Virginia Woolf

The Waves

海浪

弗吉尼亚•伍尔夫（英）  著

赵金基  译

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Chinese translation copyright © Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press 2011

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Published by Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press

No. 19 Xisanhuan Beilu

Beijing, China 100089

http://www.fltrp.com

目 录

- The Waves  海浪

The Waves

海浪

The sun had not yet risen. The sea was indistinguishable from the sky, except that the sea was slightly creased as if a cloth had wrinkles in it. Gradually as the sky whitened a dark line lay on the horizon dividing the sea from the sky and the grey cloth became barred with thick strokes moving, one after another, beneath the surface, following each other, pursuing each other, perpetually.

太阳尚未升起。大海与天空难以分辨，只是海面上微微泛着波澜，仿佛是一块布凸起了褶皱。渐渐地，随着天空发白，天边呈现出一道幽暗的线条，把海与天分开了，那块灰布的下面掀起厚重的波纹，一条接着一条，彼此跟随，互相追逐，不断前进。

As they neared the shore each bar rose, heaped itself, broke and swept a thin veil of white water across the sand. The wave paused, and then drew out again, sighing like a sleeper whose breath comes and goes unconsciously. Gradually the dark bar on the horizon became clear as if the sediment in an old wine-bottle had sunk and left the glass green. Behind it, too, the sky cleared as if the white sediment there had sunk, or as if the arm of a woman couched beneath the horizon had raised a lamp and flat bars of white, green and yellow spread across the sky like the blades of a fan. Then she raised her lamp higher and the air seemed to become fibrous and to tear away from the green surface flickering and flaming in red and yellow fibres like the smoky fire that roars from a bonfire. Gradually the fibres of the burning bonfire were fused into one haze, one incandescence which lifted the weight of the woollen grey sky on top of it and turned it to a million atoms of soft blue. The surface of the sea slowly became transparent and lay rippling and sparkling until the dark stripes were almost rubbed out. Slowly the arm that held the lamp raised it higher and then higher until a broad flame became visible; an arc of fire burnt on the rim of the horizon, and all round it the sea blazed gold.

接近岸边时，每条波纹都高高跃起，凝聚了全部的力量，然后一一迸裂，在沙滩上铺开一层薄纱似的白色水花。潮水稍作停歇，又卷土重来，发出叹息的声响，好像一个熟睡的人不自觉的呼吸。渐渐地，天边那道幽暗的线条变得明晰了，好像一只旧酒瓶子里的渣滓终于沉淀下来，露出了玻璃的绿色。后面的天空也明朗起来，仿佛那里的白色渣滓已经沉淀下去，又仿佛有个在地平线下休憩的女子，她的手臂举起一盏灯，那融合了白、绿、黄的并不鲜明的光束，好像扇子的一根根扇骨，划过天空。接着，她把灯举得更高了一些，空气似乎变得如纤维一般，似乎要像焰火中轰然而起的青烟，脱离那闪耀着红黄丝缕的绿色水面。渐渐地，焰火的万千丝缕融汇成一团雾霭，一团白热，把羊毛一样灰沉沉的天空托在上面，化作亿万点淡蓝的微尘。海面慢慢变得透明起来，波纹荡漾，波光粼粼，直到那些幽暗的条纹几乎被擦拭得干干净净。慢慢地，那只举着灯的手臂抬得越来越高，越来越高，直到可以看见一片灿烂的光辉；地平线的边缘燃起一道弧光，周围的海面金光闪闪。

The light struck upon the trees in the garden, making one leaf transparent and then another. One bird chirped high up; there was a pause; another chirped lower down. The sun sharpened the walls of the house, and rested like the tip of a fan upon a white blind and made a blue finger-print of shadow under the leaf by the bedroom window. The blind stirred slightly, but all within was dim and unsubstantial. The birds sang their blank melody outside.

阳光照在花园里的树上，把一片又一片叶子变得透明。一只鸟儿在高处啁啾；歇了一会儿；另一只鸟儿在低处开始了鸣啭。阳光清晰地照见屋子的墙壁，然后像扇坠一样映在一块白色窗帘上，给卧室窗前的那片树叶留下指纹大小的一枚蓝色阴影。窗帘微微掀动，但屋里的一切蒙蒙眬眬，无以分辨。窗外，鸟儿唱着它们单调的歌。

'I see a ring,' said Bernard, 'hanging above me. It quivers and hangs in a loop of light.'

“我看见一个圆环，”伯纳德说，“悬在我的头上。它是悬着的光环，不停地颤动。”

'I see a slab of pale yellow,' said Susan, 'spreading away until it meets a purple stripe.'

“我看见一块淡黄色的平面，”苏珊说，“向外扩展，直到它与一道紫色的条纹交汇。”

'I hear a sound,' said Rhoda, 'cheep, chirp; cheep chirp; going up and down.'

“我听到一个声音，”罗达说，“唧唧，啾啾；唧唧，啾啾；一会儿高，一会儿低。”

'I see a globe,' said Neville, 'hanging down in a drop against the enormous flanks of some hill.'

“我看见一个圆球，”内维尔说，“从巨大的山坡上陡直地悬垂下来。”

'I see a crimson tassel,' said Jinny, 'twisted with gold threads.'

“我看见一条深红色的缨穗，”吉尼说，“缠绕着金色的丝线。”

'I hear something stamping,' said Louis. 'A great beast's foot is chained. It stamps, and stamps, and stamps.'

“我听见什么东西在跺脚。”路易斯说。“一头巨兽的脚上拴着锁链。它不停地跺啊，跺啊，跺啊。”

'Look at the spider's web on the corner of the balcony,' said Bernard. 'It has beads of water on it, drops of white light.'

“瞧那阳台角落里的蜘蛛网。”伯纳德说。“上面挂着水珠，一滴滴闪着白光。”

'The leaves are gathered round the window like pointed ears,' said Susan.

“树叶堆满窗前，像带芒的麦穗。”苏珊说。

'A shadow falls on the path,' said Louis, 'like an elbow bent.'

“一个影子投在小路上，”路易斯说，“像一只弯曲的臂肘。”

'Islands of light are swimming on the grass,' said Rhoda. 'They have fallen through the trees.'

“光斑在草地上游弋。”罗达说。“它们是从树木之间漏下来的。”

'The birds' eyes are bright in the tunnels between the leaves,' said Neville.

“在树叶之间的通道中，鸟儿的眼睛是明亮的。”内维尔说。

'The stalks are covered with harsh, short hairs,' said Jinny, 'and drops of water have stuck to them.'

“叶梗表面布满粗短的绒毛，”吉尼说，“所以挂住了水滴。�

'A caterpillar is curled in a green ring,' said Susan, 'notched with blunt feet.'

“毛毛虫蜷成一个绿圈圈，”苏珊说，“上面嵌着笨拙的脚。”

'The grey-shelled snail draws across the path and flattens the blades behind him,' said Rhoda.

“灰壳的蜗牛穿过小路，身后留下压平了的草叶。”罗达说。

'And burning lights from the window-panes flash in and out on the grasses,' said Louis.

“窗格子里透出燃着的灯火，在青草上面闪闪烁烁，忽明忽灭。”路易斯说。

'Stones are cold to my feet,' said Neville. 'I feel each one, round or pointed, separately.'

“我的脚感觉到石头的凉意。”内维尔说。“每一块石头，或是圆的，或是尖的，都让我有不同的感觉。”

'The back of my hand burns,' said Jinny, 'but the palm is clammy and damp with dew.'

“我的手背火烧火燎，”吉尼说，“但是手心却沾满露水，又冷又湿。”

'Now the cock crows like a spurt of hard, red water in the white tide,' said Bernard.

“此时，雄鸡啼鸣，好像白色的浪潮中喷出一股红色的激流。”伯纳德说。

'Birds are singing up and down and in and out all round us,' said Susan.

“鸟儿围着我们婉转啁啾，忽高忽低，时隐时现。”苏珊说。

'The beast stamps; the elephant with its foot chained; the great brute on the beach stamps,' said Louis.

“野兽在跺脚；大象的脚上拴了锁链；海滩上那个巨大的牲畜在跺脚。”路易斯说。

'Look at the house,' said Jinny, 'with all its windows white with blinds.'

“瞧那幢房子，”吉尼说，“所有的窗子都挂着白色的窗帘。”

'Cold water begins to run from the scullery tap,' said Rhoda, 'over the mackerel in the bowl.'

“凉凉的水从洗碗室的水龙头里流出，”罗达说，“漫过碗中的鲭鱼。”

'The walls are cracked with gold cracks,' said Bernard, 'and there are blue, finger-shaped shadows of leaves beneath the windows.'

“墙上裂开金色的缝隙，”伯纳德说，“树叶在窗前投下形如纤指的蓝色阴影。”

'Now Mrs Constable pulls up her thick black stockings,' said Susan.

“瞧，康斯特布尔太太穿上她厚厚的黑色长袜。”苏珊说。

'When the smoke rises, sleep curls off the roof like a mist,' said Louis.

“炊烟升起，睡意也像一阵薄雾从屋顶袅袅散去。”路易斯说。

'The birds sang in chorus first,' said Rhoda. 'Now the scullery door is unbarred. Off they fly. Off they fly like a fling of seed. But one sings by the bedroom window alone.'

“鸟儿原先在合唱。”罗达说。“这时，洗碗室的门打开了。它们飞走了。它们飞走了，像一把撒出去的种子。但是有一只鸟仍在卧室窗前独自歌唱。”

'Bubbles form on the floor of the saucepan,' said Jinny. 'Then they rise, quicker and quicker, in a silver chain to the top.'

“气泡在锅底翻腾，”吉尼说。“接着它们就冒上来，越冒越快，像一条银色的珠链，直冒向锅顶。”

'Now Billy scrapes the fish-scales with a jagged knife on to a wooden board,' said Neville.

“瞧，比利用一把带锯齿的刀将鱼鳞刮到一块木质案板上。”内维尔说。

'The dining-room window is dark blue now,' said Bernard, 'and the air ripples above the chimneys.'

“此时，餐室的窗子变成深蓝色，”伯纳德说，“微风在烟囱上方荡漾。”

'A swallow is perched on the lightning-conductor,' said Susan. 'And Biddy has smacked down the bucket on the kitchen flags.'

“一只燕子停在避雷针上。”苏珊说。“比迪啪的一声把水桶撂在厨房的石板地上。”

'That is the first stroke of the church bell,' said Louis. 'Then the others follow; one, two; one, two; one, two.'

“教堂的钟敲了第一响，”路易斯说。“接着就响个不停；一声，两声；一声，两声；一声，两声。”

'Look at the table-cloth, flying white along the table,' said Rhoda. 'Now there are rounds of white china, and silver streaks beside each plate.'

“瞧那块桌布，洁白地掠过桌面。”罗达说。“这时摆上了一圈一圈洁白的瓷器，每个餐盘边都银光闪闪。”

'Suddenly a bee booms in my ear,' said Neville. 'It is here; it is past.'

“突然，一只蜜蜂在我耳边嗡嗡叫。”内维尔说。“它在这儿；它飞走了。”

'I burn, I shiver,' said Jinny, 'out of this sun, into this shadow.'

“我火烧火燎，我瑟瑟发抖，”吉尼说，“因为从阳光下来到阴影里。”

'Now they have all gone,' said Louis. 'I am alone. They have gone into the house for breakfast, and I am left standing by the wall among the flowers. It is very early, before lessons. Flower after flower is specked on the depths of green. The petals are harlequins. Stalks rise from the black hollows beneath. The flowers swim like fish made of light upon the dark, green waters. I hold a stalk in my hand. I am the stalk. My roots go down to the depths of the world, through earth dry with brick, and damp earth, through veins of lead and silver. I am all fibre. All tremors shake me, and the weight of the earth is pressed to my ribs. Up here my eyes are green leaves, unseeing. I am a boy in grey flannels with a belt fastened by a brass snake up here. Down there my eyes are the lidless eyes of a stone figure in a desert by the Nile. I see women passing with red pitchers to the river; I see camels swaying and men in turbans. I hear tramplings, tremblings, stirrings round me.

“这会儿他们都走了。”路易斯说。“我孤单一人。他们进屋吃早餐去了，剩我一人在花丛中倚墙而立。天色很早，未到上课时间。绿意悠悠，繁花点缀。花瓣色彩斑斓。花茎从下面的黑色孔隙中伸了出来。花朵好像是光化作的鱼儿，在幽深、碧绿的水面上畅游。我把一支花茎握在手中。我就是这支花茎。我的根向世界的纵深扎下去，穿透干燥的砖石和潮湿的泥土，穿透铅与银的矿脉。我全身都是力量。任何轻微的震动都会令我发抖，我的身躯承载着大地之重。瞧这儿，我的眼睛好似绿叶，一无所见。我是一个小男孩，穿着一身灰色法兰绒，系着一条黄铜蛇扣的腰带。瞧那儿，我的眼睛好似尼罗河畔沙漠中一尊石像的眼睛，永远睁着。我看见女人们头顶红色水罐前往河边；我看见那些摇摇晃晃的骆驼和缠着头巾的男人。我听见踩踏声、战栗声和骚乱声在我四周响起。

'Up here Bernard, Neville, Jinny and Susan (but not Rhoda) skim the flower-beds with their nets. They skim the butterflies from the nodding tops of the flowers. They brush the surface of the world. Their nets are full of fluttering wings. "Louis! Louis! Louis!" they shout. But they cannot see me. I am on the other side of the hedge. There are only little eye-holes among the leaves. Oh Lord, let them pass. Lord, let them lay their butterflies on a pocket—handkerchief on the gravel. Let them count out their tortoise—shells, their red admirals and cabbage whites. But let me be unseen. I am green as a yew tree in the shade of the hedge. My hair is made of leaves. I am rooted to the middle of the earth. My body is a stalk. I press the stalk. A drop oozes from the hole at the mouth and slowly, thickly, grows larger and larger. Now something pink passes the eyehole. Now an eye-beam is slid through the chink. Its beam strikes me. I am a boy in a grey flannel suit. She has found me. I am struck on the nape of the neck. She has kissed me. All is shattered.'

“在这儿，伯纳德、内维尔、吉尼和苏珊（但不包括罗达）用他们的捕网在花坛上面掠来掠去。他们在低垂的花冠上面掠捕蝴蝶。他们轻轻掠过世界的表层。他们的捕网里满是扑动的翅翼。‘路易斯！路易斯！路易斯！’他们大喊大叫。但是他们看不见我。我在树篱的另一边。树叶之间只有一些小小的洞眼。噢，上帝啊，让他们走开吧。上帝啊，让他们把他们的蝴蝶放在一小块地方——沙石堆上的一方手帕上面吧。让他们数清楚他们的乌龟壳、红花蝶和菜粉蝶吧。但别让他们看见我。我在树篱的影子里，像一株绿色的紫杉树。我的头发是片片树叶。我扎根在大地的中心。我的身体是一支花茎。我捏了捏这支花茎。一滴汁液从断口的孔隙渗出，缓缓地，黏黏地，越积越多。这时，一个粉红色的身影闪过洞眼。这时，一道目光悄悄穿透缝隙，溜了过来。这道目光落在我身上。我是一个小男孩，穿着一身灰色法兰绒套装。她发现了我。我的后脖颈被碰了一下。她吻了我。一切都乱了。”

'I was running,' said Jinny, 'after breakfast. I saw leaves moving in a hole in the hedge. I thought "That is a bird on its nest." I parted them and looked; but there was no bird on a nest. The leaves went on moving. I was frightened. I ran past Susan, past Rhoda, and Neville and Bernard in the tool-house talking. I cried as I ran, faster and faster. What moved the leaves? What moves my heart, my legs? And I dashed in here, seeing you green as a bush, like a branch, very still, Louis, with your eyes fixed. "Is he dead?" I thought, and kissed you, with my heart jumping under my pink frock like the leaves, which go on moving, though there is nothing to move them. Now I smell geraniums; I smell earth mould. I dance. I ripple. I am thrown over you like a net of light. I lie quivering flung over you.'

“我吃过早饭，”吉尼说，“正在跑步。我看见树篱的洞眼里有叶子在动。我想：‘那是一只呆在窝里的鸟吧。’我拨开它们，瞧了瞧；没有鸟，也没有窝。树叶不停地晃动。我害怕了。我从苏珊身边跑过，从罗达身边跑过，又从正在工具房里说话的内维尔和伯纳德身边跑过。我一边跑一边哭，越跑越快。是什么让树叶晃动？是什么让我心跳加快，撒腿奔跑？我冲到这里，看见你一身碧绿，像一丛灌木，像一根树枝，一动不动，路易斯，你的眼睛一眨也不眨。‘他死了吗？’心里想着，我就吻了你，我的粉红衣裙下面，我的心在砰砰跳，就像那些树叶，不停地晃动，却毫无来由。这时，我闻到天竺葵的芬芳；我闻到泥土堆的气息。我手舞足蹈。我轻扭身躯。我像一张光的网，撒向你。我躺下来，颤抖着，投入你的怀抱。”

'Through the chink in the hedge,' said Susan, 'I saw her kiss him. I raised my head from my flower-pot and looked through a chink in the hedge. I saw her kiss him. I saw them, Jinny and Louis, kissing. Now I will wrap my agony inside my pocket-handkerchief. It shall be screwed tight into a ball. I will go to the beech wood alone, before lessons. I will not sit at a table, doing sums. I will not sit next Jinny and next Louis. I will take my anguish and lay it upon the roots under the beech trees. I will examine it and take it between my fingers. They will not find me. I shall eat nuts and peer for eggs through the brambles and my hair will be matted and I shall sleep under hedges and drink water from ditches and die there.'

“透过树篱的缝隙，”苏珊说，“我看见她吻了他。我从花盆上抬起头来，透过树篱的一道缝隙望过去。我看见她吻了他。我看见他们俩，吉尼和路易斯，正在亲吻。现在，我要把我的苦恼裹进我的手帕。把它拧成紧紧的一团。上课之前，我要一个人到柏树林中去。我不要坐在桌边做算术。我不要挨着吉尼和路易斯坐。我要带走我的痛苦，把它放在柏树下面的树根上。我要小心察看它，并用手指夹住它。他们不会找到我。我要吃各种坚果，要在刺藤丛中寻觅鸟蛋，我的头发会乱成一团，我要睡在树篱下面，喝沟渠里的水，然后死在那里。”

'Susan has passed us,' said Bernard. 'She has passed the tool-house door with her handkerchief screwed into a ball. She was not crying, but her eyes, which are so beautiful, were narrow as cats' eyes before they spring. I shall follow her, Neville. I shall go gently behind her, to be at hand, with my curiosity, to comfort her when she bursts out in a rage and thinks, "I am alone."

“苏珊刚从我们身边经过。”伯纳德说。“她从工具房门口经过，她的手帕拧成了一个团。她没哭，但是一双美丽的眼睛眯着，就像猫儿受到惊吓即将起跳时的样子。我要跟着她，内维尔。我要带上好奇心，悄悄跟在她后面，随时给她帮助，在她大发脾气，心想‘我多么孤单’的时候，我要给她安慰。”

'Now she walks across the field with a swing, nonchalantly, to deceive us. Then she comes to the dip; she thinks she is unseen; she begins to run with her fists clenched in front of her. Her nails meet in the ball of her pocket-handkerchief. She is making for the beech woods out of the light. She spreads her arms as she comes to them and takes to the shade like a swimmer. But she is blind after the light and trips and flings herself down on the roots under the trees, where the light seems to pant in and out, in and out. The branches heave up and down. There is agitation and trouble here. There is gloom. The light is fitful. There is anguish here. The roots make a skeleton on the ground, with dead leaves heaped in the angles. Susan has spread her anguish out. Her pocket-handkerchief is laid on the roots of the beech trees and she sobs, sitting crumpled where she has fallen.'

“瞧，她晃晃悠悠，漫不经心地穿过田地，想瞒过我们。随后她来到那片凹地；她以为谁也没看见她；她突然把双拳攥在胸前，飞跑起来。她的指甲扣进团起来的手帕中。她正朝着阳光照不到的那片柏树林奔去。她展开双臂奔过去，像一个游泳的人，投进树荫。但是突然离开阳光，她的眼睛也盲了，她绊了一下，扑倒在树根上，光线从树丛中隐隐透射进来，好像人在喘气，一呼一吸，一呼一吸。树枝上下晃动。这儿有烦乱与苦恼。有忧悒。光线时断时续。这儿有痛苦。地上的树根好像一具骷髅，关节处积满枯叶。苏珊摊开了她的痛苦。她把手帕放在柏树的根上，然后瘫软地坐在她跌倒的地方，抽噎了起来。”

'I saw her kiss him,' said Susan. 'I looked between the leaves and saw her. She danced in flecked with diamonds light as dust. And I am squat, Bernard, I am short. I have eyes that look close to the ground and see insects in the grass. The yellow warmth in my side turned to stone when I saw Jinny kiss Louis. I shall eat grass and die in a ditch in the brown water where dead leaves have rotted.'

“我看见她吻了他。”苏珊说。“我从树叶之间望过去，就看见了她。她像微尘，在钻石点缀的光芒中翩翩起舞。可我又矮又胖，伯纳德，我多么矮小。我的眼睛总是紧紧地盯着地面，看着草丛中的昆虫。当我看见吉尼吻了路易斯，我身边温暖的阳光一下子变成了石头。我要啃着青草，死在一条沟渠里，死在枯叶腐烂的污水中。”

'I saw you go,' said Bernard. 'As you passed the door of the tool-house I heard you cry "I am unhappy." I put down my knife. I was making boats out of firewood with Neville. And my hair is untidy, because when Mrs Constable told me to brush it there was a fly in a web, and I asked, "Shall I free the fly? Shall I let the fly be eaten?" So I am late always. My hair is unbrushed and these chips of wood stick in it. When I heard you cry I followed you, and saw you put down your handkerchief, screwed up, with its rage, with its hate, knotted in it. But soon that will cease. Our bodies are close now. You hear me breathe. You see the beetle too carrying off a leaf on its back. It runs this way, then that way, so that even your desire while you watch the beetle, to possess one single thing (it is Louis now) must waver, like the light in and out of the beech leaves; and then words, moving darkly, in the depths of your mind will break up this knot of hardness, screwed in your pocket-handkerchief.'

“我看见你跑开了。”伯纳德说。“当你经过工具房门口时，我听见你哭着说：‘我真不幸。’我放下刀子。当时我正在和内维尔用烧火的木柴造船。我头发蓬乱，因为康斯特布尔太太叫我梳头的时候，正巧有一只苍蝇落在蛛网中，我就寻思着：‘我是该把苍蝇放了？还是该让蜘蛛吃掉它？’我总是这样把事情耽搁了。我的头发没梳，所以粘着这些木屑。当我听见你的哭声，我就跟了过来，看见你把拧成一团、里面包着怒气和恼恨的手帕放了下来。但这一切很快就会了结。现在我俩的身体依偎在一起。你听见了我的呼吸。你还看见了甲壳虫，正在搬动背上的一片树叶。它一会儿爬向这边，一会儿又爬向那边，所以你看，即使你观察甲壳虫的过程，也一定会让你占有一样东西（眼下就是路易斯）的欲望发生动摇，就像柏树叶中的光线那样时有时无；随后，一些话语，你心灵深处隐约涌动的话语，将会冲破拧在手帕中的这个硬结。”

'I love,' said Susan, 'and I hate. I desire one thing only. My eyes are hard. Jinny's eyes break into a thousand lights. Rhoda's are like those pale flowers to which moths come in the evening. Yours grow full and brim and never break. But I am already set on my pursuit. I see insects in the grass. Though my mother still knits white socks for me and hems pinafores and I am a child, I love and I hate.'

“我爱，”苏珊说，“我也恨。我只想追求一样东西。我的眼睛是冷酷锐利的。吉尼的眼睛会突然点亮千盏灯火。罗达的眼睛好像那些苍白的花朵，总会引来黄昏的飞蛾。你的眼睛圆满充盈，从不失去神采。但是对于我的追求，我已经打定主意。我看见草丛中的昆虫。而我的母亲还在为我织着白色短袜，为我缝制带褶边的围裙，我是个孩子，我会爱会恨。”

'But when we sit together, close,' said Bernard, 'we melt into each other with phrases. We are edged with mist. We make an unsubstantial territory.'

“但是当我们依偎着坐在一起的时候，”伯纳德说，“话语让我们彼此交融。薄雾弥漫在我们身边。为我们营造出一片空幻的领地。”

'I see the beetle,' said Susan. 'It is black, I see; it is green, I see; I am tied down with single words. But you wander off; you slip away; you rise up higher, with words and words in phrases.'

“我看见甲壳虫。”苏珊说。“它是黑色的，我看见了；它是绿色的，我看见了；我被这些单个的词语束缚住了。而你无拘无束；你神游物外；你用连珠妙语让自己神采飞扬。”

'Now,' said Bernard, 'let us explore. There is the white house lying among the trees. It lies down there ever so far beneath us. We shall sink like swimmers just touching the ground with the tips of their toes. We shall sink through the green air of the leaves, Susan. We sink as we run. The waves close over us, the beech leaves meet above our heads. There is the stable clock with its gilt hands shining. Those are the flats and heights of the roofs of the great house. There is the stable-boy clattering in the yard in rubber boots. That is Elvedon.

“来吧，”伯纳德说，“让我们一起探索。有幢白色的房子坐落在树林中。它位于离我们很远的地方。我们要沉下去，像游泳的人用脚趾尖碰触水底。苏珊，我们要沉到树叶的绿色气息下。我们一边跑，一边下沉。海浪包围了我们，柏树叶在我们头顶汇拢。瞧那口坚固的大钟，镀金的指针闪闪发光。瞧那幢大房子，那些平平凹凹、高高低低的屋顶。瞧那个小马倌，穿着胶鞋在院子里踩出咔哒咔哒的声响。那里是埃尔夫顿。

'Now we have fallen through the tree-tops to the earth. The air no longer rolls its long, unhappy, purple waves over us. We touch earth; we tread ground. That is the close-clipped hedge of the ladies' garden. There they walk at noon, with scissors, clipping roses. Now we are in the ringed wood with the wall round it. This is Elvedon. I have seen signposts at the cross-roads with one arm pointing "To Elvedon". No one has been there. The ferns smell very strong, and there are red funguses growing beneath them. Now we wake the sleeping daws who have never seen a human form; now we tread on rotten oak apples, red with age and slippery. There is a ring of wall round this wood; nobody comes here. Listen! That is the flop of a giant toad in the undergrowth; that is the patter of some primeval fir-cone falling to rot among the ferns.

“现在我们从树梢落到了地上。我们头上的天空不再翻涌，不再有绵延的、悲伤的紫色海浪。我们接触到泥土；我们踩着大地。那是女士花园旁一道修剪细致的树篱。中午的时候，她们在那儿一边散步，一边拿着剪刀修剪玫瑰。现在我们来到围墙环绕的小树林里。这里是埃尔夫顿。我在十字路口见过一处标志牌，上面有只手臂指示‘去往埃尔夫顿’。没有人去过那儿。羊齿草发出浓烈的气味，下面生长着红色的霉菌。瞧，我们惊醒了睡梦中的寒鸦，它们还从未见过人的样子呢；瞧，我们踩在腐烂的栎树瘿上面，它们被岁月染成了红色，滑溜溜的。有一道围墙环绕着这片小树林；没有人会来这里。听！一只巨大的癞蛤蟆噗嗵蹦进灌木丛里；一枚远古的冷杉球果啪嗒落了下来，将在羊齿草丛中慢慢腐烂。

'Put your foot on this brick. Look over the wall. That is Elvedon. The lady sits between the two long windows, writing. The gardeners sweep the lawn with giant brooms. We are the first to come here. We are the discoverers of an unknown land. Do not stir; if the gardeners saw us they would shoot us. We should be nailed like stoats to the stable door. Look! Do not move. Grasp the ferns tight on the top of the wall.'

“你把脚踏上这块砖。看看墙的那边。那里就是埃尔夫顿。有位女士坐在两排长长的窗子间，正在写字。几个园丁用巨大的扫帚清理着草坪。我们是最先来到这里的人。我们发现了一片无人知晓的土地。别声张；要是园丁看见我俩，他们会朝我们射击。我们会像那些白鼬一样被钉在两截门上。当心！别动。抓牢墙头的羊齿草。”

'I see the lady writing. I see the gardeners sweeping,' said Susan. 'If we died here, nobody would bury us.'

“我看见那位女士在写字。我看见几个园丁在打扫。”苏珊说。“要是死在这里，没有人会来埋葬我们。”

'Run!' said Bernard.

“快跑！”伯纳德说。

'Run! The gardener with the black beard has seen us! We shall be shot! We shall be shot like jays and pinned to the wall! We are in a hostile country. We must escape to the beech wood. We must hide under the trees. I turned a twig as we came. There is a secret path. Bend as low as you can. Follow without looking back. They will think we are foxes. Run!

“快跑！那个黑胡子园丁看见我们了！我们会被射死的！我们会像松鸦一样被射死，然后钉在墙上！我们身处敌国。我们必须逃到柏树林中去。我们必须藏到树下。来的时候我折弯过一根小树枝。有一条秘密的小路。尽量压低身子。跟紧，别回头。他们会以为我们是狐狸。快跑！

'Now we are safe. Now we can stand upright again. Now we can stretch our arms in this high canopy, in this vast wood. I hear nothing. That is only the murmur of the waves in the air. That is a wood-pigeon breaking cover in the tops of the beech trees. The pigeon beats the air; the pigeon beats the air with wooden wings.'

“现在我们安全了。现在我们可以重新站直了。现在我们可以舒展手臂了，在这高高的华盖之下，在这辽阔的树林之中。我什么也听不见。空气中只有呢喃似的波动。一只旅鸽在柏树的梢头探出身形。鸽子拍打着空气；鸽子用笨拙的翅膀拍打着空气。”

'Now you trail away,' said Susan, 'making phrases. Now you mount like an air-ball's string, higher and higher through the layers of the leaves, out of reach. Now you lag. Now you tug at my skirts, looking back, making phrases. You have escaped me. Here is the garden. Here is the hedge. Here is Rhoda on the path rocking petals to and fro in her brown basin.'

“这会儿你渐聊渐远了，”苏珊说，“编着大话。这会儿你像一根牵着气球的线绳，越飞越高，穿过层层树叶，让人捉摸不到。这会儿你拖后了。这会儿你扯着我的裙子，一边回头望去，一边说着缥缈的话语。你逃离了我。花园到了。树篱到了。罗达正在小路上，不停地摇晃着在褐色盆子里的花瓣。

'All my ships are white,' said Rhoda. 'I do not want red petals of hollyhocks or geranium. I want white petals that float when I tip the basin up. I have a fleet now swimming from shore to shore. I will drop a twig in as a raft for a drowning sailor. I will drop a stone in and see bubbles rise from the depths of the sea. Neville has gone and Susan has gone; Jinny is in the kitchen garden picking currants with Louis perhaps. I have a short time alone, while Miss Hudson spreads our copy-books on the schoolroom table. I have a short space of freedom. I have picked all the fallen petals and made them swim. I have put raindrops in some. I will plant a lighthouse here, a head of Sweet Alice. And I will now rock the brown basin from side to side so that my ships may ride the waves. Some will founder. Some will dash themselves against the cliffs. One sails alone. That is my ship. It sails into icy caverns where the sea-bear barks and stalactites swing green chains. The waves rise; their crests curl; look at the lights on the mastheads. They have scattered, they have foundered, all except my ship, which mounts the wave and sweeps before the gale and reaches the islands where the parrots chatter and the creepers...'

“我所有的船都是白色的。”罗达说。“我不想要蜀葵或天竺葵的红色花瓣。当我将盆倾覆时，我想要这些漂浮着的白色花瓣。现在我有一只舰队，从此岸驶向彼岸。我要抛下一根小树枝，给溺水船员当木筏。我要投进一块石子，看着那些泡泡从大海深处冒上来。内维尔走开了，苏珊也走开了；吉尼在家庭菜园里，可能正和路易斯一起采醋栗吧。我可以独自呆一小会儿，因为这时赫德森小姐正把我们的习字簿摊放在教室讲桌上。我拥有短暂的自由。我把所有凋落的花瓣都捡了起来，让它们在水上漂游。我给一些花瓣洒上了雨滴。我要在这儿竖起一座灯塔，一座斯威特·艾丽斯的头像。现在我要左右摇晃这褐色的水盆，好让我的船乘风破浪。有些船会沉没。有些船会冲向崖岸。有一艘船孤独地航行。那是我的船它驶入冰冷的洞窟，那里海熊在咆哮，钟乳石摆动着绿色的锁链。波浪腾空而起；浪头翻卷；睥睨着桅顶的灯。它们散架了，它们沉没了，只有我的船骑上浪头，驾着飓风，抵达小岛，岛上鹦鹉叽叽喳喳，还有啄木鸟......"

'Where is Bernard?' said Neville. 'He has my knife. We were in the tool-shed making boats, and Susan came past the door. And Bernard dropped his boat and went after her taking my knife, the sharp one that cuts the keel. He is like a dangling wire, a broken bell-pull, always twangling. He is like the seaweed hung outside the window, damp now, now dry. He leaves me in the lurch; he follows Susan; and if Susan cries he will take my knife and tell her stories. The big blade is an emperor; the broken blade a Negro. I hate dangling things; I hate dampish things. I hate wandering and mixing things together. Now the bell rings and we shall be late. Now we must drop our toys. Now we must go in together. The copy-books are laid out side by side on the green baize table.'

与下一行合并。“伯纳德去哪儿了？”内维尔说。“他拿了我的刀子。刚才我俩在工具房里造船，苏珊从门口经过。伯纳德丢下他的船，追随她去了，拿着我的刀子，那把切龙骨很锋利的刀子。他像一根摇摆的导线，一条破损的钟绳，总是带着鼻音。他像挂在窗外的海草，一会儿湿，一会儿干。他丢下我不管了；他追苏珊去了；苏珊一哭，他就会拿走我的刀子，然后给她讲故事。大刀片是位皇帝；破刀片是个黑人。我讨厌摇摆不定的东西；我讨厌湿漉漉的东西。我讨厌四处游荡，把事情搅在一起。现在铃声响了，我们要迟到了。现在我们必须丢下玩具。现在我们必须一起进去。那些习字簿紧挨着摆放在绿呢桌面上。”

'I will not conjugate the verb,' said Louis, 'until Bernard has said it. My father is a banker in Brisbane and I speak with an Australian accent. I will wait and copy Bernard. He is English. They are all English. Susan's father is a clergyman. Rhoda has no father. Bernard and Neville are the sons of gentlemen. Jinny lives with her grandmother in London. Now they suck their pens. Now they twist their copy-books, and, looking sideways at Miss Hudson, count the purple buttons on her bodice. Bernard has a chip in his hair. Susan has a red look in her eyes. Both are flushed. But I am pale; I am neat, and my knickerbockers are drawn together by a belt with a brass snake. I know the lesson by heart. I know more than they will ever know. I knew my cases and my genders; I could know everything in the world if I wished. But I do not wish to come to the top and say my lesson. My roots are threaded, like fibres in a flower-pot, round and round about the world. I do not wish to come to the top and live in the light of this great clock, yellow-faced, which ticks and ticks. Jinny and Susan, Bernard and Neville bind themselves into a thong with which to lash me. They laugh at my neatness, at my Australian accent. I will now try to imitate Bernard softly lisping Latin.'

“直到伯纳德已经说出那个动词，”路易斯说，“我才会给它变形。我父亲是布里斯班的银行家，所以我说话带有澳大利亚口音。我要等着抄伯纳德的。他是英国人。他们都是英国人。苏珊的父亲是个牧师。罗达没有父亲。伯纳德和内维尔都是绅士的儿子。吉尼与她的祖母住在伦敦。现在他们吮着他们的钢笔。现在他们揉着作业本，一边斜睥着赫德森小姐，一边数她衣裙上的紫色纽扣。伯纳德头发上有片木屑。苏珊眼中红红的。两人的脸都红扑扑的。而我脸色苍白；我干净利落，我的灯笼裤上束着一条铜蛇扣腰带。我用心记住了课文。我懂的比他们多。我早就搞懂了那些例句和性数变化；如果我愿意，我会把世界上的一切都搞懂。但我不希望回答功课，显得一枝独秀。我的根丝丝缕缕，像花坛中的纤维，在大千世界绕啊，绕啊。我不愿意出人头地，为这口嘀哒嘀哒的黄脸大钟而活。吉尼、苏珊、伯纳德和内维尔结成一条皮鞭，来抽打我。他们嘲笑我的干净利落，嘲笑我的澳大利亚口音。现在我要竭力模仿伯纳德，说点轻声曼语、口齿不清的拉丁文。”

'Those are white words,' said Susan, 'like stones one picks up by the seashore.'

“那些洁白的词语，”苏珊说，“像在海边被人拾起的石子。”

'They flick their tails right and left as I speak them,' said Bernard. 'They wag their tails; they flick their tails; they move through the air in flocks, now this way, now that way, moving all together, now dividing, now coming together.'

“我说出它们的时候，它们的尾巴左右拍打。”伯纳德说。“它们摇晃着尾巴；它们拍打着尾巴；它们成群地穿过空气，一会儿这边，一会儿那边，全都在动个不停，时而分散，时而又聚合在一起。”

'Those are yellow words, those are fiery words,' said Jinny. 'I should like a fiery dress, a yellow dress, a fulvous dress to wear in the evening.'

“那是黄色的词语，那是火红的词语。”吉尼说。“我想要一件火红的裙子，一件黄色的裙子，一件茶色的裙子，在傍晚时穿在身上。”

'Each tense,' said Neville, 'means differently. There is an order in this world; there are distinctions, there are differences in this world, upon whose verge I step. For this is only a beginning.'

“每一种时态，”内维尔说，“都有不同的含义。这个世界存在一种秩序；存在种种特性，存在世上的种种差异，而我行走在它的边缘。因为这只是个开始。”

'Now Miss Hudson,' said Rhoda, 'has shut the book. Now the terror is beginning. Now taking her lump of chalk she draws figures, six, seven, eight, and then a cross and then a line on the blackboard. What is the answer? The others look; they look with understanding. Louis writes; Susan writes; Neville writes; Jinny writes; even Bernard has now begun to write. But I cannot write. I see only figures. The others are handing in their answers, one by one. Now it is my turn. But I have no answer. The others are allowed to go. They slam the door. Miss Hudson goes. I am left alone to find an answer. The figures mean nothing now. Meaning has gone. The clock ticks. The two hands are convoys marching through a desert. The black bars on the clock face are green oases. The long hand has marched ahead to find water. The other, painfully stumbles among hot stones in the desert. It will die in the desert. The kitchen door slams. Wild dogs bark far away. Look, the loop of the figure is beginning to fill with time; it holds the world in it. I begin to draw a figure and the world is looped in it, and I myself am outside the loop; which I now join—so—and seal up, and make entire. The world is entire, and I am outside of it, crying, "Oh save me, from being blown for ever outside the loop of time!"'

“瞧，”罗达说，“赫德森小姐合上了书。现在恐怖的事要发生了。只见她拿起一截粉笔，在黑板上写了几个数字，6、7、8，然后画了个叉，然后又画了一条线。答案是什么？其他人在看；他们理解地看着。路易斯在写；苏珊在写；内维尔在写；吉尼在写；甚至伯纳德现在也开始写了。但我没法写。我只看见几个数字。其他人一个接一个，都在交答案。现在轮到我了。但是我没写出答案。其他人可以走了。他们摔门而出。赫德森小姐走了。留下我一个，还在寻找答案。此时那些数字毫无意义。它们失去了意义。钟声嘀哒。两个指针是沙漠中行进的车队。钟面上的黑杠杠是绿色的沙洲。长针已经赶在前面，找到了水源。另一指针还在沙漠中炙热的石头之间，跌跌撞撞，痛苦着。它将死在沙漠中。厨房门砰的一声响。野狗在远处狂吠。瞧，那个数字的圈圈即将被时间填满；它里面容纳了世界。我开始画一个数字，把世界圈在里面，而我自己在圈圈的外面；现在我要进来——这样——完全密封，形成一个整体。世界是一个整体，而我却在它的外面，哭喊着：‘噢，救救我，别把我永远地抛弃在时间的圈圈之外！’”

'There Rhoda sits staring at the blackboard,' said Louis, 'in the schoolroom, while we ramble off, picking here a bit of thyme, pinching here a leaf of southernwood while Bernard tells a story. Her shoulder-blades meet across her back like the wings of a small butterfly. And as she stares at the chalk figures, her mind lodges in those white circles, it steps through those white loops into emptiness, alone. They have no meaning for her. She has no answer for them. She has no body as the others have. And I, who speak with an Australian accent, whose father is a banker in Brisbane, do not fear her as I fear the others.'

“教室里罗达坐在那儿盯着黑板，”路易斯说，“伯纳德在讲一个故事，我们在闲逛，这儿摘一点百里香，那儿掐一片青蒿。她的一对肩胛，好像一只小蝴蝶的翅膀，越过她的后背相接。她的眼睛盯着那几个粉笔数字，她的心借宿在那些白色的圈圈里，踏过那些白色的圈圈，一颗孤单的心踏入空虚之中。它们对她毫无意义。她找不到它们的答案。她和其他人拥有不一样的肉体。而我，我说话带有澳大利亚口音，我的父亲是布里斯班的银行家，不像害怕其他人那样害怕她。”

'Let us now crawl,' said Bernard, 'under the canopy of the currant leaves, and tell stories. Let us inhabit the underworld. Let us take possession of our secret territory, which is lit by pendant currants like candelabra, shining red on one side, black on the other. Here, Jinny, if we curl up close, we can sit under the canopy of the currant leaves and watch the censers swing. This is our universe. The others pass down the carriage-drive. The skirts of Miss Hudson and Miss Curry sweep by like candle extinguishers. Those are Susan's white socks. Those are Louis' neat sand-shoes firmly printing the gravel. Here come warm gusts of decomposing leaves, of rotting vegetation. We are in a swamp now; in a malarial jungle. There is an elephant white with maggots, killed by an arrow shot dead in its eye. The bright eyes of hopping birds—eagles, vultures—are apparent. They take us for fallen trees. They pick at a worm—that is a hooded cobra—and leave it with a festering brown scar to be mauled by lions. This is our world, lit with crescents and stars of light; and great petals half transparent block the openings like purple windows. Everything is strange. Things are huge and very small. The stalks of flowers are thick as oak trees. Leaves are high as the domes of vast cathedrals. We are giants, lying here, who can make forests quiver.'

“现在，让我们在醋栗树叶子的华盖下，”伯纳德说，“边爬边讲故事吧。让我们栖息在地下。让我们占有这片秘密的领地。那些坠子似的醋栗好像烛台上闪烁的灯火，一面红艳艳，另一面黑漆漆，点亮着它。到这儿来，吉尼，我俩紧紧蜷起身子，就能坐在这片醋栗树叶的华盖下，一起看香炉袅袅。这是我们的天地。其他人沿着车道走远了。赫德森小姐和柯里小姐的裙子像熄烛器，一扫而过。那是苏珊的白色短袜。那是路易斯干干净净的沙地鞋，稳稳当当地踩在沙石上。阵阵暖风袭来，是枯叶，是腐草。现在我们踏进一片沼泽；一片充满瘴疠的丛林。有一头大象，身上爬满白色的蛆虫，一支箭射进它的眼睛，杀死了它。一些忙碌的鸟儿——老鹰、秃鹫——它们闪亮的眼睛清晰可见。它们把咱们当成了倒下的树。它们去啄一条虫——那是一只带着颈部皮褶的眼镜蛇——结果给它留下一处溃烂的褐色伤疤，然后由狮子来把它收拾了。这是我们的世界，新月和繁星把它照亮；半透明的巨大花瓣像紫色的窗封住各个出口。一切都很怪异。事物要么硕大无比，要么极其微小。花梗如橡树一般粗壮。树叶长得特别高，仿佛大教堂的圆顶。躺在这儿，我们是能让整个森林颤抖起来的巨人。”

'This is here,' said Jinny, 'this is now. But soon we shall go. Soon Miss Curry will blow her whistle. We shall walk. We shall part. You will go to school. You will have masters wearing crosses with white ties. I shall have a mistress in a school on the East Coast who sits under a portrait of Queen Alexandra. That is where I am going, and Susan and Rhoda. This is only here; this is only now. Now we lie under the currant bushes and every time the breeze stirs we are mottled all over. My hand is like a snake's skin. My knees are pink floating islands. Your face is like an apple tree netted under.'

“也就在这儿，”吉尼说，“也就这会儿。但是很快我们就要离去。很快柯里小姐就会吹响她的哨子。我们要去散步。我们会分开的。你要去上学。你会遇见戴着十字架、扎着白领带的男老师。我会在东海岸的一所学校遇见一位女老师，她总是坐在亚历山大皇后的画像下面。那是我要去的地方，也是苏珊和罗达要去的地方。这里只是暂时；这会儿只是暂时。现在我们躺在醋栗树丛下，每当微风吹动，我们都全身落满光斑。我的手像蛇皮。我的膝盖是漂浮着的粉红色岛屿。你的脸像底下张着网的苹果树。”

'The heat is going,' said Bernard, 'from the Jungle. The leaves flap black wings over us. Miss Curry has blown her whistle on the terrace. We must creep out from the awning of the currant leaves and stand upright. There are twigs in your hair, Jinny. There is a green caterpillar on your neck. We must form, two by two. Miss Curry is taking us for a brisk walk, while Miss Hudson sits at her desk settling her accounts.'

“炎热正在消退，”伯纳德说，“即将退出这片丛林。树叶在我们头上拍打着黑色的翅膀。柯里小姐在台阶上吹响了哨子。我们必须从醋栗树叶的遮篷里钻出去，然后站起身来。吉尼，你的头发上有些小树枝。你的脖子上有一只绿色的毛毛虫。我们必须列队，两两对齐。柯里小姐带着我们轻轻松松地散步，而赫德森小姐则坐在桌边忙着计算她的账目。”

'It is dull,' said Jinny, 'walking along the high road with no windows to look at, with no bleared eyes of blue glass let into the pavement.'

“真是无聊，”吉尼说，“沿着大马路散步，却没有橱窗让人看看，也没有像模糊的眼睛一样的蓝玻璃镶嵌在人行道上。”

'We must form into pairs,' said Susan, 'and walk in order, not shuffling our feet, not lagging, with Louis going first to lead us, because Louis is alert and not a wool-gatherer.'

“我们必须排成两人一队，”苏珊说，“按着秩序走，不拖沓，不掉队，路易斯先头领路，因为路易斯很机灵，不会心不在焉。”

'Since I am supposed,' said Neville, 'to be too delicate to go with them, since I get so easily tired and then am sick, I will use this hour of solitude, this reprieve from conversation, to coast round the purlieus of the house and recover, if I can, by standing on the same stair half-way up the landing, what I felt when I heard about the dead man through the swing-door last night when cook was shoving in and out the dampers. He was found with his throat cut. The apple-tree leaves became fixed in the sky; the moon glared; I was unable to lift my foot up the stair. He was found in the gutter. His blood gurgled down the gutter. His jowl was white as a dead codfish. I shall call this stricture, this rigidity, "death among the apple trees" for ever. There were the floating, pale—grey clouds; and the immitigable tree; the implacable tree with its greaved silver bark. The ripple of my life was unavailing. I was unable to pass by. There was an obstacle. "I cannot surmount this unintelligible obstacle," I said. And the others passed on. But we are doomed, all of us, by the apple trees, by the immitigable tree which we cannot pass.

“既然人家认为，”内维尔说，“我太柔弱，不能跟他们一起散步，既然我很容易疲劳，一疲劳接着就会生病，那么我要利用这独处的一个小时，无需交谈的这段间歇，绕着房子周边随便走走，要是有可能，我还要站在扶梯中央的同一磴台阶上，重温一下昨晚我透过弹簧门听到人们谈论那个死人时的感受，当时厨子正在进进出出地推拉风门。有人发现他被割了喉。苹果树的叶子在天空中一动不动；月亮异常明亮；我的脚再也无力登上下一个台阶。他的尸体是在排水沟里被人发现的。他的血顺着排水沟汩汩地流。他的双下巴白森森的，好像一条死鳕鱼。这样的非难，这样的冷酷，我会永远记住这‘苹果树下的谋杀’。天上飘着灰白色的云朵；地上有棵怨忿不平的树；那棵怨忿而无以平复的树翘起了银色的树皮。我生命的浪花徒劳无益。我无法袖手旁观。有一道障碍。‘我无法越过这道难以理解的障碍。’我说道。而其他人又继续向前了。但是我们在劫难逃，每个人都算上，那些苹果树，那棵怨忿而无以平复的树，我们都无法越过。

'Now the stricture and rigidity are over; and I will continue to make my survey of the purlieus of the house in the late afternoon, in the sunset, when the sun makes oleaginous spots on the linoleum, and a crack of light kneels on the wall, making the chair legs look broken.'

“现在，非难与冷酷已经成为过去；我要继续视察房子的周边，时间到了下半晌，夕阳西下，阳光在漆布上面聚成油亮亮的斑点，还有一绺光线在墙上做出跪拜的姿势，让椅子腿看着像断了似的。”

'I saw Florrie in the kitchen garden,' said Susan, 'as we came back from our walk, with the washing blown out round her, the pyjamas, the drawers, the night-gowns blown tight. And Ernest kissed her. He was in his green baize apron, cleaning silver; and his mouth was sucked like a purse in wrinkles and he seized her with the pyjamas blown out hard between them. He was blind as a bull, and she swooned in anguish, only little veins streaking her white cheeks red. Now though they pass plates of bread and butter and cups of milk at tea-time I see a crack in the earth and hot steam hisses up; and the urn roars as Ernest roared, and I am blown out hard like the pyjamas, even while my teeth meet in the soft bread and butter, and I lap the sweet milk. I am not afraid of heat, nor of the frozen winter. Rhoda dreams, sucking a crust soaked in milk; Louis regards the wall opposite with snail-green eyes; Bernard moulds his bread into pellets and calls them "people". Neville with his clean and decisive ways has finished. He has rolled his napkin and slipped it through the silver ring. Jinny spins her fingers on the table-cloth, as if they were dancing in the sunshine, pirouetting. But I am not afraid of the heat or of the frozen winter.'

“我们散步回来的时候，”苏珊说，“我看见弗洛里在家庭菜园，四周都是被风吹起的晾晒的衣物，成套的睡衣裤啦，内裤啦，睡衣啦，都被风吹得鼓鼓的。欧内斯特吻了她。他系着绿色的粗呢围裙，在洗刷银器；他嘴巴撅起，像个满是褶子的钱袋；他隔着被风吹得鼓鼓的睡衣裤抓住她。他莽撞得像一头公牛，她着恼地晕了过去，脸颊煞白，只有细小的血管渗出一点红色。这会儿正是下午茶时间，他们端过来一盘一盘的面包和黄油，一杯一杯的牛奶，我却看见地上裂了一道缝隙，热气嘶嘶地向上冒；茶壶呼哧呼哧地直叫，就跟刚才欧内斯特的吼叫一样，虽然我牙咬着柔软的面包和黄油，我嘴舔着甜甜的牛奶，我却感觉自己就像那些睡衣，被风吹得鼓鼓的。我不怕炎热，也不怕冰冷的冬天。罗达一边做梦一边舔着蘸了牛奶的面包皮；路易斯蜗牛似的绿眼睛瞅着对面的墙；伯纳德把他的面包揉成一粒一粒，称它们为‘芸芸众生’。内维尔干净利落地结束了他的下午茶。他把他的餐巾卷了起来，不声不响地套上了银圈。吉尼让她的手指在桌布上旋转，好似它们正在阳光下单脚尖点地，舞个不停。我不怕炎热，也不怕冰冷的冬天。”

'Now,' said Louis, 'we all rise; we all stand up. Miss Curry spreads wide the black book on the harmonium. It is difficult not to weep as we sing, as we pray that God may keep us safe while we sleep, calling ourselves little children. When we are sad and trembling with apprehension it is sweet to sing together, leaning slightly, I towards Susan, Susan towards Bernard, clasping hands, afraid of much, I of my accent, Rhoda of figures; yet resolute to conquer.'

“现在，”路易斯说，“我们全都起身；我们全都站起来。柯里小姐把簧风琴上面那个黑本子完全摊开。当我们唱起颂歌；当我们自称小孩子，祈祷上帝在我们睡着时保佑我们平安，这时想不哭泣也难。当我们因为忧心忡忡而悲伤、发抖时，一起唱歌多么甜蜜。我们轻轻偎依着，我挨着苏珊，苏珊挨着伯纳德；我们手握着手，心事重重，我担心我的口音，罗达害怕那些数字；但是我们有决心征服一切。”

'We troop upstairs like ponies,' said Bernard, 'stamping, clattering one behind another to take our turns in the bathroom. We buffet, we tussle, we spring up and down on the hard, white beds. My turn has come. I come now.

“我们列队上楼，好像小马驹，”伯纳德说，“噔噔噔，得得得，一个接一个，轮着进浴室。我们推搡着，扭打着，在洁白的硬板床上蹦来蹦去。终于轮到我了。我来了。

'Mrs Constable, girt in a bath-towel, takes her lemon-coloured sponge and soaks it in water; it turns chocolate-brown; it drips; and, holding it high above me, shivering beneath her, she squeezes it. Water pours down the runnel of my spine. Bright arrows of sensation shoot on either side. I am covered with warm flesh. My dry crannies are wetted; my cold body is warmed; it is sluiced and gleaming. Water descends and sheets me like an eel. Now hot towels envelop me, and their roughness, as I rub my back, makes my blood purr. Rich and heavy sensations form on the roof of my mind; down showers the day—the woods; and Elvedon; Susan and the pigeon. Pouring down the walls of my mind, running together, the day falls copious, resplendent. Now I tie my pyjamas loosely round me, and lie under this thin sheet afloat in the shallow light which is like a film of water drawn over my eyes by a wave. I hear through it far off, far away, faint and far, the chorus beginning; wheels; dogs; men shouting; church bells; the chorus beginning.'

“腰上围着浴巾的康斯特布尔太太，拿着她柠檬色的海绵，把它浸到水中；它立时变成了巧克力似的棕色；它滴着水；她把它高高地举到我的头上——我在她的手下直打颤——然后一捏。水流顺着我的脊柱淌下来。身体两侧猛地打着激灵。我被披上一层暖和的皮肉。我身上干燥的角落都淋湿了；我冰凉的身体暖和过来了；冲洗过后，皮肤闪闪发亮。水流冲下来，我像一条鳗鱼被裹在里面。现在，几条热毛巾搭在我身上，当我擦背的时候，那种粗糙的感觉弄得我血液沸腾。丰富而深沉的感觉涌现在我心灵的顶层；这一天的经历——那片树林、埃尔夫顿、苏珊和那只鸽子——纷纷扬扬地落了下来。种种感觉交汇在一起，沿着我心灵的墙壁倾泻而下，这一天的经历那么丰富，那么多彩。现在我身上系着宽松的睡衣裤，躺在浮在微光中的这床薄被单下面，它像海浪激起的一层薄水花蒙在我的眼睛上。透过它，我听见远远地，远远地，微弱而遥远地传来合唱开始的声音，车轮声，犬吠声，人们的呼号声，教堂的钟声。合唱开始了。”

'As I fold up my frock and my chemise,' said Rhoda, 'so I put off my hopeless desire to be Susan, to be Jinny. But I will stretch my toes so that they touch the rail at the end of the bed; I will assure myself, touching the rail, of something hard. Now I cannot sink; cannot altogether fall through the thin sheet now. Now I spread my body on this frail mattress and hang suspended. I am above the earth now. I am no longer upright, to be knocked against and damaged. All is soft, and bending. Walls and cupboards whiten and bend their yellow squares on top of which a pale glass gleams. Out of me now my mind can pour. I can think of my Armadas sailing on the high waves. I am relieved of hard contacts and collisions. I sail on alone under the white cliffs. Oh, but I sink, I fall! That is the corner of the cupboard; that is the nursery looking—glass. But they stretch, they elongate. I sink down on the black plumes of sleep; its thick wings are pressed to my eyes. Travelling through darkness I see the stretched flower-beds, and Mrs Constable runs from behind the corner of the pampas-grass to say my aunt has come to fetch me in a carriage. I mount; I escape; I rise on spring-heeled boots over the tree-tops. But I am now fallen into the carriage at the hall door, where she sits nodding yellow plumes with eyes hard like glazed marbles. Oh, to awake from dreaming! Look, there is the chest of drawers. Let me pull myself out of these waters. But they heap themselves on me; they sweep me between their great shoulders; I am turned; I am tumbled; I am stretched, among these long lights, these long waves, these endless paths, with people pursuing, pursuing.'

“我把连衣裙和衬裙叠了起来，”罗达说，“也打消了我要成为苏珊、成为吉尼的无望的念头。但是我要伸出脚趾，够到床尾的栏杆；够到栏杆，我会让自己有种踏实的感觉。现在我不能沉没了；不能整个陷到薄薄的被单下面了。现在我在这不牢靠的床垫上舒展全身，让自己悬在那儿。现在我在大地之上。我不再是站立的姿势，不再有击打和伤害。一切都柔和而弯曲。墙壁和橱柜变成了白色，黄色的边边角角都曲曲弯弯，顶上一面灰白色的镜子发着微光。现在我的心灵可以尽情遨游了。我可以想象我的无敌舰队正航行在惊涛骇浪之上。我避开了那些劳神的应酬和冲突。我在白色的悬崖下孤身远航。噢，但是我在下沉，我在下落！那是橱柜的一角；那是婴儿室的镜子。它们都在伸展，它们都在延长。我沉陷在睡眠的黑色羽毛中；它密实的翅膀紧紧贴着我的眼睛。我在黑暗中穿行，我看见绵延的花坛，康斯特布尔太太从长着蒲苇的那个角落跑出来，她说，我的姑妈已经坐着马车来接我了。我上车了；我溜掉了；我踩着弹簧跟的靴子，掠过树梢。但是此时，我被扔进了大门口的马车里，她坐在车里面，晃了晃头上的黄色羽饰，冷冷的目光像发亮的大理石。噢，从梦中醒来吧！瞧，这是带抽屉的衣橱。让我把自己从这海浪中拉出来吧。可是它们向我压过来；它们把我卷到巨大的波峰之间；我被掀翻了；我被摔倒了；我被扯进这连绵的光线之中，连绵的海浪里，永无尽头的小路上，人们追啊，追啊。”

The sun rose higher. Blue waves, green waves swept a quick fan over the beach, circling the spike of sea-holly and leaving shallow pools of light here and there on the sand. A faint black rim was left behind them. The rocks which had been misty and soft hardened and were marked with red clefts.

太阳升得更高了。蓝色和绿色的海浪，像一把迅捷的扇子扫过海岸，同时绕着刺芹的花穗，在沙滩上留下此一处彼一处光亮的浅水洼。隐约可见海浪退却之后留下的一条黑色印迹。原本迷离模糊的岩石轮廓变得清晰了，红色的裂缝历历可见。

Sharp stripes of shadow lay on the grass, and the dew dancing on the tips of the flowers and leaves made the garden like a mosaic of single sparks not yet formed into one whole. The birds, whose breasts were specked canary and rose, now sang a strain or two together, wildly, like skaters rollicking arm-in-arm, and were suddenly silent, breaking asunder.

一条条分明的暗影投在草地上，在花心和草尖上跳舞的露珠使得花园看上去像是一幅只有斑斑点点而尚未形成整体的镶嵌画。那些胸脯上点缀着淡黄和玫瑰色彩的鸟儿，现在唱起了一两段小曲儿，它们齐声高歌，好像滑冰的人手挽着手在欢闹，接着突然沉静下来，各自散去。

The sun laid broader blades upon the house. The light touched something green in the window corner and made it a lump of emerald, a cave of pure green like stoneless fruit. It sharpened the edges of chairs and tables and stitched white table-cloths with fine gold wires. As the light increased a bud here and there split asunder and shook out flowers, green veined and quivering, as if the effort of opening had set them rocking, and pealing a faint carillon as they beat their frail clappers against their white walls. Everything became softly amorphous, as if the china of the plate flowed and the steel of the knife were liquid. Meanwhile the concussion of the waves breaking fell with muffled thuds, like logs falling, on the shore.

太阳普照着那幢房子。阳光触到窗角某个绿色的东西，把它变成了一块翡翠，像一枚无核的果，一汪翠绿。阳光把桌椅的棱角变得更加分明，它给洁白的桌布绣上了细细的金色丝线。随着阳光增强，这里或那里的花蕾一一绽开，吐出花朵；初开的花朵渗有绿色的纹络，还在抖个不停，仿佛吐蕊付出的气力使它们一下子站不稳；它们柔弱的钟锤撞击着雪白的钟壁，发出微弱的鸣响。每一样东西都变得影影绰绰，形状无定，碗碟的瓷仿佛在流动，刀叉的钢仿佛变成了液体。同时，那海浪碎裂的震荡声发出沉闷的回响，好像原木滚落在海岸上。

'Now,' said Bernard, 'the time has come. The day has come. The cab is at the door. My huge box bends George's bandy-legs even wider. The horrible ceremony is over, the tips, and the good-byes in the hall. Now there is this gulping ceremony with my mother, this hand-shaking ceremony with my father; now I must go on waving, I must go on waving, till we turn the corner. Now that ceremony is over. Heaven be praised, all ceremonies are over. I am alone; I am going to school for the first time.

“现在，”伯纳德说，“时间到了。白天已经来临。出租马车停在门口。我的大箱子压得乔治的罗圈腿更弯曲了。讨厌的仪式结束了，是提建议，以及大厅里道别。现在是跟我母亲哭哭啼啼的分别仪式，跟我父亲握手道别的仪式；现在我必须不停地挥手，必须不停地挥手，直到过了拐弯。现在，那套仪式总算结束了。谢天谢地，所有的仪式都已结束。我孤身一人；我即将第一次踏入校门。

'Everybody seems to be doing things for this moment only; and never again. Never again. The urgency of it all is fearful. Everybody knows I am going to school, going to school for the first time. "That boy is going to school for the first time," says the housemaid, cleaning the steps. I must not cry. I must behold them indifferently. Now the awful portals of the station gape; "the moon-faced clock regards me.” I must make phrases and phrases and so interpose something hard between myself and the stare of housemaids, the stare of clocks, staring faces, indifferent faces, or I shall cry. There is Louis, there is Neville, in long coats, carrying handbags, by the booking-office. They are composed. But they look different.'

“似乎人人都只是为了此刻在忙活；而此刻永不再来。永不再来。此番紧迫令人胆怯。人人都知道我要踏入校门，第一次踏入校门。‘那孩子是第一次去上学。’正在擦着楼梯的女佣说道。我可不能哭。我必须满不在乎地瞅着她们。现在，车站的入口可怕地瞪着眼睛；‘那圆脸的钟打量着我。’我必须没话找话，编出一些词儿，这样就为我自己竖起了一道坚固的防线，隔开了盯着我看的女佣，隔开了钟的注视，隔开了目不转睛地看着的脸，漠然的脸，不然我会哭出来的。路易斯也在，内维尔也在，穿着长外套，拎着手提包，呆在售票室边上。他们镇定自若。但两人看上去各有不同。”

'Here is Bernard,' said Louis. 'He is composed; he is easy. He swings his bag as he walks. I will follow Bernard, because he is not afraid. We are drawn through the booking-office on to the platform as a stream draws twigs and straws round the piers of a bridge. There is the very powerful, bottle-green engine without a neck, all back and thighs, breathing steam. The guard blows his whistle; the flag is dipped; without an effort, of its own momentum, like an avalanche started by a gentle push, we start forward. Bernard spreads a rug and plays knuckle-bones. Neville reads. London crumbles. London heaves and surges. There is a bristling of chimneys and towers. There a white church; there a mast among the spires. There a canal. Now there are open spaces with asphalt paths upon which it is strange that people should now be walking. There is a hill striped with red houses. A man crosses a bridge with a dog at his heels. Now the red boy begins firing at a pheasant. The blue boy shoves him aside. "My uncle is the best shot in England. My cousin is Master of Foxhounds." Boasting begins. And I cannot boast, for my father is a banker in Brisbane, and I speak with an Australian accent.'

“伯纳德来了。”路易斯说。“他镇定自若；他不慌不忙。他边走边晃动着他的提包。我要跟着伯纳德，因为他什么都不怕。我们被推涌着穿过售票室来到月台上，好像一条溪流把细枝和草芥推涌到桥墩周围。那儿停着强健有力的深绿色机车，没长脖子，只有脊背和大腿，正呼哧呼哧地喘气。警卫吹响了他的哨子；信号旗放了下来；好像轻轻一推就会引发雪崩一样，我们的机车顺势毫不费力地出发向前了。伯纳德铺开毛毯，玩起了弹指球。内维尔在看书。伦敦在零星出现。伦敦渐入眼帘，又扑面而至。那儿的烟囱和塔楼林立如直立的毛发。那儿是一座白色的教堂；那儿有一根旗杆高出塔尖之上。那儿是一条运河。那儿是开阔的空地，有柏油路穿过，奇怪的是这会儿还有人在路上散步。那儿是一座小山，有红色的房屋穿插其间。一个男子在过桥，身后紧跟着一条狗。瞧，红衣男孩正准备向一只野鸡开火。蓝衣男孩把他推到一边。‘我舅舅是英格兰最棒的射手。我表哥是猎狐犬大师。’吹嘘开始了。但是我却无可吹嘘，因为我父亲是布里斯班的银行家，我说话带有澳大利亚口音。”

'After all this hubbub,' said Neville, 'all this scuffling and hubbub, we have arrived. This is indeed a moment—this is indeed a solemn moment. I come, like a lord to his halls appointed. That is our founder; our illustrious founder, standing in the courtyard with one foot raised. I salute our founder. A noble Roman air hangs over these austere quadrangles. Already the lights are lit in the form rooms. Those are laboratories perhaps; and that a library, where I shall explore the exactitude of the Latin language, and step firmly upon the well-laid sentences, and pronounce the explicit, the sonorous hexameters of Virgil, of Lucretius; and chant with a passion that is never obscure or formless the loves of Catullus, reading from a big book, a quarto with margins. I shall lie, too, in the fields among the tickling grasses. I shall lie with my friends under the towering elm trees.

“经过这一番折腾，”内维尔说，“经过这一番纷乱嘈杂之后，我们总算到了。这真是——这真是一个庄严的时刻。我来了，像一位领主来到他分封的领地。那是我们这所学校的创始人，大名鼎鼎的创始人，他正站在院子里，抬起一只脚。我向我们的创始人行了礼。一股高贵的古罗马气息笼罩着这片肃穆的四方院落。各班教室里已经点上了灯。那些大概是实验室；那是一间图书室，我要在里面钻研纯正的拉丁文，牢牢掌握那些精致的语句，朗读维吉尔、卢克莱修清晰、响亮的六音步诗行；翻开一部宽边四开本的大书，用我永不减退、永不消失的激情吟诵卡图卢斯的爱情诗篇。我还要在田野里躺下来，躺在刺痒人的草丛之间。我要和朋友们一起躺在高耸的榆树下面。

'Behold, the Headmaster. Alas, that he should excite my ridicule. He is too sleek, he is altogether too shiny and black, like some statue in a public garden. And on the left side of his waistcoat, his taut, his drum-like waistcoat, hangs a crucifix.'

“瞧，那是校长。哎，他恐怕要激起我的嘲笑了。他保养得太好了，整个人过于油光黑亮，好像公园里的一尊雕像。他的马甲，鼓面似的绷在身上，左侧挂着一个十字架。”

'Old Crane,' said Bernard, 'now rises to address us. Old Crane, the Headmaster, has a nose like a mountain at sunset, and a blue cleft in his chin, like a wooded ravine, which some tripper has fired; like a wooded ravine seen from the train window. He sways slightly, mouthing out his tremendous and sonorous words. I love tremendous and sonorous words. But his words are too hearty to be true. Yet he is by this time convinced of their truth. And when he leaves the room, lurching rather heavily from side to side, and hurls his way through the swing-doors, all the masters, lurching rather heavily from side to side, hurl themselves also through the swing-doors. This is our first night at school, apart from our sisters.'

“老克兰，”伯纳德说，“这会儿站了起来，要对我们训话。老克兰，也就是我们的校长，鼻子长得像夕阳中的大山，下巴上有一道乌青的裂纹，像林木繁茂的峡谷，被某个旅行者放火烧掉了一块；像是透过火车车窗望见的林木繁茂的峡谷。他微微摇摆，口中滔滔不绝地吐出精彩而宏亮的话语。我喜欢精彩而宏亮的话语。但是他的话语过于亲切，反而听着不真实。不过这会儿他倒是确信自己说的是真话。随后，他相当吃力地左摇右晃，脚步蹒跚，撞开弹簧门离开了这间屋子，全体老师也都相当吃力地左摇右晃，脚步蹒跚，撞开弹簧门，出去了。这是我们与姐妹分离之后学校生活的第一个夜晚。”

'This is my first night at school,' said Susan, 'away from my father, away from my home. My eyes swell; my eyes prick with tears. I hate the smell of pine and linoleum. I hate the wind—bitten shrubs and the sanitary tiles. I hate the cheerful jokes and the glazed look of everyone. I left my squirrel and my doves for the boy to look after. The kitchen door slams, and shot patters among the leaves when Percy fires at the rooks. All here is false; all is meretricious. Rhoda and Jinny sit far off in brown serge, and look at Miss Lambert who sits under a picture of Queen Alexandra reading from a book before her. There is also a blue scroll of needlework embroidered by some old girl. If I do not purse my lips, if I do not screw my handkerchief, I shall cry.'

“这是我学校生活的第一个夜晚，”苏珊说，“远离我的父亲，远离我的家。我的眼睛肿了；泪水刺痛我的眼睛。我讨厌松木和油地毯的气味。我讨厌风——冻伤的灌木，还有那些洁净的瓷砖。我讨厌那些逗乐的玩笑话和每个人脸上那木然的表情。我把我的松鼠和鸽子托付给了那个男孩来照看。厨房的门咣地一声，树叶中啪地一声枪响，是珀西在射击那些秃鼻乌鸦。这里的一切都是虚假的；一切都是华而不实的。罗达和吉尼穿着褐色的哔叽衣，远远地坐在那儿，瞅着坐在亚历山大皇后相片下面的兰伯特小姐，她正在读面前的一本书。那儿还有一幅蓝色的针线卷轴，不知是哪一位老小姐的刺绣作品。要是我不撅起嘴，要是我不拧紧手帕，我会哭出来的。”

'The purple light,' said Rhoda, 'in Miss Lambert's ring passes to and fro across the black stain on the white page of the Prayer Book. It is a vinous, it is an amorous light. Now that our boxes are unpacked in the dormitories, we sit herded together under maps of the entire world. There are desks with wells for the ink. We shall write our exercises in ink here. But here I am nobody. I have no face. This great company, all dressed in brown serge, has robbed me of my identity. We are all callous, unfriended. I will seek out a face, a composed, a monumental face, and will endow it with omniscience, and wear it under my dress like a talisman and then (I promise this) I will find some dingle in a wood where I can display my assortment of curious treasures. I promise myself this. So I will not cry.'

“兰伯特小姐戒指上那紫色的光，”罗达说，“在祈祷书洁白的书页上那黑色的污迹上面来来回回地闪过。那是葡萄酒似红色的、含情脉脉的光。因为行李箱在寝室里都安顿好了，所以我们聚拢在一起，坐在一幅幅世界地图的下面。那儿有一张张桌子，桌上都有墨水池。我们要在这儿用墨水写作业。可是在这儿，我默默无闻。我毫无尊严。这么一大群伙伴，都穿着褐色的哔叽衣，他们夺走了我的身份。我们都是冷冰冰的，谁也不把谁当朋友。我要找到一张脸，一张镇定的、纪念碑似的脸，我要赋予它全知全觉，还要像护身符一样戴在身上，然后（我保证），我要在树林里找到一处幽谷，在那儿把我各式各样的奇珍异宝展示出来。我向自己保证要这样做。这样我才不会哭出来。”

'That dark woman,' said Jinny, 'with high cheek-bones, has a shiny dress, like a shell, veined, for wearing in the evening. That is nice for summer, but for winter I should like a thin dress shot with red threads that would gleam in the firelight. Then when the lamps were lit, I should put on my red dress and it would be thin as a veil, and would wind about my body, and billow out as I came into the room, pirouetting. It would make a flower shape as I sank down, in the middle of the room, on a gilt chair. But Miss Lambert wears an opaque dress, that falls in a cascade from her snow-white ruffle as she sits under a picture of Queen Alexandra pressing one white finger firmly on the page. And we pray.'

“那个黑皮肤的女人，”吉尼说，“长着高颧骨，她有一身亮闪闪的礼服，像带纹络的贝壳，准备在傍晚时穿上。那在夏天还不错，但在冬天我还是喜欢一件薄礼服，用红线点缀，映着炉火，闪闪烁烁。那么当灯点亮的时候，我就穿上这件红色礼服，它像纱一样薄，围在我的身上，当我脚尖点地旋进屋里时，它会飘扬起来。当我在屋子中央一把镀金椅子上坐下来时，它会散成一朵花的模样。但是兰伯特小姐坐在一幅亚历山大皇后的相片下面，一只洁白的手指稳稳按住书页，身上那件晦暗的礼服，从她雪白的褶裥饰边瀑布一样倾泻下来。并且我们做祈祷。”

'Now we march, two by two,' said Louis, 'orderly, processional, into chapel. I like the dimness that falls as we enter the sacred building. I like the orderly progress. We file in; we seat ourselves. We put off our distinctions as we enter. I like it now, when, lurching slightly, but only from his momentum, Dr Crane mounts the pulpit and reads the lesson from a Bible spread on the back of the brass eagle. I rejoice; my heart expands in his bulk, in his authority. He lays the whirling dust clouds in my tremulous, my ignominiously agitated mind—how we danced round the Christmas tree and handing parcels they forgot me, and the fat woman said, "This little boy has no present," and gave me a shiny Union Jack from the top of the tree, and I cried with fury—to be remembered with pity. Now all is laid by his authority, his crucifix, and I feel come over me the sense of the earth under me, and my roots going down and down till they wrap themselves round some hardness at the centre. I recover my continuity, as he reads. I become a figure in the procession, a spoke in the huge wheel that turning, at last erects me, here and now. I have been in the dark; I have been hidden; but when the wheel turns (as he reads) I rise into this dim light where I just perceive, but scarcely, kneeling boys, pillars and memorial brasses. There is no crudity here, no sudden kisses.'

“现在我们列队，俩俩一排，”路易斯说，“整齐有序地走进礼拜堂。我喜欢进入这幢神圣建筑时突然降临的朦胧感。我喜欢这种有序的行进。我们鱼贯而入；我们各就各位。一进到这里，我们就抛开了种种特性。我现在喜欢这样：克兰博士有点踉跄地——只是出于惯性——登上讲坛，照着那只铜鹰背上翻开的一本《圣经》念起经文来。我感到喜乐；他的大块头，他的威严，都令我心情畅快。他平息了我既敏感又羞愧不安的心灵中那久久萦绕的阴云——那次，我们围着圣诞树手舞足蹈，分发礼包，而他们却把我给忘了。‘这个小男孩还没得到礼物哩。’说着，那个胖女人从树梢上摘下一面亮闪闪的国旗递给我，而我恼怒地大哭起来。——由于怜悯被记起。现在，一切都被他的威严、他的十字架平息了，我体验到整个人踏在实地的感觉，我的根扎下去，扎下去，终于盘绕在地心的坚实处。随着他念经文的声音，我重新找回了完整的我。我变成了队列中的一员，转动的巨大车轮中的一根轮辐，我终于昂起了头，此地，此时。我一直在黑暗中；我一直躲躲藏藏；但是当车轮转动（在他念经文的时候），我昂首踏入这片朦胧的光影之中，我才意识到，刚刚意识到，那些跪着的男孩子，那些柱子和黄铜祭器。这儿没有生硬的举止，没有突如其来的亲吻。”

'The brute menaces my liberty,' said Neville, 'when he prays. Unwarmed by imagination, his words fall cold on my head like paving-stones, while the gilt cross heaves on his waistcoat. The words of authority are corrupted by those who speak them. I gibe and mock at this sad religion, at these tremulous, grief-stricken figures advancing, cadaverous and wounded, down a white road shadowed by fig trees where boys sprawl in the dust—naked boys; and goatskins distended with wine hang at the tavern door. I was in Rome travelling with my father at Easter; and the trembling figure of Christ's mother was borne niddle-noddling along the streets; there went by also the stricken figure of Christ in a glass case.

“那笨蛋害我不自在，”内维尔说，“当他做祷告的时候。他那缺乏想象力的话语，像铺路石一样冷冰冰地落在我的头上，而那枚镀金十字架在他的马甲上起起伏伏。那些威严的话语被说话的人玷污了。我要嘲笑、挖苦这可悲的宗教，这些敏感、悲痛欲绝的人，他们面如死灰、伤痕累累，沿着无花果树荫下一条白色的道路踽踽前行，尘土路上趴着一些男孩——赤身裸体的男孩；装满葡萄酒的羊皮酒囊挂在酒馆的门上。复活节时我曾跟我的父亲一道在罗马旅行；满大街频频点头的都是基督之母那颤颤巍巍的形象；还有装在玻璃盒子里的基督受难的形象招摇过市。

'Now I will lean sideways as if to scratch my thigh. So I shall see Percival. There he sits, upright among the smaller fry. He breathes through his straight nose rather heavily. His blue and oddly inexpressive eyes are fixed with pagan indifference upon the pillar opposite. He would make an admirable churchwarden. He should have a birch and beat little boys for misdemeanours. He is allied with the Latin phrases on the memorial brasses. He sees nothing; he hears nothing. He is remote from us all in a pagan universe. But look—he flicks his hand to the back of his neck. For such gestures one falls hopelessly in love for a lifetime. Dalton, Jones, Edgar and Bateman flick their hands to the back of their necks likewise. But they do not succeed.'

“这会儿我要向旁边侧侧身，作势搔搔我的大腿。这样我就会看见珀西瓦尔。他坐在那儿，直直地坐在比他小的孩子们中间。他直挺的鼻子一呼一吸，相当吃力。他那双古怪的、毫无表情的蓝眼睛一动不动地盯着对面的柱子，像个事不关己的异教徒。他有望成为一位令人仰慕的教堂委员啊。他还可能操起桦条，抽打那些行为不端的小孩子呢。他是黄铜祭器上那些拉丁词语的同盟。他一无所见；他一无所闻。他在一个异教的世界，与我们所有人都相隔遥遥。但是瞧啊——他一只手轻轻拍向他的脖颈后。这样的姿势，简直会让人无可救药地爱上一辈子的。道尔顿、琼斯、埃德加和贝特曼也都同样把手轻轻拍向自己的脖颈后。但是他们做得并不成功。”

'At last,' said Bernard, 'the growl ceases. The sermon ends. He has minced the dance of the white butterflies at the door to powder. His rough and hairy voice is like an unshaven chin. Now he lurches back to his seat like a drunken sailor. It is an action that all the other masters will try to imitate; but, being flimsy, being floppy, wearing grey trousers, they will only succeed in making themselves ridiculous. I do not despise them. Their antics seem pitiable in my eyes. I note the fact for future reference with many others in my notebook. When I am grown up I shall carry a notebook—a fat book with many pages, methodically lettered. I shall enter my phrases. Under B shall come "Butterfly powder". If, in my novel, I describe the sun on the window-sill, I shall look under B and find butterfly powder. That will be useful. The tree "shades the window with green fingers". That will be useful. But alas! I am so soon distracted—by a hair like twisted candy, by Celia's Prayer Book, ivory covered. Louis' can contemplate nature, unwinking, by the hour. Soon I fail, unless talked to. "The lake of my mind, unbroken by oars, heaves placidly and soon sinks into an oily somnolence." That will be useful.'

“最终，”伯纳德说，“咆哮声停了。布道结束了。他把门口白蝴蝶的舞蹈绞成了粉末。他嗓音粗鲁、刺耳，像未剃的下巴似的。现在他一摇一晃回到座位上，像个醉了酒的水手。这是其他的老师们都愿意尽力模仿的动作；但是那些人一个个病怏怏、软塌塌，穿着灰色裤子，他们只会让自己看起来不伦不类。我并不鄙视他们。他们的滑稽举动在我眼中显得那么可怜。我把这件事和其他很多事记在我的笔记本上，以备将来参考。等我长大后，我要带上一个笔记本——一个有很多页的厚本子，上面用字母标明了顺序。我要加进我的词语。在B条下面写上‘蝴蝶粉末’。如果在我的小说中，我想描写窗台上的阳光，我就会查看B条下面，找到蝴蝶粉末。这会用得着的。树‘用绿色的手指遮住了窗’。这会用得着的。可是，哎！这么快我就被分散了心思——因为糖果拧了劲儿似的一根头发，因为西莉亚那本象牙封面的祈祷书。路易斯能一小时一小时、眼睛一眨不眨地静观大自然。我很快就不行了，除非有人说说话。‘我心灵的湖，没有被船桨划破，在平静中起起伏伏，很快沉入一片馨宁的梦幻。’这会用得着的。”

'Now we move out of this cool temple, into the yellow playing-fields,' said Louis. 'And, as it is a half-holiday (the Duke's birthday) we will settle among the long grasses, while they play cricket. Could I be "they" I would choose it; I would buckle on my pads and stride across the playing-field at the head of the batsmen. Look now, how everybody follows Percival. He is heavy. He walks clumsily down the field, through the long grass, to where the great elm trees stand. His magnificence is that of some mediaeval commander. A wake of light seems to lie on the grass behind him. Look at us trooping after him, his faithful servants, to be shot like sheep, for he will certainly attempt some forlorn enterprise and die in battle. My heart turns rough; it abrades my side like a file with two edges: one, that I adore his magnificence; the other I despise his slovenly accents—I who am so much his superior—and am jealous.'

“现在我们出了这座清凉的庙宇，来到黄色的操场。”路易斯说。“因为今天是半日假（公爵的寿诞），我们要在这片高草丛中玩个痛快，而他们则去打板球。假如我是‘他们’，我也会这样选择；我会扣上护垫，大步穿过操场，走在击球手们的最前头。瞧啊，这会儿大伙儿都跟着珀西瓦尔。他脚步沉重。他笨拙地走下操场，穿过高草，走向那些挺拔的大榆树。他的威武具有某位中世纪长官的派头。他身后的草地上似乎留下一道不灭的光影。瞧瞧我们，列队跟在他的身后，都是他忠实的仆人，将要像羔羊一样被射杀，因为他肯定要投身于某项艰巨的事业而死在战场上。我心潮翻滚；好像有一把双刃锉刀刮擦着我：一方面，我崇拜他的威严；另一方面，我又鄙视他邋里邋遢的腔调——我比他高贵——却又嫉妒他。”

'And now,' said Neville, 'let Bernard begin. Let him burble on, telling us stories, while we lie recumbent. Let him describe what we have all seen so that it becomes a sequence. Bernard says there is always a story. I am a story. Louis is a story. There is the story of the boot-boy, the story of the man with one eye, the story of the woman who sells winkles. Let him burble on with his story while I lie back and regard the stiff-legged figures of the padded batsmen through the trembling grasses. It seems as if the whole world were flowing and curving—on the earth the trees, in the sky the clouds. I look up, through the trees, into the sky. The match seems to be played up there. Faintly among the soft, white clouds I hear the cry "Run", I hear the cry "How's that?" The clouds lose tufts of whiteness as the breeze dishevels them. If that blue could stay for ever; if that hole could remain for ever; if this moment could stay for ever—

“那么现在，”内维尔说，“让伯纳德开始吧。让他嘴巴不停地给我们讲故事，我们只管舒服地躺着。让他描述一下我们大家的所见所闻，使它连贯起来。伯纳德说，总有故事可讲。我就是个故事。路易斯是个故事。那个擦鞋童的故事，那个瞎了一只眼的男人的故事，那个卖食用螺的女人的故事。让他嘴巴不停地讲故事吧，我只管仰天躺在这里，瞧着戴着护垫的击球手们穿过颤动的青草时那腿脚僵硬的样子。似乎整个世界都在流动，呈曲线流动——地上那些树，天空那些云。我抬起头来，透过那些树，望向天空。比赛仿佛在那上头进行。隐隐约约地，在柔和的白云之间，我听见‘快跑’的呼喊，我听见‘怎么回事？’的惊叫。微风吹散了云朵，那团团的洁白也随即消失了。要是那片蓝色能保持永远；要是那里的空洞永久存在；要是这一刻能化为永恒——

'But Bernard goes on talking. Up they bubble—images. "Like a camel,"... "a vulture." The camel is a vulture; the vulture a camel; for Bernard is a dangling wire, loose, but seductive. Yes, for when he talks, when he makes his foolish comparisons, a lightness comes over one. One floats, too, as if one were that bubble; one is freed; I have escaped, one feels. Even the chubby little boys (Dalton, Larpent and Baker) feel the same abandonment. They like this better than the cricket. They catch the phrases as they bubble. They let the feathery grasses tickle their noses. And then we all feel Percival lying heavy among us. His curious guffaw seems to sanction our laughter. But now he has rolled himself over in the long grass. He is, I think, chewing a stalk between his teeth. He feels bored; I too feel bored. Bernard at once perceives that we are bored. I detect a certain effort, an extravagance in his phrase, as if he said "Look!" but Percival says "No." For he is always the first to detect insincerity; and is brutal in the extreme. The sentence tails off feebly. Yes, the appalling moment has come when Bernard's power fails him and there is no longer any sequence and he sags and twiddles a bit of string and falls silent, gaping as if about to burst into tears. Among the tortures and devastations of life is this then—our friends are not able to finish their stories.'

“但是伯纳德还在滔滔不绝。汩汩冒出的——是意象。‘像一匹骆驼，’......‘一只秃鹫。’骆驼是一只秃鹫；秃鹫也是一匹骆驼；因为伯纳德是一根悬荡的电线，并不牢靠，却富有魅力。真的，当他一开口，当他打起那些愚蠢的比方，你会有一种轻松感。你也会浮起来，仿佛变成了那个气泡；你解脱了；我终于逃脱了，你会有这种感觉。甚至那几个胖乎乎的小男孩（道尔顿、拉本特和贝克）也同样感觉到这种无拘无束。他们觉得这比打板球更好玩。那些词语一冒上来他们就逮个正着。他们让轻柔的小草刺痒他们的鼻子。后来我们都感觉到了珀西瓦尔那笨重的身躯正躺在我们中间。他怪里怪气的狂笑似乎是对我们笑声的认可。但是这会儿他在高草丛中翻过身去。我想，他的牙齿之间正嚼着一截草梗。他感到厌烦；我也感到厌烦。伯纳德立即意识到我们的厌烦。我觉察到他确实很卖力，话语里有点忘乎所以，好像他说道：‘瞧！’但珀西瓦尔说：‘不。’因为他总能首先觉察到别人的虚假；又极其不给情面。接下来的那个句子弱弱地不了了之了。是的，可怕的时刻终于来到了：伯纳德泄了气，说话不再连贯了，他沮丧地捻着几根细绳沉默了，瞪目结舌，仿佛泪水就要夺眶而出。如此看来，在人生的种种磨难和破灭中还包括这样一种情况——我们的朋友甚至不能顺利讲完他们的故事。”

'Now let me try,' said Louis, 'before we rise, before we go to tea, to fix the moment in one effort of supreme endeavour. This shall endure. We are parting; some to tea; some to the nets; I to show my essay to Mr Barker. This will endure. From discord, from hatred (I despise dabblers in imagery—I resent the power of Percival intensely) my shattered mind is pieced together by some sudden perception. I take the trees, the clouds, to be witnesses of my complete integration. I, Louis, I, who shall walk the earth these seventy years, am born entire, out of hatred, out of discord. Here on this ring of grass we have sat together, bound by the tremendous power of some inner compulsion. The trees wave, the clouds pass. The time approaches when these soliloquies shall be shared. We shall not always give out a sound like a beaten gong as one sensation strikes and then another. Children, our lives have been gongs striking; clamour and boasting; cries of despair; blows on the nape of the neck in gardens.

“现在让我来试试，”路易斯说，“在我们起身之前，在我们去吃茶点之前，尽最大一份努力来修复这一时刻吧。这会让人很难受。我们各自分手；一些去吃茶点；一些去收网；我要把我的文章交给巴克先生看看。这会让人很难受。经过冲突，经过厌恶（我鄙视那些形象描述方面的半瓶醋——我极其憎恶珀西瓦尔的气焰），我纷乱的心情被某种突然的觉悟平复了。我要那些树、那些云来见证，我已经完全心平气和。我，路易斯，我，将要行走大地70年的我，正从厌恶中，从冲突中完完整整地诞生。在这儿，青草围绕的地方，我们曾坐在一起，受着内心某种巨大力量的驱使。树在摇，云在飘。分享个人独白的时刻到了。我们不要总是像锣似的发泄情绪，敲一下响一声，再敲一下又响一声。孩子们，我们的人生曾像锣一样敲响；自吹自擂；绝望的哀嚎；花园里出其不意的打击。

'Now grass and trees, the travelling air blowing empty spaces in the blue which they then recover, shaking the leaves which then replace themselves, and our ring here, sitting, with our arms binding our knees, hint at some other order, and better, which makes a reason everlastingly. This I see for a second, and shall try tonight to fix in words, to forge in a ring of steel, though Percival destroys it, as he blunders off, crushing the grasses, with the small fry trotting subservient after him. Yet it is Percival I need; for it is Percival who inspires poetry.'

“瞧这些草和树，这游荡的空气——蓝天的空穴被它吹破，接着又复原了；树叶被它摇动，接着也自动恢复了静态，还有我们围成的圆圈——我们坐在这儿，手臂拢着膝盖，都在暗示某种另外的秩序，更好的秩序，那是永恒的理性。这一切，我一秒钟就看清了，今晚我要竭力把它表述于词，锻造成一个钢环，虽然珀西瓦尔毁了它，当他踏着青草，踉踉跄跄地走开时，那群小喽啰低声下气、屁颠屁颠地追随在他的身后。不过我倒正需要珀西瓦尔；因为正是珀西瓦尔激发了我的诗意。”

'For how many months,' said Susan, 'for how many years, have I run up these stairs, in the dismal days of winter, in the chilly days of spring? Now it is midsummer. We go upstairs to change into white frocks to play tennis—Jinny and I with Rhoda following after. I count each step as I mount, counting each step something done with. So each night I tear off the old day from the calendar, and screw it tight into a ball. I do this vindictively, while Betty and Clara are on their knees. I do not pray. I revenge myself upon the day. I wreak my spite upon its image. You are dead now, I say, school day, hated day. They have made all the days of June—this is the twenty-fifth—shiny and orderly, with gongs, with lessons, with orders to wash, to change, to work, to eat. We listen to missionaries from China. We drive off in brakes along the asphalt pavement, to attend concerts in halls. We are shown galleries and pictures.

“有多少个月，”苏珊说，“有多少年，在阴沉的冬日，在寒冷的春日，我曾登上过这些楼梯？现在到了仲夏。我们上楼换上洁白的连衣裙去打网球——吉尼和我，还有罗达随后跟来。我一边上楼一边数阶梯，把每一级阶梯算作是一件完结的事情。所以每天晚上我从日历牌上撕下刚刚过去的一天，把它揉成紧紧的一个团。在贝蒂和克拉拉跪下来祷告时，我就怀着报复的心情这样做。我不做祷告。我向这天实行报复。我把我的愤恨发泄在它的具体形象上面。现在你终于死掉了，我说，上学的一天，可恨的一天。他们把六月的所有日子——今天25号——都过得熠熠生辉、井井有条，敲锣、上课，有序地洗澡、换衣服、做功课、吃饭。我们聆听着从中国归来的传教士的训话。我们坐上四轮大马车沿着柏油路开拔，去参加大礼堂的音乐会。我们被人引领着看展览、赏名画。

'At home the hay waves over the meadows. My father leans upon the stile, smoking. In the house one door bangs and then another, as the summer air puffs along the empty passages. Some old picture perhaps swings on the wall. A petal drops from the rose in the jar. The farm wagons strew the hedges with tufts of hay. All this I see, I always see, as I pass the looking-glass on the landing, with Jinny in front and Rhoda lagging behind. Jinny dances. Jinny always dances in the hall on the ugly, the encaustic tiles; she turns cartwheels in the playground; she picks some flower forbiddenly, and sticks it behind her ear so that Miss Perry's dark eyes smoulder with admiration, for Jinny, not me. Miss Perry loves Jinny; and I could have loved her, but now love no one, except my father, my doves and the squirrel whom I left in the cage at home for the boy to look after.'

“老家那边，草场上面干草起伏。我父亲靠着门梃，抽着烟。屋子里，每当夏日的清风吹过空寂无人的过道时，就会有一扇又一扇门砰然开阖。说不定某幅老照片也在墙上摇摆。一片花瓣从瓶里的玫瑰上落下。农用马车给一道道树篱点缀上一簇簇干草。当我经过楼梯平台的镜子时，吉尼走在前头，罗达落在后面，我看到了这一切，我总能看到这一切。吉尼跳起舞来。吉尼总在大厅里那难看的彩色瓷砖上面跳舞；她常在操场做侧手翻；她时而不顾禁令摘朵花插在耳后，引得佩里小姐乌黑的眼睛燃起羡慕之火，对吉尼，不是对我。佩里小姐喜欢吉尼；我也可能喜欢过她，但是现在我谁也不喜欢，除了我的父亲、我的鸽子和那只松鼠——我把它留在老家的笼子里，由那个小男仆来照看。”

'I hate the small looking-glass on the stairs,' said Jinny. 'It shows our heads only; it cuts off our heads. And my lips are too wide, and my eyes are too close together; I show my gums too much when I laugh. Susan's head, with its fell look, with its grass-green eyes which poets will love, Bernard said, because they fall upon close white stitching, put mine out; even Rhoda's face, mooning, vacant, is completed, like those white petals she used to swim in her bowl. So I skip up the stairs past them, to the next landing, where the long glass hangs and I see myself entire. I see my body and head in one now; for even in this serge frock they are one, my body and my head. Look, when I move my head I ripple all down my narrow body; even my thin legs ripple like a stalk in the wind. I flicker between the set face of Susan and Rhoda's vagueness; I leap like one of those flames that run between the cracks of the earth; I move, I dance; I never cease to move and to dance. I move like the leaf that moved in the hedge as a child and frightened me. I dance over these streaked, these impersonal, distempered walls with their yellow skirting as firelight dances over teapots. I catch fire even from women's cold eyes. When I read, a purple rim runs round the black edge of the textbook. Yet I cannot follow any word through its changes. I cannot follow any thought from present to past. I do not stand lost, like Susan, with tears in my eyes remembering home; or lie, like Rhoda, crumpled among the ferns, staining my pink cotton green, while I dream of plants that flower under the sea, and rocks through which the fish swim slowly. I do not dream.

“我讨厌楼梯上的这面小镜子。”吉尼说。“它只照出我们的脑袋；它切掉了我们的脑袋。而且我的嘴唇太厚，我的双眼靠得太近；我在笑的时候牙龈露得太多。苏珊的脑袋，还有那凶恶的神情，及一双草绿色的眼睛，诗人们会爱上的，伯纳德说，因为它们能抓住密实的白针脚，把我的脑袋比下去了；甚至罗达的脸，茫然的、呆呆的，也那么完美，就像曾经在她碗中畅游的那些白色花瓣一样。所以我跳了几级阶梯，越过他们，来到下一个楼梯转角平台，这里挂着一面长镜子，我能看见完整的自己。现在我看见我的身子和脑袋连成一体；即使穿着这件哔叽连衣裙，它们还是一体，我的身子连着我的脑袋。瞧，我一晃脑袋，我整个细小的身子都在微微颤动；甚至我纤瘦的双腿也像风中的草茎微微颤动。我摇曳在苏珊死板的面孔和罗达茫然的神情之间；我跳跃着，像大地的裂缝之间熊熊燃烧的火苗；我晃动着，我舞动着；我从未停止过晃动和跳舞。我晃动着，就像那片树叶，它曾像个孩子似的在树篱中晃动，而且把我吓了一跳。我舞蹈着，跃过这些条纹的，这些冷漠、无情的墙壁和它们黄色的踢脚板，就像炉火舞蹈着跃到茶壶上面一样。我甚至从女人们冷漠的眼神中捕捉到了火花。当我阅读时，课本的黑边闪现着紫色的光环。但我却无法通过各种变形来领悟任何单词。我无法通过把现在时变成过去时来领悟任何思想。我不会失魂落魄地傻站着，像苏珊那样，含着眼泪想家；我也不会躺下来，像罗达那样，蜷缩在羊齿草丛中，梦想着海底开花的植物和鱼儿缓缓从中游过的岩石，结果把我粉红的棉布染成绿色。我不做梦。

'Now let us be quick. Now let me be the first to pull off these coarse clothes. Here are my clean white stockings. Here are my new shoes. I bind my hair with a white ribbon, so that when I leap across the court the ribbon will stream out in a flash, yet curl round my neck, perfectly in its place. Not a hair shall be untidy.'

