外研版选修三册第六单元阅读讲解

Unit 6 Nature in words

第62页阅读讲解

First Snow
初雪

1 Mr Robert Lynd once said of Jane Austen's characters: “They are people in whose lives a slight fall of snow is an event.” Even at the risk of appearing to this fair and witty reviewer as another Mr Woodhouse, I must insist that last night's fall of snow here was an event. I was nearly as excited about it this morning as the children, whom I found all looking through the window at the magic outside and talking away as excitedly as if Christmas had suddenly come round again. The fact is, however, that the snow was as strange and fascinating to me as it was to them. It is the first fall we have had here this winter, and last year I was out of the country, sweating in a hot climate, during the snowy season, so that it really does seem an age since I saw the ground so fantastically carpeted.
罗伯特·林德先生曾这样评论过简·奥斯汀笔下的人物：“在这些人的生命里，场场小雪皆是大事。”在这位公正睿智的评论家面前，即便是冒着让自己看起来像伍德豪斯先生那样的风险，我也得坚持说：“昨晚这儿的那场雪是件大事。”对于这场雪，我今早近乎像孩子们那样兴奋。孩子们透过窗子看着外面奇妙的世界，兴奋地说个不停，就像圣诞节突然又要来了一般。事实上，这场雪于我而言，也是同样的奇异，同样的迷人。这是今年冬天我们在这里的第一场雪，而在去年的季，我身在异国，在酷热的天气理汗流不止，所以离我上次欣赏到这银装素裹的世界，着实过了些时日了。”

2 The first fall of snow is not only an event but it is a magical event. You go to bed in one kind of world and wake up to find yourself in another quite different, and if this is not magic, then where is it to be found? The very secrecy and quietness of the thing makes it more magical.
这场初雪不仅是一件大事，而且还是一件具有魔力的大事。入睡时，世界是一个模样，醒来则是完全不同的另一番模样，若非有魔力，如何才能这般？神秘，悄然，这给雪又添了几分魔力。

3 When I got up this morning the world was a cold place of dead white and pale blues. The light that came through the windows was very strange, and it made the familiar business of splashing and shaving and brushing and dressing very strange too. Then the sun came out, and by the time I had sat down to breakfast it was shining bravely and flushing the snow with delicate pinks. The dining-room window had been transformed into a lovely Japanese print. The little plum tree outside, with the faintly flushed snow lining its branches and artfully disposed along its trunk, stood in full sunlight.
今早我起床时，世界是一片寂然的白色与浅淡的蓝色，到处清清冷冷。窗子透进来的光线很是怪异，使得洗脸、刮胡子、刷牙、穿衣服这些熟悉的日常行为也显得离奇古怪。接着太阳出来了，等到我坐下来吃早餐时，太阳的光彩已是绚烂夺目，给雪地添了一抹柔和的粉红色。餐厅的窗户成了一幅可爱的日本版画。在阳光的普照之下，屋外的李子树的树干和枝丫被淡粉的积雪精致巧妙地装点着。

4 An hour or two later everything was a cold sparkle of white and blue. The world had completely changed again. The little Japanese prints had all disappeared. I looked out of my study window, over the garden, the field, to the low hills beyond, and the ground went on and on, the sky was thick grey, and all the trees so many black and threatening shapes. There was indeed something curiously disturbing about the whole prospect. It was as if our kindly countryside, close to the very heart of England, had been turned into a cruel grassland. At any moment, it seemed, a body of horsemen might be seen breaking out from the black trees, so many weapons might be heard and some distant spot of snow be reddened. It was that kind of landscape.
一两个小时过后，一切都闪着或白或蓝的微光。世界又彻底改变了模样。小小的日本版画都消失不见了，我从书房看向窗外，越过花园、田野，再望向远处低矮的小山，沿着不断向前延伸的地面望去，天空成了厚重的灰色，所有的树木都显出一副黑駿駿和凶神恶煞的样子。整个景象确实会给人带来一种奇怪的、不安的感受。就好像我们这个靠近英格兰中心位置的亲切小乡村变成了暴躁的草原；仿佛随时可能看见一群骑兵从黑黝黝的树丛中冲出，可能听见武器的交错响声，最后好像看见远处的白雪一点点被血液染红。这幅景象就是给人这种感觉。

