1920s. The frumpy Virginia Woolf even went on a “Pretty Woman”-style shopping expedition at French couture houses in London with the magazine’s fashion editor in 1925. But the tradition of self-promotion predates the camera by millenniums. In 440 B.C. or so, a first-time Greek author named Herodotus paid for his own book tour around the Aegean. His big break came during the Olympic Games, when he stood up in the temple of Zeus and declaimed his “Histories” to the wealthy, influential crowd. In the 12th century, the clergyman Gerald of Wales organized his own book party in Oxford, hoping to appeal to college audiences. According to “The Oxford Book ofOxford,” edited by Jan Morris, he invited scholars to his lodgings, where he plied them with good food and ale for three days, along with long recitations of his golden prose. But they got off easy compared with those invited to the “Funeral Supper” of the 18th-century French bon vivant Grimod de la Reynière, held to promote his opus “Reflections on Pleasure.” The guests’ curiosity turned to horror when they found themselves locked in a candlelit hall with a catafalque for a dining table, and were served an endless meal by black-robed waiters while Grimod insulted them as an audience watched from the balcony. When the diners were finally released at 7 a.m., they spread word that Grimod was mad — and his book quickly went through three -printings. Such pioneering gestures pale, however, before the promotional stunts of the 19th century. In “Crescendo of the Virtuoso: Spectacle, Skill, and Self-Promotion in Paris During the Age of Revolution,” the historian Paul Metzner notes that new technology led to an explosion in the number of newspapers in Paris, creating an array of publicity options. In “Lost Illusions,” Balzac observes that it was standard practice in Paris to bribe editors and critics with cash and lavish dinners to secure review space, while the city was plastered with loud posters advertising new releases. In 1887, Guy de Maupassant sent up a hot-air balloon over the Seine with the name of his latest short story, “Le Horla,” painted on its side. In 1884, Maurice Barrès hired men to wear sandwich boards promoting his literary review, Les Taches d’Encre. In 1932, Colette created her own line of cosmetics sold through a Paris store. (This first venture into literary name-licensing was, tragically, a flop). American authors did try to keep up. Walt Whitman notoriously wrote his own anonymous reviews, which would not be out of place today on Amazon. “An American bard at last!” he raved in 1855. “Large, proud, affectionate, eating, drinking and breeding, his costume manly and free, his face sunburnt and bearded.” But nobody could quite match the creativity of the Europeans. Perhaps the most astonishing P.R. stunt — one that must inspire awe among authors today — was plotted in Paris in 1927 by Georges Simenon, the Belgian-born author of the Inspector Maigret novels. For 100,000 francs, the wildly prolific Simenon agreed to write an entire novel while suspended in a glass cage outside the Moulin Rouge nightclub for 72 hours. Members of the public would be invited to choose the novel’s characters, subject matter and title, whileSimenon hammered out the pages on a typewriter. A newspaper advertisement promised the result would be “a record novel: record speed, record endurance and, dare we add, record talent!” It was a marketing coup. As Pierre Assouline notes in “Simenon: A Biography,” journalists in Paris “talked of nothing else.” As it happens, Simenon never went through with the glass-cage stunt, because the newspaper financing it went bankrupt. Still, he achieved huge publicity (and got to pocket 25,000 francs of the advance), and the idea took on a life of its own. It was simply too good a story for Parisians to drop. For decades, French journalists would describe the Moulin Rouge event in elaborate detail, as if they had actually attended it. (The British essayist Alain de Botton matched Simenon’s chutzpah, if not quite his glamour, a few years ago when he set up shop in Heathrow for a week and became the airport’s first “writer in residence.” But then he actually got a book out of it, along with prime placement in Heathrow’s bookshops.) What lessons can we draw from all this? Probably none, except that even the most egregious act of self--promotion will be forgiven in time. So writers today should take heart. We could dress like Lady Gaga and hang from a cage at a Yankees game — if any of us looked as good near-naked, that is. On second thought, maybe there’s a reason we have agents to rein in our P.R. ideas.。
第十届CASIO杯翻译竞赛西语原文
Desde el mirador de mi madre Clara SánchezEn el verano de 1993, con un calor insoportable, mi madre sufrióun infarto cerebral que nos cambió la vida, o por lo menos nos hizo dar un paso más en ella. Nos obligó a tratar de ver las cosas de otra manera. Yo, por ejemplo, empecéa valorar comportamientos que hasta entonces había medio despreciado, como la frivolidad. Caí en la cuenta de lo necesario que es un poco de frivolidad para sobrevivir y no dejarse arrastrar por los acontecimientos hasta lo más profundo. Pero también comenzó a fastidiarme la gente que no puede escuchar ni una frase que no se refiera al lado bueno de la existencia, que arrugan el entrecejo en cuanto oyen la palabra enfermedad, hospital, vejez, como si las contrariedades y el sufrimiento o la pena hubiese que tenerlos guardados bajo llave. La enfermedad, más que el sexo, ha sido durante mucho tiempo tabú, de conversación en voz baja, asunto de mujeres achacosas o de médicos, hasta que las series de televisión la han puesto de moda para en el fondo hablar de amoríos.Es un peñazo no poder ser débil nunca y hacer como si nada pasara. Lo malo que a uno le ocurre, también le ocurre, forma parte de su biografía. No soy de los que piensan que sólo se aprende a través del dolor, se aprende más de la alegría, de la risa y del estar bien. Es esta enseñanza la que nos empuja, hasta en los peores momentos, a buscar un espacio en nuestra mente en que continúa haciendo sol. Pero en el caso de mi familia, este hecho fue el que más nos conmocionó, quizá por su brusquedad y las secuelas que dejó.Por supuesto, a la primera que le cambió la vida fue a mi madre. Entonces tenía 62 años y ya no ha vuelto a ser la misma. La visión de esas dos imágenes, la de antes (fuerte y entera) y la de después ha sido demoledora durante bastante tiempo. Hasta que el día a día y los años han ido apaciguando la sensación de agresión y agravio ¿de quién? ¿De la vida? ¿A quién se le pide cuentas? Nos hemos ido acomodando a las circunstancias e incluso sacando lo mejor de ellas, no hay otro remedio, o aceptas las reglas del juego o te quedas fuera. Y fuera está lo desconocido, el abismo. Al principio no le apetecía salir de casa y enfrentarse al mundo, sin poder hablar. Lo bueno era que la comprensión y la memoria estaban intactas, así que nos fuimos agarrando a lo bueno. Mi madre aceptó las reglas del juego y mostró una fortaleza y una capacidad de lucha, que no nos dejaban desfallecer. Se sometía a sesiones durísimas de rehabilitación y comenzóhumildemente a intentar aprender a escribir de nuevo. Estaba agradecida a todo el mundo. Fue como si en su mente se hubiese borrado cualquier recelo hacia el prójimo, cualquier tipo de prevención. Nunca la he visto llorar por lo que le pasó, pero se le saltaban las lágrimas cuando se mencionaba a los neurólogos que la trataban o a los fisioterapeutas, sobre todo una, que un día le dijo muy seriamente: "No voy a consentir que no salgas andando de aquí", y asílo hizo, lo consiguió. Hay gente pululando anónimamente por ahí que hace cosas muy importantes por los demás. Así que gracias, Conchita, eres la mejor.Mi madre tuvo que pasar casi tres meses en el hospital, lo que supuso para todos nosotros un cursillo intensivo sobre la vida oculta o que se prefiere ignorar. Ahora me fijaba más en la gente que andaba con dificultad por la calle o que tenía algún tipo de carencia, me sentía en su mismo mundo. Creo que sabía que todo eso podría pasarme a mí, asíde sencillo. Y entonces fui consciente de lo cruel que es esta sociedad con quienes no están en plena forma. Digamos que laenfermedad de mi madre nos puso unas gafas de aumento para ver mejor lo que hay alrededor, eso sí, a un gran precio. Tras ella, el mayor sin duda lo ha pagado mi padre, que se ha hecho cargo de esta complicada situación para que a todos nos alterase lo menos posible. No es un hombre pacífico ni resignado, sino más bien rebelde e incisivo, y quizá por eso nunca se ha dejado abatir. Siempre busca recursos para estar activo y en conflicto, y no ha permitido jamás que mi madre dejase de discutir con él y decirle cuatro verdades, aunque fuese a su manera.Lo cierto es que tengo unos padres atípicos y bastante graciosos, muy discutones. Les da la vida montar el pollo durante los telediarios por algo que haya dicho fulano o mengano. Siempre ha habido tensiones políticas entre ellos. Mi padre lee EL PAÍS y Expansión y oye la SER e Intereconomía. Lleva un control férreo de los movimientos de la Bolsa. Cuando baja, está de un humor de perros. Yo, que no tengo inversiones, sé cómo va por el tono de su voz. Le gusta mucho la ropa y los complementos. Y no soporta que le llamen anciano. Lo de abuelo está absolutamente restringido a los nietos. Prefiere la definición de viejo. Dice que se dio cuenta de que era considerado viejo cuando los coches se atrevían a pasar el suyo nada más verle por detrás la nuca blanca. Y no sé cómo se las arregla para hacer un seguimiento tan exhaustivo del mundo literario. Aunque no quiera enterarme, me tiene al tanto de los logros, premios y colaboraciones de todos los colegas, para a continuación añadir, tienes que espabilar. Por eso a mis padres no les importa que escriba sobre ellos, con tal de proporcionarme material y ayudarme a salir adelante.No era fácil durante y tras lo que se podría llamar el largo verano del 93 centrarme en otra cosa. Trataba de distraerme para no hablar ni pensar en ello. Hasta que decidí que no debía olvidar, sino todo lo contrario, aprovecharlo en mi propia experiencia, no desecharlo puesto que tanto esfuerzo nos suponía a todos. Así que tiempo más tarde, cuando ya tenía la cabeza algo más fría, empecé a escribir y salió una