“现在让我们快一些吧。现在让我先脱掉这身粗陋的衣服吧。这是我干干净净的白色长袜。这是我的新鞋。我要用一条白色的丝带扎起我的头发，这样当我蹦蹦跳跳穿过院子时，丝带就会一下子飘起来，而又恰到好处地盘绕在我的脖子上。头发丝毫也不会乱。”

'That is my face,' said Rhoda, 'in the looking-glass behind Susan's shoulder—that face is my face. But I will duck behind her to hide it, for I am not here. I have no face. Other people have faces; Susan and Jinny have faces; they are here. Their world is the real world. The things they lift are heavy. They say Yes, they say No; whereas I shift and change and am seen through in a second. If they meet a housemaid she looks at them without laughing. But she laughs at me. They know what to say if spoken to. They laugh really; they get angry really; while I have to look first and do what other people do when they have done it.

“那是我的脸，”罗达说，“镜子里苏珊肩后——那张脸是我的脸。但是我要缩到她身后把它藏起来，因为我的人不在这儿。我毫无脸面。别人都有脸；苏珊和吉尼都有脸；她们的人都在这儿。她们的世界是真实的世界。她们要举起的东西都沉甸甸的。她们说‘是’就是是，她们说‘不’就是不；而我游移不定，变来变去，一下子就被人看穿。假如她们碰着一位女佣，她也只是眼瞅着她们而不敢笑。但是她会嘲笑我。有人跟她们说话，她们也知道如何对答。她们笑得真实；她们发火也真实；而我必得先观望一番，等到人家做了以后，我再照着她们的样子做。

'See now with what extraordinary certainty Jinny pulls on her stockings, simply to play tennis. That I admire. But I like Susan's way better, for she is more resolute, and less ambitious of distinction than Jinny. Both despise me for copying what they do; but Susan sometimes teaches me, for instance, how to tie a bow, while Jinny has her own knowledge but keeps it to herself. They have friends to sit by. They have things to say privately in corners. But I attach myself only to names and faces; and hoard them like amulets against disaster. I choose out across the hall some unknown face and can hardly drink my tea when she whose name I do not know sits opposite. I choke. I am rocked from side to side by the violence of my emotion. I imagine these nameless, these immaculate people, watching me from behind bushes. I leap high to excite their admiration. At night, in bed, I excite their complete wonder. I often die pierced with arrows to win their tears. If they should say, or I should see from a label on their boxes, that they were in Scarborough last holidays, the whole town runs gold, the whole pavement is illuminated. Therefore I hate looking-glasses which show me my real face. Alone, I often fall down into nothingness. I must push my foot stealthily lest I should fall off the edge of the world into nothingness. I have to bang my head against some hard door to call myself back to the body.'

“现在你瞧，吉尼多么胸有成竹地穿上长筒袜，只不过是要去打网球。这一点，我很羡慕。但是我更喜欢苏珊的风格，因为她更坚决果断，而且不像吉尼那么爱出风头。她俩都瞧不起我模仿她们的一举一动；但是苏珊有时会教我，比方说，怎么打蝴蝶结，而吉尼自有她的一番见识，却只藏在自己肚里。她们的身边总不乏朋友。她们总有些躲在角落悄悄说的话。而我迷恋的只是名字和面孔；我把它们像祛除灾祸的护身符一样储藏了起来。我选中大厅对面一个陌生的面孔，而当这个我不知道名字的她与我相对而坐时，我简直茶水也喝不下去了。我说不出话来。我被强烈的情感弄得心神不宁。我想象着这些叫不上名字的人，这些完美无瑕的人，正从灌木丛后面注视着我。我要高高跃起，引来他们的赞美。到了晚上，上了床，我要激发出他们全部的好奇心。为了赢得他们的眼泪，我时常要万箭穿心而死。假如他们说，或者我从他们行李箱的标签上看到，他们刚刚在斯卡伯勒度过假，整个小城都金光闪闪，整个步道都灯火通明。因此我讨厌镜子，它们让我看到自己真实的面孔。独自一人时，我常常会堕入虚无的境界。我必须得暗中伸出一只脚，以防自己从世界的边缘跌入虚无的境界。我得把头撞上某扇坚实的门，才能把自己召回到我的肉体。”

'We are late,' said Susan. 'We must wait our turn to play. We will pitch here in the long grass and pretend to watch Jinny and Clara, Betty and Mavis. But we will not watch them. I hate watching other people play games. I will make images of all the things I hate most and bury them in the ground. This shiny pebble is Madame Carlo, and I will bury her deep because of her fawning and ingratiating manners, because of the sixpence she gave me for keeping my knuckles flat when I played my scales. I buried her sixpence. I would bury the whole school: the gymnasium; the classroom; the dining-room that always smells of meat; and the chapel. I would bury the red-brown tiles and the oily portraits of old men—benefactors, founders of schools. There are some trees I like; the cherry tree with lumps of clear gum on the bark; and one view from the attic towards some far hills. Save for these, I would bury it all as I bury these ugly stones that are always scattered about this briny coast, with its piers and its trippers. At home, the waves are mile long. On winter nights we hear them booming. Last Christmas a man was drowned sitting alone in his cart.'

“我们迟到了。”苏珊说。“我们必须等轮到我们才能玩。我们要在这边的高草丛中投球，假装看吉尼与克拉拉、贝蒂与梅维斯打球。但是我们不会真正看她们的。我讨厌看别人打球。我要把我最讨厌的东西都变成具体的形象，然后把它们埋在土里。这枚亮晶晶的卵石是卡洛太太，我要把她埋得深深的，因为她那些奉承、巴结的举止，因为她凭我弹音阶时指节没弯而给我的那六便士。我埋了她的六便士。我要埋了整所学校：体育馆、教室、总有一股肉味的饭厅，还有那座教堂。我要埋了那些红褐色的瓷砖和那些老头子们的奉承画像——他们都是学校的资助者和创办者。有些树我是喜欢的；有株樱桃树，它的树皮上有一块块清亮的胶脂；我还喜欢从阁楼望向那片远山的景色。除了这些，我要把一切都埋掉，就像我埋掉这些难看的石子，它们像突堤和游人一样老是散布在这片海岸上。老家那边，海浪有一英里长。冬夜里我们总能听见它们隆隆的轰响。去年圣诞节，有个男人独自坐在马车里被海浪淹没了。”

'When Miss Lambert passes,' said Rhoda, 'talking to the clergyman, the others laugh and imitate her hunch behind her back; yet everything changes and becomes luminous. Jinny leaps higher too when Miss Lambert passes. Suppose she saw that daisy, it would change. Wherever she goes, things are changed under her eyes; and yet when she has gone is not the thing the same again? Miss Lambert is taking the clergyman through the wicket-gate to her private garden; and when she comes to the pond, she sees a frog on a leaf, and that will change. All is solemn, all is pale where she stands, like a statue in a grove. She lets her tasselled silken cloak slip down, and only her purple ring still glows, her vinous, her amethystine ring. There is this mystery about people when they leave us. When they leave us I can companion them to the pond and make them stately. When Miss Lambert passes, she makes the daisy change; and everything runs like streaks of fire when she carves the beef. Month by month things are losing their hardness; even my body now lets the light through; my spine is soft like wax near the flame of the candle. I dream; I dream.'

“兰伯特小姐一边走，”罗达说，“一边跟牧师说着话，其他人在她身后一边笑，一边模仿她弯着背的样子；不过每样东西都变了，变得清晰了。兰伯特小姐经过身边时，吉尼也跳得更高了。假如她瞧见了那株雏菊，它也会变的。无论她到哪儿，经她眼的东西都会发生变化；但是当她走过之后，那样东西还不是一样吗？兰伯特小姐正领着牧师经过边门来到她的私人花园；当她来到池塘边，她看见叶子上面的一只青蛙，而这种情景也会发生变化。她像小树林里的一尊雕像，站立之处唯有冷峻，唯有苍白。她任由她那件缀着流苏、丝绸般的披风滑落下来，唯有她那枚紫色的戒指，那葡萄似的紫水晶戒指还在发着幽光。每当人们离开我们时，他们身上总有这样的神秘。每当他们离开我们时，我总能陪伴他们来到池塘边，使他们看上去那么堂而皇之。每当兰伯特小姐走过时，她总会让那株雏菊发生变化；当她切割牛肉时，每样东西都像燃起了熊熊火焰。月复一月，万物都在失去它们的硬度；就连我的肉体现在也仿佛透了光；我的脊柱柔软得像靠近烛火的蜡。我梦想着，梦想着。”

'I have won the game,' said Jinny. 'Now it is your turn. I must throw myself on the ground and pant. I am out of breath with running, with triumph. Everything in my body seems thinned out with running and triumph. My blood must be bright red, whipped up, slapping against my ribs. My soles tingle, as if wire rings opened and shut in my feet. I see every blade of grass very clear. But the pulse drums so in my forehead, behind my eyes, that everything dances—the net, the grass; your faces leap like butterflies; the trees seem to jump up and down. There is nothing staid, nothing settled, in this universe. All is rippling, all is dancing; all is quickness and triumph. Only, when I have lain alone on the hard ground, watching you play your game, I begin to feel the wish to be singled out; to be summoned, to be called away by one person who comes to find me, who is attracted towards me, who cannot keep himself from me, but comes to where I sit on my gilt chair, with my frock billowing round me like a flower. And withdrawing into an alcove, sitting alone on a balcony we talk together.

“我赢了这场球。”吉尼说。“现在轮到你了。我得倒在地上喘喘气。不停的奔跑和胜利简直令我喘不过气来。不停的奔跑和胜利令我身体里的一切似乎都散了架。沸腾的血液撞击着我的胸口，肯定变得鲜红。我的脚掌感到刺痛，仿佛有些线圈在我的脚底一开一合。我看见每一片草叶都很清亮。但我脑门里面、眼睛后面的脉搏咚咚咚鼓点似的响，以至于每样东西——球网啊，小草啊——都跟着舞动起来；你们的面孔像翩翩的蝴蝶；那些树也好像蹦蹦跳跳。这个世上，没有什么是固定不变的，没有什么是安安稳稳的。唯有波动，唯有舞蹈；唯有速度和胜利。只是，当我独自躺在硬实的地上瞧着你们打球的时候，我开始感觉自己希望接受选拔，接受召唤，被一个前来寻找我的人叫走，这个人受到我的吸引，他离不开我，只能来到我的身旁，而我坐在我的镀金椅上，裙裾飞扬，像一枝花。我们俩躲进凉亭里，或者坐在无人的阳台上，喁喁而谈。

'Now the tide sinks. Now the trees come to earth; the brisk waves that slap my ribs rock more gently, and my heart rides at anchor, like a sailing-boat whose sails slide slowly down on to the white deck. The game is over. We must go to tea now.'

“这会儿潮水落了下去。瞧，树木回到地面上；撞击我胸口的欢快的波浪轻轻地摇啊摇，我的心停泊下来，就像一艘帆船，风帆缓缓地滑落到白色的甲板上。球打完了。现在我们必须去吃茶点。”

'The boasting boys,' said Louis, 'have gone now in a vast team to play cricket. They have driven off in their great brake, singing in chorus. All their heads turn simultaneously at the corner by the laurel bushes. Now they are boasting. Larpent's brother played football for Oxford; Smith's father made a century at Lords. Archie and Hugh; Parker and Dalton; Larpent and Smith; then again Archie and Hugh; Parker and Dalton; Larpent and Smith—the names repeat themselves; the names are the same always. They are the volunteers; they are the cricketers; they are the officers of the Natural History Society. They are always forming into fours and marching in troops with badges on their caps; they salute simultaneously passing the figure of their general. How majestic is their order, how beautiful is their obedience! If I could follow, if I could be with them, I would sacrifice all I know. But they also leave butterflies trembling with their wings pinched off; they throw dirty pocket-handkerchiefs clotted with blood screwed up into corners. They make little boys sob in dark passages. They have big red ears that stand out under their caps. Yet that is what we wish to be, Neville and I. I watch them go with envy. Peeping from behind a curtain, I note the simultaneity of their movements with delight. If my legs were reinforced by theirs, how they would run! If I had been with them and won matches and rowed in great races, and galloped all day, how I should thunder out songs at midnight! In what a torrent the words would rush from my throat!'

“那些夸夸其谈的男孩子们，”路易斯说，“这会儿凑了一大帮人打板球去了。他们坐着四轮大马车，一路合唱着开走了。在月桂树丛旁边的拐角处，他们同时转过头去。这会儿他们又在吹牛了。拉本特的哥哥曾为牛津大学足球队效力过；史密斯的父亲曾在洛兹学院板球场打出过一百分。阿奇和休；帕克和多尔顿；拉本特和史密斯；接着还是阿奇和休；帕克和多尔顿；拉本特和史密斯——这些名字重复来重复去；一直都是这些名字。他们是义勇军战士；他们是板球运动员；他们还是自然史学会的官员。他们总是四人一组，帽子上戴着徽章，列队而行；每当经过长官身边，他们都会一起敬礼。他们的口令多么雄壮，他们的服从多么令人钦佩！如果我能追随他们，如果我能成为其中一员，我愿奉献我所知道的一切。但是他们也任由掐掉翅膀的蝴蝶颤抖不止；他们会把凝了血迹的手帕拧成一团丢进墙角。他们会在昏暗的过道里弄哭小孩子。他们通红的大耳朵在帽子下面格外惹眼。但这正是我们，我和内维尔所希望的那个样子。我羡慕地看着他们走远。我从帘子后面偷偷地望出去，满心欢喜地注意到他们的步调那么一致。假如我的双腿因为他们的腿而增强了力量，那会跑得多么快！假如我是他们中的一员，赢得一场场球，参加划船大赛，马儿一样地整天奔跑，那么我在半夜里将会吼出多么高亢的歌声！我的话语也会脱口而出、滔滔不绝！”

'Percival has gone now,' said Neville. 'He is thinking of nothing but the match. He never waved his hand as the brake turned the corner by the laurel bush. He despises me for being too weak to play (yet he is always kind to my weakness). He despises me for not caring if they win or lose except that he cares. He takes my devotion; he accepts my tremulous, no doubt abject offering, mixed with contempt as it is for his mind. For he cannot read. Yet when I read Shakespeare or Catullus, lying in the long grass, he understands more than Louis. Not the words—but what are words? Do I not know already how to rhyme, how to imitate Pope, Dryden, even Shakespeare? But I cannot stand all day in the sun with my eyes on the ball; I cannot feel the flight of the ball through my body and think only of the ball. I shall be a clinger to the outsides of words all my life. Yet I could not live with him and suffer his stupidity. He will coarsen and snore. He will marry and there will be scenes of tenderness at breakfast. But now he is young. Not a thread, not a sheet of paper lies between him and the sun, between him and the rain, between him and the moon as he lies naked, tumbled, hot, on his bed. Now as they drive along the high road in their brake his face is mottled red and yellow. He will throw off his coat and stand with his legs apart, with his hands ready, watching the wicket. And he will pray, "Lord let us win"; he will think of one thing only, that they should win.

“这会儿珀西瓦尔已经走远了。”内维尔说。“他只琢磨着球赛的事。大马车转过月桂树丛旁边的拐角时，他从不挥手。他瞧不起我，因为我身体太弱而没法打球（但他倒是一直对我的病弱抱有同情之心）。他鄙视我，因为我不在乎他们是赢是输，而他在乎。他接受我的忠诚；他接受我紧张兮兮、无疑也是低三下四的献礼，其中掺杂了我对他的头脑的蔑视。因为他不能阅读。不过当我躺在高草丛中朗读莎士比亚或卡图卢斯时，他倒是比路易斯懂的多。并非那些词语——但词语算什么？我不是已经懂了怎么押韵，怎么模仿蒲柏、德莱顿、甚至莎士比亚？但我还是不能整天站在太阳下，眼睛盯着球；我还是不能通过身体来感觉球的飞行，一门心思只想着球。我一生都要坚持求索词语的最大量。但是我不可能和他一起生活，容忍他的愚蠢。他会变得粗俗不堪，还会打呼噜。他会结婚成家，早餐桌上也会出现温情脉脉的场面。但是现在他还年轻。当他光着身子躺在床上，辗转反侧、燥热难当时，他与太阳之间，他与雨水之间，他与月亮之间，并不存在丝毫片纸的阻隔。这会儿当他们坐着马车驶上大路时，他的脸庞被染得一块红一块黄。他会甩掉外衣，两腿叉开站在那儿，双手做好准备，防守着球门。他会祈祷：‘主保佑我们得胜’；他会只想一件事，就是他们要赢。

'How could I go with them in a brake to play cricket? Only Bernard could go with them, but Bernard is too late to go with them. He is always too late. He is prevented by his incorrigible moodiness from going with them. He stops, when he washes his hands, to say, "There is a fly in that web. Shall I rescue that fly; shall I let the spider eat it?" He is shaded with innumerable perplexities, or he would go with them to play cricket, and would lie in the grass, watching the sky, and would start when the ball was hit. But they would forgive him; for he would tell them a story.'

“我怎么可能和他们一起坐着马车去打板球呢？只有伯纳德能跟他们一起去，但是伯纳德行动太慢，没能跟着他们去。他总是行动太慢。他那无可救药的喜怒无常的情绪总是阻碍他跟他们一起去。洗手的时候他会停下来，说道：‘蛛网里有只苍蝇。我是该解救那只苍蝇，还是该让蜘蛛把它吃掉？’他总是被数不清的麻烦事笼罩着，不然他就能跟他们一起去打板球，就能躺在草地上望着天空，就能在球被击中的时候惊跳起来。但是他们不会怪他，因为他会给他们讲故事。”

'They have bowled off,' said Bernard, 'and I am too late to go with them. The horrid little boys, who are also so beautiful, whom you and Louis, Neville, envy so deeply, have bowled off with their heads all turned the same way. But I am unaware of these profound distinctions. My fingers slip over the keyboard without knowing which is black and which white. Archie makes easily a hundred; I by a fluke make sometimes fifteen. But what is the difference between us? Wait though, Neville; let me talk. The bubbles are rising like the silver bubbles from the floor of a saucepan; image on top of image. I cannot sit down to my book, like Louis, with ferocious tenacity. I must open the little trap-door and let out these linked phrases in which I run together whatever happens, so that instead of incoherence there is perceived a wandering thread, lightly joining one thing to another. I will tell you the story of the doctor.

“他们坐上车开走了，”伯纳德说，“我行动太慢，没能跟着一块去。那些讨厌又那么可爱的小男孩们，你和路易斯、内维尔羡慕不已的小男孩们，坐上车开走了，他们的脑袋齐刷刷地转向同一边。但是我却没意识到这是多么大的殊荣。我的手指在键盘上滑动，并不知道哪个是黑键哪个是白键。阿奇轻易地拿100分；我偶尔侥幸地拿到15分。但是我们之间有什么不同？不过等等，内维尔；让我说下去。气泡正在向上冒，就像银色的泡泡从锅底冒上来；意象之上还是意象。我可不能像路易斯那样坐下来，拼了命似的孜孜不倦地读书。我必得打开这道狭小的活动门，放出这些我随机组合成串的语句，这样你们就会意识到有一条恍惚的线索，轻巧地把一件事情与另一件事情串联起来，而不是互不连贯的。我要给你们讲讲那位博士的故事。

'When Dr Crane lurches through the swing-doors after prayers he is convinced, it seems, of his immense superiority; and indeed Neville, we cannot deny that his departure leaves us not only with a sense of relief, but also with a sense of something removed, like a tooth. Now let us follow him as he heaves through the swing-door to his own apartments. Let us imagine him in his private room over the stables undressing. He unfastens his sock suspenders (let us be trivial, let us be intimate). Then with a characteristic gesture (it is difficult to avoid these ready-made phrases, and they are, in his case, somehow appropriate) he takes the silver, he takes the coppers from his trouser pockets and places them there, and there, on his dressing-table. With both arms stretched on the arms of his chair he reflects (this is his private moment; it is here we must try to catch him): shall he cross the pink bridge into his bedroom or shall he not cross it? The two rooms are united by a bridge of rosy light from the lamp at the bedside where Mrs Crane lies with her hair on the pillow reading a French memoir. As she reads, she sweeps her hand with an abandoned and despairing gesture over her forehead, and sighs, "Is this all?" comparing herself with some French duchess.

“当克兰博士做完祷告一摇一晃走出弹簧门时，看来他对自己的无上权威深信不疑；但是说实在的，内维尔，他的离去不但让我们松了一口气，而且让我们感觉摆脱了某种负担，好像拔掉了一颗牙似的。这会儿他出了弹簧门直奔自己的寓所而去，让我们跟着他吧。让我们想象他在马厩上面的私室里脱衣服的情景吧。他解开他的吊袜带（让我们不避琐屑，让我们细致入微吧）。接着用一种富有特色的姿势（很难避免这些陈旧的词，何况这些词用在他身上也颇为合适），他从裤袋里掏出银币，又掏出些铜钱，把它们这儿一堆，那儿一堆，在他的梳妆台上分别放好。他摊开两臂搁在椅子扶手上沉思起来（这是他一个人独处的时刻，我们正是要在这里尽量看清他）：他是该穿过粉红桥进到卧室里呢，还是不穿过那桥？这两个房间由粉红色灯光形成的一座桥连结起来，灯光来自床边的台灯，克兰太太躺在那儿，头发披散在枕头上，正就着那盏灯在阅读一本法文回忆录。读着读着，她用一个厌弃而绝望的姿势伸手在额头上方抹了抹，一边叹息道：‘这就是全部吗？’一边拿她自己与某位法国公爵夫人进行比较。

Now, says the doctor, in two years I shall retire. I shall clip yew hedges in a west country garden. An admiral I might have been; or a judge; not a schoolmaster. What forces, he asks, staring at the gas-fire with his shoulders hunched up more hugely than we know them (he is in his shirt-sleeves remember), have brought me to this?

听着，博士说，再过两年我就退休了。我要在西部乡村一个花园里修剪紫杉树篱。我本来可以做个海军上将，或者做个法官，而不是做校长。是什么力量把我引到这方面来的呢？他凝视着煤气炉自问道。他双肩隆起，比我们素常所见更明显（记住，他只穿着衬衫）。

What vast forces? he thinks, getting into the stride of his majestic phrases as he looks over his shoulder at the window. It is a stormy night; the branches of the chestnut trees are ploughing up and down. Stars flash between them.

是什么样的巨大力量呢？他一边思考着，对自己庄严的话语满怀信心，一边回头向窗外望去。这是一个狂风暴雨的夜晚；栗树的枝杈扭来扭去。枝杈之间星斗忽闪。

What vast forces of good and evil have brought me here? he asks, and sees with sorrow that his chair has worn a little hole in the pile of the purple carpet. So there he sits, swinging his braces. But stories that follow people into their private rooms are difficult. I cannot go on with this story. I twiddle a piece of string; I turn over four or five coins in my trouser pocket.'

是什么样的善与恶的巨大力量把我引到这里来的呢？他自问道，而且他悲哀地发现他的椅子已经在紫色地毯的绒毛上磨出了一个小洞。他就这么坐在那儿，晃悠着他的裤子背带。但是跟着人家进入内室这样的故事很难讲。这个故事我没法讲下去了。我捻弄着一根线头；我翻弄着裤袋里的四五枚硬币。”

'Bernard's stories amuse me,' said Neville, 'at the start. But when they tail off absurdly and he gapes, twiddling a bit of string, I feel my own solitude. He sees everyone with blurred edges. Hence I cannot talk to him of Percival. I cannot expose my absurd and violent passion to his sympathetic understanding. It too would make a "story". I need someone whose mind falls like a chopper on a block; to whom the pitch of absurdity is sublime, and a shoe-string adorable. To whom I can expose the urgency of my own passion? Louis is too cold, too universal. There is nobody here among these grey arches, and moaning pigeons, and cheerful games and tradition and emulation, all so skilfully organized to prevent feeling alone. Yet I am struck still as I walk by sudden premonitions of what is to come. Yesterday, passing the open door leading into the private garden, I saw Fenwick with his mallet raised. The steam from the tea-urn rose in the middle of the lawn. There were banks of blue flowers. Then suddenly descended upon me the obscure, the mystic sense of adoration, of completeness that triumphed over chaos. Nobody saw my poised and intent figure as I stood at the open door. Nobody guessed the need I had to offer my being to one god; and perish, and disappear. His mallet descended; the vision broke.

“伯纳德的故事让我觉得有趣，”内维尔说，“在一开始的时候。但是当它们荒唐地不了了之，而且他捻弄着一点线头张口结舌的时候，我感受到我自身的寂寞。他看待每个人都是模棱两可的。所以我没法跟他谈论珀西瓦尔。我无法使我荒唐而热烈的情感得到他的同情与理解。那也会编成一个‘故事’的。我需要一个头脑果断、斩钉截铁的人；这个人会把荒唐至极视为崇高，把一根鞋带视同珍宝。我能向谁坦露我内心迫切的激情呢？路易斯过于冷淡，过于一般化。这儿无人可说，这些灰暗的拱门、悲吟的鸽子、欢腾的游戏，以及因循、效仿都那么巧妙地组合起来，阻抑独自感伤。可是走着走着我就会呆若木鸡，因为突然出现了即将到来的事情的一些征兆。昨天，经过通往私人花园的那扇开着的门时，我看见芬威克拿着他的木槌。草坪中央的茶水壶冒出热气。还有一垄一垄蓝色的鲜花。这时我心中突然涌上一种蒙眬而神秘的崇敬感，一种平息一切混乱的完美感。当我站在开着的花园门口时，没有人看见我坦然而专注的神态。没有人猜得到我所怀有的渴望：我愿把我的生命献给某个神，然后死去，然后消失。他的木槌放了下来，幻景破灭了。

'Should I seek out some tree? Should I desert these form rooms and libraries, and the broad yellow page in which I read Catullus, for woods and fields? Should I walk under beech trees, or saunter along the river bank, where the trees meet united like lovers in the water? But nature is too vegetable, too vapid. She has only sublimities and vastitudes and water and leaves. I begin to wish for firelight, privacy, and the limbs of one person.'

“我应该寻求某一棵树吗？我应该逃出这些班级课室和图书馆，丢下我在其中读到卡图卢斯的那本发黄的大书，奔向树林和田野吗？我应该走在山毛榉树下，或者沿着河岸漫步，看那些树像恋人似的在水中相遇、交合吗？但是大自然过于单调、过于乏味了。她有的只是崇高与广袤、水和树叶。我开始向往炉火、清静和某个人的肢体。”

'I begin to wish,' said Louis, 'for night to come. As I stand here with my hand on the grained oak panel of Mr Wickham's door I think myself the friend of Richelieu, or the Duke of St Simon holding out a snuff-box to the King himself. It is my privilege. My witticisms "run like wildfire through the court". Duchesses tear emeralds from their earrings out of admiration—but these rockets rise best in darkness, in my cubicle at night. I am now a boy only with a colonial accent holding my knuckles against Mr Wickham's grained oak door. The day has been full of ignominies and triumphs concealed from fear of laughter. I am the best scholar in the school. But when darkness comes I put off this unenviable body—my large nose, my thin lips, my colonial accent—and inhabit space. I am then Virgil's companion, and Plato's. I am then the last scion of one of the great houses of France. But I am also one who will force himself to desert these windy and moonlit territories, these midnight wanderings, and confront grained oak doors. I will achieve in my life—Heaven grant that it be not long—some gigantic amalgamation between the two discrepancies so hideously apparent to me. Out of my suffering I will do it. I will knock. I will enter.'

“我开始向往，”路易斯说，“即将到来的夜晚。我站在这儿，一只手抚着威克姆先生门上那块木纹橡木板，此时我想象自己是黎塞留的朋友，或者是圣西蒙的公爵，正把一只鼻烟盒进献给国王本人。这是我的特殊荣幸。我的妙语‘如野火一般传遍宫廷’。公爵夫人们因为叹赏不已而扯下了她们耳环上的绿宝石——不过只有到了晚上，在我的小卧室里，在黑暗中，这些飞升的焰火才会大放异彩。这会儿我只是一个带有殖民地口音的小男孩，正攥紧手指节叩着威克姆先生的木纹橡木房门。这一天充满了因怕受到嘲笑而隐藏起来的种种屈辱和得意。我是这所学校最好的学生。但是当黑夜到来时，我就丢开了这具不值得羡慕的躯体——我的大鼻子，我的薄嘴唇，我的殖民地口音——而栖居于自由的天地。这时我与维吉尔为伴，与柏拉图为伴。这时我是法兰西名门望族之一的末代苗裔。但是我也会强迫自己抛开月光下那些虚无缥缈的领地，抛开午夜里那些神思恍惚的漫游，面对这些木纹橡木房门。今生我要实现——愿上天垂怜，这一天不会太远——这两种矛盾之间的伟大融合，它们是那么狰狞可怕地出现在我面前。为了我的苦难，我要这样去做。我要敲门。我要进去。”

'I have torn off the whole of May and June,' said Susan, 'and twenty days of July. I have torn them off and screwed them up so that they no longer exist, save as a weight in my side. They have been crippled days, like moths with shrivelled wings unable to fly. There are only eight days left. In eight days' time I shall get out of the train and stand on the platform at six twenty five. Then my freedom will unfurl, and all these restrictions that wrinkle and shrivel—hours and order and discipline, and being here and there exactly at the right moment—will crack asunder. Out the day will spring, as I open the carriage-door and see my father in his old hat and gaiters. I shall tremble. I shall burst into tears. Then next morning I shall get up at dawn. I shall let myself out by the kitchen door. I shall walk on the moor. The great horses of the phantom riders will thunder behind me and stop suddenly. I shall see the swallow skim the grass. I shall throw myself on a bank by the river and watch the fish slip in and out among the reeds. The palms of my hands will be printed with pine-needles. I shall there unfold and take out whatever it is I have made here; something hard. For something has grown in me here, through the winters and summers, on staircases, in bedrooms. I do not want, as Jinny wants, to be admired. I do not want people, when I come in, to look up with admiration. I want to give, to be given, and solitude in which to unfold my possessions.

“我已经撕下了整个的五月、六月，”苏珊说，“和七月的20天。我撕下它们，把它们拧成团，它们就不再存在了，成了对我有利的一个砝码。它们是一些残缺不全的日子，像翅膀干瘪而无法飞舞的蛾子。只剩下八天了。八天之后，六点二十五分，我就要走下火车，站在月台上。那时我的自由将展翅翱翔，所有这些皱缩而干瘪的约束——钟点啦，秩序啦，纪律啦，以及准时到这儿到那儿等等——都将土崩瓦解。那一天会突然来临，我打开马车门，看见我的父亲戴着他那顶旧帽子，打着绑腿。我会发抖。我会突然放声大哭。然后第二天早上，我会天不亮就起床。我会顺着厨房门一个人来到外边。我会到荒地上散散步。幽灵骑士们的高头大马会在我身后呼啸而来，然后突然停住。我会看见燕子掠过草地。我会纵身扑倒在河岸上，瞧着那些鱼儿在芦苇间忽隐忽现。我的手掌会留下松针的印迹。我会在那儿敞开心扉，抖落掉我在这里获得的东西，令人难受的东西。因为在这儿，在冬夏的时令中，在楼梯上，在卧室里，我的心中已经长出了某种东西。我不想，像吉尼那样，想受人赞美。我不想，在我进门的时候，人家用仰慕的眼光看着我。我想付出，我想收获，我想在与世隔绝的宁静中敞开我的所有。

'Then I shall come back through the trembling lanes under the arches of the nut leaves. I shall pass an old woman wheeling a perambulator full of sticks; and the shepherd. But we shall not speak. I shall come back through the kitchen garden, and see the curved leaves of the cabbages pebbled with dew, and the house in the garden, blind with curtained windows. I shall go upstairs to my room, and turn over my own things, locked carefully in the wardrobe: my shells; my eggs; my curious grasses. I shall feed my doves and my squirrel. I shall go to the kennel and comb my spaniel. So gradually I shall turn over the hard thing that has grown here in my side. But here bells ring; feet shuffle perpetually.'

“然后我会顺着核桃树下令人颤栗的小路走回来。我会遇见一位老太太，正推着一辆装满柴禾的婴儿车，还有那位牧羊人。但是我们不会交谈。我会穿过家庭菜园走回来，我会看见沾着露珠的卷心菜那翻卷的菜叶，还有花园里那幢严严实实地遮着窗帘的房子。我会上楼来到我的房间，翻动那些被我小心地锁在衣柜里的东西：我的贝壳，我的鸟蛋，我的奇花异草。我会喂一喂我的鸽子和我的松鼠。我会到狗窝那儿，为我的长毛垂耳犬梳一梳毛。这样渐渐地，我会把在这儿我心里长出的那种令人难受的东西翻转过去。但是在这儿，铃声总是响起；脚步始终沉重。”

'I hate darkness and sleep and night,' said Jinny, 'and lie longing for the day to come. I long that the week should be all one day without divisions. When I wake early—and the birds wake me—I lie and watch the brass handles on the cupboard grow clear; then the basin; then the towel-horse. As each thing in the bedroom grows clear, my heart beats quicker. I feel my body harden, and become pink, yellow, brown. My hands pass over my legs and body. I feel its slopes, its thinness. I love to hear the gong roar through the house and the stir begin—here a thud, there a patter. Doors slam; water rushes. Here is another day, here is another day, I cry, as my feet touch the floor. It may be a bruised day, an imperfect day. I am often scolded. I am often in disgrace for idleness, for laughing; but even as Miss Matthews grumbles at my feather-headed carelessness, I catch sight of something moving—a speck of sun perhaps on a picture, or the donkey drawing the mowing-machine across the lawn; or a sail that passes between the laurel leaves, so that I am never cast down. I cannot be prevented from pirouetting behind Miss Matthews into prayers.

“我讨厌黑暗、睡觉和晚上，”吉尼说，“躺在床上盼着白天来临。我盼着一个星期会像整个一个白天那样没有间隔。当我早早醒来时，——鸟儿会叫醒我——我会躺在床上，望着橱柜上的黄铜把手逐渐变得清晰；接着是脸盆；接着是毛巾架。随着卧室里的每一样东西渐渐变得清晰，我的心跳也加速了。我感觉我的身体硬实起来，开始显出粉红色、黄色、棕色。我的手拂过我的腿和身体。我感觉到身体的起伏和纤瘦。我喜欢听见房子里锣的喧响和继之而来的骚动——这里砰的一声，那里啪的一声。房门开开阖阖；水流哗哗作响。又一天来临了，又一天来临了，我的脚一落地便大喊大叫道。可能这会是伤心的一天，不如意的一天。我经常受到责骂。我经常很不讨人喜欢，因为我懒懒散散，而且爱发笑；不过即使在马修斯小姐嘟囔我轻浮而散漫时，我也会一眼望见有什么东西在动——可能是画上的一抹阳光，或者是草坪上拉着除草机的那头驴，或者是月桂树叶间闪过的一片风帆；所以我从来不会垂头丧气。什么也阻挡不了我一边跟着马修斯小姐去做祷告，一边在她身后跳着足尖舞。

'Now, too, the time is coming when we shall leave school and wear long skirts. I shall wear necklaces and a white dress without sleeves at night. There will be parties in brilliant rooms; and one man will single me out and will tell me what he has told no other person. He will like me better than Susan or Rhoda. He will find in me some quality, some peculiar thing. But I shall not let myself be attached to one person only. I do not want to be fixed, to be pinioned. I tremble, I quiver, like the leaf in the hedge, as I sit dangling my feet, on the edge of the bed, with a new day to break open. I have fifty years, I have sixty years to spend. I have not yet broken into my hoard. This is the beginning.'

“再说，也快要到我们离开学校、穿上长裙的时候了。到了晚上，我要戴上项链，穿上一件无袖白礼服。金碧辉煌的房间里将要举办舞会。某位男士将会单独约我出去，对我讲他从未对别人讲过的事。与苏珊或罗达相比，他会更喜欢我。他会在我身上发现某种品质，某种特别的东西。但是我不会让我自己只迷恋一个人。我不想被钉住，被缠上。伴着新的一天来临，我垂着脚坐在床沿上，我发抖，我微微颤动着，像树篱上的那片叶子。我还有50年，我还有60年要过。我还不曾打开我的宝藏。这只是刚刚开始。”

'There are hours and hours,' said Rhoda, 'before I can put out the light and lie suspended on my bed above the world, before I can let the day drop down, before I can let my tree grow, quivering in green pavilions above my head. Here I cannot let it grow. Somebody knocks through it. They ask questions, they interrupt, they throw it down.

“还要好几个钟头之后，”罗达说，“我才能熄灯躺在床上，遨游世界之外；我才能让这一天落幕；我才能让我的树成长壮大，在我头上的绿亭子里微微摇曳。在这儿，我没法让它生长。有人总要把它随手拔掉。他们问这问那，他们不断打岔，他们随手就把它丢掉。

'Now I will go to the bathroom and take off my shoes and wash; but as I wash, as I bend my head down over the basin, I will let the Russian Empress's veil flow about my shoulders. The diamonds of the Imperial crown blaze on my forehead. I hear the roar of the hostile mob as I step out on to the balcony. Now I dry my hands, vigorously, so that Miss, whose name I forget, cannot suspect that I am waving my fist at an infuriated mob. "I am your Empress, people." My attitude is one of defiance. I am fearless. I conquer.

“现在我要去浴室，脱掉鞋子，准备洗澡；不过当我洗澡的时候，当我在洗脸盆上面俯下头的时候，我要让俄罗斯女皇的面纱流泻在我的肩上。皇冠上的钻石在我额头闪耀。当我移步阳台上，我听见凶恶的暴徒们的怒吼。现在我揩干我的手，动作有力，这样那位我忘了她名字的女士丝毫不会怀疑我正在向一伙愤怒的暴徒挥舞我的拳头。‘臣民们，我是你们的女皇。’我抱着一种藐视的态度。我无所畏惧。我征服一切。

'But this is a thin dream. This is a papery tree. Miss Lambert blows it down. Even the sight of her vanishing down the corridor blows it to atoms. It is not solid; it gives me no satisfaction—this Empress dream. It leaves me, now that it has fallen, here in the passage rather shivering. Things seem paler. I will go now into the library and take out some book, and read and look; and read again and look. Here is a poem about a hedge. I will wander down it and pick flowers, green cowbind and the moonlight-coloured May, wild roses and ivy serpentine. I will clasp them in my hands and lay them on the desk's shiny surface. I will sit by the river's trembling edge and look at the water-lilies, broad and bright, which lit the oak that overhung the hedge with moonlight beams of their own watery light. I will pick flowers; I will bind flowers in one garland and clasp them and present them—Oh! to whom? There is some check in the flow of my being; a deep stream presses on some obstacle; it jerks; it tugs; some knot in the centre resists. Oh, this is pain, this is anguish! I faint, I fail. Now my body thaws; I am unsealed, I am incandescent. Now the stream pours in a deep tide fertilizing, opening the shut, forcing the tight-folded, flooding free. To whom shall I give all that now flows through me, from my warm, my porous body? I will gather my flowers and present them—Oh! to whom?

“但这是一个空泛的梦。这是一棵如纸一般的树。兰伯特小姐一吹就倒。甚至她在走廊一闪而过的身影也会使它立时化为齑粉。它是靠不住的；它根本不会给我满足——这样的女皇梦。它既已破灭，就撇下我在这样的过道上瑟瑟发抖。一切似乎愈发苍白。现在我要到图书馆去，拿一本书出来，读一读，翻一翻；重新读一读，翻一翻。这儿有一首关于树篱的诗。我要沿着它信步走去，采摘鲜花和绿色的泻根，还有月色蒙眬的春光、野玫瑰和蜿蜒的常青藤。我要把它们紧紧地握在手中，然后放在明亮的桌面上。我要坐在颤悠悠的河岸边，望着舒展、艳丽的睡莲，它们淡淡的光辉像月光一样照亮了覆垂在树篱上的那棵橡树。我要采摘鲜花；我要把花儿编成一个花环，紧紧地握着它们，把它们献给——唉！献给谁呢？我的生命之流骤然停滞；一条深深的溪流遭遇了障碍；它推搡着，拉扯着；当中的某个结还在负隅顽抗。唉，这正是痛苦所在，这正是烦恼所在！我昏厥过去，我倒了下来。接着我的身体开始溶解；我开始解封，开始光芒四射。现在那条溪流一泻如潮，勇往直前，冲开闸门，突破重围，汹涌无阻。我该把此时从我温暖、疏松的身体中流出的那些东西都献给谁呢？我要采摘我的花儿，把它们献给——唉！献给谁呢？

'Sailors loiter on the parade, and amorous couples; the omnibuses rattle along the sea front to the town. I will give; I will enrich; I will return to the world this beauty. I will bind my flowers in one garland and advancing with my hand outstretched will present them—Oh! to whom?'

“水手们成群结队地闲逛，还有那些情侣们；公共马车沿着海滨吱吱嘎嘎驶向城里。我要奉献；我要充实；我要把这份美好归还给世界。我要把我的花儿编成一个花环，然后跑上前，伸过手去，把它们献给——唉！献给谁呢？”

'Now we have received,' said Louis, 'for this is the last day of the last term—Neville's and Bernard's and my last day—whatever our masters have had to give us. The introduction has been made; the world presented. They stay, we depart. The great Doctor, whom of all men I most revere, swaying a little from side to side among the tables, the bound volumes, has dealt out Horace, Tennyson, the complete works of Keats and Matthew Arnold, suitably inscribed. I respect the hand which gave them. He speaks with complete conviction. To him his words are true, though not to us. Speaking in the gruff voice of deep emotion, fiercely, tenderly, he has told us that we are about to go. He has bid us "quit ourselves like men". (On his lips quotations from the Bible, from The Times, seem equally magnificent.) Some will do this; others that. Some will not meet again. Neville, Bernard and I shall not meet here again. Life will divide us. But we have formed certain ties. Our boyish, our irresponsible years are over. But we have forged certain links. Above all, we have inherited traditions. These stone flags have been worn for six hundred years. On these walls are inscribed the names of men of war, of statesmen, of some unhappy poets (mine shall be among them). Blessings be on all traditions, on all safeguards and circumscriptions! I am most grateful to you men in black gowns, and you, dead, for your leading, for your guardianship; yet after all, the problem remains. The differences are not yet solved. Flowers toss their heads outside the window. I see wild birds, and impulses wilder than the wildest birds strike from my wild heart. My eyes are wild; my lips tight pressed. The bird flies; the flower dances; but I hear always the sullen thud of the waves; and the chained beast stamps on the beach. It stamps and stamps.'

“我们现在都已接受了，”路易斯说，“因为这是最后一个学期的最后一天——内维尔、伯纳德和我的最后一天——不管我们的老师曾经教给我们什么。我们已经得到引荐；世界已经呈现在眼前。他们还要留下来，我们就要离开了。那位了不起的博士，所有人当中我最尊敬的一位，步履略微蹒跚地穿过课桌之间，把装订好的镌刻了适当题辞的贺拉斯、丁尼生的诗集和济慈、马修·阿诺德的全集发给我们。我尊敬授人书卷的那只手。他的发言充满信念。他认为自己的话语真实可信，即便我们并不信服。他粗声粗气，饱含深情，既严厉又温柔地告诉我们说，我们即将离去。他嘱咐我们‘像男子汉一样离去’。（无论《圣经》上的话，还是《泰晤士报》上的话，从他嘴里说出来都同样铿锵有力。）有些人要做这一行；有些人要干那一行。有些人再也不会相见。内维尔、伯纳德和我再也不会在这里相见。生活将使我们各奔东西。可是我们已经结下了不解之缘。我们幼稚而无忧虑的年代结束了。可是我们已经结成了牢固不破的纽带。最重要的是，我们继承了传统。这些石板路历经六百年沧桑。这里的墙上镌刻着一些军人、政治家，还有一些不幸的诗人的名字（我的名字也将赫然其中）。愿上帝保佑所有的传统、所有的卫士和铭文！我十分感激你们这些身着黑袍的人，你们这些亡故的人，感激你们的引导，感激你们的守护；不过归根结底，问题依然存在。那些分歧还是悬而未决。窗外的花儿频频甩头。我望见那些野鸟，而比最野的鸟还要更野的冲动情绪从我狂野的心中突然冒了出来。我的目光充满野性；我的嘴唇紧紧地绷着。鸟儿飞翔；花儿舞蹈；但我总是听到海浪那沉闷的轰响；那头被链子锁住的野兽在海滩上不停地跺脚。它跺啊，跺啊。”

'This is the final ceremony,' said Bernard. 'This is the last of all our ceremonies. We are overcome by strange feelings. The guard holding his flag is about to blow his whistle; the train breathing steam in another moment is about to start. One wants to say something, to feel something, absolutely appropriate to the occasion. One's mind is primed; one's lips are pursed. And then a bee drifts in and hums round the flowers in the bouquet which Lady Hampton, the wife of the General, keeps smelling to show her appreciation of the compliment. If the bee were to sting her nose? We are all deeply moved; yet irreverent; yet penitent; yet anxious to get it over; yet reluctant to part. The bee distracts us; its casual flight seems to deride our intensity. Humming vaguely, skimming widely, it is settled now on the carnation. Many of us will not meet again. We shall not enjoy certain pleasures again, when we are free to go to bed, or to sit up, when I need no longer smuggle in bits of candle-ends and immoral literature. The bee now hums round the head of the great Doctor. Larpent, John, Archie, Percival, Baker and Smith—I have liked them enormously. I have known one mad boy only. I have hated one mean boy only. I enjoy in retrospect my terribly awkward breakfasts at the Headmaster's table with toast and marmalade. He alone does not notice the bee. If it were to settle on his nose he would flick it off with one magnificent gesture. Now he has made his joke; now his voice has almost broken but not quite. Now we are dismissed—Louis, Neville and I for ever. We take our highly polished books, scholastically inscribed in a little crabbed hand. We rise, we disperse; the pressure is removed. The bee has become an insignificant, a disregarded insect, flown through the open window into obscurity. Tomorrow we go.'

“这是最后的仪式。”伯纳德说。“这是我们参加的所有仪式中的最后一次。我们被奇异的情感所笼罩。举旗的警卫即将吹响哨子；又一次喷吐蒸气的火车即将开动。你想说几句完全应景的话，体味一下其中的感受。你的心思蓄势待发；你的嘴唇伺机而动。这时一只蜜蜂飘然而入，绕着花束中的花朵嗡嗡叫，就是汉普顿夫人，那位将军的太太，为了表示她对这番好意的感谢一直在闻的那束花。要是蜜蜂叮了她的鼻子怎么办？我们都深受感动；但感动之余既有不敬；却又后悔；既急于了结；却又依依不舍。蜜蜂让我们分了神。它随意地飞来飞去，似乎在嘲笑我们激动的心情。它嗡嗡的叫声忽强忽弱，轻轻掠过的身影忽东忽西，现在它落到那支康乃馨上面。我们很多人再也不会相见。当我们可以随意上床或者熬夜，当我不再需要私藏一截截蜡头和那些黄书，我们再也享受不到某些乐趣了。这时蜜蜂又绕着那位了不起的博士的脑袋嗡嗡叫开了。拉本特、约翰、阿奇、珀西瓦尔、贝克，还有史密斯——我曾十分喜欢他们。我只结识过一位疯疯癫癫的男孩子。我只讨厌过一位小里小气的男孩子。回想起与校长共进的那些十分别扭的早餐，有面包和果子酱的早餐，也让我感到快乐。唯有他没注意到那只蜜蜂。即使它停在他的鼻子上，他也会气派十足地挥手弹掉它。现在他的玩笑开完了；现在他的说话声几乎变了，但变化不大。现在我们被打发了——路易斯、内维尔，还有我，永远地被打发走了。我们拿着极其精美的手册，上面很有学问地题写了细小难辨的字。我们起身，我们解散；紧张情绪随即解除。那只蜜蜂成了无足轻重、无人理睬的一只昆虫，它从开着的窗飞了出去，不知飞到哪里去了。明天，我们也要飞走。”

'We are about to part,' said Neville. 'Here are the boxes; here are the cabs. There is Percival in his billycock hat. He will forget me. He will leave my letters lying about among guns and dogs unanswered. I shall send him poems and he will perhaps reply with a picture post card. But it is for that that I love him. I shall propose meeting—under a clock, by some Cross; and shall wait, and he will not come. It is for that that I love him. Oblivious, almost entirely ignorant, he will pass from my life. And I shall pass, incredible as it seems, into other lives; this is only an escapade perhaps, a prelude only. I feel already, though I cannot endure the Doctor's pompous mummery and faked emotions, that things we have only dimly perceived draw near. I shall be free to enter the garden where Fenwick raises his mallet. Those who have despised me shall acknowledge my sovereignty. But by some inscrutable law of my being sovereignty and the possession of power will not be enough; I shall always push through curtains to privacy, and want some whispered words alone. Therefore I go, dubious, but elate; apprehensive of intolerable pain; yet I think bound in my adventuring to conquer after huge suffering, bound, surely, to discover my desire in the end. There, for the last time, I see the statue of our pious founder with the doves about his head. They will wheel for ever about his head, whitening it, while the organ moans in the chapel. So I take my seat; and, when I have found my place in the comer of our reserved compartment, I will shade my eyes with a book to hide one tear; I will shade my eyes to observe; to peep at one face. It is the first day of the summer holidays.'

“我们即将分别。”内维尔说。“行李箱在这儿了；出租马车也到了。那边的珀西瓦尔戴着他的低圆顶软毡帽。他会忘了我。他会把我的信像鸟枪和猎狗一样四下乱丢，不予回复。我会寄诗给他，他也许会回复我一张带画的明信片。不过我就爱他这一点。我会提出见面——在一只挂钟下面，或在某个十字架旁边；我会一直等他，而他却不会来。我就爱他这一点。这样一个没心没肺、几乎一无所知的人，他会慢慢走出我的生活。而我会走进别人的生活，尽管好像不可思议；也许这只是一种儿戏，只是一段序曲。我已经感觉到——尽管我受不了博士那夸张的表演和做作的情感——我们曾经只是隐约意识到的那些事情越来越近了。我将自由地进入芬威克举起木槌的那座花园。那些鄙视过我的人将会承认我的独立自主。但是根据我生命中某种不可思议的法则，独立自主和拥有权力还不够；我要穿透层层帷幕，一直逼向隐秘之地，我想独自听到一些窃窃私语。因此我要出发，半信半疑，却兴高采烈；我担心会有难以忍受的痛苦；但是又想，我在历险途中遭遇巨大磨难之后必定会战胜一切，毫无疑问，最终我必定会找到自己的目标。最后一次朝那边望去，我看见我们那位虔诚的建校者的雕像，鸽子正在他头顶上空盘旋。它们将永远地盘旋在他的头上，伴着小教堂里风琴的呜咽声，染白他的头发。好了，我要就座了；等我在我们预订的车厢一角找到我的座位时，我要用书遮住我的眼睛，藏起一滴泪珠；我要遮住我的眼睛，为了观察；为了窥视一张脸。这是暑假的第一天。”

'It is the first day of the summer holidays,' said Susan. 'But the day is still rolled up. I will not examine it until I step out on to the platform in the evening. I will not let myself even smell it until I smell the cold green air off the fields. But already these are not school fields; these are not school hedges; the men in these fields are doing real things; they fill carts with real hay; and those are real cows, not school cows. But the carbolic smell of corridors and the chalky smell of schoolrooms is still in my nostrils. The glazed, shiny look of matchboard is still in my eyes. I must wait for fields and hedges, and woods and fields, and steep railway cuttings, sprinkled with gorse bushes, and trucks in sidings, and tunnels and suburban gardens with women hanging out washing, and then fields again and children swinging on gates, to cover it over, to bury it deep, this school that I have hated.

“这是暑假的第一天。”苏珊说。“但这一天依然是卷起来的。直到傍晚我踏上月台时，我才会查看它。在我闻到来自田野的、凉凉的绿色气息之前，我甚至不会让自己闻一闻它。但这些已经不是学校的操场；这些不是学校的树篱；田野里的人们正在干真正的活；他们把真正的干草装满推车；那些是真正的母牛，不是学校的母牛。但我的鼻孔里依然闻到的是学校走廊的碳味和教室的粉笔味。我的眼前依然是光亮、耀眼的企口板。我必须等着田野和树篱，树林和田野，点缀着一簇簇荆豆丛的陡峭的铁轨路堑，侧轨上的一辆辆货车，隧道，女人们晾晒衣物的郊区花园，继之而来的田野，大门上荡来荡去的孩子，等着这一切来把它覆盖，把它深深地埋葬，我曾讨厌透顶的这所学校。

'I will not send my children to school nor spend a night all my life in London. Here in this vast station everything echoes and booms hollowly. The light is like the yellow light under an awning. Jinny lives here. Jinny takes her dog for walks on these pavements. People here shoot through the streets silently. They look at nothing but shop-windows. Their heads bob up and down all at about the same height. The streets are laced together with telegraph wires. The houses are all glass, all festoons and glitter; now all front doors and lace curtains, all pillars and white steps. But now I pass on, out of London again; the fields begin again; and the houses, and women hanging washing, and trees and fields. London is now veiled, now vanished, now crumbled, now fallen. The carbolic and the pitch-pine begin to lose their savour. I smell corn and turnips. I undo a paper packet tied with a piece of white cotton. The egg shells slide into the cleft between my knees. Now we stop at station after station, rolling out milk cans. Now women kiss each other and help with baskets. Now I will let myself lean out of the window. The air rushes down my nose and throat—the cold air, the salt air with the smell of turnip fields in it. And there is my father, with his back turned, talking to a farmer. I tremble, I cry. There is my father in gaiters. There is my father.'

“我不想把我的孩子们送去上学，也一辈子不想在伦敦过夜。在这个庞大的火车站里，一切都在空洞地轰鸣、回响。昏黄的灯光像上面遮了篷布。吉尼住在这里。吉尼牵着她的狗在这些人行道上散步。这儿的人们默无声息地急匆匆穿过大街。他们的目光只盯着橱窗。他们的脑袋忽上忽下，都保持在差不多一样的高度。电报线把一条条大街缠在一起。房子全都是玻璃的，全都彩花装饰，光辉闪耀；这会儿只看到前门和蕾丝窗帘，全都是柱子和白色的台阶。不过这会儿我又继续向前，出了伦敦；又出现了田野；又看见了房子和晾晒衣物的女人，接着是树和田野。这会儿伦敦蒙上了面纱，一会儿突然消失了，一会儿支离破碎了，一会儿完全看不见了。碳和油松的气味开始散去。我闻到谷物和芜菁的气味。我解开用一根白棉线系的纸袋。蛋壳顺着我两膝之间的缝隙滑了下去。经过一站又一站，喝下了一罐又一罐牛奶，现在我们停了下来。现在女人们相互亲吻着，相互帮扶着提筐携篮。现在我要让自己探出窗外。一股气息直冲我的鼻子和喉咙——凉凉的气息，咸咸的气息，夹杂着芜菁田地的气味。那儿就是我的父亲， 他背过身去，正跟一位农民说话。我颤抖，我哭泣。那儿就是打着绑腿的我父亲。那儿就是我父亲。”

'I sit snug in my own corner going North,' said Jinny, 'in this roaring express which is yet so smooth that it flattens hedges, lengthens hills. We flash past signal-boxes; we make the earth rock slightly from side to side. The distance closes for ever in a point; and we for ever open the distance wide again. The telegraph poles bob up incessantly; one is felled, another rises. Now we roar and swing into a tunnel. The gentleman pulls up the window. I see reflections on the shining glass which lines the tunnel. I see him lower his paper. He smiles at my reflection in the tunnel. My body instantly of its own accord puts forth a frill under his gaze. My body lives a life of its own. Now the black window glass is green again. We are out of the tunnel. He reads his paper. But we have exchanged the approval of our bodies. There is then a great society of bodies, and mine is introduced; mine has come into the room where the gilt chairs are. Look—all the windows of the villas and their white-tented curtains dance; and the men sitting in the hedges in the cornfields with knotted blue handkerchiefs are aware too, as I am aware, of heat and rapture. One waves as we pass him. There are bowers and arbours in these villa gardens and young men in shirt-sleeves on ladders trimming roses. A man on a horse canters over the field. His horse plunges as we pass. And the rider turns to look at us. We roar again through blackness. And I lie back; I give myself up to rapture; I think that at the end of the tunnel I enter a lamp-lit room with chairs, into one of which I sink, much admired, my dress billowing round me. But behold, looking up, I meet the eyes of a sour woman, who suspects me of rapture. My body shuts in her face, impertinently, like a parasol. I open my body, I shut my body at my will. Life is beginning. I now break into my hoard of life.'

“我舒服地坐在自己的角落里，一路向北驶去，”吉尼说，“这隆隆的快车却又那么平稳，它让树篱变得扁扁的，让山丘变得长长的。我们从信号楼旁一闪而过；我们让大地微微地左右摇晃。远方在某一点上永远地闭合了；而我们又永远地打开了辽阔的远方。电报线杆不断地跃然眼前；一根倒了下去，另一根又升了上来。现在我们轰轰隆隆、摇摇晃晃地驶入一条隧道。有位先生拉开窗。我看见嵌在隧道壁上的明镜中的影像。我看见他放下报纸。他冲着隧道中照出的我的影子笑了笑。在他的注视下，我的身体立刻自觉地摆出一幅架势。我的身体有它自己的生活。现在黑色的窗玻璃又变成了绿色。我们出了隧道。他在读报纸。不过我们已经交换了对彼此身体的认同。接下来会有一个良好的身体交流，而我的身体已经做了介绍；它走进了一个摆满镀金椅子的房间。瞧——别墅所有的窗和白纱帐似的窗帘都跳起舞来；坐在麦田里的树篱中，戴着打了花结的蓝手帕的那些人，也像我一样，感到激动和欣喜。我们经过的时候，有一个人挥了挥手。这些别墅花园里有凉棚和藤架，还有身着衬衫的年轻人踩着梯子修剪玫瑰。一个人骑在马上慢慢跑过田野。我们经过的时候，他的马突然向前一蹿。骑马的人扭头瞧了瞧我们。我们又轰隆隆地驶入一片黑暗。我仰躺下来；我沉湎于欣喜之中；我设想在隧道的尽头，我走进一个灯火通明、摆满椅子的房间，我在众人仰慕之下坐进一把椅子里，我的衣裙起伏飘扬。可是看啊，一抬头，我碰上了一个尖酸刻薄女人的目光，她竟然怀疑我的欣喜。我的身体当着她的面合拢了，毫不客气，像一把太阳伞。我打开我的身体，我合拢我的身体，随心所欲。生活开始了。这一刻我突然闯入了我人生的宝库。”

'It is the first day of the summer holidays,' said Rhoda. 'And now, as the train passes by these red rocks, by this blue sea, the term, done with, forms itself into one shape behind me. I see its colour. June was white. I see the fields white with daisies, and white with dresses; and tennis courts marked with white. Then there was wind and violent thunder. There was a star riding through clouds one night, and I said to the star, "Consume me." That was at midsummer, after the garden party and my humiliation at the garden party. Wind and storm coloured July. Also, in the middle, cadaverous, awful, lay the grey puddle in the courtyard, when, holding an envelope in my hand, I carried a message. I came to the puddle. I could not cross it. Identity failed me. We are nothing, I said, and fell. I was blown like a feather, I was wafted down tunnels. Then very gingerly, I pushed my foot across. I laid my hand against a brick wall. I returned very painfully, drawing myself back into my body over the grey, cadaverous space of the puddle. This is life then to which I am committed.

“这是暑假的第一天。”罗达说。“此刻，当火车经过这些火红的岩石，经过这片蔚蓝的海，过去的这个学期也随之成形。我看见它的色彩。六月是白色的。我看见田野里白色的雏菊和白色的衣衫；网球场上也划了白色的标线。接着刮起了风，响起剧烈的雷声。一天晚上，有一颗星星划破云层，我对那颗星星说：‘把我化为灰烬吧。’那时正值仲夏，游园会刚刚过去，我刚刚经历了游园会上的屈辱。大风和暴雨给七月染上了色彩。而且，在院子中间，颜色死灰、令人生厌地横着晦暗的水坑，这时的我一手拿着信封来送信。我来到水坑前。我没能过去。我的脸面丢尽了。我们真是没用，我说着，就倒了。我像一支羽毛被风吹着，沿着隧道飘啊飘。后来，我十分小心地跨出一只脚。一只手扶着一堵砖墙。回来时，我收回心神，相当吃力地跨过那个晦暗的、死灰色的水坑。这就是当时我注定要过的生活。

'So I detach the summer term. With intermittent shocks, sudden as the springs of a tiger, life emerges heaving its dark crest from the sea. It is to this we are attached; it is to this we are bound, as bodies to wild horses. And yet we have invented devices for filling up the crevices and disguising these fissures. Here is the ticket collector. Here are two men; three women; there is a cat in a basket; myself with my elbow on the window-sill—this is here and now. We draw on, we make off, through whispering fields of golden corn. Women in the fields are surprised to be left behind there, hoeing. The train now stamps heavily, breathes stertorously, as it climbs up and up. At last we are on the top of the moor. Only a few wild sheep live here; a few shaggy ponies; yet we are provided with every comfort; with tables to hold our newspapers, with rings to hold our tumblers. We come carrying these appliances with us over the top of the moor. Now we are on the summit. Silence will close behind us. If I look back over that bald head, I can see silence already closing and the shadows of clouds chasing each other over the empty moor; silence closes over our transient passage. This I say is the present moment; this is the first day of the summer holidays. This is part of the emerging monster to whom we are attached.'

“我就这样脱离了那个暑期。伴着时断时续的震荡，像老虎的腾跃那般突然，生活从海上掀起了幽暗的浪头，露出了它的面目。就这样我们成为附庸；就这样我们被缚住手脚，好像身体受制的野马。而为了填补缝隙和掩盖这些裂纹，我们发明了各种工具。查票员来了。这儿是两个男人；三个女人；那儿的篮子里有一只猫；我孤身一人，胳膊肘支在窗台上——此刻的情景就是这样。我们渐渐靠近，我们匆匆离去，穿过窃窃私语的金黄麦田。田里的妇女们被甩在身后，惊奇之余继续锄草。这会儿火车仿佛使劲跺着脚，呼吸好像打呼噜似的，它越爬越高了。最后我们来到荒野之巅。这儿只生活着几只野羊；几只粗毛小马；而我们的设备一应俱全；有桌子来放报纸，有套环来放玻璃酒杯。我们随身带着这些设备来到这荒原之巅。此刻我们来到峰顶。寂静将从我们身后包围过来。假如我越过那颗秃脑袋向后望去，我就能看见寂静已经包围过来，云影在空荡的荒原上面你追我赶；我们瞬息路过，寂静随即包围过来。这就是我所说的此时此刻；这就是暑假的第一天。这就是我们无法摆脱的逐渐成形的那只怪兽的一部分。”

'Now we are off,' said Louis. 'Now I hang suspended without attachments. We are nowhere. We are passing through England in a train. England slips by the window, always changing from hill to wood, from rivers and willows to towns again. And I have no firm ground to which I go. Bernard and Neville, Percival, Archie, Larpent and Baker go to Oxford or Cambridge, to Edinburgh, Rome, Paris, Berlin, or to some American University. I go vaguely, to make money vaguely. Therefore a poignant shadow, a keen accent, falls on these golden bristles, on these poppy-red fields, this flowing corn that never overflows its boundaries; but runs rippling to the edge. This is the first day of a new life, another spoke of the rising wheel. But my body passes vagrant as a bird's shadow. I should be transient as the shadow on the meadow, soon fading, soon darkening and dying there where it meets the wood, were it not that I coerce my brain to form in my forehead; I force myself to state, if only in one line of unwritten poetry, this moment; to mark this inch in the long, long history that began in Egypt, in the time of the Pharaohs, when women carried red pitchers to the Nile. I seem already to have lived many thousand years. But if I now shut my eyes, if I fail to realize the meeting-place of past and present, that I sit in a third-class railway carriage full of boys going home for the holidays, human history is defrauded of a moment's vision. Its eye, that would see through me, shuts—if I sleep now, through slovenliness, or cowardice, burying myself in the past, in the dark; or acquiesce, as Bernard acquiesces, telling stories; or boast, as Percival, Archie, John, Walter, Lathom, Larpent, Roper, Smith boast—the names are the same always, the names of the boasting boys. They are all boasting, all talking, except Neville, who slips a look occasionally over the edge of a French novel, and so will always slip into cushioned firelit rooms, with many books and one friend, while I tilt on an office chair behind a counter. Then I shall grow bitter and mock at them. I shall envy them their continuance down the safe traditional ways under the shade of old yew trees while I consort with cockneys and clerks, and tap the pavements of the city.

“现在我们出发了。”路易斯说。“现在我悬在半空，无依无靠。我们身无所系。我们正坐着一列火车穿越英格兰。英格兰从车窗外飞逝而过，变化不定，一会儿是山，一会儿是林；一会儿是江河、杨柳，一会儿又是城镇。而我完全没有明确的落脚点。伯纳德、内维尔、珀西瓦尔、阿奇、拉本特和贝克要去牛津或剑桥，或者去爱丁堡、罗马、巴黎、柏林或美国的某所大学。我去向不明，谋生之道也不明。因此，辛酸的阴影，浓郁的口音，降落在这些金色的芒刺上，在这些红色的田野上，在这片起起伏伏绵延直达田边但从不溢出田埂之外的麦浪上。这是新生活的第一天，转动的车轮上的又一根轮辐。可是我的身体像鸟儿的影子游移不定。若不是因为我强迫自己的思维凝聚在额头，我可能也只是个过客，像草地上的影子，很快开始褪色，很快暗淡下去，消失在那边的树林中；我强迫自己来表述这一时刻，哪怕只用一行未写下的诗句；我要在源起于埃及法老时代——那时妇女们扛着红色水罐到尼罗河畔提水——这段长长的历史中留下一英寸的标记。我仿佛已经生活了好几千年。但是假如我现在合上眼睛，假如我意识不到过去和现在交汇的地方，意识不到我正坐在火车上一节三等车厢里，这节车厢坐满了放假回家的男孩子，那么人类的历史就会被窃去一小段景象。它的眼，那只总能看穿我的眼，闭上了——如果此刻我因为懒散而沉入睡梦，或因胆怯而埋头于过去、埋头于黑暗；或者默认，像伯纳德那样讲讲故事，默认一切；或者吹吹牛皮，像珀西瓦尔、阿奇、约翰、沃尔特、拉松、拉本特、罗珀和史密斯那样吹牛——总是这些不变的名字，这些吹牛的男孩子的名字。他们都在大话连篇，都在滔滔不绝，除了内维尔，他时不时地会偷偷瞥一眼一本法国小说，然后总会带上很多书和一位朋友，悄悄溜进有靠垫和炉火的房间，而那时我会歪着身子坐在柜台后面的一把办公椅子上。那时我会愤愤不平，对他们冷嘲热讽。我会嫉妒他们能在古老的紫杉树阴下继续他们安闲的旧式生活，而我却要跟伦敦佬和小职员们打交道，轻轻踏响城市的步道。

'But now disembodied, passing over fields without lodgment—(there is a river; a man fishes; there is a spire, there is the village street with its bow-windowed inn)—all is dreamlike and dim to me. These hard thoughts, this envy, this bitterness, make no lodgment in me. I am the ghost of Louis, an ephemeral passer-by, in whose mind dreams have power, and garden sounds when in the early morning petals float on fathomless depths and the birds sing. I dash and sprinkle myself with the bright waters of childhood. Its thin veil quivers. But the chained beast stamps and stamps on the shore.'

“但是现在我正满心空虚，无所着落地穿过田野——（有一条河流；一个男人在垂钓；有一座尖塔，乡村街道上有一家弓形窗子的小客栈）——一切对我来说都犹如梦幻般蒙眬。这些艰涩的思想，这种嫉妒，这种愤愤不平，根本不会在我心中落脚。我是路易斯的魅影，一个瞬息而逝的过客，在我心中，梦想拥有权力。每当清早，花瓣在无底的深渊上面漂浮，鸟儿在歌唱，花园也在奏鸣。我急匆匆为自己洒下童年时代的清澈之水。它薄薄的面纱微微颤动。但是海岸上那头拴着锁链的野兽不停地跺着脚。”

'Louis and Neville,' said Bernard, 'both sit silent. Both are absorbed. Both feel the presence of other people as a separating wall. But if I find myself in company with other people, words at once make smoke rings—see how phrases at once begin to wreathe off my lips. It seems that a match is set to a fire; something burns. An elderly and apparently prosperous man, a traveller, now gets in. And I at once wish to approach him; I instinctively dislike the sense of his presence, cold, unassimilated, among us. I do not believe in separation. We are not single. Also I wish to add to my collection of valuable observations upon the true nature of human life. My book will certainly run to many volumes, embracing every known variety of man and woman. I fill my mind with whatever happens to be the contents of a room or a railway carriage as one fills a fountain-pen in an inkpot. I have a steady unquenchable thirst. Now I feel by imperceptible signs, which I cannot yet interpret but will later, that his defiance is about to thaw. His solitude shows signs of cracking. He has passed a remark about a country house. A smoke ring issues from my lips (about crops) and circles him, bringing him into contact. The human voice has a disarming quality—(we are not single, we are one). As we exchange these few but amiable remarks about country houses, I furbish him up and make him concrete. He is indulgent as a husband but not faithful; a small builder who employs a few men. In local society he is important; is already a councillor, and perhaps in time will be mayor. He wears a large ornament, like a double tooth torn up by the roots, made of coral, hanging at his watch-chain. Walter J. Trumble is the sort of name that would fit him. He has been in America, on a business trip with his wife, and a double room in a smallish hotel cost him a whole month's wages. His front tooth is stopped with gold.

“路易斯和内维尔，”伯纳德说，“都坐着不说话。两人都聚精会神。两人都觉得别人的存在是一道隔离墙。可是我若发现自己有人作伴，话语立刻像烟圈似的袅袅升起——瞧瞧我的妙语是如何脱口而出的。好像一根火柴划着了，点燃了什么东西。这时，一位上了年纪、显然事业有成的男人，一位游客，上车了。我立刻想要接近他；我本能地不喜欢他一个人冷冰冰、不合群地置身于我们中间的那种感觉。我不赞成彼此疏远。我们并非独处世上。而且我希望收集到更多有价值的关于人生真谛的观察资料。我的著作当然要卷帙浩繁，把每一种类型的男男女女都包罗在内。不管一个房间或一节车厢里的人有些什么样的经历，都会把我的头脑填得满满的，就像在墨水瓶里灌满自来水笔一样。我总有一种难以克制的渴望。现在我凭借种种细微的迹象，这我暂时还无法解释清楚，但是以后会的，发觉他的抗拒心理即将缓和。他的静默正是开解的迹象。他刚对一处乡间宅院发表了一句议论。我嘴上就吐出一个烟圈（关于庄稼），绕着他，与他取得了联系。人类声音有消除警惕的特质（我们并非独处世上，我们本是一体）。我们对乡间宅院交换了寥寥几句但却亲切的话语之后，我就让他容光焕发，也使他开诚布公了。他是个纵容却并不忠诚的丈夫，一个雇着几个人的小建筑商。他在当地社会是个名人；已经是一位政务会委员，说不定以后会当上市长。他戴了一件挺大的饰物，像连根拔起的一颗复齿，是珊瑚做的，挂在他的表链上。沃尔特·J·特朗布尔这类名字才适合他。他去过美国，带着妻子出了一趟公差，一家小旅馆的一个双人房间花掉了他整整一个月的薪水。他的一颗门牙镶了金子。

'The fact is that I have little aptitude for reflection. I require the concrete in everything. It is so only that I lay hands upon the world. A good phrase, however, seems to me to have an independent existence. Yet I think it is likely that the best are made in solitude. They require some final refrigeration which I cannot give them, dabbling always in warm soluble words. My method, nevertheless, has certain advantages over theirs. Neville is repelled by the grossness of Trumble. Louis, glancing, tripping with the high step of a disdainful crane, picks up words as if in sugar-tongs. It is true that his eyes—wild, laughing, yet desperate—express something that we have not gauged. There is about both Neville and Louis a precision, an exactitude, that I admire and shall never possess. Now I begin to be aware that action is demanded. We approach a junction; at a junction I have to change. I have to board a train for Edinburgh. I cannot precisely lay fingers on this fact—it lodges loosely among my thoughts like a button, like a small coin. Here is the jolly old boy who collects tickets. I had one—I had one certainly. But it does not matter. Either I shall find it, or I shall not find it. I examine my note-case. I look in all my pockets. These are the things that for ever interrupt the process upon which I am eternally engaged of finding some perfect phrase that fits this very moment exactly.'

“事实上我不大善于深思。我要求一切具体化。要做到这一点，只有让我的双手触摸到这个世界。不过对我来说，一句妙语似乎也有它独立的生命。但我想最佳妙语大概是在静默中产生的吧。它们需要某种最后的冷藏，而我却办不到，我总是在温暖、易溶的词语中浅尝则止。不过，我这一套却有种种高人一筹的好处。内维尔被特朗布尔的粗俗弄得很烦。路易斯呢，偶尔瞥过来一眼，像一只迈着高步、轻快地走来走去的高傲的仙鹤，他随意地抓取词语，仿佛是方糖夹钳夹取糖果。的确，他的目光——野蛮，含着笑，还有极度的渴望——表达着我们不曾估量到的内容。内维尔和路易斯的身上都有一种精细，或曰精确的特点，这是我所羡慕却无法具备的。此时我开始意识到必须活动活动。我们快到中转站了，到了中转站我就得换车。我得搭上开往爱丁堡的火车。我无法精确地把握这一事实——它像一颗纽扣，像一枚小小的硬币，散落在我的思绪中间。那位乐呵呵的收票的老兄过来了。我有票——我当然有票。不过这没关系。我要么找到它，要么找不到它。我仔细翻了我的皮夹子。我找遍了我所有的衣兜。正是这些事情老是打断我的思维进程，使我不能持续专注于找到一个完美的词语来恰如其分地表述眼前这一时刻。”

'Bernard has gone,' said Neville, 'without a ticket. He has escaped us, making a phrase, waving his hand. He talked as easily to the horse-breeder or to the plumber as to us. The plumber accepted him with devotion. "If he had a son like that," he was thinking, "he would manage to send him to Oxford." But what did Bernard feel for the plumber? Did he not only wish to continue the sequence of the story which he never stops telling himself? He began it when he rolled his bread into pellets as a child. One pellet was a man, one was a woman. We are all pellets. We are all phrases in Bernard's story, things he writes down in his notebook under A or under B. He tells our story with extraordinary understanding, except of what we most feel. For he does not need us. He is never at our mercy. There he is, waving his arms on the platform. The train has gone without him. He has missed his connection. He has lost his ticket. But that does not matter. He will talk to the barmaid about the nature of human destiny. We are off; he has forgotten us already; we pass out of his view; we go on, filled with lingering sensations, half bitter, half sweet, for he is somehow to be pitied, breasting the world with half-finished phrases, having lost his ticket: he is also to be loved.

“伯纳德走了，”内维尔说，“一张票也没有。他编了一句词儿，挥了挥手，就撇下我们走了。他跟那个养马的人或那个管子工说起话来，就像跟我们说话一样应付自如。那个管子工真心实意地接受了他。‘要是他养这么个儿子，’他心想，‘一定设法送他上牛津。’可是伯纳德怎么看那个管子工呢？难道他不是只想着把那个一直讲给自己听的故事继续讲下去么？从孩提时代他把面包揉成团起，他的故事就开始了。一种团是男人，一种团是女人。我们都是一个个面团。我们都是伯纳德故事中的词，是他记在日记本里Ａ栏或Ｂ栏下的事。他以超常的理解力讲着我们的故事，只是不明白我们最感动的是什么。因为他根本不需要我们。他从不受我们的摆布。他就在那儿，在月台上，挥舞着手臂。火车开走了， 没载着他。他没转成车。他把车票弄丢了。不过那也没关系。他会跟那位酒吧女招待谈谈人类命运的本质。我们开走了；他已经忘了我们；我们驶出他的视野；我们继续赶路，心头满是萦回不去的情感，苦甜参半；他要凭那些半吊子词闯荡世界，而且还丢了车票，他会让人怜悯：他也会得到爱的。

'Now I pretend again to read. I raise my book, till it almost covers my eyes. But I cannot read in the presence of horse-dealers and plumbers. I have no power of ingratiating myself. I do not admire that man; he does not admire me. Let me at least be honest. Let me denounce this piffling, trifling, self-satisfied world; these horse-hair seats; these coloured photographs of piers and parades. I could shriek aloud at the smug self-satisfaction, at the mediocrity of this world, which breeds horse-dealers with coral ornaments hanging from their watch-chains. There is that in me which will consume them entirely. My laughter shall make them twist in their seats; shall drive them howling before me. No; they are immortal. They triumph. They will make it impossible for me always to read Catullus in a third-class railway carriage. They will drive me in October to take refuge in one of the universities, where I shall become a don; and go with schoolmasters to Greece; and lecture on the ruins of the Parthenon. It would be better to breed horses and live in one of those red villas than to run in and out of the skulls of Sophocles and Euripides like a maggot, with a high-minded wife, one of those University women. That, however, will be my fate. I shall suffer. I am already at eighteen capable of such contempt that horse-breeders hate me. That is my triumph; I do not compromise. I am not timid; I have no accent. I do not finick about fearing what people think of "my father a banker at Brisbane" like Louis.

“现在我又假装读起书来。我把书举起来，直到它几乎遮住了我的眼睛。可是我无法当着马贩子和管子工的面读书。我可没有自娱自乐的本事。我看不上那人；那人也看不上我。至少让我诚实一点吧。让我来控诉这个无聊、琐碎、自鸣得意的世界；这些马毛座椅；还有这些突堤和游行队伍的彩色照片。看到那种洋洋得意的自满情态；看到世上这些庸碌之辈，这世界竟然养育出表链上挂着珊瑚饰物的马贩子，我会大声尖叫的。我心中的那股火会把他们统统化为灰烬。我的笑声会让他们蜷缩在座位上，会逼得他们在我面前哀号。不，他们是不朽的。他们会赢得胜利。他们将使我无法在一节三等车厢里阅读卡图卢斯的作品。他们将逼迫我在十月份逃进一所大学，我将在那儿做一名导师；然后和教师们一起去希腊；还要在帕提侬神庙的废墟上面开讲座。最好是去养马，住进一幢红色的别墅里，不要像蛆虫一样在索福克勒斯和欧里庇得斯的骸骨里钻进钻出，再娶个品格高尚的太太，一位大学女子。可是，那将是我的命运啊。我将遭受苦难。我已经十八岁了，就这么目中无人，惹得马贩子们恨透了我。这是我的胜利；我决不妥协。我不是胆小怕事的人；我不带一点口音。我不像路易斯那样吹毛求疵，担心人家会怎么想‘我的父亲是布里斯班的银行家’。

'Now we draw near the centre of the civilized world. There are the familiar gasometers. There are the public gardens intersected by asphalt paths. There are the lovers lying shamelessly mouth to mouth on the burnt grass. Percival is now almost in Scotland; his train draws through the red moors; he sees the long line of the Border hills and the Roman wall. He reads a detective novel, yet understands everything.

“此刻我们就要临近文明世界的中心。那儿有些熟悉的储气罐。那儿有些公园，当中的柏油小路纵横交错。那儿有些恋人，不知羞臊地嘴对嘴躺在枯草上。珀西瓦尔现在差不多快到苏格兰了；他的火车正穿过那片红色荒原；他看见连绵成一线的边界山和罗马墙。他在读一本侦探小说，不过一切都毫无悬念。

The train slows and lengthens, as we approach London, the centre, and my heart draws out too, in fear, in exultation. I am about to meet—what? What extraordinary adventure waits me, among these mail vans, these porters, these swarms of people calling taxis? I feel insignificant, lost, but exultant. With a soft shock we stop. I will let the others get out before me. I will sit still one moment before I emerge into that chaos, that tumult. I will not anticipate what is to come. The huge uproar is in my ears. It sounds and resounds, under this glass roof like the surge of a sea. We are cast down on the platform with our handbags. We are whirled asunder. My sense of self almost perishes; my contempt. I become drawn in, tossed down, thrown sky-high. I step out on to the platform, grasping tightly all that I possess—one bag.'

随着我们渐渐临近伦敦这个中心，火车开始减速、加长，我的心也膨胀起来，又惊又喜。我即将碰到——什么呢？在这些邮车、搬运工和招呼出租车的人群中间，会有什么样的不平凡经历等着我呢？我感到渺小、失落，却又兴奋。轻轻一震，我们停了下来。我要让别人先下车，我后下。我要静静地先坐一会儿，再投入那片纷乱和嘈杂中。我不想预料随之而来的事。巨大的喧嚣传入我的耳中。它就像大海的浪潮，在这片玻璃穹顶下面轰响，回荡。我们被甩在月台上，只带着随身的手提包。我们被旋流打散。我几乎丧失了自我意识，连同我的轻蔑心理。我被吸了进来，掷了下去，又被高高地抛上天。我踏上月台，紧紧抓住我的所有——一个手提包。”

The sun rose. Bars of yellow and green fell on the shore, gilding the ribs of the eaten-out boat and making the sea-holly and its mailed leaves gleam blue as steel. Light almost pierced the thin swift waves as they raced fan-shaped over the beach. The girl who had shaken her head and made all the jewels, the topaz, the aquamarine, the water-coloured jewels with sparks of fire in them, dance, now bared her brows and with wide-opened eyes drove a straight pathway over the waves. Their quivering mackerel sparkling was darkened; they massed themselves; their green hollows deepened and darkened and might be traversed by shoals of wandering fish. As they splashed and drew back they left a black rim of twigs and cork on the shore and straws and sticks of wood, as if some light shallop had foundered and burst its sides and the sailor had swum to land and bounded up the cliff and left his frail cargo to be washed ashore.

太阳升了起来。一条条黄绿色的光影投在海滩上，把那艘历经风雨的船骨架镀了一层金色，还使得那株海滨刺芹和它铠甲似的叶子发出钢铁一样的蓝光。那层薄薄的、迅疾的海浪呈扇形冲上沙滩，几乎一下子就被光芒刺穿了。那个女郎，刚才晃动着脑袋，让她所有的珠宝，黄宝石、水蓝宝石、中间闪光的水彩色宝石，都舞动不已，此时露出她的双眉，用她睁大的双眼在海浪上开辟出一条直直的通道。它们颤动的、鲭鱼似的闪光暗淡下来；它们聚成一团；它们绿色的波谷幽深、晦暗，可能正有成群的游鱼经过。随着浪花飞溅、退去，它们在海滩上留下黑黑的一线细枝、软木、草秸和木棍，好似一叶轻舟沉没了，碎裂了，而那位水手已游向陆地，跃上了悬崖，任凭他脆弱的货物被冲到岸上。

In the garden the birds that had sung erratically and spasmodically in the dawn on that tree, on that bush, now sang together in chorus, shrill and sharp; now together, as if conscious of companionship, now alone as if to the pale blue sky. They swerved, all in one flight, when the black cat moved among the bushes, when the cook threw cinders on the ash heap and startled them. Fear was in their song, and apprehension of pain, and joy to be snatched quickly now at this instant. Also they sang emulously in the clear morning air, swerving high over the elm tree, singing together as they chased each other, escaping, pursuing, pecking each other as they turned high in the air. And then tiring of pursuit and flight, lovelily they came descending, delicately declining, dropped down and sat silent on the tree, on the wall, with their bright eyes glancing, and their heads turned this way, that way; aware, awake; intensely conscious of one thing, one object in particular.

花园里，鸟儿从黎明时起就在那棵树上，在那株灌木上，断断续续、毫无规律地鸣唱，这会儿开始了齐声和鸣，尖锐而又响亮；听，它们的和声，仿佛与伴侣声气相求，听，一个单音，仿佛独向苍穹倾述。当黑猫在灌木丛中移动，当厨子把煤渣倒在灰堆上，它们受到惊吓，一哄而散，都飞走了。它们的歌声中有恐惧，有对苦难的忧虑，还有此刻及时抓住的欢乐。它们还在这早晨的清新气息里竞赛似地歌唱，高高地飞过榆树梢头；它们一边唱着，一边互相追逐；有的逃，有的追，你啄我，我啄你，一起飞上高空。后来厌倦了追与逃，它们就优美地向下飞，轻巧地下降，下落，悄无声息地停在树上，墙头上，明亮的眼睛左顾右盼，脑袋转来转去；既警觉，又清醒；紧张地关注着一样东西，某个特定的目标。

Perhaps it was a snail shell, rising in the grass like a grey cathedral, a swelling building burnt with dark rings and shadowed green by the grass. Or perhaps they saw the splendour of the flowers making a light of flowing purple over the beds, through which dark tunnels of purple shade were driven between the stalks. Or they fixed their gaze on the small bright apple leaves, dancing yet withheld, stiffly sparkling among the pink-tipped blossoms. Or they saw the rain drop on the hedge, pendent but not falling, with a whole house bent in it, and towering elms; or, gazing straight at the sun, their eyes became gold beads.

或许那是个蜗牛壳，耸立在草丛中，像一座灰色的教堂，一座凸起的建筑，上面刻有晦暗的圈圈，被草映得发绿。或许它们看到了花儿的壮美，那些花儿在花坛上面形成一道流泻的紫光，透到下面，在花茎与花茎之间开辟出一条条幽暗的、紫色花荫的隧道。或许它们在定睛注视那些小小的、闪亮的苹果树叶，那些叶子翩翩起舞却有几分矜持，在粉顶的花朵之间拘谨地闪烁。或许它们看见了树篱上的雨滴，垂而不落，整个一幢房子和那些高耸的榆树都委曲其中；或许它们正直直地盯着太阳，眼睛变成了金色的珠子。

Now glancing this side, that side, they looked deeper, beneath the flowers, down the dark avenues into the unlit world where the leaf rots and the flower has fallen. Then one of them, beautifully darting, accurately alighting, spiked the soft, monstrous body of the defenceless worm, pecked again and yet again, and left it to fester. Down there among the roots where the flowers decayed, gusts of dead smells were wafted; drops formed on the bloated sides of swollen things. The skin of rotten fruit broke, and matter oozed too thick to run. Yellow excretions were exuded by slugs, and now and again an amorphous body with a head at either end swayed slowly from side to side. The gold-eyed birds darting in between the leaves observed that purulence, that wetness, quizzically. Now and then they plunged the tips of their beaks savagely into the sticky mixture.

瞧，在左顾右盼之后，它们的目光深入到花儿下面，沿着幽暗的花阴大道开始探视那个败叶落花所在的无光的世界。这时它们之一优雅地冲了出去，准确地落了下来，尖喙刺入一条毫无防卫的虫子那又软又大的身体，啄了又啄，使那条虫子遍体鳞伤。在花枝下面，花根之间，落花开始腐烂，浮动着阵阵死亡的气息；在那些膨胀的东西四周聚满水珠。烂果子的皮破了，冒出的果肉粘滞不动。黄色的分泌物是蛞蝓所为，而且时不时会有一具形状不定的身体，两端各有一只脑袋，一摇一摆地缓缓移动。冲进落叶中的金色眼睛的鸟儿疑惑地审视着眼前这片脓液和潮湿。不时地它们把喙尖狠狠地戳进粘湿的混合物中。

Now, too, the rising sun came in at the window, touching the red-edged curtain, and began to bring out circles and lines. Now in the growing light its whiteness settled in the plate; the blade condensed its gleam. Chairs and cupboards loomed behind so that though each was separate they seemed inextricably involved. The looking-glass whitened its pool upon the wall. The real flower on the window-sill was attended by a phantom flower. Yet the phantom was part of the flower, for when a bud broke free the paler flower in the glass opened a bud too.

这时，升起的太阳也来到窗前，摩挲着镶着红边的窗帘，让上面呈现出一些圈圈道道。此刻在越来越强的光线中，它的白色映在盘子上；刀刃也愈发光亮。椅子和橱柜隐约在后面闪现，所以尽管它们各自独立，看上去却难解难分。墙上镜子的反光更加洁白。窗台上的真花伴着花影。但是那影子也是花的一部分，因为每当一个花蕾倏然绽放，镜中那支苍白的花也会绽放一个蓓蕾。

The wind rose. The waves drummed on the shore, like turbaned warriors, like turbaned men with poisoned assegais who, whirling their arms on high, advance upon the feeding flocks, the white sheep.

起风了。浪涛击鼓似的拍打着海岸，像包着头巾的勇士，像包着头巾的人高高地抡起臂膀，手持毒矛冲向那觅食的畜群，那些洁白的绵羊。

'The complexity of things becomes more close,' said Bernard, 'here at college, where the stir and pressure of life are so extreme, where the excitement of mere living becomes daily more urgent. Every hour something new is unburied in the great bran pie. What am I? I ask. This? No, I am that. Especially now, when I have left a room, and people talking, and the stone flags ring out with my solitary footsteps, and I behold the moon rising, sublimely, indifferently, over the ancient chapel—then it becomes clear that I am not one and simple, but complex and many. Bernard, in public, bubbles; in private, is secretive. That is what they do not understand, for they are now undoubtedly discussing me, saying I escape them, am evasive. They do not understand that I have to effect different transitions; have to cover the entrances and exits of several different men who alternately act their parts as Bernard. I am abnormally aware of circumstances. I can never read a book in a railway carriage without asking, Is he a builder? Is she unhappy? I was aware today acutely that poor Simes, with his pimple, was feeling, how bitterly, that his chance of making a good impression upon Billy Jackson was remote. Feeling this painfully, I invited him to dinner with ardour. This he will attribute to an admiration which is not mine. That is true. But "joined to the sensibility of a woman" (I am here quoting my own biographer) "Bernard possessed the logical sobriety of a man." Now people who make a single impression, and that, in the main, a good one (for there seems to be a virtue in simplicity), are those who keep their equilibrium in mid-stream. (I instantly see fish with their noses one way, the stream rushing past another.) Canon, Lycett, Peters, Hawkins, Larpent, Neville—all fish in mid-stream. But you understand, YOU, my self, who always comes at a call (that would be a harrowing experience to call and for no one to come; that would make the midnight hollow, and explains the expression of old men in clubs—they have given up calling for a self who does not come), you understand that I am only superficially represented by what I was saying tonight. Underneath, and, at the moment when I am most disparate, I am also integrated. I sympathize effusively; I also sit, like a toad in a hole, receiving with perfect coldness whatever comes. Very few of you who are now discussing me have the double capacity to feel, to reason. Lycett, you see, believes in running after hares; Hawkins has spent a most industrious afternoon in the library. Peters has his young lady at the circulating library. You are all engaged, involved, drawn in, and absolutely energized to the top of your bent—all save Neville, whose mind is far too complex to be roused by any single activity. I also am too complex. In my case something remains floating, unattached.

“错综复杂的形式愈加逼人，”伯纳德说，“在这大学里，生活忙乱操心到了极点，单纯生活的兴奋显得一天比一天更重要了。这个麦麸大馅饼里每时每刻都会掘出新的东西。我属于哪一类？我问道。这类？不，我属于那一类。尤其现在，我离开了房间，人们还在交谈，石板路上响起我孤单的脚步声，我看见月亮升起，那样高贵、冷漠，照耀着古老的教堂——这时，我显然不是简单的个人，而是复杂的众人。伯纳德在公开场合滔滔不绝；私下里却守口如瓶。这是他们所不明白的，因为这会儿他们毫无疑问在议论我，说我逃避他们，说我遮遮掩掩。他们不明白，我必须完成不同的角色转换；必须掩护轮流扮演伯纳德的几个不同的人的登场和退场。我异常关注各种情况。我绝不可能在车厢里看书，如果事先不问一声，他是个建筑商吗？她不幸福吗？今天，我深深地意识到，那个长了粉刺的可怜的塞姆斯觉得多么痛苦；他给比利·杰克逊留下好印象的机会那么渺茫。我为这一点感到痛心，所以热情地邀请他一起吃饭。这样做，他会归功于一份仰慕，而事实上我没有。真的。不过，‘虽然近于女性的多情善感’，（此处引用为我写传记的人的话）‘伯纳德拥有男子汉的逻辑分明的冷静’。瞧，给人留下单一印象，一般来说是个好印象的人（因为简约中似乎自有其美德），总能岿然屹立于中流。（我的眼前立即浮现出那些鱼儿，它们坚定地朝着一个方向，尽管水流奔向他方。）卡农、莱西特、彼得斯、霍金斯、拉本特、内维尔——都是中流的鱼儿。不过你要明白，你，召之即来的我的本体（召之不来的经历可谓惨痛；夜半将为之空虚；俱乐部里的老人们那样的表情，正是由来于此——他们已经放弃了召唤自己永不再来的本体），你要明白，今晚我所说的一切都只代表了我肤浅的一面。骨子里，当我与众不同的那一刻，我也是和谐统一的。我的共鸣热情洋溢；我也会坐在那儿，像洞里的癞蛤蟆一样，不管发生什么都十分冷静地接受。这会儿正在议论我的人，你们当中很少有人具备这种感知与推理的双重能力。你瞧，莱西特热衷于撵兔子；霍金斯在图书馆里度过了一个相当刻苦的下午。彼得斯在流动图书馆里有个年轻的女友。你们都在忙忙碌碌，深陷其中，无法自拔，你们使出浑身解数，简直登峰造极——只有内维尔除外，他的头脑复杂得多，不被任何单一活动所左右。我也是头脑过于复杂。在我这个人身上有某种东西一直在飘荡，无所依附。

'Now, as a proof of my susceptibility to atmosphere, here, as I come into my room, and turn on the light, and see the sheet of paper, the table, my gown lying negligently over the back of the chair, I feel that I am that dashing yet reflective man, that bold and deleterious figure, who, lightly throwing off his cloak, seizes his pen and at once flings off the following letter to the girl with whom he is passionately in love.

“瞧，我对这里的气氛很敏感的一个证据是，当我走进房间，点上灯，看见纸张、桌子和随意搭在椅背上的我的睡衣，我感觉自己就是那位不顾一切而又深思熟虑的人，那位大胆而危险的人物，他轻轻地甩掉斗篷，抓起笔来，随即给他热恋的女孩炮制出一封信。

'Yes, all is propitious. I am now in the mood. I can write the letter straight off which I have begun ever so many times. I have just come in; I have flung down my hat and my stick; I am writing the first thing that comes into my head without troubling to put the paper straight. It is going to be a brilliant sketch which, she must think, was written without a pause, without an erasure. Look how unformed the letters are—there is a careless blot. All must be sacrificed to speed and carelessness. I will write a quick, running, small hand, exaggerating the down stroke of the "y" and crossing the "t" thus—with a dash. The date shall be only Tuesday, the 17th, and then a question mark. But also I must give her the impression that though he—for this is not myself—is writing in such an off-hand, such a slap-dash way, there is some subtle suggestion of intimacy and respect. I must allude to talks we have had together—bring back some remembered scene. But I must seem to her (this is very important) to be passing from thing to thing with the greatest ease in the world. I shall pass from the service for the man who was drowned (I have a phrase for that) to Mrs Moffat and her sayings (I have a note of them), and so to some reflections apparently casual but full of profundity (profound criticism is often written casually) about some book I have been reading, some out-of-the-way book. I want her to say as she brushes her hair or puts out the candle, "Where did I read that? Oh, in Bernard's letter." It is the speed, the hot, molten effect, the laval flow of sentence into sentence that I need. Who am I thinking of? Byron of course. I am, in some ways, like Byron. Perhaps a sip of Byron will help to put me in the vein. Let me read a page. No; this is dull; this is scrappy. This is rather too formal. Now I am getting the hang of it. Now I am getting his beat into my brain (the rhythm is the main thing in writing). Now, without pausing I will begin, on the very lilt of the stroke—.

“是的，一切都是好兆头。我这会儿心情正好。我可以一气呵成，完成这封我多次开头却未完成的信。我刚刚进屋；我扔下帽子和手杖；我顾不上把纸摊平，赶紧写下浮现在我脑海中的第一件事。这极有可能是一篇出色的随笔，她一定会认为，它的完成是一挥而就、绝无删改的。瞧瞧这些字母多么散漫——还有个粗心的墨点。一切都要为才思敏捷和随心所欲做出牺牲。我要用行云流水般的小字体，字母Y向下的一划要极尽夸张，字母ｔ那一横也要格外用力。日期只需写上星期二，17号，然后打上一个问号。不过我还必须给她留下这样的印象，那就是，尽管他——因为这不是我本人——写得如此随便而潦草，却微妙地暗示了某种程度的亲密与敬意。我必须不经意地提及我们俩一起说过的话——勾起某个记忆中的场景。但是我必须让她觉得（这很重要），我是极为轻松自如地写下一件又一件事情的。我要提到为那个溺水而死的人所做的仪式（对此我有措辞），提到莫法特太太和她的名言警句（对此我有记录），还要提出一些看似随意实则深刻的看法（深刻的批评常常就是随意而为），它关于某一本我一直在读的书，一本不入主流的书。我希望她在梳头或熄灭蜡烛时自言自语：‘我是在哪儿读到那些话的？哦，是在伯纳德的信中。’我需要的就是这种敏捷的才思，这种火热融融的效果，一句一句好像岩浆奔流。我想到了谁？当然是拜伦。某些方面，我跟拜伦一样。或许提到拜伦会更有助于让我血液沸腾。让我来读一页吧。不，那是无聊，那是拼凑。那是太过一本正经。瞧，我正在得其法门。瞧，我正在让他的节奏进入我的脑海（韵律是写作中主要的东西）。好了，再不迟疑，伴着轻快的笔画，我要开始写——

'Yet it falls flat. It peters out. I cannot get up steam enough to carry me over the transition. My true self breaks off from my assumed. And if I begin to re-write it, she will feel "Bernard is posing as a literary man; Bernard is thinking of his biographer" (which is true). No, I will write the letter tomorrow directly after breakfast.