5 Now it has changed again. The glare has gone and no touch of the disturbing remains. But the snow is falling heavily, in great soft flakes, so that you can hardly see across the shallow valley, and the roofs are thick and the trees all bending, and the weathercock of the village church, still to be seen through the grey loaded air, has become some creature out of Hans Andersen. From my study, which is apart from the house and faces it, I can see the children flattening their noses against the window, and there is running through my head a rhyme I used to repeat when I was a child and flattened my nose against the cold window to watch the falling snow:
现在，一切又变了。炫目的日光已然消失，也不再有那种紧张不安感。大片柔软的雪花铺天盖地地飘落，遮挡了你的视线，让你几乎看不到浅浅的山谷，屋顶上存了厚厚的雪，树木被压得弯下腰来，村庄教堂的风信鸡在灰蒙蒙的空气中依稀可见，像是从安徒生童话里走出来的活物。我的书房是和房子独立开来的，书房在房子的对面。从书房看去，可以看到孩子们把鼻子抵在窗户上看雪的样子，我的脑海里出现了一首儿歌，那是我小时候将鼻子抵在冰凉的窗户上看雪时会一直重复哼着的歌：

Snow, snow faster:
White alabaster!
Killing geese in Scotland,
Sending feathers here!
下雪吧，下快一点吧：
石膏样的雪白！
在苏格兰宰些鹅，
把雪白的羽毛送到这儿来吧！

(Adaptation from First Snow by John Boynton Priestley)
（改编自约翰·博因顿·普里斯特利的《初雪》）

第68页阅读讲解

Silent Spring
寂静的春天

1 There was a strange stillness. The birds, for example – where had they gone? Many people spoke of them, puzzled and disturbed. The feeding stations in the backyards were deserted. The few birds seen anywhere were moribund; they trembled violently and could not fly. It was a spring without voices. On the mornings that had once throbbed with the dawn chorus of robins, catbirds, doves, jays, wrens, and scores of other bird voices there was now no sound; only silence lay over the fields and woods and marsh.
“一片古怪的寂静笼罩着这里。小鸟都飞到哪里去了？许多人谈论着，茫然困惑惴惴不安。后院的饲养站已经被遗弃，为数不多的几只鸟也奄奄息；它们浑身打战，无法飞翔。这是一个寂静的春天。原本喧闹的清晨，再也没有了知更鸟、北美猫鸟、鸽子、松鸦、熊鸫的奏鸣曲以及其他小鸟的鸣叫声；只留下一片寂静，笼罩在田野、树林和沼泽的上空。”

2 Rachel Carson was a scientist by profession, but these lines from the opening chapter of her 1962 book Silent Spring, “A Fable for Tomorrow”, show her talent as a writer. By imagining a world without birds, she aimed to alert not only the scientific community but also the general public to the damaging effects of human activity on natural ecosystems – in particular, to the harmful use of pesticides, such as DDT. She believed that the chemical industry was knowingly causing harm to plants, animals and even humans, and wished to see pesticides used in a more responsible, limited and carefully monitored way.
蕾切尔·卡森本是一位科学家，但是1962年，她在《寂静的春天》一书的开篇章节“明天的寓言”中的这段描写，展现了她作为作家的天赋。通过想象一个没有鸟儿的世界，她想要警告科学界，提醒公众，人类活动已经对自然界生态系统造成了破坏性的后果，尤其是使用DDT之类的杀虫剂给自然界带来了严重的危害。她认为化学工业正在明目张胆地对动植物，甚至对人类本身造成伤害，她希望人们在使用杀虫剂时能够更加负责、节制，并且严加监管。