novela, Desde el mirador (Alfaguara, 1996), que empieza así:"La tarde va quedando atrás. Un cable negro cruza el cielo azul. La ventanilla de un vagón de tren limita y recorta el campo. Sobre el cable, y por un instante, unos grandes pájaros en fila también quedan atrás. La sierra, a lo lejos, y más cerca los árboles y las fábricas se perfilan en el aire como montañas, árboles y fábricas presentes y reales.He viajado a través de este paisaje durante dos meses y desde entonces el sol se ha ido debilitando poco a poco y también la angustia inicial que me hizo dudar de que la vida fuera buena, a pesar de que es lo único que hay. Ahora me queda cierta flaqueza por aquella duda, cierta zozobra constante y la certeza de que cuando se conoce algo ya no se puede desconocer, no tan sólo olvidar, sino que es imposible volver al origen en que no se sabía aquello.He recorrido los 60 kilómetros que unen el Hospital General con Madrid, cada dos días más o menos, hasta ésta misma tarde en que le han dado el alta a mi madre. La última imagen que he retenido de ella ha sido su blusa de seda azul alejándose en el coche, regresando al mundo, mezclándose con el aire que rodea el hospital y con el que se extiende donde se le pierde de vista y mucho más allá aún. Ya es libre, menos que un pájaro porque no puede volar y menos que un pez porque no puede respirar bajo el agua, pero más que un pájaro y un pez porque piensa. Ella me ha hecho creer que nadie puede ser libre nada más que a su manera.Recuerdo sin desesperación y con pesar, como si me hubiera distraído y no hubiese hecho algo que debía, el día de finales de junio, cuando sonó el teléfono en mi casa, en las afueras de Madrid. Una voz desde un hospital me comunicó que mi madre había sufrido un derrame cerebral. Luego se confirmóque había sido infarto. Me cuesta mucho pronunciar infarto cerebral y mucho más escribirlo, es como tratar de escribir en el papel con un hierro al rojo vivo".。
第十届CASIO杯翻译竞赛英语组原文及获奖译文
第十届CASIO杯翻译竞赛英语组原文Humans are animals and like all animals we leave tracks as we walk:signs of passage made in snow,sand,mud,grass,dew,earth or moss.The language of hunting has a luminous word for such mark-making:‘foil’.A creature’s‘foil’is its track.We easily forget that we are track-makers,though,because most of our journeys now occur on asphalt and concrete–and these are substances not easily impressed.Always,everywhere,people have walked,veining the earth with paths visible and invisible,symmetrical or meandering,’writes Thomas Clark in his enduring prose-poem‘In Praise of Walking’.It’s true that,once you begin to notice them,you see that the landscape is still webbed with paths and footways–shadowing the modern-day road network,or meeting it at a slant or perpendicular.Pilgrim paths, green roads,drove roads,corpse roads,trods,leys,dykes,drongs,sarns,snickets–say the names of paths out loud and at speed and they become a poem or rite–holloways,bostles,shutes,driftways,lichways,ridings,halterpaths,cartways,carneys, causeways,herepaths.Many regions still have their old ways,connecting place to place,leading over passes or round mountains,to church or chapel,river or sea.Not all of their histories are happy.In Ireland there are hundreds of miles of famine roads,built by the starving during the1840s to connect nothing with nothing in return for little,unregistered on Ordnance Survey base maps.In the Netherlands there are doodwegen and spookwegen–death roads and ghost roads–which converge on medieval cemeteries. Spain has not only a vast and operational network of cañada,or drove roads,but also thousands of miles of the Camino de Santiago,the pilgrim routes that lead to the shrine of Santiago de Compostela.For pilgrims walking the Camino,every footfall is doubled,landing at once on the actual road and also on the path of faith.In Scotland there are clachan and rathad–cairned paths and shieling paths–and in Japan the slender farm tracks that the poet Bashōfollowed in1689when writing his Narrow Road to the Far North.The American prairies were traversed in the nineteenthcentury by broad‘bison roads’,made by herds of buffalo moving several beasts abreast,and then used by early settlers as they pushed westwards across the Great Plains.Paths of long usage exist on water as well as on land.The oceans are seamed with seaways–routes whose course is determined by prevailing winds and currents–and rivers are among the oldest ways of all.During the winter months,the only route in and out of the remote valley of Zanskar in the Indian Himalayas is along the ice-path formed by a frozen river.The river passes down through steep-sided valleys of shaley rock,on whose slopes snow leopards hunt.In its deeper pools,the ice is blue and lucid.The journey down the river is called the chadar,and parties undertaking the chadar are led by experienced walkers known as‘ice-pilots’,who can tell where the dangers lie.Different paths have different characteristics,depending on geology and purpose. Certain coffin paths in Cumbria have flat‘resting stones’on the uphill side,on which the bearers could place their load,shake out tired arms and roll stiff shoulders;certain coffin paths in the west of Ireland have recessed resting stones,in the alcoves of which each mourner would place a pebble.The prehistoric trackways of the English Downs can still be traced because on their close chalky soil,hard-packed by centuries of trampling,daisies flourish.Thousands of work paths crease the moorland of the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides,so that when seen from the air the moor has the appearance of chamois leather.I think also of the zigzag flexure of mountain paths in the Scottish Highlands,the flagged and bridged packhorse routes of Yorkshire and Mid Wales,and the sunken green-sand paths of Hampshire on whose shady banks ferns emerge in spring,curled like crosiers.The way-marking of old paths is an esoteric lore of its own,involving cairns, grey wethers,sarsens,hoarstones,longstones,milestones,cromlechs and other guide-signs.On boggy areas of Dartmoor,fragments of white china clay were placed to show safe paths at twilight,like Hansel and Gretel’s pebble trail.In mountain country,boulders often indicate fording points over rivers:Utsi’s Stone in the Cairngorms,for instance,which marks where the Allt Mor burn can be crossed toreach traditional grazing grounds,and onto which has been deftly incised the petroglyph of a reindeer that,when evening sunlight plays over the rock,seems to leap to life.Paths and their markers have long worked on me like lures:drawing my sight up and on and over.The eye is enticed by a path,and the mind’s eye also.The imagination cannot help but pursue a line in the land–onwards in space,but also backwards in time to the histories of a route and its previous followers.As I walk paths I often wonder about their origins,the impulses that have led to their creation, the records they yield of customary journeys,and the secrets they keep of adventures, meetings and departures.I would guess I have walked perhaps7,000or8,000miles on footpaths so far in my life:more than most,perhaps,but not nearly so many as others.Thomas De Quincey estimated Wordsworth to have walked a total of 175,000–180,000miles:Wordsworth’s notoriously knobbly legs,‘pointedly condemned’–in De Quincey’s catty phrase–‘by all…female connoisseurs’,were magnificent shanks when it came to passage and bearing.I’ve covered thousands of foot-miles in my memory,because when–as most nights–I find myself insomniac,I send my mind out to re-walk paths I’ve followed,and in this way can sometimes pace myself into sleep.‘They give me joy as I proceed,’wrote John Clare of field paths,simply.Me too.‘My left hand hooks you round the waist,’declared Walt Whitman–companionably, erotically,coercively–in Leaves of Grass(1855),‘my right hand points to landscapes of continents,and a plain public road.’Footpaths are mundane in the best sense of that word:‘worldly’,open to all.As rights of way determined and sustained by use,they constitute a labyrinth of liberty,a slender network of common land that still threads through our aggressively privatized world of barbed wire and gates,CCTV cameras and‘No Trespassing’signs.It is one of the significant differences between land use in Britain and in America that this labyrinth should exist.Americans have long envied the British system of footpaths and the freedoms it offers,as I in turn envy the Scandinavian customary right of Allemansrätten(‘Everyman’s right’).This convention–born of a region that did not pass through centuries of feudalism,andtherefore has no inherited deference to a landowning class–allows a citizen to walk anywhere on uncultivated land provided that he or she cause no harm;to light fires;to sleep anywhere beyond the curtilage of a dwelling;to gather flowers,nuts and berries; and to swim in any watercourse(rights to which the newly enlightened access laws of Scotland increasingly approximate).Paths are the habits of a landscape.They are acts of consensual making.It’s hard to create a footpath on your own.The artist Richard Long did it once,treading a dead-straight line into desert sand by turning and turning about dozens of times.But this was a footmark not a footpath:it led nowhere except to its own end,and by walking it Long became a tiger pacing its cage or a swimmer doing lengths.With no promise of extension,his line was to a path what a snapped twig is to a tree.Paths connect.This is their first duty and their chief reason for being.They relate places in a literal sense,and by extension they relate people.Paths are consensual,too,because without common care and common practice they disappear:overgrown by vegetation,ploughed up or built over(though they may persist in the memorious substance of land law).Like sea channels that require regular dredging to stay open,paths need walking.In nineteenth-century Suffolk small sickles called‘hooks’were hung on stiles and posts at the start of certain wellused paths: those running between villages,for instance,or byways to parish churches.A walker would pick up a hook and use it to lop off branches that were starting to impede passage.The hook would then be left at the other end of the path,for a walker coming in the opposite direction.In this manner the path was collectively maintained for general use.By no means all interesting paths are old paths.In every town and city today, cutting across parks and waste ground,you’ll see unofficial paths created by walkers who have abandoned the pavements and roads to take short cuts and make asides. Town planners call these improvised routes‘desire lines’or‘desire paths’.In Detroit –where areas of the city are overgrown by vegetation,where tens of thousands of homes have been abandoned,and where few can now afford cars–walkers and cyclists have created thousands of such elective easements.第十届CASIO杯翻译竞赛英语组参考译文路[英]罗伯特·麦克法伦作侯凌玮译人是一种动物,因而和所有其他动物一样,我们行走时总会留下踪迹:雪地、沙滩、淤泥、草地、露水、土壤和苔藓上都有我们经过的痕迹。