“但是一切都落空了。一切渐渐消失了。我无法打起足够的精神来继续这一转换。真实的我脱离了假想的我。而我如果开始重写，她会觉得‘伯纳德在装腔作势假扮文人；伯纳德想到的是为他写传记的那个人’（确实如此）。不，我要明天早饭后马上来写这封信。

'Now let me fill my mind with imaginary pictures. Let me suppose that I am asked to stay at Restover, King's Laughton, Station Langley three miles. I arrive in the dusk. In the courtyard of this shabby but distinguished house there are two or three dogs, slinking, long-legged. There are faded rugs in the hall; a military gentleman smokes a pipe as he paces the terrace. The note is of distinguished poverty and military connections. A hunter's hoof on the writing table—a favourite horse. "Do you ride?" "Yes, sir, I love riding." "My daughter expects us in the drawing-room.” My heart pounds against my ribs. She is standing at a low table; she has been hunting; she munches sandwiches like a tomboy. I make a fairly good impression on the Colonel. I am not too clever, he thinks; I am not too raw. Also I play billiards. Then the nice maid who has been with the family thirty years comes in. The pattern on the plates is of Oriental long-tailed birds. Her mother's portrait in muslin hangs over the fireplace. I can sketch the surroundings up to a point with extraordinary ease. But can I make it work? Can I hear her voice—the precise tone with which, when we are alone, she says "Bernard"? And then what next?

“现在，让我的脑海充满想象的画面吧。让我假设我被邀请到距离兰利车站三英里的皇家劳顿庄园的蕾斯托夫家做客。我在暮色中到达。在这幢破旧但尊贵的宅邸庭院里，有两三条狗，长长的腿，鬼鬼祟祟的。大厅里铺着褪色的小块地毯；一位军人模样的绅士一边吸着烟斗一边在露台上踱步。总的气氛传达出一种高贵的清贫以及与军界有种种联系。一只猎兽的蹄子摆在写字台上——那是一匹主人中意的马。‘你骑马么？’‘是的，先生，我爱骑马。’‘我的女儿在客厅等我们呢。’我的心在胸口怦怦直跳。她正站在一张矮桌边上；她刚打猎归来；她像个假小子似的大口嚼着三明治。我给上校留下了相当好的印象。我不算太聪明，他觉得；我也不算太笨。而且我会打台球。这时，那位与这家人相处了三十年的好心女仆走了进来。盘子上的图案画的是东方的长尾鸟。她母亲身着平纹细布衣的肖像挂在壁炉上方。我能够异常轻松地把这里的环境归结为一点。可是我能不能让它产生效果呢？我能不能听见她的声音——我们独处时她叫‘伯纳德’的那种恰如其分的语调？接着，下一步会怎样呢？

'The truth is that I need the stimulus of other people. Alone, over my dead fire, I tend to see the thin places in my own stories. The real novelist, the perfectly simple human being, could go on, indefinitely, imagining. He would not integrate, as I do. He would not have this devastating sense of grey ashes in a burnt-out grate. Some blind flaps in my eyes. Everything becomes impervious. I cease to invent.

“事实上，我需要别人的激励。一个人，就着暗淡的火光，我常常发现自己那些故事当中的薄弱之处。真正的小说家，十足简约的人，是能够无限地想象下去的。他不会像我这样追求和谐统一。他不会有这种炉火燃尽唯余死灰的幻灭感。我的眼中浮动着一层阴翳。一切都无法说通。我无法虚构下去了。

'Let me recollect. It has been on the whole a good day. The drop that forms on the roof of the soul in the evening is round, many-coloured. There was the morning, fine; there was the afternoon, walking. I like views of spires across grey fields. I like glimpses between people's shoulders. Things kept popping into my head. I was imaginative, subtle. After dinner, I was dramatic. I put into concrete form many things that we had dimly observed about our common friends. I made my transitions easily. But now let me ask myself the final question, as I sit over this grey fire, with its naked promontories of black coal, which of these people am I? It depends so much upon the room. When I say to myself, "Bernard", who comes? A faithful, sardonic man, disillusioned, but not embittered. A man of no particular age or calling. Myself, merely. It is he who now takes the poker and rattles the cinders so that they fall in showers through the grate. "Lord," he says to himself, watching them fall, "what a pother!" and then he adds, lugubriously, but with some sense of consolation, "Mrs Moffat will come and sweep it all up—” I fancy I shall often repeat to myself that phrase, as I rattle and bang through life, hitting first this side of the carriage, then the other, "Oh, yes, Mrs Moffat will come and sweep it all up." And so to bed.'

“让我来回忆吧。总体来说，过去的一天是美好的。傍晚时凝聚在灵魂之巅的这滴露珠是圆润而多彩的。早上，晴好；下午，一直在散步。我喜欢穿过灰色田野的座座尖塔的景象。我喜欢不经意地从人们肩膀之间望出去。事情不断地涌入我的脑海。我想象丰富，思维敏锐。晚饭之后，我开始做戏。我把在我们共同的几个朋友身上依稀观察到的许多事情具体地加以描述。我轻而易举地做着各种角色转换。但是现在，当我坐下来，就着棱角分明的黑煤燃起的这点灰暗的火光，让我问自己最后一个问题：那些人当中的哪一个才是真正的我？这在很大程度上取决于房间里的情况。当我对自己叫一声‘伯纳德’的时候，来的是谁呢？是一个诚实而喜欢嘲弄的人，幻想破灭，却不怨天尤人。是一个没有特定年龄或使命的人。是我自己，仅此而已。就是这个人，此时操起火棍，拨动煤渣，使其纷纷落下炉膛。‘天啊，’他望着落下的煤渣，自言自语：‘好大的灰！’接着，他又安慰性地继续哀叹道：‘莫法特太太会来把它们统统打扫干净的——’我想象到——因为我一生都在鼓捣来鼓捣去，先敲敲车厢这面，再敲敲另一面——我会经常对自己重复这句话：‘哦，对了，莫法特太太会来把它们统统打扫干净的。’然后我就上床了。”

'In a world which contains the present moment,' said Neville, 'why discriminate? Nothing should be named lest by so doing we change it. Let it exist, this bank, this beauty, and I, for one instant, steeped in pleasure. The sun is hot. I see the river. I see trees specked and burnt in the autumn sunlight. Boats float past, through the red, through the green. Far away a bell tolls, but not for death. There are bells that ring for life. A leaf falls, from joy. Oh, I am in love with life! Look how the willow shoots its fine sprays into the air! Look how through them a boat passes, filled with indolent, with unconscious, with powerful young men. They are listening to the gramophone; they are eating fruit out of paper bags. They are tossing the skins of bananas, which then sink eel-like, into the river. All they do is beautiful. There are cruets behind them and ornaments; their rooms are full of oars and oleographs but they have turned all to beauty. That boat passes under the bridge. Another comes. Then another. That is Percival, lounging on the cushions, monolithic, in giant repose. No, it is only one of his satellites, imitating his monolithic, his giant repose. He alone is unconscious of their tricks, and when he catches them at it he buffets them good-humouredly with a blow of his paw. They, too, have passed under the bridge through 'the fountains of the pendant trees', through its fine strokes of yellow and plum colour. The breeze stirs; the curtain quivers; I see behind the leaves the grave, yet eternally joyous buildings, which seem porous, not gravid; light, though set so immemorially on the ancient turf. Now begins to rise in me the familiar rhythm; words that have lain dormant now lift, now toss their crests, and fall and rise, and fall and rise again. I am a poet, yes. Surely I am a great poet. Boats and youth passing and distant trees, "the falling fountains of the pendant trees". I see it all. I feel it all. I am inspired. My eyes fill with tears. Yet even as I feel this, I lash my frenzy higher and higher. It foams. It becomes artificial, insincere. Words and words and words, how they gallop—how they lash their long manes and tails, but for some fault in me I cannot give myself to their backs; I cannot fly with them, scattering women and string bags. There is some flaw in me—some fatal hesitancy, which, if I pass it over, turns to foam and falsity. Yet it is incredible that I should not be a great poet. What did I write last night if it was not good poetry? Am I too fast, too facile? I do not know. I do not know myself sometimes, or how to measure and name and count out the grains that make me what I am.

“在一个由当前时刻构成的世界，”内维尔说，“为什么要有区别对待呢？不该给事物命名，我们这样做只会改变它。这条河岸，这片美景，让它存在吧，而我，刹那间沉浸在喜悦中。太阳火辣辣的。我望着河水。我望着秋阳下斑驳、焦黄的树木。船儿驶过，穿过红花，穿过绿野。远远地，钟声鸣响，但那不是死亡的钟声。有些钟声为生命而鸣。一片叶子，喜极而落。噢，我热爱生命！瞧那棵柳树是怎样向空中抽出它的细芽！瞧那细芽之间过往的一条船，上面坐满了懒懒散散、无思无虑、身强力壮的年轻人。他们听着留声机；他们吃着纸袋子里的水果。他们乱丢的香蕉皮像鳗鱼一样，沉到河底。他们一举一动尽显优美。他们和装饰品的后面有些佐料瓶；他们的房间塞满船桨和石版画，但是他们将一切都已化作美景。桥下，那艘船过去了。另一艘船过来了。接着又有一艘。那是珀西瓦尔，正懒洋洋地倚着靠垫，庞大的身躯像歇息的巨人。不对，那只是他的小喽啰之一，在模仿他歇息时巨人般的泰然姿态。他自己还没意识到他们的把戏，若是被他当场逮住，他就会乐呵呵地挥起老拳捶打他们。他们穿过‘垂柳的喷泉’，穿过黄色与青紫色的精致图画，也已经过到桥的那边去了。微风乍起；帘帏轻颤；透过树叶，我看见那些庄严肃穆却永远喜乐的建筑物，它们似乎松散而不臃肿；尽管无可追忆地座落在古老的泥炭地上，看上去还是那么轻盈。这时，我心中开始升起熟悉的韵律；一直蛰伏的词语抬起身子，甩动羽冠，一起一伏，又一起一伏。我是一个诗人，没错。确实，我是一个伟大的诗人。过往的轻舟与青春，远方的树木和‘垂柳的落泉’。我目睹了一切。我感受到一切。我有了灵感。我热泪盈眶。但即使当我感受到这一切的时候，我还在把我的狂热之火煽动得越来越高。它如泡沫飞溅。它变得矫揉造作、华而不实。词语，词语，还是词语，它们纵横驰骋，甩动长长的鬃毛和马尾，但是由于我自身的某种失误，我却无法让自己跨上马背；我无法驱散女人和网兜，与它们一道跃马飞奔。我身上有某种缺点——某种致命的犹豫不决，稍一不注意，它就会变成泡沫和谎言。不过，我要是不成为一个伟大的诗人，那简直是不可思议的。昨晚我写的不是优秀的诗歌是什么？我是不是写得太快、太取巧了？我不知道。有时我搞不懂自己，搞不懂如何衡量、认定，以及清点那些使我成为我的种种习性。

'Something now leaves me; something goes from me to meet that figure who is coming, and assures me that I know him before I see who it is. How curiously one is changed by the addition, even at a distance, of a friend. How useful an office one's friends perform when they recall us. Yet how painful to be recalled, to be mitigated, to have one's self adulterated, mixed up, become part of another. As he approaches I become not myself but Neville mixed with somebody—with whom?—with Bernard? Yes, it is Bernard, and it is to Bernard that I shall put the question, Who am I?'

“有某种东西在这一刻离开了我；某种东西从我这里赶去会见那个姗姗而来的人物，而且让我相信，在我看清那人是谁之前我就认识他。一个人多个朋友，即使这个朋友不在眼前，也会是多么神奇的变化啊。朋友们回忆我们时，他们是在履行一个多么有益的仪式啊。当你被人回忆，被人冲淡，你的本性被人掺了假，混作一团，成为他人的附庸，却又是多么痛苦啊。那人走近时，我就不是我自己了，而是内维尔与某个人的混合体——是与谁的混合体呢？是与伯纳德么？对，就是伯纳德，我正要问问伯纳德：我是谁？”

'How strange,' said Bernard, 'the willow looks seen together. I was Byron, and the tree was Byron's tree, lachrymose, down—showering, lamenting. Now that we look at the tree together, it has a combined look, each branch distinct, and I will tell you what I feel, under the compulsion of your clarity.

“多么奇怪，”伯纳德说，“仿佛跟谁一起见过那棵柳树。我曾是拜伦，那棵树曾是拜伦的树——泪如雨下，凄凄惨惨，哀哀切切。因为我们一起瞧着那棵树，它便呈现出一幅组合的样子，每根枝条都截然分明，在你清晰的思维的驱使下，我要跟你讲讲我的感受。

'I feel your disapproval, I feel your force. I become, with you, an untidy, an impulsive human being whose bandanna handkerchief is for ever stained with the grease of crumpets. Yes, I hold Gray's Elegy in one hand; with the other I scoop out the bottom crumpet, that has absorbed all the butter and sticks to the bottom of the plate. This offends you; I feel your distress acutely. Inspired by it and anxious to regain your good opinion, I proceed to tell you how I have just pulled Percival out of bed; I describe his slippers, his table, his guttered candle; his surly and complaining accents as I pull the blankets off his feet; he burrowing like some vast cocoon meanwhile. I describe all this in such a way that, centred as you are upon some private sorrow (for a hooded shape presides over our encounter), you give way, you laugh and delight in me. My charm and flow of language, unexpected and spontaneous as it is, delights me too. I am astonished, as I draw the veil off things with words, how much, how infinitely more than I can say, I have observed. More and more bubbles into my mind as I talk, images and images. This, I say to myself, is what I need; why, I ask, can I not finish the letter that I am writing? For my room is always scattered with unfinished letters. I begin to suspect, when I am with you, that I am among the most gifted of men. I am filled with the delight of youth, with potency, with the sense of what is to come. Blundering, but fervid, I see myself buzzing round flowers, humming down scarlet cups, making blue funnels resound with my prodigious booming. How richly I shall enjoy my youth (you make me feel). And London. And freedom. But stop. You are not listening. You are making some protest, as you slide, with an inexpressibly familiar gesture, your hand along your knee. By such signs we diagnose our friends' diseases. "Do not, in your affluence and plenty," you seem to say, "pass me by." "Stop," you say. "Ask me what I suffer."

“我感受到你的批评，我感受到你的压力。和你在一起，我成了一个邋里邋遢、意气用事的人，大手帕上永远沾着烤面饼的油脂。是啊，我一只手捧着格雷的《挽歌》，另一只手舀起最后一块面饼，它已经吸足了黄油粘到盘底上了。这让你不痛快；我深深感觉到你的苦恼。我灵机一动，急着要赢回你的好感，所以接着跟你讲起我刚才如何把珀西瓦尔从床上拽了起来；我讲述他的桌子，他的熄灭的蜡烛；以及当我从他脚上掀掉毯子时他那粗暴和抱怨的口气；那时他像一只硕大的蚕茧直往洞里钻。我把这一切描述得那么生动，尽管你的心头萦绕着某种个人的悲伤（因为我们的会面笼罩了一层蒙眬的阴影），你还是忍不住大笑起来，对我露出喜色。我的吸引力和口若悬河，这样的出其不意、自然而然，也令我欣喜。当我用词语揭开事物的面纱，我惊讶地发现，我观察到了那么多，比我能说出的要多得多。在我开口的过程中，一幅幅画面源源不断地浮现在我的脑海中。这，我对自己说，正是我所需要的；为什么，我问道，我无法完成要写的那封信呢？我的房间总是散落着一些未完成的信件。当我跟你在一起时，我就会觉得自己处于那些最有天赋人们之列。充满青春的喜悦，充满活力，充满对未来的预感。我毛毛躁躁，但充满激情，我看见自己绕着花朵嗡嗡叫，嘤嘤地钻进鲜红的花萼，使这些蓝色的漏斗回响起我巨大的轰鸣。我会多么尽情地享受我的青春（是你让我有这样的感受）。享受伦敦生活。享受自由。但是别说了。你并不在听。你在做出某种抗议，因为你用一种我再熟悉不过的动作把你的手轻轻滑过膝盖。通过这样的手势我们为朋友们诊断病情。‘在你富庶充实时，’你仿佛在说，‘别不理我。’‘别说了。’你说。‘还是问问我遭遇了什么痛苦吧。’

'Let me then create you. (You have done as much for me.) You lie on this hot bank, in this lovely, this fading, this still bright October day, watching boat after boat float through the combed-out twigs of the willow tree. And you wish to be a poet; and you wish to be a lover. But the splendid clarity of your intelligence, and the remorseless honesty of your intellect (these Latin words I owe you; these qualities of yours make me shift a little uneasily and see the faded patches, the thin strands in my own equipment) bring you to a halt. You indulge in no mystifications. You do not fog yourself with rosy clouds, or yellow.

“就让我来创作一个你吧。（你曾为我做了那么多。）你正躺在这条闷热的河岸上，在这个美丽、萧索但依然明朗的十月的一天，望着一条条船从齐刷刷的柳枝间穿过。而你希望成为一个诗人；你还希望成为某人的情人。可是你那无比清醒的头脑和决不自欺的才智（这些拉丁词语我得之于你；你的这些素养让我稍微不自然地换了个角度，看到了我自身能力中那些残缺的方面和薄弱的环节）却让你止步不前。你从不醉心于故弄玄虚。你从不为玫瑰色或黄色的云彩所迷惑。

'Am I right? Have I read the little gesture of your left hand correctly? If so, give me your poems; hand over the sheets you wrote last night in such a fervour of inspiration that you now feel a little sheepish. For you distrust inspiration, yours or mine. Let us go back together, over the bridge, under the elm trees, to my room, where, with walls round us and red serge curtains drawn, we can shut out these distracting voices, scents and savours of lime trees, and other lives; these pert shop-girls, disdainfully tripping, these shuffling, heavy-laden old women; these furtive glimpses of some vague and vanishing figure—it might be Jinny, it might be Susan, or was that Rhoda disappearing down the avenue? Again, from some slight twitch I guess your feeling; I have escaped you; I have gone buzzing like a swarm of bees, endlessly vagrant, with none of your power of fixing remorselessly upon a single object. But I will return.'

“我说的对么？我是不是读懂了你左手的小动作？要是没错，把你的诗拿来给我看看吧；把你昨晚那些写得激情澎湃以至于现在还觉得有点羞臊的诗笺都递过来吧。因为你怀疑灵感，无论是你自己的，还是我的。让我们一起回去吧，从桥上，从榆树下，回到我的房间。在那儿，四面都是墙壁，红色的哔叽窗帘拉了下来，我们就能隔绝这些干扰的声音、酸橙树的清香气息和其他生灵；这些高傲地轻飘飘走过的时髦女店员，这些一步一拖、心事重重的老太太；还有这些鬼鬼祟祟的瞥视，来自某个模糊的渐渐远去的人——可能是吉尼，可能是苏珊，或者是消失在林荫道上的罗达吧？我从一丝细微的抽搐又猜到了你的感觉；我从你身边逃开了；我像一群蜜蜂嗡嗡地飞走，无边无际地游荡，因为我没有你那种能力，那么无怨无悔地专注于一件事物上。但是我会飞回来的。”

'When there are buildings like these,' said Neville, 'I cannot endure that there should be shop-girls. Their titter, their gossip, offends me; breaks into my stillness, and nudges me, in moments of purest exultation, to remember our degradation.

“当有这样一些建筑物的时候，”内维尔说，“我可受不了再有那些女店员。她们的嗤嗤窃笑，她们的闲言碎语，都令我心烦；她们闯进我的静地，诱使我在最纯净的喜乐时刻想到我们的堕落。

'But now we have regained our territory after that brief brush with the bicycles and the lime scent and the vanishing figures in the distracted street. Here we are masters of tranquillity and order; inheritors of proud tradition. The lights are beginning to make yellow slits across the square. Mists from the river are filling these ancient spaces. They cling, gently, to the hoary stone. The leaves now are thick in country lanes, sheep cough in the damp fields; but here in your room we are dry. We talk privately. The fire leaps and sinks, making some knob bright.

“不过，在经过了这一番与脚踏车、酸橙的清香以及纷乱的大街上远去的身影的短暂交锋之后，这会儿我们已经夺回了我们的领地。在这里，我们是安宁和秩序的主人，是光荣传统的继承者。灯火开始在广场上投下一道道黄色光影。河上升起的层层雾气弥漫了这片古老的空间。它们轻轻地附着在年代久远的石头上。此时乡村道上布满了落叶，羊群在潮湿的田野里咳嗽；但在这里，在你的房间里，我们干干爽爽。我们私下交谈着。火苗忽明忽暗，不时地把某个门把手映得通亮。

'You have been reading Byron. You have been marking the passages that seem to approve of your own character. I find marks against all those sentences which seem to express a sardonic yet passionate nature; a moth-like impetuosity dashing itself against hard glass. You thought, as you drew your pencil there, "I too throw off my cloak like that. I too snap my fingers in the face of destiny." Yet Byron never made tea as you do, who fill the pot so that when you put the lid on the tea spills over. There is a brown pool on the table—it is running among your books and papers. Now you mop it up, clumsily, with your pocket-handkerchief. You then stuff your handkerchief back into your pocket—that is not Byron; that is you; that is so essentially you that if I think of you in twenty years' time, when we are both famous, gouty and intolerable, it will be by that scene: and if you are dead, I shall weep. Once you were Tolstoi's young man; now you are Byron's young man; perhaps you will be Meredith's young man; then you will visit Paris in the Easter vacation and come back wearing a black tie, some detestable Frenchman whom nobody has ever heard of. Then I shall drop you.

“你一直在读拜伦。你在那些似乎与你本人性格相符的篇章上做了标记。我发现在所有那些似乎表达一种嘲讽但充满激情的本性，一种如飞蛾般撞向硬玻璃的冲动的诗句旁都做了标记。当你用你的铅笔划出那些地方，你心想：‘我也会像那样甩掉我的斗篷。面对命运，我也会啪地打个响指。’可是拜伦绝不是像你那样泡茶，你把茶壶灌得太满，一盖上盖子，茶水就漫了出来。桌上一摊褐色的茶水——正洇到你的书和纸张中去。你用手帕笨手笨脚地赶紧把它擦干。然后你把手帕塞回衣兜——这可不是拜伦的做派；这是你的做派；这就是本质上的你，即使20年后，当我们都已成名、患痛风而疼痛难忍时，我也会凭借这一场景而想起你：如果你死了，我会流泪。曾经你像托尔斯泰；现在你像拜伦；也许将来你会像梅瑞狄斯；然后你会在复活节假期造访巴黎，回来时扎一条黑色领带，像是某个谁也没听说过的讨厌的法国人。那时我就不会理你了。

'I am one person—myself. I do not impersonate Catullus, whom I adore. I am the most slavish of students, with here a dictionary, there a notebook in which I enter curious uses of the past participle. But one cannot go on for ever cutting these ancient inscriptions clearer with a knife. Shall I always draw the red serge curtain close and see my book, laid like a block of marble, pale under the lamp? That would be a glorious life, to addict oneself to perfection; to follow the curve of the sentence wherever it might lead, into deserts, under drifts of sand, regardless of lures, of seductions; to be poor always and unkempt; to be ridiculous in Piccadilly.

“我总是一个人——我自己。我崇拜卡图卢斯，但我从不模仿他。我是学生当中最听话的，这边摆一本字典，那边摆一个笔记本，我把过去完成时的古怪用法都记在里面。但是一个人不可能永无停息地拿着刀子来精雕细刻这些古老的铭文。我会一直把红色哔叽窗帘拉得严严实实而埋头于灯下这本灰白的大理石块一样的书中么？一心追求完美；沿着句子的曲线，无论它通向哪里，荒漠之中也好，流沙下面也罢，也不管多少引诱，多少魅惑，始终坚守贫穷，任凭蓬头垢面，甘愿成为皮卡迪利大街上的笑柄，那将是多么辉煌的一生。

'But I am too nervous to end my sentence properly. I speak quickly, as I pace up and down, to conceal my agitation. I hate your greasy handkerchiefs—you will stain your copy of Don Juan. You are not listening to me. You are making phrases about Byron. And while you gesticulate, with your cloak, your cane, I am trying to expose a secret told to nobody yet; I am asking you (as I stand with my back to you) to take my life in your hands and tell me whether I am doomed always to cause repulsion in those I love?

“但是我太紧张了，不知如何给我的话画一个完美的句号。我一边飞快地说着，一边踱来踱去，以掩饰我的不安。我讨厌你那些油腻的手帕——你会弄脏你那本《唐·璜》的。你没在听我说。你在围绕着拜伦编词呢。当你用你的斗篷和手杖摆出姿势示意的时候，我正试图揭示一个未曾对人讲过的秘密；我要请你（此时我背对你站着）把我的命运掌握在你手心，告诉我，是不是我注定总是引起那些我爱的人的反感？

'I stand with my back to you fidgeting. No, my hands are now perfectly still. Precisely, opening a space in the bookcase, I insert Don Juan; there. I would rather be loved, I would rather be famous than follow perfection through the sand. But am I doomed to cause disgust? Am I a poet? Take it. The desire which is loaded behind my lips, cold as lead, fell as a bullet, the thing I aim at shop-girls, women, the pretence, the vulgarity of life (because I love it) shoots at you as I throw—catch it—my poem.'

“我背对你站着，心烦意乱。不，此时我的双手分毫不乱。我准确无误地挪出书架上的空间，把《唐·璜》插了进去，正好。我宁愿有人爱我，我宁愿名声在外而不要埋头沙土以求完美。但我是不是注定要惹来厌恶？我是个诗人吗？接去吧。话到嘴边不吐不快的欲望，像铅一样冰冷，像子弹飞落，那种我瞄向女店员、妇女的东西，虚伪、生活的庸俗（因为我爱这种生活）我扔向你——接住它——连同我的诗歌。”

'He has shot like an arrow from the room,' said Bernard. 'He has left me his poem. O friendship, I too will press flowers between the pages of Shakespeare's sonnets! O friendship, how piercing are your darts—there, there, again there. He looked at me, turning to face me; he gave me his poem. All mists curl off the roof of my being. That confidence I shall keep to my dying day. Like a long wave, like a roll of heavy waters, he went over me, his devastating presence—dragging me open, laying bare the pebbles on the shore of my soul. It was humiliating; I was turned to small stones. All semblances were rolled up. "You are not Byron; you are your self." To be contracted by another person into a single being—how strange.

“他像一支箭从房间里射了出去。”伯纳德说。“他把他的诗留给了我。哦，友情，我也要把鲜花印在莎士比亚十四行诗的篇章之间。哦，友情，你的飞镖多么具有穿透力——那儿，那儿，还是那儿。他转身面向我，望着我；他把他的诗交给我。我头上的迷雾顷刻散尽。这份自信我会保持到临死的那一天。像绵绵的海浪，像滚滚的浊浪，他以毁灭一切的气势将我打翻，把我扯开，使我露出灵魂海岸上的卵石。这是令人羞愧的；我变成了小小的石子。所有的表象都被卷起。‘你不是拜伦；你是你自己。’受到另一个人的钳制而成为一个单一的人——多么奇怪啊。

'How strange to feel the line that is spun from us lengthening its fine filament across the misty spaces of the intervening world. He is gone; I stand here, holding his poem. Between us is this line. But now, how comfortable, how reassuring to feel that alien presence removed, that scrutiny darkened and hooded over! How grateful to draw the blinds, and admit no other presence; to feel returning from the dark corners in which they took refuge, those shabby inmates, those familiars, whom, with his superior force, he drove into hiding. The mocking, the observant spirits who, even in the crisis and stab of the moment, watched on my behalf now come flocking home again. With their addition, I am Bernard; I am Byron; I am this, that and the other. They darken the air and enrich me, as of old, with their antics, their comments, and cloud the fine simplicity of my moment of emotion. For I am more selves than Neville thinks. We are not simple as our friends would have us to meet their needs. Yet love is simple.

“多么奇怪地感觉到我们编织的诗行正拉长它细细的丝线穿越相隔的迷蒙空间。他走了。我站在这儿，捧着他的诗。我俩之间是这诗行。不过此刻，多么轻松自在，多么心安理得地感觉到那种疏离的神态消失了，那种审视的目光暗淡了，像被罩住了似的！多么快意地拉下窗帘，不许任何人在场；感觉到那些衣衫褴褛的室友，那些知己之交被他强力驱赶着躲了起来，现在正从他们避难的黑暗角落赶回来。那些喜爱嘲弄、极具观察力的精灵们，即使在危机之中和伤痛时刻也曾为我守候，这会儿正成群地返归故里。有了它们的加入，我成了伯纳德；我成了拜伦；我成了这人、那人或其他什么人。它们弥漫在空气中，像以往一样，用它们的古怪举止，它们的议论，使我变得充实起来，使我在激动时刻的那种美好的单纯黯然失色。因为我比内维尔所想的更看重自我。我们并不像朋友们为了满足他们的需要而希望的那么单纯。而爱是单纯的。

'Now they have returned, my inmates, my familiars. Now the stab, the rent in my defences that Neville made with his astonishing fine rapier, is repaired. I am almost whole now; and see how jubilant I am, bringing into play all that Neville ignores in me. I feel, as I look from the window, parting the curtains, "That would give him no pleasure; but it rejoices me." (We use our friends to measure our own stature.) My scope embraces what Neville never reaches. They are shouting hunting-songs over the way. They are celebrating some run with the beagles. The, little boys in caps who always turned at the same moment when the brake went round the corner are clapping each other on the shoulder and boasting. But Neville, delicately avoiding interference, stealthily, like a conspirator, hastens back to his room. I see him sunk in his low chair gazing at the fire which has assumed for the moment an architectural solidity. If life, he thinks, could wear that permanence, if life could have that order—for above all he desires order, and detests my Byronic untidiness; and so draws his curtain; and bolts his door. His eyes (for he is in love; the sinister figure of love presided at our encounter) fill with longing; fill with tears. He snatches the poker and with one blow destroys that momentary appearance of solidity in the burning coals. All changes. And youth and love. The boat has floated through the arch of the willows and is now under the bridge. Percival, Tony, Archie, or another, will go to India. We shall not meet again. Then he stretches his hand for his copy-book—a neat volume bound in mottled paper—and writes feverishly long lines of poetry, in the manner of whomever he admires most at the moment.

“瞧，他们回来了，我的室友，我的知己之交。那道刺伤，那道内维尔用他精妙绝伦的长剑在我的防御体系中划出的缺口得到了修复。我现在几乎完好无损；瞧我多么得意地又在尽情发挥内维尔不加理会的那套玩意儿。当我拉开窗帘，从窗口望出去，我觉得，‘那不会给他带来快乐，但会令我非常高兴。’（我们通过朋友来衡量我们自身的才干。）我的视野所到之处是内维尔无法企及的。他们正一路吼着猎歌。他们正为猎兔犬的某次出击而庆贺。那些戴帽子的小男孩，他们在马车拐弯时总是同时甩头，现在正互相拍着肩膀，自吹自擂。但是内维尔，巧妙地避开干扰，偷偷摸摸地，像个阴谋者似的匆忙溜回他的房间。我看见他坐进矮椅里，凝视着炉火，这一刻它呈现出建筑物似的坚实可靠。他心想，如果生活能呈现出那种永恒，如果生活能保持那种秩序该多好啊——因为他最渴望的就是秩序，讨厌我这种拜伦似的邋遢作风；然后他拉上窗帘，闩上门。他的眼睛（因为他陷入了情网；爱情那不祥的身影笼罩了我们的会面）充满渴望，充满泪水。他猛地抓起火棍，一下子摧毁了燃烧的煤火中那短暂的坚实可靠的表象。一切都会变的。青春也好，爱情也罢。那条船漂过了柳枝形成的拱门，这会儿到了桥下。珀西瓦尔、托尼、阿奇，或者另外一个将去印度。我们不会再见面了。这时他伸手拿过他的抄写本——用斑纹纸装订的整整齐齐的一册——用他此刻最仰慕的某个人的风格，兴奋地写下长长的诗行。

'But I want to linger; to lean from the window; to listen. There again comes that rollicking chorus. They are now smashing china—that also is the convention. The chorus, like a torrent jumping rocks, brutally assaulting old trees, pours with splendid abandonment headlong over precipices. On they roll; on they gallop, after hounds, after footballs; they pump up and down attached to oars like sacks of flour. All divisions are merged—they act like one man. The gusty October wind blows the uproar in bursts of sound and silence across the court. Now again they are smashing the china—that is the convention. An old, unsteady woman carrying a bag trots home under the fire-red windows. She is half afraid that they will fall on her and tumble her into the gutter. Yet she pauses as if to warm her knobbed, her rheumaticky hands at the bonfire which flares away with streams of sparks and bits of blown paper. The old woman pauses against the lit window. A contrast. That I see and Neville does not see; that I feel and Neville does not feel. Hence he will reach perfection and I shall fail and shall leave nothing behind me but imperfect phrases littered with sand.

“但是我想逗留，靠近窗口，侧耳倾听。那边又传来喧闹的合唱。他们这会儿在砸烂瓷器——那也是惯例。那合唱像激流跃过岩石，无情地冲击着老树，势如潮涌，义无反顾地冲下悬崖。他们滚滚向前；他们跃马奔驰，追着猎犬，追着足球；他们紧握船桨，一上一下，像袋袋面粉。他们分工合作——动作像一个人似的。十月的阵风刮过庭院，时而怒吼喧嚣，时而偃旗息鼓。这会儿，他们又在砸烂瓷器——那是惯例。一个摇摇晃晃的老妪，背着包，从火光映红的窗子底下急急地往家里赶。她半是害怕它们会掉下来，把她砸倒在水沟里。但她停了下来，好像要就着篝火暖和暖和她那长了骨节、害了风湿的手，这堆燃烧的篝火，纸片飞腾，火苗四溢。这位老妪在火光闪亮的窗前停了下来。形成鲜明的对照。这情景，我看见了，而内维尔却看不见；这一切，我感受到了，而内维尔感受不到。因此他将达到完美，而我将一事无成，只把泥沙混杂的残篇断简留在身后。

'I think of Louis now. What malevolent yet searching light would Louis throw upon this dwindling autumn evening, upon this china—smashing and trolling of hunting-songs, upon Neville, Byron and our life here? His thin lips are somewhat pursed; his cheeks are pale; he pores in an office over some obscure commercial document. "My father, a banker at Brisbane"—being ashamed of him he always talks of him—failed. So he sits in an office, Louis the best scholar in the school. But I seeking contrasts often feel his eye on us, his laughing eye, his wild eye, adding us up like insignificant items in some grand total which he is for ever pursuing in his office. And one day, taking a fine pen and dipping it in red ink, the addition will be complete; our total will be known; but it will not be enough.

“这会儿我想起了路易斯。路易斯会用什么样的恶毒却又一针见血的话来形容这个萧索的秋日黄昏，这种砸烂瓷器和高唱猎歌的行为，以及内维尔、拜伦和我们在这里的生活呢？他薄薄的嘴唇微微噘起；他脸颊苍白；他在一间办公室里审阅着某份费解的商业文件。‘我的父亲，布里斯班的银行家’——他以父亲为耻，所以总会这样说——破产了。因此路易斯，这位全校最优秀的学生，只好坐在一间办公室里。但是在寻求比对时，我经常感觉到他的目光在看着我们，他那嘲笑的目光，他那野蛮的目光，正把我们相加，就像他在办公室里一直追查某一笔总账时面对着那些无关紧要的细目一样。然后有一天，他拿出一支精致的钢笔，蘸了红色的墨水，要完成他的结算；我们将得知我们的总额；但是这还不够。

'Bang! They have thrown a chair now against the wall. We are damned then. My case is dubious too. Am I not indulging in unwarranted emotions? Yes, as I lean out of the window and drop my cigarette so that it twirls lightly to the ground, I feel Louis watching even my cigarette. And Louis says, "That means something. But what?"'

“砰！这会儿他们把一张椅子抛向墙壁。这么说我们是没治了。我的情况也难说。难道我不也是醉心于无根无据的情感么？没错，当我侧身窗外，丢下香烟，看它打着转轻飘飘落向地面，我感觉路易斯甚至也在看着我的香烟。路易斯说：‘这其中有点意思。但，是什么呢？’”

'People go on passing,' said Louis. They pass the window of this eating-shop incessantly. Motor-cars, vans, motor-omnibuses; and again motor-omnibuses, vans, motor-cars—they pass the window. In the background I perceive shops and houses; also the grey spires of a city church. In the foreground are glass shelves set with plates of buns and ham sandwiches. All is somewhat obscured by steam from a tea-urn. A meaty, vapourish smell of beef and mutton, sausages and mash, hangs down like a damp net in the middle of the eating-house. I prop my book against a bottle of Worcester sauce and try to look like the rest.

“人们络绎不绝。”路易斯说。他们络绎不绝地经过这家饮食店的窗前。汽车、货车、公共汽车；又是公共汽车、货车、汽车——它们从窗前经过。隐隐约约地，我注意到一家家店铺和一幢幢住宅；还有一座城市教堂的灰色塔尖。眼前是摆放了一盘盘小面包和火腿三明治的玻璃货架。茶水壶冒出的热气使得一切变得影影绰绰。牛肉和羊肉、香肠和土豆泥散发出的夹杂着肉味的蒸汽，像一张潮湿的网从馆子中央垂了下来。我把书靠着一瓶伍斯特调味汁，尽力看上去像其他人一样。

'Yet I cannot. (They go on passing, they go on passing in disorderly procession.) I cannot read my book, or order my beef, with conviction. I repeat, "I am an average Englishman; I am an average clerk", yet I look at the little men at the next table to be sure that I do what they do. Supple-faced, with rippling skins, that are always twitching with the multiplicity of their sensations, prehensile like monkeys, greased to this particular moment, they are discussing with all the right gestures the sale of a piano. It blocks up the hall; so he would take a Tenner. People go on passing; they go on passing against the spires of the church and the plates of ham sandwiches. The streamers of my consciousness waver out and are perpetually torn and distressed by their disorder. I cannot therefore concentrate on my dinner. "I would take a tenner. The case is handsome; but it blocks up the hall." They dive and plunge like guillemots whose feathers are slippery with oil. All excesses beyond that norm are vanity. That is the mean; that is the average. Meanwhile the hats bob up and down; the door perpetually shuts and opens. I am conscious of flux, of disorder; of annihilation and despair. If this is all, this is worthless. Yet I feel, too, the rhythm of the eating-house. It is like a waltz tune, eddying in and out, round and round. The waitresses, balancing trays, swing in and out, round and round, dealing plates of greens, of apricot and custard, dealing them at the right time, to the right customers. The average men, including her rhythm in their rhythm ("I would take a tenner; for it blocks up the hall") take their greens, take their apricots and custard. Where then is the break in this continuity? What the fissure through which one sees disaster? The circle is unbroken; the harmony complete. Here is the central rhythm; here the common mainspring. I watch it expand, contract; and then expand again. Yet I am not included. If I speak, imitating their accent, they prick their ears, waiting for me to speak again, in order that they may place me—if I come from Canada or Australia, I, who desire above all things to be taken to the arms with love, am alien, external. I, who would wish to feel close over me the protective waves of the ordinary, catch with the tail of my eye some far horizon; am aware of hats bobbing up and down in perpetual disorder. To me is addressed the plaint of the wandering and distracted spirit (a woman with bad teeth falters at the counter), "Bring us back to the fold, we who pass so disjectedly, bobbing up and down, past windows with plates of ham sandwiches in the foreground." Yes; I will reduce you to order.

“但是我却做不到。（他们络绎不绝，他们来来往往，杂乱无章。）我无法果断地读我的书，或者点我的牛肉。我重复道：‘我是个平常的英国人；我是个平常的职员。’但是我却要看着旁边桌上那几个小个子男人，才能确信我的举动跟他们一样。他们脸庞柔软有弹性，泛着皱纹，脸上的皮肤因为情绪的多变而抽搐不止，他们像猴子一样善于心领神会，圆滑而通融，为应对眼前的特殊时刻，他们正使出浑身解数商讨一架钢琴的出售问题。它挡住了大厅，所以他宁愿十镑钱卖掉它。人们络绎不绝；他们络绎不绝地经过教堂的塔尖和一盘盘火腿三明治。我意识中的彩旗飘摇无定，不断地被撕裂，不断地被他们的杂乱无章困扰着。因此我无法专心吃我的饭。‘我宁愿十镑钱就卖。这架钢琴美观大方；但它挡住了大厅。’他们俯冲，潜入水中，好像羽毛油光水滑的海鸠。超越这一模式的多余之举皆毫无价值。这就是一般；这就是平常。同时，一顶顶帽子忽高忽低；门不停地开开合合。我意识到变化无常、杂乱无章；意识到毁灭与绝望。如果这就是一切，这是毫无价值的。但是我还感觉到这家饮食店的节奏。它像是一支华尔兹舞曲，来来回回，旋转不息。侍女们稳稳地擎着托盘，来来回回，旋转不息，端着一盘盘青菜，一碟碟杏子和蛋奶沙司，及时而准确无误地端给各位顾客。这些平常的人们正把她的节奏融入他们的节奏（‘我宁愿十镑钱售出；因为它挡住了大厅’）接过青菜，接过杏子和蛋奶沙司。那么这衔接从哪儿中断了？是什么样的裂隙让人看到了灾难？这圈子是完整的；这和谐是完美的。这里有主旋律；这里有共同的主发条。我看着它扩张，收缩，然后重新扩张。可是我并未融入进去。如果我模仿着他们的口音说起话来，他们就会竖起耳朵，等待我重新开口，以便于确认我的归属地——我是不是来自加拿大或者澳大利亚，而我，这个不顾一切渴望投入爱的怀抱的人，却是个另类，一个局外人。我，那个总希望接近平常人那种爱的浪涛的我用我的眼角瞥见某个远方的景象；意识到一些帽子忽高忽低，总是那么杂乱无章。那颗彷徨、迷乱的心灵向我诉苦（一个豁牙露齿的女人在柜台前结结巴巴地说）：‘把我们带回到羊栏去吧，我们这些来来往往、散沙似地从摆满一盘盘火腿三明治的橱窗跟前经过的人。’好吧，我要让你们有秩序。

'I will read in the book that is propped against the bottle of Worcester sauce. It contains some forged rings, some perfect statements, a few words, but poetry. You, all of you, ignore it. What the dead poet said, you have forgotten. And I cannot translate it to you so that its binding power ropes you in, and makes it clear to you that you are aimless; and the rhythm is cheap and worthless; and so remove that degradation which, if you are unaware of your aimlessness, pervades you, making you senile, even while you are young. To translate that poem so that it is easily read is to be my endeavour. I, the companion of Plato, of Virgil, will knock at the grained oak door. I oppose to what is passing this ramrod of beaten steel. I will not submit to this aimless passing of billycock hats and Homburg hats and all the plumed and variegated head-dresses of women. (Susan, whom I respect, would wear a plain straw hat on a summer's day.) And the grinding and the steam that runs in unequal drops down the window pane; and the stopping and the starting with a jerk of motor-omnibuses; and the hesitations at counters; and the words that trail drearily without human meaning; I will reduce you to order.

“我要读一读这本靠在伍斯特调味汁瓶子上的书。它的里面有精心打造的镶边，一些完美的语句，寥寥几个词，却富有诗意。你们，你们所有人，都忽略了它。那位已故诗人说了什么，你们已经忘了。我无法把它翻译出来，以便于它的粘合力把你们套牢，并向你们摆明，你们迷失了方向；这里的节奏是庸俗而毫无价值的；这样就会消除那种低级趣味，如果你们意识不到自己的迷失，这种低级趣味就会在你们身上大行其道，让你未老先衰。把那首诗翻译出来让人们容易读懂它，这将是我努力的方向。我，柏拉图和维吉尔的朋友，将要敲响那扇带木纹的橡木门。我反对经过这种熟铁通条拨弄过的东西。我不赞同妇女们这种盲目跟风戴上小礼帽、男士毡帽，以及各式杂色饰羽毛头饰的行为。（苏珊，我所尊敬的人，在夏日里会戴着一顶朴素的草帽。）还有那研磨和窗玻璃上以大大小小的水珠形式流下来的水汽；公共汽车猛然的停下和起步；柜台前的犹犹豫豫；以及那些令人讨厌、拖沓而无聊的话语；我要让你们有秩序。

'My roots go down through veins of lead and silver, through damp, marshy places that exhale odours, to a knot made of oak roots bound together in the centre. Sealed and blind, with earth stopping my ears, I have yet heard rumours of wars; and the nightingale; have felt the hurrying of many troops of men flocking hither and thither in quest of civilization like flocks of birds migrating seeking the summer; I have seen women carrying red pitchers to the banks of the Nile. I woke in a garden, with a blow on the nape of my neck, a hot kiss, Jinny's; remembering all this as one remembers confused cries and toppling pillars and shafts of red and black in some nocturnal conflagration. I am for ever sleeping and waking. Now I sleep; now I wake. I see the gleaming tea-urn; the glass cases full of pale-yellow sandwiches; the men in round coats perched on stools at the counter; and also behind them, eternity. It is a stigma burnt on my quivering flesh by a cowled man with a red-hot iron. I see this eating-shop against the packed and fluttering birds' wings, many feathered, folded, of the past. Hence my pursed lips, my sickly pallor; my distasteful and uninviting aspect as I turn my face with hatred and bitterness upon Bernard and Neville, who saunter under yew trees; who inherit armchairs; and draw their curtains close, so that lamplight falls on their books.

“我的根须向下延伸，穿透铅与银的矿脉，穿透潮湿的、发出阵阵臭气的沼泽地，延伸到一个由橡树根须缠结在一起而形成的硬节中。虽然被封得严严实实，眼中什么也看不见，泥土掩上了我的耳朵，我还是听到了战争的传言；听到了夜莺的歌唱；感觉到了许许多多成群结队的人们以追求文明之名四处集合、奔走，像鸟群迁徙以寻求夏天；我看见了那些提着红色水罐的妇女来到尼罗河畔。我在一个花园里醒来，感觉到颈后的碰触，那是一个热吻，吉尼的吻；我记着这一切，就像一个人记着某一次夜晚的大火中那杂乱的呼喊、崩塌的柱子和红与黑的光影。我永远在睡睡醒醒。我一会儿睡着；一会儿醒着。我看见亮闪闪的茶壶；玻璃柜里摆满淡黄色的三明治；裹着圆滚滚外衣的男人们坐在柜台前的凳子上；在他们的身后，是来世。这是一个包着头巾的人用一把红通通的烙铁在我颤抖的肉体上烙下的耻辱印迹。透过那堆还在扇动着的鸟儿的翅膀——往昔的许多羽毛还在，只是折叠了起来——我看见了这家饮食店。因此我噘起嘴，脸色苍白，像生了病似的；我的神态令人讨厌，难看死了，我扭过脸去，满含怨恨地瞅着伯纳德和内维尔，他们在紫杉树下漫步；他们继承了祖上的扶手椅；他们把窗帘拉得严严实实，让灯光集中照在他们的书上。

'Susan, I respect; because she sits stitching. She sews under a quiet lamp in a house where the corn sighs close to the window and gives me safety. For I am the weakest, the youngest of them all. I am a child looking at his feet and the little runnels that the stream has made in the gravel. That is a snail, I say; that is a leaf. I delight in the snails; I delight in the leaf, I am always the youngest, the most innocent, the most trustful. You are all protected. I am naked. When the waitress with the plaited wreaths of hair swings past, she deals you your apricots and custard unhesitatingly, like a sister. You are her brothers. But when I get up, brushing the crumbs from my waistcoat, I slip too large a tip, a shilling, under the edge of my plate, so that she may not find it till I am gone, and her scorn, as she picks it up with laughter, may not strike on me till I am past the swing-doors.'

“苏珊，我尊敬她；因为她总是坐在那儿缝缝补补。她在一间屋子里安静的灯光下做着针线活儿，麦田的叹息近在窗前，给我一种安全感。因为我在他们当中身体最弱、年龄最小。我是一个孩子，正看着自己的脚下，看着那条小河在沙砾之间分出的道道细流。那是一只蜗牛，我说；那是一片叶子。我喜欢蜗牛；我喜欢叶子，我一直是年龄最小、最天真、最无疑心的那个。你们都有保护色。我却毫无遮掩。当那位发辫盘在头上的侍女扭身经过时，她毫不犹豫地为你们端上杏子和蛋奶沙司，就像一位姐妹。你们是她的兄弟。但是当我站起身来，拂去马甲上的面包屑，我偷偷地把一笔过大的小费，一个先令，塞在盘边底下，以便直到我走了之后她才会发现它，这样她大笑着拾起它的那种鄙视，直到我过了弹簧门才会落到我的身上。”

'Now the wind lifts the blind,' said Susan, 'jars, bowls, matting and the shabby arm-chair with the hole in it are now become distinct. The usual faded ribbons sprinkle the wallpaper. The bird chorus is over, only one bird now sings close to the bedroom window. I will pull on my stockings and go quietly past the bedroom doors, and down through the kitchen, out through the garden past the greenhouse into the field. It is still early morning. The mist is on the marshes. The day is stark and stiff as a linen shroud. But it will soften; it will warm. At this hour, this still early hour, I think I am the field, I am the barn, I am the trees; mine are the flocks of birds, and this young hare who leaps, at the last moment when I step almost on him. Mine is the heron that stretches its vast wings lazily; and the cow that creaks as it pushes one foot before another munching; and the wild, swooping swallow; and the faint red in the sky, and the green when the red fades; the silence and the bell; the call of the man fetching cart—horses from the fields—all are mine.

“这会儿风掀起了百叶窗，”苏珊说，“锅碗瓢盆，一切铺设，还有那张上面有洞的破扶手椅，这会儿都清晰可辨。墙纸上缀满那些常见的褪了色的彩带。鸟儿的合唱结束了，只有一只鸟儿这会儿还在卧室窗户旁歌唱。我要套上我的长袜，悄悄走过卧室的门，下楼穿过厨房，出门穿过花园，经过花房，走到田野中去。时间还是清晨。沼泽地上薄雾笼罩。这个白天像亚麻裹尸布一样苍凉、僵硬。不过它会变得柔和起来；它会变得温暖起来。在这个时刻，这个清晨时刻，我觉得我是田野，我是谷仓，我是那些树；属于我的是那一群一群的鸟儿，还有这只小野兔，就在我几乎踩到他身上的一刹那蹦了起来。属于我的是那只苍鹭，它正懒懒地舒展它巨大的翅膀；那头母牛，一边脚前脚后地挪动，一边嚼得咯吱咯吱响；那只猛冲下来的野燕；天空中的淡红，以及红色消褪之后的青色；寂静与钟声；从田野里唤回马匹的套车人的呼唤——它们都是属于我的。

'I cannot be divided, or kept apart. I was sent to school; I was sent to Switzerland to finish my education. I hate linoleum; I hate fir trees and mountains. Let me now fling myself on this flat ground under a pale sky where the clouds pace slowly. The cart grows gradually larger as it comes along the road. The sheep gather in the middle of the field. The birds gather in the middle of the road—they need not fly yet. The wood smoke rises. The starkness of the dawn is going out of it. Now the day stirs. Colour returns. The day waves yellow with all its crops. The earth hangs heavy beneath me.

“我无法被拆散，或者分离。我曾被送进学校；我曾被送往瑞士以完成我的学业。我讨厌油布地毯；我讨厌冷杉树和高山。让我此刻扑倒在这块平地上，看那云彩缓缓踱过苍天。马车沿路走来，变得越来越大。羊群聚集在田地中央。鸟儿聚集在道路中央——它们还没必要飞走。柴禾的烟升了起来。黎明的苍凉随之消失。这会儿白天醒了。色彩恢复了。白天让它所有的庄稼都翻起了黄灿灿的海浪。我的身下是沉甸甸的大地。

'But who am I, who lean on this gate and watch my setter nose in a circle? I think sometimes (I am not twenty yet) I am not a woman, but the light that falls on this gate, on this ground. I am the seasons, I think sometimes, January, May, November; the mud, the mist, the dawn. I cannot be tossed about, or float gently, or mix with other people. Yet now, leaning here till the gate prints my arm, I feel the weight that has formed itself in my side. Something has formed, at school, in Switzerland, some hard thing. Not sighs and laughter, not circling and ingenious phrases; not Rhoda's strange communications when she looks past us, over our shoulders; nor Jinny's pirouetting, all of a piece, limbs and body. What I give is fell. I cannot float gently, mixing with other people. I like best the stare of shepherds met in the road; the stare of gipsy women beside a cart in a ditch suckling their children as I shall suckle my children. For soon in the hot midday when the bees hum round the hollyhocks my lover will come. He will stand under the cedar tree. To his one word I shall answer my one word. What has formed in me I shall give him. I shall have children; I shall have maids in aprons; men with pitchforks; a kitchen where they bring the ailing lambs to warm in baskets, where the hams hang and the onions glisten. I shall be like my mother, silent in a blue apron locking up the cupboards.

“但是我，这个倚在门边，转圈观察我的猎狗鼻子的人，是谁呢？有时我觉得（我还不到二十岁），我不是一个女人，而是一道光芒，洒在这扇门上，洒在这块土地上。我是四季，有时我觉得，是一月、五月、十一月；是泥泞、薄雾、黎明。我不可能让人丢来丢去，或者温顺地随波逐流，或者与人搅合在一起。但是此刻，我靠在这儿直到我的手臂压出了门印，我感觉到身上自然产生的那份沉重。某种令人难受的东西，在学校时、在瑞士期间已经产生。不是叹气与笑声，不是兜圈子与精妙句；不是罗达在她越过我们的肩膀望着别的地方时的那些古怪的交流；也不是吉尼那四肢与身体完全一致，踮起脚尖的旋转舞步。我的表现是生猛的。我不能温顺地随波逐流，与别人搅合在一起。我最喜欢路上遇见的牧羊人的盯视；沟渠里马车旁正给孩子喂奶的吉普赛女人——我也会那样给我的孩子喂奶——的盯视。因为要不了多久，在热烘烘的正午时分，当蜜蜂绕着蜀葵嗡嗡叫的时候，我的情人就会来到。他会站在那棵雪松树下。他说一句话，我回应一句话。我身上的所有，我要交给他。我会有孩子；我会有系着围裙的女仆；手持干草叉的工人；一间厨房，在那儿，他们会把生病的小羊抱进来放在篮子里取暖，火腿也挂在这里，还有洋葱头闪着亮光。我会像我的母亲一样，系着一条蓝色围裙，默默地锁上橱柜。

'Now I am hungry. I will call my setter. I think of crusts and bread and butter and white plates in a sunny room. I will go back across the fields. I will walk along this grass path with strong, even strides, now swerving to avoid the puddle, now leaping lightly to a clump. Beads of wet form on my rough skirt; my shoes become supple and dark. The stiffness has gone from the day; it is shaded with grey, green and umber. The birds no longer settle on the high road.

“现在我饿了。我要呼唤我的猎狗。我想象着在一个充满阳光的房间，有干面包皮、整块面包、黄油和白色的盘子。我要穿过田野往回走。我要沿着这条草径，迈开有力、均匀的步伐，时而急转避开水坑，时而轻盈地跳上个土堆。我朴素的裙子上凝聚了水珠；我的鞋变得柔软、发暗。白天不再僵硬、呆板；它被蒙上一层灰色、绿色和赭石色。鸟儿不再落到大路上了。

'I return, like a cat or fox returning, whose fur is grey with rime, whose pads are hardened by the coarse earth. I push through the cabbages, making their leaves squeak and their drops spill. I sit waiting for my father's footsteps as he shuffles down the passage pinching some herb between his fingers. I pour out cup after cup while the unopened flowers hold themselves erect on the table among the pots of jam, the loaves and the butter. We are silent.

“我回来了，像一只回家的猫或者狐狸，毛上沾了灰白的霜，爪垫被粗糙的泥土磨得坚硬。我穿过那些卷心菜，碰得它们的叶子吱吱响，水珠四溅。我坐下来等待父亲的脚步声，他就要从过道上一步一拖地走来，手指间捏着某种药草。我喝了一杯又一杯，而那些未开的花儿直挺挺地立在桌子上，立在果酱罐、面包片和黄油之间。我们谁也不说话。

'I go then to the cupboard, and take the damp bags of rich sultanas; I lift the heavy flour on to the clean scrubbed kitchen table. I knead; I stretch; I pull, plunging my hands in the warm inwards of the dough. I let the cold water stream fanwise through my fingers. The fire roars; the flies buzz in a circle. All my currants and rices, the silver bags and the blue bags, are locked again in the cupboard. The meat is stood in the oven; the bread rises in a soft dome under the clean towel. I walk in the afternoon down to the river. All the world is breeding. The flies are going from grass to grass. The flowers are thick with pollen. The swans ride the stream in order. The clouds, warm now, sun-spotted, sweep over the hills, leaving gold in the water, and gold on the necks of the swans. Pushing one foot before the other, the cows munch their way across the field. I feel through the grass for the white-domed mushroom; and break its stalk and pick the purple orchid that grows beside it and lay the orchid by the mushroom with the earth at its root, and so home to make the kettle boil for my father among the just reddened roses on the tea-table.

“接着我走到橱柜那儿，拿出几袋湿漉漉的、富含营养的无核小葡萄；我把重重的面粉搬到擦得干干净净的厨房桌子上。我揉啊，抻啊，拉啊，双手插进你热乎乎的面团里。我让冷水呈扇形流经我的手指。炉火呼呼直响；苍蝇打着转嗡嗡直叫。我所有的葡萄干和大米、银色袋子和蓝色袋子又被锁进橱柜里。肉竖放在烤炉里；干净的毛巾下面，面包像柔软的屋顶鼓了起来。下午，我走向河边。整个世界都在繁衍生息。苍蝇从一片草地飞向另一片草地。鲜花上是厚厚的花粉。天鹅有序地在河上游着。霞光点点的云彩这会儿暖洋洋地掠过山顶，在水面上、在天鹅的脖颈投下一层金色。母牛脚前脚后地挪动，在田野里悠然自得地嚼着草儿。我在草丛中摸索找寻那株白色圆顶的蘑菇；我折断它的梗，又摘下长在旁边的紫色兰花，与根上沾有泥土的蘑菇放在一起，然后回家，替我父亲把水壶烧开，放在茶桌上那些红晕初绽的蔷薇花中间。

'But evening comes and the lamps are lit. And when evening comes and the lamps are lit they make a yellow fire in the ivy. I sit with my sewing by the table. I think of Jinny; of Rhoda; and hear the rattle of wheels on the pavement as the farm horses plod home; I hear traffic roaring in the evening wind. I look at the quivering leaves in the dark garden and think "They dance in London. Jinny kisses Louis".'

“但是夜色降临了，灯点亮了。当夜色降临，灯都点亮了，它们在常春藤上投下一片黄色火光。我坐在桌边做针线活。我想起了吉尼；想起了罗达；我听见农家的马吃力地拉着车回家时走在路上的辚辚车轮声；我听见晚风中车来车往的喧嚣。我望着漆黑的花园里那些颤动的树叶，心想：‘他们正在伦敦跳舞。吉尼吻着路易斯。’”

'How strange,' said Jinny, 'that people should sleep, that people should put out the lights and go upstairs. They have taken off their dresses, they have put on white nightgowns. There are no lights in any of these houses. There is a line of chimney-pots against the sky; and a street lamp or two burning, as lamps burn when nobody needs them. The only people in the streets are poor people hurrying. There is no one coming or going in this street; the day is over. A few policemen stand at the corners. Yet night is beginning. I feel myself shining in the dark. Silk is on my knee. My silk legs rub smoothly together. The stones of a necklace lie cold on my throat. My feet feel the pinch of shoes. I sit bolt upright so that my hair may not touch the back of the seat. I am arrayed, I am prepared. This is the momentary pause; the dark moment. The fiddlers have lifted their bows.

“多么奇怪啊，”吉尼说，“人们要睡觉，人们要熄了灯，然后上楼。他们脱掉礼服，他们穿上白色睡衣。这些屋子里全无灯光。天空现出一排烟囱顶；一两盏街灯亮着，就像没有人需要它们时亮着的灯。街上唯有匆匆赶路的穷人们。这条街上没有来来往往的人；白天过去了。街角站着几个警察。可是夜幕降临了。我感觉自己在黑暗中发着光。我的膝上裹着绸缎。裹着绸缎的双腿柔滑地摩擦在一起。项链上的宝石凉凉地贴着我的脖颈。我感觉鞋子有点挤脚。我坐得板板正正，这样我的头发就不会碰到椅背。我打扮好了，我准备好了。这是暂时的休止；黑暗的时刻。小提琴手已经举起了他们的琴弓。

'Now the car slides to a stop. A strip of pavement is lighted. The door is opening and shutting. People are arriving; they do not speak; they hasten in. There is the swishing sound of cloaks falling in the hall. This is the prelude, this is the beginning. I glance, I peep, I powder. All is exact, prepared. My hair is swept in one curve. My lips are precisely red. I am ready now to join men and women on the stairs, my peers. I pass them, exposed to their gaze, as they are to mine. Like lightning we look but do not soften or show signs of recognition. Our bodies communicate. This is my calling. This is my world. All is decided and ready; the servants, standing here, and again here, take my name, my fresh, my unknown name, and toss it before me. I enter.

“这会儿小汽车滑行着停了下来。人行步道上狭长的一条被照亮了。门打开，又关上了。人们到了；他们谁也不说话；他们急匆匆进了屋。大厅里传来脱掉披风的飒飒声。这是序曲，这是开头。我迅速一瞥，我偷偷观瞧，我搽了点粉。万事俱备，恰到好处。我的头发梳成弧型。我嘴唇的红润浓淡相宜。我愿意现在就加入到楼上那些男男女女、我的同龄人中间去。我从他们身边走过，面对他们注视的目光，就像他们面对我的注视一样。我们如同电光一闪，彼此相望却并不相融，也无相识的表示。我们的身体在交流。这是我的召唤。这是我的世界。一切都是稳妥而有备的；随处都有恭立的仆人们，记下我的名字，我这全新的、还不为人知的名字，然后当着我的面通报着。我走了进去。

'Here are gilt chairs in the empty, the expectant rooms, and flowers, stiller, statelier, than flowers that grow, spread green, spread white, against the walls. And on one small table is one bound book. This is what I have dreamt; this is what I have foretold. I am native here. I tread naturally on thick carpets. I slide easily on smooth-polished floors, I now begin to unfurl, in this scent, in this radiance, as a fern when its curled leaves unfurl. I stop. I take stock of this world. I look among the groups of unknown people. Among the lustrous green, pink, pearl-grey women stand upright the bodies of men. They are black and white; they are grooved beneath their clothes with deep rills. I feel again the reflection in the window of the tunnel; it moves. The black-and-white figures of unknown men look at me as I lean forward; as I turn aside to look at a picture, they turn too. Their hands go fluttering to their ties. They touch their waistcoats, their pocket-handkerchiefs. They are very young. They are anxious to make a good impression. I feel a thousand capacities spring up in me. I am arch, gay, languid, melancholy by turns. I am rooted, but I flow. All gold, flowing that way, I say to this one, "Come." Rippling black, I say to that one, "No." One breaks off from his station under the glass cabinet. He approaches. He makes towards me. This is the most exciting moment I have ever known. I flutter. I ripple. I stream like a plant in the river, flowing this way, flowing that way, but rooted, so that he may come to me. "Come," I say, "come." Pale, with dark hair, the one who is coming is melancholy, romantic. And I am arch and fluent and capricious; for he is melancholy, he is romantic. He is here; he stands at my side.

“在这空阔而有所期待的房间里有些镀金的椅子，还有些花儿，它们比生长的花儿更恬静、端庄地靠着墙壁，铺展碧绿，铺展雪白。在一张小桌子上有一本精装书。这是我一直梦想的；这是我早已预料的。我生来属于这里。我大大方方地踏上厚厚的地毯。我轻松自如地在光亮的地板上徐徐而过。在这芳香里，在这光辉下，我现在开始舒展了，像一株羊齿草，卷曲的叶子舒展开了。我停了下来。我打量这个世界。我在陌生的人群中间张望。在那些光亮的碧绿、粉红、珠光灰色彩的女人们中间笔直地挺立着男人们的身体。他们是单一的黑白色彩；他们的衣服下面是凿出的深沟。我又一次意识到隧道里车窗上映出的那个倒影；它在动。当我探身向前，那些陌生男人的黑白身影随即望向我；当我扭过脸去看一幅画，他们也转过脸去。他们的手颤颤巍巍地伸向自己的领带。他们整整自己的马甲和手帕。他们很年轻。他们急于给人留下好印象。我感觉有一千种潜能在我身上突然迸发。我的顽皮、放肆、懒散、忧郁轮番登场。我脚下仿佛生了根，却又在流动。满脸金色，顺势流过去，我对这人说：‘来吧。’泛起黑色的涟漪，我对那人说：‘不。’有一个人断然离开了玻璃橱柜下面他所站立的地方。他走近了。他朝我走过来。这是我所知道的最让人激动的时刻。我心跳加速。我兴奋不已。我像河里游动的水草，飘过来，飘过去，但是根保持原地不动，这样他就向我走来了。‘来吧，’我说，‘来吧。’走过来的这人肤色苍白，头发漆黑，忧郁而浪漫。而我既顽皮又口齿伶俐，还反复无常；因为他的忧郁，他看上去那么浪漫。他来了；他站在我的身旁。

'Now with a little jerk, like a limpet broken from a rock, I am broken off: I fall with him; I am carried off. We yield to this slow flood. We go in and out of this hesitating music. Rocks break the current of the dance; it jars, it shivers. In and out, we are swept now into this large figure; it holds us together; we cannot step outside its sinuous, its hesitating, its abrupt, its perfectly encircling walls. Our bodies, his hard, mine flowing, are pressed together within its body; it holds us together; and then lengthening out, in smooth, in sinuous folds, rolls us between it, on and on. Suddenly the music breaks. My blood runs on but my body stands still. The room reels past my eyes. It stops.

“这会儿我稍微一扭身，离开了原地，像岩石上脱落的一只帽贝，我跟他一起落了下去；我被裹挟走了。我们陷入这股缓缓的洪流。我们在这首缠绵的乐曲中起起伏伏。舞曲的洪流常被岩石阻断；它时而发出刺耳的声音，时而战栗不止。几番沉浮，我们终于被卷进这强大的阵势中了；它抱紧我俩；我们无法迈出它那蜿蜒、缠绵、突兀而又严实的围墙之外。我俩的身体，他的坚实，我的流畅，都被挤压在它的阵型之内；它抱紧我俩；然后伸展开去，让我们在它平坦、蜿蜒的怀抱里不停地转啊，转啊。突然，音乐声中断了。我的血液继续奔流，而我的身体却站着不动。房间在我眼前摇晃。它停了下来。

'Come, then, let us wander whirling to the gilt chairs. The body is stronger than I thought. I am dizzier than I supposed. I do not care for anything in the world. I do not care for anybody save this man whose name I do not know. Are we not acceptable, moon? Are we not lovely sitting together here, I in my satin; he in black and white? My peers may look at me now. I look straight back at you, men and women. I am one of you. This is my world. Now I take this thin-stemmed glass and sip. Wine has a drastic, an astringent taste. I cannot help wincing as I drink. Scent and flowers, radiance and heat, are distilled here to a fiery, to a yellow liquid. Just behind my shoulder-blades some dry thing, wide-eyed, gently closes, gradually lulls itself to sleep. This is rapture; this is relief. The bar at the back of my throat lowers itself. Words crowd and cluster and push forth one on top of another. It does not matter which. They jostle and mount on each other's shoulders. The single and the solitary mate, tumble and become many. It does not matter what I say. Crowding, like a fluttering bird, one sentence crosses the empty space between us. It settles on his lips. I fill my glass again. I drink. The veil drops between us. I am admitted to the warmth and privacy of another soul. We are together, high up, on some Alpine pass. He stands melancholy on the crest of the road. I stoop. I pick a blue flower and fix it, standing on tiptoe to reach him, in his coat. There! That is my moment of ecstasy. Now it is over.

“那么来吧，让我们晃晃悠悠地转到镀金椅子那儿。阵势比我想象的要强大。我比我预料的要晕。我不在乎世上的任何事。我不在乎任何人，除了这个我还不知道名字的男人。月光啊，难道我俩不合你的心意么？我俩一起坐在这儿，我一身绸缎，他一身黑白，难道不令人愉快么？我的同龄人这会儿可能在望着我吧。我径直回头望向你们，你们这些男男女女。我是你们当中的一员。这是我的世界。瞧，我端起这只高脚杯，小口抿着。酒里有一种浓烈、辛辣的味道。我一边喝着，一边禁不住蹙起眉头。这是把清香与鲜花、光与热提炼成了一种火一样的黄色液体。就在我的肩胛后面，某个不露声色的东西，睁大着眼睛，这会儿它温柔地闭上眼，渐渐沉入了睡乡。这令人喜出望外；这令人如释重负。我喉咙深处的那道闸门打开了。话语涌了上来，聚作一堆，一句一句，互不相让。先说哪句后说哪句，这毫无关系。它们推推搡搡，互相攀着肩膀。单个的词语与独立的词语结成伙伴，翻滚到一起又化作许多。我说了什么，这也没有关系。在拥挤当中，有一个句子像振翅飞翔的鸟儿，穿过我俩之间的空地。它停在他的唇上。我又把我的酒杯斟满。我喝着酒。我俩之间的帷幔揭开了。我被接纳到另一颗心灵的温暖和隐秘之处。我俩一起来到高高的某个阿尔卑斯山的山口。他忧郁地站在山路的顶点。我俯下身。我摘了一朵蓝色的花儿，踮起脚尖把它插在他的外衣上。瞧啊！这是令我陶醉的时刻。它到此为止了。

'Now slackness and indifference invade us. Other people brush past. We have lost consciousness of our bodies uniting under the table. I also like fair-haired men with blue eyes. The door opens. The door goes on opening. Now I think, next time it opens the whole of my life will be changed. Who comes? But it is only a servant, bringing glasses. That is an old man—I should be a child with him. That is a great lady—with her I should dissemble. There are girls of my own age, for whom I feel the drawn swords of an honourable antagonism. For these are my peers. I am a native of this world. Here is my risk, here is my adventure. The door opens. O come, I say to this one, rippling gold from head to heels. "Come," and he comes towards me.'

“这会儿倦怠与冷漠侵袭了我们。别人从一旁轻轻掠了过去。我们已经意识不到桌子下面正靠在一起的身体。我同样喜欢金发蓝眼的男人。门打开了。门不断地打开。此刻我在想，下一次门打开的时候，我整个的生活将会发生变化。谁来了？但那不过是一个上酒的仆人。又来了一个老男人——跟他一起我恐怕像个孩子。又来了一位了不起的夫人——跟她一起我得隐藏自我。对于那些与我同龄的女孩，我感到一种发自内心、剑拔弩张的敌对情绪。因为她们是与我拥有同等身份的人。我生来属于这个世界。这里有我的冒险，这里有我的奇遇。门打开了。噢，来吧，我从头到脚洋溢着金色的光彩对这人说道。‘来吧。’他向我走来了。”

'I shall edge behind them,' said Rhoda, 'as if I saw someone I know. But I know no one. I shall twitch the curtain and look at the moon. Draughts of oblivion shall quench my agitation. The door opens; the tiger leaps. The door opens; terror rushes in; terror upon terror, pursuing me. Let me visit furtively the treasures I have laid apart. Pools lie on the other side of the world reflecting marble columns. The swallow dips her wing in dark pools. But here the door opens and people come; they come towards me. Throwing faint smiles to mask their cruelty, their indifference, they seize me. The swallow dips her wings; the moon rides through the blue seas alone. I must take his hand; I must answer. But what answer shall I give? I am thrust back to stand burning in this clumsy, this ill-fitting body, to receive the shafts of his indifference and his scorn, I who long for marble columns and pools on the other side of the world where the swallow dips her wings.

“我要从她们后面慢慢靠过去，”罗达说，“就像我看到了某个熟人一样。但是我谁也不认识。我要扯开窗帘看看月亮。无知无觉的风将会平息我的不安。门打开了；老虎跳了出来。门打开了；恐怖闯了进来；一阵一阵的恐怖追赶着我。让我秘密地造访我那些分散的宝藏吧。在世界的另一边有些水池，里面映出大理石柱的影子。燕子在幽暗的水面上轻点翅膀。但是在这儿，门打开了，人们进来了；他们向我走来。他们一边抛出微笑以掩饰他们的残忍和漠然，一边抓住了我。燕子的翅膀轻点水面；月亮孤单地驶过蓝色的大海。我必须握住他的手；我必须做出回答。可是我将做出什么样的回答呢？我被推了回来，浑身发热地站在这个笨拙、不整的阵型中，接受他漠然、轻视的目光，而我心中却一直渴望世界另一边的那些大理石柱和水池，那里有燕子在水面上轻点翅膀。

'Night has wheeled a little further over the chimney-pots. I see out of the window over his shoulder some unembarrassed cat, not drowned in light, not trapped in silk, free to pause, to stretch, and to move again. I hate all details of the individual life. But I am fixed here to listen. An immense pressure is on me. I cannot move without dislodging the weight of centuries. A million arrows pierce me. Scorn and ridicule pierce me. I, who could beat my breast against the storm and let the hail choke me joyfully, am pinned down here; am exposed. The tiger leaps. Tongues with their whips are upon me. Mobile, incessant, they flicker over me. I must prevaricate and fence them off with lies. What amulet is there against this disaster? What face can I summon to lay cool upon this heat? I think of names on boxes; of mothers from whose wide knees skirts descend; of glades where the many-backed steep hills come down. Hide me, I cry, protect me, for I am the youngest, the most naked of you all. Jinny rides like a gull on the wave, dealing her looks adroitly here and there, saying this, saying that, with truth. But I lie; I prevaricate.

“烟囱顶上，夜晚愈发深沉了。越过他的肩膀，我望见窗外一只不慌不忙的猫，既不受灯光的照射，也不受绫罗绸缎的束缚，它自由地停下来，伸个懒腰，又继续前行。我讨厌个人生活中的一切繁文缛节。但是我却被钉在这里，不得不听。一股巨大的力量压在我的身上。不搬掉那几百年的重量，我是无法动一动的。百万支箭刺透我身。蔑视与耻笑向我刺来。我，这个敢于挺起胸膛抗击暴风雨并甘愿让冰雹埋葬的人，却被固定在这里，暴露无遗。老虎跳了出来。口舌的鞭子向我抽来。它们迅疾、持续地在我身上闪过。我必须支吾搪塞，用谎言挡开它们。面对这场灾难，有什么样的护身符呢？面对这股热潮，我能摆出怎样的脸庞来保持冷静呢？我想起包厢上的那些名字；想起那些母亲，裙子从她们宽大的膝上垂下；想起那些林间空地，它们连着嶙峋、陡峭的山岭。藏起我吧，我喊道，保护我吧，因为我是你们所有人当中年龄最小、最柔弱无助的一个。吉尼像一直鸥鸟遨游在海浪上，机敏地四下观瞧，说这说那，说着事实。可我却在撒谎；我在支吾搪塞。

'Alone, I rock my basins; I am mistress of my fleet of ships. But here, twisting the tassels of this brocaded curtain in my hostess's window, I am broken into separate pieces; I am no longer one. What then is the knowledge that Jinny has as she dances; the assurance that Susan has as, stooping quietly beneath the lamplight, she draws the white cotton through the eye of her needle? They say, Yes; they say, No; they bring their fists down with a bang on the table. But I doubt; I tremble; I see the wild thorn tree shake its shadow in the desert.

“一个人时，我摇晃着水盆；我是我的船队的女主人。但是在这儿，当我搓着我的女主人窗上这面锦缎窗帘的流苏时，我也被捻得支离破碎了；我不再是完整的一个人了。那么吉尼跳舞时她所拥有的那种学识来自哪里呢？苏珊在灯光下安静地弯着腰穿针引着白棉线时的那份信心来自哪里呢？她们会说，好吧；她们会说，不；她们会把她们的拳头砰地砸在桌子上。而我疑虑重重；我战战兢兢；我看见那棵野蒺藜的影子在沙漠中瑟瑟发抖。

'Now I will walk, as if I had an end in view, across the room, to the balcony under the awning. I see the sky, softly feathered with its sudden effulgence of moon. I also see the railings of the square, and two people without faces, leaning like statues against the sky. There is, then, a world immune from change. When I have passed through this drawing-room flickering with tongues that cut me like knives, making me stammer, making me lie, I find faces rid of features, robed in beauty. The lovers crouch under the plane tree. The policeman stands sentinel at the corner. A man passes. There is, then, a world immune from change. But I am not composed enough, standing on tiptoe on the verge of fire, still scorched by the hot breath, afraid of the door opening and the leap of the tiger, to make even one sentence. What I say is perpetually contradicted. Each time the door opens I am interrupted. I am not yet twenty-one. I am to be broken. I am to be derided all my life. I am to be cast up and down among these men and women, with their twitching faces, with their lying tongues, like a cork on a rough sea. Like a ribbon of weed I am flung far every time the door opens. I am the foam that sweeps and fills the uttermost rims of the rocks with whiteness; I am also a girl, here in this room.'

“现在我要穿过房间，仿佛我的眼中有个目标，走到凉篷下的阳台那儿去。我望见夜空温柔地闪动着忽然绽放的月亮的光辉。我还望见广场的栏杆，两个看不清面孔的人依偎着，像夜幕下的雕像。这么说，真的存在一个恒久不变的世界。穿过这间客厅时，它摇曳的口舌像刀子一样向我割来，令我结结巴巴，令我编造谎言，之后我发现那些面孔都失去了特色，只是披了美的外衣。悬铃树下，恋人缱绻。警察在街角站岗放哨。一个男人走过。这么说，真的存在一个恒久不变的世界。可是我无法让自己镇定下来，哪怕说一句话，此时我踮着脚尖站在炉火边，还在被热热的气息烘烤着，害怕着开门和老虎的跃出。我所说的，永远是自相矛盾的。每次门一开，我就被打断。我还不到21岁。我就要被制服。我的一生都要遭人耻笑。我要在这些面孔抽搐、满嘴谎言的男男女女中间被抛来抛去，像汹涌的大海上的一块软木。像一绺水草，每次门一开，我都会被冲得远远的。我是海上的浮沫，掠过礁石，在它们的最边缘留下洁白的印迹；我也是个女孩啊，在这儿，在这个房间里。”

The sun, risen, no longer couched on a green mattress darting a fitful glance through watery jewels, bared its face and looked straight over the waves. They fell with a regular thud. They fell with the concussion of horses' hooves on the turf. Their spray rose like the tossing of lances and assegais over the riders' heads. They swept the beach with steel blue and diamond-tipped water. They drew in and out with the energy, the muscularity, of an engine which sweeps its force out and in again. The sun fell on cornfields and woods, rivers became blue and many-plaited, lawns that sloped down to the water's edge became green as birds' feathers softly ruffling their plumes. The hills, curved and controlled, seemed bound back by thongs, as a limb is laced by muscles; and the woods which bristled proudly on their flanks were like the curt, clipped mane on the neck of a horse.

升起的太阳不再趴在绿色的垫子上从晶莹剔透的珠宝间投来阵阵光辉，而是露出了整个脸庞，径直俯视着海浪。它们落下时发出有规律的轰响。它们落下时如赛马场上马蹄的震荡。浪花飞溅，好像抛在骑手头上的长矛和投枪。它们使钢青色的、带着钻石棱角的海水掠过岸边。它们强劲有力地一进一退，仿佛一台机车在反复吞吐着力量。阳光照进麦田和树林，江河呈现出蓝色和许多皱褶，通向水边的斜坡上的草坪呈现出绿色，好像鸟儿羽翼上面柔软蓬松的绒毛。山岭曲折而皱缩，似乎被皮带向后勒着，就像肢体上的条条肌肉一样；山体侧面，傲然耸立的树林，像马脖子上胡乱剪短了的粗硬鬃毛。

In the garden where the trees stood, thick over flowerbeds, ponds, and greenhouses the birds sang in the hot sunshine, each alone. One sang under the bedroom window; another on the topmost twig of the lilac bush; another on the edge of the wall. Each sang stridently, with passion, with vehemence, as if to let the song burst out of it, no matter if it shattered the song of another bird with harsh discord. Their round eyes bulged with brightness; their claws gripped the twig or rail. They sang, exposed without shelter, to the air and the sun, beautiful in their new plumage, shell-veined or brightly mailed, here barred with soft blues, here splashed with gold, or striped with one bright feather. They sang as if the song were urged out of them by the pressure of the morning. They sang as if the edge of being were sharpened and must cut, must split the softness of the blue-green light, the dampness of the wet earth; the fumes and steams of the greasy kitchen vapour; the hot breath of mutton and beef; the richness of pastry and fruit; the damp shreds and peelings thrown from the kitchen bucket, from which a slow steam oozed on the rubbish heap. On all the sodden, the damp-spotted, the curled with wetness, they descended, dry-beaked, ruthless, abrupt. They swooped suddenly from the lilac bough or the fence. They spied a snail and tapped the shell against a stone. They tapped furiously, methodically, until the shell broke and something slimy oozed from the crack. They swept and soared sharply in flights high into the air, twittering short, sharp notes, and perched in the upper branches of some tree, and looked down upon leaves and spires beneath, and the country white with blossom, flowing with grass, and the sea which beat like a drum that raises a regiment of plumed and turbaned soldiers. Now and again their songs ran together in swift scales like the interlacings of a mountain stream whose waters, meeting, foam and then mix, and hasten quicker and quicker down the same channel, brushing the same broad leaves. But there is a rock; they sever.

花园里，挺拔、茂密的树木下面是花圃、池塘和花房，鸟儿在灼热的阳光下歌唱，每一只都那么孤单。有一只在卧室窗前歌唱；另一只在紫丁香树丛的最高枝上；还有一只在墙头边上。每一只鸟都唱得声嘶力竭、热烈、奔放，仿佛要让歌声冲破一切，不管它刺耳的不和谐音是否破坏了另一只鸟的歌唱。它们圆圆的眼睛明亮地鼓了出来；它们的爪子紧紧抓住树枝或栏杆。它们唱着，无遮无掩地暴露在空气中、阳光下，漂亮地披着新羽衣，有的像贝壳的纹理，有的像闪亮的盔甲，有的是块块柔和的蓝色，有的是星星点点的金色，有的是条鲜艳的羽毛。它们唱着，仿佛这歌声是受到清晨的驱使而唱出来的。它们唱着，仿佛生命的刀锋得以淬砺，必须劈出去，必须劈开那柔和的蓝绿色光芒，那潮湿的大地，那油腻腻的厨房烟气，那热腾腾的牛羊肉，那香喷喷的糕点和水果，还有厨房桶里拎出来的那些湿淋淋的，正在垃圾堆上缓缓冒水汽的菜帮果皮。它们落了下来，亮出它们冷冷的尖喙，那么无情，那么突然，落到各种饱含了水分、潮迹斑斑、湿润而弯折的东西上面。它们从丁香枝上或篱笆上突然俯冲下来。它们认准了一只蜗牛，把它的壳在石头上磕着。它们有条不紊地使劲磕着，直到蜗牛壳破了，黏糊糊的东西从破裂处渗了出来。它们一掠而过，敏捷地冲天而起，飞向空中，叽叽喳喳地唱出短促而尖利的音符，然后落在一棵树的高枝上，瞅着下面的树叶和塔尖，花儿洁白、草儿流动的乡村，还有大海，它像一面擂响的战鼓，召来一队裹着头巾、插着羽饰的士兵。不时地，它们的歌声迅疾地交织在一起，像溪水交织而成的一股涧流，水流相遇，激荡，融合，然后化作激流，沿着同一渠道，冲刷着同样的宽大树叶，流得越来越快。但是前方有一块礁石；它们分道扬镳了。

The sun fell in sharp wedges inside the room. Whatever the light touched became dowered with a fanatical existence. A plate was like a white lake. A knife looked like a dagger of ice. Suddenly tumblers revealed themselves upheld by streaks of light. Tables and chairs rose to the surface as if they had been sunk under water and rose, filmed with red, orange, purple like the bloom on the skin of ripe fruit. The veins on the glaze of the china, the grain of the wood, the fibres of the matting became more and more finely engraved. Everything was without shadow. A jar was so green that the eye seemed sucked up through a funnel by its intensity and stuck to it like a limpet. Then shapes took on mass and edge. Here was the boss of a chair; here the bulk of a cupboard. And as the light increased, flocks of shadow were driven before it and conglomerated and hung in many-pleated folds in the background.

阳光以鲜明的楔形照进屋里。无论什么，经阳光一照，就披上一层迷人的色彩。盘子像一泓白色的湖水。刀子看上去像一把冰锥。突然，一些玻璃酒杯被一条条光线托举着显露出来。桌椅浮了上来，仿佛它们沉到了水下又浮出水面，上面蒙了层红、橙、紫的颜色，像成熟的水果表皮上的那层粉霜。瓷器釉面上的脉络，木器的纹理，席子的纤维，都越来越清晰地显示出来。每样东西都没有阴影。罐子的颜色那么绿，以至于目光仿佛从漏斗处被强烈地吸了进去，好像一只帽贝附着在上面。接着，各种形状都呈现出主体和棱角。这儿是椅子的一部分凸饰；这儿是橱柜的整个外形。随着光线增强，它的前面形成一块块阴影，它们集合起来，像打了褶皱的层层叠叠的布景似的挂在那里。

'How fair, how strange,' said Bernard, 'glittering, many-pointed and many-domed London lies before me under mist. Guarded by gasometers, by factory chimneys, she lies sleeping as we approach. She folds the ant-heap to her breast. All cries, all clamour, are softly enveloped in silence. Not Rome herself looks more majestic. But we are aimed at her. Already her maternal somnolence is uneasy. Ridges, fledged with houses rise from the mist. Factories, cathedrals, glass domes, institutions and theatres erect themselves. The early train from the north is hurled at her like a missile. We draw a curtain as we pass. Blank expectant faces stare at us as we rattle and flash through stations. Men clutch their newspapers a little tighter, as our wind sweeps them, envisaging death. But we roar on. We are about to explode in the flanks of the city like a shell in the side of some ponderous, maternal, majestic animal. She hums and murmurs; she awaits us.

“多么清晰，多么奇怪，”伯纳德说，“闪闪烁烁的，多尖头、多圆顶的伦敦穿过薄雾浮现在我眼前。当我们越来越近时，她还在贮气罐和工厂烟囱的守护下睡着呢。她把巨大的蚁冢拥在自己的怀里。一切呼喊、一切喧哗都被轻轻地裹入寂静中。就连罗马她本身看上去也没那么庄严。但是我们的目的地就是她。她那母性的睡态早已被惊动了。装点着密密麻麻的房屋的脊背从薄雾中挺了起来。工厂、教堂、玻璃圆顶、机构和剧院都赫然耸立。北方来的早班火车像一颗飞弹投向她。当我们经过时，我们拉开了一道帷幕。当我们轰隆隆地从一个个站点一闪而过时，总有一些茫然、期待的面孔注视着我们。当我们掀起的死亡之风掠过他们时，那些人稍稍攥紧了手中的报纸。但是我们呼啸而过。我们即将在这座城市的侧翼爆炸，就像炮弹在一只笨重却带有母性威严的野兽的肋部炸开。她哼着曲调，喃喃低语；她在等候我们。

'Meanwhile as I stand looking from the train window, I feel strangely, persuasively, that because of my great happiness (being engaged to be married) I am become part of this speed, this missile hurled at the city. I am numbed to tolerance and acquiescence. My dear sir, I could say, why do you fidget, taking down your suitcase and pressing into it the cap that you have worn all night? Nothing we can do will avail. Over us all broods a splendid unanimity. We are enlarged and solemnized and brushed into uniformity as with the grey wing of some enormous goose (it is a fine but colourless morning) because we have only one desire—to arrive at the station. I do not want the train to stop with a thud. I do not want the connection which has bound us together sitting opposite each other all night long to be broken. I do not want to feel that hate and rivalry have resumed their sway; and different desires. Our community in the rushing train, sitting together with only one wish, to arrive at Euston, was very welcome. But behold! It is over. We have attained our desire. We have drawn up at the platform. Hurry and confusion and the wish to be first through the gate into the lift assert themselves. But I do not wish to be first through the gate, to assume the burden of individual life. I, who have been since Monday, when she accepted me, charged in every nerve with a sense of identity, who could not see a tooth-brush in a glass without saying, "My toothbrush", now wish to unclasp my hands and let fall my possessions, and merely stand here in the street, taking no part, watching the omnibuses, without desire; without envy; with what would be boundless curiosity about human destiny if there were any longer an edge to my mind. But it has none. I have arrived; am accepted. I ask nothing.

“在我站起来望向车窗外的同时，我奇怪地、信服地感觉到，因为我的巨大幸福（已经订婚），我才适应了这样的飞速，成为射向那座城市的炮弹的一部分。我麻木了，到了容忍、默从的地步。亲爱的先生，我想说，您为什么坐立不安，要把您的行李箱拿下来而把戴了整晚的帽子硬塞进去呢？我们所能做的都将毫无用处。我们所有人都笼罩在一种壮丽的和谐之中。我们被放大，被隆重庆祝，好像被一只巨鹅的灰色翅膀扫在一起（这是一个晴朗但毫无特色的早晨），因为我们只有一种渴望——到达车站。我不想要火车轰隆一声停下。我不想要我们之间整晚相对而坐所结成的这种联系砰然断裂。我不想要仇恨与敌对重新做了主导，每个人都各怀心思。在奔驰的火车上，我们坐在一起，怀着唯一的到达尤斯顿的愿望，这是很难得的。但是，看呀！它就这么结束了。我们实现了愿望。我们停在了月台上。匆忙、混乱，以及首先穿过大门、进入电梯的希望，那么坚定地表现出来。但是我不希望第一个穿过大门，去承担个人生活的重负。我，自从她接受我的那个星期一，我的每一根神经都充满一种合乎身份的感觉，而且非得说一声‘我的牙刷’才能看见玻璃杯中的牙刷，这个我这会儿却希望松开双手，扔下我的东西，单纯地站在这儿的大街上，事不关己地瞅着公共汽车，无所希求，无所羡慕，只有对人类命运的无限好奇——假如我的头脑有更长的触角的话。但是它没有。我到了；被接纳了。我一无所求。

'Having dropped off satisfied like a child from the breast, I am at liberty now to sink down, deep, into what passes, this omnipresent, general life. (How much, let me note, depends upon trousers; the intelligent head is entirely handicapped by shabby trousers.) One observes curious hesitations at the door of the lift. This way, that way, the other? Then individuality asserts itself. They are off. They are all impelled by some necessity. Some miserable affair of keeping an appointment, of buying a hat, severs these beautiful human beings once so united. For myself, I have no aim. I have no ambition. I will let myself be carried on by the general impulse. The surface of my mind slips along like a pale-grey stream, reflecting what passes. I cannot remember my past, my nose, or the colour of my eyes, or what my general opinion of myself is. Only in moments of emergency, at a crossing, at a kerb, the wish to preserve my body springs out and seizes me and stops me, here, before this omnibus. We insist, it seems, on living. Then again, indifference descends. The roar of the traffic, the passage of undifferentiated faces, this way and that way, drugs me into dreams; rubs the features from faces. People might walk through me. And, what is this moment of time, this particular day in which I have found myself caught? The growl of traffic might be any uproar—forest trees or the roar of wild beasts. Time has whizzed back an inch or two on its reel; our short progress has been cancelled. I think also that our bodies are in truth naked. We are only lightly covered with buttoned cloth; and beneath these pavements are shells, bones and silence.

“像婴儿在母亲怀中吃饱后满足的样子，此时的我自由地下沉，深深地潜入过往的、这种无所不在的日常生活之中。（我得注意，有多少事情取决于裤子的作用啊；蹩脚的裤子会让聪明的头脑整个变成弱智。）你会观察到电梯门口种种令人惊奇的迟疑。这边？那边？还是另外一边？这时，个性主动站了出来。他们离开了。他们全都受到了某种必然性的驱使。某件不幸的小事，像赴一个约会或买一顶帽子，都让这些一度联系那么紧密的可爱的人们分道扬镳了。对我而言，我毫无目标。我胸无大志。我将随波逐流。我的思维一掠而过，像一条浅灰色的河流，上面映出来来往往的一切。我记不住我的往事，我的鼻子，或者我眼睛的颜色，或者我对自己的总的看法。只有在紧急关头，在十字路口，在街边石上，保护身体的那种意愿才会油然而生，抓住我，把我拦在这里，拦在这辆公共马车前面。看来，我们都是一心要活着。这时，淡漠又一次降临。车流喧嚣，过往的脸庞难辨彼此，忽左忽右，使我恍然如入梦中；擦去了脸上的容貌特征。人们可能会从我的身体中穿过去。再则，这一时刻具体是什么时候呢？我发现自己被迷住的这一天？车流的隆隆声可能是任何一种喧嚣——森林的呼啸或者野兽的咆哮。时间之轴嗖嗖地退回了一两吋；我们小小的进步即被抹杀。我想我们实际上还是赤身裸体的。我们只是被轻轻地盖上了一层用纽扣装饰的布；这些人行步道的下面是贝壳、骸骨和寂静。

'It is, however, true that my dreaming, my tentative advance like one carried beneath the surface of a stream, is interrupted, torn, pricked and plucked at by sensations, spontaneous and irrelevant, of curiosity, greed, desire, irresponsible as in sleep. (I covet that bag—etc.) No, but I wish to go under; to visit the profound depths; once in a while to exercise my prerogative not always to act, but to explore; to hear vague, ancestral sounds of boughs creaking, of mammoths; to indulge impossible desires to embrace the whole world with the arms of understanding—impossible to those who act. Am I not, as I walk, trembling with strange oscillations and vibrations of sympathy, which, unmoored as I am from a private being, bid me embrace these engrossed flocks; these starers and trippers; these errand-boys and furtive and fugitive girls who, ignoring their doom, look in at shop-windows? But I am aware of our ephemeral passage.

“然而，事实上，我的梦想，我像被卷在一条河流之中的人那样试探性的挣扎，总被诸如好奇、贪婪、欲望等等自然而然、毫不相干、如梦中任性的感觉所打岔、撕碎、戳破和扯烂。（我竟然垂涎那只手提包等。）不行，但我希望下去；去触及奥妙的深处；偶尔实施我的特权，即并非总是行动，而是去探索；去倾听枝杈坼裂和猛犸象含糊、远古的声音；去沉溺于无法实现的渴望，即用理解的臂膀去拥抱整个世界——这对于那些行动的人来说是根本无法实现的。难道我不正是一边走着，一边因为同情心引起的震颤和波动而浑身发抖么？仿佛我来自于一个神秘的族类，我的同情心起锚了，促使我拥抱这些全神贯注的人群；这些瞪大眼睛的人和走来走去的人；这些跑腿的伙计和鬼鬼祟祟、溜来溜去的侍女，她们无视自己注定的命运，还在望着商店的橱窗。但是我意识到，我们都是匆匆的过客。

'It is, however, true that I cannot deny a sense that life for me is now mysteriously prolonged. Is it that I may have children, may cast a fling of seed wider, beyond this generation, this doom—encircled population, shuffling each other in endless competition along the street? My daughters shall come here, in other summers; my sons shall turn new fields. Hence we are not raindrops, soon dried by the wind; we make gardens blow and forests roar; we come up differently, for ever and ever. This, then, serves to explain my confidence, my central stability, otherwise so monstrously absurd as I breast the stream of this crowded thoroughfare, making always a passage for myself between people's bodies, taking advantage of safe moments to cross. It is not vanity; for I am emptied of ambition; I do not remember my special gifts, or idiosyncrasy, or the marks I bear on my person; eyes, nose or mouth. I am not, at this moment, myself.

“然而，事实上，我无法否认一种感觉，那就是，我的人生已被不可思议地拉长了。这是不是意味着我可能会生儿育女，可能会把种子撒得更加广阔，超越这一代人，超越这些劫数难逃却在大街上摩肩接踵、争斗不休的人？我的女儿们将在以后的暑期来到这里；我的儿孙将开辟新的领域。所以说，我们并非像雨滴那样转眼被风吹干；我们让花园奔放、树林咆哮；我们以不同的形式生于世间，永永远远。这么说就为我的信心、我的笃定找到了理由，不然的话，我挺胸挤过这拥堵的道路，总是在人们的躯体当中为自己开出一条路，瞅准安全时刻顺利通过的行为就会显得那么荒唐透顶。这不是虚荣；因为我的雄心荡然无存；我不记得我有什么特殊的天赋，或者特异的气质，或者我身上具有的明显标志；像眼睛、鼻子和嘴什么的。这一刻，我不是我自己。

'Yet behold, it returns. One cannot extinguish that persistent smell. It steals in through some crack in the structure—one's identity. I am not part of the street—no, I observe the street. One splits off, therefore. For instance, up that back street a girl stands waiting; for whom? A romantic story. On the wall of that shop is fixed a small crane, and for what reason, I ask, was that crane fixed there? and invent a purple lady swelling, circumambient, hauled from a barouche landau by a perspiring husband sometime in the sixties. A grotesque story. That is, I am a natural coiner of words, a blower of bubbles through one thing and another. And, striking off these observations spontaneously, I elaborate myself; differentiate myself and, listening to the voice that says as I stroll past, "Look! Take note of that!" I conceive myself called upon to provide, some winter's night, a meaning for all my observations—a line that runs from one to another, a summing up that completes. But soliloquies in back streets soon pall. I need an audience. That is my downfall. That always ruffles the edge of the final statement and prevents it from forming. I cannot seat myself in some sordid eating-house and order the same glass day after day and imbue myself entirely in one fluid—this life. I make my phrase and run off with it to some furnished room where it will be lit by dozens of candles. I need eyes on me to draw out these frills and furbelows. To be myself (I note) I need the illumination of other people's eyes, and therefore cannot be entirely sure what is my self. The authentics, like Louis, like Rhoda, exist most completely in solitude. They resent illumination, reduplication. They toss their pictures once painted face downward on the field. On Louis' words the ice is packed thick. His words issue pressed, condensed, enduring.

