[翻译] 那些沉默的话语

母亲读书,总喜欢裁下文章中一段或一句内容,贴在厨房的墙壁上。她有时会挑出一些无聊的句子,使我很迷惑。但我更爱取一支柔而色轻的二号铅笔,把那些触到我心弦的词句抄在一本日记里,逐字逐句。

她对此则一无所知。这没什么可奇怪的:我们谈话时,很少从某个具体的话题谈起——虽然我们每周都会打一个电话,聊得也很开心,有时甚至会到我笑得喘不过气、她流出泪来的程度。但是我们不会聊的话题数不胜数。和父亲的争吵。学校里发生的挫折。那些实在让我们不高兴的事情。

母亲从未对我说过“我爱你,莉莎。”——好像这四个字的缺失解释了我的身份——于是我怀揣着它前行,就像是带着一张标签。上次她差点说出这几个字,还是两年之前有一次她打来电话,告诉我说,她的一个朋友住院了。我说,“我爱你,妈妈。”她顿了一下,又说:“谢谢你。”那之后我就没说过这句话,但我一直好奇为什么母亲没有开口,直到一首诗的出现,以文字填补上了我们的对话当中我一直想理解的那些空白:

别只拿面包填肚子。我随口说。桌上的菜还多着呢。
我那中年的儿子说:你刚刚真的是在对我说话吗?
他所不知道的是,我们同行时,我总想拉住他的手。

它很朴素,但使人心碎。我把它抄在了日记里,又发给了妈妈,加了一句“这首诗让我想起了你。”母亲不读诗——或至少,她没告诉过我,我在点下“发送”时也有些紧张。

她从未提到过这首诗。然而此后第一次放假回家时,我注意到了厨房里多了一些东西:是那首诗,被固定在一块简朴的木板上。木板挂在暖炉上方,那是厨房里最温暖的地方。那首诗一直挂在那里。我的母亲和我都从未提到过它。


原文

When reading, my mother likes to slice a paragraph or a sentence out and attach it to the wall of her kitchen. She picks boring sentences that puzzle me. But I prefer copying favorite bright lines into a journal in soft, gray No.2 pencil, word by word.

She doesn't know any of this. There's nothing shocking: for our chatting, we seldom begin certain conversations though we talk on the phone weekly, sometimes making each other laugh so hard that I choke and she cries. But what we don't say could fill up rooms. Fights with my father. Small failures in school. Anything that really upsets us.

My mother has never told me "I love you, Lisa."—as if the four-word absence explains who I am—so I carry it with me, like a label on me. The last time she almost spoke the words was two years ago, when she called to tell me a friend had been in hospital. I said,"I love you, Mom." She stopped for a while and then said, "Thank you." I haven't said it since, but I've wondered why my mother doesn't until I've found a poem that supplies words for the blank spaces I try to understand in our conversations:

Don't fill up on bread. I say absent-mindedly. The servings here are huge.
My son, middle-aged, says: Did you really just say that to me?
What he doesn't know is that when we're walking together, I desire to reach for his hand.

It's humble, yet heartbreaking. After copying it down in my journal, I emailed it to mom, adding "This poem makes me think of you." My mother doesn't read poetry—or at least, she doesn't tell me, and I felt nervous clicking "Send".

She never mentioned the poem. But the next time I went home for vacation, I noticed something new in the kitchen fixed to an antique board: the poem. The board hung above the heater, the warmest spot in the kitchen. The poem still hangs there. Neither my mother nor I have ever spoken about it.

译者首评

favorite bright lines
bright 和 boring 相对,这个比较好看出来。剑桥词典告诉我 bright 有 exciting 的意思,直接下拉扣人心弦!但 favorite 作“我喜欢的”时很难插入,不如直接融合在一起,就译成“触动我心弦的”(

failure
我为什么要卡在这里 /ll
剑桥词典告诉我 failure 就是 not succeeding,而挫折有“遭受失败”的意思!

antique board
/kk。在我的理解,antique 直接变成了 classical,剑桥词典告诉我 classical 有 attractive because it has a simple, traditional style 的意思,直接译成简朴!


属于是重操老本行了
但是确实完全不熟练了
老外行 /kk
大概有人知道我在说什么吧 /cy

始末:这是我们期中考试英语 B 篇,当时场上我读到的时候就赞叹不已,写完卷子更是细读了好几遍,打算把它翻译出来留存。
真的很动人心弦吧原文
当然我翻译的可能很拉就是了(
题目为译者自取。

如果有错敬请指出!(但我觉得在博客园发的话啄木鸟就很少了 /kk

木板挂在暖炉上方,那是厨房里最温暖的地方。那首诗一直挂在那里。

posted @ 2023-11-12 07:57  joke3579  阅读(173)  评论(2编辑  收藏  举报