第九届“语言桥杯”翻译大赛原文
第九届“语言桥杯”翻译大赛原文第九届“语言桥杯”翻译大赛原文John Lennon was born with a gift for music and comedy that would carry him further from his roots than he ever dreamed possible. As a young man, he was lured away from the British Isles by the seemingly boundless glamour and opportunity to be found across the Atlantic. He achieved that rare feat for a British performer of taking American music to the Americans and playing it as convincingly as any homegrown practitioner, or even more so. For several years, his group toured the country, delighting audiences in city after city with their garish suits, funny hair, and contagiously happy grins.This, of course, was not Beatle John Lennon but his namesake paternal grandfather, more commonly known as Jack, born in 1855. Lennon is an Irish surname—from O’Leannain o r O’Lonain—and Jack habitually gave his birthplace as Dublin, though there is evidence that his family had already crossed the Irish Sea to become part of Liverpool’s extensive Hibernian community some time previously. He began his working life as a clerk, but in the 1880s followed a common impulse among his compatriots and emigrated to New York. Whereas the city turned other immigrant Irishmen into laborers or police officers, Jack wound up as a member of Andrew Roberton’s Colored Operatic Kentucky Minstrels.However brief or casual his involvement, this made him part of the first transatlantic popular music industry. American minstrel troupes, in which white men blackened their faces, put on outsize collars and stripey pantaloons, and sang sentimental chor uses about the Swanee River, “coons,” and “darkies,”were hugely popular in the late nineteenth century, both as performers and creators of hit songs. When Roberton’s Colored Operatic Kentucky Minstrels toured Ireland in 1897, the Limerick Chronicle called them “the world’s acknowl edged masters of refined minstrelsy,” while the Dublin Chronicle thought them the best it had ever seen. A contemporary handbook records that the troupe was about thirty-strong, that it featured some genuinely black artistes among the cosmetic ones, and that it made a specialty of parading through the streets of every town where it was to appear.For this John Lennon, unlike the grandson he would never see, music did not bring worldwide fame but was merely an exotic interlude, most details of which were never known to his descendants. Around the turn of the century, he came off the road for good, returned to Liverpool, and resumed his old life as a clerk, this time with the Booth shipping line. With him came his daughter, Mary, only child of a first marriage that had not survived his temporary immersion in burnt-cork makeup, banjo music, and applause.When Mary left him to work in domestic service, a solitary old age seemed in prospect for Jack. His remedy was to marry his housekeeper, a young Liverpool Irishwoman with the happily coincidental name of Mary Maguire. Although twenty years his junior, and illiterate, Mary—better known as Polly—proved an ideal Victorian wife, practical, hardworking, and selfless. Their home was a tiny terrace house in Copperfield Street, Toxteth, a part of the city nicknamed “Dickens Land,” so numerous were the streets named after Dickens characters. Rather like Mr. Micawber in David Copperfield, Jack sometimes talked about returning to his former life as a minstrel and earning fortunesenough for his young wife, as he put it, to be “farting against silk.” But from here on, his music making would be confined to local pubs and his own family circle.约翰·列侬与生俱来的音乐与喜剧细胞使他取得的辉煌超出他曾经梦想的可能。
CASIO杯
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CASIO杯翻译竞赛介绍 ——本届比赛
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CASIO杯翻译竞赛介绍 ——本届比赛
译文要求:
1. 电脑打印 2. 地址:上海市福建中路193号上海译文出版社 《外国文艺》编辑部,邮政编码200001 3. 信封上注明:CASIO杯翻译竞赛。 4.截稿日期: 2013年8月10日(以邮寄当日邮戳为准)
CASIO杯翻译竞赛介绍 ——本届比赛
赛题刊登:
2013年第3期(2013.6)《外国文艺》杂志 上海译文出版社网站 上海翻译家协会网站 北京塞万提斯学院网站www.pekin.cervantes.es 上海米盖尔•德•塞万提斯图书馆网站 www.biblioteca-shanghai.cervantes.es
6. 奖项设置:
一等奖1名(证书及价值6000元的奖金和奖品) 二等奖2名(证书及价值3000元的奖金和奖品) 三等奖3名(证书及价值2000元的奖金和奖品) 优胜奖20名(证书及价值300元的奖品) 优秀组织奖1名(价值5000元的奖金和奖品)
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CASIO杯翻译竞赛介绍 ——本届比赛
7. 答案公布: 《外国文艺》2013年第6期(2013年12月) 公布评选结果并刊登优秀译文,竞赛结果同时 在上海译文出版社网站、上海翻译家协会网站、 北京塞万提斯学院网站和上海米盖尔•德•塞万 提斯图书馆网站上公布。
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CASIO杯翻译竞赛介绍 ——本届比赛
5. 备注: (1)译文正文内请勿书写姓名等任何与译者个 人身份信息相关的文字或符号,否则译文无效。 (2)另页写明详尽的个人信息,如姓名、性别、 出生年月日、工作学习单位及家庭住址、联系 电话、E-MAIL地址等。
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CASIO杯翻译竞赛介绍 ——本届比赛
2012Casio杯英语演讲比赛演讲稿汇编
2012Casio杯英语演讲比赛演讲稿汇编Thesis: A Day without Internet● 初三(4)班袁清怡(Casio杯英语演讲比赛冠军)Honorable judges, dear teachers and students, it’s my great honor to stand here today, and…… oh, give me a second, I must post this on my Renren: I…… am now……on the stage of …… Casio Cup Speech Contest……so excited! Alright, remember to check it out. For that’s the charm of the internet, it makes our voice heard, keeps us located, even in situations like this.And that’s why I like this year’s topic: A Day without Internet, for the answer is simple: to me, and to lots of you guys down here enjoying the free Wifi right now, a day without internet will just be the end of the world. The internet has brought us great changes in life, and the most significant of them is that we are no longer thinking alone. Whenever we have questions, we have Google, Baidu, Wikipedia all around us. It feels so good that we almost ignored that while asking them, our creativity and our ability of independent thinking——let’s borrow one of Carlos’s lin es from yesterday’s The Little Mermaid—— while asking them, our creativity turns into foams, and spreads away.For example, this week I did a lot of research about this topic: A Day without Internet, and articles I found turned out to be almost the same, and kind of boring. So finally, I turned off my laptop and decided to explain this topic in my own way. And then a name suddenly came into my mind: Isaac Newton, how did he spend his days without internet?In the morning, perhaps, in stead of posting pictures on Facebook, he decided to visit the apple garden. When that historical apple fell on his head, he did not have Google or Wikipedia to tell him why it happened, so he did research himself and finally, discovered gravity, and lots of us students are now suffering from the subject of physics——just kidding.Anyway, without internet, people think more independently and therefore, become more creative. Yes, it is true that the internet can be for great help——especially while we are dealing with our math problems. However, with that Mr. know it all by our side, we become Mr. & Mrs. Don’t know it at all. That is a situations which all of us, especially our math teachers, never want to see.So let's just have a day without internet, try to go out and write a poem, or solve some questions, or think about what drama we are going to put on next year. Just try to create something instead of getting information from the internet, because it is our mind that is worth more listening than anything else.Thank you.● 初三(3)班张晨曦(Casio杯英语演讲比赛冠军)Ladies and gentlemen, good afternoon, isn’ t it? Such fine and wonderful thing simply reminds me of the terrible 2012 Dec. 23rd which is approaching every day and we barely have 7 months of good afternoons. Or, the movie has said so but for you, my dear, it is a lot easier to welcome your doomsday. While you are all taking the convenience of Internet for granted, a day without it might bring all of you the end of world. It seems that without this great tool of sharing and playing, our life has gone towards a stopping point.But, let’s just stop there for a moment. Before we really worry about the future that isn’t for sure to come, how about going back to the past to see what really happened for those to deal with not having Internet.So, one day I time travelled to Tang Dynasty in Ancient China where there were no Internet. Though I really had had some worry about the boredom, the experience there turned out to be gorgeous. I visited some famous structures with red and gold colors shining royally. I did some shopping, not just online shopping, but the real shopping on the streets filled with stores of all kinds, selling accessories, Chinese perfume, pretty clothes materials, and above all, delicious local foods. Well, I am much of an eater. At the end of the day, I got up the hill, sat there, with the wholesunset in the sight. Everything was showering the glorious orange sunlight. I had always been relying on movies and TV dramas online to help me picture a romance but I had not realized then that the nature itself has placed the most romantic sceneries everywhere that you look, sit, and even sleep. Just like that, I fell into dreams as the sun gradually went down and hid itself in the dark.Back I went to 21st century, only to see people still obsessed about the disappearance of Internet. And I began asking myself, was it truly that Internet makes our life convenient or that it is simply so addictive as to make us all blind about the most wonderful things that are quite independent from the silly WIFI signals. People back in the ancient time knew nothing about the Internet, but they were most certainly leading theirs lives as smoothly as we are. Internet might bring us all the things that we want but pay attention, pictures, videos, online discussions are all digital and virtual, which is interpreted by computer into nothing but zero and one. And here comes the question: DO you invest your lifelong happiness on zero and one?