“可是瞧啊，它回来了。一个人不可能完全消除那种固有的气味。它从一个人的个性结构之中的某个缝隙溜了进来。我并不是街道的组成部分——不是，我在观察街道。如此，一个人保持了疏离。比如说，后街有位女孩站在那儿等人；等谁呢？一段浪漫故事。那家商店的墙上安了一个小小的支架，我就问，什么原因让那个支架安在那儿呢？然后想象回到六十年代的某个时候，一位紫衣女士，臃肿而又装腔作势，由一位汗流浃背的丈夫从一辆四轮大马车里硬拽了出来。一段离奇故事。这就是说，我是个天生的胡编高手，这样那样的事都能让我吹得天花乱坠。而且，在自觉地剪辑这些观察时，我精心磨练了自己；使自己与众不同；而且，当我信步走过，听见一个声音说：‘看！把那个记下来！’我会构想某个冬天的夜晚，有人要我亲口说出我所有这些观察的意义所在——那将是交口相传的一句道白，画龙点睛的一段总结。但是后街上的自言自语很快变得乏味了。我需要有听众。那是我的症结所在。这个症结总是把那份综述的边角弄得皱皱巴巴，使其不成体统。我无法让自己坐在某个肮脏的餐厅，日复一日地点上同样的一杯酒，把自己完全泡在一种液体——这种生活——当中。我编弄词令，与它一起逃到某个布置好的房间，那里将会点起几十支蜡烛。我需要落在我身上的目光来引出这些褶边和坠饰。为了找回我自己（我注意到），我需要别人的目光来为我照明，因此无法完全搞清楚自己是个什么样的人。像路易斯、罗达这些人，他们的真实形象就完全存在于独处时。他们讨厌映照和翻版。他们把自己曾经的画像脸朝下抛进田野。路易斯的话语上面压着厚厚的冰。他的话语透出压抑的、浓缩的坚忍。

'I wish, then, after this somnolence to sparkle, many-faceted under the light of my friends' faces. I have been traversing the sunless territory of non-identity. A strange land. I have heard in my moment of appeasement, in my moment of obliterating satisfaction, the sigh, as it goes in, comes out, of the tide that draws beyond this circle of bright light, this drumming of insensate fury. I have had one moment of enormous peace. This perhaps is happiness. Now I am drawn back by pricking sensations; by curiosity, greed (I am hungry) and the irresistible desire to be myself. I think of people to whom I could say things: Louis, Neville, Susan, Jinny and Rhoda. With them I am many-sided. They retrieve me from darkness. We shall meet tonight, thank Heaven. Thank Heaven, I need not be alone. We shall dine together. We shall say good-bye to Percival, who goes to India. The hour is still distant, but I feel already those harbingers, those outriders, figures of one's friends in absence. I see Louis, stone-carved, sculpturesque; Neville, scissor-cutting, exact; Susan with eyes like lumps of crystal; Jinny dancing like a flame, febrile, hot, over dry earth; and Rhoda the nymph of the fountain always wet. These are fantastic pictures—these are figments, these visions of friends in absence, grotesque, dropsical, vanishing at the first touch of the toe of a real boot. Yet they drum me alive. They brush off these vapours. I begin to be impatient of solitude—to feel its draperies hang sweltering, unwholesome about me. Oh, to toss them off and be active! Anybody will do. I am not fastidious. The crossing—sweeper will do; the postman; the waiter in this French restaurant; better still the genial proprietor, whose geniality seems reserved for oneself. He mixes the salad with his own hands for some privileged guest. Which is the privileged guest, I ask, and why? And what is he saying to the lady in ear-rings; is she a friend or a customer? I feel at once, as I sit down at a table, the delicious jostle of confusion, of uncertainty, of possibility, of speculation. Images breed instantly. I am embarrassed by my own fertility. I could describe every chair, table, luncher here copiously, freely. My mind hums hither and thither with its veil of words for everything. To speak, about wine even to the waiter, is to bring about an explosion. Up goes the rocket. Its golden grain falls, fertilizing, upon the rich soil of my imagination. The entirely unexpected nature of this explosion—that is the joy of intercourse. I, mixed with an unknown Italian waiter—what am I? There is no stability in this world. Who is to say what meaning there is in anything? Who is to foretell the flight of a word? It is a balloon that sails over tree-tops. To speak of knowledge is futile. All is experiment and adventure. We are for ever mixing ourselves with unknown quantities. What is to come? I know not. But as I put down my glass I remember: I am engaged to be married. I am to dine with my friends tonight. I am Bernard, myself.'

“那么我希望，经过这番恍惚之后，在我朋友们脸庞的光照下，神采飞扬，魅力四射。我一直穿行在默默无闻、暗淡无光的领地。一片奇怪的土地。在我喘息的时刻，在我那忘却一切的满足时刻，我听到了潮水的叹息，时隐时现，那潮水漫过这里灯火璀璨的圈子，漫过这里狂暴无章的鼓乐。我拥有了一个极其平静的时刻。这也许就是幸福吧。这会儿我被刺痛感——好奇，贪婪（我如饥似渴），以及那种要找回自己的难以遏制的欲望——拉了回来。我想起那些我能向其倾吐心事的人：路易斯、内维尔、苏珊、吉尼和罗达。与他们在一起，我是多才多艺的人。他们会把我从黑暗中挽救回来。谢天谢地，今晚我们就要重逢。谢天谢地，我勿需形单影只。我们要一起进餐。我们要向珀西瓦尔道别，他要去印度。时辰还早呢，但我已经感觉到了那些开路先锋，那些骑马的随从，以及朋友们尚不在眼前的身形。我看见路易斯，如石刻的雕像一样美；内维尔，像剪刀裁剪出来的，一丝不苟；苏珊，眼睛像大大的水晶；吉尼，像一团炙热的火焰在干燥的大地上舞蹈；罗达，这位泉水仙女总是身上湿淋淋的。这些奇妙的图画——这些虚构的画面，这些尚未到来的朋友们的幻影，怪诞、肿胀，被真实的鞋尖一碰即刻倏然而逝。不过它们却把我鼓动得活跃起来。它们拨开了这些迷雾。我开始不能容忍孤独——感觉到它的帘帏闷热而不舒服地垂在我的四周。噢，扯掉它们，活跃起来吧！什么人都行。我并不挑剔。清道夫也行；邮差也行；这家法式餐馆的服务生也行；和气的店主更好，他的和蔼可亲似乎是为自己准备的。他亲手为某个贵客搅拌沙拉。贵客是哪一位呢？我问道，为什么呢？他在跟那位戴耳环的女士说什么呢？她是一位朋友，还是一位食客？当我在桌边坐下来时，我立即感觉到一阵令人愉悦的迷惑、不安、猜疑、推测蜂拥而至。种种意象瞬息之间繁衍开来。我自身的丰富想象令我有点局促。我可以游刃有余地描述这里的每一把椅子、每一张桌子和每一位食客。我思维活跃，嗡嗡地飞来飞去，给每一样东西都披上词语的薄纱。即使跟服务生说到酒，也将引起一场爆炸。火箭上天。它金色的微粒变成养分，落在我想象的肥沃土壤上。这种爆炸在性质上完全出人意料——这正是交往的乐趣所在。我，这个和一位陌生的意大利服务生混在一起的我到底是谁呢？这个世上不存在永恒。谁能说清每一件事物的含义呢？谁能预言一个词语飞向何方？它像掠过树梢的一只气球。谈论知识毫无意义。一切皆为实验和冒险。我们永远都与未知数混在一起。未来会是什么？我不知道。但是当我放下酒杯，我想起来了：我订婚了。今晚我要与朋友们一起进餐。我是伯纳德本人。”

'It is now five minutes to eight,' said Neville. 'I have come early. I have taken my place at the table ten minutes before the time in order to taste every moment of anticipation; to see the door open and to say, "Is it Percival? No; it is not Percival." There is a morbid pleasure in saying: "No, it is not Percival." I have seen the door open and shut twenty times already; each time the suspense sharpens. This is the place to which he is coming. This is the table at which he will sit. Here, incredible as it seems, will be his actual body. This table, these chairs, this metal vase with its three red flowers are about to undergo an extraordinary transformation. Already the room, with its swing-doors, its tables heaped with fruit, with cold joints, wears the wavering, unreal appearance of a place where one waits expecting something to happen. Things quiver as if not yet in being. The blankness of the white table-cloth glares. The hostility, the indifference of other people dining here is oppressive. We look at each other; see that we do not know each other, stare, and go off. Such looks are lashes. I feel the whole cruelty and indifference of the world in them. If he should not come I could not bear it. I should go. Yet somebody must be seeing him now. He must be in some cab; he must be passing some shop. And every moment he seems to pump into this room this prickly light, this intensity of being, so that things have lost their normal uses—this knife-blade is only a flash of light, not a thing to cut with. The normal is abolished.

“现在差五分八点。”内维尔说。“我来早了。我提前十分钟在桌边就座，我要体味每一刻的期待；我要看着门打开，然后说：‘你是珀西瓦尔？不对，你不是珀西瓦尔。’在‘不对，你不是珀西瓦尔。’的话语中有一股病态的高兴之情。我看着门打开、关上已经有二十次了；每一次，悬念都在加剧。这是他要来的地方。这是他要坐的桌子。这儿，尽管好像不可思议，将是他实实在在的躯体。这张桌子，这些椅子，这只插有三支红花的金属花瓶，即将经历一次不同寻常的变化。这个房间以及它的弹簧门和堆着水果、冷肉的桌子，已经露出了摇晃而不真实的面容，这是个供人等待某事发生的地方。有些东西在颤动，仿佛尚未成形。白色的桌布白得耀眼。其他食客的敌意和漠然令人压抑。我们彼此瞅瞅；发现互相并不认识，瞪了瞪眼，移开目光。这样的对望好似鞭笞。我从中感到整个人世的残酷与冷漠。假如他不来，我会受不了这个。我会离去。不过这会儿准有人看见他了吧。他准是坐在某辆出租马车上；他准是正路经某家商店。每一刻，他都好像在把这刺眼的光和生命的热情注入这个房间，以至于这里的所有东西都失去了它们通常的用途——这锋利的刀身只是一道闪光，而不是一件切割用具。通常的标准被废止了。

'The door opens, but he does not come. That is Louis hesitating there. That is his strange mixture of assurance and timidity. He looks at himself in the looking-glass as he comes in; he touches his hair; he is dissatisfied with his appearance. He says, "I am a Duke—the last of an ancient race.” He is acrid, suspicious, domineering, difficult (I am comparing him with Percival). At the same time he is formidable, for there is laughter in his eyes. He has seen me. Here he is.'

“门打开了，但他没有来。那是路易斯迟疑地站在那儿。他的样子怪怪的，混合了自信与胆怯。进来的时候他瞅了瞅镜子里的自己；他捋了捋头发；他对自己的外表总是不满意。他总说：‘我是一位公爵——一个古老家族的末代子孙。’他尖刻、多疑、专横、不易相处（我在拿他和珀西瓦尔比较）。同时他又令人敬畏，因为他的眼睛里充满欢笑。他看见我了。他走过来。”

'There is Susan,' said Louis. 'She does not see us. She has not dressed, because she despises the futility of London. She stands for a moment at the swing-door, looking about her like a creature dazed by the light of a lamp. Now she moves. She has the stealthy yet assured movements (even among tables and chairs) of a wild beast. She seems to find her way by instinct in and out among these little tables, touching no one, disregarding waiters, yet comes straight to our table in the corner. When she sees us (Neville, and myself) her face assumes a certainty which is alarming, as if she had what she wanted. To be loved by Susan would be to be impaled by a bird's sharp beak, to be nailed to a barnyard door. Yet there are moments when I could wish to be speared by a beak, to be nailed to a barnyard door, positively, once and for all.

“苏珊来了。”路易斯说。“她没看到我们。她没有打扮，因为她鄙视伦敦的浮华。她在弹簧门那儿站了一会儿，四下打量着，好像灯光下一只眩晕的动物。现在她走动了。她的动作（即使走在桌椅之间）像一只野兽似的悄无声息但胸有成竹。她似乎凭借本能在这些小桌子中间穿来穿去，不碰任何人，也不理服务生，径直向角落里我们这张桌子奔过来。当她看见我们（内维尔和我），她的脸上露出一种惊人的自信，仿佛她得到了她想要的东西。被苏珊爱上就会像被一只鸟的尖喙刺穿，或者像被钉在一扇仓院门上似的。不过有时候我甘愿被鸟的喙刺穿，或者被钉在一扇仓院门上，彻彻底底，一次性了断。

'Rhoda comes now, from nowhere, having slipped in while we were not looking. She must have made a tortuous course, taking cover now behind a waiter, now behind some ornamental pillar, so as to put off as long as possible the shock of recognition, so as to be secure for one more moment to rock her petals in her basin. We wake her. We torture her. She dreads us, she despises us, yet comes cringing to our sides because for all our cruelty there is always some name, some face, which sheds a radiance, which lights up her pavements and makes it possible for her to replenish her dreams.'

“这会儿罗达也来了，在我们不注意的时候，她不知从哪儿溜了进来。她准是兜了个圈子，时而躲在服务生身后，时而藏在某个装饰性的柱子后面，为的是尽可能推迟相认时的激动，为的是确保她还有时间摇动自己水盆里的花瓣。我们叫醒她。我们拷问她。她怕我们，她鄙视我们，却畏畏缩缩地来到我们身边，因为不管我们多么残酷无情，总有某个名字，某个脸庞，发出一道光明，照亮她脚下的路，使她能够再续自己的梦。”

'The door opens, the door goes on opening,' said Neville, 'yet he does not come.'

“门打开了，门不停地打开，”内维尔说，“但他还是没来。”

'There is Jinny,' said Susan. 'She stands in the door. Everything seems stayed. The waiter stops. The diners at the table by the door look. She seems to centre everything; round her tables, lines of doors, windows, ceilings, ray themselves, like rays round the star in the middle of a smashed window-pane. She brings things to a point, to order. Now she sees us, and moves, and all the rays ripple and flow and waver over us, bringing in new tides of sensation. We change. Louis puts his hand to his tie. Neville, who sits waiting with agonized intensity, nervously straightens the forks in front of him. Rhoda sees her with surprise, as if on some far horizon a fire blazed. And I, though I pile my mind with damp grass, with wet fields, with the sound of rain on the roof and the gusts of wind that batter at the house in winter and so protect my soul against her, feel her derision steal round me, feel her laughter curl its tongues of fire round me and light up unsparingly my shabby dress, my square-tipped finger-nails, which I at once hide under the table-cloth.'

“吉尼来了。”苏珊说。“她站在门口。一切好像停滞了。服务生站住了。靠门那张桌子的食客望着。她似乎成了一切的中心；环绕着她的桌子、成排的门窗、天花板都自然放出光芒，就像环绕着一块打碎的窗玻璃中间那颗星星的光芒一样。她让一切有了指向，有了秩序。这会儿她看见我们，走了过来，所有的光芒在我们头上扩散、流淌、飘摇，带动了新的情绪高潮。我们都变了。路易斯把手伸向自己的领带。内维尔坐在那儿等得心焦，紧张地整理着面前的餐叉。罗达吃惊地瞅着她，仿佛遥远的天边燃起了烈火。而我，尽管让自己的头脑充满潮湿的草地、湿润的田野、雨打屋顶的声音和冬天袭击房屋的狂风，以保护自己不受她的影响，还是感觉到她的嘲弄悄悄包围了我，感觉到她的笑声舔着火舌包围了我，毫不留情地映出我寒酸的衣服，我扁平的指甲，我赶紧藏在桌布下面的指甲。”

'He has not come,' said Neville. 'The door opens and he does not come. That is Bernard. As he pulls off his coat he shows, of course, the blue shirt under his arm-pits. And then, unlike the rest of us, he comes in without pushing open a door, without knowing that he comes into a room full of strangers. He does not look in the glass. His hair is untidy, but he does not know it. He has no perception that we differ, or that this table is his goal. He hesitates on his way here. Who is that? he asks himself, as he half knows a woman in an opera cloak. He half knows everybody; he knows nobody (I compare him with Percival). But now, perceiving us, he waves a benevolent salute; he bears down with such benignity, with such love of mankind (crossed with humour at the futility of "loving mankind"), that, if it were not for Percival, who turns all this to vapour, one would feel, as the others already feel: Now is our festival; now we are together. But without Percival there is no solidity. We are silhouettes, hollow phantoms moving mistily without a background.'

“他还是没来。”内维尔说。“门打开了，但他没有来。那是伯纳德。当他脱下外衣时，不出意料，他露出了腋窝下面的蓝衬衫。而且进来时，跟我们其他人都不一样的是，他根本没先推开门，也根本没意识到自己走进了一个充满陌生人的房间。他并没有照照镜子。他的头发很乱，但他意识不到。他丝毫不觉得我们有什么不同，也根本没想这张桌子就是他的目的地。他走过来时有些迟疑。那是谁啊？他自问，因为他似乎认识一位穿着夜礼服斗篷的妇女。他似乎认识每个人；其实他谁也不认识（我拿他和珀西瓦尔比较）。但是这会儿，他注意到我们，他和善地挥手致意；他全力以赴地表现出仁慈和人类之爱（交织着对‘热爱人类’这种虚妄之风的幽默态度），以至于要不是因为珀西瓦尔总是让这一切化作蒸汽，你就会觉得，而且别人已经这样觉得：此刻是我们的节日；此刻我们团聚了。可是没有珀西瓦尔，一切都不可靠。我们只是一些轮廓，一些毫无底色、影影绰绰地移动着的虚影。”

'The swing-door goes on opening,' said Rhoda. 'Strangers keep on coming, people we shall never see again, people who brush us disagreeably with their familiarity, their indifference, and the sense of a world continuing without us. We cannot sink down, we cannot forget our faces. Even I who have no face, who make no difference when I come in (Susan and Jinny change bodies and faces), flutter unattached, without anchorage anywhere, unconsolidated, incapable of composing any blankness or continuity or wall against which these bodies move. It is because of Neville and his misery. The sharp breath of his misery scatters my being. Nothing can settle; nothing can subside. Every time the door opens he looks fixedly at the table—he dare not raise his eyes—then looks for one second and says, "He has not come." But here he is.'

“弹簧门不断地打开。”罗达说。“不断地进来一些陌生的人，我们永远不会再见到的人，他们与我们擦肩而过，他们的随意，他们的漠然，以及那种离了我们世界依然存在的感觉，都令我们很不愉快。我们不能沉没下去，我们不能忘了自己的面容。即使我这个面无表情的人，这个进来时没有丝毫变化的我（苏珊和吉尼的身上、脸上都起了变化）也无拘无束地飘了起来，无所着落，松松散散地，无法填补任何空白，或者保持某种衔接，或者形成一堵墙，作为这些身体活动的背景。这是因为内维尔，因为他的悲伤。他强烈的悲伤气息使我魂飞魄散。一切无法安定，也无法平静。每次门一开，他先是死死地盯着桌子，——他不敢抬起眼睛——一秒钟之后他说：‘他还没来。’但是他来了。”

'Now,' said Neville, 'my tree flowers. My heart rises. All oppression is relieved. All impediment is removed. The reign of chaos is over. He has imposed order. Knives cut again.'

“瞧，”内维尔说，“我的树开花了。我的心情振奋起来。一切郁闷皆被开释。一切障碍皆被清除。动荡时期结束了。他令秩序稳定下来。刀子又能切割东西了。”

'Here is Percival,' said Jinny. 'He has not dressed.'

“珀西瓦尔来了。”吉尼说。“他没打扮。”

'Here is Percival,' said Bernard, 'smoothing his hair, not from vanity (he does not look in the glass), but to propitiate the god of decency. He is conventional; he is a hero. The little boys trooped after him across the playing-fields. They blew their noses as he blew his nose, but unsuccessfully, for he is Percival. Now, when he is about to leave us, to go to India, all these trifles come together. He is a hero. Oh yes, that is not to be denied, and when he takes his seat by Susan, whom he loves, the occasion is crowned. We who yelped like jackals biting at each other's heels now assume the sober and confident air of soldiers in the presence of their captain. We who have been separated by our youth (the oldest is not yet twenty-five), who have sung like eager birds each his own song and tapped with the remorseless and savage egotism of the young our own snail-shell till it cracked (I am engaged), or perched solitary outside some bedroom window and sang of love, of fame and other single experiences so dear to the callow bird with a yellow tuft on its beak, now come nearer; and shuffling closer on our perch in this restaurant where everybody's interests are at variance, and the incessant passage of traffic chafes us with distractions, and the door opening perpetually its glass cage solicits us with myriad temptations and offers insults and wounds to our confidence—sitting together here we love each other and believe in our own endurance.'

“珀西瓦尔来了，”伯纳德说，“他抹了抹头发，不是因为虚荣（他没照镜子），而是告慰礼仪之神。他是传统的；他是一个英雄。小孩子们曾经列队跟在他的身后穿过操场。他们学着他的样子擤鼻涕，却学不像，因为他是珀西瓦尔。这会儿，当他即将离开我们前往印度，所有这些琐事一起涌了过来。他是一个英雄。哦，是的，这一点不可否认，而且当他挨着苏珊——他爱的人坐下来时，场面达到了圆满。我们这些曾经像互相撕咬的豺狗一样狺狺狂吠的人，这会儿却像士兵面对长官时露出了冷静、自信的神气。我们这些人，曾经因为年轻而分离（最年长的尚不足25岁），曾经像热切的鸟儿一样各自唱着自己的歌，以年轻人那种冷酷、野蛮的唯我独尊心理敲打着我们自己的蜗牛壳，直至它碎裂（我也参与其中），或者孤独地栖身于某个卧室窗外，向那只嘴黄未退、羽毛未丰的鸟儿亲热地唱起爱情、名望以及其他个人的体验，这会儿却走近了彼此；而且栖枝上的我们挨得更紧了，尽管这家餐馆里的每个人都各异其趣，外面车辆的川流不息搅得我们心烦意乱，那扇不断打开的玻璃笼子的门以极大的诱惑力勾引着我们，给我们的自信带来侮辱和伤害——我们一起坐在这儿，既彼此相爱，又相信各自的坚守。”

'Now let us issue from the darkness of solitude,' said Louis.

“现在，让我们从孤独的黑暗中冲出来吧。”路易斯说。

'Now let us say, brutally and directly, what is in our minds,' said Neville. 'Our isolation, our preparation, is over. The furtive days of secrecy and hiding, the revelations on staircases, moments of terror and ecstasy.'

“现在让我们开诚布公、直截了当地说说自己的心里话吧。”内维尔说。“我们的隔离，我们的功课，都结束了。还有神神秘秘、遮遮掩掩的那段日子，楼梯上的那些启示，恐惧与痴迷的时刻。”

'Old Mrs Constable lifted her sponge and warmth poured over us,' said Bernard. 'We became clothed in this changing, this feeling garment of flesh.'

“老康斯特布尔太太举起她的海绵，温暖立即流过我们全身。”伯纳德说。“我们被裹进这件变幻莫测、这件肉感的衣服里。”

'The boot-boy made love to the scullery-maid in the kitchen garden,' said Susan, 'among the blown-out washing.'

“那个皮靴小子在菜园里向做杂务的女仆示爱，”苏珊说，“就在鼓胀的晾晒物中间。”

'The breath of the wind was like a tiger panting,' said Rhoda.

“风的气息好像一只老虎在呼呼直喘。”罗达说。

'The man lay livid with his throat cut in the gutter,' said Neville. 'And going upstairs I could not raise my foot against the immitigable apple tree with its silver leaves held stiff.'

“那个人全身乌青躺在水沟里，被人割了喉。”内维尔说。“上楼时我无法抬脚迈过那株绝不通融的苹果树，它的银色叶子僵硬地横在那里。”

'The leaf danced in the hedge without anyone to blow it,' said Jinny.

“那片叶子在树篱上舞蹈，可谁也没去吹动它。”吉尼说。

'In the sun-baked corner,' said Louis, 'the petals swam on depths of green.'

“那阳光炙烤的角落里，”路易斯说，“花瓣在浓浓的绿意中游弋。”

'At Elvedon the gardeners swept and swept with their great brooms, and the woman sat at a table writing,' said Bernard.

“在埃尔夫登，园丁们用他们的大扫帚扫啊，扫啊，而那位女士坐在桌子旁写着什么。”伯纳德说。

'From these close-furled balls of string we draw now every filament,' said Louis, 'remembering, when we meet.'

“这会儿我们从这些缠得紧紧的线球中抽出每一根细丝，”路易斯说，“我们一见面，什么都想起来了。”

'And then,' said Bernard, 'the cab came to the door, and, pressing our new bowler hats tightly over our eyes to hide our unmanly tears, we drove through streets in which even the housemaids looked at us, and our names painted in white letters on our boxes proclaimed to all the world that we were going to school with the regulation number of socks and drawers, on which our mothers for some nights previously had stitched our initials, in our boxes. A second severance from the body of our mother.'

“当时，”伯纳德说，“出租马车来到门口，我们把新的圆顶礼帽紧紧扣在眼睛上面，以掩饰我们有失男子汉气概的泪水，我们驶过大街，甚至街上的女仆也在瞧着我们，我们的姓名用白色的字母涂在我们的行李箱上，向全世界宣告了我们是去上学，箱子里带的是规定数量的袜子和内裤，上面有我们的母亲预先花了好几个晚上缝上去的我们的姓名首字母缩写。这是我们第二次与母亲的身体分离。”

'And Miss Lambert, Miss Cutting and Miss Bard,' said Jinny, 'monumental ladies, white-ruffed, stone-coloured, enigmatic, with amethyst rings moving like virginal tapers, dim glow-worms over the pages of French, geography and arithmetic, presided; and there were maps, green-baize boards, and rows of shoes on a shelf.'

“然后是兰伯特小姐、卡廷小姐和巴德小姐，”吉尼说，“这几位纪念碑似的女士围着白色的环领，面色像石头，一幅高深莫测的样子，她们的紫水晶戒指像未用过的小蜡烛，或像隐约的萤火虫似的在法文、地理和算术课本上面闪动，她们主持了我们的生活；还有那些地图、绿呢板和架子上的一排排鞋子。”

'Bells rang punctually,' said Susan, 'maids scuffled and giggled. There was a drawing in of chairs and a drawing out of chairs on the linoleum. But from one attic there was a blue view, a distant view of a field unstained by the corruption of this regimented, unreal existence.'

“铃声准时响起，”苏珊说，“女仆们互相打闹，咯咯笑着。椅子在油布地毯上拖进拖出。不过从一间阁楼上面可以望见一片蓝色的景致，一派遥远的田野风光，那里丝毫不被这种严加管制的虚假生活所污染。”

'Down from our heads veils fell,' said Rhoda. 'We clasped the flowers with their green leaves rustling in garlands.'

“我们头上的薄纱揭落了。”罗达说。“我们攥紧手中的花儿，绿叶在花环中沙沙作响。”

'We changed, we became unrecognizable,' said Louis. 'Exposed to all these different lights, what we had in us (for we are all so different) came intermittently, in violent patches, spaced by blank voids, to the surface as if some acid had dropped unequally on the plate. I was this, Neville that, Rhoda different again, and Bernard too.'

“我们变了，我们变得认不出了。”路易斯说。“暴露在所有这些不同的灯光下，我们身上原先具有的东西（我们都变得那么不同）间歇性地、夹杂着空白、一大块一大块地浮现出来，仿佛酸液不均匀地滴在底片上似的。我曾是这个样子，内维尔是那个样子，罗达又有不同，伯纳德也有变化。”

'Then canoes slipped through palely tinted yellow branches,' said Neville, 'and Bernard, advancing in his casual way against breadths of green, against houses of very ancient foundation, tumbled in a heap on the ground beside me. In an access of emotion—winds are not more raving, nor lightning more sudden—I took my poem, I flung my poem, I slammed the door behind me.'

“那时独木舟轻巧地穿过淡黄的树枝，”内维尔说，“而伯纳德迎着辽阔的绿色，迎着古老的宅院，信步向前，一下子摔倒在我身边的一个土堆上。在情绪冲动之下——风没像那么狂暴，闪电也没像那么突然——我拿出我的诗歌，扔了过去，砰地关上了身后的门。”

'I, however,' said Louis, 'losing sight of you, sat in my office and tore the date from the calendar, and announced to the world of ship-brokers, corn-chandlers and actuaries that Friday the tenth, or Tuesday the eighteenth, had dawned on the city of London.'

“可是，”路易斯说，“看不见你们之后，我坐在自己的办公室里，从日历牌上撕下一个个日子，向那帮船舶代理商、粮食零售商和保险精算师们宣布说，10号、星期五或18号、星期二的曙光已经照到了伦敦市区。”

'Then,' said Jinny, 'Rhoda and I, exposed in bright dresses, with a few precious stones nestling on a cold ring round our throats, bowed, shook hands and took a sandwich from a plate with a smile.'

“那时，”吉尼说，“我和罗达，身着盛装出现在人们面前，脖子上依偎着镶着几颗宝石的冷冰冰的项链，我们鞠躬，握手，然后微笑着从盘子里取了块三明治。”

'The tiger leapt, and the swallow dipped her wings in dark pools on the other side of the world,' said Rhoda.

“在世界的另一边，老虎跃起，燕子的翅膀轻盈地掠过幽深的池水。”

'But here and now we are together,' said Bernard. 'We have come together, at a particular time, to this particular spot. We are drawn into this communion by some deep, some common emotion. Shall we call it, conveniently, "love"? Shall we say "love of Percival" because Percival is going to India?

“但在此时此地，我们团聚了。”伯纳德说。“在一个特定的时间，我们一起来到这个特定的地方。我们被某种深沉的、共同的情感牵引进这次聚会。我们是不是可以照惯例称其为‘爱’？我们是不是可以说‘那是对珀西瓦尔的爱’，因为珀西瓦尓就要去往印度？”

'No, that is too small, too particular a name. We cannot attach the width and spread of our feelings to so small a mark. We have come together (from the North, from the South, from Susan's farm, from Louis' house of business) to make one thing, not enduring—for what endures?—but seen by many eyes simultaneously. There is a red carnation in that vase. A single flower as we sat here waiting, but now a seven-sided flower, many-petalled, red, puce, purple-shaded, stiff with silver-tinted leaves—a whole flower to which every eye brings its own contribution.'

“不，那是过于狭窄、过于特定的一个名称。我们不能给我们深厚、宽广的情感贴上这么小的一个标签。我们来到一起（从北方，从南方，从苏珊的农场，从路易斯的商务所），要做一件事情，不求其永恒——哪儿有什么永恒？——但求许多双眼睛同时见证。那边的花瓶里有一支红色的康乃馨。我们坐在这儿等待的时候，它是一支孤零零的花，而现在它是一支七边形的花，有许多花瓣，有的红色，有的深褐色，有的投下紫色的阴影，挺立在那些泛着银色的叶子中——一支完整的花，它接受了每一只眼睛的献礼。”

'After the capricious fires, the abysmal dullness of youth,' said Neville, 'the light falls upon real objects now. Here are knives and forks. The world is displayed, and we too, so that we can talk.'

“经过青春时代反复无常的烈火和深不可测的黑暗之后，”内维尔说，“这会儿光芒照在实物上面了。这儿是刀子和叉子。世界展现出它的面目，我们也是一样，所以我们可以畅谈了。”

'We differ, it may be too profoundly,' said Louis, 'for explanation. But let us attempt it. I smoothed my hair when I came in, hoping to look like the rest of you. But I cannot, for I am not single and entire as you are. I have lived a thousand lives already. Every day I unbury—I dig up. I find relics of myself in the sand that women made thousands of years ago, when I heard songs by the Nile and the chained beast stamping. What you see beside you, this man, this Louis, is only the cinders and refuse of something once splendid. I was an Arab prince; behold my free gestures. I was a great poet in the time of Elizabeth. I was a Duke at the court of Louis the Fourteenth. I am very vain, very confident; I have an immeasurable desire that women should sigh in sympathy. I have eaten no lunch today in order that Susan may think me cadaverous and that Jinny may extend to me the exquisite balm of her sympathy. But while I admire Susan and Percival, I hate the others, because it is for them that I do these antics, smoothing my hair, concealing my accent. I am the little ape who chatters over a nut, and you are the dowdy women with shiny bags of stale buns; I am also the caged tiger, and you are the keepers with red-hot bars. That is, I am fiercer and stronger than you are, yet the apparition that appears above ground after ages of nonentity will be spent in terror lest you should laugh at me, in veerings with the wind against the soot storms, in efforts to make a steel ring of clear poetry that shall connect the gulls and the women with bad teeth, the church spire and the bobbing billycock hats as I see them when I take my luncheon and prop my poet—is it Lucretius?—against a cruet and the gravy-splashed bill of fare.'

“我们各有不同，要做出解释，”路易斯说，“恐怕过于深奥了。但是让我们试试吧。我进来时抹了抹我的头发，是希望看起来像你们一样。但这不可能，因为我并不像你们那样单纯而完整。我已经度过千种人生。每天我都在掘墓——翻土。我在沙土中找到我的遗骸，那是数千年前妇女们堆起来的，那时我听到尼罗河的歌声和那只拴着锁链的野兽跺脚的声音。你所看见的身边的一切，这个男人，这个名叫路易斯的人，都只是曾经辉煌的某样东西的残渣废料。我曾是一位阿拉伯王子；瞧我的身姿何等自由。我曾是伊丽莎白时代一位伟大的诗人。我曾是路易斯十四宫廷里的一位公爵。我十分虚荣，十分自信，我无限渴望妇女们在同情中为我叹息。今天我没吃午餐，为的是苏珊可能会觉得我形容枯槁，吉尼可能会把怜惜的精美香脂赠送给我。但在爱慕苏珊和珀西瓦尔的同时，我却讨厌其他人，因为正是为了他们，我才做出诸如抹平头发、掩饰口音这些古怪动作的。我是小小的猿，对着一枚坚果吱吱地叫，你们是邋遢的女人，锃亮的袋子里装着发馊的馒头；我是笼子里的老虎，你们是驯养员，手持通红的铁条。也就是说，我比你们更凶猛、更强大，但是多年默默无闻、一朝出人头地的愿景却终将化作泡影，因为我怕你们笑话我，因为我总是随风倒向煤烟的风暴，因为我总是力求为铿锵的诗歌套上钢铁的环，要把我在吃饭时看到的鸥鸟、豁牙露齿的妇女、教堂的塔尖和忽高忽低的毡帽联系到一起，那时我把那本诗人的集子——是卢克莱修斯吧？——靠在佐料瓶和溅了肉汁的价目单上。”

'But you will never hate me,' said Jinny. 'You will never see me, even across a room full of gilt chairs and ambassadors, without coming to me across the room to seek my sympathy. When I came in just now everything stood still in a pattern. Waiters stopped, diners raised their forks and held them. I had the air of being prepared for what would happen. When I sat down you put your hands to your ties, you hid them under the table. But I hide nothing. I am prepared. Every time the door opens I cry "More!" But my imagination is the bodies. I can imagine nothing beyond the circle cast by my body. My body goes before me, like a lantern down a dark lane, bringing one thing after another out of darkness into a ring of light. I dazzle you; I make you believe that this is all.'

“但是你永远不会讨厌我。”吉尼说。“即使穿过整个都是镀金椅子，而且坐满了大使的房间，你也绝不会看见我，如果你不从房间那头走过来寻求我的怜惜。在我刚才进来时，一切都定格了似的一动不动。服务生停下脚步，食客们举着叉子，愣在半空。我露出一幅对即将发生的事早有准备的神气。当我坐下来时，你摸了摸领带，你把手藏在桌子下面。但我毫无隐藏。我有备而来。每次门一开，我就叫道：‘又来了！’不过我的想象只在那些身体。我无法想象我的身体所及范围之外的任何东西。我的身体走在我的前面，好像漆黑的道路上的一盏灯，使一样又一样东西摆脱了黑暗，进入到一个光环之中。我令你眼花缭乱；我让你相信这就是一切。”

'But when you stand in the door,' said Neville, 'you inflict stillness, demanding admiration, and that is a great impediment to the freedom of intercourse. You stand in the door making us notice you. But none of you saw me approach. I came early; I came quickly and directly, HERE, to sit by the person whom I love. My life has a rapidity that yours lack. I am like a hound on the scent. I hunt from dawn to dusk. Nothing, not the pursuit of perfection through the sand, nor fame, nor money, has meaning for me. I shall have riches; I shall have fame. But I shall never have what I want, for I lack bodily grace and the courage that comes with it. The swiftness of my mind is too strong for my body. I fail before I reach the end and fall in a heap, damp, perhaps disgusting. I excite pity in the crises of life, not love. Therefore I suffer horribly. But I do not suffer, as Louis does, to make myself a spectacle. I have too fine a sense of fact to allow myself these juggleries, these pretences. I see everything—except one thing—with complete clarity. That is my saving. That is what gives my suffering an unceasing excitement. That is what makes me dictate, even when I am silent. And since I am, in one respect, deluded, since the person is always changing, though not the desire, and I do not know in the morning by whom I shall sit at night, I am never stagnant; I rise from my worst disasters, I turn, I change. Pebbles bounce off the mail of my muscular, my extended body. In this pursuit I shall grow old.'

“但是当你站在门口时，”内维尔说，“你让大伙儿惊呆了，惹起一片赞叹，而这极大地阻碍了交往的自由。你站在门口，让我们大伙儿都注意你。但你们谁也没看见我的到来。我早早地来了；我马上直接赶来，坐在这里，坐在我爱的人身边。我的生活中有一种你们缺乏的急速节奏。我像一只嗅觉灵敏的猎犬。我从早到晚，追踪不停。无论跋涉于沙漠追求完美，无论名声或金钱，对我来说都毫无意义。我会得到财富；我会得到名声。但我永远得不到我想要的东西，因为我缺乏身体的优雅和随之而来的勇气。对我的身体而言，我敏捷的头脑过于强大。没等达到目的我就会先倒下，我会跌作一滩烂泥，潮湿，或许还会令人作呕。在生活的危机中，我所激起的是怜悯，不是爱。因此我极其痛苦。但是我的痛苦并不像路易斯那样使自己成为别人的笑柄。我对事实的感觉非常细腻，绝不允许自己装腔作势、自欺欺人。我把一切——除了一件事情——都看得清清楚楚。这是我的可取之处。正因为这一点，我的痛苦令人激动不已。正因为这一点，即使当我沉默时，我也在发号施令。而且因为我在某方面是玩世不恭的，因为人总在变来变去，虽说欲望不变，我在早上并不知道晚上会坐在谁的身边，我从不消停，我从最惨痛的灾难中爬起来，转过身，我就会变。石子纷纷从我健壮、舒展，披着铠甲的身体上弹了出去。我会坚持这样的追求，一直到老。”

'If I could believe,' said Rhoda, 'that I should grow old in pursuit and change, I should be rid of my fear: nothing persists. One moment does not lead to another. The door opens and the tiger leaps. You did not see me come. I circled round the chairs to avoid the horror of the spring. I am afraid of you all. I am afraid of the shock of sensation that leaps upon me, because I cannot deal with it as you do—I cannot make one moment merge in the next. To me they are all violent, all separate; and if I fall under the shock of the leap of the moment you will be on me, tearing me to pieces. I have no end in view. I do not know how to run minute to minute and hour to hour, solving them by some natural force until they make the whole and indivisible mass that you call life. Because you have an end in view—one person, is it, to sit beside, an idea is it, your beauty is it? I do not know—your days and hours pass like the boughs of forest trees and the smooth green of forest rides to a hound running on the scent. But there is no single scent, no single body for me to follow. And I have no face. I am like the foam that races over the beach or the moonlight that falls arrowlike here on a tin can, here on a spike of the mailed sea holly, or a bone or a half-eaten boat. I am whirled down caverns, and flap like paper against endless corridors, and must press my hand against the wall to draw myself back.

“如果我能相信，”罗达说，“我会在追求与变化中终老一生，我可能就会摆脱我的担忧：凡事皆无长远。此一时，彼一时。门总要打开，老虎总要跃起。你们没有看见我的到来。我绕过椅子，以避免那突然的跃起会带来恐惧。我害怕你们所有人。我害怕那激动的情绪向我扑来，因为我无法像你们一样应付它——我无法让这一刻融入下一刻。对我来说，每一刻都是强悍的，都是不相连的；如果我在那一跃的激动时刻倒下了，你们就会冲过来，把我撕成碎片。我毫无目标。我不知道如何把握一分钟又一分钟，一小时又一小时，借助某种自然力来应对它们，直到它们成为完整而不可分割的一团——你们称之为生活。因为你们有目标——那是一个人，一个坐在身旁的人，对么？那是一种理念，对么？那是你们的美貌，对么？我不知道——你们的每天、每个钟头都像森林里的树枝匆匆而过，仿佛森林里的绵绵绿意涌向一只追踪气味的猎犬。可是对我来说，既无迹可循，又无人可追。而且我毫无面目。我像涌上海滩的泡沫，或像箭一样的月光一会儿射在一只锡罐上面，一会儿射在那株披了铠甲似的海滨刺芹的尖穗上面，或者射在一块骨头或几乎烂掉的一条船上面。我被卷进重重山洞，像纸一样拍打着永无尽头的通道，我必须用手抵住墙壁才抽回身来。

'But since I wish above all things to have lodgment, I pretend, as I go upstairs lagging behind Jinny and Susan, to have an end in view. I pull on my stockings as I see them pull on theirs. I wait for you to speak and then speak like you. I am drawn here across London to a particular spot, to a particular place, not to see you or you or you, but to light my fire at the general blaze of you who live wholly, indivisibly and without caring.'

“不过因为我特别希望凡事有个着落，当我拖在吉尼和苏珊身后上楼时，我假装有了一个目标。我穿上我的长袜，因为我看见她们穿上长袜。我等待你开口说话，然后我像你一样开口说话。我被吸引到这儿，穿过伦敦来到一个特定的地点，来到一个特定的场所，不是来看你，你，或你，而是要就着你们——你们这些过着无忧无虑、完整而不可分割的生活的人——整体的火苗燃起我自己的火焰。”

'When I came into the room tonight,' said Susan, 'I stopped, I peered about like an animal with its eyes near to the ground. The smell of carpets and furniture and scent disgusts me. I like to walk through the wet fields alone, or to stop at a gate and watch my setter nose in a circle, and to ask: Where is the hare? I like to be with people who twist herbs, and spit into the fire, and shuffle down long passages in slippers like my father. The only sayings I understand are cries of love, hate, rage and pain. This talking is undressing an old woman whose dress had seemed to be part of her, but now, as we talk, she turns pinkish underneath, and has wrinkled thighs and sagging breasts. When you are silent you are again beautiful. I shall never have anything but natural happiness. It will almost content me. I shall go to bed tired. I shall lie like a field bearing crops in rotation; in the summer heat will dance over me; in the winter I shall be cracked with the cold. But heat and cold will follow each other naturally without my willing or unwilling. My children will carry me on; their teething, their crying, their going to school and coming back will be like the waves of the sea under me. No day will be without its movement. I shall be lifted higher than any of you on the backs of the seasons. I shall possess more than Jinny, more than Rhoda, by the time I die. But on the other hand, where you are various and dimple a million times to the ideas and laughter of others, I shall be sullen, storm-tinted and all one purple. I shall be debased and hide-bound by the bestial and beautiful passion of maternity. I shall push the fortunes of my children unscrupulously. I shall hate those who see their faults. I shall lie basely to help them. I shall let them wall me away from you, from you and from you. Also, I am torn with jealousy. I hate Jinny because she shows me that my hands are red, my nails bitten. I love with such ferocity that it kills me when the object of my love shows by a phrase that he can escape. He escapes, and I am left clutching at a string that slips in and out among the leaves on the tree-tops. I do not understand phrases.'

“当我今晚走进这个房间时，”苏珊说，“我停下脚步，像一只动物，眼睛贴近地面，四下窥视。地毯、家具和香水的气味都令我厌烦。我喜欢独自从湿漉漉的田野中走过，或者逗留在大门口，看着我的猎犬鼻子转着圈，问道：那只野兔在哪儿呢？我喜欢与我父亲那样的人在一起，他们捻着药草，向火里吐着唾沫，穿着拖鞋慢吞吞地走在长长的过道上。我所理解的言语无非是爱与恨、怒与痛的呐喊。这样的谈话简直是在剥掉一位老妪的衣服，这衣服似乎早已与她成为一体，可是此刻，当我们谈话的时候，她露出了衣服下面的桃红色，她的大腿皱巴巴的，她的乳房软塌塌地耷拉下来。当你沉默时，你又变成了美人。除了自然之乐，我绝不会有其他乐趣。这几乎就会让我心满意足了。我会疲倦地爬到床上。我会躺下来，像生长着一茬又一茬庄稼的田地；夏天，热浪在我身上翻滚；冬天，寒冷把我皮肤冻裂。但是热也好，冷也好，都将自然交替，不管我是否愿意。我的孩子们将把我传承下去；他们长牙，他们哭闹，他们上学、回家，都像我身后绵延的海浪。没有哪一天不在起伏。我会比你们任何人都更高地站到季节的脊背上。当我死去的时候，我所拥有的东西会超过吉尼，超过罗达。但另一方面，你们个个多才多艺，总是频频露出酒窝，回应别人的观点和笑声，而我将会阴沉着脸，暴雨欲来，一片紫气。我将会被残酷而美好的母性激情弄得低三下四、迂腐不堪。我将会不择手段地驱使我的孩子们积累财富。我将会憎恨那些指出他们缺点的人。我将会不知羞耻地撒谎来庇护他们。我要让他们像墙一样围着我，远远地隔开你，你，还有你。同时我也嫉妒得要命。我恨吉尼，因为她让我看到我红红的手和残破的指甲。我的爱来势汹汹，所以当我爱的对象用一句话挑明了他可能逃避时，我简直痛不欲生。他逃避了，而我留在这儿，死死抓着树梢上树叶间时隐时现的一根细绳。我不理解他们的说辞。”

'Had I been born,' said Bernard, 'not knowing that one word follows another I might have been, who knows, perhaps anything. As it is, finding sequences everywhere, I cannot bear the pressure of solitude. When I cannot see words curling like rings of smoke round me I am in darkness—I am nothing. When I am alone I fall into lethargy, and say to myself dismally as I poke the cinders through the bars of the grate, Mrs Moffat will come. She will come and sweep it all up. When Louis is alone he sees with astonishing intensity, and will write some words that may outlast us all. Rhoda loves to be alone. She fears us because we shatter the sense of being which is so extreme in solitude—see how she grasps her fork—her weapon against us. But I only come into existence when the plumber, or the horse-dealer, or whoever it may be, says something which sets me alight. Then how lovely the smoke of my phrase is, rising and falling, flaunting and falling, upon red lobsters and yellow fruit, wreathing them into one beauty. But observe how meretricious the phrase is—made up of what evasions and old lies. Thus my character is in part made of the stimulus which other people provide, and is not mine, as yours are. There is some fatal streak, some wandering and irregular vein of silver, weakening it. Hence the fact that used to enrage Neville at school, that I left him. I went with the boasting boys with little caps and badges, driving off in big brakes—there are some here tonight, dining together, correctly dressed, before they go off in perfect concord to the music hall; I loved them. For they bring me into existence as certainly as you do. Hence, too, when I am leaving you and the train is going, you feel that it is not the train that is going, but I, Bernard, who does not care, who does not feel, who has no ticket, and has lost perhaps his purse. Susan, staring at the string that slips in and out among the leaves of the beech trees, cries: "He is gone! He has escaped me!" For there is nothing to lay hold of. I am made and remade continually. Different people draw different words from me.

“要是我生来就不懂词与词的连贯，”伯纳德说，“那么也许我，谁知道呢，是什么样子都有可能。事实上，因为随处都要找到先后次序，我不能忍受孤独的压力。当我不能看到词语像烟圈儿一样盘绕着我，我就处在黑暗当中——我简直一无是处。当我孤单一人，陷入昏昏欲睡之中，一边通过炉栅捅着炉渣，一边闷闷地自言自语时，莫法特太太就会走过来。她会过来把所有的炉渣清扫干净。当路易斯孤单一人时，他的观察惊人地透彻，他写下的一些词语也许会比我们所有人的生命更持久。罗达喜欢独自一人。她害怕我们，因为我们会击碎她的激越情感，她的孤独——瞧，她把叉子攥得多么紧————是她对抗我们的武器。但是，只有管子工、马贩子，或不管什么人说出引发我兴致的话来，才有我的存在。这时我的话语是多么漂亮的烟圈，在红色的龙虾和黄色的水果上面起伏、缭绕，仿佛花环装点着美人。但是请注意，这番话语多么华而不实——包含了种种托辞和陈旧的谎言。因此我的性格在某种程度上包含了别人所提供的刺激因素，它不属于我，不像你们。某种致命的纹理，某种曲折、不规则的银色脉络，一直在削弱着它。因此上学时我才会经常丢下内维尔，令他大为恼火。我跟那些戴着小帽、别着徽章、总爱吹牛的男孩子混在一起，坐着大马车驶向远方——有几个今晚在这儿，一起吃过了饭，穿得板板正正，一团和气地到音乐厅去了；我喜欢他们。因为他们正像你们一样，让我存在。也正因为如此，当我缓缓离开你们、火车缓缓开走时，你们觉得远去的不是那列火车，而是我，伯纳德，那个满不在乎，无动于衷，没有车票，也许丢了钱包的他。苏珊盯着山毛榉树叶丛中那根时隐时现的细绳，叫道：‘他走了！他从我身边逃开了！’因为没有什么抓得住。我被不断地塑造，重新塑造。不同的人从我口中引出不同的话语。

'Thus there is not one person but fifty people whom I want to sit beside tonight. But I am the only one of you who is at home here without taking liberties. I am not gross; I am not a snob. If I lie open to the pressure of society I often succeed with the dexterity of my tongue in putting something difficult into the currency. See my little toys, twisted out of nothing in a second, how they entertain. I am no hoarder—I shall leave only a cupboard of old clothes when I die—and I am almost indifferent to the minor vanities of life which cause Louis so much torture. But I have sacrificed much. Veined as I am with iron, with silver and streaks of common mud, I cannot contract into the firm fist which those clench who do not depend upon stimulus. I am incapable of the denials, the heroisms of Louis and Rhoda. I shall never succeed, even in talk, in making a perfect phrase. But I shall have contributed more to the passing moment than any of you; I shall go into more rooms, more different rooms, than any of you. But because there is something that comes from outside and not from within I shall be forgotten; when my voice is silent you will not remember me, save as the echo of a voice that once wreathed the fruit into phrases.'

“所以今晚我想挨着坐的不是哪一个人，而是50个人。但是你们当中唯有我在这儿无拘无束而不放肆。我不粗俗；我不是势利小人。如果我面对社会的压力公开撒谎，我经常会用我的伶牙俐齿成功地化险为夷。瞧我的小玩意儿，一转眼就被无中生有地揉搓出来，它们多么有趣。我绝不是敛财的人——我死的时候只会留下一柜子的旧衣服——我几乎漠不关心那些微不足道的名利，而它们却给路易斯带来那么多痛苦。但是我牺牲了很多。尽管我带有铁器、银器的脉络和普通泥土的纹理，但我无法攥成一只结实的拳头，而那些不依赖刺激的人们却能。我无法做出路易斯和罗达那样的种种克制和英雄主义行为。即便在谈话中，我也绝对说不出一句完美的妙语。但是对于匆匆而过的这一刻，我可能比你们任何人贡献都大；我会比你们任何人走进更多的房间，更多不同的房间。但是因为某种外来的而非发自内心的东西的存在，我会被人忘掉；当我的声音沉默下来，你们就不会记得我了，只有那个曾把水果编成妙语的声音，还会回响。”

'Look,' said Rhoda; 'listen. Look how the light becomes richer, second by second, and bloom and ripeness lie everywhere; and our eyes, as they range round this room with all its tables, seem to push through curtains of colour, red, orange, umber and queer ambiguous tints, which yield like veils and close behind them, and one thing melts into another.'

“注意，”罗达说，“听着。瞧，光线一秒一秒愈加丰富，随处可见花儿绽放、果实成熟；而我们的眼睛，在环顾这个房间和这里所有的桌子时，似乎穿透了色彩的重重帷幕，红色、橙色、棕色，还有些古怪、暧昧的染色，它们像薄纱一样闪开，随后合拢，一样东西融入另一样东西。”

'Yes,' said Jinny, 'our senses have widened. Membranes, webs of nerve that lay white and limp, have filled and spread themselves and float round us like filaments, making the air tangible and catching in them far-away sounds unheard before.'

“是啊，”吉尼说，“我们的感官扩张了。原来苍白无力的神经网膜现已充盈而遍布，像细丝一样在我们四周浮动，使空气变得可以触摸，而且把前所未闻的遥远的声音捕获其中。”

'The roar of London,' said Louis, 'is round us. Motor-cars, vans, omnibuses pass and repass continuously. All are merged in one turning wheel of single sound. All separate sounds—wheels, bells, the cries of drunkards, of merrymakers—are churned into one sound, steel blue, circular. Then a siren hoots. At that shores slip away, chimneys flatten themselves, the ship makes for the open sea.'

“伦敦的喧嚣，”路易斯说，“包围着我们。汽车、货车、公共马车络绎不绝。一切都汇成一个转动的车轮，一种单一的声音。各种分散的声音——车轮声、钟声、醉汉和寻欢作乐者的叫嚷声——被搅拌成一种声音，发出钢青色的光，环绕着。这时汽笛一声长鸣。随后，海岸悄悄溜远了，烟囱矮下身去，轮船驶向辽阔的大海。”

'Percival is going,' said Neville. 'We sit here, surrounded, lit up, many coloured; all things—hands, curtains, knives and forks, other people dining—run into each other. We are walled in here. But India lies outside.'

“珀西瓦尔要走了。”内维尔说。“我们坐在这儿，被簇拥着，被映照得多彩多姿；一切事物——手、窗帘、刀叉、其他的食客——相互撞击。我们被墙壁隔在这里。而印度却在墙外。”

'I see India,' said Bernard. 'I see the low, long shore; I see the tortuous lanes of stamped mud that lead in and out among ramshackle pagodas; I see the gilt and crenellated buildings which have an air of fragility and decay as if they were temporarily run up buildings in some Oriental exhibition. I see a pair of bullocks who drag a low cart along the sun-baked road. The cart sways incompetently from side to side. Now one wheel sticks in the rut, and at once innumerable natives in loin-cloths swarm round it, chattering excitedly. But they do nothing. Time seems endless, ambition vain. Over all broods a sense of the uselessness of human exertion. There are strange sour smells. An old man in a ditch continues to chew betel and to contemplate his navel. But now, behold, Percival advances; Percival rides a flea-bitten mare, and wears a sun-helmet. By applying the standards of the West, by using the violent language that is natural to him, the bullock-cart is righted in less than five minutes. The Oriental problem is solved. He rides on; the multitude cluster round him, regarding him as if he were—what indeed he is—a God.'

“我看见了印度。”伯纳德说。“我看见低矮、绵延的海岸；我看见被踏得泥泞不堪的蜿蜒街巷，在摇摇欲坠的高塔中穿来穿去；我看见镀了金色且带有雉堞的大楼，样子脆弱而腐朽，仿佛它们是某个东方展览会上临时搭起来的建筑。我看见一对阉牛在烈日炎炎的路上拉着一辆低沉的车。那辆车不堪重负，左摇右晃。这时一只车轮卡在车辙里，立即有无数的围着腰布的土著人聚拢过来，七嘴八舌，兴高采烈。但是他们什么也没干。仿佛时光无尽，理想即虚妄。一切之上都笼罩着一种人类努力徒劳无益的感觉。有些奇怪的酸臭气味。沟渠里有位老人继续嚼着蒌叶，凝视着自己的肚脐。但是这时，瞧，珀西瓦尔来到近前；珀西瓦尔骑着一匹红棕色斑点的母马，戴着一顶遮阳帽。通过贯彻西方的行为准则，通过运用他惯常的粗野语言，不到五分钟牛车就被抚上正路。东方的问题解决了。他骑在马上继续前行；众人簇拥着他，把他看做仿佛是——他真是——一个神。”

'Unknown, with or without a secret, it does not matter,' said Rhoda, 'he is like a stone fallen into a pond round which minnows swarm. Like minnows, we who had been shooting this way, that way, all shot round him when he came. Like minnows, conscious of the presence of a great stone, we undulate and eddy contentedly. Comfort steals over us. Gold runs in our blood. One, two; one, two; the heart beats in serenity, in confidence, in some trance of well-being, in some rapture of benignity; and look—the outermost parts of the earth—pale shadows on the utmost horizon, India for instance, rise into our purview. The world that had been shrivelled, rounds itself; remote provinces are fetched up out of darkness; we see muddy roads, twisted jungle, swarms of men, and the vulture that feeds on some bloated carcass as within our scope, part of our proud and splendid province, since Percival, riding alone on a flea-bitten mare, advances down a solitary path, has his camp pitched among desolate trees, and sits alone, looking at the enormous mountains.'

“他神秘莫测，是否藏有秘密，这并不重要，”罗达说，“他像一块石头投进池塘，小鱼都聚拢过来。像小鱼一样，他一来，我们这些东奔西窜的人都奔向他的身边。像小鱼一样，我们意识到一块大石头的存在，就心满意足地翻起波浪、搅起漩涡。慰藉偷偷袭上我们心头。金光在我们的血液中流淌。一，二；一，二；心儿在跳，充满平静，充满信心，充满幸福的梦幻，充满温和的狂喜；瞧——大地最外围的地方——比如印度，那遥远天际的暗影，都浮现在我们眼底。一度皱缩的世界变得圆润了；偏僻的外省从黑暗中被托了起来；我们把泥泞的道路、盘根错节的丛林、蜂拥的人群和啄食腐尸的秃鹫都看作是我们视野中的所有，是我们这个壮丽而骄傲的省份的一部分，因为珀西瓦尔，正独自骑着一匹红棕色斑点的母马，沿着一条寂寞的小路前进，他在荒凉的树丛之间扎下营帐，一个人坐着，眺望巍峨的群山。”

'It is Percival,' said Louis, 'sitting silent as he sat among the tickling grasses when the breeze parted the clouds and they formed again, who makes us aware that these attempts to say, "I am this, I am that," which we make, coming together, like separated parts of one body and soul, are false. Something has been left out from fear. Something has been altered, from vanity. We have tried to accentuate differences. From the desire to be separate we have laid stress upon our faults, and what is particular to us. But there is a chain whirling round, round, in a steel-blue circle beneath.'

“正是珀西瓦尔，”路易斯说，“当云朵在微风中分分合合时，他坐在刺痒的草丛中，默默地坐着，正是他让我们意识到，我们为了要说‘我如何如何’之类的话而做出的这些努力——像一个人支离破碎的肉体和灵魂汇集到一起——是虚伪的。出于畏惧，有的事情被省略了。出于虚荣，有的事情被篡改了。我们试图要突出差异。因为渴望与众不同，我们着重强调了自己的缺点，以及对我们有特别意义的事情。但是在我们脚下有一条链子，绕着钢青色的圈圈旋转，旋转。”

'It is hate, it is love,' said Susan. 'That is the furious coal—black stream that makes us dizzy if we look down into it. We stand on a ledge here, but if we look down we turn giddy.'

“这是恨，这是爱。”苏珊说。“这是墨黑的狂流，向下一望，会令我们头晕目眩。我们站在这儿的一块巉岩上，但是向下一望，我们就会头晕目眩。”

'It is love,' said Jinny, 'it is hate, such as Susan feels for me because I kissed Louis once in the garden; because equipped as I am, I make her think when I come in, "My hands are red," and hide them. But our hatred is almost indistinguishable from our love.'

“那是爱，”吉尼说，“那是恨，这正是苏珊对我的感受，因为我曾在花园里吻了路易斯；因为我的打扮，进来时使她觉得‘我的手通红’，赶紧把手藏了起来。但是我们的恨与我们的爱几乎难以分辨。”

'Yet these roaring waters,' said Neville, 'upon which we build our crazy platforms are more stable than the wild, the weak and inconsequent cries that we utter when, trying to speak, we rise; when we reason and jerk out these false sayings, "I am this; I am that!" Speech is false.

“不过，”内维尔说，“即使我们在上面搭起了狂热的平台的喧嚣水流也比我们肆无忌惮、软弱无力又微不足道的叫嚷更可靠，我们只是站起身来想要发言；我们只是争来争去，结结巴巴地吐出‘我如何如何’之类的假话。话语是虚假的。

'But I eat. I gradually lose all knowledge of particulars as I eat. I am becoming weighed down with food. These delicious mouthfuls of roast duck, fitly piled with vegetables, following each other in exquisite rotation of warmth, weight, sweet and bitter, past my palate, down my gullet, into my stomach, have stabilized my body. I feel quiet, gravity, control. All is solid now. Instinctively my palate now requires and anticipates sweetness and lightness, something sugared and evanescent; and cool wine, fitting glove-like over those finer nerves that seem to tremble from the roof of my mouth and make it spread (as I drink) into a domed cavern, green with vine leaves, musk-scented, purple with grapes. Now I can look steadily into the mill-race that foams beneath. By what particular name are we to call it? Let Rhoda speak, whose face I see reflected mistily in the looking-glass opposite; Rhoda whom I interrupted when she rocked her petals in a brown basin, asking for the pocket-knife that Bernard had stolen. Love is not a whirlpool to her. She is not giddy when she looks down. She looks far away over our heads, beyond India.'

“但我吃着东西。吃东西的时候我渐渐失去了一切细节认知。越吃我越打不起精神来。这一口一口的美味烤鸭，适当地配着各种蔬菜，温暖、油腻、甘甜、辛辣，微妙地轮番经过我的味蕾，沿着我的食道，进入我的肠胃，使我稳定下来。我感到平静、庄重而克制。现在一切都实实在在。出于本能，我的味蕾现在需要并期待甜而清淡的滋味，加了糖或入口即化的东西；那是清凉的葡萄酒，熨帖地抚慰着我上腭上面似乎微微颤动的神经末梢，使我的嘴巴张开（当我饮酒时），成为一个隆起的洞口，那儿绿盈盈地掩映在藤叶下，散发着麝香的气息，缀着紫色的葡萄。现在我可以从容不迫地注视着脚下泛着泡沫的引水槽。我们该用什么特定的名字来称呼它呢？让罗达发言吧，我看见她的脸模模糊糊地映在对面的镜子里；罗达这人，当年在摇晃着褐色水盆里的花瓣时，我拦住她，询问伯纳德偷走的那把小刀。对她而言，爱并非漩涡。她望着下面也不会头晕目眩。她越过我们的头顶向远处望去，望向印度以外的地方。”

'Yes, between your shoulders, over your heads, to a landscape,' said Rhoda, 'to a hollow where the many-backed steep hills come down like birds' wings folded. There, on the short, firm turf, are bushes, dark leaved, and against their darkness I see a shape, white, but not of stone, moving, perhaps alive. But it is not you, it is not you, it is not you; not Percival, Susan, Jinny, Neville or Louis. When the white arm rests upon the knee it is a triangle; now it is upright—a column; now a fountain, falling. It makes no sign, it does not beckon, it does not see us. Behind it roars the sea. It is beyond our reach. Yet there I venture. There I go to replenish my emptiness, to stretch my nights and fill them fuller and fuller with dreams. And for a second even now, even here, I reach my object and say, "Wander no more. All else is trial and make-believe. Here is the end.” But these pilgrimages, these moments of departure, start always in your presence, from this table, these lights from Percival and Susan, here and now. Always I see the grove over your heads, between your shoulders, or from a window when I have crossed the room at a party and stand looking down into the street.'

“是的，从你们的肩膀之间，越过你们的头顶，我望到一处风景，”罗达说，“一个山谷，峭壁嶙峋的山岭围拢过来，好像鸟儿收起的翅膀。那边矮小、坚硬的草地上生长着灌木，叶片幽暗，在那幽暗的背景下，我看见一个模糊的形状，白色的，但不是石头的形状，它在动，也许还有生命。但那不是你，不是你，不是你；不是珀西瓦尔，不是苏珊，不是吉尼，不是内维尔，也不是路易斯。当那只白色的手臂靠在膝上，它变成了三角形；瞧，它直立起来——变成一根柱子；瞧，它变成一股泉水，倾泻而下。它没做任何手势，它没打招呼，它没看见我们。它身后是咆哮的大海。它在我们无法企及的地方。但是我要去那儿冒险。我要去那儿填补我的空虚，延长我的夜晚，用梦境使它们越来越充实。眨眼之间，就在此刻，就在此地，我到达了我的目标，说道：‘不要再流浪了。别的一切都是考验，都是假的。这儿就是最终的目的。’但是这些朝圣之旅，这些离别时刻，总是当着你的面开始，从这张桌子、这些灯盏，从珀西瓦尔和苏珊身边，从此地此时开始。我总是越过你们的头顶，从你们的肩膀之间看见那片树林，或者在聚会上我穿过房间站在一扇窗前，透过窗子观望下面的街道。”

'But his slippers?' said Neville.

“但是他的拖鞋呢？”内维尔说。

'And his voice downstairs in the hall? And catching sight of him when he does not see one? One waits and he does not come. It gets later and later. He has forgotten. He is with someone else. He is faithless, his love meant nothing. Oh, then the agony—then the intolerable despair! And then the door opens. He is here.'

“楼下大厅里他的说话声呢？他谁也不见的时候有人看见他了？有人等他，而他就是不来。时间越来越晚。他忘了。他和别人在一起。他背信弃义，他的爱毫无意义。噢，痛苦之极——无法容忍的绝望！这时门开了。他来了。”

'Ripping gold, I say to him, "Come",' said Jinny. 'And he comes; he crosses the room to where I sit, with my dress like a veil billowing round me on the gilt chair. Our hands touch, our bodies burst into fire. The chair, the cup, the table—nothing remains unlit. All quivers, all kindles, all burns clear.'

“我尽显温柔，对他说道：‘来吧。’”吉尼说。“他过来了；他穿过房间走向我就坐的地方，我身上的礼服像薄纱一样铺展在镀金椅子上。我们的手碰到一起，我们的身体一下子燃起了火。椅子、杯子、桌子——无一不被照亮。一切都在颤动，一切都在燃烧，一切都在发出明亮的光。”

('Look, Rhoda,' said Louis, 'they have become nocturnal, rapt. Their eyes are like moths' wings moving so quickly that they do not seem to move at all.'

（“罗达你瞧，”路易斯说，“他们变成了夜的精灵，那么心醉神迷。他们的眼睛像飞蛾的翅膀一样闪动得如此之快，以至于看似丝毫不动。”

'Horns and trumpets,' said Rhoda, 'ring out. Leaves unfold; the stags blare in the thicket. There is a dancing and a drumming, like the dancing and the drumming of naked men with assegais.'

“圆号和小号，”罗达说，“响了起来。树叶展开了；雄鹿在灌木丛中高声鸣叫。传来一阵跳舞和擂鼓的声音，好像手持长矛、赤身裸体的人们在跳舞和擂鼓似的。”

'Like the dance of savages,' said Louis, 'round the camp-fire. They are savage; they are ruthless. They dance in a circle, flapping bladders. The flames leap over their painted faces, over the leopard skins and the bleeding limbs which they have torn from the living body.'

“好像野人们，”路易斯说，“围着篝火舞蹈。他们野蛮；他们残忍。他们转着圈儿舞蹈，拍打着皮囊。火舌飞扬，越过了他们描画的脸，越过了豹子的毛皮和他们从活体上劈下来的还在滴血的肢体。”

'The flames of the festival rise high,' said Rhoda. 'The great procession passes, flinging green boughs and flowering branches. Their horns spill blue smoke; their skins are dappled red and yellow in the torchlight. They throw violets. They deck the beloved with garlands and with laurel leaves, there on the ring of turf where the steep-backed hills come down. The procession passes. And while it passes, Louis, we are aware of downfalling, we forebode decay. The shadow slants. We who are conspirators, withdrawn together to lean over some cold urn, note how the purple flame flows downwards.'

“节日的火焰高高飞扬。”罗达说。“盛大的游行队伍所经之处，不停地抛掷青青的树枝和开花的枝条。他们的号角喷出蓝烟；他们的皮肤在火把的火光中染上了红黄斑点。他们抛掷紫罗兰。他们用花环和月桂树叶装点所爱的人，就在那边圆形的草地上，周围是峭壁嶙峋的山岭。游行队伍走了过去。在它经过期间，路易斯，我们意识到情绪的低落，我们预感到颓废。影子斜了下去。我们心照不宣，一起退了回来，屈身在某个冷冷的坟头，望着那紫红的火焰渐渐垂落下去。”

'Death is woven in with the violets,' said Louis. 'Death and again death.')

“死亡与紫罗兰交织在一起。”路易斯说。“死亡，还是死亡。”）

'How proudly we sit here,' said Jinny, 'we who are not yet twenty—five! Outside the trees flower; outside the women linger; outside the cabs swerve and sweep. Emerged from the tentative ways, the obscurities and dazzle of youth, we look straight in front of us, ready for what may come (the door opens, the door keeps on opening). All is real; all is firm without shadow or illusion. Beauty rides our brows. There is mine, there is Susan's. Our flesh is firm and cool. Our differences are clear-cut as the shadows of rocks in full sunlight. Beside us lie crisp rolls, yellow-glazed and hard; the table-cloth is white; and our hands lie half curled, ready to contract. Days and days are to come; winter days, summer days; we have scarcely broken into our hoard. Now the fruit is swollen beneath the leaf. The room is golden, and I say to him, "Come".'

“我们多么自豪地坐在这儿，”吉尼说，“我们还不到25岁呢！外面，草木在开花；外面，妇女在徘徊；外面，出租马车突然拐弯，绝尘而去。经过了种种摸索，经过了青春时代的懵懂和迷惑，我们直视前方，准备迎接可能到来的一切（门开了，门不停地打开。）一切都是真实的；一切都是确定的，绝无虚影或幻象。美驰骋在我们的眉头。我有我的美，苏珊有苏珊的美。我们的肉身结实而从容。我们之间的差异像骄阳下岩石的影子一样轮廓鲜明。我们身旁是黄灿灿、结实的面包卷；桌布是白色的；我们的手半蜷着，随时准备握紧。漫长的日子即将到来；冬日，夏日；我们几乎未曾动用过我们的宝藏。现在果实在树叶下膨胀起来。房间金灿灿的，我对他说：‘来吧。’”

'He has red ears,' said Louis, 'and the smell of meat hangs down in a damp net while the city clerks take snacks at the lunch bar.'

“他有一对红耳朵，”路易斯说，“当那些城市职员在快餐店进餐的时候，肉的气息像一张潮湿的网撒了下来。”

'With infinite time before us,' said Neville, 'we ask what shall we do? Shall we loiter down Bond Street, looking here and there, and buying perhaps a fountain-pen because it is green, or asking how much is the ring with the blue stone? Or shall we sit indoors and watch the coals turn crimson? Shall we stretch our hands for books and read here a passage and there a passage? Shall we shout with laughter for no reason? Shall we push through flowering meadows and make daisy chains? Shall we find out when the next train starts for the Hebrides and engage a reserved compartment? All is to come.'

“无穷无尽的时间摆在我们面前，”内维尔说，“我们不禁要问，我们怎么办？我们是沿着邦德大街逛来逛去，东瞅西瞧，也许买下一支钢笔，因为它是绿色的，或者问问那枚镶着蓝宝石的戒指价值几何？还是坐在屋里，望着煤块烧得通红？还是随手抓过书来，东读一篇，西读一章？还是毫无缘由地放声大嚷大笑？还是穿过鲜花烂漫的草地，编织雏菊花环？还是问明下一班去往赫布里底群岛的火车何时开行，然后预定一个包厢？一切皆有可能。”

'For you,' said Bernard, 'but yesterday I walked bang into a pillar-box. Yesterday I became engaged.'

“是对你来说，”伯纳德说，“但是昨天，我砰地撞上了邮筒。昨天，我订婚了。”

'How strange,' said Susan, 'the little heaps of sugar look by the side of our plates. Also the mottled peelings of pears, and the plush rims to the looking-glasses. I had not seen them before. Everything is now set; everything is fixed. Bernard is engaged. Something irrevocable has happened. A circle has been cast on the waters; a chain is imposed. We shall never flow freely again.'

“我们盘子旁边那一小撮一小撮的糖，”苏珊说，“看上去多么奇怪啊。还有那些斑驳的梨皮，镜子的豪华镶边。以前我从未见过这些。现在一切都安排好了；一切都定下来了。伯纳德订婚了。不可挽回的事情已经发生了。水花上面终于铸成了一个圆环；强加了一道锁链。我们再也不可能自由地奔流了。”

'For one moment only,' said Louis. 'Before the chain breaks, before disorder returns, see us fixed, see us displayed, see us held in a vice.

“只有一会儿工夫。”路易斯说。“挣断锁链之前，秩序再次混乱之前，你看我们被老虎钳夹住了，无法动弹，任人围观。

'But now the circle breaks. Now the current flows. Now we rush faster than before. Now passions that lay in wait down there in the dark weeds which grow at the bottom rise and pound us with their waves. Pain and jealousy, envy and desire, and something deeper than they are, stronger than love and more subterranean. The voice of action speaks. Listen, Rhoda (for we are conspirators, with our hands on the cold urn), to the casual, quick, exciting voice of action, of hounds running on the scent. They speak now without troubling to finish their sentences. They talk a little language such as lovers use. An imperious brute possesses them. The nerves thrill in their thighs. Their hearts pound and churn in their sides. Susan screws her pocket-handkerchief. Jinny's eyes dance with fire.'

“但是现在圈圈打破了。瞧，水流通畅。瞧，我们比先前奔流得愈发急速。瞧，激情蛰伏在水下幽暗的杂草丛中，伺机而动，高涨起来了，用它们的浪涛拍击着我们。痛苦与嫉妒，羡慕与渴望，还有比它们更深沉、比爱更强大也更深藏不露的东西。行动的声音说话了。罗达（因为我俩心照不宣，我们的手抚在冷冷的坟头），你听那随意、急促而亢奋的行动的声音，猎犬追踪气味的声音。她们现在说起话来，根本顾不上说出完整的句子。她们有点像情人间的喁喁而谈。一头蛮横的野兽左右了她们。她们大腿的神经在颤动。她们肋下的心脏在狂跳，在翻腾。苏珊拧着她的手帕。吉尼的眼睛闪着火光。”

'They are immune,' said Rhoda, 'from picking fingers and searching eyes. How easily they turn and glance; what poses they take of energy and pride! What life shines in Jinny's eyes; how fell, how entire Susan's glance is, searching for insects at the roots! Their hair shines lustrous. Their eyes burn like the eyes of animals brushing through leaves on the scent of the prey. The circle is destroyed. We are thrown asunder.'

“她们满不在乎，”罗达说，“不管是挑剔的指点，还是探寻式的目光。她们转身瞥了一眼，多么自如；她们多么会摆姿势，透着强干和骄傲！吉尼的眼睛里闪着多么旺盛的生命力；搜寻草根里的昆虫时，苏珊的目光多么犀利，多么全面！她们的头发富有光泽。她们的眼睛闪闪发光，好像掠过叶丛追踪猎物气息的野兽的眼睛。圈圈被打破了。我们四分五裂。”

'But soon, too soon,' said Bernard, 'this egotistic exultation fails. Too soon the moment of ravenous identity is over, and the appetite for happiness, and happiness, and still more happiness is glutted. The stone is sunk; the moment is over. Round me there spreads a wide margin of indifference. Now open in my eyes a thousand eyes of curiosity. Anyone now is at liberty to murder Bernard, who is engaged to be married, so long as they leave untouched this margin of unknown territory, this forest of the unknown world. Why, I ask (whispering discreetly), do women dine alone together there? Who are they? And what has brought them on this particular evening to this particular spot? The youth in the corner, judging from the nervous way in which he puts his hand from time to time to the back of his head, is from the country. He is suppliant, and so anxious to respond suitably to the kindness of his father's friend, his host, that he can scarcely enjoy now what he will enjoy very much at about half-past eleven tomorrow morning. I have also seen that lady powder her nose three times in the midst of an absorbing conversation—about love, perhaps, about the unhappiness of their dearest friend perhaps. "Ah, but the state of my nose!" she thinks, and out comes her powder-puff, obliterating in its passage all the most fervent feelings of the human heart. There remains, however, the insoluble problem of the solitary man with the eyeglass; of the elderly lady drinking champagne alone. Who and what are these unknown people? I ask. I could make a dozen stories of what he said, of what she said—I can see a dozen pictures. But what are stories? Toys I twist, bubbles I blow, one ring passing through another. And sometimes I begin to doubt if there are stories. What is my story? What is Rhoda's? What is Neville's? There are facts, as, for example: "The handsome young man in the grey suit, whose reserve contrasted so strangely with the loquacity of the others, now brushed the crumbs from his waistcoat and, with a characteristic gesture at once commanding and benign, made a sign to the waiter, who came instantly and returned a moment later with the bill discreetly folded upon a plate." That is the truth; that is a fact, but beyond it all is darkness and conjecture.'

“但是匆匆，太匆匆，”伯纳德说，“这样的自鸣得意消失了。太匆匆，这个极度个性的时刻就结束了，渴求幸福、幸福、更多幸福的欲望就得到了满足。石子沉了；此刻成了过去。漫无边际的冷漠气氛在我四周蔓延。现在我的眼睛里张开了一千只好奇的眼睛。任何人在此刻都能随意地除掉伯纳德，这个订了婚的人，只要他们不去触动未知领地的这条界线，未知世界的这片森林。为什么，我（小心地轻声）问道，那边的女人们单独凑在一起吃饭？她们是谁？是什么风把她们在这个特定的夜晚吹到了这个特定的地方？角落里那个年轻人，从他不时地手摸后脑勺那幅紧张的样子来判断，来自乡下。他有事相求，所以急于要得体地应酬他父亲的朋友，他的东道主的这番好意，以至于他现在几乎享受不到明天上午11点半左右他将享受的那种极大乐趣。我还看见那位女士在一场引人入胜的谈话期间为她的鼻子扑了三次粉，谈话内容也许是爱情，也许是她们最亲的一位朋友的不幸。‘唉，但是我的鼻子的样子呀！’心里想着，她就拿出了粉扑，一边扑着粉，一边抹去人类心中一切最热诚的情感。可是，那位戴单片眼镜的孤身男子依然是个不解的难题；还有那位独自喝着香槟的年长的女士。这些陌生的人是谁？他们是干什么的？我问道。我可以编出十几段故事，讲讲他说过什么话，她说过什么话——我可以看见十几幅画面。可是故事算什么？我揉搓的玩具，我吹出的泡泡，一个圈圈穿过另一个圈圈。有时我开始怀疑是否有故事的存在。我的故事是什么？罗达的故事是什么？内维尔的故事是什么？有一些事实的存在，比如，‘那个穿着灰色套装的潇洒的小伙子，他的寡言与其他人的饶舌形成了奇怪的对比，他这时掸了掸他马甲上的面包屑，用一个极具特点、既威严又和善的手势向服务生示意，对方立即上前，过了一会儿，拿着小心地叠放在一只托盘上的账单回来了。’这是真实；这是事实，但除此之外，一切皆是未知，全凭猜测。”

'Now once more,' said Louis, 'as we are about to part, having paid our bill, the circle in our blood, broken so often, so sharply, for we are so different, closes in a ring. Something is made. Yes, as we rise and fidget, a little nervously, we pray, holding in our hands this common feeling, "Do not move, do not let the swing door cut to pieces the thing that we have made, that globes itself here, among these lights, these peelings, this litter of bread crumbs and people passing. Do not move, do not go. Hold it for ever."'

“现在又一次，”路易斯说，“当我们付了账单、即将分别的时候，我们血液中的那个圆环——因为我们彼此各异，它时常会突然断掉——接合到一起。形成了某种东西。是的，我们站起身来，烦躁不安，我们怀着同一种心情，紧张兮兮地祈祷：‘别动，别让弹簧门粉碎了我们之间所形成的东西——在这儿，在这些灯盏、果皮、散落的面包屑和来往的人们之中所形成的这片天地。别动，别走。永远留住它吧。’”

'Let us hold it for one moment,' said Jinny; 'love, hatred, by whatever name we call it, this globe whose walls are made of Percival, of youth and beauty, and something so deep sunk within us that we shall perhaps never make this moment out of one man again.'

“让我们再保留它一会儿吧，”吉尼说，“爱，恨，不管我们怎么给它命名，这片天地之墙是由珀西瓦尔围起来的，是由青春与美以及沉潜于我们内心深处的某种东西共同围起来的，我们也许再也不可能从一个人身上找回这样的时刻了。”

'Forests and far countries on the other side of the world,' said Rhoda, 'are in it; seas and jungles; the howlings of jackals and moonlight falling upon some high peak where the eagle soars.'

“其中包含了世界另一面的森林和旷野，”罗达说，“海洋和丛莽，豺狼的嚎叫，还有月光洒向高山之巅，照耀着雄鹰展翅翱翔。”

'Happiness is in it,' said Neville, 'and the quiet of ordinary things. A table, a chair, a book with a paper-knife stuck between the pages. And the petal falling from the rose, and the light flickering as we sit silent, or, perhaps, bethinking us of some trifle, suddenly speak.'

“其中包含了幸福，”内维尔说，“还有寻常事物的宁静。一张桌子，一把椅子，一本书，书页之间插着一把裁纸刀。玫瑰花瓣凋落了，光影摇曳，我们静静地坐着，或者可能想起某件小事，突然说起话来。”

'Week-days are in it,' said Susan, 'Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday; the horses going up to the fields, and the horses returning; the rooks rising and falling, and catching the elm-trees in their net, whether it is April, whether it is November.'

“其中包含了工作日，”苏珊说，“星期一，星期二，星期三；马儿奔向田野，马儿驰骋归来；秃鼻乌鸦起起落落，成群结队地聚集在榆树上它们的巢中，无论四月，还是十一月。”

'What is to come is in it,' said Bernard. 'That is the last drop and the brightest that we let fall like some supernal quicksilver into the swelling and splendid moment created by us from Percival. What is to come? I ask, brushing the crumbs from my waistcoat, what is outside? We have proved, sitting eating, sitting talking, that we can add to the treasury of moments. We are not slaves bound to suffer incessantly unrecorded petty blows on our bent backs. We are not sheep either, following a master. We are creators. We too have made something that will join the innumerable congregations of past time. We too, as we put on our hats and push open the door, stride not into chaos, but into a world that our own force can subjugate and make part of the illumined and everlasting road.

“其中包含了未来。”伯纳德说。“这是我们投下的最后也是最明亮的一滴，仿佛一道来自上天的水银，落进我们凭借珀西瓦尔所营造的膨胀而辉煌的时刻当中。未来会怎样？我掸去马甲上的面包屑，问道，外面会怎样？我们坐着吃，坐着谈，已经证明了我们有能力积累时光的宝库。我们不是奴隶，不会注定要弯腰曲背不停地遭受罄竹难书的卑鄙打击。我们也不是跟在主人身后的绵羊。我们是创造者。我们也曾创造出将会注入过去无数会众中去的东西。当我们戴上帽子、推开门时，我们也会迈开大步，不是踏入混沌之中，而是踏入这样一个世界——我们自身的力量能够征服它，并使它成为光明与永恒之路上的一部分。

'Look, Percival, while they fetch the taxi, at the prospect which you are so soon to lose. The street is hard and burnished with the churning of innumerable wheels. The yellow canopy of our tremendous energy hangs like a burning cloth above our heads. Theatres, music halls and lamps in private houses make that light.'

“珀西瓦尔，趁着他们去叫出租车的这阵工夫，赶紧瞧一瞧这里的景象吧，你很快就会见不着它了。无数车轮的碾压使得街道坚硬而光滑。我们勃勃生机的黄色华盖，像一块燃烧的帷幕笼罩在我们头上。剧院、音乐厅和私家住宅的灯火形成了这片光明。”

'Peaked clouds,' said Rhoda, 'voyage over a sky dark like polished whalebone.'

“天上飘着尖尖的云朵，”罗达说，“天空阴沉，像抛了光的鲸须。”

'Now the agony begins; now the horror has seized me with its fangs,' said Neville. 'Now the cab comes; now Percival goes. What can we do to keep him? How bridge the distance between us? How fan the fire so that it blazes for ever? How signal to all time to come that we, who stand in the street, in the lamplight, loved Percival? Now Percival is gone.'

“此刻，痛苦开始了；恐怖的利齿攫住了我。”内维尔说。“此刻出租马车到了；此刻珀西瓦尔要走了。我们有什么办法能留住他？如何跨越我们之间的距离？如何扇动火焰使它永久熊熊燃烧？如何向未来的时光证明我们这些站在街道上、路灯下的人，曾经爱过珀西瓦尔？此刻，珀西瓦尔走了。”

The sun had risen to its full height. It was no longer half seen and guessed at, from hints and gleams, as if a girl couched on her green-sea mattress tired her brows with water-globed jewels that sent lances of opal-tinted light falling and flashing in the uncertain air like the flanks of a dolphin leaping, or the flash of a falling blade. Now the sun burnt uncompromising, undeniable. It struck upon the hard sand, and the rocks became furnaces of red heat; it searched each pool and caught the minnow hiding in the cranny, and showed the rusty cartwheel, the white bone, or the boot without laces stuck, black as iron, in the sand. It gave to everything its exact measure of colour; to the sandhills their innumerable glitter, to the wild grasses their glancing green; or it fell upon the arid waste of the desert, here wind-scourged into furrows, here swept into desolate cairns, here sprinkled with stunted dark-green jungle trees. It lit up the smooth gilt mosque, the frail pink-and-white card houses of the southern village, and the long-breasted, white-haired women who knelt in the river bed beating wrinkled cloths upon stones. Steamers thudding slowly over the sea were caught in the level stare of the sun, and it beat through the yellow awnings upon passengers who dozed or paced the deck, shading their eyes to look for the land, while day after day, compressed in its oily throbbing sides, the ship bore them on monotonously over the waters.

太阳当空高挂。它不再是半遮半掩，只露出些微迹象和闪光惹人猜测，仿佛一位躺在海洋绿床垫上的少女给自己的额头戴上水珠似的珠宝首饰，它们射出一道道猫眼石色彩的光芒，在不稳定的空气中流泻、闪烁，像跃起的海豚的腹部，或者像劈落的刀片的闪光。此时，太阳发出炙热的光芒，毫不容情，无懈可击。它照射在坚实的沙滩上，岩石变成了炽热火红的熔炉；它搜索着每一个水潭，抓住躲藏在石缝中的小鱼，映出沙滩上锈迹斑斑的车轮，森森的白骨，或者没系鞋带的靴子，黑得像铁一样。它给一切涂上适量的色彩；它使沙丘闪烁着无数的金缕，使绿油油的野草一览无余；或者它照在沙漠中贫瘠的荒原之上，一会儿像曲折的鞭子抽打着沟壑，一会儿掠过荒凉的石堆标，一会儿在墨绿的矮树丛中洒下光辉。它照亮了金碧辉煌的清真寺，南部乡村红白相间的单薄板房，还有乳房松弛、头发花白的妇女，她们跪在河床里，捶打着石头上面皱巴巴的衣物。直射的阳光捕获到海面上轰隆隆地缓缓行驶的轮船，它透过黄色的遮阳篷照着那些打盹的、或在甲板上一边踱步一边遮起眼睛眺望陆地的乘客，而他们正日复一日地挤在油腻、颠簸的船舷边，任由这艘船载着他们单调地行驶在海浪之上。

The sun beat on the crowded pinnacles of southern hills and glared into deep, stony river beds where the water was shrunk beneath the high slung bridge so that washerwomen kneeling on hot stones could scarcely wet their linen; and lean mules went picking their way among the chattering grey stones with panniers slung across their narrow shoulders. At midday the heat of the sun made the hills grey as if shaved and singed in an explosion, while, further north, in cloudier and rainier countries hills smoothed into slabs as with the back of a spade had a light in them as if a warder, deep within, went from chamber to chamber carrying a green lamp. Through atoms of grey-blue air the sun struck at English fields and lit up marshes and pools, a white gull on a stake, the slow sail of shadows over blunt-headed woods and young corn and flowing hayfields. It beat on the orchard wall, and every pit and grain of the brick was silver pointed, purple, fiery as if soft to touch, as if touched it must melt into hot-baked grains of dust. The currants hung against the wall in ripples and cascades of polished red; plums swelled out their leaves, and all the blades of the grass were run together in one fluent green blaze. The trees' shadow was sunk to a dark pool at the root. Light descending in floods dissolved the separate foliation into one green mound.

太阳照着南部群山的密集峰顶，直射深深的、满是石子的河床，高吊桥下面的河水枯竭得很厉害，以至于跪在炎热石头上面的洗衣妇几乎无法浸湿她们的亚麻布；精瘦的骡子在咯咯作响的灰色石子中间择路而行，它们狭窄的肩上横跨着驮篮。晌午，太阳的炙热把山岭烤成了灰色，仿佛在一次爆炸中被削平、烧焦了似的，而再向北一些，在更为多云、多雨的地区，平滑的山岭，像是用铁锹的背面平整过似的，发出一道光芒，仿佛山岭深处有位守夜人，手提一盏绿荧荧的灯，走过一个又一个房间。透过灰蓝色空气中的微尘，太阳照射在英国的田野上，照亮了沼泽和水塘，照亮了标桩上的一只白色鸥鸟，照亮了钝头树林、麦苗和起伏的草场上空的缓慢云影。它照在果园的墙上，砖石的每一处凹孔和纹络都被点染得银光闪闪，灿烂如火，仿佛有一种柔软的触感，仿佛一碰它就会化作烘焙的灰尘。醋栗果从墙上垂落下来，红艳艳的，像朵朵浪花，像条条飞瀑；李子圆鼓鼓地从树叶中间探出头来，所有的草叶被集合到一起，形成绿油油连绵的一片。树影沉了下去，在根部形成幽暗的一滩。倾泻而下的阳光把分散的叶片溶为一片绿丘。

The birds sang passionate songs addressed to one ear only and then stopped. Bubbling and chuckling they carried little bits of straw and twig to the dark knots in the higher branches of the trees. Gilt and purpled they perched in the garden where cones of laburnum and purple shook down gold and lilac, for now at midday the garden was all blossom and profusion and even the tunnels under the plants were green and purple and tawny as the sun beat through the red petal, or the broad yellow petal, or was barred by some thickly furred green stalk.

鸟儿热情的歌声似乎只为某一位听者而唱，这时停了下来。它们扑扑楞楞、叽叽喳喳地把细草嫩枝衔进高处树干上的黑树节里。披着金色和紫色的外衣，它们落进花园里，这儿，金链花的球果和紫色花朵摇落一地金灿灿的花影，因为现在正是晌午，花园里百花盛开，花团锦簇，随着阳光穿透红色的花瓣、宽大的黄色花瓣，或者被一支毛茸茸的绿色花茎挡住，就连花丛下面的坑道也呈现出绿色、紫色和黄褐色。

The sun struck straight upon the house, making the white walls glare between the dark windows. Their panes, woven thickly with green branches, held circles of impenetrable darkness. Sharp-edged wedges of light lay upon the window-sill and showed inside the room plates with blue rings, cups with curved handles, the bulge of a great bowl, the crisscross pattern in the rug, and the formidable corners and lines of cabinets and bookcases. Behind their conglomeration hung a zone of shadow in which might be a further shape to be disencumbered of shadow or still denser depths of darkness.

太阳直接照射在房子上，使得白色的墙壁在幽暗的窗子之间发出炫目的光。密密匝匝的绿枝在窗玻璃上编织出一圈圈难以刺穿的暗影。锋利的楔形阳光照在窗台上，映出房间里带蓝边的盘子，带有弧形把手的杯子，一只圆鼓鼓的大碗，地毯上的十字形图案，以及棱角和线条都很鲜明的橱柜和书柜。在这些东西的后面笼罩着一片阴影区，其中可能存在某个稍远的模糊的东西，即将从阴影中或从更为浓重的黑暗深处挣脱出来。

The waves broke and spread their waters swiftly over the shore. One after another they massed themselves and fell; the spray tossed itself back with the energy of their fall. The waves were steeped deep-blue save for a pattern of diamond-pointed light on their backs which rippled as the backs of great horses ripple with muscles as they move. The waves fell; withdrew and fell again, like the thud of a great beast stamping.

海浪迸裂，海水迅速地漫上海岸。一浪接着一浪，涌起，落下；随着下落的势头，浪花又全身而退。海浪通体深蓝，除了浪尖上闪出一道钻石一样的光芒，波光荡漾，仿佛宝马良驹纵横驰骋时背部肌肉的颤动。海浪落下；退去，又落下，像一只巨兽砰砰地跺脚。

'He is dead,' said Neville. 'He fell. His horse tripped. He was thrown. The sails of the world have swung round and caught me on the head. All is over. The lights of the world have gone out. There stands the tree which I cannot pass.

“他死了。”内维尔说。“他跌了下来。他的马绊了一下。他被甩了下来。世界的风帆突然转了方向，砸在了我的头上。一切都完了。世界的灯火熄灭了。横在面前的这棵大树，我无法跨越。

'Oh, to crumple this telegram in my fingers—to let the light of the world flood back—to say this has not happened! But why turn one's head hither and thither? This is the truth. This is the fact. His horse stumbled; he was thrown. The flashing trees and white rails went up in a shower. There was a surge; a drumming in his ears. Then the blow; the world crashed; he breathed heavily. He died where he fell.

“噢，揉碎我指间的这封电报——让世界之光回流——然后说，这一切不曾发生！可是，你的头为什么摇来摇去？这是真实。这是事实。他的马绊了一下；他被甩了下来。忽闪的树和白色的围栏纷纷扬扬地飞了起来。浪涛汹涌；他的耳中嗡嗡作响。接着是重重的一击；整个世界轰然倒塌；他沉重地喘了一口气。他死在他摔下来的地方。

'Barns and summer days in the country, rooms where we sat—all now lie in the unreal world which is gone. My past is cut from me. They came running. They carried him to some pavilion, men in riding-boots, men in sun helmets; among unknown men he died. Loneliness and silence often surrounded him. He often left me. And then, returning, "See where he comes!" I said.

“乡下的谷仓和夏日，我们曾经共同呆过的房间——此时都只存在于过往的虚幻世界里了。我的过去与我割断了联系。他们跑着赶过来。他们把他抬到某个亭子里，他们穿着马靴，戴着遮阳帽；他死在陌生的人们中间。孤独和沉默时常包围着他。他时常丢下我。那时，我总回应说：‘瞧吧，他会回来的!'

'Women shuffle past the window as if there were no gulf cut in the street, no tree with stiff leaves which we cannot pass.

“女人们拖着步子经过窗前，仿佛根本就没有街道上挖开的沟，也根本没有我们无法逾越的叶子硬挺的树。

We deserve then to be tripped by molehills. We are infinitely abject, shuffling past with our eyes shut. But why should I submit? Why try to lift my foot and mount the stair? This is where I stand; here, holding the telegram. The past, summer days and rooms where we sat, stream away like burnt paper with red eyes in it. Why meet and resume? Why talk and eat and make up other combinations with other people? From this moment I am solitary. No one will know me now. I have three letters, "I am about to play quoits with a colonel, so no more," thus he ends our friendship, shouldering his way through the crowd with a wave of his hand. This farce is worth no more formal celebration. Yet if someone had but said: "Wait"; had pulled the strap three holes tighter—he would have done justice for fifty years, and sat in Court and ridden alone at the head of troops and denounced some monstrous tyranny, and come back to us.

这么说，我们活该要被田鼠丘绊倒。我们闭着眼睛，拖着脚步而过，无比凄凉。可是为什么我要听之任之？为什么竭力要抬起我的脚来攀上楼梯？我站在这个地方；在这里，手握着电报。过去，夏日，我们共同呆过的房间，像纸灰似的飘走了，也带走了红肿的眼睛。为什么见面、重新开始？为什么谈天、吃饭，与别的人建立别的联系？从这一刻起，我要与世隔绝。如今没有人会理解我了。我存有三封信，‘我马上要跟一位上校玩掷铁圈，所以不多写了。’他就这样结束了我们的友谊，挥了挥手，从人群当中挤了出去。这样的闹剧再也不值得郑重庆贺了。可是，假如有人仅仅说声‘等一下’；假如有人把皮带再紧三个孔——他起码会对得起50年人生，坐在法庭上，或一马当先，统率军队，推翻某个万恶的暴君，然后凯旋归来。

'Now I say there is a grinning, there is a subterfuge. There is something sneering behind our backs. That boy almost lost his footing as he leapt on the bus. Percival fell; was killed; is buried; and I watch people passing; holding tight to the rails of omnibuses; determined to save their lives.

“唉，有人咧嘴而笑，有人闪烁其词。有人在我们身后冷嘲热讽。那个男孩跳上公共汽车时几乎立脚不稳。珀西瓦尔摔了下来；死了；埋了；我看着匆匆而过的人们；紧紧抓住公共马车的扶手；决意拯救自己的性命。

'I will not lift my foot to climb the stair. I will stand for one moment beneath the immitigable tree, alone with the man whose throat is cut, while downstairs the cook shoves in and out the dampers. I will not climb the stair. We are doomed, all of us. Women shuffle past with shopping-bags. People keep on passing. Yet you shall not destroy me. For this moment, this one moment, we are together. I press you to me. Come, pain, feed on me. Bury your fangs in my flesh. Tear me asunder. I sob, I sob.'

