周一至周五：跟我们一起听英语 有 些人走远路，有些人抄捷径
每个人都在用自己的方式创造自己的命运，除了表现出善意、慷慨和耐心之外，别的忙谁都帮不上
今 天跟大家分享的是： My First Book 我的第一本书 When it came time for my vacation—I hadn’t taken one for three years, I was so eager to make the company a success! —I took three weeks instead of two and I wrote the book about the twelve little men. I wrote it straight off , five, seven, sometimes eight thousand words a day. I thought that a man, to be a writer, must do at least five thousand words a day. I thought he must say everything all at once —in one book—and collapse afterwards. 当我的假期到来时——我已经三年没度假了，因为我急于把公司办起来！——我休了三周而不是两周，并且写了这本关于 12 个小人物的书
我毫不犹豫写了起来，每天五千、七千、有时是八千字我认为一个人要想成为作家，必须每天至少写五千字
我认为他得把事情一口气说完——在一本书里说完——然后精疲力竭地倒下
I didn’t know a thing about writing. I was scared shitless . But I was determined to wipe Horatio Alger out of the North American consciousness. I suppose it was the worst book any man has ever written. It was a colossal tome and faulty from start to finish . But it was my first book and I was in love with it. If I had had the money, as Gide had, I would have published it at my own expense . If I had had the courage that Whitman had, I would have peddled it from door to door. Everybody I showed it to said it was terrible. I was urged to give up the idea of writing. I had to learn, as Balzac did, that one must write volumes before signing one’s own name. I had to learn, as I soon did, that one must give up everything and not do anything else but write, that one must write and write and write, even if everybody in the world advises you against it, even if nobody believes in you. 我对写作一窍不通
我被吓得魂不附体，但我下决心要把霍雷肖 · 阿尔杰从北美人的意识中抹去
我想这是有史以来写得最糟糕的一本书这是一本大部头书，从头到尾都是错误但它是我的第一本书，我对它饱含深情假如当时我像纪德那样有钱，我可能会自费出版假如当时我有惠特曼的勇气，我可能会挨家挨户去卖这本书我把这本书给谁看，谁都说写得很糟糕我被劝说放弃写作的念头
我得像巴尔扎克那样明白，一个人必须在写了很多书之后才能署上自己的名字
我得明白，正如不久后我真的明白的那样，一个人必须放弃一切，除了写作别的什么也不做，必须不停地写、写、写，哪怕世界上每个人都劝你不要写，哪怕没有人相信你
Perhaps one does it just because nobody believes; perhaps the real secret lies in making people believe. That the book was inadequate, faulty, bad, terrible, as they said, was only natural. I was attempting at the start what a man of genius would have undertaken only at the end. I wanted to say the last word at the beginning. It was absurd and pathetic . It was a crushing defeat , but it put iron in my backbone and sulphur in my blood. I knew at least what it was to fail. I knew what it was to attempt something big. Today, when I think of the circumstances under which I wrote that book, when I think of the overwhelming material which I tried to put into form , when I think of what I hoped to encompass , I pat myself on the back , I give myself a double A . 一个人之所以写作也许就是因为没有人相信；也许真正的秘诀就在于使别人相信
他们说这本书水平不够、错误百出、质量不高、糟糕透顶纯属自然
我从一开始就在尝试天才人物只在最后才做的事情，我想一开始就说最后一句话
这真是既荒唐又可悲，结果我一败涂地，但它使我变得坚强起来我至少明白了失败是怎么回事，明白了尝试做大事是怎么回事
今天，当我想起当时的创作环境、想起我努力整理的大量素材、想起我希望完成的东西，我就觉得自己很了不起，就会给自己一个最高评价
I am proud of the fact that I made such a miserable failure of it; had I succeeded I would have been a monster . Sometimes, when I look over my notebooks, when I look at the names alone of those whom I thought to write about, I am seized with vertigo . Each man came to me with a world of his own; he came to me and unloaded it on my desk; he expected me to pick it up and put it on my shoulders. I had no time to make a world of my own: I had to stay fixed like Atlas , my feet on the elephant’s back and the elephant on the tortoise’s back. To inquire on what the tortoise stood would be to go mad. 让我感到自豪的是，我败得那么惨；要是我成功了，我一定是个魔鬼
有时候，当我翻看我的笔记本，当我独自看着当时我想描写的那些人的名字，我就会晕头转向
每个人都带着他自己的世界来到我面前；他来到我面前，把他的世界卸到我的桌上；他希望我把它拿起来，放到我的肩上
我无暇创造自己的世界：我只能像以肩顶天的巨神阿特拉斯那样固定在那儿，我的双脚站在大象背上，大象站在乌龟背上
如果想知道乌龟站在什么上面，那我一定是疯了
I didn’t dare to think of anything then except the “facts”. To get beneath the facts I would have had to be an artist, and one doesn’t become an artist overnight. First you have to be crushed, to have your conflicting points of view annihilated . You have to be wiped out as a human being in order to be born again an individual. You have to be carbonized and mineralized in order to work upwards from the last common denominator of the self. You have to get beyond pity in order to feel from the very roots of your being. 除了“事实”，我什么也不敢想
要挖掘事实下面的东西，我得是个艺术家，而一个人不可能一夜之间就成为艺术家
首先，你得脱胎换骨，这样才能把自相矛盾的观点消灭掉你得把你作为人的东西去掉，这样才能获得重生你必须得碳化或矿物化，这样才能从自己最后一个共同点往上走你得超越怜悯，这样才能从内心得到一种感受
One can’t make a new heaven and earth with “facts”. There are no “facts”—there is only the fact that man, every man everywhere in the world, is on his way to ordination . Some men take the long route and some take the short route. Every man is working out his destiny in his own way and nobody can be of help except by being kind, generous and patient. 一个人不可能利用“事实”创造出一个新世界
“事实”根本不存在——惟一的事实是，人，世界上任何地方的任何人，都在走向完美
有些人走远路，有些人抄捷径
每个人都在用自己的方式创造自己的命运，除了表现出善意、慷慨和耐心之外，别的忙谁都帮不上
Vocabulary straight off 立即 all at once 一起 collapse v. 崩溃 be scared shitless 吓得要命 colossal a. 巨大的 tome n. 大部头书 faulty a. 有错误的 from start to finish 从头到尾 at sb.’s expense 由某人付费 peddle v. 叫卖 Balzac 巴尔扎克 volume n. 卷 absurd a. 荒谬的 pathetic a. 可怜的 a crushing defeat 彻底失败 backbone n. 脊骨 sulphur n, 硫磺 put…into form 整理… encompass v. 包含 pat sb. on the back 表扬某人 give sb. a double A 给某人最高分 monster n. 怪物 be seized with 被…影响 vertigo n, 眩晕 Atlas 阿特拉斯 tortoise n. 乌龟 annihilate v. 消灭 carbonize v. 碳化 mineralize v. 矿物化 denominator n. 水平 make a new heaven and earth 创造一个新世界 ordination n. 神职授予 文章选自《用英语点亮人生》/ 胡敏主编 精 彩 回 顾 与生俱来与后天培养 发现生活中的感动 时间由你来支配 The Present 是现在还是礼物？ ▼ 更多精彩，请点击“阅读原文”