● 初三(5)班陈润Good afternoon.Like every one of you here, I used to be totally a fan of the internet. I could visit blogs, check messages all day. I could even sing to my computer:‖ a day without you is like a year without rain.‖And here comes the story. It was a typical summer. I got tired of the relaxing vacation. I was searching for something to fulfill the vanity of my life. Of course, the internet appeared to be the best option. But a month later, the hole in my heart wasn’t growing smaller but bigger. You know the kind of feeling after heavy exposure to screens and it was just not myself.One day, the signal was cut because of repairing at my home. Hearing the shocking news, I felt myself living in a hell with no computer, no laptop, no Ipad. I was crazy pressing F5 on my keyboard. But when I look back now, that was really ablessing in disguise. It was the absence of the internet that made me walk out of the world of cyber land.I left my home and walked outside. There was always something out there. I looked around the garden near a river just below my balcony. To my surprise, everything was beyond recognition, no matter fluttering the birds, shifting in and out the waves, crawling the snails and chirping the frogs. When darkness fell, the twinkling stars and sparkling lights on the water filled my eyes. With the noise far, far away, I found peace deeply in here.I was isolated in the nature, which was completely different from how I was isolated in the internet. A voice inside was calling me to reach for the nature. At that moment, I realized how much I had missed for the past month, but I was determined not to miss any more. A day without internet wasn’t a year without rain, but a day full of surprises. And finally I have sentence from Emerson for all of us here :Never lose an opportunity of seeing anythin g beautiful, for beauty is God’s handwriting.● 初三(6)班单晨Good afternoon,ladies and gentlemen. It’s my great honor to stand on the stage and give you my speech. Today my topic ―A day without Internet‖.Suppose you are a white-collar worker or a university student, and all of your work depends on the Internet, which can provide you a great deal of latest information. But have you ever thought that if the Internet suddenly disappeared, what would you do?Nowadays, because of the development of information technology, Internet is playing a most important role in society. Without the help of Internet, we will not be able to search information or communicate with others so conveniently, and our life will probably become a mess.It’s true that nobody can deny the necessity of Internet, but as many people are gradually becoming crazy over the Internet, its disadvantages are also shown to the people. For instance, micro-blog, as one of the most popular means of communication, has become a necessary part of the modern life, and many people are so addicted to micro-blogs that they just cannot live without micro-blogs. They would rather speak on the micro-blogs than take action in the real life. In another word, they are just like the fish that can’t get out of the ―net‖.Since the Internet does more harm than good to some people, why not try to live without Internet?Some people may immediately say no, but it’s an undeniable fact that before the Internet was invented, our ancestors could still live properly and peacefully. Thus, why do we modern people always focus on nothing but Internet?In fact, there are a lot of ways to spend your day without Internet, say, you can ride a bicycle to the quiet countryside, and relax yourself by sitting in the warm and peaceful sunshine; or you’d rather go to a small café to drin k a cup of coffee. At that moment, you don’t have to deal with any complicated information and the entire thing you need to do is to relax yourself and forget all about your tiredness.Of course, it was only a perfect living attitude which is hard to reach, but we should still have the thought in our mind that we should not be controlled by the Internet, by the thing which is actually invented by us. It is a beautiful but poisonous net – while we are weaving it, do not let the strings corrode our mind; It is a magnificent but unknown ocean – while we are sailing on it, do not let the hurricanes destroy our mind; It is a brilliant but dangerous firework – while we are watching it, do not let the sparks burn our mind.Internet is a useful tool but we should not be limited by this tool. My dear friends, if there is a day without Internet, stop complaining and begin to enjoy. Just go back to the innocence, and let your lifestyle shine!● 初三(6)班劳越Ladies and gentlemen, look at here and say ―cheese‖. Perfect! Thank you! I’m going to put this photo onto my micro-blog. How can I miss this meaningful moment?Oh, wait! A piece of announcement: sorry, netizens. You might need to spend a day without Internet, because there’s something wrong with the system.Dear audience, have you ever imagined a day without Internet? Some might tell me it wouldn’t be that bad. It would slow down our life and let people communicate face to face. But I want to say: much more than the advantages, we must admit the fact that the world would be in a panic.On a day without Internet, the media failed to collect news from different parts of the world. A day without news seemed dull and narrow and what if a piece of breaking news like 911 takes place?On a day without Internet, transportation was badly affected. Not having coordinated well, two aero-planes crashed into each other and caused a big tragedy.On a day without Internet, the netting system in a hospital broke down. On a day without Internet, workers in a multinational company got so bored. On a day without Internet, the WHO failed to do its surveillance work.On a day without Internet, it seemed that only my mom looked happy. Why? Because I was not being a computer cat any more. However, problems came fairly soon. Math homework was so difficult that without searching on the net, I could only stare at one problem for a whole morning. Then I went to discuss on our group work but I found it so hard to contact with 5 people at the same time without QQ. What was more, my dad couldn’t receive an important e-mail from his colleague, and my mom herself complained of not being able to go shopping online.Imagining the situations I have mentioned, can you now consider the day as a good experience? Absolutely no. As the internet has already become part of life and part of the society, we can’t be without it even for one day. It’s Internet that makes information shareable. It’s Internet that makes communication convenient. It’s Internet that makes daily life easy. It’s Internet that makes the globe s mall. Nobody can deny the importance and necessity of it. And as teenagers in the 21st century, weare supposed to make full use of the net, but of course on a limitation of not falling into the unreal world. We are supposed to live in an Internet epoch. Yeah, I mean Internet has already become the name of the epoch. Not only because of the help it gives us, but also because it’s sending us the spirit of the new age, the life style that we open up our minds to be with all human beings on the earth. Just as the theme of this year’s English Festival suggests us: netting the globe, reaching the world.Thank you!● 初三(4)班姜镇涛Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen! It’s my great honor to stand on the stage and give you my speech. My topic will be ―A Day without Internet‖.At the beginning of my speech, please allow me to ask you some questions. Would you stay with your family or hang out with your friends in your spare time, or would you just sit on the front the computer, play games or chat with those you have never met? It is taken for granted that those high-tech communications gradually make the earth a global village, but due to Internet, people seem too lazy to get involved in hobbies and social activities.Looking around, you will notice many people desperate for Internet just like hungry souls hoping for a scrap of food. They waste hours and hours on line and when they leave their computers, they become vaguely jittery. They may be enjoying themselves on line, but they lost more important things: the joy in their normal life.Perhaps most of you have heard of the story of a broken circle. He lost a part of his body before and keeps seeking for it. Since he is not complete, he has to roll very slowly. On his way, he has made so many friends, enjoyed so many beautiful surroundings. However, when he eventually finds that piece, he begins to speed, missing all the friends and views on the way. We, just like that complete circle, manage to speed on our road, but at the same time, are losing more important things——friendship, love and freedom.It is time for us to reject this kind of way of life. The screens we yearn to possess have instead begun to possess us. We all seemed to get along pretty well in the days before the screens invaded our lives. But fixated on this convenient means of communication, we miss those close relationships between us and our friends and families. Just like if you are fortunate when you are gazing at the iPhone in your palms, you do not walk into a lamp pole. When we rushed down the road of life, we would probably get badly injured. We navigated our life rather efficiently when we slow down our steps. And only in that way, we will gain more friendship, love and freedom.Look away from this screen. Look around you, out the window, or across the room or down the street. Isn’t it something? It looks so real, and you have to believe you can touch it yourself.Thank you!● 初三(5)班李佳迅Dear teachers and fellow friends, what a great honor to have you all here and share my speech. Today I would like to talk about my schedule on a day without Internet.When I first received this topic, the first question that came into my mind was: ―How am I going to spare the boredom?