Among School Children
by: William Butler Yeats
英诗翻译：在学童中
作者：威廉•巴特勒•叶芝
翻译：Tulip
I
I walk through the long schoolroom questioning;
A kind old nun in a white hood replies;
The children learn to cipher and to sing,
To study reading-books and histories,
To cut and sew, be neat in everything
In the best modern way—the children’s eyes
In momentary wonder stare upon
A sixty-year-old smiling public man.
我踱步在长教室，一边提问，
一个肩披白罩的老修女答题；
孩子们学习解迷，学会颂吟，
学习阅读百科书，了解历史；
学会裁剪缝制，处世样样顺，
孩子们眼里，效仿的最新式；
眉宇间，聚来了好奇的眼神，
盯住了六旬开外的谈笑名人。
II
I dream of a Ledaean body, bent
Above a sinking fire. a tale that she
Told of a harsh reproof, or trivial event
That changed some childish day to tragedy—
Told, and it seemed that our two natures blent
Into a sphere from youthful sympathy,
Or else, to alter Plato’s parable,
Into the yolk and white of the one shell.
我梦见一位佳丽的风姿，她屈身
奄奄一息的烟火上，她讲起自己
童年一次受严惩的小遭遇，至今
在她童心中，这一天酿成了悲剧——
提起这事，我们两个自然的本能
仿佛，从青春的同情中融入一体。
换句话说，用柏拉图的箴言描述，
化为蛋黄和蛋白在蛋壳的同里层。
III
And thinking of that fit of grief or rage
I look upon one child or t’other there
And wonder if she stood so at that age—
For even daughters of the swan can share
Something of every paddler’s heritage—
And had that colour upon cheek or hair,
And thereupon my heart is driven wild:
She stands before me as a living child.
想起那事好一阵悲伤或愤怒，
我一个又一个地关注着小孩，
揣摩她还像妙龄时婷婷欲出——
即便是天鹅的女儿也会展开，
每一种飞禽有生具有的禀赋——
脸蛋或头发上也有同样色彩，
于是我的心七上八下地乱跳，
她一个活着的幼童迎面打招。
IV
Her present image floats into the mind—
Did Quattrocento finger fashion it
Hollow of cheek as though it drank the wind
And took a mess of shadows for its meat?
And I though never of Ledaean kind
Had pretty plumage once—enough of that,
Better to smile on all that smile, and show
There is a comfortable kind of old scarecrow.
她眼前的形象在我心里浮漂，
难道是十五世纪手指的造化，
她面容憔悴仿佛把风作酒肴
胡乱吞影子就算饱食一顿吗？
尽管我从不是佳丽出自朱豪，
曾有双漂亮的羽翅——这就足够，
以微笑面对所有笑容更好，显示出
一个年迈的稻草人日子过得挺舒服。
V
What youthful mother, a shape upon her lap
Honey of generation had betrayed,
And that must sleep, shriek, struggle to escape
As recollection or the drug decide,
Would think her Son, did she but see that shape
With sixty or more winters on its head,
A compensation for the pang of his birth,
Or the uncertainty of his setting forth?
年轻的母亲，膝上搂着一个人体
甜蜜的后代早已有人走漏风声，
他们肯定在睡觉，尖叫，拼命逃生
当冥想或药物麻醉决定着意识；
她实在太想儿子，的确见头顶
一个年迈六十载寒冬匆匆过逝，
这就是为分娩儿子痛苦的补偿，
也为孩子的出世添了一份牵肠？
VI
Plato thought nature but a spume that plays
Upon a ghostly paradigm of things;
Solider Aristotle played the taws
Upon the bottom of a king of kings;
World-famous golden-thighed Pythagoras
Fingered upon a fiddle-stick or strings
What a star sang and careless Muses heard:
Old clothes upon old sticks to scare a bird.
柏拉图之见自然只不过像泡沫，
摆弄万物以幽灵般的千姿百态；
亚里士多德的坚实鞭挞如林，
抽打着王中之王的臀部骨块；
世界著名的金股毕达哥拉斯
轻拨琴弦或琴弓便一睹为快，
星唱歌,淡漠的缪斯伴随聆听：
揭竿的碎片破布吓唬了鸟灵。
VII
Both nuns and mothers worship images,
But thos the candles light are not as those
That animate a mother’s reveries,
But keep a marble or a bronze repose.
And yet they too break hearts—O presences
That passion, piety or affection knows,
And that all heavenly glory symbolise—
O self-born mockers of man’s enterprise;
修女和母亲，他们都崇拜偶像，
可是蜡光照耀的玉容肃穆如往，
依然激荡不起母亲的空空幻想，
而只能让大理石铜雕保持安详。
但是他们的心都已撕碎——啊！众多的神灵，
激情、虔诚、慈爱所经历的知情，
一切神圣至高荣耀的本身象征——
就是对人类自生进取心的嘲讽。
VIII
Labour is blossoming or dancing where
The body is not bruised to pleasure soul.
Nor beauty born out of its own despair,
Nor blear-eyed wisdom out of midnight oil.
O chestnut-tree, great-rooted blossomer,
Are you the leaf, the blossom or the bole?
O body swayed to music, O brightening glance,
How can we know the dancer from the dance?
临产的阵痛正在开花或在跳舞，
当躯体不为娱悦灵魂而受煎熬。
美貌并不有生就出于自寻烦苦，
朦胧的智慧也并非缘烛光夜照。
啊！栗树，盘根错节繁茂威武，
你是叶子，花朵，还是树杆枝梢？
啊！躯体伴音乐扭动，眼光闪闪，
我怎能把舞者从舞蹈中细细辩看？
2013年6月5日
翻译：Tulip
|
发表于 2013-6-5 14:23
收藏
分享
发表于 2013-6-7 08:48
发表于 2013-6-7 08:48
发表于 2013-6-7 09:34
楼主