“我不想抬脚爬上楼梯。当楼下的厨子一进一出推拉风门时，我要在这棵愤愤不平的树下站一会儿，和那个被人割喉的人单独在一起。我不想爬上楼梯。我们所有人都注定一死。女人们提着购物袋拖着步子而过。人们不停地来来往往。可是你是击不垮我的。此时此刻，我们在一起。我紧紧拥抱你。来吧，痛苦，吞噬我吧。把你的利齿深深咬进我的肉体。把我撕得粉碎。我呜咽，我哭泣。”

'Such is the incomprehensible combination,' said Bernard, 'such is the complexity of things, that as I descend the staircase I do not know which is sorrow, which joy. My son is born; Percival is dead. I am upheld by pillars, shored up on either side by stark emotions; but which is sorrow, which is joy? I ask, and do not know, only that I need silence, and to be alone and to go out, and to save one hour to consider what has happened to my world, what death has done to my world.

“这是令人难以理解的关联，”伯纳德说，“事情就是这么复杂，当我走下楼梯时，我简直搞不清哪个是悲，哪个是喜。我的儿子出生了；珀西瓦尔死了。我被立柱撑了起来，两肋被极度的情感所左右；但哪边是悲，哪边是喜？我问着自己，却无法回答，只知道我需要安静，需要独自到外面去，让自己有一个小时的时间来考虑一下，我的世界发生了什么事，死亡给我的世界带来了哪些影响。

'This then is the world that Percival sees no longer. Let me look. The butcher delivers meat next door; two old men stumble along the pavement; sparrows alight. The machine then works; I note the rhythm, the throb, but as a thing in which I have no part, since he sees it no longer. (He lies pale and bandaged in some room.) Now then is my chance to find out what is of great importance, and I must be careful, and tell no lies. About him my feeling was: he sat there in the centre. Now I go to that spot no longer. The place is empty.

“那么这是珀西瓦尔再也看不到的世界了。让我好好看看吧。屠夫给隔壁人家送去了肉；两个老人磕磕绊绊地走在人行步道上；麻雀飞落下来。这时机器开始运转；我注意到它的节奏，它的律动，但那完全与我无关，因为他再也看不到这些了。（他面色苍白、缠着绷带躺在某个房间里。）那么现在，我正好有机会弄清什么才是最重要的事，我必须小心，绝不撒谎。对于他，我曾经的感觉是：他总是居于中心位置。现在我不会再去那儿了。那个地方已经空了。

'Oh yes, I can assure you, men in felt hats and women carrying baskets—you have lost something that would have been very valuable to you. You have lost a leader whom you would have followed; and one of you has lost happiness and children. He is dead who would have given you that. He lies on a camp-bed, bandaged, in some hot Indian hospital while coolies squatted on the floor agitate those fans—I forget how they call them. But this is important; "You are well out of it," I said, while the doves descended over the roofs and my son was born, as if it were a fact. I remember, as a boy, his curious air of detachment. And I go on to say (my eyes fill with tears and then are dry), "But this is better than one had dared to hope." I say, addressing what is abstract, facing me eyeless at the end of the avenue, in the sky, "Is this the utmost you can do?" Then we have triumphed. You have done your utmost, I say, addressing that blank and brutal face (for he was twenty-five and should have lived to be eighty) without avail. I am not going to lie down and weep away a life of care. (An entry to be made in my pocket-book; contempt for those who inflict meaningless death.) Further, this is important; that I should be able to place him in trifling and ridiculous situations, so that he may not feel himself absurd, perched on a great horse. I must be able to say, "Percival, a ridiculous name." At the same time let me tell you, men and women, hurrying to the tube station, you would have had to respect him. You would have had to form up and follow behind him. How strange to oar one's way through crowds seeing life through hollow eyes, burning eyes.

“哦，是的，我可以明确告诉你们，你们这些带毡帽的男人和提篮子的女人——你们失去了本来会对你们十分珍贵的东西。你们失去了一位本来可以追随的领袖；你们当中的某人失去了幸福和孩子。他本来会给你们这些，可他已经死了。他缠着绷带，躺在印度一家闷热的医院里的一张行军床上，而那些蹲在地上的苦力——我忘了当地怎么称呼他们——猛劲儿挥着扇子。但是这件事情意义重大；‘你可能还不知情吧，’当鸽子飞落在屋顶上，我的儿子出生之际，我说道，仿佛事实真是这样。我在年少时就记得他那怪异超然的神态。接着我继续说（我的眼睛充满泪水，随后变干）：‘但这可是你大胆也想象不到的事啊。’面对大街尽头、茫茫苍天中某种抽象而盲目的东西，我申述说：‘这就是你尽到的最大能力么？’那么我们已经成功了。你已经竭尽所能了，说着，我徒劳无益地望向那张茫然而冷酷的脸（他才25岁啊，本来有可能活到80岁）。我并不打算就此趴下，在哭泣中度过烦恼人生。（这一词条要出现在我的笔记本上，以示我对那些承受无谓牺牲的人的蔑视。）进一步说，这一点很重要；我应该能把他置于无聊、可笑的境地，这样当他骑上一匹高头大马时，他也许感觉不到自己的荒唐。我肯定能说：‘珀西瓦尔，一个可笑的名字。’同时我要告诉你们，你们这些匆匆赶往地铁站的男男女女，你们本该敬佩他的。你们本该列队跟在他的身后。众人都在用空洞的目光、如火的目光看待生活，而你却要划桨穿过他们，多么奇怪。

'Yet already signals begin, beckonings, attempts to lure me back. Curiosity is knocked out for only a short time. One cannot live outside the machine for more perhaps than half an hour. Bodies, I note, already begin to look ordinary; but what is behind them differs—the perspective. Behind that newspaper placard is the hospital; the long room with black men pulling ropes; and then they bury him. Yet since it says a famous actress has been divorced, I ask instantly Which? Yet I cannot take out my penny; I cannot buy a paper; I cannot suffer interruption yet.

“但是信号已经发出了，不停地示意，竭力诱使我回头。好奇心的消失只持续了一会儿。一个人生活在这架机器之外，恐怕不可能超过半个小时。我注意到，人们的身体已经看不出什么特别之处；但身体后面的东西——远景却千差万别。那块报纸张贴牌的后面是医院；长长的房间，几个黑人拉着绳子；然后他们安葬了他。可是自从听说一位著名的女演员离了婚，我就立即问：哪一位？不过我无法掏出一文钱来；我无法去买一份报纸；我还无法容忍任何打岔。

'I ask, if I shall never see you again and fix my eyes on that solidity, what form will our communication take? You have gone across the court, further and further, drawing finer and finer the thread between us. But you exist somewhere. Something of you remains. A judge. That is, if I discover a new vein in myself I shall submit it to you privately. I shall ask, What is your verdict? You shall remain the arbiter. But for how long? Things will become too difficult to explain: there will be new things; already my son. I am now at the zenith of an experience. It will decline. Already I no longer cry with conviction, "What luck!" Exaltation, the flight of doves descending, is over. Chaos, detail return. I am no longer amazed by names written over shop-windows. I do not feel Why hurry? Why catch trains? The sequence returns; one thing leads to another—the usual order.

“我问道，假如我再也见不到你，再也无法注视那实实在在的你，我们将会以怎样的形式交流呢？你已经穿过球场，越走越远，我们之间的那根线拉得越来越细。但你依然活在某个地方。你身上的某些东西存留下来。一位裁判。就是说，如果我在自己身上发现了一种新的才干，我会私下里把它提交给你。我会问，你有什么意见？你还是那位仲裁者。但这会持续多久呢？事情会变得难以解释；会发生新的事情；我已经有了儿子。我现在正处于一种经历的顶峰。接下来就要走下坡路了。我已经不再信心十足地大喊：‘多好的运气！’异常的兴奋，鸽群的飞落，都结束了。纷乱，细节回来了。我不再为写在橱窗上的名目而惊奇。我不再寻思：为什么匆匆忙忙？为什么要赶火车？顺序恢复了；一环扣一环——按照通常的次序。

'Yes, but I still resent the usual order. I will not let myself be made yet to accept the sequence of things. I will walk; I will not change the rhythm of my mind by stopping, by looking; I will walk. I will go up these steps into the gallery and submit myself to the influence of minds like mine outside the sequence. There is little time left to answer the question; my powers flag; I become torpid. Here are pictures. Here are cold madonnas among their pillars. Let them lay to rest the incessant activity of the mind's eye, the bandaged head, the men with ropes, so that I may find something unvisual beneath. Here are gardens; and Venus among her flowers; here are saints and blue madonnas. Mercifully these pictures make no reference; they do not nudge; they do not point. Thus they expand my consciousness of him and bring him back to me differently. I remember his beauty. "Look, where he comes," I said.

“是的，但我依然憎恨通常的次序。我不愿让自己被迫接受事物的顺序。我要走下去；我不愿因为停停看看而改变我思维的节奏；我要走下去。我要迈上这些台阶，走进画廊，让自己受到像我一样的不守常规的思想的影响。几乎无暇回答那个问题了；我的精力开始衰退；我变得麻木了。这儿是画像。这儿是廊柱之间冷冰冰的圣母像。让那只不停眨动的心灵之眼、那颗缠着绷带的脑袋和那些拉绳子的人们都安息下来吧，我也许会发现事物背后某些隐藏的东西。这儿是花园；还有花丛中的维纳斯；这儿是圣徒和忧郁的圣母。幸好这些画像毫无寓意；它们既不推搡；它们也不指手画脚。结果，它们扩展了我对他的认识，并以不同的方式让他回到我的面前。我想起他的美好。‘瞧，他回来了。’我说。

'Lines and colours almost persuade me that I too can be heroic, I, who make phrases so easily, am so soon seduced, love what comes next, and cannot clench my fist, but vacillate weakly making phrases according to my circumstances. Now, through my own infirmity I recover what he was to me: my opposite. Being naturally truthful, he did not see the point of these exaggerations, and was borne on by a natural sense of the fitting, was indeed a great master of the art of living so that he seems to have lived long, and to have spread calm round him, indifference one might almost say, certainly to his own advancement, save that he had also great compassion. A child playing—a summer evening—doors will open and shut, will keep opening and shutting, through which I see sights that make me weep. For they cannot be imparted. Hence our loneliness; hence our desolation. I turn to that spot in my mind and find it empty. My own infirmities oppress me. There is no longer him to oppose them.

“线条与色彩几乎让我相信，我也能表现出英雄气概，可是我这个人，总是轻易地编弄辞藻，转眼之间就会受到诱惑，随遇而安，不能攥紧拳头，只是无力地摇摆，根据我的处境编弄辞藻而已。现在，通过我自身的弱点，我找回了他曾经在我心中的形象：我的对立面。由于天性真诚，他看不出这些夸大之辞的意义，他受到一种天生的分寸感的驱使，实际上，他是一位生活艺术大师，所以他看似久经世道，周身散发出淡定之气，你几乎可以说他冷漠，当然是对他自身的前途而言，但他同时怀有极大的怜悯之心。一个玩耍的孩子——一个夏天的傍晚——门一开一合，不停地开开合合，透过一道道门，我看到的景象令我泪流满面。因为它们无以言表。所以才有我们的孤独；所以才有我们的寂寞。我转向心中的那个角落，发现那里空空如也。我自身的弱点压迫着我。再也没有他来对抗它们了。

'Behold, then, the blue madonna streaked with tears. This is my funeral service. We have no ceremonies, only private dirges and no conclusions, only violent sensations, each separate. Nothing that has been said meets our case. We sit in the Italian room at the National Gallery picking up fragments. I doubt that Titian ever felt this rat gnaw. Painters live lives of methodical absorption, adding stroke to stroke. They are not like poets—scapegoats; they are not chained to the rock. Hence the silence, the sublimity. Yet that crimson must have burnt in Titian's gizzard. No doubt he rose with the great arms holding the cornucopia, and fell, in that descent. But the silence weighs on me—the perpetual solicitation of the eye. The pressure is intermittent and muffled. I distinguish too little and too vaguely. The bell is pressed and I do not ring or give out irrelevant clamours all jangled. I am titillated inordinately by some splendour; the ruffled crimson against the green lining; the march of pillars: the orange light behind the black, pricked ears of the olive trees. Arrows of sensation strike from my spine, but without order.

“那么瞧吧，这位忧郁的圣母泪水纵横。这是我的葬礼。我们没有任何仪式，只有私下的哀歌，没有盖棺定论，只有互不相干的激情。说过的话没有一句与我们的实情相符。我们坐在国家美术馆意大利厅，捡拾着碎片。我怀疑提香可曾感觉到这种老鼠的啃咬。画家们过着井然而专注的生活，一笔一笔画着。他们不像诗人——那些替罪的羔羊；他们没有被铁链拴在岩石上。所以才有这里的静穆与庄严。可是那种深红色一定在提香的胃囊里燃烧过。毫无疑问，他曾用有力的臂膀举着羊角登上顶峰，然后在下坡路上摔了跟头。但是这种静穆——这种对眼睛的永恒诱惑——重重地压迫着我。这种压力断断续续、隐隐约约。我的分辨力太差，也太不明确。按在铃上，我却并没鸣响，也没发出格格不入的刺耳的喧闹。我异常兴奋于某种光辉；绿色衬里衬托着那种带褶饰边的深红；那廊柱的队列：从橄榄树竖起的黑耳朵后面发出橘黄色的光。激情的箭镞从我的脊柱射出，但毫无章法。

'Yet something is added to my interpretation. Something lies deeply buried. For one moment I thought to grasp it. But bury it, bury it; let it breed, hidden in the depths of my mind some day to fructify. After a long lifetime, loosely, in a moment of revelation, I may lay hands on it, but now the idea breaks in my hand. Ideas break a thousand times for once that they globe themselves entire. They break: they fall over me. "Line and colours they survive, therefore..."

“可是某种东西加入了我的理解当中。某种埋藏很深的东西。一时之间我想抓起它。但还是埋下它吧，埋下它吧；让它藏在我的心灵深处，繁育，直到有一天结出果实来吧。在轻轻松松地度过漫长的一生之后，在一个幡然醒悟的时刻，我也许会触摸它，但是此刻，这个念头在我手上中断了。种种念头中断了上千次，难得一次圆满成形。它们中断了：它们与我无关了。‘即使线条与色彩消失，它们依然存在，所以……’

'I am yawning. I am glutted with sensations. I am exhausted with the strain and the long, long time—twenty-five minutes, half an hour—that I have held myself alone outside the machine. I grow numb; I grow stiff. How shall I break up this numbness which discredits my sympathetic heart? There are others suffering—multitudes of people suffering. Neville suffers. He loved Percival. But I can no longer endure extremities; I want someone with whom to laugh, with whom to yawn, with whom to remember how he scratched his head; someone he was at ease with and liked (not Susan, whom he loved, but Jinny rather). In her room also I could do penance. I could ask, Did he tell you how I refused him when he asked me to go to Hampton Court that day? Those are the thoughts that will wake me leaping in anguish in the middle of the night—the crimes for which one would do penance in all the markets of the world bareheaded; that one did not go to Hampton Court that day.

“我在打哈欠。我厌倦了种种激情。绷紧的神经，漫长的时间——25分钟，半个小时——我一直独自坚守在那架机器之外，弄得我筋疲力尽。我变得麻木了；我变得僵硬了。这种麻木令我的同情之心蒙了耻辱，我该如何消除它呢？别人正在经受痛苦——许许多多的人正在经受痛苦。内维尔也在痛苦之中。他曾深爱着珀西瓦尔。但是我再也无法承受死亡；我希望有个人与我一起笑，一起打哈欠，一起回忆他怎么挠头；一个他喜欢的并相处融洽的人（不是他曾爱过的苏珊，而是吉尼，确切地说）。同时，我可以在她的房间里忏悔。我可以问：他跟你讲过那天他邀请我到汉普顿宫去的时候我是怎么拒绝他的么？一想到这些，它们就会让我半夜里从痛苦中惊跳起来——这些都是会让一个人在世界的所有集市上脱帽忏悔的罪过啊；竟然有个人那天没去汉普顿宫。

'But now I want life round me, and books and little ornaments, and the usual sounds of tradesmen calling on which to pillow my head after this exhaustion, and shut my eyes after this revelation. I will go straight, then, down the stairs, and hail the first taxi and drive to Jinny.'

“但是现在，我希望我的周围充满生气，书籍，小饰物，以及商人们日常的吆喝声，好让我在这番精疲力尽之后枕一枕脑袋，在这番醒悟之后合上我的双眼。然后我要径直走下楼去，叫上遇到的第一辆出租车，开向吉尼那里。”

'There is the puddle,' said Rhoda, 'and I cannot cross it. I hear the rush of the great grindstone within an inch of my head. Its wind roars in my face. All palpable forms of life have failed me. Unless I can stretch and touch something hard, I shall be blown down the eternal corridors for ever. What, then, can I touch? What brick, what stone? and so draw myself across the enormous gulf into my body safely?

“那儿有个水坑，”罗达说，“我无法跨越它。我听见巨大的磨刀石冲到了距离我脑袋一英寸的地方。它裹挟而来的风在我脸上嘶吼。一切可感知的生命形式都背弃了我。如果我不能舒展开来，触摸到什么坚实的东西，我就会被永远地吹进遥无尽头的通道中去。那么，我能触摸到什么呢？什么样的砖头，什么样的石块？能帮我跨过这巨大的深坑而平安地回到我的躯体中呢？

'Now the shadow has fallen and the purple light slants downwards. The figure that was robed in beauty is now clothed in ruin. The figure that stood in the grove where the steep-backed hills come down falls in ruin, as I told them when they said they loved his voice on the stair, and his old shoes and moments of being together.

“现在影子落下来了，紫色的光斜照下来。曾经披着美好外衣的身影此时被裹进了褴褛中。当他们说，他们喜爱他在楼梯上的说话声、他的旧鞋子以及那些共度的时光，我告诉他们，那个屹立在嶙峋峭壁之下小树林中的身影已经化作了废墟。

'Now I will walk down Oxford Street envisaging a world rent by lightning; I will look at oaks cracked asunder and red where the flowering branch has fallen. I will go to Oxford Street and buy stockings for a party. I will do the usual things under the lightning flash. On the bare ground I will pick violets and bind them together and offer them to Percival, something given him by me. Look now at what Percival has given me. Look at the street now that Percival is dead. The houses are lightly founded to be puffed over by a breath of air. Reckless and random the cars race and roar and hunt us to death like bloodhounds. I am alone in a hostile world. The human face is hideous. This is to my liking. I want publicity and violence and to be dashed like a stone on the rocks. I like factory chimneys and cranes and lorries. I like the passing of face and face and face, deformed, indifferent. I am sick of prettiness; I am sick of privacy. I ride rough waters and shall sink with no one to save me.

“现在我要走向牛津大街，正视一个被闪电划破的世界；我要看看那些橡树，花枝折断之处，四分五裂，血红淋漓。我要去往牛津大街，为一场聚会买些长袜。即使在电光之下，我也要做好通常的事情。即使在光秃秃的地上，我也要采来紫罗兰花，扎到一起，献给珀西瓦尔，这是我给他的东西啊。现在瞧瞧珀西瓦尔给了我什么吧。既然珀西瓦尔已经死了，瞧瞧这条大街吧。房子建得轻飘飘的，一口气就能吹倒。汽车横冲直撞，呼啸而过，像寻血犬一样直把我们逼向死路。我孤单一人，走在一个充满敌意的世界。人类的面孔那么丑恶。这正合我的喜好。我渴望公众的注意，渴望暴力，渴望像一枚石子在岩石上被砸碎。我喜欢工厂的烟囱、吊车和卡车。我喜欢来来往往的一张又一张面孔，扭曲而冷漠。我厌烦了美丽；我厌烦了隐私。我驾乘着汹涌的潮水，我会沉没的，但没有人会来救我。

'Percival, by his death, has made me this present, has revealed this terror, has left me to undergo this humiliation—faces and faces, served out like soup-plates by scullions; coarse, greedy, casual; looking in at shop-windows with pendent parcels; ogling, brushing, destroying everything, leaving even our love impure, touched now by their dirty fingers.

“珀西瓦尔的死，让我领受了这份礼物，让我看到了这份恐怖，他撇下我独自承受这份屈辱——源源不断的面孔，像汤盘一样被仆人们端了出来；粗劣、贪婪、漫不经心；提着大包小包从橱窗朝里观望；眉目传情，搔首弄姿，把一切都糟践了，甚至我俩的爱情，现在经他们肮脏的手指一碰，也变得不那么纯洁了。

'Here is the shop where they sell stockings. And I could believe that beauty is once more set flowing. Its whisper comes down these aisles, through these laces, breathing among baskets of coloured ribbons. There are then warm hollows grooved in the heart of the uproar; alcoves of silence where we can shelter under the wing of beauty from truth which I desire. Pain is suspended as a girl silently slides open a drawer. And then, she speaks; her voice wakes me. I shoot to the bottom among the weeds and see envy, jealousy, hatred and spite scuttle like crabs over the sand as she speaks. These are our companions. I will pay my bill and take my parcel.

“这儿是一家卖长袜的商店。我简直可以相信美好又一次涌现了。它的轻声软语漫过这些通道，透过这些花边，弥散在装满五彩缎带的篮子间。那么在这喧嚣的中心尚可凿出温暖的凹处；尚有寂静的密室，我们可以隐藏其中，在美好的羽翼下，躲开我所渴望的真实。在一个女孩轻轻拉开抽屉时，痛苦暂停了。然后，她说话了；她的声音惊醒了我。我拨开杂草，一探究竟，我看见艳羡、嫉妒、仇视和怨恨随着她的话语仓皇逃遁，好像沙滩上的螃蟹。这些是我们的同伴。我要付账买下我看中的那包东西。

'This is Oxford Street. Here are hate, jealousy, hurry, and indifference frothed into the wild semblance of life. These are our companions. Consider the friends with whom we sit and eat. I think of Louis, reading the sporting column of an evening newspaper, afraid of ridicule; a snob. He says, looking at the people passing, he will shepherd us if we will follow. If we submit he will reduce us to order. Thus he will smooth out the death of Percival to his satisfaction, looking fixedly over the cruet, past the houses at the sky. Bernard, meanwhile, flops red-eyed into some arm-chair. He will have out his notebook; under D, he will enter "Phrases to be used on the deaths of friends". Jinny, pirouetting across the room, will perch on the arm of his chair and ask, "Did he love me?" "More than he loved Susan?" Susan, engaged to her farmer in the country, will stand for a second with the telegram before her, holding a plate; and then, with a kick of her heel, slam to the oven door. Neville, after staring at the window through his tears, will see through his tears, and ask, "Who passes the window?"—"What lovely boy！" This is my tribute to Percival; withered violets, blackened violets.

“这是牛津大街。这儿的仇恨、嫉妒、匆忙和冷漠，像泡沫一样形成了生活的粗野外表。这些是我们的同伴。想想与我们坐在一起吃饭的朋友们吧。我想起路易斯，他在阅读一份晚报的体育专栏，怕被人耻笑；一个假内行。看着来往的人流，他说，如果我们愿意追随，他将引领着我们。如果我们顺从，他会把我们约束在秩序之内。这样他就遂其所愿地抚平了珀西瓦尔之死带来的伤痛，他的目光越过那个佐料瓶，经过那些房屋，注视着苍天。同时，伯纳德猛地坐到某个扶手椅里，眼睛红红的。他掏出自己的笔记本；在D栏下面，他加进了‘用于朋友去世时的词汇’。吉尼踮着脚尖旋转过屋子，像小鸟儿一样落在他的椅子扶手上，问道：‘他爱过我么？’‘胜过他爱苏珊？’苏珊已经与她那位乡下的农夫订了婚，她端着盘子，看着眼前的电报，愣怔了一秒钟；然后，脚跟一抬，踢向烤炉的门。透过泪水向窗外凝视了一会儿之后，内维尔泪眼模糊地望着窗外，问道：‘谁从窗前经过？’——‘多么潇洒的男孩！’这是我给珀西瓦尔的献礼；枯萎的紫罗兰，发黑的紫罗兰。

'Where shall I go then? To some museum, where they keep rings under glass cases, where there are cabinets, and the dresses that queens have worn? Or shall I go to Hampton Court and look at the red walls and courtyards and the seemliness of herded yew trees making black pyramids symmetrically on the grass among flowers? There shall I recover beauty, and impose order upon my raked, my dishevelled soul? But what can one make in loneliness? Alone I should stand on the empty grass and say, Rooks fly; somebody passes with a bag; there is a gardener with a wheelbarrow. I should stand in a queue and smell sweat, and scent as horrible as sweat; and be hung with other people like a joint of meat among other joints of meat.

“接下来我要去哪儿呢？去某个博物馆看看存放在玻璃盒子下的戒指，还有那些小陈列室以及王后们穿过的礼服？或者去汉普顿宫看看那里的红墙和庭院，还有一簇簇彬彬有礼的紫杉树，它们在花间草地上形成对称的黑色金字塔？在那儿，我会重新找回美好，使我残破、凌乱的灵魂趋于平复？可是一个人在孤单之中能做些什么呢？孤孤单单地，我可能会站在空阔的草地上，自言自语，秃鼻乌鸦飞了；有人提着包裹走了过去，有个园丁推着一辆独轮车。我可能会站在队伍中，闻着汗味以及与汗味同样难闻的气味；与其他人吊在一起，好像一块肉吊在其他的肉中间。

'Here is a hall where one pays money and goes in, where one hears music among somnolent people who have come here after lunch on a hot afternoon. We have eaten beef and pudding enough to live for a week without tasting food. Therefore we cluster like maggots on the back of something that will carry us on. Decorous, portly—we have white hair waved under our hats; slim shoes; little bags; clean-shaven cheeks; here and there a military moustache; not a speck of dust has been allowed to settle anywhere on our broadcloth. Swaying and opening programmes, with a few words of greeting to friends, we settle down, like walruses stranded on rocks, like heavy bodies incapable of waddling to the sea, hoping for a wave to lift us, but we are too heavy, and too much dry shingle lies between us and the sea. We lie gorged with food, torpid in the heat. Then, swollen but contained in slippery satin, the seagreen woman comes to our rescue. She sucks in her lips, assumes an air of intensity, inflates herself and hurls herself precisely at the right moment as if she saw an apple and her voice was the arrow into the note, "Ah!"

“这儿是个大厅，你花了钱就可以进去，混在那些昏昏欲睡的人们中间听听音乐，这些人在炎热的午后吃过午饭就来到这里。我们吃过了牛肉和布丁，足以维持一个星期而无需再吃东西。因此我们像蛆虫一样聚集在某个东西的背上，任由它驮着我们前行。端庄得体，大腹便便——帽子下面，我们白发飘飘；修长的鞋子；小巧的提包；刮得干干净净的面颊；零星可见军人式的唇髭；我们的绒面呢衣服上面纤尘不染。抖一抖节目单把它打开，向朋友们招呼几声，我们安顿下来，像搁浅在礁石上的海象，笨重的身体无法摆回大海，希望有一股海浪把我们浮起来，可是我们过于笨重，又有太多干硬沙石横在我们与大海之间。我们被食物撑得饱饱的，有气无力地躺在炎热之中。这时，那位臃肿但裹着光滑绸缎，一身海绿色的女人过来解救了我们。她抿着嘴唇，显出专注的样子，她充足了气，准确而不失时机地弹了出去，仿佛她看见一只苹果，‘啊’的一声是她射向目标的那支箭。

'An axe has split a tree to the core; the core is warm; sound quivers within the bark.

“斧头劈进树的中心；树的中心是温暖的；树皮里面声音颤动。

"Ah!" cried a woman to her lover, leaning from her window in Venice.

‘啊！’在威尼斯，曾有一个女人从她的窗口探出头来，向她的情人呼喊。

"Ah, ah!" she cried, and again she cries "Ah!" She has provided us with a cry. But only a cry. And what is a cry? Then the beetle-shaped men come with their violins; wait; count; nod; down come their bows. And there is ripple and laughter like the dance of olive trees and their myriad-tongued grey leaves when a seafarer, biting a twig between his lips where the many-backed steep hills come down, leaps on shore.

‘啊，啊！’她曾呼喊过，她又在呼喊：‘啊！’她让我们听到一声呼喊。但只是一声呼喊而已。而一声呼喊算什么？这时，甲虫模样的男人们带着他们的小提琴过来了；等待着；算计着；点着头；哈下腰。而在那峭壁嶙峋的山岭交汇之处，一位水手，嘴上衔着一根树枝跳到岸上，荡起了阵阵涟漪，阵阵笑声，仿佛橄榄树和它们无数舌头似的灰色叶子在舞蹈。

‘"Like" and "like" and "like"—but what is the thing that lies beneath the semblance of the thing? Now that lightning has gashed the tree and the flowering branch has fallen and Percival, by his death, has made me this gift, let me see the thing. There is a square; there is an oblong. The players take the square and place it upon the oblong. They place it very accurately; they make a perfect dwelling-place. Very little is left outside. The structure is now visible; what is inchoate is here stated; we are not so various or so mean; we have made oblongs and stood them upon squares. This is our triumph; this is our consolation.

“‘好像’，‘好像’，‘好像’——但是在事物的外表下隐藏着什么东西呢？既然闪电劈开了这棵树，花枝也已经折断，而且珀西瓦尔用他的死给我留下了这份礼物，那就让我看看那个东西吧。有一个正方形；有一个长方形。运动员们拿起正方形放在长方形上面。他们放得非常准确；他们造出一个完美的居所。几乎没有什么露在外面。现在可以看出构架了；这里阐述了尚未成形的东西；我们并非那么多才多艺，也并非那么平庸；我们造出了长方形，把它们立于正方形之上。这是我们的胜利；这是我们的安慰。

'The sweetness of this content overflowing runs down the walls of my mind, and liberates understanding. Wander no more, I say; this is the end. The oblong has been set upon the square; the spiral is on top. We have been hauled over the shingle, down to the sea. The players come again. But they are mopping their faces. They are no longer so spruce or so debonair. I will go. I will set aside this afternoon. I will make a pilgrimage. I will go to Greenwich. I will fling myself fearlessly into trams, into omnibuses. As we lurch down Regent Street, and I am flung upon this woman, upon this man, I am not injured, I am not outraged by the collision. A square stands upon an oblong. Here are mean streets where chaffering goes on in street markets, and every sort of iron rod, bolt and screw is laid out, and people swarm off the pavement, pinching raw meat with thick fingers. The structure is visible. We have made a dwelling-place.

“这番洋溢着的心满意足的甜蜜流过我的脑际，也冲开了理解上的桎梏。别再游荡了，我说；这就是结局。长方形置于正方形之上；螺旋形在顶端。我们被拖过沙石，拖向大海。运动员们又来了。但是他们在擦脸。他们不再那么潇洒自如，也不再那么温文尔雅。我要走了。我要空出这个午后。我要做一次朝拜。我要去格林威治。我要无所畏惧地跳上电车，跳上公共马车。我们的车在摄政大街突然发生了倾斜，我被抛到一个女人身上，又被抛到一个男人身上，我没受伤，也没因为冲撞而恼火。正方形立于长方形之上。这儿是平庸的街道，街市上随处都在讨价还价，各种钢条、螺栓和螺钉罗列两旁，人们蜂拥走下人行步道，用粗厚的手指捏着生肉。可以看得见构架了。我们造了一处安居之地。

'These, then, are the flowers that grow among the rough grasses of the field which the cows trample, wind-bitten, almost deformed, without fruit or blossom. These are what I bring, torn up by the roots from the pavement of Oxford Street, my penny bunch, my penny bunch of violets. Now from the window of the tram I see masts among chimneys; there is the river; there are ships that sail to India. I will walk by the river. I will pace this embankment, where an old man reads a newspaper in a glass shelter. I will pace this terrace and watch the ships bowling down the tide. A woman walks on deck, with a dog barking round her. Her skirts are blown; her hair is blown; they are going out to sea; they are leaving us; they are vanishing this summer evening. Now I will relinquish; now I will let loose. Now I will at last free the checked, the jerked—back desire to be spent, to be consumed. We will gallop together over desert hills where the swallow dips her wings in dark pools and the pillars stand entire. Into the wave that dashes upon the shore, into the wave that flings its white foam to the uttermost corners of the earth, I throw my violets, my offering to Percival.'

“那么，这些就是长在田间野草丛中的花了，它们被母牛践踏，大风摧残，几乎变了形，既不结果也不开花。这些就是我带过来的东西，它们是从牛津大街的人行步道上连根拔起来的，我的一便士花束，我的一便士紫罗兰花束。此刻，透过电车的车窗，我看见烟囱之间的桅杆；有一条河；有一些驶向印度的船。我要在河边走一走。我要慢慢走过这里的岸堤，岸堤上有位老人在玻璃棚下读着报纸。我要慢慢走过这里的平台，望着船只破浪而行。一个女人在甲板上散步，一条狗绕着她吠叫。她的裙裾随风鼓荡；她的秀发随风飘扬；他们正驶向大海；他们正离开我们；在这个夏季的傍晚，他们正渐渐远去。此刻我要放弃；此刻我要放松。此刻我终于要释放从前那受到压制、受到阻抑的欲望：消磨人生，死而后已。我们要结伴驰骋，越过荒山野岭，看燕子展翅，轻快地划过幽暗的池水，看廊柱耸立，齐刷刷的。我要把这些紫罗兰，这份给予珀西瓦尔的献礼扔掉，扔进撞击海岸的海浪之中，扔进白沫飞溅遍布大地各个角落的海浪之中。”

The sun no longer stood in the middle of the sky. Its light slanted, falling obliquely. Here it caught on the edge of a cloud and burnt it into a slice of light, a blazing island on which no foot could rest. Then another cloud was caught in the light and another and another, so that the waves beneath were arrow-struck with fiery feathered darts that shot erratically across the quivering blue.

太阳不再立于中天。它的光芒斜照下来。这会儿，它攀上一朵云彩的边沿，映出一片光明，一座熊熊燃烧的无人岛。接着，又有一朵云彩被罩在光芒中，然后又有下一朵，下一朵，以至于下面的海浪也被颤动的蔚蓝之中随意射出的火红色羽箭击中了。

The topmost leaves of the tree were crisped in the sun. They rustled stiffly in the random breeze. The birds sat still save that they flicked their heads sharply from side to side. Now they paused in their song as if glutted with sound, as if the fullness of midday had gorged them. The dragon-fly poised motionless over a reed, then shot its blue stitch further through the air. The far hum in the distance seemed made of the broken tremor of fine wings dancing up and down on the horizon. The river water held the reeds now fixed as if glass had hardened round them; and then the glass wavered and the reeds swept low. Pondering, sunken headed, the cattle stood in the fields and cumbrously moved one foot and then another. In the bucket near the house the tap stopped dripping, as if the bucket were full, and then the tap dripped one, two, three separate drops in succession.

阳光下，树梢的叶子起了皱纹。它们在肆意的微风中局促地发出沙沙声。鸟儿停着不动，只是机敏地转动脑袋，忽左忽右。此时，它们的歌声停顿下来，仿佛它们厌腻了声音，仿佛正午的充实使它们感到了餍足。蜻蜓一动不动地停在一棵芦苇上面，然后把它的蓝色细身躯高高地刺向天空。远处传来隐约的嗡嗡声，仿佛是正在天边上下舞动的纤细的翅膀发出的时断时续的颤音。这时，河水拥着芦苇，直挺挺的，仿佛玻璃在它们周围凝固了；然后，玻璃开始晃动，芦苇倒伏下来。牛儿站在田地里，垂着头，思索着，一步一步笨重地挪着。房子近旁的储水桶里，龙头不再往下滴水，仿佛桶里已经装满，但是过了一会儿，龙头又接连地滴出水来，一滴，两滴，三滴。

The windows showed erratically spots of burning fire, the elbow of one branch, and then some tranquil space of pure clarity. The blind hung red at the window's edge and within the room daggers of light fell upon chairs and tables making cracks across their lacquer and polish. The green pot bulged enormously, with its white window elongated in its side. Light driving darkness before it spilt itself profusely upon the corners and bosses; and yet heaped up darkness in mounds of unmoulded shape.

窗户上面不定时地映出点点火光，一根弯折的树枝，然后是一片静谧的澄澈透明的空白。红艳艳的帷幔垂在窗边，房间里，光芒的利刃刺在椅子和桌子上，使它们整个的漆面和光面形成一道道裂纹。绿色的水罐鼓得很大，侧面的白色透气口拉得很长。光芒一边驱退黑暗，一边慷慨地洒向各个角落和各种凸饰；不过黑暗又在它的前面聚成无可名状的一堆。

The waves massed themselves, curved their backs and crashed. Up spurted stones and shingle. They swept round the rocks, and the spray, leaping high, spattered the walls of a cave that had been dry before, and left pools inland, where some fish stranded lashed its tail as the wave drew back.

海浪汹涌，起伏，迸碎。溅起沙石。它们掠过岩石，激起高高的浪花，溅湿了原本干燥的洞穴四壁，并且在内陆留下一些水潭，随着海浪的退去，一些困在里面的鱼没命地抽打着尾巴。

'I have signed my name,' said Louis, 'already twenty times. I, and again I, and again I. Clear, firm, unequivocal, there it stands, my name. Clear-cut and unequivocal am I too. Yet a vast inheritance of experience is packed in me. I have lived thousands of years. I am like a worm that has eaten its way through the wood of a very old oak beam. But now I am compact; now I am gathered together this fine morning.

“我已经签下名字，”路易斯说，“足有20次之多了。我，又是我，还是我。清楚，果断，毫不含糊，我的名字赫然醒目。轮廓鲜明，毫不含糊，也是我的写照。可是我的身上背负了承继下来的大量经验。我活过了数千年。我像一只蛀虫，蛀透了十分古老的橡树干。但是此刻，我一身轻装；此刻，在这个美好的早晨，我精神焕发。

'The sun shines from a clear sky. But twelve o'clock brings neither rain nor sunshine. It is the hour when Miss Johnson brings me my letters in a wire tray. Upon these white sheets I indent my name. The whisper of leaves, water running down gutters, green depths flecked with dahlias or zinnias; I, now a duke, now Plato, companion of Socrates; the tramp of dark men and yellow men migrating east, west, north and south; the eternal procession, women going with attaché cases down the Strand as they went once with pitchers to the Nile; all the furled and close-packed leaves of my many-folded life are now summed in my name; incised cleanly and barely on the sheet. Now a full-grown man; now upright standing in sun or rain. I must drop heavy as a hatchet and cut the oak with my sheer weight, for if I deviate, glancing this way, or that way, I shall fall like snow and be wasted.

“太阳在明朗的天空闪耀。但是12点钟既不会带来雨，也不会带来阳光。这个钟点是约翰逊小姐端着镍网托盘给我送来信件的时候。在这些白色的纸张上面，我要印下我的名字。树叶在低语，水流下沟渠，浓绿中点缀着大丽花或百日草；我时而是位公爵，时而是柏拉图，苏格拉底的朋友；是飘荡四方的黑种人和黄种人中的流浪汉；是永恒的队列，女人们带着公文包走过斯特兰德大街，就像她们曾经提着水罐走向尼罗河一样；我波澜起伏的人生当中所有那些卷折起来并压得紧紧的篇章，此刻都凝聚在我的名字之中；清清楚楚、明明白白地刻印在纸张之上。此刻，我是一个完全成熟的男人；此刻，我傲然屹立于阳光或风雨之中。我必须像斧头一样重重地落下，用我全部的力量劈向那棵橡树，因为假如我左顾右盼，有所偏离，我会像雪花坠落，虚掷一生。

'I am half in love with the typewriter and the telephone. With letters and cables and brief but courteous commands on the telephone to Paris, Berlin, New York, I have fused my many lives into one; I have helped by my assiduity and decision to score those lines on the map there by which the different parts of the world are laced together. I love punctually at ten to come into my room; I love the purple glow of the dark mahogany; I love the table and its sharp edge; and the smooth-running drawers. I love the telephone with its lip stretched to my whisper, and the date on the wall; and the engagement book. Mr Prentice at four; Mr Eyres sharp at four-thirty.

“我几乎爱上了打字机和电话机。通过信件和电报，以及发向巴黎、柏林和纽约的简洁而不失礼仪的电话指令，我把我的多种生活融而为一；我以我的勤勉与决断帮助画出了地图上的那些线，通过它们，世界上不同的地方得以联系在一起。我爱在10点钟准时走进我的房间；我爱那幽暗的红木发出的紫色光芒；我爱那张桌子和它鲜明的棱角；还有那些活动自如的抽匣。我爱那部电话机，它的话筒接收了我的低语，以及墙上的日期；还有那本约会簿。四点，普伦蒂斯先生；四点半整，艾尔斯先生。

'I like to be asked to come to Mr Burchard's private room and report on our commitments to China. I hope to inherit an arm-chair and a Turkey carpet. My shoulder is to the wheel; I roll the dark before me, spreading commerce where there was chaos in the far parts of the world. If I press on,—from chaos making order, I shall find myself where Chatham stood, and Pitt, Burke and Sir Robert Peel. Thus I expunge certain stains, and erase old defilements; the woman who gave me a flag from the top of the Christmas tree; my accent; beatings and other tortures; the boasting boys; my father, a banker at Brisbane.

“我喜欢被请进伯查德先生的私人房间，汇报我们对中国方面的业务状况。我希望继承一把扶手椅和一条土耳其地毯。我的肩膀抵着车轮；我推开前方的黑暗，把业务拓展到发生骚乱的那些遥远的地方。如果我坚持不懈——在骚乱中建立秩序，我会让自己位于查塔姆、皮特、伯克和罗伯特·皮尔爵士之列。这样我就可以消除某些污点，擦掉旧日的耻辱；从圣诞树梢拔给我一面小旗帜的那个女人；我的口音；体罚和种种折磨；吹牛皮的男孩们；我的父亲，一位布里斯班的银行家。

'I have read my poet in an eating-house, and, stirring my coffee, listened to the clerks making bets at the little tables, watched the women hesitating at the counter. I said that nothing should be irrelevant, like a piece of brown paper dropped casually on the floor. I said their journeys should have an end in view; they should earn their two pound ten a week at the command of an august master; some hand, some robe, should fold us about in the evening. When I have healed these fractures and comprehended these monstrosities so that they need neither excuse nor apology, which both waste our strength, I shall give back to the street and the eating-shop what they lost when they fell on these hard times and broke on these stony beaches. I shall assemble a few words and forge round us a hammered ring of beaten steel.

“我曾在一家餐馆里读我的诗，而且一边搅着咖啡，一边听职员们在小桌子边上打赌，看女人们在柜台边上迟疑不决。我说过，凡事不该不合时宜，比如褐色的纸片随意落在地板上这种事。我说过，他们的奔波总该有个目的；他们总该在一位威严的上司的指示下赚到两镑十先令；到了晚上，总该有一只手为我们裹上一件睡袍。当我治愈了这些创伤，理解了这些畸形儿，他们就无需辩解也无需道歉了，因为那只会浪费我们的力气，我会把他们在艰难时世下跌倒及在多石的海滩上折断筋骨时所失去的东西归还给街道和餐馆。我要组织起几个词儿，锤炼出一道锻铁的环，把我们围在里面。

'But now I have not a moment to spare. There is no respite here, no shadow made of quivering leaves, or alcove to which one can retreat from the sun, to sit, with a lover, in the cool of the evening. The weight of the world is on our shoulders; its vision is through our eyes; if we blink or look aside, or turn back to finger what Plato said or remember Napoleon and his conquests, we inflict on the world the injury of some obliquity. This is life; Mr Prentice at four; Mr Eyres at four-thirty. I like to hear the soft rush of the lift and the thud with which it stops on my landing and the heavy male tread of responsible feet down the corridors. So by dint of our united exertions we send ships to the remotest parts of the globe; replete with lavatories and gymnasiums. The weight of the world is on our shoulders. This is life. If I press on, I shall inherit a chair and a rug; a place in Surrey with glass houses, and some rare conifer, melon or flowering tree which other merchants will envy.

“但是现在我抽不出片刻时间。在这儿，没有间歇，没有枝叶摇曳形成的树阴，也没有凉亭让人避开阳光，与爱人一起坐在黄昏的凉意里。世界的重担压在我们的肩上；它的愿景映入我们的眼帘；如果我们眨一下眼睛，或者向旁边望一眼，或者转身琢磨琢磨柏拉图所言、回想一下拿破仑与他的无往不摧，我们就会间接地让世界遭受伤害。这就是生活；普伦蒂斯先生约在四点；艾尔斯先生约在四点半。我喜欢听电梯飞驰而上的悦耳声，然后砰地停在我的楼层，那个担着责任的男人迈着沉重的脚步穿过走廊。就这样，凭借我们的齐心合力，我们把船只发往地球上最遥远的地方；船上的盥洗室和健身房一应俱全。世界的重担落在我们肩上。这就是生活。如果我坚持不懈，我会继承一把椅子和一块地毯；萨里郡的一处地产，有暖房，有罕见的针叶树、甜瓜或花树，会令其他商人艳羡不已。

'Yet I still keep my attic room. There I open the usual little book; there I watch the rain glisten on the tiles till they shine like a policeman's waterproof; there I see the broken windows in poor people's houses; the lean cats; some slattern squinting in a cracked looking-glass as she arranges her face for the street corner; there Rhoda sometimes comes. For we are lovers.

“不过我依然保留着我的阁楼房间。我在那儿翻开通常的小册子；我在那儿望着雨滴亮闪闪地落在屋瓦上，使得那些瓦片像警察的防雨衣似的发出光来；我在那儿看着贫穷人家的破碎窗户；那些瘦弱的猫；某个妓女一边照着破镜子挤眉弄眼，一边梳妆打扮准备上街；罗达有时也会到那儿。因为我们是恋人。

'Percival has died (he died in Egypt; he died in Greece; all deaths are one death). Susan has children; Neville mounts rapidly to the conspicuous heights. Life passes. The clouds change perpetually over our houses. I do this, do that, and again do this and then that. Meeting and parting, we assemble different forms, make different patterns. But if I do not nail these impressions to the board and out of the many men in me make one; exist here and now and not in streaks and patches, like scattered snow wreaths on far mountains; and ask Miss Johnson as I pass through the office about the movies and take my cup of tea and accept also my favourite biscuit, then I shall fall like snow and be wasted.

“珀西瓦尔死了（他死在埃及；他死在希腊；死在哪里都是一样）。苏珊有了孩子；内维尔很快爬上显赫的高位。生活在流逝。我们屋顶的云彩变幻不停。我做做这，做做那，然后又是做做这，做做那。合合分分之中，我们变成了不同的模样，形成了不同的风格。但是假如我不把这些印象牢牢钉在木板上，让我身上的许多人合而为一；假如我只存在于此时此地，而不像散落在远山上的雪冠那样赫然醒目；假如我在穿过办公室时只是询问约翰逊小姐关于电影的情况，然后喝一杯茶，再接过我最爱的饼干，那么我就会像雪花一样坠落，虚掷一生。

'Yet when six o'clock comes and I touch my hat to the commissionaire, being always too effusive in ceremony since I desire so much to be accepted; and struggle, leaning against the wind, buttoned up, with my jaws blue and my eyes running water, I wish that a little typist would cuddle on my knees; I think that my favourite dish is liver and bacon; and so am apt to wander to the river, to the narrow streets where there are frequent public-houses, and the shadows of ships passing at the end of the street, and women fighting. But I say to myself, recovering my sanity, Mr Prentice at four; Mr Eyres at four-thirty. The hatchet must fall on the block; the oak must be cleft to the centre. The weight of the world is on my shoulders. Here is the pen and the paper; on the letters in the wire basket I sign my name, I, I, and again I.'

“可是当六点一到，我向看门人触帽致意，因为我十分渴望被人接纳所以总是表现得过于注重礼节；我艰难前行，迎着风，扣紧衣扣，我的下巴乌青，我的眼睛流出泪水，这时我希望有一位小巧的打字员依偎在我的膝上；我会想到我最爱的一道菜是肝配熏肉；我可能会溜达到河边，溜达到狭窄的街道，那里有很多酒吧，街道尽头有往来的船影，还有打架的女人。但是当我恢复了理智，我自言自语道，普伦蒂斯先生约在四点；艾尔斯先生约在四点半。斧头一定要落到木头上；橡树一定要被劈到中心。世界的重担落在我的肩上。眼前是钢笔和文件；在铁丝信筐里的那些信件上面，我签下我的名字，我，我，还是我。”

'Summer comes, and winter,' said Susan. 'The seasons pass. The pear fills itself and drops from the tree. The dead leaf rests on its edge. But steam has obscured the window. I sit by the fire watching the kettle boil. I see the pear tree through the streaked steam on the window-pane.

“夏天来了，接着是冬天。”苏珊说。“四季匆匆而过。梨熟了，从树上落了下来。它上面还挂着一片枯叶。但是水汽蒙上了那扇窗。我坐在炉火边，看着水壶烧开。透过窗玻璃上袅袅的水汽，我看见了那棵梨树。

'Sleep, sleep, I croon, whether it is summer or winter, May or November. Sleep I sing—I, who am unmelodious and hear no music save rustic music when a dog barks, a bell tinkles, or wheels crunch upon the gravel. I sing my song by the fire like an old shell murmuring on the beach. Sleep, sleep, I say, warning off with my voice all who rattle milk-cans, fire at rooks, shoot rabbits, or in any way bring the shock of destruction near this wicker cradle, laden with soft limbs, curled under a pink coverlet.

“睡吧，睡吧，我轻轻地唱，无论夏天还是冬天，五月还是十一月。我唱着催眠曲——尽管我并不入调，也从来听不到音乐，除了那些乡间的音乐：狗的吠叫，钟的叮当，或是车轮吱吱嘎嘎碾过砾石路。我在炉火边唱着我的歌，像一只老贝在海滩上嘀嘀咕咕。睡吧，睡吧，我不停地说，想用我的声音提醒所有摇动奶罐的人，射击秃鼻乌鸦的人，射杀兔子的人，或者不管用什么方式在这个藤条摇篮边上惹起毁灭性惊吓的人，摇篮里，娇嫩的肢体蜷缩在粉红色的床罩下面。

'I have lost my indifference, my blank eyes, my pear-shaped eyes that saw to the root. I am no longer January, May or any other season, but am all spun to a fine thread round the cradle, wrapping in a cocoon made of my own blood the delicate limbs of my baby. Sleep, I say, and feel within me uprush some wilder, darker violence, so that I would fell down with one blow any intruder, any snatcher, who should break into this room and wake the sleeper.

“我已失去了淡然的心态、纯粹的目光和探求根源梨形的眼睛。我不再是一月、五月或者其他任何一个季节，而是全身心地在摇篮边吐出细丝，用我自己的血肉凝成一个茧，裹住我宝宝娇嫩的肢体。睡吧，我说，立时感觉我的胸中涌上一股愈发狂野、愈发深沉的力量，任何外来者，任何强盗，若是胆敢闯进房间，惊醒睡着的孩子，我都会一拳击倒他们。

'I pad about the house all day long in apron and slippers, like my mother who died of cancer. Whether it is summer, whether it is winter, I no longer know by the moor grass, and the heath flower; only by the steam on the window-pane, or the frost on the window-pane. When the lark peels high his ring of sound and it falls through the air like an apple paring, I stoop; I feed my baby. I, who used to walk through beech woods noting the jay's feather turning blue as it falls, past the shepherd and the tramp, who stared at the woman squatted beside a tilted cart in a ditch, go from room to room with a duster. Sleep, I say, desiring sleep to fall like a blanket of down and cover these weak limbs; demanding that life shall sheathe its claws and gird its lightning and pass by, making of my own body a hollow, a warm shelter for my child to sleep in. Sleep, I say, sleep. Or I go to the window, I look at the rook's high nest; and the pear tree. "His eyes will see when mine are shut," I think. "I shall go mixed with them beyond my body and shall see India. He will come home, bringing trophies to be laid at my feet. He will increase my possessions."

“我系着围裙，趿拉着拖鞋，成天围着屋子转，像我那死于癌症的母亲一样。是不是夏天到了，是不是冬天来了，我不再凭着酸沼草原和石南花做出判断；而只看窗玻璃上是不是凝了水汽，或者结了霜花。当云雀的鸣叫高高地抛上天空，又像苹果皮一样划破空气落下来时，我俯下身来；我开始喂我的宝宝。我过去常常从山毛榉树丛中走过，注意到鸟儿下落时它的羽毛会变成蓝色，从牧羊人和流浪汉的身旁走过，他们定睛望着一个蹲在沟渠里一辆倾斜的推车旁边的女人，这个我拿着掸子走过一个个房间。睡吧，我说，我渴望睡意降临，像毯子一样，罩住这些柔弱的肢体；我要求生活收起它的利爪，收起它的闪电，悄悄走过，让我的身体变成一个洞穴，一个温暖的庇护所，让我的孩子在里面安睡。睡吧，我说，睡吧。或者我来到窗前，我望着秃鼻乌鸦那高高的窝；还有那株梨树。‘当我闭上眼睛时，他的眼睛会看得见。’我想。‘我会超越我的身体，和它们融合在一起，我会看到印度。他会衣锦还乡，带回各种战利品，摆在我的脚下。他会增加我的财富。’

'But I never rise at dawn and see the purple drops in the cabbage leaves; the red drops in the roses. I do not watch the setter nose in a circle, or lie at night watching the leaves hide the stars and the stars move and the leaves hang still. The butcher calls; the milk has to be stood under a shade lest it should sour.

“但是我再也不会在黎明时起身，去看卷心菜叶子上的紫色露珠；玫瑰花上的红色露珠。我不会望着猎犬用鼻子转着圈嗅，也不会在晚上躺下来，望着树叶藏住了星星，而星星在移动，树叶却纹丝不动。卖肉的在吆喝；牛奶必得放在阴凉下面，以免变酸。

'Sleep, I say, sleep, as the kettle boils and its breath comes thicker and thicker issuing in one jet from the spout. So life fills my veins. So life pours through my limbs. So I am driven forward, till I could cry, as I move from dawn to dusk opening and shutting, "No more. I am glutted with natural happiness." Yet more will come, more children; more cradles, more baskets in the kitchen and hams ripening; and onions glistening; and more beds of lettuce and potatoes. I am blown like a leaf by the gale; now brushing the wet grass, now whirled up. I am glutted with natural happiness; and wish sometimes that the fullness would pass from me and the weight of the sleeping house rise, when we sit reading, and I stay the thread at the eye of my needle. The lamp kindles a fire in the dark pane. A fire burns in the heart of the ivy. I see a lit-up street in the evergreens. I hear traffic in the brush of the wind down the lane, and broken voices, and laughter, and Jinny who cries as the door opens, "Come! Come!"

“睡吧，我说，睡吧，这时水壶烧开了，越来越浓的水汽从壶口喷射出来。就这样，生活填满了我的血管。就这样，生活贯穿了我的肢体。就这样，我被驱赶着向前，从黎明到黄昏，开门关门忙个不停，直到有一天我可能会大声呼喊：‘够了。我腻烦了天伦之乐。’可是更多的东西仍会来临，会有更多的孩子；更多的摇篮，厨房里会有更多的菜篮和完熟的火腿；白花花的洋葱头；会有更多的菜圃，种着莴苣和土豆。我像一片叶子，被大风吹着；时而掠过湿润的草地，时而旋转飞起。我腻烦了天伦之乐；有时，当我们坐下来读书，我停下穿在针眼里的线，我希望摆脱这种餍足感，卸去满屋沉睡带来的压抑。台灯在幽暗的窗玻璃上燃起一团火。常春藤的中央燃起一团火。我看见常青树丛中一条灯火通明的大街。我听见巷子里随风掠过的车水马龙声，断断续续的人语和笑声，以及门打开时吉尼的喊声：‘进来！进来!'

'But no sound breaks the silence of our house, where the fields sigh close to the door. The wind washes through the elm trees; a moth hits the lamp; a cow lows; a crack of sound starts in the rafter, and I push my head through the needle and murmur, "Sleep".'

“但是没有任何声音打破我们这所房子里的寂静，这里只有田野在门口发出叹息。风掠过榆树；一只飞蛾撞向台灯；一只母牛哞哞地叫；房椽上响起干裂声，我硬着头皮穿着针，嘴上喃喃低语：‘睡吧’。”

'Now is the moment,' said Jinny. 'Now we have met, and have come together. Now let us talk, let us tell stories. Who is he? Who is she? I am infinitely curious and do not know what is to come. If you, whom I meet for the first time, were to say to me, "The coach starts at four from Piccadilly," I would not stay to fling a few necessaries in a bandbox, but would come at once.

“现在正是时候。”吉尼说。“瞧，我们见面了，团聚了。现在我们来说说话，我们讲讲各自的经历吧。他是谁？她是谁？我极其好奇，不知会遇到什么事。虽然我和你初次见面，但要是你跟我说一声‘长途车在四点钟从皮卡迪利大街出发’，我不会耽搁时间往硬纸盒里塞几件必用衣物，而会立即赶过来。

'Let us sit here under the cut flowers, on the sofa by the picture. Let us decorate our Christmas tree with facts and again with facts. People are so soon gone; let us catch them. That man there, by the cabinet; he lives you say, surrounded by china pots. Break one and you shatter a thousand pounds. And he loved a girl in Rome and she left him. Hence the pots, old junk found in lodging-houses or dug from the desert sands. And since beauty must be broken daily to remain beautiful, and he is static, his life stagnates in a china sea. It is strange though; for once as a young man, he sat on damp ground and drank rum with soldiers.

“让我们坐在这里吧，坐在这片修剪过的花丛下面，坐在这幅照片旁边的沙发上。让我们用反复的事实装点我们的圣诞树吧。人们正迅速散去；让我们抓住他们吧。橱柜旁边的那个男人；你说，他生活在瓷器罐罐的包围之中。打碎一件，你就会损失一千英镑。他曾在罗马爱上一个女孩，但她离开了他。因此才有了这些罐罐，在公寓中找到的或从沙石中挖出来的一些旧货。因为美的东西必定每天都会被打碎以维持其美丽，因为他举止恬静，他的生活也凝滞在瓷器的海洋中了。不过说来奇怪；他在年轻时，曾有一次坐在潮湿的地上，与士兵们一起喝朗姆酒。

'One must be quick and add facts deftly, like toys to a tree, fixing them with a twist of the fingers. He stoops, how he stoops, even over an azalea. He stoops over the old woman even, because she wears diamonds in her ears, and, bundling about her estate in a pony carriage, directs who is to be helped, what tree felled, and who turned out tomorrow. (I have lived my life, I must tell you, all these years, and I am now past thirty, perilously, like a mountain goat, leaping from crag to crag; I do not settle long anywhere; I do not attach myself to one person in particular; but you will find that if I raise my arm, some figure at once breaks off and will come.) And that man is a judge; and that man is a millionaire, and that man, with the eyeglass, shot his governess through the heart with an arrow when he was ten years old. Afterwards he rode through deserts with despatches, took part in revolutions and now collects materials for a history of his mother's family, long settled in Norfolk. That little man with a blue chin has a right hand that is withered. But why? We do not know. That woman, you whisper discreetly, with the pearl pagodas hanging from her ears, was the pure flame who lit the life of one of our statesmen; now since his death she sees ghosts, tells fortunes, and has adopted a coffee-coloured youth whom she calls the Messiah. That man with the drooping moustache, like a cavalry officer, lived a life of the utmost debauchery (it is all in some memoir) until one day he met a stranger in a train who converted him between Edinburgh and Carlisle by reading the Bible.

“你必须反应敏捷，熟练地添加事实，就像把小玩意挂在树上，手指一捻固定住它们。他俯下身去，他甚至朝一枝杜鹃花俯下身去。他甚至朝那位老妇人俯下身去，因为她的耳朵上戴着钻石，坐在一辆小马车上打理她的庄园，指点着该救济谁，该伐哪棵树，明天该把谁开掉。（我必须告诉你，我已经活了这么些年，现在我已经30多了，危机四伏，像一只山羊，从一处悬崖跳向另一处悬崖；我在哪里也呆不长久；我不会让自己迷上哪个特定的人；但是你会发现，如果我抬起手臂，立即就会有人拔脚奔过来。）那个男人是个法官；那个男人是个百万富翁，而戴着眼镜的那个男人，在十岁的时候就一箭射中了他的家庭女教师的心房。此后他奉差遣驰骋大漠，参加了一次次革命，现在他正在收集材料，准备为长期居住在诺福克的他母亲的家族书写历史。那个下巴乌青的小个子男人，他的右手萎缩了。但是什么原因？我们不知道。那个耳朵上垂着珍珠宝塔的女人，你小心翼翼，轻声细语地说，曾是一团清纯的火焰，照亮了我们一位政要的生命；自打他去世至今，她经常看见鬼魂，总喜欢算卦，而且收养了一位咖啡色皮肤的年轻人，她称那人为救世主。那位垂着小胡子的男人，好像一位骑兵军官，曾经过着一种极其放荡的生活（这都记述在一本回忆录里），直到有一天他在火车上遇见一位陌生人，这人在爱丁堡与卡莱尔之间的路上通过读《圣经》终于使他改变了。

'Thus, in a few seconds, deftly, adroitly, we decipher the hieroglyphs written on other people's faces. Here, in this room, are the abraded and battered shells cast on the shore. The door goes on opening. The room fills and fills with knowledge, anguish, many kinds of ambition, much indifference, some despair. Between us, you say, we could build cathedrals, dictate policies, condemn men to death, and administer the affairs of several public offices. The common fund of experience is very deep. We have between us scores of children of both sexes, whom we are educating, going to see at school with the measles, and bringing up to inherit our houses. In one way or another we make this day, this Friday, some by going to the Law Courts; others to the city; others to the nursery; others by marching and forming fours. A million hands stitch, raise hods with bricks. The activity is endless. And tomorrow it begins again; tomorrow we make Saturday. Some take train for France; others ship for India. Some will never come into this room again. One may die tonight. Another will beget a child. From us every sort of building, policy, venture, picture, poem, child, factory, will spring. Life comes; life goes; we make life. So you say.

“这样，几秒钟之后，我们就迅速、巧妙地破译了写在别人脸上的那些象形文字。这间屋子里的人，犹如被抛在岸上的伤痕累累的贝壳。门不断地打开。屋子塞满了，塞满了知识，苦恼，多种志向，许多冷漠，还有些绝望。你说，我俩可以建起大教堂，发号施令，判人死刑，管理公共事务。我们共同积累了非常深厚的经验。我俩生有男男女女许多子嗣，我们教育他们，麻疹流行时我们去学校看望他们，我们抚养他们长大以继承我们的房产。我们以这样或那样的方式充实着这一天，这个星期五，有人上法庭；有人进城；有人去托儿所；有人四人一组走队列。百万双手在缝纫，或擎起砖瓦灰斗。种种活动，不胜枚举。而明天一切重新开始；明天我们安排星期六的活动。有些人乘火车去法国；有些人搭船去印度。有些人再也不会来到这间屋子。有人也许今晚就会死去。有人将要为人父。因为我们，各式建筑、政策、企业、绘画、诗歌、子女、工厂都将应运而生。生活过往；我们创造了生活。你如是说。

'But we who live in the body see with the body's imagination things in outline. I see rocks in bright sunshine. I cannot take these facts into some cave and, shading my eyes, grade their yellows, blues, umbers into one substance. I cannot remain seated for long. I must jump up and go. The coach may start from Piccadilly. I drop all these facts—diamonds, withered hands, china pots and the rest of it—as a monkey drops nuts from its naked paws. I cannot tell you if life is this or that. I am going to push out into the heterogeneous crowd. I am going to be buffeted; to be flung up, and flung down, among men, like a ship on the sea.

“但是我们生存于肉体之中，我们借助肉体的想象力方可看到事物的轮廓。我在明亮的阳光下方可看到岩石。我无法把这些事实带进某个岩洞，然后遮着眼睛辨别不同层次的黄色、蓝色和赭色，从而使它们形成一种具有实质的东西。我不能长时间一直坐着。我必须站起来，马上动身。长途车可能要从皮卡迪利大街出发了。我丢掉所有这些事实——钻石，萎缩的手，瓷器罐罐，如此种种——就像猴子张开赤裸裸的爪子丢掉坚果一样。我不能告诉你生活是不是如此这般。我要奋勇向前，汇入混杂的人群。我可能会被推来搡去；忽而被抛起，忽而被抛落，身陷茫茫人海，就像大海上的一条船。

'For now my body, my companion, which is always sending its signals, the rough black "No", the golden "Come", in rapid running arrows of sensation, beckons. Someone moves. Did I raise my arm? Did I look? Did my yellow scarf with the strawberry spots float and signal? He has broken from the wall. He follows. I am pursued through the forest. All is rapt, all is nocturnal, and the parrots go screaming through the branches. All my senses stand erect. Now I feel the roughness of the fibre of the curtain through which I push; now I feel the cold iron railing and its blistered paint beneath my palm. Now the cool tide of darkness breaks its waters over me. We are out of doors. Night opens; night traversed by wandering moths; night hiding lovers roaming to adventure. I smell roses; I smell violets; I see red and blue just hidden. Now gravel is under my shoes; now grass. Up reel the tall backs of houses guilty with lights. All London is uneasy with flashing lights. Now let us sing our love song—Come, come, come. Now my gold signal is like a dragonfly flying taut. Jug, jug, jug, I sing like the nightingale whose melody is crowded in the too narrow passage of her throat. Now I hear crash and rending of boughs and the crack of antlers as if the beasts of the forest were all hunting, all rearing high and plunging down among the thorns. One has pierced me. One is driven deep within me.

“此时此刻，我的肉体，我的同伴，它一直在发送信号，好像迅疾的情感之箭，一会儿是粗略黑色的‘不’，一会儿是金灿灿的‘来吧’，召唤着。有人动起来了。我抬起过手臂？我望了一眼？我那带有草莓斑点的黄围巾飘起来发了信号？他突然离开了墙边。他心领神会。我被追着来到树林深处。一切都令人着迷，一切都在夜幕笼罩之下，鹦鹉尖叫着穿过枝杈。我所有的感官都兴奋起来。时而，我感觉到我拨开的纤维帘幕那粗糙的质地；时而，我感觉到我手掌下面冰冷的铁栏杆和起泡的油漆。时而，那凉丝丝的黑暗的潮水向我涌来。我们到了屋外。夜幕开启；夜幕中有游荡的飞蛾穿过；夜幕遮掩了四处游荡冒险的情人们。我闻到了玫瑰；我闻到了紫罗兰；我看见隐藏的红色和蓝色。时而，我的脚踩到砾石；时而踩在草上。房屋的高大后墙卷了起来，怯生生地闪着灯火。忽闪的灯火使整个伦敦心神不宁。现在，让我们唱出我们的情歌——来吧，来吧，来吧。瞧，我发出的金色音符像倏然飞去的蜻蜓。唧，唧，唧，我像夜莺一样鸣唱，它的嗓子眼太细，美妙的音符拥堵在那里。这时我听见树枝咔嚓折断的声音和鹿角噼啪碎裂的声音，好像树林中的野兽都在追捕猎物，荆棘丛中高高跃起，突然冲过来。一只鹿角刺穿了我。一只鹿角深深扎进我的身体。

'And velvet flowers and leaves whose coolness has been stood in water wash me round, and sheathe me, embalming me.'

“接着，丝绒一样的花和叶，犹如水的清凉，为我做了洗礼，然后给我涂上香膏，裹了起来。”

'Why, look,' said Neville, 'at the clock ticking on the mantelpiece? Time passes, yes. And we grow old. But to sit with you, alone with you, here in London, in this firelit room, you there, I here, is all. The world ransacked to its uttermost ends, and all its heights stripped and gathered of their flowers, holds no more. Look at the firelight running up and down the gold thread in the curtain. The fruit it circles droops heavy. It falls on the toe of your boot, it gives your face a red rim—I think it is the firelight and not your face; I think those are books against the wall, and that a curtain, and that perhaps an armchair. But when you come everything changes. The cups and saucers changed when you came in this morning. There can be no doubt, I thought, pushing aside the newspaper, that our mean lives, unsightly as they are, put on splendour and have meaning only under the eyes of love.

“哎呀，”内维尔说，“瞧见壁炉架上那滴答作响的钟了么？时光流逝，是真的。我们变老了。但是和你坐在一起，和你单独在一起，在伦敦这个地方，在这间灯火辉煌的屋子里，你在那儿，我在这儿，足矣。这个世界，各个角落都被洗劫一空，所有高地上的花朵都被掠夺殆尽，正摇摇欲坠。瞧那火光上下窜动，映出窗幔上的金色丝线。火光里的那枚果子沉甸甸地垂下来。它落在你的靴子尖上，它给你的脸镶上一轮红晕——我心想，那是火光，而不是你的脸；我心想，那些是靠墙而放的书，那是一条窗幔，那或许是一把扶手椅。可是你一来，一切都会变样。今早你一来，杯子、碟子就变了样。我曾撇开报纸，心想，毫无疑问，我们平淡的人生纵然并不悦目，但在满是爱意的眼睛里也会焕发光彩，富有意义。

'I rose. I had done my breakfast. There was the whole day before us, and as it was fine, tender, non-committal, we walked through the Park to the Embankment, along the Strand to St Paul's, then to the shop where I bought an umbrella, always talking, and now and then stopping to look. But can this last? I said to myself, by a lion in Trafalgar Square, by the lion seen once and for ever;—so I revisit my past life, scene by scene; there is an elm tree, and there lies Percival. For ever and ever, I swore. Then darted in the usual doubt. I clutched your hand. You left me. The descent into the Tube was like death. We were cut up, we were dissevered by all those faces and the hollow wind that seemed to roar down there over desert boulders. I sat staring in my own room. By five I knew that you were faithless. I snatched the telephone and the buzz, buzz, buzz of its stupid voice in your empty room battered my heart down, when the door opened and there you stood. That was the most perfect of our meetings. But these meetings, these partings, finally destroy us.

“我站起身来。我吃完了早餐。我们拥有一整天的时间，天气晴朗而温和，没有事务缠身，我们穿过公园街走到堤岸街，沿着斯特兰德大街走到圣·保罗商场，然后走进一家商店，在那儿我买了一把伞，一路说个不停，时不时地驻足观望。可是这能持久么？在特拉法尔加广场的一尊狮子旁，在那尊过目难忘的狮子旁，我自言自语；——我就这样一幕一幕回顾我以往的生活；那儿有一棵榆树，那儿躺着珀西瓦尔。我发誓，永志不渝。然后怀着常有的那份疑虑奔向前。我紧紧握住你的手。你离开我。走进地铁犹如死别。所有那些面孔，那股好像在沙漠砾石上面呼啸而过的空穴来风，把我们分开了，把我们割断了。我瞪着眼睛坐在自己的房间里。到了五点钟，我终于明白，你根本不守信用。我抓起电话，你的房间空无一人，听筒里恼人的嗡嗡声击沉了我的心，这时门开了，你站在门口。这是我们俩最完美的一次相会。可是这样的相会，这样的别离，最终却毁了我们。

'Now this room seems to me central, something scooped out of the eternal night. Outside lines twist and intersect, but round us, wrapping us about. Here we are centred. Here we can be silent, or speak without raising our voices. Did you notice that and then that? we say. He said that, meaning.... She hesitated, and I believe suspected. Anyhow, I heard voices, a sob on the stair late at night. It is the end of their relationship. Thus we spin round us infinitely fine filaments and construct a system. Plato and Shakespeare are included, also quite obscure people, people of no importance whatsoever. I hate men who wear crucifixes on the left side of their waistcoats. I hate ceremonies and lamentations and the sad figure of Christ trembling beside another trembling and sad figure. Also the pomp and the indifference and the emphasis, always on the wrong place, of people holding forth under chandeliers in full evening dress, wearing stars and decorations. Some spray in a hedge, though, or a sunset over a flat winter field, or again the way some old woman sits, arms akimbo, in an omnibus with a basket—those we point at for the other to look at. It is so vast an alleviation to be able to point for another to look at. And then not to talk. To follow the dark paths of the mind and enter the past, to visit books, to brush aside their branches and break off some fruit. And you take it and marvel, as I take the careless movements of your body and marvel at its ease, its power—how you fling open windows and are dexterous with your hands. For alas! my mind is a little impeded, it soon tires; I fall damp, perhaps disgusting, at the goal.

“此刻，这间屋子对我来说似乎成了世界的中心，是从无尽的黑夜中分离出来的某种东西。屋外，线条错综交织，但都围着我们，把我们裹得严严实实。在这儿，我们即是世界的中心。在这儿，我们可以沉默无语，说话也无需抬高嗓门。你注意到那个和那个了么？我们说。他那么说，意思是……她犹犹豫豫，我相信是在怀疑。无论如何，我听见说话声，深夜有人在楼梯上抽泣。他们之间的关系结束了。于是我们没完没了地抽出细丝，在我们周围构筑起一张网。柏拉图和莎士比亚被网罗其中，还有一些鲜为人知的人物，无关紧要的人物。我讨厌那些把十字架戴在马甲左侧的人。我讨厌各种仪式和哀悼，我讨厌基督那悲惨的形象在另一个颤抖、悲伤的形象身旁微微颤抖。我讨厌那种不合时宜的炫耀、冷漠和加重的语气，人们穿着深沉的晚装，戴着各种星饰和勋章，在枝形吊灯下面侃侃而谈。但是，树篱上的小花枝，平坦的冬季原野上的落日，又或者公共汽车上一位叉着腰，提着篮子的老妇人的坐姿——这些我们都会指指点点，让对方来看。能够指指点点，让另一个人一起来看，这是莫大的安慰啊。然后无需言语。沿着隐秘的思路回到往事中去，翻一翻书籍，拨开枝叶摘下一些果实。你接受，并对此感到惊异，如同我惊异于你身体的不经意之举，惊异于它的从容，它的力量——你猛地推开窗，双手多么麻利。因为，唉！我的思维有点受阻，很快就会感到厌倦；或许是对那个目标产生了反感，我沉闷地倒了下去。

'Alas! I could not ride about India in a sun helmet and return to a bungalow. I cannot tumble, as you do, like half-naked boys on the deck of a ship, squirting each other with hose-pipes. I want this fire, I want this chair. I want someone to sit beside me after the day's pursuit and all its anguish, after its listenings, and its waitings, and its suspicions. After quarrelling and reconciliation I need privacy—to be alone with you, to set this hubbub in order. For I am as neat as a cat in my habits. We must oppose the waste and deformity of the world, its crowds eddying round and round disgorged and trampling. One must slip paper—knives, even, exactly through the pages of novels, and tie up packets of letters neatly with green silk, and brush up the cinders with a hearth broom. Everything must be done to rebuke the horror of deformity. Let us read writers of Roman severity and virtue; let us seek perfection through the sand. Yes, but I love to slip the virtue and severity of the noble Romans under the grey light of your eyes, and dancing grasses and summer breezes and the laughter and shouts of boys at play—of naked cabin-boys squirting each other with hosepipes on the decks of ships. Hence I am not a disinterested seeker, like Louis, after perfection through the sand. Colours always stain the page; clouds pass over it. And the poem, I think, is only your voice speaking. Alcibiades, Ajax, Hector and Percival are also you. They loved riding, they risked their lives wantonly, they were not great readers either. But you are not Ajax or Percival. They did not wrinkle their noses and scratch their foreheads with your precise gesture. You are you. That is what consoles me for the lack of many things—I am ugly, I am weak—and the depravity of the world, and the flight of youth and Percival's death, and bitterness and rancour and envies innumerable.

“唉！我不能戴着太阳帽驰骋于印度，然后回到一间小平房里。我不能跟你一样翻筋斗，像船甲板上半裸的小子们那样用水管互相喷射。我需要这炉火，我需要这椅子。一天的忙碌和种种烦恼之后，在不断的倾听、等待和疑虑之后，我需要有人坐在我的身旁。在争吵、和解之后，我需要清静——和你单独在一起，让一切嘈杂都平息。因为我习惯于像猫一样整洁。我们必须反对浪费和世上的丑陋，反对那些晕头转向的人流四处呕吐、践踏。你必须用小刀匀匀称称、恰到好处地划开小说的书页，用绿色的丝带整整齐齐地系好一包包信件，用壁炉边的扫帚把炉渣清理得干干净净。为了回击丑陋带来的恐怖，我们必须做好每一件事情。让我们读一读具有罗马人的严谨与正直的那些作家吧；让我们淘尽沙石追求完美吧。是的，但是我更愿把高贵的罗马人的严谨与正直悄悄藏在你灰暗的目光里，藏在摇曳的草丛和夏日的微风里，藏在玩耍的男孩们的笑声和呼喊声里——船甲板上，赤裸着的船上侍者正在用水管互相喷射。如此看来，我并不是一个不问世事的求索者，像路易斯那样淘尽沙石追求完美。色彩总是染上书页；云朵从上面掠过。而这首诗，我觉得，它只是你的声音在述说。亚西比德、埃阿斯、赫克托和珀西瓦尔也是你。他们爱骑马，他们随意地拿自己的性命冒险，他们也都不好读书。但你既不是埃阿斯也不是珀西瓦尔。他们不会像你那么恰到好处地皱皱鼻子、搔搔额头。你就是你。这一点令我欣慰，弥补了我的许多缺憾——我的丑陋，我的软弱——还有世界的堕落，青春的流逝，珀西瓦尔的死，悲苦，怨恨，嫉妒，不一而足。

'But if one day you do not come after breakfast, if one day I see you in some looking-glass perhaps looking after another, if the telephone buzzes and buzzes in your empty room, I shall then, after unspeakable anguish, I shall then—for there is no end to the folly of the human heart—seek another, find another, you. Meanwhile, let us abolish the ticking of time's clock with one blow. Come closer.'

“但是如果有一天你吃完早饭后不过来，如果有一天我看见镜子里的你也许在注视另一个人，如果电话机在你空无一人的房间里嗡嗡响，那么我就会在难以言说的痛苦之后，我就会——因为人心的愚蠢念头永远不会终止——追求另一个人，找到另一个你。同时，让我们一拳废止那时钟的滴答声吧。靠得更近一些吧。”

The sun had now sunk lower in the sky. The islands of cloud had gained in density and drew themselves across the sun so that the rocks went suddenly black, and the trembling sea holly lost its blue and turned silver, and shadows were blown like grey cloths over the sea. The waves no longer visited the further pools or reached the dotted black line which lay irregularly upon the beach. The sand was pearl white, smoothed and shining. Birds swooped and circled high up in the air. Some raced in the furrows of the wind and turned and sliced through them as if they were one body cut into a thousand shreds. Birds fell like a net descending on the tree-tops. Here one bird taking its way alone made wing for the marsh and sat solitary on a white stake, opening its wings and shutting them.

此时，太阳在天空中愈发沉了下去。云团更加密集，缓缓收拢，遮住了太阳，礁石突然变得漆黑，摇曳的海滨刺芹褪去了蓝色，变成银色，海面上漂浮着灰布一样的阴影。海浪不再光顾那些较远处的水潭，也不再触摸那条不规则地横在海滩上的断断续续的黑线。沙子像珍珠一样洁白，光滑而闪亮。鸟儿在高高的天空俯冲、盘旋。有些鸟儿在风中追逐，翻腾，划破气流，仿佛一个整体被切割成万千碎片。鸟儿像一张网落在树梢。一只单飞的鸟展翅向沼泽地飞过来，孤零零地停在白色的木桩上，翅膀一开一合。

Some petals had fallen in the garden. They lay shell-shaped on the earth. The dead leaf no longer stood upon its edge, but had been blown, now running, now pausing, against some stalk. Through all the flowers the same wave of light passed in a sudden flaunt and flash as if a fin cut the green glass of a lake. Now and again some level and masterly blast blew the multitudinous leaves up and down and then, as the wind flagged, each blade regained its identity. The flowers, burning their bright discs in the sun, flung aside the sunlight as the wind tossed them, and then some heads too heavy to rise again drooped slightly.

花园里，落了一些花瓣。它们落在地上，形状像贝壳。枯叶不再坚守，而是被风吹着时而奔跑，时而停下来靠在一枝花茎上。一道光波炫耀似地突然一闪，穿过所有的花儿，好像一片鱼鳍划开明镜似的绿色湖面。时不时地，一阵平稳而强劲的风吹得无数的草叶起伏不定，随着风势减弱，片片叶片又恢复了尊严。花儿在太阳下闪耀着鲜艳的花盘，随风轻轻摇晃着，抖落上面的阳光，但是有些太沉而无法重新挺直的花儿微微垂下了头。

The afternoon sun warmed the fields, poured blue into the shadows and reddened the corn. A deep varnish was laid like a lacquer over the fields. A cart, a horse, a flock of rooks—whatever moved in it was rolled round in gold. If a cow moved a leg it stirred ripples of red gold, and its horns seemed lined with light. Sprays of flaxen-haired corn lay on the hedges, brushed from the shaggy carts that came up from the meadows short legged and primeval looking. The round-headed clouds never dwindled as they bowled along, but kept every atom of their rotundity. Now, as they passed, they caught a whole village in the fling of their net and, passing, let it fly free again. Far away on the horizon, among the million grains of blue-grey dust, burnt one pane, or stood the single line of one steeple or one tree.

午后的太阳温暖了田野，给暗影注入了蓝色，把谷物也映红了。一道幽暗的光亮像是在田野上面涂了一层漆。一辆车，一匹马，一群秃鼻乌鸦——不管其中是什么在移动，都被裹上了金色。如果母牛抬起一条腿，立即就会激起赤金色的涟漪，它的角也似乎镶了一轮光晕。树篱上挂着一簇簇淡黄色的谷穗，是从装得蓬蓬松松的马车上擦落的，它们从低矮而原始的牧场那边驶过来。云团一路翻滚向前，保持着原有的成分，毫无缩减的迹象。瞧，它们经过时，把整个村庄罩在它们撒下的网中，经过之后，又把它放了出来。在遥远的天边，在亿万蓝灰色的尘埃之中，闪耀着一块窗玻璃，或者矗立着单线条的一座尖塔或一棵树。

The red curtains and the white blinds blew in and out, flapping against the edge of the window, and the light which entered by flaps and breadths unequally had in it some brown tinge, and some abandonment as it blew through the blowing curtains in gusts. Here it browned a cabinet, there reddened a chair, here it made the window waver in the side of the green jar.

红色的帷幔和白色的窗帘一会儿鼓出来，一会儿缩回去，轻轻拍打着窗沿，宽宽窄窄的光线参差不齐地照进窗子里，其中包含着棕色的基调，而在随风穿过鼓起的帷幔时，它们露出了放纵的神气。它们时而把橱柜染成棕色，时而把椅子染为红色，时而又让窗子在绿色水罐的壁上波动起来。

All for a moment wavered and bent in uncertainty and ambiguity, as if a great moth sailing through the room had shadowed the immense solidity of chairs and tables with floating wings.

有一会儿，所有的东西都在起伏、波动，影影绰绰，模模糊糊，仿佛一只掠过房间的巨大飞蛾用它浮动的翅膀遮住了桌子、椅子的庞大实体。

'And time,' said Bernard, 'lets fall its drop. The drop that has formed on the roof of the soul falls. On the roof of my mind time, forming, lets fall its drop. Last week, as I stood shaving, the drop fell. I, standing with my razor in my hand, became suddenly aware of the merely habitual nature of my action (this is the drop forming) and congratulated my hands, ironically, for keeping at it. Shave, shave, shave, I said. Go on shaving. The drop fell. All through the day's work, at intervals, my mind went to an empty place, saying, "What is lost? What is over?" And "Over and done with," I muttered, "over and done with," solacing myself with words. People noticed the vacuity of my face and the aimlessness of my conversation. The last words of my sentence tailed away. And as I buttoned on my coat to go home I said more dramatically, "I have lost my youth."

“时光啊，”伯纳德说，“一直在滴落。凝聚在灵魂屋檐上的那滴时光落下。在我心灵的屋檐上，时光在凝聚，时光在滴落。上个星期，当我站着刮脸时，有一滴时光落了下去。我手拿剃刀站住了，突然意识到我的行为在本质上只是习惯性的（这是一滴凝聚的时光），于是我自嘲地祝贺我的双手抓住了它。刮啊，刮啊，刮啊，我说。不停地刮啊。那滴时光就落了下去。在一天到晚的工作中，在工作的间隙，我的思维来到一片空地，说道：‘什么东西失去了吧？什么东西了结了吧？’‘已经了结了，’我喃喃道，‘已经了结了。’我用话语安慰着自己。人们注意到我的脸上茫然若失，我的话语漫无目的。我的句子往往说得有头无尾。而当我扣上衣扣要回家时，我更富有戏剧性地说道：‘我失去了我的青春。’

'It is curious how, at every crisis, some phrase which does not fit insists upon coming to the rescue—the penalty of living in an old civilization with a notebook. This drop falling has nothing to do with losing my youth. This drop falling is time tapering to a point. Time, which is a sunny pasture covered with a dancing light, time, which is widespread as a field at midday, becomes pendant. Time tapers to a point. As a drop falls from a glass heavy with some sediment, time falls. These are the true cycles, these are the true events. Then as if all the luminosity of the atmosphere were withdrawn I see to the bare bottom. I see what habit covers. I lie sluggish in bed for days. I dine out and gape like a codfish. I do not trouble to finish my sentences, and my actions, usually so uncertain, acquire a mechanical precision. On this occasion, passing an office, I went in and bought, with all the composure of a mechanical figure, a ticket for Rome.

奇怪的是，每当遇到危机，某个不合时宜的词藻总会坚持来救急——这是对依靠笔记本固守旧文明的惩罚。正在下落的这滴时光与失去我的青春毫不相关。它是时光正在缩小为一个点。时光，像太阳底下光影摇曳的牧场，像正午时分广阔无垠的田野，像一颗坠子垂了下去。时光缩成了一个点。像一滴水含了某种沉淀物，从杯子里重重地落下，时光也落了下去。这些就是真实的循环，这些就是真实的事件。这时，仿佛撤去了大气层中的所有光明，我的心底一览无余。我看清了习惯掩盖之下的一切。我一天一天慵懒地躺在床上。外出吃饭时，我会像鳕鱼一样目瞪口呆。我不想费神说出完整的一句话，我一向犹豫不定的行为也习惯了一种机械的定势。在这样的情况下，经过一家售票处时，我走了进去，用尽一个机械的人固有的沉着，买了一张去往罗马的车票。

'Now I sit on a stone seat in these gardens surveying the eternal city, and the little man who was shaving in London five days ago looks already like a heap of old clothes. London has also crumbled. London consists of fallen factories and a few gasometers. At the same time I am not involved in this pageantry. I see the violet-sashed priests and the picturesque nursemaids; I notice externals only. I sit here like a convalescent, like a very simple man who knows only words of one syllable. "The sun is hot," I say. "The wind is cold." I feel myself carried round like an insect on top of the earth and could swear that, sitting here, I feel its hardness, its turning movement. I have no desire to go the opposite way from the earth. Could I prolong this sense another six inches I have a foreboding that I should touch some queer territory. But I have a very limited proboscis. I never wish to prolong these states of detachment; I dislike them; I also despise them. I do not wish to be a man who sits for fifty years on the same spot thinking of his navel. I wish to be harnessed to a cart, a vegetable-cart that rattles over the cobbles.

“此时，我坐在花园里一张石凳上，审视着这座永恒的城市，五天前还在伦敦刮脸的这个小人物看上去已经像一堆旧衣服了。伦敦也已经分崩离析了。伦敦只是一些倒塌的工厂和几座贮气罐而已。但同时，我与这里的盛况并无关系。我看见了身披紫罗兰饰带的牧师和美丽活泼的保姆；我只注意到了外在的东西。我坐在这儿，像个正在康复的病人，像个只懂几个单音节词的非常单纯的人。‘太阳热。’我说。‘风冷。’我感觉自己像只昆虫一样被带到了世界之巅，而且我敢发誓，坐在这儿，我感觉到了它的坚硬，它的转动。我并不渴望与这个世界背道而驰。如果我能把这种知觉再延长六英寸，我有一种预感，我也许会触到某种奇异的境界。但是我的喙长度很有限。我从不希望推延凡此种种的超然状态；我讨厌这些；我也鄙视这些。我不希望成为一个意守丹田、原地静坐50年的人。我希望被套上一辆大车，一辆拉运蔬菜的大车，在卵石路上辚辚碾过。

'The truth is that I am not one of those who find their satisfaction in one person, or in infinity. The private room bores me, also the sky. My being only glitters when all its facets are exposed to many people. Let them fail and I am full of holes, dwindling like burnt paper. Oh, Mrs Moffat, Mrs Moffat, I say, come and sweep it all up. Things have dropped from me. I have outlived certain desires; I have lost friends, some by death—Percival—others through sheer inability to cross the street. I am not so gifted as at one time seemed likely. Certain things lie beyond my scope. I shall never understand the harder problems of philosophy. Rome is the limit of my travelling. As I drop asleep at night it strikes me sometimes with a pang that I shall never see savages in Tahiti spearing fish by the light of a blazing cresset, or a lion spring in the jungle, or a naked man eating raw flesh. Nor shall I learn Russian or read the Vedas. I shall never again walk bang into the pillar-box. (But still a few stars fall through my night, beautifully, from the violence of that concussion.) But as I think, truth has come nearer. For many years I crooned complacently, "My children... my wife... my house... my dog." As I let myself in with the latch-key I would go through that familiar ritual and wrap myself in those warm coverings. Now that lovely veil has fallen. I do not want possessions now. (Note: an Italian washer—woman stands on the same rung of physical refinement as the daughter of an English duke.)

“事实上，我并不是一个能在个人或芸芸众生中找到满足的人。私人房间和天空都让我感到厌倦。我的生命只有当它的各个方面都展露给众人时才会熠熠生辉。就让它们消逝吧，我已千疮百孔，像纸一样渐渐烧尽。唉，莫法特太太，莫法特太太，我说，来把它清扫干净吧。有些东西从我这里脱落了。我年事已高，不再怀有某些渴望了；我失去了朋友，有些是因为死亡——如珀西瓦尔——另外那些纯属无力过街之故。我不再拥有天赋了，虽然一度似乎拥有过。某些东西是我力所不能及的。我将永远弄不明白那些高难的哲学问题。罗马是我游历的极限。当我在夜晚倒头欲睡时，偶尔会伴着一阵痛苦突然想到，我将永远看不到塔希提岛的野人就着灯光在叉鱼，或是一头狮子在丛林中突然跃起，或是一个赤身裸体的人在吃着生肉。我也永远学不会俄语，或者阅读吠陀经。我再也不会走着走着径直撞上邮筒。（但是因为那次剧烈的碰撞，依然还有几颗星星优美地落入我的睡梦。）而当我想到这儿，真相也愈发接近了。很多年来，我洋洋自得地哼着小调：‘我的孩子……我的太太……我的房子……我的小狗。’当我开了弹键锁进了家门，我总要经历那番熟悉的仪式，然后把自己裹进那些温暖的罩子里。现在，那层美丽的面纱滑落了。我现在并不想拥有那些。（注：一位意大利洗衣妇在形体的优雅方面是可以和一位英国公爵的女儿相提并论的。）

'But let me consider. The drop falls; another stage has been reached. Stage upon stage. And why should there be an end of stages? and where do they lead? To what conclusion? For they come wearing robes of solemnity. In these dilemmas the devout consult those violet-sashed and sensual-looking gentry who are trooping past me. But for ourselves, we resent teachers. Let a man get up and say, "Behold, this is the truth," and instantly I perceive a sandy cat filching a piece of fish in the background. Look, you have forgotten the cat, I say. So Neville, at school, in the dim chapel, raged at the sight of the doctor's crucifix. I, who am always distracted, whether by a cat or by a bee buzzing round the bouquet that Lady Hampden keeps so diligently pressed to her nose, at once make up a story and so obliterate the angles of the crucifix. I have made up thousands of stories; I have filled innumerable notebooks with phrases to be used when I have found the true story, the one story to which all these phrases refer. But I have never yet found that story. And I begin to ask, Are there stories?

“但是让我仔细想想。那滴时光落了下去；到了另一个阶段。一个阶段接着一个阶段。为什么会有一个尽头呢？它们通向哪里呢？要达到什么样的结局呢？因为它们披着庄严的长袍而来。碰到这些难题，虔诚的人们总是求教于那些身披紫罗兰饰带而满脸淫像的家伙，他们正列队经过我身边。可是对我们来说，我们讨厌教师。假如一个人站起来，说：‘瞧，这就是真理。’立刻我就会察觉到一只沙色的猫正在背后偷吃一块鱼。小心，你忘了那只猫，我说。所以在学校时，在那昏暗的小教堂里，一看见博士的十字架内维尔就气不打一处来。我呢，总是分神，要么因为一只猫，要么因为绕着花束嗡嗡叫的一只蜜蜂，汉普顿小姐正孜孜不倦地把那花束凑近自己的鼻子，这时我立即就会编出一个故事来，磨去十字架的所有棱角。我编了成千上万个故事；我的词语记满了无数的笔记本，以备我找到那个真实的故事，那个所有这些词语都适用的故事时用到它们。但是我还从未找到那个故事。我开始问道：还有故事么？

'Look now from this terrace at the swarming population beneath. Look at the general activity and clamour. That man is in difficulties with his mule. Half a dozen good-natured loafers offer their services. Others pass by without looking. They have as many interests as there are threads in a skein. Look at the sweep of the sky, bowled over by round white clouds. Imagine the leagues of level land and the aqueducts and the broken Roman pavement and the tombstones in the Campagna, and beyond the Campagna, the sea, then again more land, then the sea. I could break off any detail in all that prospect—say the mule-cart—and describe it with the greatest ease. But why describe a man in trouble with his mule? Again, I could invent stories about that girl coming up the steps. She met him under the dark archway.... 'It is over,' he said, turning from the cage where the china parrot hangs." Or simply, "That was all." But why impose my arbitrary design? Why stress this and shape that and twist up little figures like the toys men sell in trays in the street? Why select this, out of all that—one detail?

“现在从这个露台看看下面的芸芸众生吧。看看那日常的活动和喧闹的场面。那人与他的骡子较上了劲。五六个好心的闲汉主动帮忙。别的人看也不看从旁边经过。他们自己操心的事多得像一团乱麻。看看广袤的天空，朵朵白云飘过。想象一下那绵延的平坦田地，那些沟渠，那条凹凸不平的古罗马步道，坎帕尼亚平原上的那些墓碑，过了坎帕尼亚平原，就是大海，然后又是更加辽阔的田地，然后是大海。我本可以脱离那整幅图景上的任何细节——比方说那辆骡车——而极其游刃有余地把它描述一番。但是干嘛要描述一个与自己的骡子较劲的人呢？再说，我本可以编出一些故事讲讲那个正走上台阶的女孩。她在漆黑的拱廊下面遇见他……‘结束了。’说着，他从挂着瓷鹦鹉的鸟笼那儿转过身来。或者只是说：‘那样就够了。’但是干嘛要把我无端臆造的情节强加于人？干嘛要强调这个、塑造那个、扭捏出一些小形象，就像大街上人们放在托盘里出售的那些玩偶？干嘛要从那一切当中挑出这个——这个细节？

'Here am I shedding one of my life-skins, and all they will say is, "Bernard is spending ten days in Rome." Here am I marching up and down this terrace alone, unoriented. But observe how dots and dashes are beginning, as I walk, to run themselves into continuous lines, how things are losing the bald, the separate identity that they had as I walked up those steps. The great red pot is now a reddish streak in a wave of yellowish green. The world is beginning to move past me like the banks of a hedge when the train starts, like the waves of the sea when a steamer moves. I am moving too, am becoming involved in the general sequence when one thing follows another and it seems inevitable that the tree should come, then the telegraph-pole, then the break in the hedge. And as I move, surrounded, included and taking part, the usual phrases begin to bubble up, and I wish to free these bubbles from the trap-door in my head, and direct my steps therefore towards that man, the back of whose head is half familiar to me. We were together at school. We shall undoubtedly meet. We shall certainly lunch together. We shall talk. But wait, one moment wait.

“在这儿，我正蜕去我生命中的一层皮，而他们却只会说：‘伯纳德正在罗马度他的十天假期。’在这儿，我正迈开步子一个人在这块露台上走来走去，漫无目的。但是瞧啊，我一边走，那些圆点和破折号便开始自然而然地形成不间断的线条，各种东西都在失去我在走上台阶时它们所具有的那种毫无掩饰、互不相干的特点。红色的大水壶这时变成了黄绿色波浪中的一绺艳红。世界开始从我的身旁一闪而过，像火车开动时两旁掠过的树篱，像轮船出发时掀起的一波波海浪。我也在移动，正在被卷入通常的次第当中，一环套着另一环，而且似乎不可避免似的，一棵树迎面而来，然后是一根电话线杆，然后是树篱的一个缺口。移动中我被围住了，被接纳了，参与其中，往日那些词语也开始汩汩地冒了上来，我希望从我头脑的活板门里放出这些泡泡，希望以此指引我的脚步，走向那个后脑勺有些熟悉的人。我们曾一起上学。我们无疑会相遇。我们肯定要共进午餐。我们要交谈。但是且慢，稍等一会儿。

'These moments of escape are not to be despised. They come too seldom. Tahiti becomes possible. Leaning over this parapet I see far out a waste of water. A fin turns. This bare visual impression is unattached to any line of reason, it springs up as one might see the fin of a porpoise on the horizon. Visual impressions often communicate thus briefly statements that we shall in time to come uncover and coax into words. I note under F., therefore, "Fin in a waste of waters." I, who am perpetually making notes in the margin of my mind for some final statement, make this mark, waiting for some winter's evening.