‖ Living on campus, we may not see the connection between the Internet and our lives so tight, but to a large extent, we rely on the Internet to work, to study, and to entertain.For many of us, a day without Internet is like a disaster. How to catch up with the daily trends without cell phone news? How to focus on the soccer game without live show reports? How to get information without Google? And how to share your feelings without microblog? In the age of Internet, our lives are drowned in a diversity of information. If the global network ever breaks down, as if water in the oceans ever dries, everyone will be gazing at the computer screen anxiously as if fish without water.On the day without Internet, the world will fall into chaos, but it could also be a chance to take a rest.Why not walk outside to ease the pressure that the Internet has brought us? Let the clean air refresh your weary body. Let the sunbeam fix your poor eyesight. Away from the virtual space, we get a chance to approach the real world, the natural world. Just like in the movie Matrix, only when Neo swallowed the tiny red pill, had he seen how distant the real world is away from us. I choose to say hello to the nature on the day without Internet.Reading is an another choice to spare the time. Thanks to the Internet , the information we want is only a single click a way. It’s so convenient that we can simply throw away a whole library, while time for quality reading is sharply limited. Now that Baidu or Google are out of service, I choose to keep the books’ companion on the day without Internet.Above all, instead of sitting in front of the computer screen, it’s time to turn your face to people. Because the best memories ever in life is the time you spent with family and friends, not with the Internet. On the day without Internet, I choose to spend time with people.Thus, on the day without Internet, we’ve found something that has always been ignored behind our busy lives, which is actually the true essence of happiness.● 初三(3)班周臻What would the world be like without internet? Some will say that panic would be setting out all around the earth, but it would still not be the end of the world. Frankly, we can’t live without internet. There are millions of people who work by using internet. Many of the young people even seem to be addicted to the unreal world. It’s sad but true. If the internet service were off line today, they would be in trouble.Internet provides people with an extremely efficient means of communication. It seems that we can’t live without it. Also it has helped users around the world form anew, creative way of behaving and thinking. It has not only largely decreased the limit of time and distance, acknowledged our mind, but also offers countless conveniences to us.In spite of all those advantages that I have mentioned, we are talking about ―A Day W ithout Internet‖, aren’t we? Then what I’m telling you next is about besides internet, what have we got. Taken for example, yesterday’s Drama Night was really brilliant, not only the actors’ wonderful performance, but also the excellent dancing and singing gave the audience a very good impression. When the show was on, I saw many students using their electronic gadgets, logging on QQ or RenRen, expressing how exciting feelings. If we hadn’t had the internet service last night, we would still enjoy the glorious performance. There are also enormous numbers of ways for us to express our passion. Yes, passion. Internet can provide us everything except passion, love and other complicated human feelings! That is the shortage of the internet, of all those electronic gadgets.To be honest, internet can make us happy, but it can’t bring us the real happiness. The real happiness is only in the real world. Remember those young people who are crazy over online-games and leave their families, joining gangs, those bad examples? Like every coin has two sides. Internet is gradually taking something from us, like in compensation.We must remember that in the modern world, power, treasure and all those what people are pursuing their entire life, they are not everything. We are human. We have feelings. That’s what can’t be replaced. So without internet, I can’t say that life will be better, but life will go on. Thank you.。
中英互译比赛原文
中英互译比赛原文中英互译比赛原文英译汉竞赛原文:The Posteverything GenerationI never expected to gain any new insight into the nature of my generation, or the changing landscape of American colleges, in Lit Theory. Lit Theory is supposed to be the class where you sit at the back of the room with every other jaded sophomore wearing skinny jeans, thick-framed glasses, an ironic tee-shirt and over-sized retro headphones, just waiting for lecture to be over so you can light up a Turkish Gold and walk to lunch while listening to Wilco. That’s pretty much the way I spent the course, too: through structuralism, formalism, gender theory, and post-colonialism, I was far too busy shuffling through my Ipod to see what the patriarchal world order of capitalist oppression had to do with Ethan Frome. But when we began to study postmodernism, something struck a chord with me and made me sit up and look anew at the seemingly blasé college-aged literati of which I was so self-consciously one.According to my textbook, the problem with defining postmodernism is that it’s impossible. The difficulty is that it is so...post. It defines itself so negatively against what came before it –naturalism, romanticism and the wild revolution of modernism –that it’s sometimes hard to see what it actually is. It denies that anything can be explained neatly or even at all. It is parodic, detached, strange, and sometimes menacing to traditionalists who do not understand it. Although it arose in the post-war west (the term was coined in 1949), the generation that has witnessed its ascendance has yet to come up with anexplanation of what postmodern attitudes mean for the future of culture or society. The subject intrigued me because, in a class otherwise consumed by dead-letter theories, postmodernism remained an open book, tempting to the young and curious. But it also intrigued me because the question of what postmodernism –what a movement so post-everything, so reticent to define itself – is spoke to a larger question about the political and popular culture of today, of the other jaded sophomores sitting around me who had grown up in a postmodern world.In many ways, as a college-aged generation, we are also extremely post: post-Cold War, post-industrial, post-baby boom, post-9/11...at one point in his famous essay, “Postmodernism, or the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism,” literary critic Frederic Jameson even calls us “post-literate.” We are a generation that is riding on the tail-end of a century of war and revolution that toppled civilizations, overturned repressive social orders, and left us with more privilege and opportunity than any other society in history. Ours could be an era to accomplish anything.And yet do we take to the streets and the airwaves and say “here we are, and this is what we demand”? Do we plant our flag of youthful rebellion on the mall in Washington and say “we arenot leaving until we see change! Our eyes have been opened by our education and our conception of what is possible has been expanded by our privilege and we demand a better world because it is our right”? It would seem we do the opposite. We go to war without so much as questioning the rationale, we sign away our civil liberties, we say nothing when the Supreme Court uses Brown v. Board of Education to outlaw desegregation, andwe sit back to watch the carnage on the evening news.On campus, we sign petitions, join organizations, put our names on mailing lists, make small-money contributions, volunteer a sp are hour to tutor, and sport an entire wardrobe’s worth of Live Strong bracelets advertising our moderately priced opposition to everything from breast cancer to global warming. But what do we really stand for? Like a true postmodern generation we refuse to weave together an overarching narrative to our own political consciousness, to present a cast of inspirational or revolutionary characters on our public stage, or to define a specific philosophy. We are a story seemingly without direction or theme, structure or meaning – a generation defined negatively against what came before us. When Al Gore once said “It’s the combination of narcissism and nihilism that really defines postmodernism,” he might as well have been echoing his entire generation’s critique o f our own. We are a generation for whom even revolution seems trite, and therefore as fair a target for bland imitation as anything else. We are the generation of the Che Geuvera tee-shirt.Jameson calls it “Pastiche” –“the wearing of a linguistic mask, s peech in a dead language.” In literature, this means an author speaking in a style that is not his own – borrowing a voice and continuing to use it until the words lose all meaning and the chaos that is real life sets in. It is an imitation of an imitation, something that has been re-envisioned so many times the original model is no longer relevant or recognizable. It is mass-produced individualism, anticipated revolution. It is why postmodernism lacks cohesion, why it seems to lack purpose or direction. For us, the post-everything generation, pastiche is the use and reuse of the old clichés of social change and moraloutrage – a perfunctory rebelliousness that has culminated in the age of rapidly multiplying non-profits and relief funds. We live our lives in masks and speak our minds in a dead language – the language of a society that expects us to agitate because that’s what young people do. But how do we rebel against a generation that is expecting, anticipating, nostalgic for revolution?How do we rebel against parents that sometimes seem to want revolution more than we do? We don’t. We rebel by not rebelling. We wear the defunct masks of protest and moral outrage, but the real energy in campus activism is on the internet, with websites like . It is in the rapidly developing ability to communicate ideas and frustration in chatrooms instead of on the streets, and channel them into nationwide projects striving earnestly for moderate and peaceful change: we are the generation of Students Taking Action Now Darfur; we are the Rockthe Vote generation; the generation of letter-writing campaigns and public interest lobbies; the alternative energy generation.College as America once knew it – as an incubator of radical social change – is coming to an end. To our generation the word “radicalism” evokes images of al Qaeda, not the Weathermen. “Campus takeover” sounds more like Virginia Tech in 2007 than Columbia University in 1968. Such phrases are a dead language to us. They are vocabulary from another era that does not reflect the realities of today. However, the technological revolution, the revolution, the revolution of the organization kid, is just as real and just as profound as the revolution of the 1960’s – it is just not as visible. It is a work in progress, but it is there. Perhaps when our parents finally stop pointing out thethings that we are not, the stories that we do not write, they will see the threads of our narrative begin to come together; they will see that behind our pastiche, the post generation speaks in a language that does make sense. We are writing a revolution. We are just putting it in our own words.汉译英竞赛原文:保护古村落就是保护“根性文化”传统村落是指拥有物质形态和非物质形态文化遗产,具有较高的历史、文化、科学、艺术、社会、经济价值的村落。