3 Carson urged people to make themselves aware of the facts and do something about the situation. Silent Spring contains a lot of scientific research and case studies. The book details the gypsy moth eradication programme, which killed birds, in addition to gypsy moths. Another case study was the fire-ant programme that killed cows, but not fire ants. The book also gives dozens of other examples of eradication programmes that did nothing to reduce the problems they were originally designed to solve. The 50 or so pages at the end of the book list Carson's sources, showing how thorough and precise she was as a scientist.
卡森敦促人们认清事实，并且为此做出努力。《寂静的春天》中含有大量的科学研究和真实案例。在灭除舞毒蛾运动这案例中，她细致讲述了人们在消灭舞毒蛾的同时，也杀死了鸟类；另一个案例则是在开展消灭火蚁计划时，人们杀死的是奶牛，而非火蚁。书中还讲了几十个其他灭除计划的案例，都未能像预期那样解决问题。这本书最后的五十几页列出了卡森的资料来源，显示出她作为一名科学家的周密和严谨。

4 Carson's message was very alarming, causing a great increase in environmental awareness. Its impact was immediate and farreaching: the use of DDT was banned and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was established in the US. Silent Spring was therefore regarded as a milestone in the launch of the green movement in the Western world. It also earned Carson a posthumous Presidential Medal of Freedom and put her face on the 17-cent US stamp.
卡森所述的事实让人们十分担忧，大大提升了人们保护环境的意识。这本书的效果立竿见影，并且影响深远：DDT被禁用；环境保护署也在美国成立。《寂静的春天》因此被视为西方发起绿色运动的里程碑，这使作者在去世后获得了“总统自由勋章”的荣誉，美国17美分的邮票上也印上了她的头像。

5 Silent Spring was not, however, received positively by everyone. Though Carson's research was strong and was supported by most scientists who reviewed her work, the book quickly became a target for critics in the pesticide industry. They said that Carson did not understand the science behind her arguments because she was a marine biologist rather than a chemist. Some also said that her work was more emotional than scientific. These were attempts to damage Carson's reputation and stop her work from influencing public policy, but she remained determined to stand by her research. Carson appeared in public and on television to defend her claims – and today, more than 50 years after it was published, the voice of Silent Spring is still ringing loud and clear.
但并不是所有人都支持《寂静的春天》。虽然卡森的研究很有说服力，而且得到多数审阅过这本书的科学家的支持，但是这本书很快成为了杀虫剂行业批判的对象。他们说卡森并不理解她论证背后的科学原理，因为她是一位海洋生物学家，而非化学家。还有一些人说她的作品过于情感化，科学性并不强。他们想要通过破坏卡森的名声来削减她的作品对公共政策的影响，但卡森仍然坚持自己的研究，在公众面前、在电视节目中捍卫自己的观点。时至今日，《寂静的春天》已经出版五十多年了，但它的影响力依旧深远绵长。

6 Personally, I enjoy Carson's book. She made a crucial but potentially difficultto- understand subject interesting and accessible to millions of people. This is not so much because of the quality of her arguments, strong though they are, but because of the beauty and elegance of her writing. Her book not only changed the world; half a century later it remains a book that deserves to be reread today, so that we can once again feel ourselves warm to the fire of its passionate message. For unless we do listen to Rachel Carson's warning, one day we may wake up to the strange and quiet horror of another silent spring.
而我个人也十分喜欢卡森的书。她把一个至关重要但十分复杂的问题用简单有趣的方式传达给了数百万人。这并不都是因为她书中高质量的论点是多么强有力，而是因为她美丽和高雅的文笔让读者喜欢。她的书不仅在当时改变了世界，就是在半个世纪后的今天，它仍然值得人们重新阅读，以感受她充满感情的文字带给我们如火焰般的温暖。因为如果我们不听从卡森的劝告，可能有一天在我们醒来之后，真的会面对一个古怪而又相当恐怖的寂静的春天。