“这种短暂的逃避不该受到鄙视。它们太不常见了。塔希提之行有可能实现。倚着这里的胸墙，我远远地望见一片汪洋。鱼鳍翻动。这个单纯的视觉印象不属于任何理性范畴，它突然浮现在眼前，就像你也许会看见天边一条鼠海豚的鳍一样。比如，视觉印象常常会发出简短的提示，不久之后，我们就要揭开匣子摆弄花言巧语了。因此，我在Ｆ栏下记录了‘一片汪洋中的鱼鳍’。我，这个一直都在头脑的空白处为某个最终的表述而做着记录的我，留下了这个记号，等待着某个冬日的黄昏。

'Now I shall go and lunch somewhere, I shall hold my glass up, I shall look through the wine, I shall observe with more than my usual detachment, and when a pretty woman enters the restaurant and comes down the room between the tables I shall say to myself, "Look where she comes against a waste of waters." A meaningless observation, but to me, solemn, slate-coloured, with a fatal sound of ruining worlds and waters falling to destruction.

现在我要去某个地方吃午饭了，我要举起我的杯子，我要让我的目光透过杯中的酒，我要比以往更超然地观察一切，而且当一位漂亮女人走进饭店、穿过桌子之间走来时，我要对自己说：‘瞧，她从一片汪洋中走来。’毫无意义的观察，但是对我来说却是庄重的，带着石板的色彩，发出世界毁灭、水波散尽的宿命之声。

'So, Bernard (I recall you, you the usual partner in my enterprises), let us begin this new chapter, and observe the formation of this new, this unknown, strange, altogether unidentified and terrifying experience—the new drop—which is about to shape itself. Larpent is that man's name.'

“那么，伯纳德（我想起了你，你一直就是我事业中的搭档），让我们开始这新的一章吧，一起看看这段全新、未知、奇怪、恐怖而且根本无法说清的经历——即将成形的全新的时光之滴——是如何凝聚起来的吧。那人的名字叫拉本特。”

'In this hot afternoon,' said Susan, 'here in this garden, here in this field where I walk with my son, I have reached the summit of my desires. The hinge of the gate is rusty; he heaves it open. The violent passions of childhood, my tears in the garden when Jinny kissed Louis, my rage in the schoolroom, which smelt of pine, my loneliness in foreign places, when the mules came clattering in on their pointed hoofs and the Italian women chattered at the fountain, shawled, with carnations twisted in their hair, are rewarded by security, possession, familiarity. I have had peaceful, productive years. I possess all I see. I have grown trees from the seed. I have made ponds in which goldfish hide under the broad-leaved lilies. I have netted over strawberry beds and lettuce beds, and stitched the pears and the plums into white bags to keep them safe from the wasps. I have seen my sons and daughters, once netted over like fruit in their cots, break the meshes and walk with me, taller than I am, casting shadows on the grass.

“在这个炎热的午后，”苏珊说，“在我和我的儿子一起散步的这个花园里，这片田野上，我完成了我最大的心愿。大门的铰链生了锈；他使劲把它拉开。童年时代的狂野激情，吉尼亲吻路易斯时我在花园里流的泪，我在弥漫着松树气味的学校教室里发的火，当骡子迈开尖尖的蹄子得得走来，围着披肩、头发上插着康乃馨的意大利妇女在泉水边喋喋不休时，我在异国他乡感受的孤独，都由现在的平安、充实和亲昵给予了补偿。我拥有了平静祥和、富有成果的人生岁月。我拥有我所目睹的一切。我埋下种子，培育出了树木。我开辟了池塘，水中的金鱼藏在宽大的睡莲叶下。我在草莓地和莴苣地上面搭起了网，我把梨和李子套进白色的口袋，免得黄蜂来破坏。我看着我的儿女们一度像鲜果一样躺在罩着网的小床上，一个个扯断网线，走在我的身边，个头比我还高，身影投在草地上。

'I am fenced in, planted here like one of my own trees. I say, "My son," I say, "My daughter," and even the ironmonger looking up from his counter strewn with nails, paint and wire-fencing respects the shabby car at the door with its butterfly nets, pads and bee-hives. We hang mistletoe over the clock at Christmas, weigh our blackberries and mushrooms, count out jam-pots, and stand year by year to be measured against the shutter in the drawing-room window. I also make wreaths of white flowers, twisting silver-leaved plants among them for the dead, attaching my card with sorrow for the dead shepherd, with sympathy for the wife of the dead carter; and sit by the beds of dying women, who murmur their last terrors, who clutch my hand; frequenting rooms intolerable except to one born as I was and early acquainted with the farmyard and the dung-heap and the hens straying in and out, and the mother with two rooms and growing children. I have seen the windows run with heat, I have smelt the sink.

“我被围了起来，像我自己种下的树一样生长在这里。我叫着，‘我的儿子’，我叫着，‘我的女儿’，甚至那位小五金店的老板也从散放着钉子、涂料和铁围子的柜台上抬起头来，对停在门口的这辆装着蝶网、果篓和蜂箱的破车肃然起敬。圣诞节时，我们在钟上面挂起檞寄生小枝，称好我们的黑莓和蘑菇，算出我们的果酱罐，年年都要站在客厅的百叶窗前量身高。我还为死者扎起白色的花环，里面编进银色的枝叶，附上一张卡片，寄寓我对那位已故牧羊人的哀伤，以及我对那位已故车夫的遗孀的同情；我坐在那些弥留之际的妇女们的床边，她们攥着我的手，喃喃述说着最后的恐惧；常出入的房间，除了像我这种出身的人，这种从小见惯了农家院，粪堆，跑来跑去的母鸡，拉扯着一帮孩子挤在两间房里的母亲的人之外，简直令人无法忍受。我见过热浪炙烤窗户的情景，我闻过污水池的气味。

'I ask now, standing with my scissors among my flowers, Where can the shadow enter? What shock can loosen my laboriously gathered, relentlessly pressed down life? Yet sometimes I am sick of natural happiness, and fruit growing, and children scattering the house with oars, guns, skulls, books won for prizes and other trophies. I am sick of the body, I am sick of my own craft, industry and cunning, of the unscrupulous ways of the mother who protects, who collects under her jealous eyes at one long table her own children, always her own.

“此时，我手拿剪刀站在花丛中，禁不住疑惑：哪里会有什么阴影？什么样的震荡会让我丢开这含辛茹苦、身不由己的生活？不过有时，自然界的欢乐，果实的生长，孩子们弄得满屋都是船桨、猎枪、骷髅、获奖的书本和其他战利品，都让我感到厌倦。我厌倦了这躯体，厌倦了我的手腕、辛劳和精明，厌倦了一个母亲不遗余力地保护她的孩子，诚惶诚恐地把她自己的孩子，总是她自己的孩子，聚拢在一张长桌旁。

'It is when spring comes, cold showery, with sudden yellow flowers—then as I look at the meat under the blue shade and press the heavy silver bags of tea, of sultanas, I remember how the sun rose, and the swallows skimmed the grass, and phrases that Bernard made when we were children, and the leaves shook over us, many-folded, very light, breaking the blue of the sky, scattering wandering lights upon the skeleton roots of the beech trees where I sat, sobbing. The pigeon rose. I jumped up and ran after the words that trailed like the dangling string from an air ball, up and up, from branch to branch escaping. Then like a cracked bowl the fixity of my morning broke, and putting down the bags of flour I thought, Life stands round me like a glass round the imprisoned reed.

“当春天来临，冷雨凄凄，黄花骤然开放——这时，我一边瞧着挂在蓝色阴凉下的肉，捏着装有茶叶和无核小葡萄的沉甸甸的银色口袋，一边回忆着太阳如何升起，燕子如何掠过草地，回忆着我们正当年少时伯纳德编造的那些词儿，还有那些树叶，在我们头顶摇曳，层层叠叠，轻轻柔柔，弄碎了蓝色的天空，把游弋的光影洒在山毛榉的根茎上，我就坐在那儿，抽泣着。鸽子飞了起来。我跳了起来，追赶着那些词语，它们仿佛是牵着气球的那根细绳，越来越高，飞过一根根树枝，消失了。这时，我清晨的宁静被打破了，就像一只开裂的碗，放下面粉口袋，我心想，生活罩住了我，就像一只玻璃杯罩住了那棵芦苇。

'I hold some scissors and snip off the hollyhocks, who went to Elvedon and trod on rotten oak-apples, and saw the lady writing and the gardeners with their great brooms. We ran back panting lest we should be shot and nailed like stoats to the wall. Now I measure, I preserve. At night I sit in the arm-chair and stretch my arm for my sewing; and hear my husband snore; and look up when the light from a passing car dazzles the windows and feel the waves of my life tossed, broken, round me who am rooted; and hear cries, and see other's lives eddying like straws round the piers of a bridge while I push my needle in and out and draw my thread through the calico.

“我手持剪刀修剪蜀葵，想起当年我曾踏着腐烂的栎五倍子前去埃尔夫顿，看见了那位写字的女子和拿着大扫帚的园丁们。我们气喘吁吁地往回跑，生怕我们会像白鼬一样被人射死然后钉在墙上。此时，我在称量，我在储藏。到了晚上，我就坐在扶手椅里，伸臂拿过针线活；耳闻我的丈夫鼾声阵阵；当过往的一辆车的灯光炫目地照在窗上，我抬起头来，感觉我人生的海浪在我周围涌起，迸碎，而我已生了根；我听见呼喊，我看见他人的人生像桥墩周围的草秸在打着旋，而我只顾反反复复地在那块印花布上穿针引线。

'I think sometimes of Percival who loved me. He rode and fell in India. I think sometimes of Rhoda. Uneasy cries wake me at dead of night. But for the most part I walk content with my sons. I cut the dead petals from hollyhocks. Rather squat, grey before my time, but with clear eyes, pear-shaped eyes, I pace my fields.'

“有时我会想起曾经爱过我的珀西瓦尔。他在印度骑马，落马。有时我会想起罗达。不安的呼喊常常在死寂的夜晚把我惊醒。但大部分时间我还是满足地和我的儿子们一起散步。我剪掉蜀葵的枯萎花瓣。虽然相当矮胖，又早生白发，但我时常漫步于我的田园，我的眼睛清澈且如梨形一般。”

'Here I stand,' said Jinny, 'in the Tube station where everything that is desirable meets—Piccadilly South Side, Piccadilly North Side, Regent Street and the Haymarket. I stand for a moment under the pavement in the heart of London. Innumerable wheels rush and feet press just over my head. The great avenues of civilization meet here and strike this way and that. I am in the heart of life. But look—there is my body in that looking glass. How solitary, how shrunk, how aged! I am no longer young. I am no longer part of the procession. Millions descend those stairs in a terrible descent. Great wheels churn inexorably urging them downwards. Millions have died. Percival died. I still move. I still live. But who will come if I signal?

“此时，”吉尼说，“我站在地铁站里，这儿汇聚了勾人欲望的一切——皮卡迪利南，皮卡迪利北，摄政大街，以及干草大集。我在伦敦中心的人行步道下面站了一会儿。无数急速转动的轮子和踏过的脚刚好在我的头上。文明的大道在这里交汇，又伸向四方。我来到生活的中心。可是瞧啊——那面镜子里有我的身体。多么孤单，多么干瘪，多么衰老！我已青春不再。我已不再是队列中的一员。成千上万的人通过那些阶梯急速降落下来。巨大的轮子无情地转动，向下驱赶着他们。成千上万的人死去了。珀西瓦尔死了。我还在行走。我还活着。可是如果我招手示意，谁会过来呢？

'Little animal that I am, sucking my flanks in and out with fear, I stand here, palpitating, trembling. But I will not be afraid. I will bring the whip down on my flanks. I am not a whimpering little animal making for the shadow. It was only for a moment, catching sight of myself before I had time to prepare myself as I always prepare myself for the sight of myself, that I quailed. It is true; I am not young—I shall soon raise my arm in vain and my scarf will fall to my side without having signalled. I shall not hear the sudden sigh in the night and feel through the dark someone coming. There will be no reflections in window-panes in dark tunnels. I shall look into faces, and I shall see them seek some other face. I admit for one moment the soundless flight of upright bodies down the moving stairs like the pinioned and terrible descent of some army of the dead downwards and the churning of the great engines remorselessly forwarding us, all of us, onwards, made me cower and run for shelter.

“我就像一只小兽，站在这儿，恐惧地喘着气，两胁起伏，心里直跳，浑身发抖。可是我不要害怕。我会经受得住抽在我两肋的鞭子。我并不是一只要躲向暗处的呜咽的小兽。只有那么一会儿，像刚才我还没来得及像平常那样为看到我自己的形象做好准备就突然看见了自己，我畏缩了。事实如此；我并不年轻了——我很快就将抬不起手臂，我的围巾也将不知不觉地滑落到一边。我将听不见夜里突然的叹息，也感觉不到黑暗中有人走近。穿过漆黑的隧道时，窗玻璃上再也不会有任何倒影了。我将仔细地端详那些脸庞，我将看到它们也在找寻另一张脸庞。我承认，有那么一会儿，那些直立的人体沿着移动的阶梯无声地奔逃，好像一支死人的军队身不由己地急速降下来，还有那些转动的巨大机器正无情地驱赶着我们，我们所有人，向前，曾让我胆战心惊，想赶紧找个藏身之所。

'But now I swear, making deliberately in front of the glass those slight preparations that equip me, I will not be afraid. Think of the superb omnibuses, red and yellow, stopping and starting, punctually in order. Think of the powerful and beautiful cars that now slow to a foot's pace and now shoot forward; think of men, think of women, equipped, prepared, driving onward. This is the triumphant procession; this is the army of victory with banners and brass eagles and heads crowned with laurel-leaves won in battle. They are better than savages in loin-cloths, and women whose hair is dank, whose long breasts sag, with children tugging at their long breasts. These broad thoroughfares—Piccadilly South, Piccadilly North, Regent Street and the Haymarket—are sanded paths of victory driven through the jungle. I too, with my little patent-leather shoes, my handkerchief that is but a film of gauze, my reddened lips and my finely pencilled eyebrows, march to victory with the band.

“可是现在，我故意在镜子前做出那些把我武装起来的小小准备之后，我发誓我不会害怕。想想那些华美的公共汽车吧，红黄两色，停停走走，准时而有序。想想那些劲道而美观的轿车吧，时而缓慢如步行，时而突然前冲；想想那些男男女女吧，全副武装，胸有成竹，驾车前行。这是得胜的队列；这是战场上凯旋归来的手持旗帜、身佩黄铜鹰徽、头戴桂冠的胜利之师。他们好过那些裹着腰布的野蛮人，也好过那些头发潮湿、乳房低垂、松弛的乳房上拖着吃奶孩子的妇女。这些宽阔的通衢大道——皮卡迪利南，皮卡迪利北，摄政大街，以及干草大集——是从丛林中开辟出来的铺满黄沙的胜利之路。我，穿着我那双小小的漆皮鞋，拿着我那方只是一层薄纱的手帕，把我的嘴唇涂得鲜红，把我的眉毛描得纤细，也随着众人大步走向胜利。

'Look how they show off clothes here even under ground in a perpetual radiance. They will not let the earth even lie wormy and sodden. There are gauzes and silks illumined in glass cases and underclothes trimmed with a million close stitches of fine embroidery. Crimson, green, violet, they are dyed all colours. Think how they organize, roll out, smooth, dip in dyes, and drive tunnels blasting the rock. Lifts rise and fall; trains stop, trams start as regularly as the waves of the sea. This is what has my adhesion. I am a native of this world, I follow its banners. How could I run for shelter when they are so magnificently adventurous, daring, curious, too, and strong enough in the midst of effort to pause and scrawl with a free hand a joke upon the wall? Therefore I will powder my face and redden my lips. I will make the angle of my eyebrows sharper than usual. I will rise to the surface, standing erect with the others in Piccadilly Circus. I will sign with a sharp gesture to a cab whose driver will signify by some indescribable alacrity his understanding of my signals. For I still excite eagerness. I still feel the bowing of men in the street like the silent stoop of the corn when the light wind blows, ruffling it red.

“瞧，即使在这儿，在地下他们也一直兴奋地炫耀着服饰。他们甚至不会让泥土生虫、湿透。轻纱和绸缎在玻璃柜子里闪闪放光，内衣装饰有成千上万刺绣的细密针脚。深红的，绿的，紫的，他们被染上了各种色彩。想想他们如何编织，铺展，摊平，浸染，然后爆破岩石，开辟出隧道。升降机起起落落；火车、电车停停开开，像海浪一样有规律。这正是我所追随的。我生来属于这个世界，我追随着它的旗帜。他们是那么雄心勃勃，敢作敢为，既大胆又好奇，而且那么强悍，在努力的过程中还能暂时歇一歇，用闲下来的手在墙上涂鸦一个玩笑，这时我怎么可能跑去寻觅藏身之所呢？因此我要在脸上涂脂抹粉，把我的嘴唇搽得鲜红。我要把我的眉毛描得比平时轮廓更加分明。我要出头露脸，笔直地站在皮卡迪利广场上的那些人中间。我要用一个果断的手势向一辆出租车示意，车里的司机会以一种难以形容的欣然姿态表明他理解了我的手势。因为我仍然能激发出别人的热情。我仍然能感觉到大街上男人的鞠躬，好像轻风吹拂让谷物泛红时那无言的俯首。

'I will drive to my own house. I will fill the vases with lavish, with luxurious, with extravagant flowers nodding in great bunches. I will place one chair there, another here. I will put ready cigarettes, glasses and some gaily covered new unread book in case Bernard comes, or Neville or Louis. But perhaps it will not be Bernard, Neville or Louis, but somebody new, somebody unknown, somebody I passed on a staircase and, just turning as we passed, I murmured, "Come." He will come this afternoon; somebody I do not know, somebody new. Let the silent army of the dead descend. I march forward.'

“我要乘车赶回我自己的屋子。我要慷慨、豪爽而铺张地给花瓶插上大束大束频频颔首的鲜花。我要把一张椅子放在那边，另一张放在这边。我要放好香烟、酒杯和一本封面华丽、尚未翻开的新书，等候伯纳德或内维尔或路易斯的到来。但是来者也许不会是伯纳德、内维尔或路易斯，而是某个新面孔，某个陌生人，某个我在阶梯上碰到的人，我们擦肩而过时，我扭头小声说道：‘来吧。’今天下午他要来；一个我不认识的人，一张新面孔。让那支无声的死人的军队退下去吧。我要前行。”

'I no longer need a room now,' said Neville, 'or walls and firelight. I am no longer young. I pass Jinny's house without envy, and smile at the young man who arranges his tie a little nervously on the door-step. Let the dapper young man ring the bell; let him find her. I shall find her if I want her; if not, I pass on. The old corrosion has lost its bite—envy, intrigue and bitterness have been washed out. We have lost our glory too. When we were young we sat anywhere, on bare benches in draughty halls with the doors always banging. We tumbled about half naked like boys on the deck of a ship squirting each other with hose-pipes. Now I could swear that I like people pouring profusely out of the Tube when the day's work is done, unanimous, indiscriminate, uncounted. I have picked my own fruit. I look dispassionately.

“现在我不再需要一个房间，”内维尔说，“也不再需要四壁和火光。我已青春不再。我毫无妒意地经过吉尼的屋前，冲着门阶上那位有点局促地整理领带的年轻人微微一笑。让这位衣冠楚楚的年轻人拉响门铃吧；让他找她吧。如果我想她，我会找她的；如果我不想，我就走过去。旧伤已失去了疼痛——嫉妒、阴谋和仇恨已被冲刷殆尽。我们也已失去了我们的荣耀。年轻时，我们随意地坐在光板长凳上，不管厅堂里如何漏风，门如何咣当直响。我们半裸着身子四下里打闹，就像船甲板上那些用水管互相喷射的小子们一样。此时我敢发誓，我愿意看到那些工作了一天的人们纷纷涌出地铁，整齐划一，不分彼此，不计其数。我已摘取了我自己的果实。我不动声色地观望着。

'After all, we are not responsible. We are not judges. We are not called upon to torture our fellows with thumb-screws and irons; we are not called upon to mount pulpits and lecture them on pale Sunday afternoons. It is better to look at a rose, or to read Shakespeare as I read him here in Shaftesbury Avenue. Here's the fool, here's the villain, here in a car comes Cleopatra, burning on her barge. Here are figures of the damned too, noseless men by the police-court wall, standing with their feet in fire, howling. This is poetry if we do not write it. They act their parts infallibly, and almost before they open their lips I know what they are going to say, and wait the divine moment when they speak the word that must have been written. If it were only for the sake of the play, I could walk Shaftesbury Avenue for ever.

“毕竟，我们并无责任。我们并非评判者。没有人呼吁我们用翼形螺钉和烙铁拷问我们的同胞；没有人邀请我们登上讲坛在阴郁的星期天下午讲法布道。最好还是观赏一朵玫瑰，或者读读莎士比亚，就像我总在这沙夫茨伯里大道上阅读他的作品那样。傻瓜走来了，恶棍走来了，车里走下一位美人，好像那位大驳船上闪亮出场的埃及艳后，克娄巴特拉。该死的人也来了，这些没鼻子的人，靠在治安法庭的围墙上，双脚站在烈火中，哀嚎着。这就是诗，如果我们不把它写下来。他们绝对无误地扮演着自己的角色，几乎不等他们开口，我就知道他们要说什么，然后等待他们说出必定写好了的那个词的神圣时刻。如果只是为了看这部剧本，我可能会永远走在沙夫茨伯里大道上。

'Then coming from the street, entering some room, there are people talking, or hardly troubling to talk. He says, she says, somebody else says things have been said so often that one word is now enough to lift a whole weight. Argument, laughter, old grievances—they fall through the air, thickening it. I take a book and read half a page of anything. They have not mended the spout of the teapot yet. The child dances, dressed in her mother's clothes.

“这时，有人从大街上走来，有人进了某个房间，有人在交谈，或几乎懒得交谈。他在说，她在说，还有别人也在说着那些重复了千百遍而此时一句话足以揭示明白的事情。争论，嬉笑，以往的种种隐忧——充斥在空气中，使空气变得凝滞起来。我拿起一本书，随意地读了半页。他们尚未修复茶壶的壶嘴。有个孩子舞了起来，穿着她母亲的衣服。

'But then Rhoda, or it may be Louis, some fasting and anguished spirit, passes through and out again. They want a plot, do they? They want a reason? It is not enough for them, this ordinary scene. It is not enough to wait for the thing to be said as if it were written; to see the sentence lay its dab of clay precisely on the right place, making character; to perceive, suddenly, some group in outline against the sky. Yet if they want violence, I have seen death and murder and suicide all in one room. One comes in, one goes out. There are sobs on the staircase. I have heard threads broken and knots tied and the quiet stitching of white cambric going on and on on the knees of a woman. Why ask, like Louis, for a reason, or fly like Rhoda to some far grove and part the leaves of the laurels and look for statues? They say that one must beat one's wings against the storm in the belief that beyond this welter the sun shines; the sun falls sheer into pools that are fledged with willows. (Here it is November; the poor hold out matchboxes in wind-bitten fingers.) They say truth is to be found there entire, and virtue, that shuffles along here, down blind alleys, is to be had there perfect. Rhoda flies with her neck outstretched and blind fanatic eyes, past us. Louis, now so opulent, goes to his attic window among the blistered roofs and gazes where she has vanished, but must sit down in his office among the typewriters and the telephone and work it all out for our instruction, for our regeneration, and the reform of an unborn world.

“不过这时，罗达，也可能是路易斯，总之是某个正在斋戒、苦恼非常的人物，走了进来，又走了出去。他们想要一个情节，是么？他们想要一个理由吧？这样一个平淡的场面对他们来说是不够的。静待说出那件仿佛写好了的事是不够的；眼瞅着那句话把一小块黏土精准地贴在恰当的位置上，塑造出人物形象是不够的；猛然之间意识到某个群体在天幕上映出模糊的形象是不够的。不过，如果他们想要激烈的场面，我倒是见过死亡、谋杀和自杀，完全发生在一间屋子里。一个人进来，一个人出去。楼梯上传来啜泣声。我听见扯断线头的声音，打结的声音，一个女人在膝头的白细薄布上静悄悄缝缝补补的声音。干嘛像路易斯那样要求一个理由，或像罗达那样飞向某个遥远的丛林，拨开月桂树的枝叶以寻找雕像？他们说，一个人必须展开翅膀迎击风暴，坚信经过这番锤炼之后会有阳光闪耀；会有阳光一泻无余地照进池塘，池边杨柳依依。（此地正是十一月份；穷人们被风吹裂的手拿出一盒盒火柴。）他们说，在那儿将会找到完全的真理，在那儿将会拥有完美的德行，虽然在这儿，它沿着死胡同艰难向前。罗达伸着长长的脖子、张着盲目而狂热的眼睛从我们身旁飞了过去。如今那么飞黄腾达的路易斯走向他的阁楼窗子，穿过凹凸不平的屋顶，他凝望着她消逝的地方，但他必须坐在他的办公室里，坐在他的打字机和电话机中间，为了给我们以教导，为了让我们获得新生，为了改造一个尚未诞生的世界，他必须兢兢业业，殚精竭虑。

'But now in this room, which I enter without knocking, things are said as if they had been written. I go to the bookcase. If I choose, I read half a page of anything. I need not speak. But I listen. I am marvellously on the alert. Certainly, one cannot read this poem without effort. The page is often corrupt and mud-stained, and torn and stuck together with faded leaves, with scraps of verbena or geranium. To read this poem one must have myriad eyes, like one of those lamps that turn on slabs of racing water at midnight in the Atlantic, when perhaps only a spray of seaweed pricks the surface, or suddenly the waves gape and up shoulders a monster. One must put aside antipathies and jealousies and not interrupt. One must have patience and infinite care and let the light sound, whether of spiders' delicate feet on a leaf or the chuckle of water in some irrelevant drain-pipe, unfold too. Nothing is to be rejected in fear or horror. The poet who has written this page (what I read with people talking) has withdrawn. There are no commas or semi-colons. The lines do not run in convenient lengths. Much is sheer nonsense. One must be sceptical, but throw caution to the winds and when the door opens accept absolutely. Also sometimes weep; also cut away ruthlessly with a slice of the blade soot, bark, hard accretions of all sorts. And so (while they talk) let down one's net deeper and deeper and gently draw in and bring to the surface what he said and she said and make poetry.

“但是此刻，在我无需敲门而进入的这个房间里，说出来的事情仿佛是早已写好了似的。我走向书柜。要我选择的话，我就随意地读上半页。我无须发言。但是我在倾听。我异常警觉。当然，读这首诗你不可能不花气力。书页常常有损毁而且沾了泥污，残破而由褪了色的树叶粘在一起，夹杂着马鞭草或天竺葵的碎片。读这首诗你必得浑身长满眼睛，就像大西洋中午夜时分照耀在惊涛骇浪之上的一盏明灯，或许只能看见一小枝海草探出水面，或者突然之间海浪张开大口，一只怪物冲了出来。你必得抛开抵触和嫉妒，不干预。你必得有耐心和极大的细心，让轻微的声响，不管是蜘蛛在一片叶子上的窸窣脚步声，还是某个不相关的排水管中水的滴答声，也显露出来。无论什么，都不该因为恐惧或恐怖而加以排斥。写下这一页（我在人们交谈过程中所读的这一页）的诗人已经退隐了。没有逗号，也没有分号。诗行的长短不合规范。大多是纯粹的胡话。你肯定会有所怀疑，结果却把谨慎的心思抛掷风中，当门打开时，便完全接受了。有时你还会哭泣；也会利刃一挥，无情地除掉烟灰、树皮和各种硬瘤。那么（在他们交谈的过程中），让你的网沉得越来越深，轻轻地收紧，把他和她说过的话拉出水面，写成诗吧。

'Now I have listened to them talking. They have gone now. I am alone. I could be content to watch the fire burn for ever, like a dome, like a furnace; now some spike of wood takes the look of a scaffold, or pit, or happy valley; now it is a serpent curled crimson with white scales. The fruit on the curtain swells beneath the parrot's beak. Cheep, cheep, creaks the fire, like the cheep of insects in the middle of a forest. Cheep, cheep, it clicks while out there the branches thrash the air, and now, like a volley of shot, a tree falls. These are the sounds of a London night. Then I hear the one sound I wait for. Up and up it comes, approaches, hesitates, stops at my door. I cry, "Come in. Sit by me. Sit on the edge of the chair." Swept away by the old hallucination, I cry, "Come closer, closer".'

“现在我听过了他们的交谈。此刻他们已经走了。我独自一人。我原本可以心满意足地看着火光经久不息，像苍穹，像熔炉；但是忽而出现了一段木头楔子，样子像棚架，像坑槽，像美妙的山谷；忽而是一条盘着的蛇，红体白鳞。帘帏上的果实在鹦鹉的喙下膨胀起来。吱，吱，火烧得正旺，仿佛树林中昆虫吱吱的叫声。噼，啪，火苗发出脆响，树枝弹破空气，忽然，好像枪弹齐发，一棵树倒了。这些就是伦敦之夜的声音。这时我听到了我期盼的那个声音。一点一点，它走了过来，靠近，迟疑，停在我的门口。我叫道：‘进来吧。坐在我身旁。坐在椅子边上。’我被以往的幻觉裹挟而去，不由地叫道：‘再近一些，再近一些吧。’”

'I come back from the office,' said Louis. 'I hang my coat here, place my stick there—I like to fancy that Richelieu walked with such a cane. Thus I divest myself of my authority. I have been sitting at the right hand of a director at a varnished table. The maps of our successful undertakings confront us on the wall. We have laced the world together with our ships. The globe is strung with our lines. I am immensely respectable. All the young ladies in the office acknowledge my entrance. I can dine where I like now, and without vanity may suppose that I shall soon acquire a house in Surrey, two cars, a conservatory and some rare species of melon. But I still return, I still come back to my attic, hang up my hat and resume in solitude that curious attempt which I have made since I brought down my fist on my master's grained oak door. I open a little book. I read one poem. One poem is enough.

“我从办公室回来了。”路易斯说。“我把外衣挂在这儿，手杖放在那儿——我总愿意想象黎赛留当年散步时就用到这样一根手杖。这样我就剥去了自己的威严。我一直坐在一张漆得发亮的桌子前，一位主管的右手边。墙上，我们事业成功的图示正对着我们。我们用我们的船只把整个世界联系在一起。我们的航线贯通全球。我是极其受人尊敬的。办公室里所有的年轻女士在我进门时都向我致意。现在，我喜欢到哪儿吃饭就可以到哪儿吃饭，而且我可以豪不虚张声势地认为，不久我就会在萨里郡拥有一处宅邸，两部轿车，一座暖房和一些种类珍稀的甜瓜。但我还是回来了，我还是回到了我的阁楼，挂起了我的礼帽，在孤寂中继续我那奇妙的尝试，从我的拳头叩响校长家的细纹橡木门时起，我就一直做这样的尝试。我翻开一本小册子。我读了一首诗。一首诗足矣。

O western wind...

嗨，西风……

O western wind, you are at enmity with my mahogany table and spats, and also, alas, with the vulgarity of my mistress, the little actress, who has never been able to speak English correctly—

唉，西风啊，你与我的红木桌子、我的鞋罩为敌，而且，唉，也与我的情妇，那位从来没能准确说英语的小演员的粗鄙为敌——

O western wind, when wilt thou blow...

嗨，西风，何时你将吹来……

Rhoda, with her intense abstraction, with her unseeing eyes the colour of snail's flesh, does not destroy you, western wind, whether she comes at midnight when the stars blaze or at the most prosaic hour of midday. She stands at the window and looks at the chimney-pots and the broken windows in the houses of poor people—

西风啊，罗达，她的神思极其恍惚，她茫然的眼睛透出蜗牛肉似的色彩，从未让你偃息，无论她在星光闪耀的午夜时分走来，还是在最为无聊的日中时刻走来。她站在窗前，望着那些穷苦人家房子的烟囱管帽和破碎窗户——

O western wind, when wilt thou blow...

嗨，西风，何时你将吹来……

'My task, my burden, has always been greater than other people's. A pyramid has been set on my shoulders. I have tried to do a colossal labour. I have driven a violent, an unruly, a vicious team. With my Australian accent I have sat in eating-shops and tried to make the clerks accept me, yet never forgotten my solemn and severe convictions and the discrepancies and incoherences that must be resolved. As a boy I dreamt of the Nile, was reluctant to awake, yet brought down my fist on the grained oak door. It would have been happier to have been born without a destiny, like Susan, like Percival, whom I most admire.

“我的任务，我的负荷，一直比别人的重大。一座金字塔压在了我的肩上。我竭力承担起繁多的劳作。我驾驭着一支粗野、蛮横而凶狠的团队。唇齿间带着澳大利亚口音的我曾坐在餐馆里竭力要让那些职员们接受我，但从未忘记我庄重而严肃的信条，以及必须解决的种种分歧和矛盾。从孩提时代起我就梦想着尼罗河，不愿醒来，结果却把我的拳头叩在那扇细纹橡木门上。如果生来不由命运，像苏珊，像我最敬仰的珀西瓦尔一样，那会更幸福的。

O western wind, when wilt thou blow.

嗨，西风，何时你将吹来。

That the small rain down can rain?

好让那细雨降临大地？

'Life has been a terrible affair for me. I am like some vast sucker, some glutinous, some adhesive, some insatiable mouth. I have tried to draw from the living flesh the stone lodged at the centre. I have known little natural happiness, thought I chose my mistress in order that, with her cockney accent, she might make me feel at my ease. But she only tumbled the floor with dirty under-linen, and the charwoman and the shop-boys called after me a dozen times a day, mocking my prim and supercilious gait.

“人生对我来说一直是一件可怕的事。我像一只巨大的吸盘，一张黏黏糊糊、贪得无厌的嘴巴。我竭力要从血肉之躯剥离出那枚嵌在当中的石子。我几乎不懂自然之乐，本想找个情妇，好让她借着伦敦土话使我感到安逸。但她只会让地板上堆满脏内衣，而且那位女佣和那些店伙计们会每天十多次地跟在我的身后叫喊，模仿我拘谨而高傲的步态。

O western wind, when wilt thou blow,

嗨，西风，何时你将吹来。

That the small rain down can rain?

好让那细雨降临大地？

'What has my destiny been, the sharp-pointed pyramid that has pressed on my ribs all these years? That I remember the Nile and the women carrying pitchers on their heads; that I feel myself woven in and out of the long summers and winters that have made the corn flow and have frozen the streams. I am not a single and passing being. My life is not a moment's bright spark like that on the surface of a diamond. I go beneath ground tortuously, as if a warder carried a lamp from cell to cell. My destiny has been that I remember and must weave together, must plait into one cable the many threads, the thin, the thick, the broken, the enduring of our long history, of our tumultuous and varied day. There is always more to be understood; a discord to be listened for; a falsity to be reprimanded. Broken and soot-stained are these roofs with their chimney cowls, their loose slates, their slinking cats and attic windows. I pick my way over broken glass, among blistered tiles, and see only vile and famished faces.

“我的命运，这些年来一直强压在我身上的尖尖的金字塔，到底是什么呢？我总是想起尼罗河和那些头顶水罐的妇女；我总是发觉自己迂回于麦浪翻滚的长长夏天和江河冰封的漫漫冬季。我并非孤身的过客。我的生命并非钻石表面的刹那光影。我在地下迂回前行，仿佛狱卒提着灯盏走过一间又一间牢房。我的命运就是念念不忘，就是必须把许多线头，我们漫长的历史和风云变幻的岁月中那些有粗有细、时断时续的线头，编织在一起，编成一条巨缆。总有更多东西要被了解；纷争要被倾听；虚假要被谴责。这些屋顶破破烂烂、满是灰尘，随处可见烟囱帽、松散的石板瓦、偷偷溜走的猫和一扇扇阁楼窗子。我小心翼翼地越过碎玻璃，透过凸起的瓦片，看到的只是卑鄙、饥饿的脸庞。

'Let us suppose that I make reason of it all—one poem on a page, and then die. I can assure you it will not be unwillingly. Percival died. Rhoda left me. But I shall live to be gaunt and sere, to tap my way, much respected, with my gold-headed cane along the pavements of the city. Perhaps I shall never die, shall never attain even that continuity and permanence—

“让我们设想一下，我找到了一切的根源——书页上留下的一首诗，然后死去。你放心，我不会心有不甘。珀西瓦尔死了。罗达离我而去。可我却要一直活到憔悴而干枯，十分受人尊敬地拄着金头手杖，沿着城市的街道踽踽独行。也许我会永远不死，永远无法获得那种完整和永恒——

O western wind, when wilt thou blow,

嗨，西风，何时你将吹来。

That the small rain down can rain?

好让那细雨降临大地？

'Percival was flowering with green leaves and was laid in the earth with all his branches still sighing in the summer wind. Rhoda, with whom I shared silence when the others spoke, she who hung back and turned aside when the herd assembled and galloped with orderly, sleek backs over the rich pastures, has gone now like the desert heat. When the sun blisters the roofs of the city I think of her; when the dry leaves patter to the ground; when the old men come with pointed sticks and pierce little bits of paper as we pierced her—

“珀西瓦尔正当花季，绿叶繁茂，却被埋进土里，全身的枝杈还在夏日的风中叹息。罗达，当别人说话时，我与她共守沉默，当肥壮的羊群聚拢，有序而顺从地奔向丰腴的牧场时，她缩在后面，避开了，此时已经走了，犹如消退的大漠炎热。每当太阳晒得城市的屋顶起皱时；每当枯叶啪嗒坠地时；每当老人们拄着尖尖的手杖走来，刺向地上的小纸片，就像我们当年刺向她一样；那时，我就会想起她。

O western wind, when wilt thou blow,

嗨，西风，何时你将吹来，

That the small rain down can rain?

好让那细雨降临大地？

Christ, that my love were in my arms,

主啊，但愿我的爱人回到我的怀抱。

And I in my bed again!

让我重安眠！

I return now to my book; I return now to my attempt.'

我时而重新翻开我的书；时而重新开始我的尝试。”

'Oh, life, how I have dreaded you,' said Rhoda, 'oh, human beings, how I have hated you! How you have nudged, how you have interrupted, how hideous you have looked in Oxford Street, how squalid sitting opposite each other staring in the Tube! Now as I climb this mountain, from the top of which I shall see Africa, my mind is printed with brown-paper parcels and your faces. I have been stained by you and corrupted. You smelt so unpleasant too, lining up outside doors to buy tickets. All were dressed in indeterminate shades of grey and brown, never even a blue feather pinned to a hat. None had the courage to be one thing rather than another. What dissolution of the soul you demanded in order to get through one day, what lies, bowings, scrapings, fluency and servility! How you chained me to one spot, one hour, one chair, and sat yourselves down opposite! How you snatched from me the white spaces that lie between hour and hour and rolled them into dirty pellets and tossed them into the waste-paper basket with your greasy paws. Yet those were my life.

“唉，生活啊，我多么害怕你！”罗达说，“唉，人类啊，我多么憎恨你们！你们推推搡搡，你们插科打诨，你们在牛津街上的样子何其丑陋，你们面对面坐在地铁里，邋里邋遢，目光呆滞！此时，当我爬上这座山，从山巅我将望到非洲，我的脑海里浮现出牛皮纸袋和你们的脸庞。我被你们玷污了，变得堕落了。在门外排队买票时，你们散发的气味也那么难闻。身上都披着难辨是灰色还是棕色的衣服，甚至从未见过哪顶帽子上别有一支蓝色羽毛。没有哪个胆敢与他人有别。为了熬过一天，你们的灵魂经历了怎样的迷失，说了多少谎言，鞠了多少躬，受了多少伤，费了多少口舌，忍了多少屈辱！你们把我束缚在一个固定的位置，一把椅子上，长达一个钟头，而你们自己只管坐在对面！你们用油腻的爪子从我这里夺走了存在于各个时刻之间的空白页，把它们卷成肮脏的纸团，丢进废纸篓里。可是这就是我的生活。

'But I yielded. Sneers and yawns were covered with my hand. I did not go out into the street and break a bottle in the gutter as a sign of rage. Trembling with ardour, I pretended that I was not surprised. What you did, I did. If Susan and Jinny pulled up their stockings like that, I pulled mine up like that also. So terrible was life that I held up shade after shade. Look at life through this, look at life through that; let there be rose leaves, let there be vine leaves—I covered the whole street, Oxford Street, Piccadilly Circus, with the blaze and ripple of my mind, with vine leaves and rose leaves. There were boxes too, standing in the passage when the school broke up. I stole secretly to read the labels and dream of names and faces. Harrogate, perhaps, Edinburgh, perhaps, was ruffled with golden glory where some girl whose name I forget stood on the pavement. But it was the name only. I left Louis; I feared embraces. With fleeces, with vestments, I have tried to cover the blue-black blade. I implored day to break into night. I have longed to see the cupboard dwindle, to feel the bed soften, to float suspended, to perceive lengthened trees, lengthened faces, a green bank on a moor and two figures in distress saying good-bye. I flung words in fans like those the sower throws over the ploughed fields when the earth is bare. I desired always to stretch the night and fill it fuller and fuller with dreams.

“但是我屈服了。讥笑和哈欠被我的手掩盖了。我并没有冲到大街上，在阴沟里摔破一只酒瓶以发泄愤怒。我激动得浑身发抖，却装作波澜不惊。你们怎么做，我也怎么做。如果苏珊和吉尼把她们的袜子拉上去，我也像她们那样拉上我的袜子。生活那么可怕，我只好竖起一道又一道屏障。时而透过这里看生活，时而透过那里看生活；让这里长出玫瑰叶子，让那里长出葡萄叶子——用我的灵光闪现，用葡萄叶子和玫瑰叶子，我遮住了整个街道，牛津大街，皮卡迪利广场。学校放假时，有一些箱子挡在过道上。我偷偷摸摸地读着上面的标签，想象着那些名字和脸庞。也许哈罗盖特，也许爱丁堡，立时焕发出金色的容光，因为有个我忘了名字的女孩站在那儿的人行道上。但那只不过一个名字而已。我离开了路易斯；我害怕拥抱。用各种绒布，用各种衣物，我曾竭力要遮住那蓝幽幽的锋芒。我乞求白天突然变成黑夜。我渴望看到橱柜缩至无形，摸到软软的床铺，飘浮在半空，意识到拉长的树，拉长的脸，荒原上一条绿堤，两个伤心的人在道别。我把词语抛洒出去，就像大地光秃时播种的人在翻耕过的田地间播撒种子。我总是希望让黑夜延长，用梦使它变得愈发充实。

'Then in some Hall I parted the boughs of music and saw the house we have made; the square stood upon the oblong. "The house which contains all," I said, lurching against people's shoulders in an omnibus after Percival died; yet I went to Greenwich. Walking on the embankment, I prayed that I might thunder for ever on the verge of the world where there is no vegetation, but here and there a marble pillar. I threw my bunch into the spreading wave. I said, "Consume me, carry me to the furthest limit." The wave has broken; the bunch is withered. I seldom think of Percival now.

“这时，在某个大厅，我拨开音乐的树枝，看见了我们建造的房子；正方形叠着长方形。‘房子里什么都有。’珀西瓦尔死后，我在公共汽车上斜靠着人们的肩膀说道；可我还是去了格林尼治。走在路堤上，我祈求要像雷声永远在天边轰鸣，那里没有植被，只有随处可见的大理石柱。我把手中的花束扔进绵延的海浪。我说：‘吞噬我吧，带我去天涯海角。’海浪迸碎了；花束已凋零。现在我很少想起珀西瓦尔。

'Now I climb this Spanish hill; and I will suppose that this mule-back is my bed and that I lie dying. There is only a thin sheet between me now and the infinite depths. The lumps in the mattress soften beneath me. We stumble up—we stumble on. My path has been up and up, towards some solitary tree with a pool beside it on the very top. I have sliced the waters of beauty in the evening when the hills close themselves like birds' wings folded. I have picked sometimes a red carnation, and wisps of hay. I have sunk alone on the turf and fingered some old bone and thought: When the wind stoops to brush this height, may there be nothing found but a pinch of dust.

“此刻，我登上这座西班牙的山峰；我要设想这里的骡背即是我的床，我躺下来，奄奄一息。现在的我与无底的深渊之间只隔着薄薄一层床单。床垫里的硬物在我身下变软了。我们蹒跚而上——我们蹒跚向前。我脚下的路一直向上，向上，通向山巅一棵孤零零的树，它的旁边有个池塘。当黄昏降临，山岭四合，犹如鸟儿收拢翅膀，我细细地剖开水的柔美。有时我摘下一朵红色的康乃馨，拾起一绺绺的干草。我独自坐在草地上，手指捻弄着一块古老的骨头，心想：当风儿俯身掠过这片高地，但愿它只看见一抔尘土。

'The mule stumbles up and on. The ridge of the hill rises like mist, but from the top I shall see Africa. Now the bed gives under me. The sheets spotted with yellow holes let me fall through. The good woman with a face like a white horse at the end of the bed makes a valedictory movement and turns to go. Who then comes with me? Flowers only, the cowbind and the moonlight-coloured May. Gathering them loosely in a sheaf I made of them a garland and gave them—Oh, to whom? We launch out now over the precipice. Beneath us lie the lights of the herring fleet. The cliffs vanish. Rippling small, rippling grey, innumerable waves spread beneath us. I touch nothing. I see nothing. We may sink and settle on the waves. The sea will drum in my ears. The white petals will be darkened with sea water. They will float for a moment and then sink. Rolling me over the waves will shoulder me under. Everything falls in a tremendous shower, dissolving me.

“骡子磕磕绊绊，向上，向前。山脊浮动，犹如雾霭，但是到了山巅，我就会望见非洲。此时，床在我的身下塌陷了。我穿过点缀着黄色圆孔的床单掉了下去。床脚那位面孔像白马的好心女人做了一个告辞的动作，转身离开了。那么谁跟我一道来呢？只有花了，白泻根和月光一样的山楂花。我把它们松散地集成一束，编成一个花冠，送给——唉，送给谁呢？现在我们跨过了悬崖。在我们下面是捕鲱船队的灯火。崖壁消失了。我们的脚下是绵延无际的海浪，微微荡漾，泛着灰蒙蒙的光。我接触不到任何东西。我看不见任何东西。我们也许会降落到海浪上。大海将在我的耳畔轰鸣。洁白的花瓣将被海水染黑。它们将会短暂地漂浮在水面，然后沉下去。海浪裹住了我，它们要把我摁到水下。一切如骤雨突降，将我淹没。

'Yet that tree has bristling branches; that is the hard line of a cottage roof. Those bladder shapes painted red and yellow are faces. Putting my foot to the ground I step gingerly and press my hand against the hard door of a Spanish inn.'

“可是那棵树的枝杈像竖立的鬃毛；那边的村舍屋顶现出硬实的线条。那些被涂成红色和黄色的皮囊似的东西是人的脸庞。我伸出脚踏向地面，战战兢兢地迈开步子，然后把我的手按在一家西班牙旅馆坚硬的门上。”

The sun was sinking. The hard stone of the day was cracked and light poured through its splinters. Red and gold shot through the waves, in rapid running arrows, feathered with darkness. Erratically rays of light flashed and wandered, like signals from sunken islands, or darts shot through laurel groves by shameless, laughing boys. But the waves, as they neared the shore, were robbed of light, and fell in one long concussion, like a wall falling, a wall of grey stone, unpierced by any chink of light.

太阳正在沉落。白昼像一块坚硬的石头裂开了，阳光穿透它的碎屑倾洒下来。红色和金色射穿了海浪，像疾驰的箭镞，装饰着黑色的翎羽。一道道光线变幻不定地闪动，游移，像是从沉没的岛屿上发出的信号，也像是无耻、大笑的男孩们从月桂树丛中射出的飞镖。但是海浪一接近岸边就失去了光芒，在一阵经久不息的震荡声中倒下了，像一道倾塌的墙，一道密不透光的灰暗的石墙。

A breeze rose; a shiver ran through the leaves; and thus stirred they lost their brown density and became grey or white as the tree shifted its mass, winked and lost its domed uniformity. The hawk poised on the topmost branch flicked its eyelids and rose and sailed and soared far away. The wild plover cried in the marshes, evading, circling, and crying further off in loneliness. The smoke of trains and chimneys was stretched and torn and became part of the fleecy canopy that hung over the sea and the fields.

微风吹拂；树叶之中掠过一阵颤动；如此惊动之下，它们失去了浓浓的褐色，变得或灰或白，同时那棵树也移了身形，闪烁着，失去了它与天合一的感觉。栖在最高枝上的那只鹰眨着眼睛，腾空跃起，飞向远方。那只野鸻在沼泽地里悲鸣，闪躲，盘旋，然后飞到更远的地方，继续在孤独中悲鸣。火车和烟囱排出的烟蔓延开来，四下飞散，变成了羊毛般天幕的一部分，笼罩在大海和田野之上。

Now the corn was cut. Now only a brisk stubble was left of all its flowing and waving. Slowly a great owl launched itself from the elm tree and swung and rose, as if on a line that dipped, to the height of the cedar. On the hills the slow shadows now broadened, now shrank, as they passed over. The pool on the top of the moor looked blank. No furry face looked there, or hoof splashed, or hot muzzle seethed in the water. A bird, perched on an ash-coloured twig, sipped a beak full of cold water. There was no sound of cropping, and no sound of wheels, but only the sudden roar of the wind letting its sails fill and brushing the tops of the grasses. One bone lay rain-pocked and sun-bleached till it shone like a twig that the sea has polished. The tree, that had burnt foxy red in spring and in midsummer bent pliant leaves to the south wind, was now black as iron, and as bare.

麦子收割了。波浪一样翻涌的麦田现在只剩下清爽的残茬。慢慢地，一只大猫头鹰离开那棵榆树，摇摇晃晃地飞了起来，像是沿着一条下垂的路线，飞向那棵雪松的梢头。山岭上面，缓缓掠过的阴影时而扩大，时而缩小。荒原之巅的那个池塘看上去空落落的。没有毛茸茸的脸在那儿张望，没有蹄子在那儿溅出水花，也没有热烘烘的鼻孔浸在池水中。栖在灰色细枝上的一只鸟吸了满满一口凉水。丝毫听不见收割声，也听不见车轮声，只有骤然的风的呼啸，使其风帆张满，掠过草尖。一根骨头，经历着雨打日晒，直到变得亮闪闪的，好像被大海磨光的一截树枝。那棵树，那棵在春天闪现出妩媚的红色，在仲夏把柔韧的枝叶献给南风的树，此时变得像铁一样乌黑，而且那么赤裸裸。

The land was so distant that no shining roof or glittering window could be any longer seen. The tremendous weight of the shadowed earth had engulfed such frail fetters, such snail-shell encumbrances. Now there was only the liquid shadow of the cloud, the buffeting of the rain, a single darting spear of sunshine, or the sudden bruise of the rainstorm. Solitary trees marked distant hills like obelisks.

这块陆地如此遥远，望不见任何闪亮的屋顶或耀眼的窗户。在这块阴沉沉的土地上，一股巨大的力量包围了那些并不结实的镣铐，那些蜗牛壳似的赘物。此时只有流动的云影，不停敲打的雨滴，一箭射来的阳光，或者突然袭来的暴风雨。远处山岭中孤零零的树木好像方尖碑似的清晰可见。

The evening sun, whose heat had gone out of it and whose burning spot of intensity had been diffused, made chairs and tables mellower and inlaid them with lozenges of brown and yellow. Lined with shadows their weight seemed more ponderous, as if colour, tilted, had run to one side. Here lay knife, fork and glass, but lengthened, swollen, and made portentous. Rimmed in a gold circle the looking-glass held the scene immobile as if everlasting in its eye.

傍晚的太阳热量已经失去，光点已经分散，使得椅子和桌子的色彩更加柔和，而且将褐色和黄色的菱形块嵌入其中。在阴影的衬托下，它们似乎更加凝重，仿佛色彩发生了倾斜，聚到一边去了。这边放着刀、叉和杯子，但是拉得长长的，胀得鼓鼓的，一幅煞有介事的样子。镜子镶着金边，里面的景物一动不动，仿佛是它眼中永恒的存在。

Meanwhile the shadows lengthened on the beach; the blackness deepened. The iron black boot became a pool of deep blue. The rocks lost their hardness. The water that stood round the old boat was dark as if mussels had been steeped in it. The foam had turned livid and left here and there a white gleam of pearl on the misty sand.

同时，海滩上的阴影拉长了；黑暗加深了。那只黑铁似的靴子变成了一个深蓝的水洼。礁石失去了它们的冷峻。那艘破船四周的海水是深黑色的，仿佛有贻贝浸在里面。泡沫变成铅色，在蒙眬的沙滩上随处留下一道道白色的珍珠光影。

'Hampton Court,' said Bernard. 'Hampton Court. This is our meeting-place. Behold the red chimneys, the square battlements of Hampton Court. The tone of my voice as I say "Hampton Court" proves that I am middle-aged. Ten years, fifteen years ago, I should have said "Hampton Court?" with interrogation—what will it be like? Will there be lakes, mazes? Or with anticipation, What is going to happen to me here? Whom shall I meet? Now, Hampton Court—Hampton Court—the words beat a gong in the space which I have so laboriously cleared with half a dozen telephone messages and post cards, give off ring after ring of sound, booming, sonorous: and pictures rise—summer afternoons, boats, old ladies holding their skirts up, one urn in winter, some daffodils in March—these all float to the top of the waters that now lie deep on every scene.

“汉普顿宫。”伯纳德说。“汉普顿宫。这是我们约见的地方。瞧瞧汉普顿宫那红色的烟囱和方形的雉堞。我说‘汉普顿宫’时的声调证明我已人到中年。10年前，15年前，我可能会说：‘汉普顿宫？’带着疑问——那里会是什么样子？那里会有湖，有迷宫吗？或者含着期待：我在这里会碰到什么事呢？我会遇见谁呢？此时，汉普顿宫——汉普顿宫——这几个字像一面锣，在我如此费力，用了半打的电话信息和明信片清理出的空地上敲响，发出一阵接一阵的声音，急促而宏亮；同时一幅幅画面——夏日午后，游船，提着裙子的老太太，冬日里的一座坟冢，三月的黄水仙——浮现出来，每一幅画面都从它们深藏的水下浮了上来。

'There at the door by the Inn, our meeting-place, they are already standing—Susan, Louis, Rhoda, Jinny and Neville. They have come together already. In a moment, when I have joined them, another arrangement will form, another pattern. What now runs to waste, forming scenes profusely, will be checked, stated. I am reluctant to suffer that compulsion. Already at fifty yards distance I feel the order of my being changed. The tug of the magnet of their society tells upon me. I come nearer. They do not see me. Now Rhoda sees me, but she pretends, with her horror of the shock of meeting, that I am a stranger. Now Neville turns. Suddenly, raising my hand, saluting Neville I cry, "I too have pressed flowers between the pages of Shakespeare's sonnets," and am churned up. My little boat bobs unsteadily upon the chopped and tossing waves. There is no panacea (let me note) against the shock of meeting.

瞧，就在酒馆的门口，我们约见的地方，他们已经站在那儿了——苏珊、路易斯、罗达、吉尼，还有内维尔。他们已经一起赶到了。我和他们一会合，马上就会形成另一种安排，另一种组合。现在因为大量组合画面而造成的浪费将会被核实、阐明。我可不情愿受那种强制。50码开外我已经感觉到我的生活常规发生了改变。他们群体的磁力在我身上发挥作用了。我走得更近了。他们没看见我。瞧，罗达看见我了，但是她怕见面时的激动，所以假装我是个陌生人。瞧，内维尔转过身来。突然，我扬起手，一边招呼内维尔一边喊着：‘我也曾在莎士比亚的十四行诗的书页之间夹过鲜花哩。’然后就思绪翻涌了。我小小的船儿在波澜起伏的海浪上面不稳定地颠簸着。针对见面时的激动，根本就不存在什么灵丹妙药（我得注意）。

'It is uncomfortable too, joining ragged edges, raw edges; only gradually, as we shuffle and trample into the Inn, taking coats and hats off, does meeting become agreeable. Now we assemble in the long, bare dining-room that overlooks some park, some green space still fantastically lit by the setting sun so that there is a gold bar between the trees, and sit ourselves down.'

“把参差不齐的棱角，天然的棱角弥合在一起也是不舒服的；只是逐渐地，随着我们慢慢吞吞踏进酒店，脱去外衣和帽子，会面才变得融洽了。现在我们聚集到一间长形的空餐厅，它下方是一处公园，一片绿地，夕阳依然梦幻般地照在上面，树与树之间有一道金色的光柱，在这里，我们各自坐了下来。”

'Now sitting side by side,' said Neville, 'at this narrow table, now before the first emotion is worn smooth, what do we feel? Honestly now, openly and directly as befits old friends meeting with difficulty, what do we feel on meeting? Sorrow. The door will not open; he will not come. And we are laden. Being now all of us middle-aged, loads are on us. Let us put down our loads. What have you made of life, we ask, and I? You, Bernard; you, Susan; you, Jinny; and Rhoda and Louis? The lists have been posted on the doors. Before we break these rolls, and help ourselves to fish and salad, I feel in my private pocket and find my credentials—what I carry to prove my superiority. I have passed. I have papers in my private pocket that prove it. But your eyes, Susan, full of turnips and cornfields, disturb me. These papers in my private pocket—the clamour that proves that I have passed—make a faint sound like that of a man clapping in an empty field to scare away rooks. Now it has died down altogether, under Susan's stare (the clapping, the reverberation that I have made), and I hear only the wind sweeping over the ploughed land and some bird singing—perhaps some intoxicated lark. Has the waiter heard of me, or those furtive everlasting couples, now loitering, now holding back and looking at the trees which are not yet dark enough to shelter their prostrate bodies? No; the sound of clapping has failed.

“这会儿我们紧挨着，”内维尔说，“围坐在这张狭长的桌子边，在最初的情绪尚未平复之前，我们感觉到了什么？就像遇到难处的老友该做的那样，让我们诚诚恳恳、开诚布公、直截了当地来说说，见面时我们感觉到了什么？是悲伤。门不会开了；他不会来了。而且我们重担在身。我们都已人到中年，重担压身。让我们卸下重担吧。你们从生活中得到了什么，我们要问问，我要问问？你，伯纳德；你，苏珊；你，吉尼；还有罗达和路易斯？名单已经贴在了各个门上。在我们切开面包卷、品尝鱼肉和沙拉之前，我摸了摸贴身的衣袋，我摸到了里面的各种证书——我带着它们以证明自己高人一筹。我通过了。我有贴身衣袋里的证书可以证明。但是苏珊，你的眼里都是芜菁和麦田，令我不安。我贴身衣袋里的这些证书——证明我通过了的有力的宣示——发出微弱的声音，像一个人在旷野里拍手以吓走白嘴鸦的声音。在苏珊的注视下，现在这声音（拍手的声音，我弄出的混响）渐渐消失了，我只听见风声掠过翻耕的土地，一只鸟儿在歌唱——或许是一只陶醉的云雀吧。那位侍者，或者那些鬼鬼祟祟、纠缠不清，时而磨磨蹭蹭，时而犹豫不决，盼着树林完全黑下来以遮住他们俯卧的身体的情侣，有没有听到我的声响呢？没有；拍手的声音失效了。

'What then remains, when I cannot pull out my papers and make you believe by reading aloud my credentials that I have passed? What remains is what Susan brings to light under the acid of her green eyes, her crystal, pear-shaped eyes. There is always somebody, when we come together, and the edges of meeting are still sharp, who refuses to be submerged; whose identity therefore one wishes to make crouch beneath one's own. For me now, it is Susan. I talk to impress Susan. Listen to me, Susan.

“当我无法掏出我的证书，大声念出证明我通过了的那些凭证，那我还剩下什么呢？剩下的就只是苏珊那尖锐的绿眼睛，她那水晶般的梨形眼睛里浮现出的东西。每当我们聚到一起，刚见面的别扭尚未消除时，总会有人不甘心被埋没；你总是希望让那人的身份蜷伏在你自己的身份之下。此刻对我来说，那人就是苏珊。我用说话来打动苏珊。听我说啊，苏珊。

'When someone comes in at breakfast, even the embroidered fruit on my curtain swells so that parrots can peck it; one can break it off between one's thumb and finger. The thin, skimmed milk of early morning turns opal, blue, rose. At that hour your husband—the man who slapped his gaiters, pointing with his whip at the barren cow—grumbles. You say nothing. You see nothing. Custom blinds your eyes. At that hour your relationship is mute, null, dun-coloured. Mine at that hour is warm and various. There are no repetitions for me. Each day is dangerous. Smooth on the surface, we are all bone beneath like snakes coiling. Suppose we read The Times; suppose we argue. It is an experience. Suppose it is winter. The snow falling loads down the roof and seals us together in a red cave. The pipes have burst. We stand a yellow tin bath in the middle of the room. We rush helter-skelter for basins. Look there—it has burst again over the bookcase. We shout with laughter at the sight of ruin. Let solidity be destroyed. Let us have no possessions. Or is it summer? We may wander to a lake and watch Chinese geese waddling flat-footed to the water's edge or see a bone-like city church with young green trembling before it. (I choose at random; I choose the obvious.) Each sight is an arabesque scrawled suddenly to illustrate some hazard and marvel of intimacy. The snow, the burst pipe, the tin bath, the Chinese goose—these are signs swung high aloft upon which, looking back, I read the character of each love; how each was different.

“每当早餐时有人进来，就连我帷幔上绣的果子也会膨胀，以至于鹦鹉也来啄食；你简直能用拇指和指头把它摘下来。清晨送来的稀薄的脱脂牛奶会变成乳白色、蓝色、玫瑰色。那时候，你的丈夫——那个拍打着自己的绑腿，挥鞭指向一头不下崽的母牛的男人——唠唠叨叨。你一言不发。你视而不见。习惯蒙住了你的眼睛。那时候，你们之间没有言语，冷漠而阴沉。那时候，我的关系热烈，变化多样。对我来说绝无重复。每天都有危险。表面圆滑，骨子里面却像盘曲的蛇一样棘手。假定我们读着《泰晤士报》；假定我们争吵起来。那是一段经历。假定那是冬天。大雪纷飞，积压在屋顶，把我们一起密封在一个红色的洞穴里。水管爆裂了。我们在屋子当中放了个黄色铁锡浴缸。我们手忙脚乱地找来水盆。瞧那儿——书柜上面又爆裂了。一看到这种惨状，我们又笑又嚷。让一切坚固的东西都毁了吧。让我们一无所有。也许那是夏天？我们漫步走向一个湖，望着蒌鹅迈着平足摇摇晃晃来到水边，或者看着一座骨头架子似的城市教堂，门前新绿摇曳。（我的选择是随意的；我选择的是显而易见的事情。）每一种景象都像是信手涂鸦的阿拉伯式图案，是为了证实亲密关系所带来的灾难和惊喜。大雪，爆裂的水管，铁锡浴缸，蒌鹅——这些都是高悬的标志，在这样的基础上回望，我总能认清每一种爱的特征；每一种爱各有哪些不同。

'You meanwhile—for I want to diminish your hostility, your green eyes fixed on mine, and your shabby dress, your rough hands, and all the other emblems of your maternal splendour—have stuck like a limpet to the same rock. Yet it is true, I do not want to hurt you; only to refresh and furbish up my own belief in myself that failed at your entry. Change is no longer possible. We are committed. Before, when we met in a restaurant in London with Percival, all simmered and shook; we could have been anything. We have chosen now, or sometimes it seems the choice was made for us—a pair of tongs pinched us between the shoulders. I chose. I took the print of life not outwardly, but inwardly upon the raw, the white, the unprotected fibre. I am clouded and bruised with the print of minds and faces and things so subtle that they have smell, colour, texture, substance, but no name. I am merely "Neville" to you, who see the narrow limits of my life and the line it cannot pass. But to myself I am immeasurable; a net whose fibres pass imperceptibly beneath the world. My net is almost indistinguishable from that which it surrounds. It lifts whales—huge leviathans and white jellies, what is amorphous and wandering; I detect, I perceive. Beneath my eyes opens—a book; I see to the bottom; the heart—I see to the depths. I know what loves are trembling into fire; how jealousy shoots its green flashes hither and thither; how intricately love crosses love; love makes knots; love brutally tears them apart. I have been knotted; I have been torn apart.

与此同时，你——因为我一心想贬损你的敌对情绪，你的绿眼睛注视着我，你那破旧的衣服，你那粗糙的双手，还有其他标志着你母性光辉的一切——像一只帽贝死死抱着同一块礁石。可是说真的，我并不想伤害你；我只想振作精神，恢复我在你进门时所丧失的那份自信。不再可能改变现状了。我们的命运已经注定。从前，当我们与珀西瓦尔在伦敦一家餐馆会面时，所有人都热血沸腾，摇摆不定；那时一切皆有可能。我们做出了抉择，也可以说，有时似乎是别人为我们做出了抉择——一把钳子夹在我们肩膀之间。我做出了抉择。我不是把生活的烙印留在外表，而是留在内心，留在自然、洁白、毫无防护的纤维上。种种思想、面孔，以及有味道、有色彩、有质地、实实在在却无可名之的微妙之物的烙印弄得我混混沌沌，伤痕累累。对你而言，我只是‘内维尔’而已，你看见了我人生的狭隘极限和它无法逾越的界线。但是对我自己而言，我是无可估量的；我是一张网，它的纤维不易察觉地遍布世界。我的网与它围住的一切几乎难分彼此。它网起了鲸鱼——那些巨大的怪兽，还有白色的一团团糊状物——那些没有固定形状、四处游移的东西；我探测着，我观察着。我的眼睛下面，翻开了——一本书；我直入网底；直达中心——我看到深处。我知道哪些爱正在翻腾着化作烈焰；嫉妒会如何四处喷吐着绿色的火苗；爱会如何错综交叉；纠集成结；又无情地把它们拆散。我曾纠结过；也曾被拆散。

'But there was another glory once, when we watched for the door to open, and Percival came; when we flung ourselves unattached on the edge of a hard bench in a public room.'

“但是曾经有过另一件让人畅怀的事，那是当我们守望着门开，然后珀西瓦尔走进来的时候；那是当我们无拘无束地一下子坐到公用室里一张硬板凳的角上的时候。”

'There was the beech wood,' said Susan, 'Elvedon, and the gilt hands of the clock sparkling among the trees. The pigeons broke the leaves. The changing travelling lights wandered over me. They escaped me. Yet look, Neville, whom I discredit in order to be myself, at my hand on the table. Look at the gradations of healthy colour here on the knuckles, here on the palm. My body has been used daily, rightly, like a tool by a good workman, all over. The blade is clean, sharp, worn in the centre. (We battle together like beasts fighting in a field, like stags making their horns clash.) Seen through your pale and yielding flesh, even apples and bunches of fruit must have a filmed look as if they stood under glass. Lying deep in a chair with one person, one person only, but one person who changes, you see one inch of flesh only; its nerves, fibres, the sullen or quick flow of blood on it; but nothing entire. You do not see a house in a garden; a horse in a field; a town laid out, as you bend like an old woman straining her eyes over her darning. But I have seen life in blocks, substantial, huge; its battlements and towers, factories and gasometers; a dwelling-place made from time immemorial after an hereditary pattern. These things remain square, prominent, undissolved in my mind. I am not sinuous or suave; I sit among you abrading your softness with my hardness, quenching the silver-grey flickering moth-wing quiver of words with the green spurt of my clear eyes.

“在埃尔夫登，”苏珊说，“曾经有一片山毛榉林，一座钟的镀金指针在树丛间闪耀。鸽子拨开树叶。变幻不定的灯火在我头上游荡。它们照不到我。可是内维尔，为了突出我自己，我总是败坏你的名声，你瞧桌子上的我这只手。瞧这儿，我的指节上，还有这儿，我的掌心上，深浅不一的健康肤色。我的身体一直操劳，日复一日，像巧匠手中的一件工具，尽其所用。锋刃光洁、锋利，中心已经磨损了。（我们缠斗在一起，像野兽在野地里争斗，像雄鹿犄角相抵。）透过你苍白、柔弱的身体看来，即使一个个苹果和一串串果实肯定也会蒙上一层膜，仿佛隔着玻璃似的。当你和一个人，虽然只是一个人，但那是一个总在变化的人，躺在一把椅子里时，你只看见一英寸厚的皮肉；里面的神经，纤维，或沉闷或急速的血液流动；但毫不完整。你看不见花园里的房子，田野里的马匹，铺展开的城镇，因为你像一个老妪佝偻着身子，正费尽眼力盯着她缝制的衣物。但是我看到了街区实实在在、庞大的生活；其中有城垛、塔楼、工厂和贮气罐；一处从远古时代继承下来的居所。这些东西方方正正，突兀而起，在我的脑海中经久不去。我既不委婉也不文雅；我坐在你们中间，以我的冷峻磨蚀着你们的柔情，以我清澈的眼睛里射出的绿光淬砺着像颤动的银灰色飞蛾翅膀似的闪烁之辞。

'Now we have clashed our antlers. This is the necessary prelude; the salute of old friends.'

“瞧，我们相互顶过犄角了。这是必要的序曲；老友之间的问候。”

'The gold has faded between the trees,' said Rhoda, 'and a slice of green lies behind them, elongated like the blade of a knife seen in dreams, or some tapering island on which nobody sets foot. Now the cars begin to wink and flicker, coming down the avenue. Lovers can draw into the darkness now; the boles of the trees are swollen, are obscene with lovers.'

“树丛中的金色消褪了，”罗达说，“树后一抹绿色，拉得长长的，像梦中所见的刀锋，也像正在渐渐隐没的无人涉足的岛屿。这时，车辆开始忽闪着灯光，沿着大道开过来了。情人们这会儿可以躲进暗影里了；树的枝干变得肿胀，因情人们而不堪入目。”

'It was different once,' said Bernard. 'Once we could break the current as we chose. How many telephone calls, how many post cards, are now needed to cut this hole through which we come together, united, at Hampton Court? How swift life runs from January to December! We are all swept on by the torrent of things grown so familiar that they cast no shade; we make no comparisons; think scarcely ever of I or of you; and in this unconsciousness attain the utmost freedom from friction and part the weeds that grow over the mouths of sunken channels. We have to leap like fish, high in the air, in order to catch the train from Waterloo. And however high we leap we fall back again into the stream. I shall never now take ship for the South Sea Islands. A journey to Rome is the limit of my travelling. I have sons and daughters. I am wedged into my place in the puzzle.

“以往有所不同。”伯纳德说。“以往我们能随自己的选择决流而出。而现在需要多少电话、多少明信片我们才能挤出这个关口，一起来到这里，齐聚在汉普顿宫？从一月到十二月，生活的步伐多么快啊！我们都被如此司空见惯，以至于我们毫不在意的事流裹挟向前；我们不做任何比较；几乎不曾想过我或你；而就在这样的无意识之中最大限度地避免了摩擦，冲开了凹陷的隧道口上的杂草。我们不得不像鱼一样跃起，高高地跃到空中，为了赶上从滑铁卢开来的火车。而不管我们跃到多高，我们总要重新落回到溪流中。如今我再也不会乘船去往南海诸岛了。罗马之旅是我最远的行程。我有儿有女。我迷迷糊糊地被楔进了现在的位置。

'But it is only my body—this elderly man here whom you call Bernard—that is fixed irrevocably—so I desire to believe. I think more disinterestedly than I could when I was young and must dig furiously like a child rummaging in a bran-pie to discover my self. "Look, what is this? And this? Is this going to be a fine present? Is that all?" and so on. Now I know what the parcels hold; and do not care much. I throw my mind out in the air as a man throws seeds in great fan-flights, falling through the purple sunset, falling on the pressed and shining ploughland which is bare.

“但只是我的躯体——眼前你们称其为伯纳德的这个上了年纪的人——被无可更改地固定住了——我愿相信这一点。我比年轻时更能公正地进行思考，那时为了发现自我，我不顾一切地刨根问底，非要像孩子一样在一个麦麸饼里探究不止。‘瞧，这是什么？这个呢？这个能算是一件精美的礼物么？只有那样了么？’如此种种。现在我知道包裹里装有什么；而且不大在意了。我把自己的思绪撒向空中，就像一个农人大把地撒出种子，在紫色的夕阳中散落下来，落在紧绷绷、亮闪闪、赤裸裸的耕地上。

'A phrase. An imperfect phrase. And what are phrases? They have left me very little to lay on the table, beside Susan's hand; to take from my pocket, with Neville's credentials. I am not an authority on law, or medicine, or finance. I am wrapped round with phrases, like damp straw; I glow, phosphorescent. And each of you feels when I speak, "I am lit up. I am glowing."

“一句妙语。一句不完美的妙语。什么是妙语？它们并没有给我带来什么，好让我摆在桌子上，摆在苏珊那只手的旁边；好让我从衣袋里掏出来，与内维尔的那些证书放在一起。我并非法律、医药或金融方面的权威。我被妙语包裹着，像潮湿的稻草；我发着热，闪着磷光。当我说到：‘我在燃烧，我在发光。’时，你们每个人都有感觉。

The little boys used to feel "That's a good one, that's a good one", as the phrases bubbled up from my lips under the elm trees in the playing-fields. They too bubbled up; they also escaped with my phrases. But I pine in solitude. Solitude is my undoing.

当初在操场上的榆树下面，随着妙语汩汩地冒出我的嘴唇，那些小男孩总觉得‘这句不错，那句也不错’。他们也滔滔不绝；他们也和我的妙语一道逃走了。我在孤独中憔悴。孤独是我的死穴。

'I pass from house to house like the friars in the Middle Ages who cozened the wives and girls with beads and ballads. I am a traveller, a pedlar, paying for my lodging with a ballad; I am an indiscriminate, an easily pleased guest; often putting up in the best room in a four-poster; then lying in a barn on a haystack. I don't mind the fleas and find no fault with silk either. I am very tolerant. I am not a moralist. I have too great a sense of the shortness of life and its temptations to rule red lines. Yet I am not so indiscriminate as you think, judging me—as you judge me—from my fluency. I have a little dagger of contempt and severity hidden up my sleeve. But I am apt to be deflected. I make stories. I twist up toys out of anything. A girl sits at a cottage door; she is waiting; for whom? Seduced, or not seduced? The headmaster sees the hole in the carpet. He sighs. His wife, drawing her fingers through the waves of her still abundant hair, reflects—et cetera. Waves of hands, hesitations at street corners, someone dropping a cigarette into the gutter—all are stories. But which is the true story? That I do not know. Hence I keep my phrases hung like clothes in a cupboard, waiting for someone to wear them. Thus waiting, thus speculating, making this note and then another, I do not cling to life. I shall be brushed like a bee from a sunflower. My philosophy, always accumulating, welling up moment by moment, runs like quicksilver a dozen ways at once. But Louis, wild-eyed but severe, in his attic, in his office, has formed unalterable conclusions upon the true nature of what is to be known.'

我走过千家万户，就像中世纪那些用念珠和民谣哄骗妇人和女子的天主教会修士们一样。我是一个行者，一个货郎，用一首民谣换取一次投宿；我是一个不加挑剔、容易满足的客人；经常宿在最好的房间里一张四柱大床上；然后却又躺在牲口棚里一堆干草上。我不在乎跳蚤，对绫罗绸缎也毫无芥蒂。我很宽宏大量。我不是一个卫道士。我对人生苦短及种种诱惑有着十分清醒的认识，不想再规划出道道红线。可我不像你们想的那么不分皂白——就像你们从我的口若悬河得出的判断那样。我的袖筒里藏着一把轻蔑而严厉的短剑。但是我容易注意力分散。我编造故事。我随意搓弄出好玩的东西。一个女孩坐在村舍门口；她在等待；等谁呢？她被引诱了，还是没被引诱？校长看见地毯上的洞。他叹了口气。他的太太，手指穿过她那波浪似的依然浓密的头发，陷入了沉思——诸如此类。频频挥舞的手，街角的迟疑，有人把一支香烟丢进排水沟——都是故事。但是哪一个是真实的故事呢？这我就不知道啦。因此我把我的妙语像衣服一样挂在一个壁橱里，等待有人穿上它们。就这样等待着，揣摩着，记下这句，然后下一句，我并不执着于生活。我会像一只蜜蜂，被人从一朵向日葵上赶走。我的哲学，总在不断地累积，分分秒秒都在涌现，一下子像水银一样四处流泻。但是路易斯，目光粗野而冷峻，在他的阁楼里，在他的办公室里，已经对所要知道的事情的真正本质做出了不容更改的结论。”

'It breaks,' said Louis, 'the thread I try to spin; your laughter breaks it, your indifference, also your beauty. Jinny broke the thread when she kissed me in the garden years ago. The boasting boys mocked me at school for my Australian accent and broke it. "This is the meaning," I say; and then start with a pang—vanity. "Listen," I say, "to the nightingale, who sings among the trampling feet; the conquests and migrations. Believe—” and then am twitched asunder. Over broken tiles and splinters of glass I pick my way. Different lights fall, making the ordinary leopard spotted and strange. This moment of reconciliation, when we meet together united, this evening moment, with its wine and shaking leaves, and youth coming up from the river in white flannels, carrying cushions, is to me black with the shadows of dungeons and the tortures and infamies practised by man upon man. So imperfect are my senses that they never blot out with one purple the serious charge that my reason adds and adds against us, even as we sit here. What is the solution, I ask myself, and the bridge? How can I reduce these dazzling, these dancing apparitions to one line capable of linking all in one? So I ponder; and you meanwhile observe maliciously my pursed lips, my sallow cheeks and my invariable frown.

“乱了，”路易斯说，“我试图连缀起来的那根线乱了；你的笑声，你的满不在乎，你的美，把它弄乱了。多年前吉尼在花园里吻我的时候就曾弄乱过那根线。上学时那些夸夸其谈的男孩模仿我的澳大利亚口音也曾把它弄乱。‘这就是意义所在。’说着，猛然升起一股虚荣。‘听，’我说，‘在践踏的铁蹄下，在征服与迁徙中，夜莺从未停止歌唱。相信——’然后就被人打断了。我小心翼翼地趟过残砖碎瓦和玻璃碴子。不同的灯光照射下来，使寻常的豹子变得斑驳而怪异。我们团聚的这一和谐时刻，这一黄昏时刻，斛筹交错，树影摇曳，青春一袭洁白法兰绒、背负着气垫浮出水面，对我来说，却因为地牢的阴影和人施于人的臭名昭著的拷打而变得漆黑一片。我的感官如此残缺，即便我们坐在这儿，它们也无法用一道紫色的光芒完全掩去我的理性不断加于我们的严肃指责。出路在何方，我问自己，桥梁在何处？我如何能把这些晃动的、令人眼花缭乱的幻影归结为一条连结一切的线？于是我陷入沉思；而同时你们不怀好意地观察着我撅起的嘴唇、苍白的面颊和一直紧锁的眉头。

'But I beg you also to notice my cane and my waistcoat. I have inherited a desk of solid mahogany in a room hung with maps. Our steamers have won an enviable reputation for their cabins replete with luxury. We supply swimming-baths and gymnasiums. I wear a white waistcoat now and consult a little book before I make an engagement.

“但是我请求你们也注意一下我的手杖和我的马甲。在一间挂满地图的屋子里，我继承了一张结实的红木办公桌。我们的轮船凭借它们豪华的客舱而赢得了令人羡慕的声誉。我们配备有游泳池和健身房。目前我总穿着一件白色马甲，赴约之前总要核实一下小巧的记事簿。

'This is the arch and ironical manner in which I hope to distract you from my shivering, my tender, and infinitely young and unprotected soul. For I am always the youngest; the most naively surprised; the one who runs in advance in apprehension and sympathy with discomfort or ridicule—should there be a smut on a nose, or a button undone. I suffer for all humiliations. Yet I am also ruthless, marmoreal. I do not see how you can say that it is fortunate to have lived. Your little excitements, your childish transports, when a kettle boils, when the soft air lifts Jinny's spotted scarf and it floats web-like, are to me like silk streamers thrown in the eyes of the charging bull. I condemn you. Yet my heart yearns towards you. I would go with you through the fires of death. Yet am happiest alone. I luxuriate in gold and purple vestments. Yet I prefer a view over chimneypots; cats scraping their mangy sides upon blistered chimney-stacks; broken windows; and the hoarse clangour of bells from the steeple of some brick chapel.'

“这种姿态既傲慢无礼又含着讥讽，我希望以此使你们分心，不至于察觉到我战栗、柔弱、极其幼稚而毫无防护的灵魂。因为我永远是最幼稚的；最容易天真烂漫地表露惊诧；最先领会并同情那些令人不快或荒唐可笑的事情——不管是鼻子上的一块污迹，还是一颗松开的纽扣。我为一切屈辱而难受。但同时我也残忍无情，像大理石一样冰冷。我不明白你怎么能说活在世上是幸运的。水壶烧开的时候，轻风吹起吉尼那沾了污迹的围巾，它像蛛网一样飘浮的时候，你们小小的兴奋，你们孩子气的狂喜，对我来说就像那只冲锋的公牛眼中一闪而过的绸带。我谴责你们。可我又心系你们。我愿与你们一起经历死亡之火。可我最乐于孤身独处。我在锦绣华服中极尽奢华。我却更喜欢越过烟囱管帽极目眺望；猫在爆了皮的烟囱管上蹭着它们长满疥癣的腹部；破碎的窗户；一座砖砌的小教堂的塔尖传来嘶哑的叮叮当当的钟声。”

'I see what is before me,' said Jinny. 'This scarf, these wine-coloured spots. This glass. This mustard pot. This flower. I like what one touches, what one tastes. I like rain when it has turned to snow and become palatable. And being rash, and much more courageous than you are, I do not temper my beauty with meanness lest it should scorch me. I gulp it down entire. It is made of flesh; it is made of stuff. My imagination is the body's. Its visions are not fine-spun and white with purity like Louis'. I do not like your lean cats and your blistered chimney-pots. The scrannel beauties of your roof-tops repel me. Men and women, in uniforms, wigs and gowns, bowler hats and tennis shirts beautifully open at the neck, the infinite variety of women's dresses (I note all clothes always) delight me. I eddy with them, in and out, in and out, into rooms, into halls, here, there, everywhere, wherever they go. This man lifts the hoof of a horse. This man shoves in and out the drawers of his private collection. I am never alone. I am attended by a regiment of my fellows. My mother must have followed the drum, my father the sea. I am like a little dog that trots down the road after the regimental band, but stops to snuff a tree-trunk, to sniff some brown stain, and suddenly careers across the street after some mongrel cur and then holds one paw up while it sniffs an entrancing whiff of meat from the butcher's shop. My traffics have led me into strange places. Men, how many, have broken from the wall and come to me. I have only to hold my hand up. Straight as a dart they have come to the place of assignation—perhaps a chair on a balcony, perhaps a shop at a street corner. The torments, the divisions of your lives have been solved for me night after night, sometimes only by the touch of a finger under the table-cloth as we sat dining—so fluid has my body become, forming even at the touch of a finger into one full drop, which fills itself, which quivers, which flashes, which falls in ecstasy.

“我看见在我眼前的东西。”吉尼说。“这条围巾，这些酒色的污迹。这只酒杯。这个芥末瓶。这朵花。我喜欢触摸到的东西，品尝到的东西。我喜欢的雨化作了雪，变得合乎我的口味。因为我的率直，因为我比你们更有胆量，我从不用粗俗来调和我的美，以免那会把我烤焦。我大口地把它整个吞下。它有血有肉；它实实在在。我的想象力源自我的肉体。它的幻影不像路易斯的幻影那么精细而洁白。我不喜欢你的那些瘦猫和爆了皮的烟囱管帽。你那些屋顶上的贫乏之美令我生厌。男人和女人，身着制服，假发和长袍，圆顶礼帽和优雅的开领网球衫，变化无极限的女式服装（我总是注意各种衣服），都令我赏心悦目。我与他们一起流转，来来回回，来来回回，进入房间，进入厅堂，时而这里，时而那里，他们去哪儿，我就在哪儿。这人抬起一匹马的蹄子。那人反复推拉他装有私家收藏的抽屉。我从不孤单。总有一群伙伴围着我。我的母亲肯定一直追随鼓乐，我的父亲一心向往大海。我像一只小狗，亦步亦趋地沿路跟在军乐队后面，仅仅停下来嗅嗅一株树干，嗅嗅一处褐色的污迹，突然冲过街道跟在一只杂种野狗的后面，然后抬起一只爪子，嗅着肉铺里飘出的一缕诱人的肉香。我的交往把我带进了新奇之地。男人，多少男人，从墙的那边急急地向我走来。我只需举手之劳。他们就像飞镖一样径直来到约会地点——可能是阳台的一把椅子，可能是街角的一家店铺。你们生活中的苦恼和分歧对我来说是一夜一夜解开的，有时仅凭我们坐着吃饭时手指在桌布下面的一触——我的身体变得如此灵动，甚至在手指的一触之下凝成完整的一滴，充实，战栗，忽闪着，忘形地落了下去。

'I have sat before a looking-glass as you sit writing, adding up figures at desks. So, before the looking-glass in the temple of my bedroom, I have judged my nose and my chin; my lips that open too wide and show too much gum. I have looked. I have noted. I have chosen what yellow or white, what shine or dullness, what loop or straightness suits. I am volatile for one, rigid for another, angular as an icicle in silver, or voluptuous as a candle flame in gold. I have run violently like a whip flung out to the extreme end of my tether. His shirt front, there in the corner, has been white; then purple; smoke and flame have wrapped us about; after a furious conflagration—yet we scarcely raised our voices, sitting on the hearth-rug, as we murmured all the secrets of our hearts as into shells so that nobody might hear in the sleeping-house, but I heard the cook stir once, and once we thought the ticking of the clock was a footfall—we have sunk to ashes, leaving no relics, no unburnt bones, no wisps of hair to be kept in lockets such as your intimacies leave behind them. Now I turn grey; now I turn gaunt; but I look at my face at midday sitting in front of the looking-glass in broad daylight, and note precisely my nose, my chin, my lips that open too wide and show too much gum. But I am not afraid.'

“你们坐在桌前写写算算的时候，我一直坐在一面镜子前。就这样，在我卧室的神殿中那面镜子前，我审视着我的鼻子和下巴；我的嘴唇咧得太大，露出太多牙龈。我瞧着。我注意观察。我选择黄或白，亮或暗，弯或直，看它们是否搭配。我有时活泼，有时拘谨，有时像银色的冰柱棱角分明，有时像金色的烛焰撩人心魄。我像猛抽出去的鞭子极尽我之所能。那边角落里的人，他的衬衫前胸曾是白的；后来变成了紫红；烟雾和火焰笼罩了我们；经历了突发的一场大火——可是我们几乎没有抬高我们的嗓门，一直坐在炉边的地毯上，悄悄说出我们心中的秘密，好像对着贝壳耳语似的，为的是不让卧室里的人听见，但是有一次我听到厨子走动的声音，还有一次我们以为钟的滴答是谁的脚步——我们化成了灰烬，没有留下一丝残骸，一根未烧尽的骨头，或是一绺头发，保存在纪念盒里，就像你们的亲友身后留下的那些东西。如今我白发苍苍；如今我憔悴不堪；但是我在正午的光天化日之下坐在镜子前望着我的脸庞，分毫不差地观察着我的鼻子，我的下巴，我的嘴唇咧得太大，露出太多的牙龈。但是我并不害怕。”

'There were lamp-posts,' said Rhoda, 'and trees that had not yet shed their leaves on the way from the station. The leaves might have hidden me still. But I did not hide behind them. I walked straight up to you instead of circling round to avoid the shock of sensation as I used. But it is only that I have taught my body to do a certain trick. Inwardly I am not taught; I fear, I hate, I love, I envy and despise you, but I never join you happily. Coming up from the station, refusing to accept the shadow of the trees and the pillar-boxes, I perceived, from your coats and umbrellas, even at a distance, how you stand embedded in a substance made of repeated moments run together; are committed, have an attitude, with children, authority, fame, love, society; where I have nothing. I have no face.

“有些灯杆，”罗达说，“还有些枝叶尚未舒展的树在从车站过来的路上。枝叶本可以把我静静地遮掩起来。但我并没有躲在它们后面。我径直向你们走过去，并没有像以往那样绕着圈子以回避情绪的波动。但这只是我教我的身体使出的一个花招而已。我的内心并未受教；我怕，我恨，我爱，我羡慕你们，也鄙视你们，但我从未快乐地加入你们。从车站一路走来，我拒绝接受那些树和邮筒的遮掩，通过你们的外套和雨伞，即使从远处我也感觉到，你们站在那儿，仿佛被嵌入一种由于连续的时光反复而形成的物质当中；你们身负使命，审时度势，拥有儿女、职权、名望、爱情和社会交往；而我在这些方面一无所有。我毫无脸面。

'Here in this dining-room you see the antlers and the tumblers; the salt-cellars; the yellow stains on the tablecloth. "Waiter!" says Bernard.

“在这间餐厅里，你们看见那些鹿角和平底玻璃杯；那些盐罐子；那些桌布上的黄色污迹。‘服务生！’伯纳德说。

"Bread!" says Susan.

‘面包！’苏珊说。

And the waiter comes; he brings bread. But I see the side of a cup like a mountain and only parts of antlers, and the brightness on the side of that jug like a crack in darkness with wonder and terror. Your voices sound like trees creaking in a forest. So with your faces and their prominences and hollows. How beautiful, standing at a distance immobile at midnight against the railings of some square! Behind you is a white crescent of foam, and fishermen on the verge of the world are drawing in nets and casting them. A wind ruffles the topmost leaves of primeval trees. (Yet here we sit at Hampton Court.) Parrots shrieking break the intense stillness of the jungle. (Here the trams start.) The swallow dips her wings in midnight pools. (Here we talk.) That is the circumference that I try to grasp as we sit together. Thus I must undergo the penance of Hampton Court at seven thirty precisely.

服务生过来了；他拿来了面包。但是我看见杯壁，像一座大山，只看见部分鹿角，水壶壁上的光亮像黑暗中一道裂缝，奇妙而恐怖。你们的话语听起来像森林中的树木正在嘎吱嘎吱响。你们的脸和上面的凹凸不平也是一样。夜半时分，靠在某个广场的栏杆上，远远地、一动不动地站在这里，多么美啊！你的身后是新月形的洁白的浪花，天边，渔夫们正在收网撒网。一阵风从古树枝头粼粼掠过。（可是我们坐在这儿的汉普顿宫里。）尖叫的鹦鹉冲破了丛林的沉寂。（这儿的电车开动了。）燕子在午夜的池水中蘸湿了它的翅膀。（我们在这儿说着话。）这就是我们坐在一起时我试图把握的周围环境。因此我必须在七点三十分整经历汉普顿宫的这番苦修。

'But since these rolls of bread and wine bottles are needed by me, and your faces with their hollows and prominences are beautiful, and the table-cloth and its yellow stain, far from being allowed to spread in wider and wider circles of understanding that may at last (so I dream, falling off the edge of the earth at night when my bed floats suspended) embrace the entire world, I must go through the antics of the individual. I must start when you pluck at me with your children, your poems, your chilblains or whatever it is that you do and suffer. But I am not deluded. After all these callings hither and thither, these pluckings and searchings, I shall fall alone through this thin sheet into gulfs of fire. And you will not help me. More cruel than the old torturers, you will let me fall, and will tear me to pieces when I am fallen. Yet there are moments when the walls of the mind grow thin; when nothing is unabsorbed, and I could fancy that we might blow so vast a bubble that the sun might set and rise in it and we might take the blue of midday and the black of midnight and be cast off and escape from here and now.'

“但是既然这些面包卷和酒瓶子是我需要的，你们凹凸不平的脸是美丽的，这块桌布和它上面的黄色污迹也远远的，不会漫延成越来越大的圆圈，以至于像人的认知一样可能最终（我梦想着晚上当我的床悬在半空，我从大地的边缘坠落下去）包含整个世界，我必须经历个人的种种古怪行为。我必须在你们用你们的孩子、诗歌、冻疮或随意什么所作所为和遭遇来缠着我的时候开始。但是我不会轻信。在所有这些来自四方的召唤，这些纠缠和探询之后，我还是会孤身一人穿透这薄层，坠入火坑。你们是不会帮我的。你们比古时的拷问者更为残忍，任由我坠落，而且在我落下时将我撕成碎片。不过有些时候，理智的围墙愈发单薄，没有什么不被吸收进去，我甚至幻想我们可以吹出一个硕大的泡泡，让太阳在其中升起、落下，我们可以携着正午的天蓝和夜半的黑暗，逃脱出去，逃离此时此地。”

'Drop upon drop,' said Bernard, 'silence falls. It forms on the roof of the mind and falls into pools beneath. For ever alone, alone, alone,—hear silence fall and sweep its rings to the farthest edges. Gorged and replete, solid with middle-aged content, I, whom loneliness destroys, let silence fall, drop by drop.

“一滴接着一滴，”伯纳德说，“寂静降临了。它在思维的屋檐上凝聚，然后落进下面的水池里。永远孤孤单单，孤孤单单，孤孤单单——倾听寂静降临，然后把它掸向天边。饱经沧桑，人到中年，终于志得意满，我，毁于孤独的我，任由寂静降临，一滴接着一滴。

'But now silence falling pits my face, wastes my nose like a snowman stood out in a yard in the rain. As silence falls I am dissolved utterly and become featureless and scarcely to be distinguished from another. It does not matter. What matters? We have dined well. The fish, the veal cutlets, the wine have blunted the sharp tooth of egotism. Anxiety is at rest. The vainest of us, Louis perhaps, does not care what people think. Neville's tortures are at rest. Let others prosper—that is what he thinks. Susan hears the breathing of all her children safe asleep. Sleep, sleep, she murmurs. Rhoda has rocked her ships to shore. Whether they have foundered, whether they have anchored, she cares no longer. We are ready to consider any suggestion that the world may offer quite impartially. I reflect now that the earth is only a pebble flicked off accidentally from the face of the sun and that there is no life anywhere in the abysses of space.'

“但是此刻，不断降临的寂静弄得我的脸坑坑洼洼，我的鼻子混混沌沌，好像雨中在院子里亮相的一个雪人。随着寂静降临，我被彻底融化了，变得毫无特点，几乎与别人一般无二。这不要紧。什么事要紧呢？我们吃得挺好。鱼啊，小牛排啊，酒啊，已经把自我的尖牙利齿磨钝了。焦虑平息了。我们当中最自负的可能是路易斯吧，也不在乎人家怎么想了。内维尔的苦恼平息了。随别人功成名就去吧——他就是这么想的。苏珊听见她所有安然入睡的孩子们的呼吸声。睡吧，睡吧，她喃喃低语。罗达已经把她的船摇向岸边。它们是否沉没了，它们是否下了锚，她也不再关心了。我们乐于考虑这个世界非常公正地提出的任何建议。此刻我认识到，地球只是从太阳表面偶然甩出的一块卵石，茫茫太空中哪里都毫无生命的存在。”

'In this silence,' said Susan, 'it seems as if no leaf would ever fall, or bird fly.'

“如此寂静，”苏珊说，“仿佛树叶永远不会落下，鸟儿也不再飞起。”

'As if the miracle had happened,' said Jinny, 'and life were stayed here and now.'

“仿佛奇迹发生了，”吉尼说，“生命停滞在此时此地。”

'And,' said Rhoda, 'we had no more to live.'

“于是，”罗达说，“我们再无需活下去了。”

'But listen,' said Louis, 'to the world moving through abysses of infinite space. It roars; the lighted strip of history is past and our Kings and Queens; we are gone; our civilization; the Nile; and all life. Our separate drops are dissolved; we are extinct, lost in the abysses of time, in the darkness.'

“但是听啊，”路易斯说，“这个世界正穿行在浩瀚的太空。它发出轰鸣；被照亮的历史片段以及我们的国王和皇后们，都已成为过去；我们都已消逝；我们的文明；尼罗河；一切的生命。我们独立的一点一滴都溶解了；我们灭绝了，消失在时间的深渊之中，黑暗之中。”

'Silence falls; silence falls,' said Bernard. 'But now listen; tick, tick; hoot, hoot; the world has hailed us back to it. I heard for one moment the howling winds of darkness as we passed beyond life. Then tick, tick (the clock); then hoot, hoot (the cars). We are landed; we are on shore; we are sitting, six of us, at a table. It is the memory of my nose that recalls me. I rise; "Fight," I cry, "fight!" remembering the shape of my own nose, and strike with this spoon upon this table pugnaciously.'

“寂静降临了；寂静降临了。”伯纳德说。“但是此刻，听啊；嘀嗒，嘀嗒；嘟嘟，嘟嘟；世界已经发出召唤，让我们回去。刚才的一刹那，我听见了呼啸的黑暗之风，因为我们跨越到了生命之外。然后，嘀嗒，嘀嗒（这是时钟）；然后，嘟嘟，嘟嘟（这是车辆）。我们登陆了；我们来到岸上；我们坐在这儿，六个人，围着一张桌子。是鼻子的回忆提醒了我。我站起身；‘战斗，’我大喊，‘战斗啊！’一边回想着我鼻子的模样，一边用手中的勺子狠命地敲打眼前的桌子。”

'Oppose ourselves to this illimitable chaos,' said Neville, 'this formless imbecility.