历届韩素音翻译大奖赛竞赛原文及译文详解
历届韩素音翻译大奖赛竞赛原文及译文英译汉部分 (2)Beauty (excerpt) (2)美(节选) (2)The Literature of Knowledge and the Literature of Power byThomas De Quincey (5)知识文学与力量文学托马斯.昆西 (5)An Experience of Aesthetics by Robert Ginsberg (6)审美的体验罗伯特.金斯伯格 (6)A Person Who Apologizes Has the Moral Ball in His Court by Paul Johnson (8)谁给别人道歉,谁就在道义上掌握了主动保罗.约翰逊 (8)On Going Home by Joan Didion (11)回家琼.狄迪恩 (11)The Making of Ashenden (Excerpt) by Stanley Elkin (13)艾兴登其人(节选)斯坦利.埃尔金 (13)Beyond Life (17)超越生命[美] 卡贝尔著 (17)Envy by Samuel Johnson (20)论嫉妒[英]塞缪尔.约翰逊著 (20)中译英部分 (23)在义与利之外 (23)Beyond Righteousness and Interests (23)读书苦乐杨绛 (25)The Bitter-Sweetness of Reading Yang Jiang (25)想起清华种种王佐良 (26)Reminiscences of Tsinghua Wang Zuoliang (26)歌德之人生启示宗白华 (28)What Goethe's Life Reveals by Zong Baihua (28)怀想那片青草地赵红波 (30)Yearning for That Piece of Green Meadow by Zhao Hongbo (30)可爱的南京 (32)Nanjing the Beloved City (32)霞冰心 (33)The Rosy Cloud byBingxin (33)黎明前的北平 (33)Predawn Peiping (33)老来乐金克木 (34)Delights in Growing Old by Jin Kemu (34)可贵的“他人意识” (36)Calling for an Awareness of Others (36)教孩子相信 (38)To Implant In Our Children’s Young Hearts An Undying Faith In Humanity (38)英译汉部分Beauty (excerpt)美(节选)Judging from the scientists I know, including Eva and Ruth, and those whom I've read about, you can't pursue the laws of nature very long without bumping撞倒; 冲撞into beauty. “I don't know if it's the same beauty you see in the sunset,”a friend tells me, “but it feels the same.”This friend is a physicist, who has spent a long career deciphering破译(密码), 辨认(潦草字迹) what must be happening in the interior of stars. He recalls for me this thrill on grasping for the first time Dirac's⑴equations describing quantum mechanics, or those o f Einstein describing relativity. “They're so beautiful,” he says, “you can see immediately they have to be true. Or at least on the way toward truth.” I ask him what makes a theory beautiful, and he replies, “Simplicity, symmetry .对称(性); 匀称, 整齐, elegance, and power.”我结识一些科学家(包括伊娃和露丝),也拜读过不少科学家的著作,从中我作出推断:人们在探求自然规律的旅途中,须臾便会与美不期而遇。
第九届河南省翻译竞赛试题及参考译文-英语专业组-分值修订
第九届河南省翻译竞赛试题——英语专业组I. Translate the Following Passage into Chinese. (50 Points)When I got home after my 27th birthday party late last year, I sobbed. I cried because I was drunk. I cried because my boyfriend – away on work –hadn’t bothered to send me a card or a present, then he shouted at me for crying, then he dumped me. I cried because I had reached the age I had thought was ancient when I was a child (I remember thinking when I was 10 that by 27 I will probably have traveled around the world, had a hit single, married Prince William and had a baby).Now, as if I didn’t fell closer to death already, Soho House said it will “actively discourage” anyone 27 and over from joining. I am not quite sure what this will achieve. On my first visit to Soho House (I was 24 and terminally unimpressed), I saw an actress from a teen soap flirting disgustingly with an old, ugly man who I presumed must do something big in TV – this is the type of young person who thinks Soho House is a good place to hang out.The kind of youth injection Soho House needs – perhaps an Arctic Monkey or two and a couple of grim MCs–would lose all their credibility by signing that membership form. So I’m pleased to say that I have no interest in joining Soho House (at least not until I’m 37) –that makes me feel young, even if they think I’m too old.In fact, how can I be too old? I still can’t drive. I still don’t know the difference between a Chardonnay and a Riesling and I still don’t know when to stop drinking either of them. I still don’t bother to cleanse, tone and moisturize. At Christmas gatherings, I still refer to aunts and uncles as “the grown-ups”.II. Translate the Following Passage into English. (50 Points)艺术是人们现实生活和精神世界的形象反映,是艺术家知觉、情感、理想、意念综合心理活动的有机产物。
关于发掘自我的CASIO杯英语演讲稿
关于发掘自我的CASIO杯英语演讲稿第一篇:关于发掘自我的CASIO杯英语演讲稿Ladies and Gentlemen,It’s my great honor to stand here and nice to meet all of you.My name is Lvxueyuan,I’m from Qingdao No.2 middle school.Well, the topic I'm going to deal with is discover yourself.Now I’m a senior high school freshman in grade 1 and I have found that facing some of the tension made me under too much pressure.Actually,I felt heavy breath, and for the future, Who am I?What kind of life will I lead ?Questions crowded my mind.Until then understood, in life ups and downs and difficulties every time before, only you can save your own,You need to discover yourself.Discovering yourself is not only mean self-confidence, to give encouragement to yourself and to explore your own talent,but an attitude to your life as well.First,discover yourself means you should enjoy your life and appreciate what you have.THOUGH Geniuses amaze us,impress us and make us all a little jealous,WE CAN still find something valuable on ourselves.DO YOU think so?Your dreams are waiting to be realized.Don't waste time making excuses.Reach for your peak,your goal and change your limits!!Secondly, to discover yourself you need to develop your ability to deal with some situstions or difficulties and the virtue Now, I want to share with you a story of a girl who used to be very shy and not brave enough.But according to the summer military training,she has changed a lot.The girl, he-he,definitely is me.ATTENTION!At ease!March off!The Military training impressed me a lot.So far I have ears still ringing those voices back.Five days of military training is much more difficult than expected.The top discipline is to obey orders.We often stopmilitary posture more than an hour.The long march and the High-intensity training left me unforgetable pain, The midday sun burnt my skin,I was getting darker and darker.Emergency dril in the midnight made me completely crazy!The coach punished me by forcing me to run five laps of the track made me exhuasted and my voice became hoarse.On the third day of training,I said to myself” I can’t stand it!I could not get on!I'm not a strong girl!” My tears fell down.In tears,I saw the figure of the instructors in the distant.They have a strong spirit of resolute character.They never give up.Why can’t I?I can do it!Just believe in yourself;you have the talent to overcome the obstacles.The potential is waiting to be discovered.”After that,I made every effort in traing because I knew that was an opportunity for me to discover myself.I eventually completed military training, when walking though the platform as a pioneer of the team,I was so proud of myself.As an old saying says,”Noting is written,you’ve been taught how to write for yourself.”Da re to compare,dare to care,dare to dream,dare to love.The door to all the best things in the world will open to me, but the key to that door is in my hand.That is all my presentation, thank you for listening.第二篇:第十一届CASIO杯翻译竞赛征文启事第十一届CASIO杯翻译竞赛主办:上海市文学艺术界联合会上海世纪出版股份有限公司承办:上海翻译家协会上海译文出版社《外国文艺》杂志协办:卡西欧(上海)贸易有限公司沪江网征文启事由上海翻译家协会和上海译文出版社共同承办,以推进我国翻译事业的繁荣发展,发现和培养翻译新人为宗旨的CASIO杯翻译竞赛,继成功举办了十届之后,已成为翻译界的知名赛事。
第十二届CASIO杯(现“上译杯”)翻译竞赛英语组原文及获奖译文
第十二届CASIO杯翻译竞赛英语组原文【作者简介】W·H·奥登(1907—1973),英国著名诗人、评论家(由于出生于英国,后来成为美国公民,所以也有人将其列为美国作家),二十世纪最伟大的作家之一。
奥登的作品数量巨大,主题多样,技巧高超,身后亦备受推崇,其独特风格对后辈作家影响深远。
【内容提要】作为二十世纪最受推崇,且在诗艺上最为严肃的诗人之一,奥登以一种微妙的心态创作了大量评论类的文字,《染匠之手》(The Dyer’s Hand)是唯一一本奥登以书的架构自己收辑而成的散文集。
本文选自全书序章“阅读”篇章的第一段落,奥登用隐约相连的警句隽语描摹阅读的方方面面,轻盈、清澈、亲切,完全体现奥登无往不利的文思和炉火纯青的文字功夫。
2014年首次译入中文的《奥登诗选》轰动书坛,之后奥登的散文集也将相继面世,无论是想要从诗句之外窥探奥登文学艺术的资深读者,还是想要在最好的英文上打磨手艺的译事新人,都可以从这篇文章开始。
Reading(excerpt)W.H.AudenA book is a mirror:if an ass peers into it,you can’t expect an apostle to look out.C.G.LICHTENBERGOne only reads well that which one reads with some quite personal purpose.It may be to acquire some power.It can be out of hatred for the author.PAUL VALÉRY The interests of a writer and the interests of his readers are never the same and if, on occasion,they happen to coincide,this is a lucky accident.In relation to a writer,most readers believe in the Double Standard:they may be unfaithful to him as often as they like but he must never,never be unfaithful to them.To read is to translate,for no two persons’experiences are the same.A bad reader is like a bad translator:he interprets literally when he ought to paraphrase and paraphrases when he ought to interpret literally.In learning to read well,scholarship, valuable as it is,is less important than instinct;some great scholars have been poor translators.We often derive much profit from reading a book in a different way from that which its author intended but only(once childhood is over)if we know that we are doing so.As readers,most of us,to some degree,are like those urchins who pencil mustaches on the faces of girls in advertisements.One sign that a book has literary value is that it can be read in a number of different ways.Vice versa,the proof that pornography has no literary value is that,if one attempts to read it in any other way than as a sexual stimulus,to read it,say,as a psychological case history of the author’s sexual fantasies,one is bored to tears.need help fromothers in defining them.Whether it be a matter of taste in food or taste in literature, the adolescent looks for a mentor in whose authority he can believe.He eats or reads what his mentor recommends and,inevitably,there are occasions when he has to deceive himself a little;he has to pretend that he enjoys olives or War and Peace a little more than he actually does.Between the ages of twenty and forty we are engaged in the process of discovering who we are,which involves learning the difference between accidental limitations which it is our duty to outgrow and the necessary limitations of our nature beyond which we cannot trespass with impunity. Few of us can learn this without making mistakes,without trying to become a little more of a universal man than we are permitted to be.It is during this period that a writer can most easily be led astray by another writer or by some ideology.When someone between twenty and forty says,apropos of a work of art,“I know what I like,”he is really saying“I have no taste of my own but accept the taste of my cultural milieu,”because,between twenty and forty,the surest sign that a man has a genuine taste of his own is that he is uncertain of it.After forty,if we have not lost our authentic selves altogether,pleasure can again become what it was when we were children,the proper guide to what we should read.Though the pleasure which works of art give us must not be confused with other pleasures that we enjoy,it is related to all of them simply by being our pleasure and not someone else’s.All the judgments,aesthetic or moral,that we pass,however objective we try to make them,are in part a rationalization and in part a corrective discipline of our subjective wishes.So long as a man writes poetry or fiction,his dream of Eden is his own business,but the moment he starts writing literary criticism, honesty demands that he describe it to his readers,so that they may be in the position to judge his judgments.第十二届CASIO杯翻译竞赛英语组获奖译文论读书(节选)[英]W.H.奥登作孟思佳译书是一面镜子:如果一头蠢驴朝里瞧,就别指望会映出圣徒的面貌。
