1．I have never cultivated a mustache though I’m sure one would enhance my distinguished looks and cause women to giggle as I passed along the boulevard.尽管我确信蓄胡子会使我更加气度不凡，走在大街上会使女性发笑，但我从不留胡子。

2．I might be thrown into such a panic that I’d blurt out ... 我可能会惊慌得脱口而出...3．It is one of the paradoxes of social intercourse that a compliment is harder to respond to than an insult. Here is an area of small talk that most of us act awkwardly.在社会交往中，应对恭维比对付辱骂要艰难得多，这话听起来有点矛盾，却有一定的道理。

闲聊时来句恭维话，往往让我们大多数人不知所措。

5．Someone utters a pleasing, praiseful remark in our direction and we grow inarticulate and our kneecaps begin to vibrate. 有人对我们说上一句动听、赞美的话，我们就慌得说不出话来，膝盖开始瑟瑟发抖。

6．I can’t accept with grace a compliment bestowed upon me for a thing that isn’t real ly mine.如果别人称赞不是真正属于我自己的东西时，我根本无法欣然接受.7．The nearest I ever came to downright acceptance of this particular compliment was the time I said, “Well, we like it.”我在接受这种特定的恭维时，表示最能完全接受的说法就是“嗯，我们喜欢。

”8．... carried away by the vastness of his complimentary remark ...被他的这种极度夸张的恭维话所吸引的9．I think we make a mistake when we react to a compliment with denial and derogation.我认为，对待恭维采取否定和贬低的态度是错误的。

10．The situation here is much the same as the one regarding my view.这种情景，与我上述提出的观点非常相似。

11．I know a man who has put his mind to this problem and come up with a technique for brushing off praise. 我认识一个潜心研究这种问题的人，他想出了一个办法来避开别人的表扬。

12．He employs a sort of unreasonable realism. 他采取了一种不近情理的现实态度。

13．I don’t think this fellow is on the right track. 我想这个家伙回答的方式有问题。

14．This sort of thing, the witty reply, ought to be placed under government regulation.这种俏皮机智的应答，应该置于政府的规定之中。

15．That one, I thought, was more than passable. 我想，这个回答相当不错。

16．But for every genuinely clever retort there are a thousand that fall flat.但是，在千百次的应对中才会有一句真正巧妙的应答。

17．It takes a Dorothy Parker or a George S. Kaufman to handle the quip comeback with skill.只有像多萝西·帕克或乔治·考夫曼这样的人才能应对自如。

18．… swell out their chests…挺着胸脯19．I worked like a dog to get it written. 我当时写得好苦啊。

20．... the unwritten code of authorhood ... 著书人的一条不成文的规定.21．... with immeasurably lovely egg on your face ... 一脸尴尬22．There is no point in trying to play the game back at them —they’ll top you in the end, no matter what.要想回敬他们是没有用的——不管说什么，最后他们总会占上风。

23．... at the bottom of all graceful social intercourse lies poise ... 在所有得体的社交场合，最根本的就是保持镇定24．Given the same circumstances I would have quietly asked for a coil of rope.要是我遇到这种情况，我会感到极为窘迫，恨不得悄悄地找根绳子去上吊。

.25．If we could all comport ourselves with that kind of dignity, and quit jittering, our social life would be much more enjoyable.要是我们的行为举止都能保持这种风度，摆脱局促不安，那我们的社交生活就会有趣得多。

26．... the chances he’s just making conversation ...他可能只是想和你说说话。

Unit 21. I date a woman for a while—literary type, well-read, lots of books in her place—whom I admired a bit too extravagantly(unusually unreasonably high; exorbitant), and one Christmas I decided to give her something nice and, I’m afraid, unusually expensive.我曾与一位女子约会过一段时间—她属于文学爱好者之类，博览群书，其寓所藏书甚丰—我对她的倾慕有点过分。

有一次圣诞节，我决定送她一样非同一般的好东西，其价格也是贵得吓人。

2．She insisted that I take the books back or sell them or keep them for myself. When I protested she just got more upset, and finally she asked me to leave and to take the books with me. Hurt and perplexed, I did.她坚持认为我把书拿走，要么卖掉，要么自己留着。

见我不肯罢休，她越发不安。

最后，她请我带着书离开。

我伤心困惑地离开了。

3．But I have it in me, obviously, to be, as my ex-girlfriend said, totally out of proportion: to give people things I can’t afford, or things that betoken an intimacy that doesn’t exist, or things that bear no relation to the interests or desires of the person I’m giving them to….但我的毛病也是明摆着的，正如我的前女友所言，送的礼物根本就不合适。

比如说：送给人家的礼物自己难以支付，或者把象征亲密关系的礼物送给与自己没有那层关系的人，或者送的礼物与所送之人的兴趣或渴望的东西毫不相干。

4．In most cultures, most of them more sensible than our own, the giving of gifts is highly ritualistic—that is, it is governed by rules and regulations; it is under strict social control. It is also, more or less explicitly, an exchange.在大多数文化中（其中多数文化都比我们的文化更明智），送礼是很讲究规矩的—也就是说，受到条条框框的限制和严格的社会制约。

送礼多少有点明显地也是一种交换。

5．Gift-giving involves the expectations of reciprocity therefore, but we wise men of the western world avoid this fact; we paper it over with rhetoric about selflessness, about how much better it is to give than to receive.因此，送礼涉及到对互惠的期待，但我们西方世界的智者却回避这个事实：我们高谈无私之道，阔谈给予如何胜于接受，以遮掩这一点。

6．I’ve given some thought to my own proclivities in this matter and have concluded that even at my most ridiculously generous, my most spontaneously giving, I expect something in turn as much as the next man does.我曾反省过自己在这方面的习性，并得出这样的结论：即使在我慷慨的最最荒唐，送礼完全是发自内心时，我也和别人一样期待着回报。