“我们来对抗这无限的混乱吧，”内维尔说，“这无可名状的愚钝。

Making love to a nursemaid behind a tree, that soldier is more admirable than all the stars. Yet sometimes one trembling star comes in the clear sky and makes me think the world beautiful and we maggots deforming even the trees with our lust.'

那个士兵正在树后和一个保姆做爱，他比满天的星星更令人称羡。不过有时候一颗闪烁的星星出现在明净的天空中，让我觉得这世界是美丽的，而我们这些蛆虫实际上正在用我们的淫欲扭曲着那些树。”

('Yet, Louis,' said Rhoda, 'how short a time silence lasts. Already they are beginning to smooth their napkins by the side of their plates.

（“不过，路易斯，”罗达说，“寂静持续的时间多么短暂啊。他们已经开始抚平他们盘子边上的餐巾了。

"Who comes?" says Jinny; and Neville sighs, remembering that Percival comes no more. Jinny has taken out her looking-glass. Surveying her face like an artist, she draws a powder-puff down her nose, and after one moment of deliberation has given precisely that red to the lips that the lips need. Susan, who feels scorn and fear at the sight of these preparations, fastens the top button of her coat, and unfastens it. What is she making ready for? For something, but something different.'

‘谁来了？’吉尼说；内维尔叹了口气，想起珀西瓦尔再也不会来了。吉尼拿出了她的镜子。她一边像艺术家似的审视着自己的脸庞，一边在鼻子上扑了一点粉，然后稍稍考虑了一下，恰到好处地在嘴唇上涂了浓淡相宜的一抹红。一见这番修饰，苏珊的心里既轻蔑又敬畏，她扣紧了大衣最上面的那颗纽扣，又解开了。她要准备做什么呢？要做点事情，但那是与众不同的事情吧。”

'They are saying to themselves,' said Louis, ‘"It is time. I am still vigorous," they are saying. "My face shall be cut against the black of infinite space." They do not finish their sentences. "It is time," they keep saying. "The gardens will be shut." And going with them, Rhoda, swept into their current, we shall perhaps drop a little behind.'

“他们在自言自语，”路易斯说，“‘时候到了。我依然精力充沛。’他们还在说。‘在茫茫太空的黑色背景下，我的脸庞将被刻画出来。’他们的话没有说完。‘时候到了。’他们还在说。‘园子要关门了。’与他们一路同行，罗达已经卷入了他们的流，或许我们应该落在后面一点点。”

'Like conspirators who have something to whisper,' said Rhoda.)

“好像有事要密谈的共谋者似的。”罗达说。）

'It is true, and I know for a fact,' said Bernard, 'as we walk down this avenue, that a King, riding, fell over a molehill here. But how strange it seems to set against the whirling abysses of infinite space a little figure with a golden teapot on his head. Soon one recovers belief in figures;but not at once in what they put on their heads. Our English past—one inch of light. Then people put teapots on their heads and say, "I am a King!" No, I try to recover, as we walk, the sense of time, but with that streaming darkness in my eyes I have lost my grip. This Palace seems light as a cloud set for a moment on the sky. It is a trick of the mind—to put Kings on their thrones, one following another, with crowns on their heads. And we ourselves, walking six abreast, what do we oppose, with this random flicker of light in us that we call brain and feeling, how can we do battle against this flood; what has permanence? Our lives too stream away, down the unlighted avenues, past the strip of time, unidentified. Once Neville threw a poem at my head. Feeling a sudden conviction of immortality, I said, "I too know what Shakespeare knew." But that has gone.'

“的确，当我们走上这条大道时，”伯纳德说，“我想起一个事实，一位国王，骑着马，绊倒在这儿的一个鼹鼠丘上。但是，在深邃、旋转的无限空间背景下设置一个头顶金色茶壶的小小的人物形象，看起来多么奇怪啊。很快，你在人物形象中找回了信念；但不会马上相信他们戴在头上的东西。我们英国人的过去——一英寸的光芒。那时人们都会把茶壶戴在头上，然后说：‘我是一位国王！’不，我们一边走，我一边竭力恢复对时间的意识，但是因为我眼中那片流动的黑暗，我已经失去把握了。这座宫殿似乎轻飘飘的，像天上停留片刻的一朵云彩。那是头脑想出的花招——把国王一个接一个扶上宝座，头戴王冠。而我们自己，六个人并肩走着，凭借我们身上这种我们称之为思想与情感的胡乱的闪光，我们在对抗什么？我们怎样才能与这股洪流抗争？什么是恒久不变的？我们的生命也在流走，沿着黑灯瞎火的林阴道，穿过时光之隙，默默无闻。曾经内维尔劈面扔给我一首诗。心中油然生出一股不朽的信念，我说：‘莎士比亚所了解的，我也了解。’但那已成过往。”

'Unreasonably, ridiculously,' said Neville, 'as we walk, time comes back. A dog does it, prancing. The machine works. Age makes hoary that gateway. Three hundred years now seem no more than a moment vanished against that dog. King William mounts his horse wearing a wig, and the court ladies sweep the turf with their embroidered panniers. I am beginning to be convinced, as we walk, that the fate of Europe is of immense importance, and, ridiculous as it still seems, that all depends upon the battle of Blenheim. Yes; I declare, as we pass through this gateway, it is the present moment; I am become a subject of King George.'

“不合情理，荒唐可笑，”内维尔说，“随着我们的脚步，时光倒流了。一只狗欢腾跳跃。机器开始运转。岁月让那门道陈旧。以那只狗为背景，现在看来三百年只是消逝的瞬间。威廉国王戴着假发骑在马上，宫女们的绣花裙撑掠过草皮。伴着我们的脚步，我开始相信，欧洲的命运意义重大，而且，尽管看似依然荒唐可笑，一切还是全仗布伦海姆之战。是的；我们穿过大门时，我宣布，就在此刻；我成了乔治国王的子民。”

'While we advance down this avenue,' said Louis, 'I leaning slightly upon Jinny, Bernard arm-in-arm with Neville, and Susan with her hand in mine, it is difficult not to weep, calling ourselves little children, praying that God may keep us safe while we sleep. It is sweet to sing together, clasping hands, afraid of the dark, while Miss Curry plays the harmonium.'

“当我们沿着这条林阴道一路前行，”路易斯说，“我轻轻依偎着吉尼，伯纳德与内维尔手挽着手，苏珊的一只手握在我的手中，我们禁不住掉下眼泪，称呼自己为小孩子，祈祷上帝在我们睡着时保佑我们平安。因为害怕黑暗，我们一起唱着歌，拍着手，柯里小姐拉着风琴，多么甜蜜啊。”

'The iron gates have rolled back,' said Jinny. 'Time's fangs have ceased their devouring. We have triumphed over the abysses of space, with rouge, with powder, with flimsy pocket-handkerchiefs.'

“铁门已经卷起。”吉尼说。“时间的利齿停止了咬啮。我们克服了空间的深渊，用口红，用脂粉，用薄薄的手帕。”

'I grasp, I hold fast,' said Susan. 'I hold firmly to this hand, anyone's, with love, with hatred; it does not matter which.'

“我抓住了，握得牢牢的。”苏珊说。“我紧紧抓住这只手，不管它是谁的，是因为爱还是恨；爱或恨并不重要。”

'The still mood, the disembodied mood is on us,' said Rhoda, 'and we enjoy this momentary alleviation (it is not often that one has no anxiety) when the walls of the mind become transparent. Wren's palace, like the quartet played to the dry and stranded people in the stalls, makes an oblong. A square is stood upon the oblong and we say, "This is our dwelling-place. The structure is now visible. Very little is left outside.”'

“平静的情绪，游移的情绪，笼罩着我们，”罗达说，“当头脑的围墙变得透明，我们享受着这短暂的轻松时刻（无忧无虑的时刻并不常有）。雷恩宫，好像是对着池座里那些呆板、乏味之流表演的四重奏，形成一个长方形。一个方形立于长方形之上，于是我们说：‘这就是我们的居住之地。建筑物已经在望。外面几无可留。’”

'The flower,' said Bernard, 'the red carnation that stood in the vase on the table of the restaurant when we dined together with Percival, is become a six-sided flower; made of six lives.'

“那朵花，”伯纳德说，“我们与珀西瓦尔聚餐时那家餐馆桌子上插在花瓶里的那支红色康乃馨，成了一朵六边形的花；含了六种生活。”

'A mysterious illumination,' said Louis, 'visible against those yew trees.'

“在那些紫杉的映衬下，”路易斯说，“可以看见一道神秘的光。”

'Built up with much pain, many strokes,' said Jinny.

“融入了许多痛苦，许多爱抚。”吉尼说。

'Marriage, death, travel, friendship,' said Bernard; 'town and country; children and all that; a many-sided substance cut out of this dark; a many-faceted flower. Let us stop for a moment; let us behold what we have made. Let it blaze against the yew trees. One life. There. It is over. Gone out.'

“婚姻、死亡、游历、友谊，”伯纳德说，“城镇与乡村，子女及其有关的一切；它是从黑暗中切割出来的一种多面体，一朵多面的花。让我们停留片刻；让我们瞧瞧我们营造的东西。让它在紫杉的映衬下发出光彩吧。一个生命。在那儿。完结了。熄灭了。”

'Now they vanish,' said Louis. 'Susan with Bernard. Neville with Jinny. You and I, Rhoda, stop for a moment by this stone urn. What song shall we hear now that these couples have sought the groves, and Jinny, pointing with her gloved hand, pretends to notice the water-lilies, and Susan, who has always loved Bernard, says to him, "My ruined life, my wasted life." And Neville, taking Jinny's little hand, with the cherry-coloured finger-nails, by the lake, by the moonlit water, cries, "Love, love," and she answers, imitating the bird, "Love, love?" What song do we hear?'

“这会儿他们不见了。”路易斯说。“苏珊和伯纳德一起。内维尔和吉尼一起。罗达，你和我在这座石头坟墓旁待一会儿吧。既然这几对已经走进树林里去了，我们将会听到什么样的歌呢？吉尼用她戴着手套的手指指点点，装出留心那些睡莲的样子，苏珊一直爱着伯纳德，她向他诉说：‘我糟糕的一生，我虚度的一生。’内维尔，正抓着吉尼那留着樱桃色指甲的小手，在湖畔，在月光映照的水边，大声表白着：‘爱人啊，爱人啊，’而她模仿着鸟儿的声音回应着：‘爱人么，爱人么？’我们听到了什么样的歌？”

'They vanish, towards the lake,' said Rhoda. 'They slink away over the grass furtively, yet with assurance as if they asked of our pity their ancient privilege—not to be disturbed. The tide in the soul, tipped, flows that way; they cannot help deserting us. The dark has closed over their bodies. What song do we hear—the owl's, the nightingale's, the wren's? The steamer hoots; the light on the electric rails flashes; the trees gravely bow and bend. The flare hangs over London. Here is an old woman, quietly returning, and a man, a late fisherman, comes down the terrace with his rod. Not a sound, not a movement must escape us.'

“他们不见了，朝湖边去了。”罗达说。“他们穿过草地悄悄溜掉了，却很有把握，好像他们已经从我们这里征得了那项古老特权——不会受到打扰。心潮澎湃，势不可挡；他们不得不丢开我们。黑暗掩住了他们的身体。我们听到了什么样的歌——是猫头鹰的，是夜莺的，还是鹪鹩的？轮船发出突突的声音；电车轨道上的光一闪一闪；树木庄严地俯身鞠躬。光芒笼罩着伦敦上空。这儿有一位老妇人，正默默地向回走，还有个男人，一位迟归的渔夫，扛着钓竿从坝上走来。任何声音、任何动作都不可能逃过我们。”

'A bird flies homeward,' said Louis. 'Evening opens her eyes and gives one quick glance among the bushes before she sleeps. How shall we put it together, the confused and composite message that they send back to us, and not they only, but many dead, boys and girls, grown men and women, who have wandered here, under one king or another?'

“一只鸟飞向它的巢。”路易斯说。“夜晚睁开了眼睛，她在入睡之前迅速地瞥了一眼灌木丛。不仅仅是他们，还有许多死去的人，男孩和女孩，成年的男人和女人，某个国王治下曾在这里游荡的人们，向我们发回的这些纷纭复杂的信息，我们将如何把它们融合到一起呢？”

'A weight has dropped into the night,' said Rhoda, 'dragging it down. Every tree is big with a shadow that is not the shadow of the tree behind it. We hear a drumming on the roofs of a fasting city when the Turks are hungry and uncertain tempered. We hear them crying with sharp, stag-like barks, "Open, open." Listen to the trams squealing and to the flashes from the electric rails. We hear the beech trees and the birch trees raise their branches as if the bride had let her silken nightdress fall and come to the doorway saying "Open, open".'

“一个砝码落进夜里，”罗达说，“把它拖了下来。每棵树都带着一片阴影，显得很大，但这阴影不同于后面树的阴影。我们听见一座斋戒中的城市的上空响起一阵击鼓声，当时土耳其人正饥肠辘辘、心绪不宁。我们听见他们用牡鹿似的凄厉嗓音叫嚷着：‘开门，开门。’听，电车的尖叫声和轨道上刺啦的闪光。我们听见山毛榉树和桦树扬起了枝条，仿佛新娘脱去了她的丝绸睡衣，来到门口，轻轻说着：‘开门，开门’。”

'All seems alive,' said Louis. 'I cannot hear death anywhere tonight. Stupidity, on that man's face, age, on that woman's, would be strong enough, one would think, to resist the incantation, and bring in death. But where is death tonight? All the crudity, odds and ends, this and that, have been crushed like glass splinters into the blue, the red-fringed tide, which, drawing into the shore, fertile with innumerable fish, breaks at our feet.'

“一切都似乎充满生气。”路易斯说。“今晚无论哪里我都听不到死亡的声息。你也许以为，那个男人脸上的愚钝，那个女人脸上的衰老，都很明显，足以打破咒语，召来死亡。但是今晚死亡在哪里呢？一切粗枝大叶、细枝末节、点点滴滴都像玻璃碎片一样被碾碎，化作蓝色的、带红色镶边的潮汐，裹挟着数不清的鱼儿，涌向岸边，崩碎在我们脚下。”

'If we could mount together, if we could perceive from a sufficient height,' said Rhoda, 'if we could remain untouched without any support—but you, disturbed by faint clapping sounds of praise and laughter, and I, resenting compromise and right and wrong on human lips, trust only in solitude and the violence of death and thus are divided.'

“要是我们一起登上山峰，凭高远眺，”罗达说，“要是我们凌空独立，远离尘俗——可是你，被微弱的鼓掌喝彩和笑声烦扰；而我，讨厌妥协和人们嘴头的是是非非，只相信孤独和死亡的力量，因此而分道扬镳了。”

'For ever,' said Louis, 'divided. We have sacrificed the embrace among the ferns, and love, love, love by the lake, standing, like conspirators who have drawn apart to share some secret, by the urn. But now look, as we stand here, a ripple breaks on the horizon. The net is raised higher and higher. It comes to the top of the water. The water is broken by silver, by quivering little fish. Now leaping, now lashing, they are laid on shore. Life tumbles its catch upon the grass. There are figures coming towards us. Are they men or are they women? They still wear the ambiguous draperies of the flowing tide in which they have been immersed.'

“永远地分道扬镳了。”路易斯说。我们牺牲了羊齿草丛中的拥抱，也牺牲了一次次伫立湖边、坟旁、像避人耳目分享秘密的同谋者那样的谈情说爱。但是此刻，瞧，当我们站在这里时，天边突然泛起涟漪。那张网越升越高。它浮出水面了。不停抖动的银色小鱼划破了水面。它们跳跃着，扑腾着，被抛到岸上。生活把它的捕获物胡乱丢在草地上。有些人正向我们走来。他们是男人还是女人呢？他们仍然穿着他们沉浸于潮汐之中的那身模糊不清的外衣。”

'Now,' said Rhoda, 'as they pass that tree, they regain their natural size. They are only men, only women. Wonder and awe change as they put off the draperies of the flowing tide. Pity returns, as they emerge into the moonlight, like the relics of an army, our representatives, going every night (here or in Greece) to battle, and coming back every night with their wounds, their ravaged faces. Now light falls on them again. They have faces. They become Susan and Bernard, Jinny and Neville, people we know. Now what a shrinkage takes place! Now what a shrivelling, what an humiliation! The old shivers run through me, hatred and terror, as I feel myself grappled to one spot by these hooks they cast on us; these greetings, recognitions, pluckings of the finger and searchings of the eyes. Yet they have only to speak, and their first words, with the remembered tone and the perpetual deviation from what one expects, and their hands moving and making a thousand past days rise again in the darkness, shake my purpose.'

“瞧，”罗达说，“一拐过那棵树，他们就恢复了自然的形态。他们只是寻常男女。他们一脱去潮汐的外衣，惊奇和敬畏也随即改变。怜悯之情重新涌现，当他们在月光下现出身形，像一支军队的残兵败卒，他们代表我们出征，每晚（从这里或从希腊）走上战场，每晚又带着创伤、面目全非地归来。此刻光线又照在他们身上。他们有各自的脸庞。他们变成了苏珊和伯纳德，吉尼和内维尔，都是我们熟悉的人。这一刻多么让人望而生畏！这一刻多么让人束手无策，多么难堪！我的全身起了一阵熟悉的震颤，有怨恨也有惊恐，我感觉自己被他们抛过来的这些钩子，这些问候、称许、指指戳戳，以及探寻的目光抓到了某个地方。然而他们只需开口说话，那刚开始的几句话，那熟悉的语调，那永远与你期望值相背离的主题，他们让一千个曾经的日子又在黑暗中浮现的手势，就动摇了我的意志。”

'Something flickers and dances,' said Louis. 'Illusion returns as they approach down the avenue. Rippling and questioning begin. What do I think of you—what do you think of me? Who are you? Who am I?—that quivers again its uneasy air over us, and the pulse quickens and the eye brightens and all the insanity of personal existence without which life would fall flat and die, begins again. They are on us. The southern sun flickers over this urn; we push off in to the tide of the violent and cruel sea. Lord help us to act our parts as we greet them returning—Susan and Bernard, Neville and Jinny.'

“某种东西在闪烁、跳跃。”路易斯说。“他们沿着林阴道走近时，幻影又出现了。开始了谈笑风生，问这问那。我怎么看你；你怎么看我？你是谁？我是谁？——这些又一次振动了我们周围的不安气氛，脉搏加快了，眼睛发亮了，个人存在的一切疯狂（没有它，生命将是失败和死亡）又开始了。他们朝我们走来了。南方的太阳照耀着这座坟丘；我们起身投入凶猛无情的大海的浪潮。当我们欢迎他们——苏珊和伯纳德，内维尔和吉尼——归来时，愿上帝帮助我们扮演好我们的角色吧。”

'We have destroyed something by our presence,' said Bernard, 'a world perhaps.'

“我们的出现破坏了某种东西，”伯纳德说，“或许破坏了一个世界。”

'Yet we scarcely breathe,' said Neville, 'spent as we are. We are in that passive and exhausted frame of mind when we only wish to rejoin the body of our mother from whom we have been severed. All else is distasteful, forced and fatiguing. Jinny's yellow scarf is moth-coloured in this light; Susan's eyes are quenched. We are scarcely to be distinguished from the river. One cigarette end is the only point of emphasis among us. And sadness tinges our content, that we should have left you, torn the fabric; yielded to the desire to press out, alone, some bitterer, some blacker juice, which was sweet too. But now we are worn out.'

“可是我们几乎连口气也没喘啊，”内维尔说，“尽管我们精疲力尽。我们处在被动而疲乏的心态中，这时我们只希望与我们曾经脱离的母体重新会合。其他一切都是令人厌恶的，被迫的，使人劳累的。吉尼的黄围巾在这片光照下变成了飞蛾的颜色；苏珊的眼睛里失去了光芒。我们几乎要与这条河浑然一体。一颗烟蒂是我们之间唯一的突出之物。我们的满足染上了悲伤的气息，因为我们本该离开你们，撕烂衣物，屈从于欲望，独自去挤出更苦涩、更暗沉的汁液，这汁液同时也是甜蜜的。但是此刻我们疲惫不堪。”

'After our fire,' said Jinny, 'there is nothing left to put in lockets.'

“我们激情过后，”吉尼说，“就再没有什么可放进盒子里了。”

'Still I gape,' said Susan, 'like a young bird, unsatisfied, for something that has escaped me.'

“我仍然目瞪口呆着，”苏珊说，“像一只雏鸟，不满足地等待着从我这里溜掉的什么东西。”

'Let us stay for a moment,' said Bernard, 'before we go. Let us pace the terrace by the river almost alone. It is nearly bed-time. People have gone home. Now how comforting it is to watch the lights coming out in the bedrooms of small shopkeepers on the other side of the river. There is one—there is another. What do you think their takings have been today? Only just enough to pay for the rent, for light and food and the children's clothing. But just enough. What a sense of the tolerableness of life the lights in the bedrooms of small shopkeepers give us! Saturday comes, and there is just enough to pay perhaps for seats at the Pictures. Perhaps before they put out the light they go into the little garden and look at the giant rabbit couched in its wooden hut. That is the rabbit they will have for Sunday dinner. Then they put out the light. Then they sleep. And for thousands of people sleep is nothing but warmth and silence and one moment's sport with some fantastic dream. "I have posted my letter," the greengrocer thinks, "to the Sunday newspaper. Suppose I win five hundred pounds in the football competition? And we shall kill the rabbit. Life is pleasant. Life is good. I have posted the letter. We shall kill the rabbit." And he sleeps.

“让我们待一会儿吧，”伯纳德说，“然后再离开。让我们悠闲地走在河边的阶丘上吧，这里几乎没有旁人。快到上床睡觉的时间了。人们已经回家了。此刻，望着河对岸小店主们的卧室里映出的灯火，多么温馨。那儿一家，那儿又一家。你觉得他们今天收入如何？只够支付房租、电灯、吃食和孩子们的穿着。但是刚好够用。小店主们卧室里的灯火给我们一种感觉：没有过不去的生活！星期六到了，手头的余钱或许刚好够买几张电影票。或许熄灯之前，他们会走进小花园，看看卧在小木屋里的那只肥大的兔子。那是他们用作星期日晚宴的兔子。然后他们熄了灯。然后他们睡着了。对于成千上万的人来说，睡眠只是温暖、安宁和充满奇妙梦想的休闲一刻。‘我寄出了那封信，’菜贩子想，‘寄给了《星期日报》。假如我在那场足球赛中赢得五百英镑？我们就宰了那只兔子。生活是愉快的。生活是美好的。我寄出了那封信。我们要宰掉那只兔子。’然后他睡着了。

'That goes on. Listen. There is a sound like the knocking of railway trucks in a siding. That is the happy concatenation of one event following another in our lives. Knock, knock, knock. Must, must, must. Must go, must sleep, must wake, must get up—sober, merciful word which we pretend to revile, which we press tight to our hearts, without which we should be undone. How we worship that sound like the knocking together of trucks in a siding!

“那边还在继续。听。好像是铁路侧轨上货车车皮与铁轨的碰撞声。那是我们生活中一个事件跟另一个事件的巧妙连结。嘭，嘭，嘭。必须，必须，必须。必须出发，必须睡觉，必须醒来，必须起身——一个理智而慈悲的字眼，我们装模作样斥责它，却又把它铭记于心，因为没有它我们就不完整。我们多么崇拜那种好像铁路侧轨上火车车轮与铁轨在一起时的碰撞声！

'Now far off down the river I hear the chorus; the song of the boasting boys, who are coming back in large charabancs from a day's outing on the decks of crowded steamers. Still they are singing as they used to sing, across the court, on winters' nights, or with the windows open in summer, getting drunk, breaking the furniture, wearing little striped caps, all turning their heads the same way as the brake rounded the corner; and I wished to be with them.

“此刻远远地从河的下游传来合唱声；那些夸夸其谈的男孩子们的歌声，他们结束了在拥挤的轮船甲板上一天的出行，正乘着一辆敞篷大马车回来。他们一如既往地唱着歌，在冬日的夜晚穿过院子，或者夏天里敞着窗子，喝得烂醉，砸破家具，戴着条纹小帽，随着大马车拐过街角齐刷刷地扭过头去；而那时我希望成为他们中的一员。

'What with the chorus, and the spinning water and the just perceptible murmur of the breeze we are slipping away. Little bits of ourselves are crumbling. There! Something very important fell then. I cannot keep myself together. I shall sleep. But we must go; must catch our train; must walk back to the station—must, must, must. We are only bodies jogging along side by side. I exist only in the soles of my feet and in the tired muscles of my thighs. We have been walking for hours it seems. But where? I cannot remember. I am like a log slipping smoothly over some waterfall. I am not a judge. I am not called upon to give my opinion. Houses and trees are all the same in this grey light. Is that a post? Is that a woman walking? Here is the station, and if the train were to cut me in two, I should come together on the further side, being one, being indivisible. But what is odd is that I still clasp the return half of my ticket to Waterloo firmly between the fingers of my right hand, even now, even sleeping.'

“随着合唱、旋转的水流和隐约可辨的风的低语，我们在不知不觉中失去了多少啊。我们自身的点点滴滴崩得粉碎。瞧啊！某种十分重要的东西丢在当时了。我无法使自己保持清醒了。我要睡了。但是我们必须出发；必须赶上我们的火车；必须走回到火车站——必须，必须，必须。我们只是肩并肩一路小跑的躯体。只有我的双脚掌和我大腿疲劳的肌肉证明我的存在。似乎我们已经一直走了数小时。但是哪些地方？我记不住。我像一根原木平稳地滑过某瀑布。我并不是一个裁判。没人要我发表意见。在这灰暗的光线下，房子和树木完全一样。那是一个邮筒么？那是一个走路的女人么？车站到了，即使火车把我分成两半，我也会在更远的一边聚合到一起，因为我本是一体，不可分割的。但是奇怪的是，即使在此刻，即使在睡梦中，我的右手手指之间依然牢牢地攥着返回滑铁卢的半程车票。”

Now the sun had sunk. Sky and sea were indistinguishable. The waves breaking spread their white fans far out over the shore, sent white shadows into the recesses of sonorous caves and then rolled back sighing over the shingle.

现在太阳落山了。海与天浑然难辨。迸碎的海浪在岸边远远地铺开它们白色的扇面，给隆隆作响的岩洞深处罩上层层白影，然后叹息着掠过砂石退了回去。

The tree shook its branches and a scattering of leaves fell to the ground. There they settled with perfect composure on the precise spot where they would await dissolution. Black and grey were shot into the garden from the broken vessel that had once held red light. Dark shadows blackened the tunnels between the stalks. The thrush was silent and the worm sucked itself back into its narrow hole. Now and again a whitened and hollow straw was blown from an old nest and fell into the dark grasses among the rotten apples. The light had faded from the tool-house wall and the adder's skin hung from the nail empty. All the colours in the room had overflown their banks. The precise brush stroke was swollen and lop-sided; cupboards and chairs melted their brown masses into one huge obscurity. The height from floor to ceiling was hung with vast curtains of shaking darkness. The looking-glass was pale as the mouth of a cave shadowed by hanging creepers.

枝杈晃动，树叶纷纷坠地。它们十分从容地躺在原地，等待死亡。一度红光闪闪的那条破船发出的黑色和灰色的光射进花园里。暗影使花茎之间的孔隙变得更黑了。画眉鸟沉默了，小虫子缩回到它狭窄的洞里。不时地，一截发白、中空的麦秆从一个旧巢里被风吹落，掉进烂苹果之间漆黑的草丛中。光线已从工具房的墙上消失了，蝰蛇蜕下的皮空空地悬在钉子上。房间里所有的颜色都溢了出来。精确的笔画变得肿胀而旁逸斜出；橱柜和椅子的褐色实体消融在一大片晦暗之中。从地板到天花板之间整个垂着颤动的巨幅黑色帷幕。镜子蒙眬不清，像是被悬垂的爬藤遮掩的洞口。

The substance had gone from the solidity of the hills. Travelling lights drove a plumy wedge among unseen and sunken roads, but no lights opened among the folded wings of the hills, and there was no sound save the cry of a bird seeking some lonelier tree. At the cliff's edge there was an equal murmur of air that had been brushed through forests, of water that had been cooled in a thousand glassy hollows of mid-ocean.

山岭固有的实质被抽走了。游移的光影在望不见的、低洼的道路之间钉下一个羽毛状的楔子，但是在收拢的山翼当中却看不到任何光影，而且没有任何声音，除了一只鸟的哀鸣——它在寻找一棵更为僻静的树。悬崖边上，掠过树林的风发出曼声细语，在大海中央千万个平静如镜的空洞中平静下来的海浪也开始了呢喃。

As if there were waves of darkness in the air, darkness moved on, covering houses, hills, trees, as waves of water wash round the sides of some sunken ship. Darkness washed down streets, eddying round single figures, engulfing them; blotting out couples clasped under the showery darkness of elm trees in full summer foliage. Darkness rolled its waves along grassy rides and over the wrinkled skin of the turf, enveloping the solitary thorn tree and the empty snail shells at its foot. Mounting higher, darkness blew along the bare upland slopes, and met the fretted and abraded pinnacles of the mountain where the snow lodges for ever on the hard rock even when the valleys are full of running streams and yellow vine leaves, and girls, sitting on verandahs, look up at the snow, shading their faces with their fans. Them, too, darkness covered.

仿佛空气中涌动着黑暗的波浪，黑暗不断向前，笼罩了房屋、山岭、树木，就像大海的波浪冲击一条沉船的四壁。黑暗冲向街道，围着那些孤身的行人打转，把他们一一吞没；也把盛夏枝叶繁盛的榆树浓阴下缠绵的情侣们吸了进去。黑暗的波浪涌上草绿色的骑马道，漫过起伏的草皮，淹没了那棵孤零零的荆棘树和它脚下空空的蜗牛壳。黑暗越攀越高，慢慢爬上光秃秃的高地斜坡，遇到峭壁嶙峋的山峰，在那里，坚硬的岩石上面终年积着雪，即使当山谷里满是潺潺的溪流和葡萄藤的黄叶时，女孩们坐在走廊上，用扇子遮住了脸，一抬头也总能望见远方的雪。而它们，也淹没在黑暗中了。

'Now to sum up,' said Bernard. 'Now to explain to you the meaning of my life. Since we do not know each other (though I met you once, I think, on board a ship going to Africa), we can talk freely. The illusion is upon me that something adheres for a moment, has roundness, weight, depth, is completed. This, for the moment, seems to be my life. If it were possible, I would hand it to you entire. I would break it off as one breaks off a bunch of grapes. I would say, "Take it. This is my life."

“现在做个总结吧。”伯纳德说。“现在向你解释一下我人生的意义吧。因为我们相互不了解（尽管我见过你一面，我想，是在一条开往非洲去的船上吧），我们可以毫不拘束地谈谈。我有一种幻觉，什么东西瞬间凝固了，有圆度，有重量，　有深度，完完整整。这，目前看来，似乎就是我的生活。如果有可能，我会把它整个交给你。我会把它摘下来，就像摘下一串葡萄那样。我会说：‘接住它。这就是我的生活。’

'But unfortunately, what I see (this globe, full of figures) you do not see. You see me, sitting at a table opposite you, a rather heavy, elderly man, grey at the temples. You see me take my napkin and unfold it. You see me pour myself out a glass of wine. And you see behind me the door opening, and people passing. But in order to make you understand, to give you my life, I must tell you a story—and there are so many, and so many—stories of childhood, stories of school, love, marriage, death, and so on; and none of them are true. Yet like children we tell each other stories, and to decorate them we make up these ridiculous, flamboyant, beautiful phrases. How tired I am of stories, how tired I am of phrases that come down beautifully with all their feet on the ground! Also, how I distrust neat designs of life that are drawn upon half-sheets of note-paper. I begin to long for some little language such as lovers use, broken words, inarticulate words, like the shuffling of feet on the pavement. I begin to seek some design more in accordance with those moments of humiliation and triumph that come now and then undeniably. Lying in a ditch on a stormy day, when it has been raining, then enormous clouds come marching over the sky, tattered clouds, wisps of cloud. What delights me then is the confusion, the height, the indifference and the fury. Great clouds always changing, and movement; something sulphurous and sinister, bowled up, helter-skelter; towering, trailing, broken off, lost, and I forgotten, minute, in a ditch. Of story, of design, I do not see a trace then.

“但遗憾的是，我所看见的（这个世界，充满了影影绰绰的人），你却看不见。你看见我，正坐在你对面的桌子旁，一个相当笨重、上了年纪的人，两鬓斑白。你看见我接过餐巾，把它展开。你看见我为自己倒了一杯酒。你看见我身后打开的门和来来往往的人。但是为了让你理解，为了把我的生活交给你，我必须给你讲个故事——有那么多，那么多故事——童年的故事，学校的故事，爱情，婚姻，死亡，等等，而没有一个是真的。不过就像小孩子一样，我们彼此讲故事，为了修饰它们，我们编造出这些荒唐可笑、惹人耳目的华丽词藻。我多么厌倦那些故事，多么厌倦那些代代相传华丽的词藻！而且我多么怀疑那些绘在半张便笺纸上的整洁的人生设计图啊。我开始渴望诸如情人们使用的一些简洁语言，断断续续的字句，含混不清的字句，就像人行道上拖曳的脚步。我开始寻找某种设计，以便更加合乎那些确凿无疑、时而出现的荣辱时刻。在一个暴风雨的日子，躺在一条水沟里，起初一直下着雨，接着巨大的云团弥漫了天空，然后是破碎的云块，丝丝缕缕的云。这时令我欣喜的正是这种混乱，这种极端，这种冷漠和愤怒。美妙的云朵总在变化，总在移动；某种地狱般的、阴险的东西，慌慌张张，滚滚而来；忽而超越，忽而尾随，忽而戛然而止，消失了，而我，如此微不足道，被遗忘在水沟里。这时，什么故事，什么设计，我根本看不到一丝踪迹。

'But meanwhile, while we eat, let us turn over these scenes as children turn over the pages of a picture-book and the nurse says, pointing: "That's a cow. That's a boat." Let us turn over the pages, and I will add, for your amusement, a comment in the margin.

“但是同时，在我们吃饭期间，让我们翻开这些场景吧，就像小孩子逐页翻开一本图画书，保姆指点着说：‘那是一只母牛。那是一条船。’让我们一页页翻开吧，为了让你开心，我愿意在页边空白处加上评注。

'In the beginning, there was the nursery, with windows opening on to a garden, and beyond that the sea. I saw something brighten—no doubt the brass handle of a cupboard. Then Mrs Constable raised the sponge above her head, squeezed it, and out shot, right, left, all down the spine, arrows of sensation. And so, as long as we draw breath, for the rest of time, if we knock against a chair, a table, or a woman, we are pierced with arrows of sensation—if we walk in a garden, if we drink this wine. Sometimes indeed, when I pass a cottage with a light in the window where a child has been born, I could implore them not to squeeze the sponge over that new body. Then, there was the garden and the canopy of the currant leaves which seemed to enclose everything; flowers, burning like sparks upon the depths of green; a rat wreathing with maggots under a rhubarb leaf; the fly going buzz, buzz, buzz upon the nursery ceiling, and plates upon plates of innocent bread and butter. All these things happen in one second and last for ever. Faces loom. Dashing round the corner. "Hullo," one says, "there's Jinny. That's Neville. That's Louis in grey flannel with a snake belt. That's Rhoda." She had a basin in which she sailed petals of white flowers. It was Susan who cried, that day when I was in the tool-house with Neville; and I felt my indifference melt. Neville did not melt. "Therefore," I said, "I am myself, not Neville", a wonderful discovery. Susan cried and I followed her. Her wet pocket-handkerchief, and the sight of her little back heaving up and down like a pump-handle, sobbing for what was denied her, screwed my nerves up. "That is not to be borne," I said, as I sat beside her on the roots that were hard as skeletons. I then first became aware of the presence of those enemies who change, but are always there; the forces we fight against. To let oneself be carried on passively is unthinkable. "That's your course, world," one says, "mine is this." So, "Let's explore," I cried, and jumped up, and ran downhill with Susan and saw the stable-boy clattering about the yard in great boots. Down below, through the depths of the leaves, the gardeners swept the lawns with great brooms. The lady sat writing. Transfixed, stopped dead, I thought, "I cannot interfere with a single stroke of those brooms. They sweep and they sweep. Nor with the fixity of that woman writing." It is strange that one cannot stop gardeners sweeping nor dislodge a woman. There they have remained all my life. It is as if one had woken in Stonehenge surrounded by a circle of great stones, these enemies, these presences. Then a wood-pigeon flew out of the trees. And being in love for the first time, I made a phrase—a poem about a wood-pigeon—a single phrase, for a hole had been knocked in my mind, one of those sudden transparencies through which one sees everything. Then more bread and butter and more flies droning round the nursery ceiling on which quivered islands of light, ruffled, opalescent, while the pointed fingers of the lustre dripped blue pools on the corner of the mantelpiece. Day after day as we sat at tea we observed these sights.

“开始的时候，有间育婴室，窗户开向一处花园，远处是大海。我看见什么东西发出亮光——无疑那是一个橱柜的铜把手。接着康斯特布尔太太把海绵举过她头顶，一挤，左右两边立即射出麻酥酥的箭头，全都顺着脊柱流下来。在此后的岁月里，只要我们吸气就会有这种感觉，如果我们撞上一把椅子，一张桌子，或者一个女人，我们都会通体感觉到那些麻酥酥的箭头——如果我们在花园里漫步，如果我们喝下这杯酒，也会有同样的感觉。其实有时候，当我经过一间窗口亮着灯的小屋，屋里刚刚降生了一个孩子，我真想恳请他们不要在那新生的躯体上面挤海绵。然后，有座花园，醋栗枝叶的华盖似乎要遮住一切；花儿灼灼，像绿叶深处的火苗；一片大黄叶子下面，一只老鼠身上爬满蛆虫；那只苍蝇嗡嗡嗡地飞到育婴室的天花板上，也飞到一盘一盘无知无觉的面包和黄油上面。所有这些都发生在瞬间，而持续到永远。面孔隐约可见。从街角窜了出来。‘嗨，’你会说，‘那是吉尼。那是内维尔。那是路易斯，一身灰色法兰绒，扎了一条蛇皮腰带。那是罗达。’她有一个水盆，她让白色的花瓣在里面扬帆起航。那是苏珊，那天当我和内维尔在工具房里时，她哭着跑开了；我立即感到我的冷漠消融了。内维尔倒是不为所动。‘这么说，’我说，‘我是我，不是内维尔。’一个惊人的发现。苏珊哭着跑开了，我随后跟着她。她湿润的手帕，她因为失落而抽泣时小巧的后背像泵杆似的一起一伏的样子，鼓起了我的勇气。‘真是让人不好受。’说着，我坐在她身旁骷髅一样坚硬的树根上。当时我第一次意识到敌人的存在，他们变幻无定，但却一直都在；那是我们总在反抗的种种势力。让自己顺从地被裹挟向前是不可想象的。‘那是你的行程，入世之路，’你会说，‘而我走的是这条路。’那么，‘让我们探索吧。’我大喊着，跳起来，和苏珊一起跑下山坡，看见那个小马夫穿着大马靴啪嗒啪嗒地在院子里忙碌。更远的地方，透过浓密的枝叶望去，园丁们用大扫帚清扫着草坪。有位女士坐在那儿写字。我惊呆了，突然停下来，心想：‘我不能妨碍那些扫帚一下一下的清扫。他们扫啊，扫啊。也不能打扰那个正在写字的女人的安定。’奇怪的是，你不能让园丁们停止清扫，也不能驱开一个女人。在我的毕生当中，他们一直在那儿。仿佛你在巨石阵中醒来，周围一圈大石头，那么多仇敌，那么多幽灵。这时树林中飞出一只斑鸠。那时正当初恋，我就编出一句词，一首关于斑鸠的诗——只有一句词，因为我的头脑忽然开了窍，灵光闪现，一眼即看穿一切。接着出现了更多面包和黄油，更多的苍蝇围着育婴室的天花板嗡嗡地叫，那上面摇曳着一块块散乱的乳白色光斑，同时从那光影的指尖漏出蓝色的光圈，滴在壁炉架的一角。日复一日，我们一边坐下来喝茶，一边观看这些景象。

'But we were all different. The wax—the virginal wax that coats the spine melted in different patches for each of us. The growl of the boot-boy making love to the tweeny among the gooseberry bushes; the clothes blown out hard on the line; the dead man in the gutter; the apple tree, stark in the moonlight; the rat swarming with maggots; the lustre dripping blue—our white wax was streaked and stained by each of these differently. Louis was disgusted by the nature of human flesh; Rhoda by our cruelty; Susan could not share; Neville wanted order; Jinny love; and so on. We suffered terribly as we became separate bodies.

“但是我们都变了。那层蜡——那层裹住脊柱的纯洁的蜡，在我们每个人身上融化成了不同的斑块。醋栗丛中与女佣做爱的那个皮靴男孩的呼哧声；晾衣绳上被风吹得鼓鼓的那些衣物；水沟里的那个死人；月光下那棵光秃秃的苹果树；聚满蛆虫的那只老鼠；蓝色淅沥的那片光影——每一种景象都在我们洁白的封蜡上面留下了不同的纹络和污迹。路易斯对人类肉欲的本质深恶痛绝；罗达对我们的残酷无情痛恨不已；苏珊无法与人分享；内维尔渴望秩序；吉尼渴望爱情；如此等等。我们因为各自离散而痛苦万分。

'Yet I was preserved from these excesses and have survived many of my friends, am a little stout, grey, rubbed on the thorax as it were, because it is the panorama of life, seen not from the roof, but from the third-storey window, that delights me, not what one woman says to one man, even if that man is myself. How could I be bullied at school therefore? How could they make things hot for me? There was the Doctor lurching into chapel, as if he trod a battleship in a gale of wind, shouting out his commands through a megaphone, since people in authority always become melodramatic—I did not hate him like Neville, or revere him like Louis. I took notes as we sat together in chapel. There were pillars, shadows, memorial brasses, boys scuffling and swopping stamps behind Prayer Books; the sound of a rusty pump; the Doctor booming, about immortality and quitting ourselves like men; and Percival scratching his thigh. I made notes for stories; drew portraits in the margin of my pocket-book and thus became still more separate. Here are one or two of the figures I saw.

“不过我却避免了这样的极端，比我的许多朋友也更长命，现在有点发福，头也白了，可以说饱经沧桑，因为正是生活的全景，不是从楼顶而是从三层楼的窗口看到的景象，也不是一个女人对一个男人说的话，即使那个男人就是我本人，这些都令我喜乐。不然我怎么能在学校时受人欺凌？他们怎么能弄出事情让我激动不已呢？那位博士蹒跚着走进礼拜堂，仿佛踏上飓风中的一艘战舰，通过喇叭发号施令，因为权威人士总是容易情绪激昂——我不像内维尔那样讨厌他，也不像路易斯那样尊敬他。当我们一起坐在礼拜堂里时，我总是做些记录。廊柱，阴影，黄铜祭器，男孩子们在祈祷书后面蹭脚、踢打；生锈的水泵的声音；博士在大吹大擂，关于不朽，关于如何像男人一样表现自己；珀西瓦尔搔搔他的大腿。我为讲故事记录些素材；在记事簿的页边空白处画些肖像，从而显得更加心不在焉。下面就是我所看见的几幅形象。

'Percival sat staring straight ahead of him that day in chapel. He also had a way of flicking his hand to the back of his neck. His movements were always remarkable. We all flicked our hands to the backs of our heads—unsuccessfully. He had the kind of beauty which defends itself from any caress. As he was not in the least precocious, he read whatever was written up for our edification without any comment, and thought with that magnificent equanimity (Latin words come naturally) that was to preserve him from so many meannesses and humiliations, that Lucy's flaxen pigtails and pink cheeks were the height of female beauty. Thus preserved, his taste later was of extreme fineness. But there should be music, some wild carol. Through the window should come a hunting-song from some rapid unapprehended life—a sound that shouts among the hills and dies away. What is startling, what is unexpected, what we cannot account for, what turns symmetry to nonsense—that comes suddenly to my mind, thinking of him. The little apparatus of observation is unhinged. Pillars go down; the Doctor floats off; some sudden exaltation possesses me. He was thrown, riding in a race, and when I came along Shaftesbury Avenue tonight, those insignificant and scarcely formulated faces that bubble up out of the doors of the Tube, and many obscure Indians, and people dying of famine and disease, and women who have been cheated, and whipped dogs and crying children—all these seemed to me bereft. He would have done justice. He would have protected. About the age of forty he would have shocked the authorities. No lullaby has ever occurred to me capable of singing him to rest.

“那天珀西瓦尔在礼拜堂里直瞪瞪地盯着前方。他还有个用手轻拍后脖颈的习惯。他的动作总是魅力非凡。我们都用手拍过后脖颈——却没啥效果。他所具有的那种美，拒绝任何亲近。因为他一点也不早熟，那些专门写来教诲我们的书，他都一概不加评议地读过了，而且他以博大的平和心态（拉丁词自然地冒了出来），正是这种心态使他避开了种种龌龊和耻辱，认为，露西的亚麻色发辫和粉红色的脸蛋就是女性美的极致。因为这样的熏陶，他拥有了后来的优雅品味。不过那也许是音乐吧，某种狂放的颂歌。透过窗子，也许会传来某个逍遥的生命匆匆而过的行猎之歌——呼啸于山林又渐渐消失的声音。令人吃惊的，出人意料的，我们无法解释的，由匀称变为歪曲的——想到他，这一切立即涌现在我的脑海。小小的观察器被卸了下来。廊柱沉下去了；博士漂走了；一阵突如其来的狂喜攫住了我。他是在骑马比赛中摔下来的，当我今晚沿着沙夫茨伯里大道走来时，从地铁站口汩汩冒出的那些微不足道、几无定型的脸，许许多多名不见经传的印度人，死于饥荒和疾病的人，遭遇不忠的女人，挨鞭子的狗，哭闹的儿童——在我看来所有这些人都受到了损失。他本来可以主持正义。他本来可以实施保护。他本来可以在40岁前后给官方以震撼。我永远想不起来有哪一首催眠曲能够让他安息。

'But let me dip again and bring up in my spoon another of these minute objects which we call optimistically, "characters of our friends"—Louis. He sat staring at the preacher. His being seemed conglobulated in his brow, his lips were pressed; his eyes were fixed, but suddenly they flashed with laughter. Also he suffered from chilblains, the penalty of an imperfect circulation. Unhappy, unfriended, in exile he would sometimes, in moments of confidence, describe how the surf swept over the beaches of his home. The remorseless eye of youth fixed itself upon his swollen joints. Yes, but we were also quick to perceive how cutting, how apt, how severe he was, how naturally, when we lay under the elm trees pretending to watch cricket, we waited his approval, seldom given. His ascendancy was resented, as Percival's was adored. Prim, suspicious, lifting his feet like a crane, there was yet a legend that he had smashed a door with his naked fist. But his peak was too bare, too stony for that kind of mist to cling to it. He was without those simple attachments by which one is connected with another. He remained aloof; enigmatic; a scholar capable of that inspired accuracy which has something formidable about it. My phrases (how to describe the moon) did not meet with his approval. On the other hand, he envied me to the point of desperation for being at my ease with servants. Not that the sense of his own deserts failed him. That was commensurate with his respect for discipline. Hence his success, finally. His life, though, was not happy. But look—his eye turns white as he lies in the palm of my hand. Suddenly the sense of what people are leaves one. I return him to the pool where he will acquire lustre.

“但是让我再沉下去，用勺子舀起另一件我们乐观地称之为‘朋友之性格’的细小事物吧——说说路易斯。他坐在那儿凝望着说教者。他的存在似乎凝聚在他的额头；他的嘴唇绷得紧紧的；他的眼睛一动不动，但突然间就会闪出笑意。另外，他害了冻疮，是血脉流通不畅造成的。他闷闷不乐，无亲无友，因为身在异乡，有时，在一些私密的时刻，他会描绘家乡海浪漫上沙滩的景象。不屈不挠的青春的目光注视着他肿胀的关节。是啊，但是我们也迅速觉察到了他有多么犀利，多么敏锐，多么苛刻，当我们躺在榆树下装模作样看板球赛时，我们自然期待他的首肯，而他却很少点头。在珀西瓦尔的优势受到推崇的同时，他的优势遭来了怨恨。拘谨，多疑，他走路的样子像一只鹤，不过有个传说，他曾直接用拳头砸烂了一扇门。但是他的峰头太光秃，过于嶙峋，而那样的薄雾是站不住脚的。他缺少那些人与人藉以相互联系的单纯的依恋。他一直落落寡合；高深莫测；像一位一丝不苟的学者，给人启发，令人敬畏。我的词藻（比如描绘月亮之类）没有得到过他的认同。另一方面，我和仆人们相处的从容自如令他嫉妒得要命。他本人的孤立感并没让他失败。那与他对纪律的尊重刚好相称。后来他终于成功了。但是他的生活并不幸福。可是瞧啊——他躺在我的掌心里，一只眼翻白了。突然之间你就会失去对人的觉知。我让他游回到池水里，在那儿他会重新染上光泽。

'Neville next—lying on his back staring up at the summer sky. He floated among us like a piece of thistledown, indolently haunting the sunny corner of the playing-field, not listening, yet not remote. It was through him that I have nosed round without ever precisely touching the Latin classics and have also derived some of those persistent habits of thought which make us irredeemably lop-sided—for instance about crucifixes, that they are the mark of the devil. Our half-loves and half-hates and ambiguities on these points were to him indefensible treacheries. The swaying and sonorous Doctor, whom I made to sit swinging his braces over a gas-fire, was to him nothing but an instrument of the inquisition. So he turned with a passion that made up for his indolence upon Catullus, Horace, Lucretius, lying lazily dormant, yes, but regardant, noticing, with rapture, cricketers, while with a mind like the tongue of an ant-eater, rapid, dexterous, glutinous, he searched out every curl and twist of those Roman sentences, and sought out one person, always one person to sit beside.

“下一个是内维尔——正仰面躺着，凝望着夏日的天空。他像一片飞絮飘浮在我们中间，懒洋洋地萦绕在操场上那块阳光灿烂的角落，不在倾听，却也并不疏远。正是受了他的影响，我才四处涉猎，却不曾好好接触拉丁文的经典，而且还染上了一些顽固的思考习惯，使得我们无可救药地走向偏颇——比如对于十字架，我们就认为它是诅咒的标志。我们不彻底的爱与恨以及在这些见解上的模棱两可，对他而言就是无可辩解的背叛行为。那位摇摇晃晃、嗓门洪亮的博士，那位我曾描绘为坐在煤气炉边摆弄他的背带的博士，对他而言只是宗教法庭的一个工具。于是在一股弥补了他在阅读卡图卢斯、贺拉斯、卢克莱修时的懒散的激情之下，他转过头去，懒洋洋地静躺下来，是的，但他却在向后看，颇有兴致地留意着那些板球手，同时他用像食蚁兽的舌头一样迅速、灵敏而具有黏性的大脑，搜索出那些罗马诗句中的每一处幽微深曲，然后找一个人，常常是一个坐在他身旁的人。

'And the long skirts of the masters' wives would come swishing by, mountainous, menacing; and our hands would fly to our caps. And immense dullness would descend unbroken, monotonous. Nothing, nothing, nothing broke with its fin that leaden waste of waters. Nothing would happen to lift that weight of intolerable boredom. The terms went on. We grew; we changed; for, of course, we are animals. We are not always aware by any means; we breathe, eat, sleep automatically. We exist not only separately but in undifferentiated blobs of matter. With one scoop a whole brakeful of boys is swept up and goes cricketing, footballing. An army marches across Europe. We assemble in parks and halls and sedulously oppose any renegade (Neville, Louis, Rhoda) who sets up a separate existence. And I am so made that, while I hear one or two distinct melodies, such as Louis sings, or Neville, I am also drawn irresistibly to the sound of the chorus chanting its old, chanting its almost wordless, almost senseless song that comes across courts at night; which we hear now booming round us as cars and omnibuses take people to theatres. (Listen; the cars rush past this restaurant; now and then, down the river, a siren hoots, as a steamer makes for the sea.) If a bagman offers me snuff in a train I accept. I like the copious, shapeless, warm, not so very clever, but extremely easy and rather coarse aspect of things; the talk of men in clubs and public-houses, of miners half naked in drawers—the forthright, perfectly unassuming, and without end in view except dinner, love, money and getting along tolerably; that which is without great hopes, ideals or anything of that kind; what is unassuming except to make a tolerably good job of it. I like all that. So I joined them, when Neville sulked or Louis, as I quite agree sublimely, turned on his heel.

“老师们的太太总是拖着长裙嗖嗖地掠过来，像山一样，煞是威严；我们的手总是飞快地触帽致敬。无边的沉闷笼罩下来，浑然而无变化。没有，没有，没有什么东西能用它的鳍划破那片死水。没有任何事情会消除那沉重难忍的厌倦。一个个学期过去了。我们成长着；我们改变着；因为，当然了，我们是动物。无论如何我们并不总是有意识的；我们机械地呼吸、吃饭、睡觉。我们不仅各自独立地存在，而且以一团团混合物质的形式存在。一勺舀下去，整个一大车的男孩子就被发动起来，去打板球，或去踢足球。一支军队开向欧洲。我们聚集在公园里，庭院里，坚持不懈地反对任何标新立异的叛徒（如内维尔、路易斯、罗达等人）。我是这样一个人，每当听到一两首清晰的曲调，比如路易斯或内维尔的歌唱，我也会情不自禁地被吸引到那合唱的声音中去，那是夜晚的庭院中传来的古老的，几乎没有歌词，几乎毫无意义的歌；此刻，当轿车和公共汽车载着人们赶往剧院的时候，我们又听到那支歌回荡在我们耳畔。（听；一辆辆轿车驶过这家餐馆；时不时地，沿河传来汽笛的鸣响，因为有一艘轮船正驶向大海。）如果火车上有位游动商贩向我兜售鼻烟，我会接受的。我喜欢事物呈现出它们丰富的，形状无定的，温暖的，不是很聪明的，但极其随意又相当粗糙的方面；喜欢俱乐部和酒吧里那些人，还有身着内裤的半裸的矿工们的谈话——那种直率，毫不做作，除了吃饭、恋爱、挣钱和隐忍度日之外，再无其他生活目标；没有远大希望、理想或凡此种种；除了勉力做好一份工作之外，用不着装腔作势。我喜欢所有这一切。于是我加入到他们当中，而这时内维尔会生闷气，路易斯，我完全相信，会急忙转身走人。

'Thus, not equally by any means or with order, but in great streaks my waxen waistcoat melted, here one drop, there another. Now through this transparency became visible those wondrous pastures, at first so moon-white, radiant, where no foot has been; meadows of the rose, the crocus, of the rock and the snake too; of the spotted and swart; the embarrassing, the binding and tripping up. One leaps out of bed, throws up the window; with what a whirr the birds rise! You know that sudden rush of wings, that exclamation, carol, and confusion; the riot and babble of voices; and all the drops are sparkling, trembling, as if the garden were a splintered mosaic, vanishing, twinkling; not yet formed into one whole; and a bird sings close to the window. I heard those songs. I followed those phantoms. I saw Joans, Dorothys, Miriams, I forget their names, passing down avenues, stopping on the crest of bridges to look down into the river. And from among them rise one or two distinct figures, birds who sang with the rapt egotism of youth by the window; broke their snails on stones, dipped their beaks in sticky, viscous matter; hard, avid, remorseless; Jinny, Susan, Rhoda. They had been educated on the east coast or on the south coast. They had grown long pigtails and acquired the look of startled foals, which is the mark of adolescence.

“就这样，我的蜡质马甲大条、大条地融化了，完全不均匀，也无秩序，这儿一滴，那儿一滴。此刻，穿过这层透明物，可以看见那些奇妙的牧场，乍一看光芒四射，像月亮一样洁白，无人踏足；草坪上有玫瑰和藏红花，也有岩石和蛇；有斑驳而黝黑的东西；有令人局促、绊手绊脚、突兀而起的东西。你跳下床，推开窗；鸟儿呼地一声飞起！你熟悉那种突然的展翅，那种惊叫、欢唱和迷惑；那种骚乱、嘈杂的声音；滴滴水珠都在闪烁、颤动，仿佛花园是一幅支离破碎的镶嵌画，时隐时现；尚未形成一个整体；一只鸟在靠窗的地方歌唱。我听见了那些歌。我追随着那些幻影。我看见那些名叫琼的、多萝西的、米里亚姆的，我总是忘了她们的名字，我走过林阴道，停在桥头向河里张望。从她们当中浮现出一两个清晰的身影，窗边的鸟儿在狂热、自我地唱响青春；在石头上摔破蜗牛的壳，把它们的喙伸进黏黏糊糊的物质中，冷酷、贪婪、无情；她们是吉尼、苏珊、罗达。她们在东部海岸或南部海岸受过教育。她们留起了长长的辫子，学会了那种受惊的小马驹似的神情，这都是青春期的标志。

'Jinny was the first to come sidling up to the gate to eat sugar. She nipped it off the palms of one's hands very cleverly, but her ears were laid back as if she might bite. Rhoda was wild—Rhoda one never could catch. She was both frightened and clumsy. It was Susan who first became wholly woman, purely feminine. It was she who dropped on my face those scalding tears which are terrible, beautiful; both, neither. She was born to be the adored of poets, since poets require safety; someone who sits sewing, who says, "I hate, I love," who is neither comfortable nor prosperous, but has some quality in accordance with the high but unemphatic beauty of pure style which those who create poetry so particularly admire. Her father trailed from room to room and down flagged corridors in his flapping dressing-gown and worn slippers. On still nights a wall of water fell with a roar a mile off. The ancient dog could scarcely heave himself up on to his chair. And some witless servant could be heard laughing at the top of the house as she whirred the wheel of the sewing-machine round and round.

“吉尼第一个悄悄靠近大门，想要吃糖。她很聪明地从人家的掌心把糖夹走，但是她的耳朵竖着，仿佛她会咬人似的。罗达很任性——这个罗达，谁也别想抓住她。她既担惊受怕又笨手笨脚。苏珊第一个成为十足的女人，散发出纯粹的女性气息。是她把那些滚烫的泪水洒在我的脸上，有时恐怖，有时美丽；有时兼而有之，有时莫名其妙。她天生要受到诗人们的礼赞，因为诗人们需要安全感；需要有人坐下来缝补，那人会说：‘我恨，我爱’，那人既不会带来安慰也不会带来幸运，但拥有某种品质，正合乎创作诗歌的人特别追求的纯文体中那种崇高却不显山露水的美。她的父亲披着松松垮垮的晨衣，趿拉着一双破拖鞋，拖着步子走过一个个房间，走过铺着石板的廊道。在寂静的夜晚，一英里外的一条瀑布轰然而下。那个老迈的狗几乎无法让自己坐到椅子上。当她那台缝纫机的轮子呼呼地转个不停的时候，可以听见某个没头没脑的仆人正在屋顶大笑。

'That I observed even in the midst of my anguish when, twisting her pocket-handkerchief, Susan cried, "I love; I hate." "A worthless servant," I observed, "laughs upstairs in the attic," and that little piece of dramatization shows how incompletely we are merged in our own experiences. On the outskirts of every agony sits some observant fellow who points; who whispers as he whispered to me that summer morning in the house where the corn comes up to the window, "The willow grows on the turf by the river. The gardeners sweep with great brooms and the lady sits writing." Thus he directed me to that which is beyond and outside our own predicament; to that which is symbolic, and thus perhaps permanent, if there is any permanence in our sleeping, eating, breathing, so animal, so spiritual and tumultuous lives.

“当苏珊拧着手帕，呼喊着：‘我爱，我恨’，即使处在痛苦当中的我也注意到了那一点。‘一个没用的仆人，’我注意到，‘在上面的阁楼里大笑，’这一小段剧情表明，我们并非完全地融入我们自身的体验。每一桩苦恼的边上都坐着一个机警的家伙在指指点点；在悄声细语，就像那个夏日早晨，谷物运到窗前时，他对屋里的我轻声说：‘那棵柳树生长在河边的草地上。那些园丁用大扫帚清扫，那位女士坐着写字。’就这样，他把我引向超出我们自身处境之外的遥远的地方；引向象征性的，因而也许是永恒的境界，如果在我们睡觉、吃饭、呼吸，既像野兽又有心灵追求的骚乱生活中存在着永恒的话。

'The willow tree grew by the river. I sat on the smooth turf with Neville, with Larpent, with Baker, Romsey, Hughes, Percival and Jinny. Through its fine plumes specked with little pricked ears of green in spring, of orange in autumn, I saw boats; buildings; I saw hurrying, decrepit women. I buried match after match in the turf decidedly to mark this or that stage in the process of understanding (it might be philosophy; science; it might be myself) while the fringe of my intelligence floating unattached caught those distant sensations which after a time the mind draws in and works upon; the chime of bells; general murmurs; vanishing figures; one girl on a bicycle who, as she rode, seemed to lift the corner of a curtain concealing the populous undifferentiated chaos of life which surged behind the outlines of my friends and the willow tree.

“那棵柳树长在河边。我坐在平坦的草地上，和我一起的有内维尔、拉本特、贝克、拉姆西、休斯、珀西瓦尔和吉尼。透过那些点缀着小小的春绿或秋黄刺穗的细叶，我看见了小船，楼房；我看见了匆匆忙忙、年老色衰的女人们。我把一根又一根火柴埋进草地里，以便明确标明在理解（也许是哲学、科学；也许是我自身）的过程中的某某阶段，同时我那飘忽无定的头脑的触角捕捉到那些遥远的感觉，过一段时间由头脑来吸收和加工的感觉；比如钟的鸣声，通常的窃窃私语，消失的身形；一个骑自行车的女孩，在她前进的时候，她似乎要揭开帷幕的一角，那后面藏着芸芸众生千篇一律的混乱生活，这种生活在我的朋友们和这棵柳树的模糊的身影后面汹涌激荡。

'The tree alone resisted our eternal flux. For I changed and changed; was Hamlet, was Shelley, was the hero, whose name I now forget, of a novel by Dostoevsky; was for a whole term, incredibly, Napoleon; but was Byron chiefly. For many weeks at a time it was my part to stride into rooms and fling gloves and coat on the back of chairs, scowling slightly. I was always going to the bookcase for another sip of the divine specific. Therefore, I let fly my tremendous battery of phrases upon somebody quite inappropriate—a girl now married, now buried; every book, every window-seat was littered with the sheets of my unfinished letters to the woman who made me Byron. For it is difficult to finish a letter in somebody else's style. I arrived all in a lather at her house; exchanged tokens but did not marry her, being no doubt unripe for that intensity.

“单单这棵树就阻碍了我们永恒的流动。因为我变啊，变啊；一会儿是哈姆雷特，一会儿是雪莱，一会儿是陀思妥也夫斯基的一部小说中的主人公，名字我现在不记得了；不可思议的是，有整个一学期我还是拿破仑哩；但主要还是拜伦。有一段时间连着好多星期，我扮的角色都是大步走进房间，微蹙着眉头，把手套和外衣胡乱扔在椅背上。我总是走向书柜，要再啜一口那神奇的特效药。因此，我让一组惊人的词藻飞向某个很不适宜的人——一个出嫁了的女孩，一个入了土的女孩；每一本书，每一个靠窗的座位，都塞满了一张张未完成的写给使我成为拜伦的那位女士的信。因为以别人的风格写完一封信是不容易的。我激动满怀地来到她家；交换了信物却没有娶她，毫无疑问是因为心急而时机并未成熟。

'Here again there should be music. Not that wild hunting-song, Percival's music; but a painful, guttural, visceral, also soaring, lark-like, pealing song to replace these flagging, foolish transcripts—how much too deliberate! how much too reasonable!—which attempt to describe the flying moment of first love. A purple slide is slipped over the day. Look at a room before she comes and after. Look at the innocents outside pursuing their way. They neither see nor hear; yet on they go. Moving oneself in this radiant yet gummy atmosphere how conscious one is of every movement—something adheres, something sticks to one's hands, taking up a newspaper even. Then there is the being eviscerated—drawn out, spun like a spider's web and twisted in agony round a thorn. Then a thunder-clap of complete indifference; the light blown out; then the return of measureless irresponsible joy; certain fields seem to glow green for ever, and innocent landscapes appear as if in the light of the first dawn—one patch of green, for example, up at Hampstead; and all faces are lit up, all conspire in a hush of tender joy; and then the mystic sense of completion and then that rasping, dog-fish skin-like roughness—those black arrows of shivering sensation, when she misses the post, when she does not come. Out rush a bristle of horned suspicions, horror, horror, horror—but what is the use of painfully elaborating these consecutive sentences when what one needs is nothing consecutive but a bark, a groan? And years later to see a middle-aged woman in a restaurant taking off her cloak.

“这儿又该有点音乐了。不要那种狂野的行猎歌声，那是珀西瓦尔的音乐；而是一种痛苦的，刺耳的，发自肺腑的，也是激昂的，云雀一般的响亮歌声，来代替这些萎靡而愚蠢的文本——多么深思熟虑！多么合情合理！——它们试图要描写初恋的飞扬时刻。白日里闪出一道紫色的光影。看看在她到来之前和到来之后一个房间的情况吧。看看外面那些正在赶路的蒙昧无知的人吧。他们既视而不见又听而不闻；只是一味地向前走。在这种光明却粘滞的气氛中自顾前进，你的一举一动要多么清醒啊——有些东西黏糊糊的，有些东西会粘住你的手，即使你拿起的是一份报纸。接着是对生命的解剖——如同一只蜘蛛，抽丝，结网，在痛苦中围着荆棘盘绕。接着是一声霹雳，整个变得漠然；灯火被吹灭了；随后恢复了那种无限轻松的喜悦；某些田野似乎正发出永恒的绿光，一幅幅自然的风景仿佛在沐浴第一缕晨光中——比如汉普斯蒂德的那畦绿地；一张张容光焕发的脸庞，在静默中酝酿温柔的喜悦；接着是那种全然的神秘感，还有随之而来的那种粗厉的、角鲨皮似的粗糙感——当她错失邮件或不肯赴约时，激动的心情犹如暗箭穿心。蓦然生出一阵令人如坐针毡的猜疑，惊恐，惊恐，惊恐——你所需要的只是一声咆哮或一声呻吟，而你煞费苦心地编造这些连贯的词句有什么用呢？多年之后只会看到一个中年妇女在一家餐馆里脱下她的斗篷。

'But to return. Let us again pretend that life is a solid substance, shaped like a globe, which we turn about in our fingers. Let us pretend that we can make out a plain and logical story, so that when one matter is despatched—love for instance—we go on, in an orderly manner, to the next. I was saying there was a willow tree. Its shower of falling branches, its creased and crooked bark had the effect of what remains outside our illusions yet cannot stay them, is changed by them for the moment, yet shows through stable, still, and with a sternness that our lives lack. Hence the comment it makes; the standard it supplies, and the reason why, as we flow and change, it seems to measure. Neville, for example, sat with me on the turf. But can anything be as clear as all that, I would say, following his gaze, through the branches, to a punt on the river, and a young man eating bananas from a paper bag? The scene was cut out with such intensity and so permeated with the quality of his vision that for a moment I could see it too; the punt, the bananas, the young man, through the branches of the willow tree. Then it faded.

“不过话说回来。让我们再次假设，生命是一种固状的东西，像个圆球，任由我们玩弄于指掌之间。让我们假设，我们能够编出一个平淡而合乎逻辑的故事，以至于当一桩事情——比如爱情——匆匆而过，我们还可继续，有条不紊地进入下一桩事情。我刚刚说到有一棵柳树。它纷披的枝条，它曲曲皱皱的树皮，造成的效果一直在我们的幻想之外，不但无法抑制而且暂时被它们所改变，尽管如此，那种效果还是显露出来，稳稳地，而且带着一种我们的生命所缺乏的坚定精神。由此，它作出评价；它提供标准，而且在我们流动、变化时，它似乎有理由为我们把握尺度。比如，内维尔和我一起坐在草地上。可是我要说，顺着他的目光，穿过树枝，望向河上的一条船，有个年轻人正从纸袋里拿出香蕉吃，一切能像那样明明白白？那个场景被集中刻画出来，充满了他想象的成分，所以一时之间仿佛我也能看得到；透过柳树的枝条，那边有条小船，有些香蕉，有个年轻人。随后一切都消失了。

'Rhoda came wandering vaguely. She would take advantage of any scholar in a blowing gown, or donkey rolling the turf with slippered feet to hide behind. What fear wavered and hid itself and blew to a flame in the depths of her grey, her startled, her dreaming eyes? Cruel and vindictive as we are, we are not bad to that extent. We have our fundamental goodness surely or to talk as I talk freely to someone I hardly know would be impossible—we should cease. The willow as she saw it grew on the verge of a grey desert where no bird sang. The leaves shrivelled as she looked at them, tossed in agony as she passed them. The trams and omnibuses roared hoarse in the street ran over rocks and sped foaming away. Perhaps one pillar, sunlit, stood in her desert by a pool where wild beasts come down stealthily to drink.

“罗达神思恍惚地溜了过来。她总会利用穿着蓬松长袍的学者或拖着脚碾过草地的驴子把自己隐藏起来。在她梦游似的、惊愕的、灰色的眼睛深处，有着怎样微微颤动、隐隐约约、欲成燎原之火的恐惧？虽然我们残酷无情、心存报复，我们也没有坏到那种程度啊。我们当然拥有我们基本的德行，或者说，我们不可能说起话来就像我跟某个素不相识的人说话时那样开诚布公——我们不会那么干的。她眼中的那棵柳树长在一片灰色的沙漠边缘，那里没有鸟儿的歌唱。她抬眼一瞧，树叶立刻变得萎缩了，她从旁边一经过，树叶立刻痛苦地摇晃起来。大街上，嘶哑着轰鸣而过的电车和公共汽车，越过山岩，喘着粗气飞驰而去。也许有一根廊柱，在阳光照耀下，矗立于她的沙漠中，旁边一个水潭，野兽们悄悄过来饮水。

'Then Jinny came. She flashed her fire over the tree. She was like a crinkled poppy, febrile, thirsty with the desire to drink dry dust. Darting, angular, not in the least impulsive, she came prepared. So little flames zigzag over the cracks in the dry earth. She made the willows dance, but not with illusion; for she saw nothing that was not there. It was a tree; there was the river; it was afternoon; here we were; I in my serge suit; she in green. There was no past, no future; merely the moment in its ring of light, and our bodies; and the inevitable climax, the ecstasy.

“这时吉尼来了。她的火光在树上一闪。她像一株皱缩的罂粟花，充满了狂热、渴望，欲饮干燥的尘土。气势汹汹，锋芒毕露，她有备而来，绝非一时冲动。所以小小的火苗蜿蜒地燃遍了干燥大地上的一道道裂缝。她使得柳树翩翩起舞，但并非出于幻觉；因为她看不见任何那儿不存在的东西。那是一棵树；那儿有条河；时间是午后；这儿有我们；我穿了一套哔叽呢；她穿了一身绿。没有过去，没有将来；只有光环里的片刻，我们的肉体；必然的高潮和狂喜。

'Louis, when he let himself down on the grass, cautiously spreading (I do not exaggerate) a mackintosh square, made one acknowledge his presence. It was formidable. I had the intelligence to salute his integrity; his research with bony fingers wrapped in rags because of chilblains for some diamond of indissoluble veracity. I buried boxes of burnt matches in holes in the turf at his feet. His grim and caustic tongue reproved my indolence. He fascinated me with his sordid imagination. His heroes wore bowler-hats and talked about selling pianos for tenners. Through his landscape the tram squealed; the factory poured its acrid fumes. He haunted mean streets and towns where women lay drunk, naked, on counterpanes on Christmas day. His words falling from a shot-tower hit the water and up it spurted. He found one word, one only for the moon. Then he got up and went; we all got up; we all went. But I, pausing, looked at the tree, and as I looked in autumn at the fiery and yellow branches, some sediment formed; I formed; a drop fell; I fell—that is, from some completed experience I had emerged.

“路易斯，当他要在草地上坐下来时，会小心翼翼地把一块雨衣布铺得方方正正（我毫不夸张），总要使人认可他的存在。这是令人敬畏的。我理解并钦佩他的诚实；钦佩他用因为冻疮而裹着破布的瘦骨嶙峋的手指对一颗货真价实的钻石所做的研究。我在他脚边的草地上挖洞埋下了一盒盒烧掉的火柴。他的冷酷而刻薄之舌对我的懒散横加指责。他可怜的想象力令我着迷。他的主人公戴着圆顶礼帽，谈论着几十英镑卖掉钢琴。他的景物中有电车呼啸而过；工厂排出呛人的烟尘。他出没于破败的街道和城镇，那里的女人们在圣诞节这天醉醺醺地，赤身裸体地躺在床单上。他的话语从发射塔上坠落，撞进水里，又迸射上来。他找到一个词，只用来修饰月亮的一个词。然后他站起来，走了；我们都站了起来；我们都走了。可是我，迟疑地望着那棵树，当我在秋天里望着那些如火的黄色枝条，一些沉淀凝聚了；我凝聚了；一滴水坠落了；我坠落了——也就是说，我从某种完整的体验中浮了上来。

'I rose and walked away—I, I, I; not Byron, Shelley, Dostoevsky, but I, Bernard. I even repeated my own name once or twice. I went, swinging my stick, into a shop, and bought—not that I love music—a picture of Beethoven in a silver frame. Not that I love music, but because the whole of life, its masters, its adventurers, then appeared in long ranks of magnificent human beings behind me; and I was the inheritor; I, the continuer; I, the person miraculously appointed to carry it on. So, swinging my stick, with my eyes filmed, not with pride, but with humility rather, I walked down the street. The first whirr of wings had gone up, the carol, the exclamation; and now one enters; one goes into the house, the dry, uncompromising, inhabited house, the place with all its traditions, its objects, its accumulations of rubbish, and treasures displayed upon tables. I visited the family tailor, who remembered my uncle. People turned up in great quantities, not cut out, like the first faces (Neville, Louis, Jinny, Susan, Rhoda), but confused, featureless, or changed their features so fast that they seemed to have none. And blushing yet scornful, in the oddest condition of raw rapture and scepticism, I took the blow; the mixed sensations; the complex and disturbing and utterly unprepared for impacts of life all over, in all places, at the same time. How upsetting! How humiliating never to be sure what to say next, and those painful silences, glaring as dry deserts, with every pebble apparent; and then to say what one ought not to have said, and then to be conscious of a ramrod of incorruptible sincerity which one would willingly exchange for a shower of smooth pence, but could not, there at that party, where Jinny sat quite at her ease, rayed out on a gilt chair.

“我站起身来，走开了——我，我，我；不是拜伦、雪莱、陀思妥也夫斯基，而是我，伯纳德。我甚至把我自己的名字重复一两遍。我拄着拐杖走进一家商店，买了——并非出于我对音乐的热爱——一幅镶在银色镜框中的贝多芬像。并非出于我对音乐的热爱，而是因为生命的整体，它的掌控者们，它的探索者们，当时出现在我的身后，出现在长长的杰出人类的队列之中；我是他们的继承人；我是他们的传承人；我是那个奇迹般地被委以重任而继往开来的人。就这样，我拄着拐杖，眼睛模糊地走在大街上，心中充满的不是自豪，而是谦卑。响起了最初翅膀扇动的呼呼声，那颂歌，那惊叫；此刻，你走了进来；你走进这幢房子，这幢住了人却冷冰冰、无情的房子，这个桌上陈列着各种传统、各种物品、成堆的废物和珍宝的地方。我拜访了那位家庭裁缝，他对我的叔父念念不忘。人们大量涌现，不像原先那些面孔（内维尔、路易斯、吉尼、苏珊、罗达）那么清晰可辨，而是混混沌沌，看不清面目，或者说他们的面目如此多变，以至于看上去跟没有一样。含着羞却带着鄙夷，在不加掩饰的又惊又喜的极为古怪的心情中，我接受了这突然的一击；这交织的情感；这复杂、恼人、一时间从四面八方不期而来的人生冲击。多么令人心烦意乱！令人羞愧难当的是：在那次晚宴上，吉尼悠闲地坐在镀金椅子上，光彩熠熠，而你老是不确定接下来说什么，那些痛苦的沉默时刻，闪着光，好像冷冷的沙漠，每一颗卵石都历历在目；接着就要说出本不该说的话，然后意识到自己的诚挚犹如一支不容腐朽的枪管，但愿换成洒落的一把光滑的便士，却做不到。

'Then says some lady with an impressive gesture, "Come with me." She leads one into a private alcove and admits one to the honour of her intimacy. Surnames change to Christian names; Christian names to nicknames. What is to be done about India, Ireland or Morocco? Old gentlemen answer the question standing decorated under chandeliers. One finds oneself surprisingly supplied with information. Outside the undifferentiated forces roar; inside we are very private, very explicit, have a sense indeed, that it is here, in this little room, that we make whatever day of the week it may be. Friday or Saturday. A shell forms upon the soft soul, nacreous, shiny, upon which sensations tap their beaks in vain. On me it formed earlier than on most. Soon I could carve my pear when other people had done dessert. I could bring my sentence to a close in a hush of complete silence. It is at that season too that perfection has a lure. One can learn Spanish, one thinks, by tying a string to the right toe and waking early. One fills up the little compartments of one's engagement book with dinner at eight; luncheon at one-thirty. One has shirts, socks, ties laid out on one's bed.

“这时有位女士做了一个令人难忘的手势，说：‘跟我来。’她把你领进一间私密的凹室，让你有幸与她亲密。称呼由姓氏改为教名；又由教名改为昵称。该如何应对印度、爱尔兰或摩洛哥呢？老先生们一身盛装站在枝形吊灯下面解答着这类问题。你发觉自己出人意料地被灌输了各种知识。屋外，种种难以分辨的势力在喧嚣；屋里，我们很亲昵，很率直，实实在在有一种感觉，在这儿，在这间小小的屋子里，我们把这一天当作一星期中的哪一天都行。管它星期五还是星期六。柔软的心灵上面结了一层壳，像珍珠似的，闪着光泽，情感的利喙徒劳地轻轻叩着它的表面。它在我心上形成得比多数人要早。不久我就能在别人吃完甜点时切梨了。我就可以在一阵完全的沉默中结束我的话语了。也正是在那一时期，完美有了一种诱惑力。你觉得，通过右脚趾上系根绳的方式并早早醒来，你就可以学会西班牙语。你在记事簿的小空格里填上：晚餐八点；午餐一点半。你把衬衫、袜子、领带摊放在床上。

'But it is a mistake, this extreme precision, this orderly and military progress; a convenience, a lie. There is always deep below it, even when we arrive punctually at the appointed time with our white waistcoats and polite formalities, a rushing stream of broken dreams, nursery rhymes, street cries, half-finished sentences and sights—elm trees, willow trees, gardeners sweeping, women writing—that rise and sink even as we hand a lady down to dinner. While one straightens the fork so precisely on the table-cloth, a thousand faces mop and mow. There is nothing one can fish up in a spoon; nothing one can call an event. Yet it is alive too and deep, this stream. Immersed in it I would stop between one mouthful and the next, and look intently at a vase, perhaps with one red flower, while a reason struck me, a sudden revelation. Or I would say, walking along the Strand, "That's the phrase I want", as some beautiful, fabulous phantom bird, fish or cloud with fiery edges swam up to enclose once and for all some notion haunting me, after which on I trotted taking stock with renewed delight of ties and things in shop-windows.

“但是这种一丝不苟，这种秩序井然的军事化行进，是一个错误；一个快捷方式，一个谎言。即使当我们穿着白色的马甲，彬彬有礼地在约定的时间如期到达，这种行为的下面总是深藏着一股急流，裹挟着破碎的梦，育婴室的小调，街头的叫喊声，残缺不全的话语，还有各种景致——榆树，柳树，清扫的园丁，写字的女人——甚至在我们搀扶一位女士赴宴时也在起起伏伏。你那么一丝不苟地把餐叉摆在桌布上，而同时有一千张面孔在做着鬼脸。没有什么你能一勺捞起来；没有什么你能称其为一件大事。可它也是活生生的，这条深藏的溪流。沉浸其中，我会停在一口气与下一口气之间，专心地瞅着一只花瓶，或许里面插了一枝红花，这时一个缘由会突然降临，给我一个顿悟。或者走在斯特兰德大街上，我会说：‘那就是我想要的一个词’，因为一只漂亮的传说中的神鸟，一条鱼，或者一朵镶着红边的云漂移过来，彻底隔开了某个一直困扰我的念头，此后我就会快步前行，以全新的兴致清点着商店橱窗里的领带和各种东西。

'The crystal, the globe of life as one calls it, far from being hard and cold to the touch, has walls of thinnest air. If I press them all will burst. Whatever sentence I extract whole and entire from this cauldron is only a string of six little fish that let themselves be caught while a million others leap and sizzle, making the cauldron bubble like boiling silver, and slip through my fingers. Faces recur, faces and faces—they press their beauty to the walls of my bubble—Neville, Susan, Louis, Jinny, Rhoda and a thousand others. How impossible to order them rightly; to detach one separately, or to give the effect of the whole—again like music. What a symphony with its concord and its discord, and its tunes on top and its complicated bass beneath, then grew up! Each played his own tune, fiddle, flute, trumpet, drum or whatever the instrument might be. With Neville, "Let's discuss Hamlet." With Louis, science. With Jinny, love. Then suddenly, in a moment of exasperation, off to Cumberland with a quiet man for a whole week in an inn, with the rain running down the window-panes and nothing but mutton and mutton and again mutton for dinner. Yet that week remains a solid stone in the welter of unrecorded sensation. It was then we played dominoes; then we quarrelled about tough mutton. Then we walked on the fell. And a little girl, peeping round the door, gave me that letter, written on blue paper, in which I learnt that the girl who had made me Byron was to marry a squire. A man in gaiters, a man with a whip, a man who made speeches about fat oxen at dinner—I exclaimed derisively and looked at the racing clouds, and felt my own failure; my desire to be free; to escape; to be bound; to make an end; to continue; to be Louis; to be myself; and walked out in my mackintosh alone, and felt grumpy under the eternal hills and not in the least sublime; and came home and blamed the meat and packed and so back again to the welter; to the torture.

“那晶体，你称之为生命的球体，远非摸上去那么坚硬、冰冷，它围裹着一层层极为稀薄的空气。如果我挤压它们，整个会爆裂。无论我从这口大锅里完完整整地提炼出什么样的词句，只是一串包括了六条自愿被逮的小鱼而已，其他上百万条鱼跳跃不止，咝咝有声，使得大锅汩汩地冒泡，像沸腾的银色水花，然后它们从我的指缝间溜走了。面孔反复出现，面孔，还是面孔——把他们的美印在我这个气泡壁上——内维尔、苏珊、路易斯、吉尼、罗达，还有其他上千的人。简直不可能恰到好处地排列他们；单独把哪一个分离出来，或发挥那种整体效果——又像是在说音乐了。多么宏伟的一首交响乐，和谐与嘈杂，高亢的旋律与复杂的低音，这时激昂响起！每人演奏各自的曲调：小提琴、笛子、小号、鼓，或无论什么可能奏响的乐器。内维尔演奏的是‘让我们讨论哈姆雷特’。路易斯演奏的是‘科学’。吉尼演奏的是‘爱情’。然后，突然，一阵恼怒之下，转到了坎伯兰郡，和一个安静的男子在一家小客栈整整一个星期，雨水从窗玻璃上流下来，晚餐只有羊肉，羊肉，还是羊肉。可那个星期一直是未有记录的激情漩涡中一块不可磨灭的砥石。就在那时我们玩了多米诺骨牌；那时我们为咬不动的羊肉而争吵。那时我们漫步在山岗上。后来，一个小女孩偷偷向门里张望，她把那封写在蓝色纸上的信交给我，从这封信里我了解到，那个曾使我成为拜伦的女孩就要嫁给一位乡绅。一个穿长统橡胶靴子的男人，一个挥动鞭子的男人，一个在吃饭时大谈肥牛的男人——我嘲弄地一声惊叹，望向疾驰而过的云，感觉到我自身的失败；我渴望自由；渴望逃离；渴望受到约束；渴望做个了断；渴望继续前行；渴望成为路易斯；渴望成为我自己；我披着雨衣独自走在外面，在永恒的群山之下，我只觉得怨气丛生，毫无升华之感；我回了家，责怪嚼不烂的肉，打好行装，于是又回到漩涡之中；回到苦闷之中。

'Nevertheless, life is pleasant, life is tolerable. Tuesday follows Monday; then comes Wednesday. The mind grows rings; the identity becomes robust; pain is absorbed in growth. Opening and shutting, shutting and opening, with increasing hum and sturdiness, the haste and fever of youth are drawn into service until the whole being seems to expand in and out like the mainspring of a clock. How fast the stream flows from January to December! We are swept on by the torrent of things grown so familiar that they cast no shadow. We float, we float...

“尽管如此，生活是令人愉快的，生活是可忍受的。星期二紧跟着星期一；随后就到了星期三。思维一圈一圈地扩展；个性变得强健；痛苦融入成长之中。开开合合，合合开开，越来越强壮，嗡嗡声越来越大，青春的鲁莽和狂热被加以吸收利用，从而整个生命似乎都在反反复复地扩张，好像钟表的主发条似的。从1月到12月，时间之流多么迅速！我们被种种事情的奔流裹挟向前，这些事情变得如此司空见惯，全然不露行迹。我们漂啊，我们漂啊……

'However, since one must leap (to tell you this story), I leap, here, at this point, and alight now upon some perfectly commonplace object—say the poker and tongs, as I saw them sometime later, after that lady who had made me Byron had married, under the light of one whom I will call the third Miss Jones. She is the girl who wears a certain dress expecting one at dinner, who picks a certain rose, who makes one feel "Steady, steady, this is a matter of some importance", as one shaves. Then one asks, "How does she behave to children?" One observes that she is a little clumsy with her umbrella; but minded when the mole was caught in the trap; and finally, would not make the loaf at breakfast (I was thinking of the interminable breakfasts of married life as I shaved) altogether prosaic—it would not surprise one sitting opposite this girl to see a dragon-fly perched on the loaf at breakfast. Also she inspired me with a desire to rise in the world; also she made me look with curiosity at the hitherto repulsive faces of new-born babies. And the little fierce beat—tick-tack, tick-tack—of the pulse of one's mind took on a more majestic rhythm. I roamed down Oxford Street. We are the continuers, we are the inheritors, I said, thinking of my sons and daughters; and if the feeling is so grandiose as to be absurd and one conceals it by jumping on to a bus or buying the evening paper, it is still a curious element in the ardour with which one laces up one's boots, with which one now addresses old friends committed to different careers. Louis, the attic dweller; Rhoda, the nymph of the fountain always wet; both contradicted what was then so positive to me; both gave the other side of what seemed to me so evident (that we marry, that we domesticate); for which I loved them, pitied them, and also deeply envied them their different lot.

“不过，既然总得跳跃（为了给你讲好这个故事），那么在这儿，在这个时候，我就跳跃一下，马上落到某个完全习以为常的东西上——比如说拨火棍和火钳子什么的，因为后来有一次，就在那位使我成为拜伦的女士出嫁之后，在那个我想称其为第三号琼斯小姐的人的光辉映照下，我曾见过这些东西。她是这样一位女孩——总是在邀你吃饭时穿一套特定的礼服，总是挑选一支特定的玫瑰，总会在你刮胡子的时候让你犯寻思：‘稳当一点，稳当一点，这可是一桩非同小可之事。’这时你会问：‘她对孩子们会有怎样的表现呢？’你会注意到，她打雨伞有点笨手笨脚；但是当那只鼹鼠被套住的时候，她却很上心；而且最后一点，她不会把早餐（我一边刮胡子一边在想婚后生活中那没完没了的早餐）的面包弄得毫无新意——你坐在这位女孩的对面，看见一只蜻蜓落在早餐的面包上，你并不会感到吃惊。而且她激发了我飞黄腾达的渴望；她还让我开始充满好奇地看待至今为止觉得丑陋的新生婴儿的脸。你脑海中那种轻微而有力的敲打——嘀嗒，嘀嗒——的波动形成了更加庄重的韵律。我漫步在牛津大街。我们是传承人，我们是继承人，我一边说着一边想到我的子女们；即使这种情绪浮夸到荒唐的程度，而你只好借着跳上一辆公共汽车或买一份晚报来加以掩饰，它仍然是人欲当中的一种神奇的成分，有了它，你总是系紧你的靴带，有了它，此刻你与执着于不同事业的老朋友们侃侃而谈。路易斯，这位阁楼上的住客；罗达，这位总是湿淋淋的泉水女神；两人都与当时我那么确信无疑的理念相抵触；两人都表现出对我来说似乎那么理所当然的行为（我们结婚，我们安于家庭生活）的另一面；为此我爱他们，怜悯他们，同时又深深地羡慕他们那不同的命运。

'Once I had a biographer, dead long since, but if he still followed my footsteps with his old flattering intensity he would here say, "About this time Bernard married and bought a house... His friends observed in him a growing tendency to domesticity... The birth of children made it highly desirable that he should augment his income." That is the biographic style, and it does to tack together torn bits of stuff, stuff with raw edges. After all, one cannot find fault with the biographic style if one begins letters "Dear Sir", ends them "your faithfully"; one cannot despise these phrases laid like Roman roads across the tumult of our lives, since they compel us to walk in step like civilized people with the slow and measured tread of policemen though one may be humming any nonsense under one's breath at the same time—"Hark, hark, the dogs do bark", "Come away, come away, death", "Let me not to the marriage of true minds", and so on. "He attained some success in his profession... He inherited a small sum of money from an uncle"—that is how the biographer continues, and if one wears trousers and hitches them up with braces, one has to say that, though it is tempting now and then to go blackberrying; tempting to play ducks and drakes with all these phrases. But one has to say that.

“曾经有一位为我写传记的作家，如今早已死掉了，可是如果他仍然以他早年那种谄媚至极的笔锋追寻着我的足迹，在这儿他就会写道，‘大约在这一时期，伯纳德结了婚，买了一幢房子......他的朋友们注意到他越来越倾心于家庭生活......孩子们的出生使他迫切需要增加自己的收入。’这就是传记的手法，它总能把支离破碎、点点滴滴的素材，那些未经加工、有棱有角的素材，拼凑到一起。毕竟，如果你写信总是以‘亲爱的先生’开头，以‘您诚挚的某某’结尾，那么你就无法挑出这种传记文体的毛病；你无法轻视这些贯穿于我们纷乱生活中的好像罗马大道似的词语，因为正是它们迫使我们像文明人一样走路，与那些慢慢吞吞、规规矩矩的警察们步调一致，尽管你也许同时压低嗓子嘟囔些废话——‘听啊，听啊，狗真的叫啦’，‘滚开，滚开，死神’，‘别让我相信有真心实意的婚姻吧’，等等。‘他在事业上取得了一些成就......他从一个叔父那里继承了数额不大的一笔钱’——那位传记作家就是这么写下去的，而如果你穿着长裤，吊着背带，你也得说道说道，尽管偶尔去采黑莓更有意思；用这些词语打水漂玩也很有意思。但是你总得说道说道。

'I became, I mean, a certain kind of man, scoring my path across life as one treads a path across the fields. My boots became worn a little on the left side. When I came in, certain re-arrangements took place. "Here's Bernard!" How differently different people say that! There are many rooms—many Bernards. There was the charming, but weak; the strong, but supercilious; the brilliant, but remorseless; the very good fellow, but, I make no doubt, the awful bore; the sympathetic, but cold; the shabby, but—go into the next room—the foppish, worldly, and too well dressed. What I was to myself was different; was none of these. I am inclined to pin myself down most firmly there before the loaf at breakfast with my wife, who being now entirely my wife and not at all the girl who wore when she hoped to meet me a certain rose, gave me that feeling of existing in the midst of unconsciousness such as the tree-frog must have couched on the right shade of green leaf. "Pass"... I would say.

“我是说，我成了一种特定类型的人，正在镂刻我的人生之路，就像你在田地之间踩出一条路一样。我左脚的靴子有点破了。我进来时，发生了某些变化。‘伯纳德来了！’不同的人说出这句话时有多么大的不同啊！有很多个房间——很多个伯纳德。有的迷人却虚弱；有的强壮却傲慢；有的才华横溢却冷酷无情；有时是那个很善良的人，却，我毫不怀疑，十分乏味；有的心怀同情却面若冰霜；有时衣衫褴褛，却——走进下一个房间——变得浮华、世故且衣冠楚楚。就我自己看来，我又是另外一幅样子；与前面这些完全不同。我很可能把自己牢牢地钉在那儿，面对着早餐的面包和我的太太，她现在已经完全是我的太太，根本不再是希望约见我时就戴上一朵特定的玫瑰的那个女孩了，她给我造成了那种生活在无意识之中的感觉，这种感觉就像树蛙肯定会蜷伏在绿叶的惬意阴凉里一样。‘递一下’……我会说。

"Milk"... she might answer, or "Mary's coming"...

‘牛奶’……她可能回应一声，或者说，‘玛丽要来了……’

—simple words for those who have inherited the spoils of all the ages but not as said then, day after day, in the full tide of life, when one feels complete, entire, at breakfast. Muscles, nerves, intestines, blood-vessels, all that makes the coil and spring of our being, the unconscious hum of the engine, as well as the dart and flicker of the tongue, functioned superbly. Opening, shutting; shutting, opening; eating, drinking; sometimes speaking—the whole mechanism seemed to expand, to contract, like the mainspring of a clock. Toast and butter, coffee and bacon. The Times and letters—suddenly the telephone rang with urgency and I rose deliberately and went to the telephone. I took up the black mouth. I marked the ease with which my mind adjusted itself to assimilate the message—it might be (one has these fancies) to assume command of the British Empire; I observed my composure; I remarked with what magnificent vitality the atoms of my attention dispersed, swarmed round the interruption, assimilated the message, adapted themselves to a new state of affairs and had created, by the time I put back the receiver, a richer, stronger, a more complicated world in which I was called upon to act my part and had no doubt whatever that I could do it. Clapping my hat on my head, I strode into a world inhabited by vast numbers of men who had also clapped their hats on their heads, and as we jostled and encountered in trains and tubes we exchanged the knowing wink of competitors and comrades braced with a thousand snares and dodges to achieve the same end—to earn our livings.

——对于那些继承了各个时代的战利品的人来说，这些都是简单不过的词，但当时并不是这么说的，因为你正日复一日地投入到生活的大潮中，你在早餐时只感觉到完美和满足。肌肉、神经、肠道、血管，这些都是我们赖以生存的线圈和弹簧，它们造成了这架机器在无意识中嗡嗡作响，也让舌头或信口开河或闪烁其词，完美地运行。开开合合；合合开开；吃吃喝喝；有时还要夸夸其谈——整个机体似乎一直不停地扩张、收缩，像钟表的主发条似的。面包与黄油，咖啡与熏肉。《泰晤士报》与各种信件——突然，电话铃急促响起，我不慌不忙地站了起来，去接电话。我拿起黑黑的话筒。我注意到我的头脑从容不迫地做着调整，以便接收传来的信息——也许是（你总会有这样的幻想）要承担起大英帝国的领导权吧；我谨守我的沉着冷静；我觉察到我那注意力的原子正以莫大的活力分散开去，围拢过来，吸收信息，自动调整以适应新的事态，而当我放回听筒的时候，它们已经创造出了更为丰富、更为强大、更为复杂的一个世界，在这个世界里，我被召唤来承担起我的角色，且毫无疑问我都能一一胜任。我把帽子扣在头上，大步走进了一个芸芸众生的世界，他们的头上也同样扣着帽子，当我们摩肩接踵、相遇在火车和地铁中时，我们互相心照不宣地眨着眼睛，因为我们既是竞争对手，也是合作伙伴，为了达成同一目的——谋生——而被千番阴谋诡计牢牢地拴在一起。

'Life is pleasant. Life is good. The mere process of life is satisfactory. Take the ordinary man in good health. He likes eating and sleeping. He likes the snuff of fresh air and walking at a brisk pace down the Strand. Or in the country there's a cock crowing on a gate; there's a foal galloping round a field. Something always has to be done next. Tuesday follows Monday; Wednesday Tuesday. Each spreads the same ripple of wellbeing, repeats the same curve of rhythm; covers fresh sand with a chill or ebbs a little slackly without. So the being grows rings; identity becomes robust. What was fiery and furtive like a fling of grain cast into the air and blown hither and thither by wild gusts of life from every quarter is now methodical and orderly and flung with a purpose—so it seems.

“生活是令人愉快的。生活是美好的。单是生命的过程就是令人满意的。就拿一个健康的普通人来说吧。他喜欢吃饭、睡觉。他喜欢吸点新鲜空气，喜欢沿着斯特兰德大街轻松漫步。或者在乡村，一只雄鸡在大门上鸣叫；一匹小马驹在田野里撒欢奔跑。接下来总有事情要做。星期二紧跟着星期一；星期三跟着星期二。每一天都荡漾着不变的幸福的涟漪，重复着同一韵律的曲线；铺上新沙，带来一阵寒意，或稍稍隐退，慵懒而不觉寒冷。就这样，生命一圈一圈增长；个性一点一点变得强健。那曾经热烈而神秘的生命，像一把种子撒向空中，被来自四面八方的生活的狂风吹得东飘西荡，现在变得有条有理，秩序井然，目的明确——至少看似如此。

'Lord, how pleasant! Lord, how good! How tolerable is the life of little shopkeepers, I would say, as the train drew through the suburbs and one saw lights in bedroom windows. Active, energetic as a swarm of ants, I said, as I stood at the window and watched workers, bag in hand, stream into town. What hardness, what energy and violence of limb, I thought, seeing men in white drawers' scouring after a football on a patch of snow in January. Now being grumpy about some small matter—it might be the meat—it seemed luxurious to disturb with a little ripple the enormous stability, whose quiver, for our child was about to be born, increased its joy, of our married life. I snapped at dinner. I spoke unreasonably as if, being a millionaire, I could throw away five shillings; or, being a perfect steeple-jack, stumbled over a footstool on purpose. Going up to bed we settled our quarrel on the stairs, and standing by the window looking at a sky clear like the inside of a blue stone, "Heaven be praised," I said, "we need not whip this prose into poetry. The little language is enough." For the space of the prospect and its clarity seemed to offer no impediment whatsoever, but to allow our lives to spread out and out beyond all bristling of roofs and chimneys to the flawless verge.