西科杯翻译大赛
College Degree“College Degree”, the phrase only exists in Chinese. Its high-sounding and feeling empty inside seems to be a hermaphroditic animal. In fact, College Degree is nothing but a kind of cultural quality that is similar to quality of people having received collegiate education. That’s to say, you can get it by other ways such as teaching by correspondence, speed-up educational program, training and so on even though are not educated in university.This word that college degree often exists in the resume and record of official. It plays the role of inflator, making people more confident and advertising them. However, the result is opposite. It fact, it destroys a wonderful painting as a redundant inkblot, losing the artistic conception.It’s not the important thing that having or not college degree. Qi Baishi, coming from a apprentice, became a maestro at last. He didn’t have college degree but gave a lesson for students in Peking University. The number of genius like him is countless.Yes is yes, no is no. This is the easiest objective truth in the word. Unfortunately, Chinese people are used to thinking simply. They will say “maybe”, “seem to”, “may not, or “perhaps”. As a result, the art function in Chinese language is displayed vividly.A multitude of phrases such as College Degree and so on are made out by high-intelligence quotient mediocre persons to conceal the truth. For thousands of years, the poisoning Chinese has been cureless----how many people can understand “College Degree”the real meaning. According to the linguistic theory of Saussure, signifier and designatum have been divided, even have opposed.“College Degree”,according to what I know, is “The Emperor’s New clothes”put on the people whose cultural quality is far below university man. What’s worse, I choose presumingly the child’s life in fairy tale world, speaking the truth that shouldn’t be spoken out. I have no weapon in my hand, when the imperatorial lifeguards who hold swords walk towards me getting up on their hind legs.I believe in the point forever that doesn’t destroy the taboo and you can’t get the truth.。
第十一届CASIO杯翻译竞赛英语组原文及获奖译文
第十一届CASIO杯翻译竞赛原文(英语组)To evoke the London borough of Diston,we turn to the poetry of Chaos:Each thing hostileTo every other thing:at every pointHot fought cold,moist dry,soft hard,and the weightlessResisted weight.So Des lived his life in tunnels.The tunnel from flat to school,the tunnel(not the same tunnel)from school to flat.And all the warrens that took him to Grace,and brought him back again.He lived his life in tunnels…And yet for the sensitive soul, in Diston Town,there was really only one place to look.Where did the eyes go?They went up,up.School–Squeers Free,under a sky of white:the weakling headmaster,the demoralised chalkies in their rayon tracksuits,the ramshackle little gym with its tripwires and booby traps,the Lifestyle Consultants(Every Child Matters),and the Special Needs Coordinators(who dealt with all the‘non-readers’).In addition, Squeers Free set the standard for the most police call-outs,the least GCSE passes,and the highest truancy rates.It also led the pack in suspensions,expulsions,and PRU ‘offrolls’;such an offroll–a transfer to a Pupil Referral Unit–was usually the doorway to a Youth Custody Centre and then a Young Offender Institution.Lionel, who had followed this route,always spoke of his five and a half years(on and off)in a Young Offender Institution(or Yoi,as he called it)with rueful fondness,like one recalling a rite of passage–inevitable,bittersweet.I was out for a month,he would typically reminisce.Then I was back up north.Doing me Yoi.On the other hand,Squeers Free had in its staff room an exceptional Learning Mentor–a Mr Vincent Tigg.What’s going on with you,Desmond?You were always an idle little sod.Now you can’t get enough of it.Well,what next?I fancy modern languages,sir.And history.And sociology.And astronomy.And–You can’t study everything,you know.Yes I can.Renaissance boy,innit.…You want to watch that smile,lad.All right.We’ll see about you.Now off you go.And in the schoolyard?On the face of it,Des was a prime candidate for persecution.He seldom bunked off,he never slept in class,he didn’t assault the teachers or shoot up in the toilets–and he preferred the company of the gentler sex (the gentler sex,at Squeers Free,being quite rough enough).So in the normal course of things Des would have been savagely bullied,as all the other misfits(swats,wimps, four-eyes,sweating fatties)were savagely bullied–to the brink of suicide and beyond. They called him Skiprope and Hopscotch,but Des wasn’t bullied.How to explain this? To use Uncle Ringo’s favourite expression,it was a no-brainer.Desmond Pepperdine was inviolable.He was the nephew,and ward,of Lionel Asbo.It was different on the street.Once a term,true,Lionel escorted him to Squeers Free,and escorted him back again the same day(restraining,with exaggerated difficulty,the two frothing pitbulls on their thick steel chains).But it would be foolish to suppose that each and every gangbanger and posse-artist(and every Yardie and jihadi)in the entire manor had heard tell of the great asocial.And it was different at night,because different people,different shapes,levered themselves upward after dark…Des was fleet of foot,but he was otherwise unsuited to life in Diston Town. Second or even first nature to Lionel(who was pronounced‘uncontrollable’at the age of eighteen months),violence was alien to Des,who always felt that violence–extreme and ubiquitous though it certainly seemed to be–came from another dimension.So,this day,he went down the tunnel and attended school.But on his way home he feinted sideways and took a detour.With hesitation,and with deafening self-consciousness,he entered the Public Library on Blimber Road.Squeers Free had a library,of course,a distant Portakabin with a few primers and ripped paperbacks scattered across its floor…But this:rank upon rank of proud-chested bookcases,likelavishly decorated generals.By what right or title could you claim any share of it?He entered the Reading Room,where the newspapers,firmly clamped to long wooden struts,were apparently available for scrutiny.No one stopped him as he approached.He had of course seen the dailies before,in the corner shop and so on,and there were Gran’s Telegraphs,but his experience of actual newsprint was confined to the Morning Larks that Lionel left around the flat,all scrumpled up,like origami tumbleweeds(there was also the occasional Diston Gazette).Respectfully averting his eyes from the Times,the Independent,and the Guardian,Des reached for the Sun, which at least looked like a Lark,with its crimson logo and the footballer’s fiancée on the cover staggering out of a nightclub with blood running down her neck.And,sure enough,on page three(News in Briefs)there was a hefty redhead wearing knickers and a sombrero.But then all resemblances ceased.You got scandal and gossip,and more girls, but also international news,parliamentary reports,comment,analysis…Until now he had accepted the Morning Lark as an accurate reflection of reality.Indeed,he sometimes thought it was a local paper(a light-hearted adjunct to the Gazette),such was its fidelity to the customs and mores of his borough.Now,though,as he stood there with the Sun quivering in his hands,the Lark stood revealed for what it was–a daily lads’mag,perfunctorily posing as a journal of record.The Sun,additionally to recommend it,had an agony column presided over not by the feckless Jennaveieve,but by a wise-looking old dear called Daphne,who dealt sympathetically,that day,with a number of quite serious problems and dilemmas,and suggested leaflets and helplines,and seemed genuinely…第十一届CASIO杯翻译竞赛获奖译文(英语组)莱昂内尔•阿斯博[英]马丁•艾米斯作徐弘译为了描绘伦敦自治市迪斯顿,我们借用混沌之诗:物物相克,同在一体而冷热相争、干湿相抗、软硬相攻、轻重相击。
第九届学术英语词汇竞赛
