新概念第四冊課文精講 Lesson5:青年
課文5 青年
67. People are always talking about 'the problem of youth'.
人們總是在談?wù)?ldquo;青年問題”。
68. If there is one -- which I take leave to doubt -- then it is older people who create it, not the young themselves.
如果這個問題存在的話 -- 請允許我對此持懷疑態(tài)度 -- 那么，這個問題是由老年人而不是青年人造成的。
69. Let us get down to fundamentals and agree that the young are after all human beings -- people just like their elders.
讓我們來認真研究一些基本事實：承認青年人和他們的長輩一樣也是人。
70. There is only one difference between an old man and a young one:
老年人和青年人只有一個區(qū)別：
71. the young man has a glorious future before him and the old one has a splendid future behind him:
青年人有光輝燦爛的前景，而老年人的輝煌已成為過去。
72. and maybe that is where the rub is.
問題的癥結(jié)恐怕就在這里。
73. When I was a teenager, I felt that I was just young and uncertain -- that I was a new boy in a huge school,
我十幾歲時，總感到自己年輕，有些事拿不準(zhǔn) -- 我是一所大學(xué)里的一名新生，
74. and I would have been very pleased to be regarded as something so interesting as a problem.
如果我當(dāng)時真的被看成像一個問題那樣有趣，我會感到很得意的。
75. For one thing, being a problem gives you a certain identity, and that is one of the things the young are busily engaged in seeking.
因為這至少使我得到了某種承認，這正是年輕人所熱衷追求的。
76. I find young people exciting.
我覺得年輕人令人振奮，
77. They have an air of freedom, and they not a dreary commitment to mean ambitions or love of comfort.
他們無拘無束。既不追逐卑鄙的名利，也不貪圖生活的舒適。
78. They are not anxious social climbers, and they have no devotion to material things.
他們不熱衷于向上爬，也不一味追求物質(zhì)享受。
79. All this seems to me to link them with life, and the origins of things.
在我看來，所有這些使他們與生命和萬物之源聯(lián)系在了一起。
80. It's as if they were, in some sense, cosmic beings in violent and lovely contrast with us suburban creatures.
從某種意義上講，他們似乎是宇宙人，同我們這些凡夫俗子形成了強烈而鮮明的對照。
81. All that is in my mind when I meet a young person.
每逢我遇到年輕人，腦子里就想到
82. He may be conceited, ill-mannered, presumptuous or fatuous,
這些年輕人也許狂妄自負，舉止無理，傲慢放肆，愚昧無知，
83. but I do not turn for protection to dreary cliches about respect of elders
但我不會用應(yīng)當(dāng)尊重長者這一套陳詞濫調(diào)來為我自己辨護，
84. as if mere age were a reason for respect.
似乎年長就是受人尊敬的理由。
85. I accept that we are equals, and I will argue with him, as an equal, if I think he is wrong.
我認為我和他們是平等的。如果我認為他們錯了，我就以平等的身份和他們爭個明白。