“天啊，多么愉快！天啊，多么美好！小店主们的生活很不错啊，当火车驶过郊区，你看着卧室窗口透出的灯火，我会这样说。勤劳而有活力，像一群蚂蚁，当我站在窗前，望着工人们手提行李涌向城里，我这样说。多么坚实、有力而灵活的肢体啊，看着那些穿白色短裤的人们在一月的冰雪地上追逐一只足球，我这样想。我现在常常会在某件小事情——也许是那块肉——上大发脾气，用一点微小的波澜惊扰一下那巨大的平静，似乎成了奢侈的享受，它的颤动，因为我们的孩子即将出生，增添了我们婚后生活的乐趣。吃饭时我声色俱厉。说话语无伦次，仿佛作为一个百万富翁我可以随手扔掉五先令；或者作为一个高空作业修建工，我故意绊倒在一只脚凳上。要上床了，我们在楼梯上结束了争吵，站在窗边，望着晴朗的夜空，仿佛是一颗蓝宝石的内部。‘感谢老天，’我说，‘我们无需把这篇散文匆匆凑成诗歌。朴实的语言足矣。’因为我们未来的时空清清楚楚，一览无余，似乎毫无障碍，使我们的生活可以超越所有那些林立的屋顶和烟囱，向外延伸，延伸，伸向完美无瑕的天边。

'Into this crashed death—Percival's. "Which is happiness?"

“直到深入这场意外——珀西瓦尔之死。‘哪一边是幸福?'

I said (our child had been born), "which pian?" referring to the two sides of my body, as I came downstairs, making a purely physical statement. Also I made note of the state of the house; the curtain blowing; the cook singing; the wardrobe showing through the half-opened door. I said, "Give him (myself) another moment's respite" as I went downstairs. "Now in this drawing-room he is going to suffer. There is no escape.” But for pain words are lacking. There should be cries, cracks, fissures, whiteness passing over chintz covers, interference with the sense of time, of space; the sense also of extreme fixity in passing objects; and sounds very remote and then very close; flesh being gashed and blood spurting, a joint suddenly twisted—beneath all of which appears something very important, yet remote, to be just held in solitude. So I went out. I saw the first morning he would never see—the sparrows were like toys dangled from a string by a child. To see things without attachment, from the outside, and to realize their beauty in itself—how strange! And then the sense that a burden has been removed; pretence and make-believe and unreality are gone, and lightness has come with a kind of transparency, making oneself invisible and things seen through as one walks—how strange. "And now what other discovery will there be?" I said, and in order to hold it tight ignored newspaper placards and went and looked at pictures. Madonnas and pillars, arches and orange trees, still as on the first day of creation, but acquainted with grief, there they hung, and I gazed at them. "Here," I said, "we are together without interruption." This freedom, this immunity, seemed then a conquest, and stirred in me such exaltation that I sometimes go there, even now, to bring back exaltation and Percival. But it did not last. What torments one is the horrible activity of the mind's eye—how he fell, how he looked, where they carried him; men in loin-cloths, pulling ropes; the bandages and the mud. Then comes the terrible pounce of memory, not to be foretold, not to be warded off—that I did not go with him to Hampton Court. That claw scratched; that fang tore; I did not go. In spite of his impatiently protesting that it did not matter; why interrupt, why spoil our moment of uninterrupted community?—Still, I repeated sullenly, I did not go, and so, driven out of the sanctuary by these officious devils, went to Jinny because she had a room; a room with little tables, with little ornaments scattered on little tables. There I confessed, with tears—I had not gone to Hampton Court. And she, remembering other things, to me trifles but torturing to her, showed me how life withers when there are things we cannot share. Soon, too, a maid came in with a note, and as she turned to answer it and I felt my own curiosity to know what she was writing and to whom, I saw the first leaf fall on his grave. I saw us push beyond this moment, and leave it behind us for ever. And then sitting side by side on the sofa we remembered inevitably what had been said by others; "the lily of the day is fairer far in May"; we compared Percival to a lily—Percival whom I wanted to lose his hair, to shock the authorities, to grow old with me; he was already covered with lilies.

我说（我们的孩子已经出生），‘哪一边是痛苦？’我一边下楼，一边指着身体两侧，试图做出一个纯粹生理上的判断。同时我注意到屋子的状况；窗帘鼓了起来；厨子在唱歌；透过半开的门，衣柜隐约可见。‘再给他（我自己）一刻喘息的时间吧。’我一边下楼一边说。‘此刻，在这间客厅，他要受罪了。无可逃避。’但是针对痛苦，言语显得多么贫乏。也许会有呼喊，裂缝，裂纹，印花棉布床单上透出苍白，时空感觉的错乱；同时感觉到移动物体的极端稳定性；各种声响时而非常遥远，时而非常接近；肉体被划破，鲜血迸射，一个关节突然扭曲——从所有这一切的下面浮现出某种非常有意义的东西，不过还很遥远，尚需在静默中体会。所以我走出家门。我看见了他永远看不到的清晨——那些麻雀像是孩子用一根绳拴起来的玩具。超然地从局外来看种种事情，来认识它们的本质之美——多么奇怪啊！随之而来是那种如释重负的感觉；虚情假意、装腔作势和天马行空统统不见了，代之以澄澈透明的轻盈，仿佛你一边走一边隐没了身形，而把一切都看得清清楚楚——多么奇怪。‘那么此刻，还会有什么其他的发现呢？’说着，为了牢牢抓住这种感觉，我并不理会那些阅报栏，而是上前去看那些图画。圣母像和廊柱，拱门和橘子树，一如创世首日时的宁静，不过它们已经洞悉了人世的悲伤，它们悬挂在那儿，而我凝神望着它们。‘嘿，’我说，‘我们在一起，没有任何干扰。’这样的自由自在，这样的无所挂碍，在当时似乎就是一场胜利，它在我心中激起了莫大的喜悦，以至于甚至到现在有时候我也会去那儿，回忆珀西瓦尔，回忆那曾经的喜悦。但是这种感觉并不持久。折磨你的是心灵之眼中那些可怕的情景——他如何摔下来，他摔成什么样子，他们把他抬到哪儿；人们系着腰布，拽着绳子；一层层绷带和泥浆。随后突袭而来的是那个让我无法释怀的回忆，预料不到，也躲避不开——那就是，我没有跟他一起去汉普顿宫。那只利爪抓挠着；那颗利齿撕扯着；我没去啊。尽管他不耐烦地抗议说，没关系的；为何要中止，为何要破坏我俩之间连续的团聚时刻呢？——尽管如此，我总是郁闷地想，我没去啊，于是，我被这些好事的魔鬼赶出了圣殿，去了吉尼那儿，因为她有一个房间；她的房间里有些小桌子，小桌子上散放着一些小饰物。在那儿，我含着眼泪忏悔——我没去汉普顿宫。而她想起了别的事情，那些事情在我看来都是鸡毛蒜皮的琐事，而她却备受折磨，这让我明白了，当有许多东西我们无法共同分享时，生命在凋萎。不久，一个侍女也进了房间，拿了一张便条，当她转身回复，而我满怀好奇地想知道她写了什么以及写给谁时，我看见第一片叶子落在他的坟上。我看见我们急匆匆跨过这一刻，把它永远地抛在了身后。然后我们并肩坐在沙发上，难免回想起别人说过的话；‘如今的百合花在五月开得愈发动人’；我们把珀西瓦尔比作一株百合花——珀西瓦尔啊，我多么希望他冲冠一怒，权势为之动摇，与我终老此生啊；可他已经埋没于百合花丛中了。

'So the sincerity of the moment passed; so it became symbolical; and that I could not stand. Let us commit any blasphemy of laughter and criticism rather than exude this lily-sweet glue; and cover him with phrases, I cried. Therefore I broke off, and Jinny, who was without future, or speculation, but respected the moment with complete integrity, gave her body a flick with the whip, powdered her face (for which I loved her), and waved to me as she stood on the doorstep, pressing her hand to her hair so that the wind might not disorder it, a gesture for which I honoured her, as if it confirmed our determination—not to let lilies grow.

“这么说，那真挚的时刻逝去了；这么说，它变得具有象征意义了；这样我可无法忍受。让我们发出亵渎神明的笑声和批评吧，不要流出这种百合花香似的泪水；或用各种词藻加在他身上，我大声嚷嚷着。因此我突然沉默下来，而吉尼，她既无将来的概念，也无任何思索，只是全心全意地看重眼前时刻，用鞭子在她身上轻轻一抽，在她脸上扑了点粉（我就爱她这一点），站在门阶上冲我挥手，另一只手拢着头发，免得它被风吹乱，这个动作让我对她顿生敬重之意，仿佛它是在明示我们的决心——不要让那些百合花疯长。

'I observed with disillusioned clarity the despicable nonentity of the street; its porches; its window curtains; the drab clothes, the cupidity and complacency of shopping women; and old men taking the air in comforters; the caution of people crossing; the universal determination to go on living, when really, fools and gulls that you are, I said, any slate may fly from a roof, any car may swerve, for there is neither rhyme nor reason when a drunk man staggers about with a club in his hand—that is all. I was like one admitted behind the scenes: like one shown how the effects are produced. I returned, however, to my own snug home and was warned by the parlourmaid to creep upstairs in my stockings. The child was asleep. I went to my room.

“我用梦幻破灭后的清澈目光观察着大街上那些卑劣的无足轻重的事物；那些门廊；那些窗帘；那些逛街女人们色泽单调的衣服，她们的贪得无厌和自鸣得意；那些裹着羊毛围巾来到户外散步的老人；那些小心翼翼的过路行人；每个人都怀着继续活下去的决心，而实际上，你们这些傻子和呆鸟，我说，每一块瓦片都可能从屋顶飞落下来，每一辆车都可能突然转向，因为当一个醉汉手持棍棒晃来晃去的时候，是既无规律也无理性的——就是这样。我好像被人引到了幕后：看清了舞台上的效果是如何策划出来的。不管怎样，我回到自己舒适的家中，客厅女侍叮嘱我要穿着袜子轻轻上楼。孩子睡了。我来到自己的房间。

'Was there no sword, nothing with which to batter down these walls, this protection, this begetting of children and living behind curtains, and becoming daily more involved and committed, with books and pictures? Better burn one's life out like Louis, desiring perfection; or like Rhoda leave us, flying past us to the desert; or choose one out of millions and one only like Neville; better be like Susan and love and hate the heat of the sun or the frost-bitten grass; or be like Jinny, honest, an animal. All had their rapture; their common feeling with death; something that stood them in stead. Thus I visited each of my friends in turn, trying, with fumbling fingers, to prise open their locked caskets. I went from one to the other holding my sorrow—no, not my sorrow but the incomprehensible nature of this our life—for their inspection. Some people go to priests; others to poetry; I to my friends, I to my own heart, I to seek among phrases and fragments something unbroken—I to whom there is not beauty enough in moon or tree; to whom the touch of one person with another is all, yet who cannot grasp even that, who am so imperfect, so weak, so unspeakably lonely. There I sat.

“难道没有一把剑，或别的什么东西，用来捣毁这四面的墙，这防护之所，这种生儿育女、帘帏背后的生活，日复一日地忙碌、沉湎于书籍和画册中？不如像路易斯那样，在追求完美中耗尽生命；或像罗达那样撇开我们，从我们身旁掠过，飞向沙漠；或者百万之中选一，只做像内维尔那样的人；不如像苏珊那样，有爱，有恨，管它烈日炎炎，还是冰霜衰草；或像吉尼那样，实实在在，像只小动物似的。每人都有各自的狂喜；他们对死亡抱有同感；他们的前方矗立着有益的东西。因此我一一拜访了我的每一位朋友，用我抖抖索索的手指试图撬开他们上了锁的宝盒。我依次来到他们跟前，手捧着我的哀伤——不，并非我的哀伤，而是我们此番生活中令人费解的本质——供他们来检视。有些人求助于牧师；另有人求助于诗歌；我求助于我的朋友们，求助于我的内心，在残章断片之间寻求某种完整的东西——在我看来，月亮或一棵树并不具有充分的美；在我看来，一个人与另一个人的联系即是一切，可是我即使这一点也把握不住，我是那么不完美，那么软弱无力，那么无可形容地孤独。我坐了下来。

'Should this be the end of the story? a kind of sigh? a last ripple of the wave? A trickle of water in some gutter where, burbling, it dies away? Let me touch the table—so—and thus recover my sense of the moment. A sideboard covered with cruets; a basket full of rolls; a plate of bananas—these are comfortable sights. But if there are no stories, what end can there be, or what beginning? Life is not susceptible perhaps to the treatment we give it when we try to tell it. Sitting up late at night it seems strange not to have more control. Pigeon-holes are not then very useful. It is strange how force ebbs away and away into some dry creek. Sitting alone, it seems we are spent; our waters can only just surround feebly that spike of sea-holly; we cannot reach that further pebble so as to wet it. It is over, we are ended. But wait—I sat all night waiting—an impulse again runs through us; we rise, we toss back a mane of white spray; we pound on the shore; we are not to be confined. That is, I shaved and washed; did not wake my wife, and had breakfast; put on my hat, and went out to earn my living. After Monday, Tuesday comes.

“就这样结束这个故事？一种叹息？海浪的最后一丝波纹？水沟里一股细流，潺潺地，消失无踪？让我摸摸这张桌子吧——这样——从而恢复我对这刻的感知。一个放满各种调味瓶的餐具柜；一只装满面包卷的篮子；一盘香蕉——这些都是令人舒服的景象。但是假如根本就没有故事，那还会有什么结局或开始？当我们试图讲述生活的时候，它大概是不会容许我们横加处理的。奇怪的是，深夜不眠时，它却愈发失去控制。这时文件架也不是很起作用。奇怪的是，力量在消退，消退，直到隐没在一条干涸的小溪之中。独坐时，似乎我们的精力已耗尽；我们的水只能软弱无力地缱绻在海滨刺芹的尖穗周围；我们无法抵达更远处的那块卵石从而把它溅湿。结束了，我们完了。只能等待——我坐在这儿彻夜等待——一阵冲动再一次涌上我们全身；我们昂扬而起，抖落马鬃似的白色水沫；我们拍击着海岸；我们是不肯受到约束的。也就是说，我刮了胡子，洗了脸；不惊醒我的太太，吃了早饭；戴上帽子，出门谋生去了。过了星期一，就是星期二。

'Yet some doubt remained, some note of interrogation. I was surprised, opening a door, to find people thus occupied; I hesitated, taking a cup of tea, whether one said milk or sugar. And the light of the stars falling, as it falls now, on my hand after travelling for millions upon millions of years—I could get a cold shock from that for a moment—not more, my imagination is too feeble. But some doubt remained. A shadow flitted through my mind like moths' wings among chairs and tables in a room in the evening. When, for example, I went to Lincolnshire that summer to see Susan and she advanced towards me across the garden with the lazy movement of a half-filled sail, with the swaying movement of a woman with child, I thought, "It goes on; but why?" We sat in the garden; the farm carts came up dripping with hay; there was the usual gabble of rooks and doves; fruit was netted and covered over; the gardener dug. Bees boomed down the purple tunnels of flowers; bees embedded themselves on the golden shields of sunflowers. Little twigs were blown across the grass. How rhythmical, and half conscious and like something wrapped in mist it was; but to me hateful, like a net folding one's limbs in its meshes, cramping. She who had refused Percival lent herself to this, to this covering over.

“可是，某种怀疑，某种疑问的声音一直存在。打开一扇门，我惊讶地发现人们如此不得闲；我犹豫地接过一杯茶，不顾人家问是加牛奶还是加糖。星光泼洒下来，穿过千百万年的路途之后，此刻落在我的手上——使我在刹那间打了一个冷激灵——仅此而已，我的想象力太薄弱了。但是某种怀疑一直存在。我脑海中掠过一道暗影，好像飞蛾的翅膀在傍晚时房间里的桌椅之间扇动。比如，当我那年夏天去林肯郡看望苏珊，她以半张的风帆似的懒洋洋的步态和怀孕的女人那种摇摇晃晃的身姿穿过花园向我迎过来时，我心想：‘时光荏苒啊；可为什么呢？’我们坐在花园里；农场的大车驶过，洒落一地干草；白嘴鸦和白鸽像平常一样发出咕咕声；果子上面张了网，被罩了起来；那位花匠在挖土。有些蜜蜂嗡嗡地飞过紫色的花间通道；有些蜜蜂把它们的身体嵌在向日葵的金色花盘上。草地上到处是被风吹落的细枝。这一切多么富有韵律，且蒙眬，仿佛笼罩在薄雾之中；可是对我来说却显得可憎，好像一张网把人的四肢束缚在网眼里，越收越紧。她拒绝了珀西瓦尔，却让自己陷入这种境地，被这一切罩在下面。

'Sitting down on a bank to wait for my train, I thought then how we surrender, how we submit to the stupidity of nature. Woods covered in thick green leafage lay in front of me. And by some flick of a scent or a sound on a nerve, the old image—the gardeners sweeping, the lady writing—returned. I saw the figures beneath the beech trees at Elvedon. The gardeners swept; the lady at the table sat writing. But I now made the contribution of maturity to childhood's intuitions—satiety and doom; the sense of what is unescapable in our lot; death; the knowledge of limitations; how life is more obdurate than one had thought it. Then, when I was a child, the presence of an enemy had asserted itself; the need for opposition had stung me. I had jumped up and cried, "Let's explore." The horror of the situation was ended.

“我在一侧岸边坐下来等着我的火车，这时我想到，我们总是放弃，我们总是屈从于本性中的愚蠢啊。我的面前是绿叶浓密的树林。由于一丝芬芳或一个声响轻轻触动了某根神经，以往那幅画面——园丁们在清扫，有位女士在写字——又出现了。我看见了在埃尔夫登山毛榉树丛背后的那些身影。园丁们在清扫；桌边有位女士坐在那儿写字。但是现在，我使得童年时代的种种直观感觉达到了成熟——知足而听天由命；知道了在我们的命运中有些东西无可逃避；认识了死亡；了解了种种局限；生活比你所想象的更为冷酷无情。当初，我是小孩子的时候，就已经种下了敌对意识；反抗的渴望曾把我刺伤。我曾经跳起来大声喊道：‘让我们去探索一番吧。’那种处境下的惊惧心理消除了。

'Now what situation was there to end? Dullness and doom. And what to explore? The leaves and the wood concealed nothing. If a bird rose I should no longer make a poem—I should repeat what I had seen before. Thus if I had a stick with which to point to indentations in the curve of being, this is the lowest; here it coils useless on the mud where no tide comes—here, where I sit with my back to a hedge, and my hat over my eyes, while the sheep advanced remorselessly in that wooden way of theirs, step by step on stiff, pointed legs. But if you hold a blunt blade to a grindstone long enough, something spurts—a jagged edge of fire; so held to lack of reason, aimlessness, the usual, all massed together, out spurted in one flame hatred, contempt. I took my mind, my being, the old dejected, almost inanimate object, and lashed it about among these odds and ends, sticks and straws, detestable little bits of wreckage, flotsam and jetsam, floating on the oily surface. I jumped up. I said, "Fight! Fight!" I repeated. It is the effort and the struggle, it is the perpetual warfare, it is the shattering and piecing together—this is the daily battle, defeat or victory, the absorbing pursuit. The trees, scattered, put on order; the thick green of the leaves thinned itself to a dancing light. I netted them under with a sudden phrase. I retrieved them from formlessness with words.

“那么还有什么样的处境要结束呢？了无生趣，听天由命。又有什么可探索的呢？枝叶和树林的背后一无所有。即使鸟儿飞起，我再也做不出一首诗——我只会重复先前之所见。因此，假如我用一根权杖来指出生命曲线中的凹处，这里就是最低点了；瞧，它在泥泞里徒劳地打转，因为潮水再也漫不到这里——瞧，我背靠树篱坐在这儿，用帽子遮住眼睛，而羊群露出它们特有的呆相，迈开僵硬的细腿，一步，一步，漠然地向前。可是假如你把钝刀放在一块磨刀石上磨得足够长久，它也会迸发——迸出锯齿状的火光；若是放在缺乏理性、漫无目的、混沌一团的寻常之物上磨，那么迸出的就是憎恨或耻辱的火焰。我拾掇起我的头脑，我的生命，这令人沮丧的、几乎了无生气的老迈之身，向着漂浮在油腻腻的海面上的这些零零碎碎、枯枝败草、令人望而生厌的残骸朽骨和散落的货物一股脑地乱抽过去。我跳了起来。我大声说：‘冲啊！冲啊！’我一遍一遍地说。这是奋起与挣扎，这是永久的冲突，这是砸烂与再修补——这是日复一日的战斗，无论失败或成功，都是极为有趣的人生追求。那些树，零乱的树，恢复了秩序；树叶的浓绿色彩淡了下去，摇曳生辉。我用一个即兴的词网住了它们。我用词语把它们由无形化作有形。

'The train came in. Lengthening down the platform, the train came to a stop. I caught my train. And so back to London in the evening. How satisfactory, the atmosphere of common sense and tobacco; old women clambering into the third-class carriage with their baskets; the sucking at pipes; the good-nights and see you tomorrows of friends parting at wayside stations, and then the lights of London—not the flaring ecstasy of youth, not that tattered violet banner, but still the lights of London all the same; hard, electric lights, high up in offices; street lamps laced along dry pavements; flares roaring above street markets. I like all this when I have despatched the enemy for a moment.

“火车进站了。火车长长地驶过月台，慢慢停了下来。我搭上了火车。因此在傍晚时回到了伦敦。多么令人满意啊，这通常的气氛和烟草的气息；提着篮子爬上三等车厢的老太婆们；烟袋嘴上的啪嗒声；朋友们在路边车站道别时的‘晚安’和‘明天见’，然后就出现了伦敦的灯火——不是那种炫目的青春狂喜，不是那种破烂的紫色旗帜，但即便如此总还是伦敦的灯火；高高的办公楼里，冷冰冰的电灯；冷清的人行道上，花边似的街灯；街市上空喧嚣的吵闹。我喜欢所有这一切，因为这时我暂时驱散了我的仇敌。

'Also I like to find the pageant of existence roaring, in a theatre for instance. The clay-coloured, earthy nondescript animal of the field here erects himself and with infinite ingenuity and effort puts up a fight against the green woods and green fields and sheep advancing with measured tread, munching. And, of course, windows in the long grey streets were lit up; strips of carpet cut the pavement; there were swept and garnished rooms, fire, food, wine, talk. Men with withered hands, women with pearl pagodas hanging from their ears, came in and went out. I saw old men's faces carved into wrinkles and sneers by the work of the world; beauty cherished so that it seemed newly sprung even in age; and youth so apt for pleasure that pleasure, one thought, must exist; it seemed that grass-lands must roll for it; and the sea be chopped up into little waves; and the woods rustle with bright-coloured birds for youth, for youth expectant. There one met Jinny and Hal, Tom and Betty; there we had our jokes and shared our secrets; and never parted in the doorway without arranging to meet again in some other room as the occasion, as the time of the year, suggested. Life is pleasant; life is good. After Monday comes Tuesday, and Wednesday follows.

“同时我也乐于发现——比方说在剧院里——生命际会的喧嚣。田野上那只黏土色的、粗俗得难以形容的野兽此时突然挺直身躯，无比灵巧又无限从容地挑起了一场战争，反抗那绿色的树林、绿色的原野和那一边吃草一边迈着方步走来的羊群。当然，灰暗的长街上，　一扇扇窗户亮起了灯；一条条地毯横在人行道上；清扫过的、装饰一新的房间，有炉火、佳肴和美酒，还有闲谈。双手尽是皱纹的男人们，两耳挂着珍珠宝塔坠饰的女人们，都在进进出出。我看见老人们的脸庞被世俗的劳作刻出了一道道皱纹和一丝丝嘲笑；美得以珍惜，甚至于它似乎随着年岁而焕发了新意；年轻人如此耽于寻欢作乐，以至于你总觉得欢乐肯定存在；似乎草地肯定为此而起伏翻涌；大海为此而被切割成细浪；树林沙沙作响，与彩色的鸟儿一起，迎接青春，迎接即将来临的青春。瞧，你遇见了吉尼和哈尔，汤姆和贝蒂；瞧，我们互相开着玩笑，分享着彼此的秘密；而且没有一次不是在门口分手时就安排好在另一间屋子里再见，按不同的情况，或按一年中不同的时间而定。生活是愉快的；生活是美好的。过了星期一就是星期二，随后而来的是星期三。

'Yes, but after a time with a difference. It may be that something in the look of the room one night, in the arrangement of the chairs, suggests it. It seems comfortable to sink down on a sofa in a corner, to look, to listen. Then it happens that two figures standing with their backs to the window appear against the branches of a spreading willow. With a shock of emotion one feels "There are figures without features robed in beauty." In the pause that follows while the ripples spread, the girl to whom one should be talking says to herself, "He is old." But she is wrong. It is not age; it is that a drop has fallen; another drop. Time has given the arrangement another shake. Out we creep from the arch of the currant leaves, out into a wider world. The true order of things—this is our perpetual illusion—is now apparent. Thus in a moment, in a drawing-room, our life adjusts itself to the majestic march of day across the sky.

“是的，但是一段时间之后就会出现分歧。可能是因为某个晚上房间的外观，椅子的摆设，给出了暗示。深深地坐在角落里的沙发上，瞧着，听着，似乎感到了惬意。这时，凑巧有两个背对窗子直立的身影出现在一棵枝叶繁茂的柳树前面。情绪一激动，你感觉到‘世上真有没有披着美的外衣的身影’。稍一犹豫之后，波纹荡漾开去，那个女孩，那个你也许正与之交谈的女孩心里说：‘他老了。’但是她错了。不关年龄；是因为一滴水珠落了；又一滴水珠落了。时间又一次动摇了既定的安排。我们从红醋栗树叶的拱门中爬了出来，进入了一个更为广阔的世界。事物的真正秩序——这是我们永久的错觉——在这一刻昭然眼前。因此，一转眼，在一间客厅里，我们的生命就自动适应了穿越时空的庄严步伐。

'It was for this reason that instead of pulling on my patent—leather shoes and finding a tolerable tie, I sought Neville. I sought my oldest friend, who had known me when I was Byron; when I was Meredith's young man, and also that hero in a book by Dostoevsky whose name I have forgotten. I found him alone, reading. A perfectly neat table; a curtain pulled methodically straight; a paper-knife dividing a French volume—nobody, I thought, ever changes the attitude in which we saw them first, or the clothes. Here he has sat in this chair, in these clothes, ever since we first met. Here was freedom; here was intimacy; the firelight broke off some round apple on the curtain. There we talked; sat talking; sauntered down that avenue, the avenue which runs under the trees, under the thick-leaved murmuring trees, the trees that are hung with fruit, which we have trodden so often together, so that now the turf is bare round some of those trees, round certain plays and poems, certain favourites of ours—the turf is trodden bare by our incessant unmethodical pacing. If I have to wait, I read; if I wake in the night, I feel along the shelf for a book. Swelling, perpetually augmented, there is a vast accumulation of unrecorded matter in my head. Now and then I break off a lump, Shakespeare it may be, it may be some old woman called Peck; and say to myself, smoking a cigarette in bed, "That's Shakespeare. That's Peck"—with a certainty of recognition and a shock of knowledge which is endlessly delightful, though not to be imparted. So we shared our Pecks, our Shakespeares; compared each other's versions; allowed each other's insight to set our own Peck or Shakespeare in a better light; and then sank into one of those silences which are now and again broken by a few words, as if a fin rose in the wastes of silence; and then the fin, the thought, sinks back into the depths, spreading round it a little ripple of satisfaction, content.

“就因为这个原因，我没有套上我专有的皮鞋，也没扎上一条看得上眼的领带，而是奔内维尔这儿来了。我来找我这位老朋友，他一直了解我，不管当我是拜伦的时候，还是当我是梅瑞狄斯笔下的年轻人，同时还是陀思妥也夫斯基一本书中的男主人公——名字我倒忘了——的时候。我发现他在独自看书。井井有条的书桌；纹丝不乱的窗帘；夹在一册法文书中的裁纸刀——我心想，谁也没有改变我们初次相见时的姿势或衣着。瞧，自从我们初次相见，他一直坐在这把椅子上，穿着这套衣服。这就是随心所欲；这就是亲密无间；火光在窗帘上映出一个圆圆的苹果。你瞧，我们聊着天；坐下来聊着；沿着这条大街漫步，大街在树下延伸，树叶繁茂、沙沙作响，树上的果实压弯了枝条，我们经常一起走在这条大街上，以至于现在在某些树的周围，在某些戏剧和诗歌的周围，在某些我们至爱之物的周围，草坪已经变得光秃了——那里的草坪被我们不间断的杂乱脚步踩踏得光秃了。如果我不得不等待，我就看书；如果我在夜里醒来，我就摸索着从书架上抽出一本书。一直膨胀，不停地被扩张，我的头脑里累积了一大堆来历不明的东西。时而，我分离出一个肿块，也许是莎士比亚，也许是某个名叫佩克的老太太；我在床上点燃一支烟，自言自语道：‘这就是莎士比亚。这就是佩克。’——一种确定无疑的认同和激动人心的了解油然而生，虽然无可言传，但它带给人无限喜悦。于是我们彼此分享对佩克的理解，对莎士比亚的理解；对比各自的版本；使对方的洞见得以更好地阐明我们自己对佩克或莎士比亚的认识；然后陷入时常的沉默，而这样的沉默又一次一次被只言片语所打破，仿佛鱼鳍浮出沉寂的死水；随后，那鱼鳍，那思想，又潜回深处，它的周围漾开满足而得意的细小涟漪。

'Yes, but suddenly one hears a clock tick. We who had been immersed in this world became aware of another. It is painful. It was Neville who changed our time. He, who had been thinking with the unlimited time of the mind, which stretches in a flash from Shakespeare to ourselves, poked the fire and began to live by that other clock which marks the approach of a particular person. The wide and dignified sweep of his mind contracted. He became on the alert. I could feel him listening to sounds in the street. I noted how he touched a cushion. From the myriads of mankind and all time past he had chosen one person, one moment in particular. A sound was heard in the hall. What he was saying wavered in the air like an uneasy flame. I watched him disentangle one footstep from other footsteps; wait for some particular mark of identification and glance with the swiftness of a snake at the handle of the door. (Hence the astonishing acuteness of his perceptions; he has been trained always by one person.) So concentrated a passion shot out others like foreign matter from a still, sparkling fluid. I became aware of my own vague and cloudy nature full of sediment, full of doubt, full of phrases and notes to be made in pocket-books. The folds of the curtain became still, statuesque; the paperweight on the table hardened; the threads on the curtain sparkled; everything became definite, external, a scene in which I had no part. I rose, therefore; I left him.

“是啊，但突然你听见时钟的嘀嗒声。一直沉浸在这个世界里的我们渐渐意识到，还有另一个世界。这是令人痛苦的。是内维尔改变了我们的时间。他一直随着头脑中不受限制的时间来思考，其思绪在一闪念之间就由莎士比亚跳到我们自身，拨弄着炉火，按照另一个时钟开始生活了，那个时钟标志着一个特殊人物的到来。他那开阔而高贵的思想缩小了范围。他变得警觉了。我能感觉到，他在倾听大街上的声音。我注意到他是如何摸了一下坐垫。从古往今来的芸芸众生之中，他挑选了一个人物，一个特殊的时刻。大厅里传来一个声音。他的话语在空气中颤动，好像不安的火苗。我观察到，他把某一种脚步从其他的脚步声中剥离出来；等待着某个特殊的识别标志，然后以蛇一样的迅疾目光瞅着门把手。（因此他的感觉总是惊人地敏锐；他总是接受一个人物的培训。）如此专注的一股激情，突然迸发，好像从一汪静止、闪亮的液体中抽出的异物似的。我渐渐意识到自己暧昧而忧郁的本性中充满了沉淀物，充满了怀疑，充满了需要记在便笺簿里的各种套语和短句。窗帘的折痕纹丝不动，像雕塑似的；书桌上的镇纸稳稳当当；帘帏上的丝线一闪一闪；一切都变得明明白白，真真切切，成了与我无关的场景。因此我站起身来；我离开了他。

'Heavens! how they caught me as I left the room, the fangs of that old pain! the desire for someone not there. For whom? I did not know at first; then remembered Percival. I had not thought of him for months. Now to laugh with him, to laugh with him at Neville—that was what I wanted, to walk off arm-in-arm together laughing. But he was not there. The place was empty.

“天啊！我一离开房间，那旧日痛苦的利齿就牢牢攫住了我！还有那对于某个没在场的人的渴望。对谁的渴望呢？起初我并不确定；然后我想起了珀西瓦尔。有好几个月我没有想到他了。这会儿与他一起大笑，与他一起嘲笑内维尔——手挽着手一起大笑着走出去，这就是我所渴望的。可是他不在这儿。这个位置空了。

'It is strange how the dead leap out on us at street corners, or in dreams.

“说来奇怪，那些死去的人会在街角，或在梦里跳出来，出现在我们面前。

'This fitful gust blowing so sharp and cold upon me sent me that night across London to visit other friends, Rhoda and Louis, desiring company, certainty, contact. I wondered, as I mounted the stairs, what was their relationship? What did they say alone? I figured her awkward with the tea-kettle. She gazed over the slate roofs—the nymph of the fountain always wet, obsessed with visions, dreaming. She parted the curtain to look at the night. "Away!" she said.

“这股断断续续的风那么急剧，冷飕飕地吹在我的身上，在这个夜晚使我愈发渴望有人陪伴、有人肯定、与人交流，于是我穿过整个伦敦去看望其他朋友，罗达和路易斯。我一边上楼一边心里嘀咕，他们俩到底什么关系呢？他们私下里说些什么呢？我想象出她端着茶壶笨拙的样子。她越过石板屋顶呆呆地凝望——这位泉水女神总是湿淋淋的，神思恍惚，如入梦境。她拨开窗帘，望着黑夜。‘不在了！’她说。

"The moor is dark beneath the moon." I rang; I waited. Louis perhaps poured out milk in a saucer for the cat; Louis, whose bony hands shut like the sides of a dock closing themselves with a slow anguish of effort upon an enormous tumult of waters, who knew what has been said by the Egyptian, the Indian, by men with high cheek-bones and solitaires in hair shirts. I knocked; I waited; there was no answer. I tramped down the stone stairs again. Our friends—how distant, how mute, how seldom visited and little known. And I, too, am dim to my friends and unknown; a phantom, sometimes seen, often not. Life is a dream surely. Our flame, the will-o'-the-wisp that dances in a few eyes, is soon to be blown out and all will fade. I recalled my friends. I thought of Susan. She had bought fields. Cucumbers and tomatoes ripened in her hothouses. The vine that had been killed by last year's frost was putting out a leaf or two. She walked heavily with her sons across her meadows. She went about the land attended by men in gaiters, pointing with her stick at a roof, at hedges, at walls fallen into disrepair. The pigeons followed her, waddling, for the grain that she let fall from her capable, earthy fingers. "But I no longer rise at dawn," she said. Then Jinny—entertaining, no doubt, some new young man. They reached the crisis of the usual conversation. The room would be darkened; chairs arranged. For she still sought the moment. Without illusions, hard and clear as crystal, she rode at the day with her breast bared. She let its spikes pierce her. When the lock whitened on her forehead she twisted it fearlessly among the rest. So when they come to bury her nothing will be out of order. Bits of ribbons will be found curled up. But still the door opens. Who is coming in? she asks, and rises to meet him, prepared, as on those first spring nights when the tree under the big London houses where respectable citizens were going soberly to bed scarcely sheltered her love; and the squeak of trams mixed with her cry of delight and the rippling of leaves had to shade her languor, her delicious lassitude as she sank down cooled by all the sweetness of nature satisfied. Our friends, how seldom visited, how little known—it is true; and yet, when I meet an unknown person, and try to break off, here at this table, what I call "my life", it is not one life that I look back upon; I am not one person; I am many people; I do not altogether know who I am—Jinny, Susan, Neville, Rhoda, or Louis; or how to distinguish my life from theirs.

‘月亮下面，荒野漆黑一片。’我按了门铃；我等待着。路易斯也许倒出一些牛奶在碟子里准备喂猫；这个路易斯，他瘦骨嶙峋的双手一合，就像一座船坞的两侧挡板，缓慢而痛苦地用力把汹涌澎湃的海水围拢起来一样，他懂得那些埃及人、那些印度人、那些高颧骨的人和身穿苦行僧衣的居士们所说的话。我敲敲门；我等了一会儿；毫无回应。我又沉重地走下石阶。我们的朋友啊——多么疏远，悄无声息，很少走动，互不了解。而我，对于我的朋友们而言，也是模糊不清，形同陌路；像个幽灵，偶尔现身，大多时候隐而不见。人生无疑就是一场梦幻。我们的激情之火，那种在为数不多的眼睛里跳跃的灵感，很快就会被吹灭，然后一切都会消失。我回忆起我的朋友们。我想到苏珊。她买了田地。她的温室里黄瓜和西红柿熟了。被去年的霜寒冻坏了的葡萄藤正发出一两片新芽。她脚步沉重地和儿子们一起穿过她的草场。她巡视着由脚上穿长统橡胶靴子的男人们经管的田地，她用手杖指向一处屋顶，指向一道道树篱，指向那些残垣断壁。那些鸽子跟在她的身后，摇摇摆摆地，啄食着从她那朴实能干的手指之间漏下的谷粒。‘可是我不再起大早了。’她说。然后是吉尼——毫无疑问，她又在款待某个新来的年轻人。他们到了一般交往的紧要关头。房间要弄得暗下来；椅子要刻意摆设。因为她依然追求眼前时刻。不抱任何幻想，像水晶一样明澈而坚硬，就在今日，坦胸露怀，纵横驰骋。任由岩尖将她刺穿。当额头那绺发丝变得灰白时，她无所畏惧地将它夹入其余的发丝中间。所以，当他们前来埋葬她的时候，一切都丝毫不乱。只会发现卷扎起来的一节节缎带。但是门还是开了。谁进来了？她问了一声，然后站起身来迎接他，精精神神地，就像在那些初春的夜晚，屋里面可敬的公民们正清清爽爽地准备上床睡觉，而那伦敦的高楼大厦下面的树阴几乎遮不住她的爱情；电车的吱嘎声与她兴奋的呼喊混杂在一起，而随着一切自然芬芳的消退，她满足地沉落下去，这时那树叶的起伏正好掩饰了她的疲倦，她惬意的慵懒。我们的朋友啊，多么缺少来往，多么缺乏了解——真的；可是，当我遇见一个并不熟悉的人，并试图就在这张桌子这儿挣脱所谓的‘我的生活’时，它却不是我回忆中的某一种生活；我不是某一个人；我是许多人；我根本搞不懂我是谁——是吉尼，是苏珊，是内维尔，是罗达，或是路易斯；也不知如何来分辨我的生活与他们的生活。

'So I thought that night in early autumn when we came together and dined once more at Hampton Court. Our discomfort was at first considerable, for each by that time was committed to a statement, and the other person coming along the road to the meeting-place dressed like this or that, with a stick or without, seemed to contradict it. I saw Jinny look at Susan's earthy fingers and then hide her own; I, considering Neville, so neat and exact, felt the nebulosity of my own life blurred with all these phrases. He then boasted, because he was ashamed of one room and one person and his own success. Louis and Rhoda, the conspirators, the spies at table, who take notes, felt, "After all, Bernard can make the waiter fetch us rolls—a contact denied us.” We saw for a moment laid out among us the body of the complete human being whom we have failed to be, but at the same time, cannot forget. All that we might have been we saw; all that we had missed, and we grudged for a moment the other's claim, as children when the cake is cut, the one cake, the only cake, watch their slice diminishing.

“那个初秋的晚上，当我们聚在一起，又一次在汉普顿宫吃饭的时候，我就是这么想的。刚开始时，我们感觉相当不舒服，因为每个人在见面时都要对自己的情况做个交代，而这似乎总会与另外那个身着这样或那样的服装、拄着或没拄手杖、一路赶来赴约的人形成抵触。我看见吉尼望着苏珊粗糙的手指，随后藏起了她自己的手；我呢，打量着内维尔，那么衣冠楚楚、一丝不苟，就感觉我自己的生活被所有那些词藻弄得一塌糊涂。他接下来开始自吹自擂，因为内心的惭愧，他老是呆在某一个场所，老是保持某一幅形象，老是那么一帆风顺。路易斯和罗达呢，这两个同谋者，饭桌上的密探，心里琢磨着：‘无论如何，伯纳德都会让服务生给我们送来面包卷的——免得我们开口了。’一时之间，我们看见了我们失之交臂却无法忘怀的那个完整的人呈现在我们面前。我们原本有望成就的一切，我们已经失掉的一切，我们看到了；我们对他人的所得嫉妒一时，就像切蛋糕时，一块蛋糕，唯一一块蛋糕，孩子们总是望着自己的那一份，感觉它在变小。

'However, we had our bottle of wine, and under that seduction lost our enmity, and stopped comparing. And, half-way through dinner, we felt enlarge itself round us the huge blackness of what is outside us, of what we are not. The wind, the rush of wheels became the roar of time, and we rushed—where? And who were we? We were extinguished for a moment, went out like sparks in burnt paper and the blackness roared. Past time, past history we went. For me this lasts but one second. It is ended by my own pugnacity. I strike the table with a spoon. If I could measure things with compasses I would, but since my only measure is a phrase, I make phrases—I forget what, on this occasion. We became six people at a table in Hampton Court. We rose and walked together down the avenue. In the thin, the unreal twilight, fitfully like the echo of voices laughing down some alley, geniality returned to me and flesh. Against the gateway, against some cedar tree I saw blaze bright, Neville, Jinny, Rhoda, Louis, Susan, and myself, our life, our identity. Still King William seemed an unreal monarch and his crown mere tinsel. But we—against the brick, against the branches, we six, out of how many million millions, for one moment out of what measureless abundance of past time and time to come, burnt there triumphant. The moment was all; the moment was enough. And then Neville, Jinny, Susan and I, as a wave breaks, burst asunder, surrendered—to the next leaf, to the precise bird, to a child with a hoop, to a prancing dog, to the warmth that is hoarded in woods after a hot day, to the lights twisted like white ribbon on rippled waters. We drew apart; we were consumed in the darkness of the trees, leaving Rhoda and Louis to stand on the terrace by the urn.

“但是，我们各自饮尽瓶中的酒，在它的魅惑下渐渐失去相互的敌意，也不再攀比了。而且，吃到半酣时，我们忽然感觉到我们的身外之物，与我们无关之物，那无边的黑暗仿佛在我们周围扩大了。风声，辚辚车轮声，变成了时间的怒吼，我们急匆匆地——赶往哪里呢？我们是谁呢？我们一刹那间就熄灭了，像纸张燃尽后的火星一样熄灭了，黑暗在咆哮。我们穿越时光，穿越历史。对我来说，这只持续了一秒钟。就被我的好斗情绪终结了。我用小勺敲敲桌子。要是我能用罗盘来计量一切的话，我会那么做的，可是既然我唯一的工具就是词藻，那么我就编吧——这一次，我忘了编出一些什么词。在汉普顿宫时，我们一桌六个人。我们站起身来，一起走在林阴道上。在稀薄、虚幻的暮色中，温暖的感觉，好像山路上回荡着的阵阵笑语，又回到了我的身上，我的肉体上。在大门前，在雪松树下，我看见耀眼的光芒——内维尔，吉尼，罗达，路易斯，苏珊，还有我，我们的生活，我们的特性。威廉国王似乎更像是一个虚构的统治者，他的王冠只是华而不实的金属箔片。而我们——映着砖石，映着树枝，我们这多少亿人当中的一行六个，在过去与未来无限丰富的时光中的这一时刻，在这里焕发出胜利者的光彩。此刻即是一切；此刻足矣。然后，内维尔、吉尼、苏珊和我，犹如海浪迸碎一般突然散开，退了下去——让步于相邻的那片叶子，于某一只鸟，于一个玩着铁箍的孩子，于一只前扑后跳的狗，于一个大热天之后树林里贮存的温度，于荡漾的水面上白色缎带一样缠绕的光线。我们分开了；我们隐没在树的暗影里，留下罗达和路易斯站在坟墓旁的阶丘上。

'When we emerged from that immersion—how sweet, how deep!—and came to the surface and saw the conspirators still standing there it was with some compunction. We had lost what they had kept. We interrupted. But we were tired, and whether it had been good or bad, accomplished or left undone, the dusky veil was falling upon our endeavours; the lights were sinking as we paused for a moment upon the terrace that overlooks the river. The steamers were landing their trippers on the bank; there was a distant cheering, the sound of singing, as if people waved their hats and joined in some last song. The sound of the chorus came across the water and I felt leap up that old impulse, which has moved me all my life, to be thrown up and down on the roar of other people's voices, singing the same song; to be tossed up and down on the roar of almost senseless merriment, sentiment, triumph, desire. But not now. No! I could not collect myself; I could not distinguish myself; I could not help letting fall the things that had made me a minute ago eager, amused, jealous, vigilant, and hosts of other things, into the water. I could not recover myself from that endless throwing away, dissipation, flooding forth without our willing it and rushing soundlessly away out there under the arches of the bridge, round some clump of trees or an island, out where sea-birds sit on stakes, over the roughened water to become waves in the sea—I could not recover myself from that dissipation. So we parted.

“当我们从那种沉浸中浮现——多么惬意，多么深沉——来到水面，看见那两个同谋者依然站在那里时，是抱有一些懊恼的。我们失去了他们一直保持的东西。我们打扰了他们。但是我们厌倦了，不管那是好事还是坏事，是大功告成还是仍无结果，都有夜幕笼罩着我们的努力；当我们在临河的阶丘上停了一会儿时，光线慢慢沉了下去。轮船正把那些旅行者卸到岸上；远远地传来欢呼，唱歌的声音，仿佛人们都在挥动帽子，加入到最后一支歌中。合唱的声音涉水而来，我的心里一下子又涌起了以往那种感动我一生的冲动，唱起同一首歌，随着别人喧嚣的声浪而翻腾起伏；随着那几乎毫无意义的欢乐、激动、得意、渴望的嘶吼而心潮澎湃。但是此刻不行。不行！我无法聚精会神；我无法看清自己；我不得不让一分钟之前曾使我变得热切、愉悦、猜忌、警醒的那些东西和许多别的东西统统落进水里。我无法振作起来，让自己摆脱那漫无目的的丢弃，放荡，不由自主的随波逐流，悄无声息地奔向远方，桥洞下，树墩或小岛边，奔向有海鸟栖息的树桩的地方，奔向海浪汹涌的大海，变成海浪——我无法振作起来，让自己摆脱这样的放荡。所以我们分开了。

'Was this, then, this streaming away mixed with Susan, Jinny, Neville, Rhoda, Louis, a sort of death? A new assembly of elements? Some hint of what was to come? The note was scribbled, the book shut, for I am an intermittent student. I do not say my lessons by any means at the stated hour. Later, walking down Fleet Street at the rush hour, I recalled that moment; I continued it. "Must I for ever," I said, "beat my spoon on the table-cloth? Shall I not, too, consent?” The omnibuses were clogged; one came up behind another and stopped with a click, like a link added to a stone chain. People passed.

“那么，这样跟苏珊、吉尼、内维尔、罗达、路易斯他们混在一起，随波逐流，这是不是一种死亡呢？是众元素的一种新的组合？是对未来的某种暗示？笔记乱七八糟，书也合上了，因为我的学习是断断续续的。我从来不在指定的钟点背诵课文。后来，当我在高峰时间走上港湾街时，我又回想起那个时刻；我将它继续了。‘我总得，’我说，‘在桌布上敲打我的勺子不可吗？我就不会也随声附和一下？’公共汽车堵塞了；一辆接着一辆开过来，嘎的一声停下，好像挂在一根石链子上的一节链环。人们川流不息。

'Multitudinous, carrying attaché-cases, dodging with incredible celerity in and out, they went past like a river in spate. They went past roaring like a train in a tunnel. Seizing my chance I crossed; dived down a dark passage and entered the shop where they cut my hair. I leant my head back and was swathed in a sheet. Looking-glasses confronted me in which I could see my pinioned body and people passing; stopping, looking, and going on indifferent. The hairdresser began to move his scissors to and fro. I felt myself powerless to stop the oscillations of the cold steel. So we are cut and laid in swaths, I said; so we lie side by side on the damp meadows, withered branches and flowering. We have no more to expose ourselves on the bare hedges to the wind and snow; no more to carry ourselves erect when the gale sweeps, to bear our burden upheld; or stay, unmurmuring, on those pallid noondays when the bird creeps close to the bough and the damp whitens the leaf. We are cut, we are fallen. We are become part of that unfeeling universe that sleeps when we are at our quickest and burns red when we lie asleep. We have renounced our station and lie now flat, withered and how soon forgotten! Upon which I saw an expression in the tail of the eye of the hairdresser as if something interested him in the street.

“他们成群结队，提着公文包，非常敏捷地互相躲闪着，进进出出，像一条泛滥的河。他们像隧道中的一列火车呼啸而过。我抓个机会，过了马路；穿过一条幽暗的巷子，走进一家店理发。我把脑袋后仰，胸前被罩上一块布单。镜子正对着我，我能看见镜子里我被裹住的身体和那些过往的人；他们停下脚步，看了看，然后漠然地走开了。理发师开始来回推动他的剪刀。我感觉自己毫无力量让那冷冰冰的铁器停止振动。我们就这样一列列地被收割了，我说；我们就这样肩并肩躺在潮湿的草地、枯萎的树枝和花朵上面。我们无需再让自己在光秃的树篱上面迎风沐雪了；无需再让自己在狂风掠过时挺直身躯，承担起我们的重任；或者在那些沉闷的正午，只是呆坐着，一声不吭，望着鸟儿悄悄挨近树枝，潮气染白了树叶。我们被收割了；我们被砍倒了。我们变成了那无情世界的一部分，当我们思维敏捷时，它却睡着了，而当我们睡倒时，它却红彤彤地燃烧起来。我们已经宣布放弃我们的立足之地，这会儿躺了下来，了无生气，委顿不堪，很快就将被遗忘！这时我瞧见理发师的眼梢露出一丝表情，好像街上有什么事情吸引了他。

'What interested the hairdresser? What did the hairdresser see in the street? It is thus that I am recalled. (For I am no mystic; something always plucks at me—curiosity, envy, admiration, interest in hairdressers and the like bring me to the surface.) While he brushed the fluff from my coat I took pains to assure myself of his identity, and then, swinging my stick, I went into the Strand, and evoked to serve as opposite to myself the figure of Rhoda, always so furtive, always with fear in her eyes, always seeking some pillar in the desert, to find which she had gone; she had killed herself. "Wait," I said, putting my arm in imagination (thus we consort with our friends) through her arm. "Wait until these omnibuses have gone by. Do not cross so dangerously. These men are your brothers." In persuading her I was also persuading my own soul. For this is not one life; nor do I always know if I am man or woman, Bernard or Neville, Louis, Susan, Jinny, or Rhoda—so strange is the contact of one with another.

“什么事情吸引了理发师呢？理发师看见大街上发生了什么？就这样我又被唤了回来。（因为我根本不是一个神秘主义者；总有什么事情——好奇啦，嫉妒啦，仰慕啦，对理发师们的兴趣啦，以及诸如此类的事情——拉住我，将我拉回到尘世中来。）当他拂去我外衣上面的毛茬时，我煞费苦心终于弄清楚了他的身份，然后我颤颤巍巍地拄着手杖，走上斯特兰德大街，而同时为了与我本人相对照，我唤来了罗达的形象，她总是那么神神秘秘，总是眼睛里透着敬畏，总是在寻找沙漠中的廊柱，而且为了找到它她走了；她自杀了。‘等一下，’说着，我在想象中（我们就这样结交我们的朋友）挽住了她的手臂。‘等这些公共汽车开过去吧。别这么冒险穿过去。这些人都是你的兄弟。’我在说服她的同时也在说服我自己的灵魂。因为这并不是某一种生活；我也并不总是很清楚自己是男是女，是伯纳德还是内维尔、路易斯、苏珊、吉尼，或是罗达——人与人之间的联系那么奇怪啊。

'Swinging my stick, with my hair newly cut and the nape of my neck tingling, I went past all those trays of penny toys imported from Germany that men hold out in the street by St Paul's—St Paul's, the brooding hen with spread wings from whose shelter run omnibuses and streams of men and women at the rush hour. I thought how Louis would mount those steps in his neat suit with his cane in his hand and his angular, rather detached gait. With his Australian accent ("My father, a banker at Brisbane") he would come, I thought, with greater respect to these old ceremonies than I do, who have heard the same lullabies for a thousand years. I am always impressed, as I enter, by the rubbed roses; the polished brasses; the flapping and the chanting, while one boy's voice wails round the dome like some lost and wandering dove. The recumbency and the peace of the dead impress me—warriors at rest under their old banners. Then I scoff at the floridity and absurdity of some scrolloping tomb; and the trumpets and the victories and the coats of arms and the certainty, so sonorously repeated, of resurrection, of eternal life. My wandering and inquisitive eye then shows me an awe-stricken child; a shuffling pensioner; or the obeisances of tired shop-girls burdened with heaven knows what strife in their poor thin breasts come to solace themselves in the rush hour. I stray and look and wonder, and sometimes, rather furtively, try to rise on the shaft of somebody else's prayer into the dome, out, beyond, wherever they go. But then like the lost and wailing dove, I find myself failing, fluttering, descending and perching upon some curious gargoyle, some battered nose or absurd tombstone, with humour, with wonder, and so again watch the sightseers with their Baedekers shuffling past, while the boy's voice soars in the dome and the organ now and then indulges in a moment of elephantine triumph. How then, I asked, would Louis roof us all in? How would he confine us, make us one, with his red ink, with his very fine nib? The voice petered out in the dome, wailing.

“我拄着手杖，头发是新理的，脖颈后还有点刺痛，一路经过所有那些从德国进口的廉价玩具的摊子，它们就在圣保罗大教堂旁的街道上——圣保罗大教堂，像一只张着翅膀正在孵蛋的母鸡，护佑着高峰时间里川流不息的公共汽车和男男女女。我想象着路易斯会怎样西装革履、手持拐杖、迈着生硬而相当超然的步伐登上那些台阶。他会操着一口澳大利亚音（‘我父亲是布里斯班的一位银行家’）赶过来，我想，他会怀着比我更深的敬意赶来参加这些古老的仪式，因为我已经听了上千年这同样的催眠曲。每当我进来，我总会迷上那些涂了油膏的玫瑰花；迷上那些擦得发亮的铜管乐器；迷上那种拍击和念诵，伴着一个男孩的哀号响彻穹顶，仿佛一只失群而流浪的鸽子。那些逝者——长眠在他们古老的旗帜下的勇士们——的安然与宁静令我着迷。这时，我开始嘲笑那试图名垂青史的坟墓上的鲜丽与荒唐；嘲笑那一阵阵号角，一次次凯旋，一枚枚盾形纹章，以及一遍一遍大声重复的对于复活、对于永生的信念。我那游移不定、充满疑问的眼睛随后让我看到了一个满心敬畏的孩子；一个蹒跚的退休老者；或者那些疲倦的女店员们的谦恭有礼，天知道她们贫乏、瘦弱的胸膛里承载着怎样的冲突，高峰期跑来安慰她们自己。我迷茫，张望，充满好奇，有时相当隐秘地试图借着别人的祷告之箭射向穹顶，刺破天空，飞向远方，随它们去向哪里。可是接着，就像那只失群、哀鸣的鸽子，我发现自己正在失去力量，翅膀扇动着，飞了下来，幽默而疑惑地落在某个奇形怪状的滴水嘴上，某个损坏了的喷嘴或荒唐可笑的墓石上，这样我就又观察起那些拿着导游手册缓缓走过的观光客们了，同时穹顶下面回荡起那个男孩的声音，那架风琴似乎也时不时地陶醉于每一个伟大的凯旋时刻。那么，我问道，路易斯怎么会把我们所有人都笼罩在里面呢？他怎么会用他的红色墨水，用他那支纤细的笔尖将我们禁闭起来，让我们合而为一？那声音在穹顶下面哀鸣着，渐渐平息了。

'So into the street again, swinging my stick, looking at wire trays in stationers' shop-windows, at baskets of fruit grown in the colonies, murmuring Pillicock sat on Pillicock's hill, or Hark, hark, the dogs do bark, or The World's great age begins anew, or Come away, come away, death—mingling nonsense and poetry, floating in the stream. Something always has to be done next. Tuesday follows Monday; Wednesday, Tuesday. Each spreads the same ripple. The being grows rings, like a tree. Like a tree, leaves fall.

“于是我又来到街上，拄着拐杖，瞧着文具店橱窗里的镍网托盘，瞧着一篮一篮产自殖民地的水果，嘀咕着‘霹雳考克坐在霹雳考克山上’，或者‘你听，你听，狗在叫’，或者‘这世界的伟大时代又开始了’，或者‘走开，走开，死亡’——胡言乱语与诗歌搅合在一起，犹如随波逐流一样。下一步总有要做的事。星期二跟着星期一；星期三跟着星期二。每一天都激起同样的涟漪。生命一圈一圈成长，就像一棵树。就像一棵树，叶子总要凋落。

'For one day as I leant over a gate that led into a field, the rhythm stopped; the rhymes and the hummings, the nonsense and the poetry. A space was cleared in my mind. I saw through the thick leaves of habit. Leaning over the gate I regretted so much litter, so much unaccomplishment and separation, for one cannot cross London to see a friend, life being so full of engagements; nor take ship to India and see a naked man spearing fish in blue water. I said life had been imperfect, an unfinishing phrase. It had been impossible for me, taking snuff as I do from any bagman met in a train, to keep coherency—that sense of the generations, of women carrying red pitchers to the Nile, of the nightingale who sings among conquests and migrations. It had been too vast an undertaking, I said, and how can I go on lifting my foot perpetually to climb the stair? I addressed myself as one would speak to a companion with whom one is voyaging to the North Pole.

“因为有一天，当我倚靠在通向田野的大门上时，那个韵律忽然停止了；那些韵脚与和声，胡言乱语与诗歌，都消失了。我的头脑中一片清澈。我看透了习性的浓阴。倚靠在大门上，我为曾经那么多的凌乱、那么多的不如意和彼此分离而感到惋惜，因为生活中总是充满了忙碌，你甚至无法穿过伦敦去看望一个朋友；也无法乘船到印度去看一个赤身裸体的人在蔚蓝的水里用矛刺鱼。我说过，生命从来都不完美，犹如道不尽的词藻。虽然我会从火车上遇见的任何推销员那里嗅一嗅鼻烟，但一直以来我还是难以保持——一贯性地来认识那些一代一代传承不息的人，那些头顶红色大水罐到尼罗河边取水的女人，那只伴着征服与迁徙而歌唱不休的夜莺。我说过，这是一项太过宏伟的事业，我怎么可能一刻不停地迈开脚步、攀登这一阶梯呢？我向自己致辞，就像一个人对结伴向北极远航的另一个人说话似的。

'I spoke to that self who had been with me in many tremendous adventures; the faithful man who sits over the fire when everybody has gone to bed, stirring the cinders with a poker; the man who has been so mysteriously and with sudden accretions of being built up, in a beech wood, sitting by a willow tree on a bank, leaning over a parapet at Hampton Court; the man who has collected himself in moments of emergency and banged his spoon on the table, saying, "I will not consent."

“我对曾在许多重大历险中与我相伴的那个自我说话；当大伙儿都已上床睡觉的时候，这个忠诚的人还坐在炉火旁边，用拨火棍捅着炉渣；这个人，那么神秘莫测，而且突然之间从山毛榉树林里拔地而起，一直坐在岸边的一棵柳树旁，一直倚靠在汉普顿宫的栏杆前；这个人曾在一个个紧要关头挺身而出，用勺子猛敲着桌面说：‘我不赞成。’

'This self now as I leant over the gate looking down over fields rolling in waves of colour beneath me made no answer. He threw up no opposition. He attempted no phrase. His fist did not form. I waited. I listened. Nothing came, nothing. I cried then with a sudden conviction of complete desertion, Now there is nothing. No fin breaks the waste of this immeasurable sea. Life has destroyed me. No echo comes when I speak, no varied words. This is more truly death than the death of friends, than the death of youth. I am the swathed figure in the hairdresser's shop taking up only so much space.

“现在，这个自我，就在我倚着大门，俯瞰下面波浪滚滚一般的缤纷田野时，却毫无回应。他毫无反驳之意。他毫无表现之辞。他并没握紧拳头。我等待着。我倾听者。毫无动静，丝毫没有。这时我哭了起来，幡然醒悟：我被完全抛弃了，现在什么都没有了。没有鱼鳍来冲破这沉寂的汪洋大海。生活已经把我摧毁了。我说话时没了生花妙语，没有丝毫回音。这是真实的死，比朋友之死、青春之死更为真实。我是理发店里被裹的那个人，只占有那么大一块地方。

'The scene beneath me withered. It was like the eclipse when the sun went out and left the earth, flourishing in full summer foliage, withered, brittle, false. Also I saw on a winding road in a dust dance the groups we had made, how they came together, how they ate together, how they met in this room or that. I saw my own indefatigable busyness—how I had rushed from one to the other, fetched and carried, travelled and returned, joined this group and that, here kissed, here withdrawn; always kept hard at it by some extraordinary purpose, with my nose to the ground like a dog on the scent; with an occasional toss of the head, an occasional cry of amazement, despair and then back again with my nose to the scent. What a litter—what a confusion; with here birth, here death; succulence and sweetness; effort and anguish; and myself always running hither and thither. Now it was done with. I had no more appetites to glut; no more stings in me with which to poison people; no more sharp teeth and clutching hands or desire to feel the pear and the grape and the sun beating down from the orchard wall.

“在我下面的景物凋零了。好像日蚀时，太阳隐没了，使得夏季里原本蓊郁的大地一派凋零景象，脆弱而不真实。同时我看见尘土飞扬的一条弯路上出现了我们这伙人，他们一起走来，一起吃饭，相聚在某个房间。我看见自己不知疲倦地忙碌着——匆匆地从一个地方赶到另一个地方，打打杂，外出旅行，还得回来，加入这一团体，或者那一组织，时而亲吻，时而回避；老是因为某种离奇的意志而苦苦纠缠于这些事，我的鼻子贴着地面，就像一条追踪气味的狗；偶尔晃一晃脑袋，偶尔发出惊诧、绝望的叫声，然后我继续用鼻子嗅着气味。多么凌乱——多么令人困惑；时而是生，时而是死；鲜美与香甜；昂扬与苦闷；而我自己一直在四处奔跑。现在一切都完结了。我不再有狼吞虎咽的胃口；不再有扎人的毒刺；不再有锋利无比的牙齿和抓取有力的双手，也不再渴望在果园的墙上抚摸那梨子和葡萄，受那灼人的日晒了。

'The woods had vanished; the earth was a waste of shadow. No sound broke the silence of the wintry landscape. No cock crowed; no smoke rose; no train moved. A man without a self, I said. A heavy body leaning on a gate. A dead man. With dispassionate despair, with entire disillusionment, I surveyed the dust dance; my life, my friends' lives, and those fabulous presences, men with brooms, women writing, the willow tree by the river—clouds and phantoms made of dust too, of dust that changed, as clouds lose and gain and take gold or red and lose their summits and billow this way and that, mutable, vain. I, carrying a notebook, making phrases, had recorded mere changes; a shadow. I had been sedulous to take note of shadows. How can I proceed now, I said, without a self, weightless and visionless, through a world weightless, without illusion?

“树林消失了；大地变成一片沉寂的暗影。没有任何声音来打破这冬日的景致。没有鸡鸣；没有炊烟升起；没有火车开过。一个没有自我的人，我说。倚在门上的一具沉重的躯体。一个死人。怀着失去激情的绝望，怀着完完全全的醒悟，我审视着这场尘埃之舞；我的人生，朋友们的人生，还有那些传说中的幽灵，手持扫帚的男人们，写信的女人们，河畔的那棵柳树——也都是尘埃凝成的浮云与幻影，同样的尘埃变幻，恰如浮云有消有长，或金黄或嫣红，与峰顶若即若离，忽左忽右，飘忽无定，虚幻无凭。我呢，携着记事本，编着五花八门的词藻，只不过记录了一些变幻；一片暗影而已。我一直勤勤恳恳地记录着种种幻影。现在我还怎么能够继续，我说道，在失去自我、既无轻重又无远见的情况下行进在一个毫无轻重、毫无梦幻的世界里呢？

'The heaviness of my despondency thrust open the gate I leant on and pushed me, an elderly man, a heavy man with grey hair, through the colourless field, the empty field. No more to hear echoes, no more to see phantoms, to conjure up no opposition, but to walk always unshadowed, making no impress upon the dead earth. If even there had been sheep munching, pushing one foot after another, or a bird, or a man driving a spade into the earth, had there been a bramble to trip me, or a ditch, damp with soaked leaves, into which to fall—but no, the melancholy path led along the level, to more wintriness and pallor and the equal and uninteresting view of the same landscape.

“我的沮丧如此沉重，终于撞开了我倚靠的那扇门，把我，这个上了年纪的人，一个白发苍苍、身子笨重的人，推进那颜色暗淡的田野，那空荡荡的田野。再也听不见回声，再也看不见幻影，或召来虚构的敌人，只是无忧无虑地一直走下去，在这死寂的大地上不留下任何印记。即使有羊群在大口吃草，前脚后脚地推进，或者一只鸟儿，或者一个正把铁锹铲进泥土的汉子，假如有一簇荆棘绊了我一跤，或者一道沟渠，湿漉漉的，有树叶浸泡在里面，而我跌了进去——可是都没有，只有这条忧郁的小路平坦地向前伸延，伸向那片愈发寒冷、苍白而从来都是单调、乏味的风景。

'How then does light return to the world after the eclipse of the sun? Miraculously. Frailly. In thin stripes. It hangs like a glass cage. It is a hoop to be fractured by a tiny jar. There is a spark there. Next moment a flush of dun. Then a vapour as if earth were breathing in and out, once, twice, for the first time. Then under the dullness someone walks with a green light. Then off twists a white wraith. The woods throb blue and green, and gradually the fields drink in red, gold, brown. Suddenly a river snatches a blue light. The earth absorbs colour like a sponge slowly drinking water. It puts on weight; rounds itself; hangs pendent; settles and swings beneath our feet.

“那么在日蚀之后，光明是如何回归这个世界的呢？奇迹般地。弱弱地。呈细微的条纹状。像个玻璃做的笼子挂在那儿。一个小小的罐子也会弄断它的环儿。那里有一星火花。下一刻又出现了一片暗褐色。接着升起一团水汽，仿佛混沌初开，大地一呼一吸，一下，两下。然后有人在昏暗之中提着一盏绿莹莹的灯走来了。随后一道白色的魅影盘旋着渐渐散去。树林颤动着，露出蓝色和绿色，渐渐地，田野也陶醉在红色、金黄色与棕褐色之中了。突然，一条河捕捉到了一线蓝光。大地吸收着色彩，就像一块正在慢慢吸水的海绵。它越来越重；变得圆润；垂了下去；稳稳地下沉，落在我们脚下。

'So the landscape returned to me; so I saw the fields rolling in waves of colour beneath me, but now with this difference; I saw but was not seen. I walked unshadowed; I came unheralded. From me had dropped the old cloak, the old response; the hollowed hand that beats back sounds. Thin as a ghost, leaving no trace where I trod, perceiving merely, I walked alone in a new world, never trodden; brushing new flowers, unable to speak save in a child's words of one syllable; without shelter from phrases—I who have made so many; unattended, I who have always gone with my kind; solitary, I who have always had someone to share the empty grate, or the cupboard with its hanging loop of gold.

“就这样，那熟悉的风景又回到我的眼前；就这样，我看到了脚下波浪滚滚一般的缤纷田野，但是现在有一点不同；我在看风景，却无人看我。我的行走无忧无虑；我的到来毫无征兆。没有了往日那件斗篷，没有了往日的回应；也没有了总能击打出回响的中空的手。我独自走在一个从未来过的新世界，像幽灵一样轻盈，走在哪儿都不留任何痕迹，只是在细细地观察；当我与清新的花朵擦身而过，却只能像小孩子似的说些单音节的词语；没有了词藻的庇荫——而我曾经编造出那么多啊；没有人理会我——而我的身边曾一直不乏声气相投的同类啊；我离群索居——而曾经一直有人愿意与我分享那清空的炉栅或挂着金圈的食橱啊。

'But how describe the world seen without a self? There are no words. Blue, red—even they distract, even they hide with thickness instead of letting the light through. How describe or say anything in articulate words again?—save that it fades, save that it undergoes a gradual transformation, becomes, even in the course of one short walk, habitual—this scene also. Blindness returns as one moves and one leaf repeats another. Loveliness returns as one looks, with all its train of phantom phrases. One breathes in and out substantial breath; down in the valley the train draws across the fields lop-eared with smoke.

“但是如何来描述失去自我情况下所见到的世界呢？找不到任何词语。蓝色，红色——就连这些词也不知溜到哪里去了，严严实实地藏了起来，藏在阳光照不到的地方。如何再一次用传情达意的词语来描绘或述说一切呢？——除了说它渐渐逝去，除了说它经历了一场渐进的变革，甚至也可以说是在一次习惯性的短暂散步中变成了眼前这幅景象。当你在走动而一片一片叶子却没什么两样时，茫然的感觉就会重现。当你带着一连串虚幻的词藻驻足观瞧时，美好的感觉就会重现。你吸进、呼出的气息具有实质的意义；在下面的山谷中，火车拖着垂耳似的烟缕驶过田野。

'But for a moment I had sat on the turf somewhere high above the flow of the sea and the sound of the woods, had seen the house, the garden, and the waves breaking. The old nurse who turns the pages of the picture-book had stopped and had said, "Look. This is the truth."

“但是有那么一会儿，我坐在草地上，高踞于汹涌的大海和嘈杂的树林之上，我望见了那幢房子，那座花园，还有拍岸的海浪。那位一页一页翻着图画书的老保姆停了下来，说道：‘瞧。这就是真相。’

'So I was thinking as I came along Shaftesbury Avenue to-night. I was thinking of that page in the picture-book. And when I met you in the place where one goes to hang up one's coat I said to myself, "It does not matter whom I meet. All this little affair of 'being' is over. Who this is I do not know; nor care; we will dine together." So I hung up my coat, tapped you on the shoulder, and said, "Sit with me."

“这就是今晚我走在沙夫茨伯里大街上时所想的。我在想图画书里的那一页。当我在挂外衣的地方遇见你时，我对自己说：‘我遇见谁都无所谓。“生命”这件小事完全结束了。这人是谁，我不知道；也不在乎；反正我们要一起吃饭。’所以我挂上外衣，拍拍你的肩膀，说：‘陪我坐坐吧。’

'Now the meal is finished; we are surrounded by peelings and breadcrumbs. I have tried to break off this bunch and hand it you; but whether there is substance or truth in it I do not know. Nor do I know exactly where we are. What city does that stretch of sky look down upon? Is it Paris, is it London where we sit, or some southern city of pink-washed houses lying under cypresses, under high mountains, where eagles soar? I do not at this moment feel certain.

“现在饭吃完了；我们四周到处都是果皮和面包屑。我曾试图把这札东西拆开递给你；但其中包含着实质还是真相，我并不知道。我也不知道我们的准确所在。那一片天空俯视着哪一座城市？我们坐着的地方是巴黎，是伦敦，还是某个南方城市，那里雄鹰翱翔，一座座粉红色的房屋卧在高山脚下、柏树林中？这会儿我也把握不准。

'I begin now to forget; I begin to doubt the fixity of tables, the reality of here and now, to tap my knuckles smartly upon the edges of apparently solid objects and say, "Are you hard?" I have seen so many different things, have made so many different sentences. I have lost in the process of eating and drinking and rubbing my eyes along surfaces that thin, hard shell which cases the soul, which, in youth, shuts one in—hence the fierceness, and the tap, tap, tap of the remorseless beaks of the young. And now I ask, "Who am I?" I have been talking of Bernard, Neville, Jinny, Susan, Rhoda and Louis. Am I all of them? Am I one and distinct? I do not know. We sat here together. But now Percival is dead, and Rhoda is dead; we are divided; we are not here. Yet I cannot find any obstacle separating us. There is no division between me and them. As I talked I felt "I am you". This difference we make so much of, this identity we so feverishly cherish, was overcome. Yes, ever since old Mrs Constable lifted her sponge and pouring warm water over me covered me with flesh I have been sensitive, percipient. Here on my brow is the blow I got when Percival fell. Here on the nape of my neck is the kiss Jinny gave Louis. My eyes fill with Susan's tears. I see far away, quivering like a gold thread, the pillar Rhoda saw, and feel the rush of the wind of her flight when she leapt.

“现在我开始忘事了；我开始怀疑一张张桌子的稳固性，此时此地的真实性，我用指关节潇洒地敲着那些看似坚固的东西的边沿，说道：‘你结实吗？’我见过那么多不同的东西，造过那么多不同的词句。我曾迷恋于吃啊、喝啊、揉着眼睛探询那层包容灵魂的薄薄的硬壳，年轻时，这层外壳总是把一个人封锁起来——因此年轻人的利喙才会那么凶猛、那么冷酷地啄啊，啄啊，啄啊。此刻我自问：‘我是谁？’我一直谈到伯纳德、内维尔、吉尼、苏珊、罗达和路易斯。我是他们全部吗？我是其中唯一而独特的那个吗？我不知道。我们曾一起坐在这里。但是现在，珀西瓦尔死了，罗达也死了；我们分道扬镳；我们不在这里。可是我找不出任何障碍会将我们分散。我与他们之间毫无分隔。我说话时感觉‘我就是你’。我们人为造成的那么大的彼此差异，我们那么狂热看重的各自身份，是站不住脚的。是的，自从老康斯特布尔太太举起她的海绵、把温暖的水浇在我的身上使我充满了肉欲的那时候起，我就一直多愁善感。我额头的伤口是珀西瓦尔坠马时留下的。我脖颈后面是吉尼给路易斯的亲吻。我的眼睛满含苏珊的泪水。我望见远方罗达曾经看见的像一条金线似的微微颤动的那根廊柱，感觉到她飞跃时带起的那股迅疾的风。

'Thus when I come to shape here at this table between my hands the story of my life and set it before you as a complete thing, I have to recall things gone far, gone deep, sunk into this life or that and become part of it; dreams, too, things surrounding me, and the inmates, those old half-articulate ghosts who keep up their hauntings by day and night; who turn over in their sleep, who utter their confused cries, who put out their phantom fingers and clutch at me as I try to escape—shadows of people one might have been; unborn selves. There is the old brute, too, the savage, the hairy man who dabbles his fingers in ropes of entrails; and gobbles and belches; whose speech is guttural, visceral—well, he is here. He squats in me. To-night he has been feasted on quails, salad, and sweetbread. He now holds a glass of fine old brandy in his paw. He brindles, purrs and shoots warm thrills all down my spine as I sip. It is true, he washes his hands before dinner, but they are still hairy. He buttons on trousers and waistcoats, but they contain the same organs. He jibs if I keep him waiting for dinner. He mops and mows perpetually, pointing with his half-idiot gestures of greed and covetousness at what he desires. I assure you, I have great difficulty sometimes in controlling him. That man, the hairy, the ape-like, has contributed his part to my life. He has given a greener glow to green things, has held his torch with its red flames, its thick and smarting smoke, behind every leaf. He has lit up the cool garden even. He has brandished his torch in murky by-streets where girls suddenly seem to shine with a red and intoxicating translucency. Oh, he has tossed his torch high! He has led me wild dances!

“因此，当我在这张桌子这儿，在我的双手之间，一点一点捻弄出我的人生故事，并把它作为一件完整的作品摆在你的面前时，我不得不回忆起许多事情，它们已经变得久远，变得深邃，渗入某段生活并与其融为一体；还有许多梦想，我周围的事物，同住一室的伙伴们，那些往日里若隐若现不分黑白一直纠缠着我的幽灵；它们在睡梦中翻身，它们发出迷乱的叫喊，它们在我试图逃跑时伸出虚无缥缈的手指紧紧抓住我——它们都是你也许会成为的那些人的影子；尚未出生的自我。还有那个老畜生，那个野人，那个手指上湿淋淋地缠着一段段肠子的长毛人；他狼吞虎咽，然后打着饱嗝；他说话带着喉音，发自内心——嗯，他也在这儿。他盘踞在我身上。今晚他已经饱尝了鹌鹑、色拉和杂碎。现在他的爪子端着一杯精美的陈年白兰地。我抿了一口，他立时起了波澜，咕噜咕噜地，使我整个脊梁骨上感到阵阵酥麻。他的手在吃饭前的确洗过，但还是毛烘烘的。他的裤子和马甲都系着扣子，但里面的器官还是一样。要是我让他等会儿吃饭，他就会不肯。他会一直做出愁眉苦脸的样子，带着既馋又贪、近乎白痴的神情指着他想吃的东西。跟你说实话，有时候我很难控制住他。这个人，这个毛烘烘的、猿人似的人，已经影响了我的一部分生活。他曾让绿色的东西发出更加绿莹莹的光彩，曾在每一片树叶后面举起他那支闪着红色火苗、冒着刺激的浓烟的火炬。他甚至曾经照亮过那冷清的花园。他曾在阴暗的胡同挥舞着他的火炬，那儿的女孩们似乎突然之间焕发出红艳通透、醉人的光彩。哦，他曾高高地扬起那支火炬！他曾引领我肆意狂舞！

'But no more. Now to-night, my body rises tier upon tier like some cool temple whose floor is strewn with carpets and murmurs rise and the altars stand smoking; but up above, here in my serene head, comes only fine gusts of melody, waves of incense, while the lost dove wails, and the banners tremble above tombs, and the dark airs of midnight shake trees outside the open windows. When I look down from this transcendency, how beautiful are even the crumbled relics of bread! What shapely spirals the peelings of pears make—how thin, and mottled like some sea-bird's egg. Even the forks laid straight side by side appear lucid, logical, exact; and the horns of the rolls which we have left are glazed, yellow-plated, hard. I could worship my hand even, with its fan of bones laced by blue mysterious veins and its astonishing look of aptness, suppleness and ability to curl softly or suddenly crush—its infinite sensibility.

“但一切都已不再。今晚，此刻，我的躯体一层一层浮了起来，好像某个肃穆的庙宇，地上铺着一块块毡子，四下传来喃喃低语，祭坛上面烟雾缭绕；但在最高层，浮现在我平静的脑海中的，只有阵阵优美的旋律，绵绵不绝的馨香，同时，那只失群的鸽子不住地哀鸣，坟墓上面的旗帜飘摇不定，午夜里幽暗的风摇曳着敞开的窗子外面的树。当我透过这样的超然心境俯视下界时，即便那面包的碎屑也显得多么美啊！那些梨的皮是多么美观的螺旋形状啊——多么薄，色彩斑斓，像某种海鸟的蛋。甚至那些整齐地并排放着的叉子也显得晶莹剔透，有条有理，丝毫不乱；我们吃剩的圆面包的角质部分像上了一层釉，镀了一层黄色，看上去硬硬的。我甚至可以向我的手顶礼膜拜，它像把扇子，上面的一根根骨头饰有神秘的蓝色纹理，看上去出奇地灵活，柔软，能轻轻地蜷起来，也能突然把东西捏碎——它无比灵敏。

'Immeasurably receptive, holding everything, trembling with fullness, yet clear, contained—so my being seems, now that desire urges it no more out and away; now that curiosity no longer dyes it a thousand colours. It lies deep, tideless, immune, now that he is dead, the man I called "Bernard", the man who kept a book in his pocket in which he made notes—phrases for the moon, notes of features; how people looked, turned, dropped their cigarette ends; under B, butterfly powder, under D, ways of naming death. But now let the door open, the glass door that is for ever turning on its hinges. Let a woman come, let a young man in evening-dress with a moustache sit down: is there anything that they can tell me? No! I know all that, too. And if she suddenly gets up and goes, "My dear," I say, "you no longer make me look after you." The shock of the falling wave which has sounded all my life, which woke me so that I saw the gold loop on the cupboard, no longer makes quiver what I hold.

“无限地接受，容纳一切，因充实而颤抖，却又清醒而泰然自若——我的生命似乎就是这样，因为欲望不再那么强烈地驱使它；因为好奇心不再给它染上千变万化的色彩。它变得深沉，波澜不惊，百毒不侵，因为他已经死了，那个人，我称之为‘伯纳德’，那个人的口袋里总是揣个本子，不停地记录——对月亮的描绘，对容貌的刻画；人们如何观望，如何转身，如何丢掉烟头；B栏下面记着‘蝴蝶粉末’，D栏下面记着‘死的各种名目’。但是现在，让那扇门，那扇一直在铰链上转个不休的玻璃门，打开吧。让一个女人进来，让一个穿着晚礼服、留着小胡子的年轻人坐下来：有什么他们可以跟我讲的吗？没有！所有的一切我也都知道。如果她突然起身要走，‘亲爱的，’我会说，‘你不再让我留恋你的背影了。’那海浪崩落的震荡，曾响彻我的一生，曾把我惊醒，让我看到了橱柜上的金色光圈，如今再也不会让我拿不稳手中的东西了。

'So now, taking upon me the mystery of things, I could go like a spy without leaving this place, without stirring from my chair. I can visit the remote verges of the desert lands where the savage sits by the camp-fire. Day rises; the girl lifts the watery fire-hearted jewels to her brow; the sun levels his beams straight at the sleeping house; the waves deepen their bars; they fling themselves on shore; back blows the spray; sweeping their waters they surround the boat and the sea-holly. The birds sing in chorus; deep tunnels run between the stalks of flowers; the house is whitened; the sleeper stretches; gradually all is astir. Light floods the room and drives shadow beyond shadow to where they hang in folds inscrutable. What does the central shadow hold? Something? Nothing? I do not know.

“所以现在，因为领略了事物的奥秘，我无须离开此地、无须从我的椅子里起身就能像间谍一样溜出门去。我可以游走在偏僻的沙漠边陲，在那儿有个野人坐在篝火旁。白昼来临；少女把如水似的中心火红的宝石戴上额头；太阳的光线平行地直射在那幢沉睡的房子上；海浪波纹变深了；它们猛冲向岸边；浪花溅了回来；翻涌着，漫过了小船和海滨刺芹。鸟儿齐声合唱；幽深的孔隙通向花茎之间；房子现出白色；睡觉的人伸着懒腰；渐渐地，一切开始了活动。阳光涌进房间，一点一点把阴影赶进犄角旮旯，使它们神秘秘地重合着悬在那儿。最中心的阴影里包裹着什么呢？是有？是无？我不清楚。

'Oh, but there is your face. I catch your eye. I, who had been thinking myself so vast, a temple, a church, a whole universe, unconfined and capable of being everywhere on the verge of things and here too, am now nothing but what you see—an elderly man, rather heavy, grey above the ears, who (I see myself in the glass) leans one elbow on the table, and holds in his left hand a glass of old brandy. That is the blow you have dealt me. I have walked bang into the pillar-box. I reel from side to side. I put my hands to my head. My hat is off—I have dropped my stick. I have made an awful ass of myself and am justly laughed at by any passer-by.

“哦，但那是你的脸啊。我捕捉到你的目光。我啊，一直认为自己如此浩大，像一座庙宇，像一座教堂，像整个宇宙，自由自在，可以抵达事物边缘的任何一处，这儿也不例外，现在什么也不是，除了你看到的这幅样子——一个上了年纪的人，身子相当笨重，两鬓花白，他（我在镜子里看到我自己）把一只胳膊肘支在桌子上，左手端着一杯陈年白兰地。这就是你曾给我造成的创伤。我曾走路时嘭地撞上邮筒。我踉踉跄跄。我用手摸摸脑袋。我的帽子没了——我的拐杖也撒手了。我让自己出尽了洋相，每个过路人都有理由笑我。

'Lord, how unutterably disgusting life is! What dirty tricks it plays us, one moment free; the next, this. Here we are among the breadcrumbs and the stained napkins again. That knife is already congealing with grease. Disorder, sordidity and corruption surround us. We have been taking into our mouths the bodies of dead birds. It is with these greasy crumbs, slobbered over napkins, and little corpses that we have to build. Always it begins again; always there is the enemy; eyes meeting ours; fingers twitching ours; the effort waiting. Call the waiter. Pay the bill. We must pull ourselves up out of our chairs. We must find our coats. We must go. Must, must, must—detestable word. Once more, I who had thought myself immune, who had said, "Now I am rid of all that," find that the wave has tumbled me over, head over heels, scattering my possessions, leaving me to collect, to assemble, to heap together, summon my forces, rise and confront the enemy.

“天啊，生活是多么无法言说的令人厌恶！它向我们施展多么卑鄙的手段啊，一个瞬间让人自由自在；下一个瞬间却是这样。这会儿我们又身处面包屑和脏餐巾之中了。那把刀已经凝上了油脂。混乱、肮脏和腐败包围着我们。我们一直在把死禽的肉体塞进我们口中。正是有了这些令人馋涎欲滴的油腻的碎屑和小小的尸体我们才得以强健。这种事情周而复始地发生；死敌永远存在；与我们目光相接；与我们手指相较；伺机而动。招呼服务生。结账。我们必须费力撑起自己离开我们的座椅。我们必须找到我们的外衣。我们必须走。必须，必须，必须——这个可恶的词。又一次，我，这个曾认为自己百毒不侵的人，这个曾说‘瞧，我抛开了一切’的人，发现海浪将我掀翻，从头到脚，把我拥有的一切冲得七零八落，让我来收拾、整理、堆积到一起，然后召集力量，挺身而起，面对敌人。

'It is strange that we, who are capable of so much suffering, should inflict so much suffering. Strange that the face of a person whom I scarcely know save that I think we met once on the gangway of a ship bound for Africa—a mere adumbration of eyes, cheeks, nostrils—should have power to inflict this insult. You look, eat, smile, are bored, pleased, annoyed—that is all I know. Yet this shadow which has sat by me for an hour or two, this mask from which peep two eyes, has power to drive me back, to pinion me down among all those other faces, to shut me in a hot room; to send me dashing like a moth from candle to candle.

“说来奇怪，我们本身承受着那么多痛苦，竟然也给别人造成那么多痛苦。奇怪的是，一个人的脸庞，那个人我几乎不认识，我想我们只是在开往非洲去的一艘船的舷梯上见过一面——只留下眼睛、面颊、鼻孔的大致轮廓——竟能造成这样的伤害。你瞧着，吃着，微笑着，感到厌倦，满意，生气——我只知道这些。可是这个坐在我身旁有一两个小时的影子，这幅只把眼睛露在外面的面具，却能把我逼回去，将我绑缚在另外那些面孔当中，关进一间闷热的屋子里；令我像一只飞蛾扑向一支支蜡烛。

'But wait. While they add up the bill behind the screen, wait one moment. Now that I have reviled you for the blow that sent me staggering among peelings and crumblings and old scraps of meat, I will record in words of one syllable how also under your gaze with that compulsion on me I begin to perceive this, that and the other. The clock ticks; the woman sneezes; the waiter comes—there is a gradual coming together, running into one, acceleration and unification. Listen: a whistle sounds, wheels rush, the door creaks on its hinges. I regain the sense of the complexity and the reality and the struggle, for which I thank you. And with some pity, some envy and much good will, take your hand and bid you good night.

“但是等等。趁着他们隔着屏风在核算账单的时候，稍等一下吧。既然我曾斥责过你给我的那沉重一击，使我在果皮、面包屑和陈年肉渣之间立脚不稳，那么我要用一些单音节词来记录，我是如何同时在你那种强迫的目光注视之下开始认识到这个、那个以及其他种种的。时钟嘀嗒；女人打着喷嚏；服务生过来了——逐渐聚拢，汇合，加速，统一。听：一声汽笛，车轮滚滚，门在铰链上吱吱嘎嘎。我又找到了那种复杂、现实和挣扎的感觉，为此我要感谢你。怀着一点怜悯、一点羡慕和极大的好意，我要握住你的手，祝你晚安。

'Heaven be praised for solitude! I am alone now. That almost unknown person has gone, to catch some train, to take some cab, to go to some place or person whom I do not know. The face looking at me has gone. The pressure is removed. Here are empty coffee-cups. Here are chairs turned but nobody sits on them. Here are empty tables and nobody any more coming to dine at them to-night.

“感谢天赐孤独！我现在孤身一人。那个几乎素不相识的人已经走了，搭上某一趟火车，坐上某一辆出租车，去往某个地方，或者去找某个我不认识的人了。望着我的那张脸不见了。压力解除了。这儿是一个个空的咖啡杯子。这儿是一把把转动的椅子，却没有人坐在上面。这儿是一张张空桌子，今晚不会再有人来吃饭了。

'Let me now raise my song of glory. Heaven be praised for solitude. Let me be alone. Let me cast and throw away this veil of being, this cloud that changes with the least breath, night and day, and all night and all day. While I sat here I have been changing. I have watched the sky change. I have seen clouds cover the stars, then free the stars, then cover the stars again. Now I look at their changing no more. Now no one sees me and I change no more. Heaven be praised for solitude that has removed the pressure of the eye, the solicitation of the body, and all need of lies and phrases.

“让我此刻高唱颂歌吧。感谢天赐孤独。让我独自一人吧。让我扯下并扔掉这生命的面纱吧，这片阴云，随着最轻微的呼吸而变化，夜以继日，昼夜不休。刚才坐在这儿的时候，我一直在变化。我观察到天空的变化。我看见乌云遮住了星辰，释放出星辰，再一次遮住了星辰。现在我不再观望它们的变化了。现在没有人看见我，我也不再变化了。感谢天赐孤独，让我摆脱了目光的压力、肉体的诱惑，也无需编造任何谎言和词藻。

'My book, stuffed with phrases, has dropped to the floor. It lies under the table, to be swept up by the charwoman when she comes wearily at dawn looking for scraps of paper, old tram tickets, and here and there a note screwed into a ball and left with the litter to be swept up. What is the phrase for the moon? And the phrase for love? By what name are we to call death? I do not know. I need a little language such as lovers use, words of one syllable such as children speak when they come into the room and find their mother sewing and pick up some scrap of bright wool, a feather, or a shred of chintz. I need a howl; a cry. When the storm crosses the marsh and sweeps over me where I lie in the ditch unregarded I need no words. Nothing neat. Nothing that comes down with all its feet on the floor. None of those resonances and lovely echoes that break and chime from nerve to nerve in our breasts, making wild music, false phrases. I have done with phrases.

“我那本充塞了各种词藻的记事簿掉在了地上。它躺在桌子下面，即将被那个打杂女佣扫走，天不亮她就会睡眼惺忪地赶来，搜寻纸屑、用过的电车票和随处可见的揉作一团混同垃圾的便条，然后把它们统统扫走。用什么词来描绘月亮？用什么词来描述爱情？我们该如何给死亡定名？我不知道。我需要一种小巧的语言，就像情人之间使用的那种，一些单音节的词，就像孩子们走进房间，发现妈妈在缝纫，就拾起一些彩色线绒、一片羽毛或一块碎布条时，他们说出的那种词。我需要一种嚎叫；一种呐喊。当暴风雨掠过沼泽地，从我头上横扫而过，我正躺在沟渠里，无人过问，这时我无需任何词语。无需任何整洁优雅的东西。无需任何伴着地板上的步伐款款走来的事物。无需任何共鸣和美妙的回响，它们总是戛然而止，然后在我们胸膛里的一根根神经之间鸣响，形成狂乱的音乐和虚伪的词藻。我已受够词藻了。

'How much better is silence; the coffee-cup, the table. How much better to sit by myself like the solitary sea-bird that opens its wings on the stake. Let me sit here for ever with bare things, this coffee-cup, this knife, this fork, things in themselves, myself being myself. Do not come and worry me with your hints that it is time to shut the shop and be gone. I would willingly give all my money that you should not disturb me but will let me sit on and on, silent, alone.

“沉默多么美好；像咖啡杯子和桌子一样。一个人坐着多么美好，像那木桩上晾翅的孤独的海鸟一样。让我永远坐在这儿吧，陪伴这些单纯的东西，这只咖啡杯子，这把刀子，这把叉子，它们是它们，我是我。别过来打扰我，提示我已经到了打烊的时候，该走了。我情愿掏出身上所有的钱，求你别打扰我，让我一直这样坐着，一个人静静地坐着。

'But now the head waiter, who has finished his own meal, appears and frowns; he takes his muffler from his pocket and ostentatiously makes ready to go. They must go; must put up the shutters, must fold the table-cloths, and give one brush with a wet mop under the tables.

“但这时，那位吃完了饭的领班走了出来，皱起了眉头；他从衣袋里掏出他的围巾，夸张地做出准备要走的架势。他们必须要走；必须升起卷闸门，必须叠好桌布，然后用湿拖把拖一拖桌子下面。

'Curse you then. However beat and done with it all I am, I must haul myself up, and find the particular coat that belongs to me; must push my arms into the sleeves; must muffle myself up against the night air and be off. I, I, I, tired as I am, spent as I am, and almost worn out with all this rubbing of my nose along the surfaces of things, even I, an elderly man who is getting rather heavy and dislikes exertion, must take myself off and catch some last train.

“那么真该死。不管我多么疲惫不堪并厌烦所有这一切，我必须硬撑着自己站起来，找到属于我的那件外衣；必须把我的胳膊伸进衣袖；必须把我自己裹严实，不透夜风，然后来到门外。我，我，我，尽管我感到厌烦，尽管我感到疲惫，而且刚才那番硬碰硬的直接交锋几乎弄得我精疲力尽，即便如此，我，一个身子相当笨重而且不愿再操心发奋的老人，还必须自己出门，去赶那末班的火车。

'Again I see before me the usual street. The canopy of civilization is burnt out. The sky is dark as polished whalebone. But there is a kindling in the sky whether of lamplight or of dawn. There is a stir of some sort—sparrows on plane trees somewhere chirping. There is a sense of the break of day. I will not call it dawn. What is dawn in the city to an elderly man standing in the street looking up rather dizzily at the sky? Dawn is some sort of whitening of the sky; some sort of renewal. Another day; another Friday; another twentieth of March, January, or September. Another general awakening. The stars draw back and are extinguished. The bars deepen themselves between the waves. The film of mist thickens on the fields. A redness gathers on the roses, even on the pale rose that hangs by the bedroom window. A bird chirps. Cottagers light their early candles. Yes, this is the eternal renewal, the incessant rise and fall and fall and rise again.

“又一次，我看到面前那熟悉的街道。文明的华盖已燃烧殆尽。天空如抛光的鲸骨一样昏暗。但是天边有一丝星火，不知是灯光还是曙光。传来某种骚动——某个地方的悬铃树上有麻雀在叽叽喳喳。有一种天将破晓的感觉。我不愿称之为黎明。城市的黎明对于一个站在大街上头昏眼花地望着天空的老人来说意味着什么呢？黎明意味着天空发白；意味着新生。又一天；又一个星期五；又一个20号，三月，一月，或九月。又一次全体苏醒。星辰隐没，星光消逝。海浪之间的条纹愈发深沉。田野上的雾气愈加浓重。一抹红润凝聚在玫瑰花上，甚至凝聚在卧室窗旁那朵苍白的玫瑰花上。一只鸟亮开歌喉。农舍里的人点亮晨烛。是啊，这是永恒的新生，连绵不绝的潮起潮落，潮落潮起。

'And in me too the wave rises. It swells; it arches its back. I am aware once more of a new desire, something rising beneath me like the proud horse whose rider first spurs and then pulls him back. What enemy do we now perceive advancing against us, you whom I ride now, as we stand pawing this stretch of pavement? It is death. Death is the enemy. It is death against whom I ride with my spear couched and my hair flying back like a young man's, like Percival's, when he galloped in India. I strike spurs into my horse. Against you I will fling myself, unvanquished and unyielding, O Death!'

“而我心中，波浪也在升起。它汹涌着；它挺起脊梁。我又一次察觉到一股新的渴望，有什么东西从我心底涌上来，好像一匹骄傲的奔马，它背上的骑手先是踢了一下马刺，却又勒住了缰绳。此时，我骑在你的背上，我们在这段路上不停地扒着蹄子，我们意识到什么样的敌人正向我们逼近呢？是死亡。那敌人就是死亡。我正是朝着死亡策马奔去，长矛端在手中，头发向后飞扬，像年轻人一样，像珀西瓦尔在印度跃马驰骋时那样。我用马刺连连踢打我的马。嗨，死亡！我要向你猛冲过去，永不言败，永不屈服。”

The waves broke on the shore.

海浪拍岸，纷纷碎裂。

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