注意这一部分,不是英译汉,就是汉译英考试Unit 1:A common misconception among youngsters attending school is that their teachers were child prodigies. Who else but a bookworm, with none of the normal kid’s tendency to play rather than study, would grow up to be a teacher anyway?I’ve tried desperately to explain to my students that the image they have of me as an enthusiastic devotee of books and homework during my adolescence is a bit out of focus. On the contrary, I hated compulsory education with a passion.I could never quite accept the notion of having to go to school while the fish were biting.上学的孩子们中间有一种普遍的错误想法,即认为他们的老师当年都是些神童。
不管怎么说,除了不像一般孩子那样生性贪玩、不愿学习的书呆子之外,还有谁愿意长大后当老师呢?我竭力向我的学生们解释我在他们心目中的形象−−一个在青春期热衷于书本和作业的人−−有一点被扭曲了。
相反,我极为憎恨义务教育。
我永远都无法接受在鱼儿上钩时不得不去上学的想法。
Unit2Children are entitled to special consideration for two reasons: helplessness and innocence. They have not yet acquired either the faculty of reason or the wisdom of experience. Consequently, they are defenseless (incapable of fending for themselves) and blameless (incapable of real sin). That's why we grant them special protection. In an emergency, it is our duty to save them first because they, helpless, have put their lives in our hands. And in wartime, they are supposed to be protected by special immunity because they can have threatened or offended no one.孩子们之所以有权享受特殊照顾有两个理由:无助和无辜。
他们还不具备推理的能力或来自经验的智慧。
所以,他们不能自卫(不能照料自己),无可指责(不可能真正犯罪)。
这就是我们给予他们特殊保护的原因。
在紧急情况下,我们有责任先救他们,因为他们软弱无助,已将生命交付于我们手中。
在战时,他们应该受到特殊豁免权的保护,因为他们不可能会威胁或冒犯任何人。
Unit 3I sincerely believe that for children, and for parents seeking to guide them, it is not half so important to know as it is to feel. If facts are the seeds that later produce knowledge and wisdom, then the emotions and the impressions of the senses are the fertile soil in which the seeds must grow. The years of early childhood are the time to prepare the soil.我真诚地相信,对于孩子们来说,对于想要指导他们的父母们来说,感受比知道要重要得多。
如果事实是以后能长出知识与智慧的种子,那么情感和感官印象则是种子必须赖以生长的沃土。
幼儿时期就是培育土壤的时候。
Once the emotions have been aroused — a sense of the beautiful, the excitement of the new and the unknown, a feeling of sympathy, pity, admiration or love —then we wish for knowledge about the object of our emotional response. Once found, such knowledge has far more lasting meaning than mere information. It is more important to pave the way for children’s desire to know than to put them on a diet of facts they are not ready to assimilate.一旦情感被激起——一种对美的感受,对新的和未知事物的激动,一种同情、怜悯、敬慕或爱恋的感觉——我们就会渴望了解引起我们情感反应的事物。
一旦找到,这种知识就比纯粹的信息具有持久得多的意义。
为孩子们的求知欲铺平道路比向他们灌输一堆他们不准备吸收的事实更为重要。
Unit 4What I wish for all students is some release from the grim grip of the future. I wish them a chance to enjoy each segment of their education as an experience in itself and not as a tiresome requirement in preparation for the next step. I wish them the right to experiment, to trip and fall, to learn that defeat is as educational as victory and is not the end of the world.我希望于所有的学生是从未来的严酷无情中得到一些解脱。
我希望他们有机会把他们每一阶段的教育纯粹作为一种经历来享受,而不是作为一种为下一步做准备的令人厌倦的需要。
我希望他们有权利试验、跌跤,并懂得失败如同胜利一样具有教育意义,失败并不是世界的末日。
My wish, of course, is naive. One of the few rights that America does not proclaim is the right to fail. Achievement is the national god, worshipped in our media — the million-dollar athlete, the wealthy executive — and glorified in our praise of possessions. In the presence of such a potent state religion, the young are growing up old.当然,我的希望是天真的。
在美国人不赞扬的为数不多的权利之中,有一个便是失败的权利。
成就是民族之神,它在我们媒体中受到崇拜——身价百万的运动员,富有的主管人员——在我们对财富的赞美中得到荣耀。
年轻人就是在这样一种强有力的国脚熏陶之下长大的。
Unit 5America can be a strange experience for a foreigner. My wife and I arrived in the United States in January after seven years overseas —four in France, three in Poland. From the jumble of first impressions, we compiled an A-to-Z explanation of why America can be such a foreign country to those who arrive here from Europe对一个外国人来说,身在美国可能是一种奇特的经历。
在国外呆了7年以后- 4年在法国,3年在波兰,我和我的妻子一月份到达了美国。
从杂乱的初步印象中,我们编了一套A到Z的解释,来说明为什么对那些从欧洲来到这里的人来说,美国会是这样陌生的一个国家。
I should explain at the outset that I am from Britain, but my Florida-born wife Lisa is as American as apple pie .In our list, however, A doesn't stand for apple pie. It stands for:我应该一开始就说明我是英国人,但在佛罗里达出生的我地妻子莉萨却是如苹果馅饼一般地道的美国人。
不过,在我们列出的清单中,A并不代表苹果馅饼。
它代表的是:Ambition. In the Old World, people are taught to hide it. Here it‘’s quite proper to announce that you’re after the boss’s job or want to make a million dollars by the age of 30.雄心。
在旧大陆欧洲,人们受的教育是对自己的雄心藏而不露。
在这儿,宣称你在追求老板的职位或者想在30岁以前赚上100万美元,并没有什么不合适。