第九届学术英语词汇竞赛The 9th Academic English Vocabulary CompetitionVocabulary is the foundation of language proficiency and a crucial component of academic success. As students strive to excel in their studies, the mastery of academic English vocabulary has become increasingly important. The 9th Academic English Vocabulary Competition serves as a platform to showcase the linguistic abilities of students and to inspire them to enhance their vocabulary skills.The competition is open to students from all educational backgrounds, providing a level playing field for individuals to demonstrate their command of academic English vocabulary. Participants are required to showcase their knowledge through a series of challenging tasks that test their ability to comprehend, analyze, and apply academic vocabulary in various contexts.One of the key aspects of the competition is the emphasis on depth of understanding rather than mere memorization of words. Participants are expected to not only recognize the definitions of words but also to demonstrate their ability to use them appropriately in academic writing, oral presentations, and critical thinking exercises.The competition is structured in a way that encourages participants to develop a comprehensive understanding of academic vocabulary. The first round typically involves a written examination that assesses the participants' knowledge of word meanings, synonyms, antonyms, and contextual usage. This round serves as a foundation for the subsequent stages, where participants are challenged to showcase their vocabulary skills in more complex and dynamic scenarios.The second round may involve tasks such as academic essay writing, where participants are required to incorporate a predetermined set of academic vocabulary words into their compositions. This exercise not only tests the participants' writing proficiency but also their ability to seamlessly integrate academic vocabulary into their written work.In the third round, participants may be asked to deliver oral presentations on academic topics, utilizing their extensive vocabulary knowledge to effectively communicate their ideas and engage the audience. This round not only assesses the participants' verbal communication skills but also their ability to adapt their language to the specific demands of academic discourse.The final round of the competition often involves a comprehensive assessment of the participants' overall academic vocabularyproficiency. This may include tasks such as analyzing academic texts, identifying and explaining the nuances of academic vocabulary, and demonstrating the ability to apply vocabulary knowledge in problem-solving scenarios.Throughout the competition, participants are encouraged to not only focus on the acquisition of academic vocabulary but also to develop a deeper understanding of the contextual and conceptual aspects of language. This approach aims to foster a holistic understanding of academic English, which is essential for success in higher education and beyond.The 9th Academic English Vocabulary Competition is not merely a test of memorization; it is a celebration of the participants' intellectual prowess and their commitment to linguistic excellence. The competition provides a platform for students to showcase their language skills, network with their peers, and receive valuable feedback from experienced educators and language experts.The benefits of participating in the 9th Academic English Vocabulary Competition extend far beyond the competition itself. Participants who excel in the competition often find themselves better equipped to navigate the challenges of academic life, from writing research papers to delivering presentations in their respective fields of study. The skills and knowledge gained through the competition can alsobe leveraged in future professional endeavors, as employers increasingly value individuals with strong academic language proficiency.In conclusion, the 9th Academic English Vocabulary Competition is a testament to the importance of academic English vocabulary in the pursuit of academic and professional success. By participating in this event, students have the opportunity to challenge themselves, expand their linguistic horizons, and ultimately, become more confident and effective communicators in the academic realm and beyond.。
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Means of DeliveryJoshua CohenSmuggling Afghan heroin or women from Odessa would have been more reprehensible, but more logical. You know you’re a fool when what you’re doing makes even the post office seem efficient. Everything I was packing into this unwieldy, 1980s-vintage suitcase was available online. I don’t mean that when I arrived in Berlin I could have ordered more Levi’s 510s for next-day delivery. I mean, I was packing books.Not just any books — these were all the same book, multiple copies. “Invalid Format: An Anthology of Triple Canopy, Volume 1” is published, yes, by Triple Canopy, an online magazine featuring essays, fiction, poetry and all variety of audio/visual culture, dedicated — click “About” — “to slowing down the Internet.” With their book, the first in a planned series, the editors certainly succeeded. They were slowing me down too, just fine.“Invalid Format” collects in print the magazine’s first four issues and retails, ideally, for $25. But the 60 copies I was couriering, in exchange for a couch and coffee-press access in Kreuzberg, would be given away. For free.Until lately the printed book changed more frequently, but less creatively, than any other medium. If you thought “The Quotable Ronald Reagan” was too expensive in hardcover, you could wait a year or less for the same content to go soft. E-books, which made their debut in the 1990s, cut costs even more for both consumer and producer, though as the Internet expanded those roles became confused. Self-published book properties began outnumbering, if not outselling, their trade equivalents by the mid-2000s, a situation further convoluted when the conglomerates started “publishing” “self-published books.” Last year, Penguin became the first major trade press to go vanity: its Book Country e-imprint will legitimize your “original genre fiction” for just under $100. These shifts make small, D.I.Y. collectives like Triple Canopy appear more traditional than ever, if not just quixotic — a word derived from one of the first novels licensed to a publisher.Kennedy Airport was no problem, my connection at Charles de Gaulle went fine. My luggage connected too, arriving intact at Tegel. But immediately after immigration, I was flagged. A smaller wheelie bag held the clothing. As a customs official rummaged through my Hanes, I prepared for what came next: the larger case, casters broken, handle rusted — I’m pretty sure it had already been Used when it was given to me for my bar mitzvah.Before the official could open the clasps and start poking inside, I presented him with the document the Triple Canopy editor, Alexander Provan, had e-mailed me — the night before? two nights before already? I’d been up one of those nights scouringNew York City for a printer. No one printed anymore. The document stated, in English and German, that these books were books. They were promotional, to be given away at universities, galleries, the Miss Read art-book fair at Kunst-Werke.“All are same?” the official asked.“Alle gleich,” I said.An older guard came over, prodded a spine, said something I didn’t get. The younger official laughed, translated, “He wants to know if you read every one.”At lunch the next day with a musician friend. In New York he played twice a month, ate food stamps. In collapsing Europe he’s paid 2,000 euros a night to play a quattrocento church.“Where are you handing the books out?” he asked.“At an art fair.”“Why an art fair? Why not a book fair?”“It’s an art-book fair.”“As opposed to a book-book fair?”I told him that at book-book fairs, like the famous one in Frankfurt, they mostly gave out catalogs.Taking trains and trams in Berlin, I noticed: people reading. Books, I mean, not pocket-size devices that bleep as if censorious, on which even Shakespeare scans like a spreadsheet. Americans buy more than half of all e-books sold internationally — unless Europeans fly regularly to the United States for the sole purpose of downloading reading material from an American I.P. address. As of the evening I stopped searching the Internet and actually went out to enjoy Berlin, e-books accounted for nearly 20 percent of the sales of American publishers. In Germany, however, e-books accounted for only 1 percent last year. I began asking the multilingual, multiethnic artists around me why that was. It was 2 a.m., at Soho House, a private club I’d crashed in the former Hitlerjugend headquarters. One installationist said, “Americans like e-books because they’re easier to buy.” A performance artist said, “They’re also easier not to read.” True enough: their presence doesn’t remind you of what you’re missing; they don’t take up space on shelves. The next morning, Alexander Provan and I lugged the books for distribution, gratis. Question: If books become mere art objects, do e-books become conceptual art?Juxtaposing psychiatric case notes by the physician-novelist Rivka Galchen with a dramatically illustrated investigation into the devastation of New Orleans, “Invalid Format” is among the most artful new attempts to reinvent the Web by the codex, and the codex by the Web. Its texts “scroll”: horizontally, vertically; title pages evoke “screens,” reframing content that follows not uniformly and continuously but rather as a welter of column shifts and fonts. Its closest predecessors might be mixed-media Dada (Duchamp’s loose-leafed, shuffleable “Green Box”); or perhaps “I Can HasCheezburger?,” the best-selling book version of the pet-pictures-with-funny-captions Web site ; or similar volumes from and . These latter books are merely the kitschiest products of publishing’s recent enthusiasm for “back-engineering.” They’re pseudoliterature, commodities subject to the same reversing process that for over a century has paused “movies” into “stills” — into P.R. photos and dorm posters — and notated pop recordings for sheet music.Admittedly I didn’t have much time to consider the implications of adaptive culture in Berlin. I was too busy dancing to “Ich Liebe Wie Du Lügst,” a k a “Love the Way You Lie,” by Eminem, and falling asleep during “Bis(s) zum Ende der Nacht,” a k a “The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn,” just after the dubbed Bella cries over her unlikely pregnancy, “Das ist unmöglich!” — indeed!Translating mediums can seem just as unmöglich as translating between unrelated languages: there will be confusions, distortions, technical limitations. The Web ande-book can influence the print book only in matters of style and subject — no links, of course, just their metaphor. “The ghost in the machine” can’t be exorcised, only turned around: the machine inside the ghost.As for me, I was haunted by my suitcase. The extra one, the empty. My last day in Kreuzberg was spent considering its fate. My wheelie bag was packed. My laptop was stowed in my carry-on. I wanted to leave the pleather immensity on the corner of Kottbusser Damm, down by the canal, but I’ve never been a waster. I brought it back.It sits in the middle of my apartment, unrevertible, only improvable, hollow, its lid flopped open like the cover of a book.。