2023考研英語閱讀上世紀的名流

　　Twentieth-century lion

　　上世紀的名流

　　My Song: A Memoir of Art, Race and Defiance. ByHarry Belafonte;

　　《我的歌：追憶藝術，種族與反抗》哈利貝拉方特著。

　　IT ALL began with a set of Venetian blinds. In1946 a couple in a Manhattan apartment building asked their janitor, a biracial Jamaican NewYorker newly returned from naval service in the second world war, to install a set in their flat.The task completed, they gave him two theatre tickets as payment. The janitor, having nomoney for the dinner that a proper date would have included, went on his own to see Homeis the Hunter, a play about black servicemen returning to America after the war. He wasenraptured.

　　這一切要從一套百葉窗簾說起。故事發生在1946年的曼哈頓，有對夫婦想在家里安裝一套百葉窗簾，于是便叫來一位公寓清潔工，作為報酬，事后給了他兩張戲票。想來，邀人看戲起碼得請吃個飯，可無奈囊中羞澀，這清潔工就自個兒去美國黑人劇院看了場《家是獵人》。這出戲講述了一位美國黑人士兵戰后返鄉的事，看著看著這哥們就陶醉了。

　　The tenants, Clarice Taylor and Maxwell Glanville, performed in the play, which was puton by the American Negro Theatre . The janitor was, of course, Harry Belafonte.

　　劇中表演者正是那對夫婦，克萊斯泰勒與麥斯威爾格蘭維爾;而那清潔工呢，自然就是哈利貝拉方特;說來，那時二戰剛剛終了，結束海軍服役后，這個有著牙買加血統的美籍混血回到紐約，在一幢公寓里做起了清潔工。

　　In short order Mr Belafonte also found his way into the ANT, where he not only acted butmade my first friend in life, another poor, hustling West Indian named Sidney Poitier. Thetwo of them hatched get-rich-quick schemesMr Poitier wanted to market an extract ofCaribbean conch as an aphrodisiacand they shared theatre tickets: they could only afford asingle ticket between them, so one would attend before the interval and one after, then eachwould fill the other in. Mr Poitier got his break first: he took Mr Belafonte s place in a play thatthe latter, still employed as a janitor, missed because he had to collect his tenants rubbish.It took Mr Belafonte several more years of struggling, and he gained fame not as an actor,for which he had trained, but as a singer, for which he had not, filling time during theinterval at Lester Young s concerts, where his first backup band included Max Roach andCharlie Parker.

　　不久后，貝拉方特也找到了通往美國黑人劇院的門路。在那兒，他不僅演戲，還結實了生命中第一個朋友 西德尼波蒂埃。和貝拉方特一樣，這個來自西印度群島的小伙兒生活拮據，為了生計四處奔波。私下里，二人策劃了快速致富的計劃：加勒比貝殼的提取物可拿來當春藥使，波蒂埃就想帶著貨去市場賣;此外，哥倆還共用一張戲票。由于只付得起一張票錢，兩人就以幕間休息為準，你來半場，我來半場，互換位置。波蒂埃首先打開局面，并在一出戲中擠掉了貝拉方特的戲份。而貝拉方特仍舊干著清潔，因為他還得打掃房客的垃圾，遺憾得錯過了機會。又是幾年過去了，經過奮斗，貝拉方特終于獲得成功。這一次，他沒有拾起老本去演戲，而選擇從未訓練過的職業，做起了歌手：李斯特楊的音樂會上，幕間休息時常見他一展歌喉，那時，在他最初伴奏樂隊里還有著像麥克斯羅奇，查理帕克這樣的人物。

　　Looming over both this book and its subject s life are two ghosts: Millie, his formidable,perpetually dissatisfied mother; and Paul Robeson, whose combination of entertainmentand political activism⑾ forged a path that Mr Belafonte would follow. But whereas Robeson sactivism ran headlong into early cold-war paranoia, blacklists and McCarthyism, MrBelafonte was luckier: his career rose more or less in tandem with the American civil-rightsmovement.

　　不論是本書還是貝拉方特的一生中，總有兩朵陰霾不肯散去：一個是他的母親米勒。這女人讓人敬畏，而且永不知滿足。另一個則是保羅羅貝孫，他將娛樂與政治激進主義糅合，鋪下前路，好讓貝拉方特遵循。然而，正是他的激進行為，讓其猛然栽入早期冷戰妄想與麥卡錫主義中，并在各種黑名單上記錄在案，與之相比，貝拉方特幸運多了：其職業生涯的崛起，多多少少與美國民權運動相連。

　　Martin Luther King junior sought him out in 1956, just a few months after rising to fameduring the Montgomery bus boycott⒀. King was then 26, and a preacher at the DexterAvenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, while Mr Belafonte was 28 and newly crownedAmerica s Negro matine idol. Mr Belafonte was sceptical of both religion and non-violence, but was won over by King s humility. There is an especiallytouching scene from nine years later in which, following a celebrity-studded civil-rightsfund-raiser in Paris, King, then a Nobel peace-prize winner, serves food to the assembledstars as an exercise in humility, an act of abject gratitude to all these stars for coming outfor him. In a book that is riddled with many of the usual faults of celebrity autobiographyname-dropping, score-settling, preening and a rather ungallant treatment of his first wifeand some of his childrenMr Belafonte s portrayal of King stands out for its unfussy warmthand unhagiographical affection.

　　1956年，蒙哥馬利市爆發巴士抵制運動，一名來自德克斯特大街浸信會教堂的牧師聲名鵲起。他，就是馬丁路德金。幾個月后，時年26歲的金找到貝拉方特，那時，后者28歲，新得美譽通吃美國婦女的小黑哥。貝拉方特不信教，也不信非暴力，卻因金的謙遜而折服。九年后的一幕最是感人心脾：那是在巴黎舉行的一場民權籌款會，到場的盡是知名人士，金，這位諾貝爾和平獎桂冠竟為在場的群星盛放實物， 以此向為他而來的群星們行以謙恭之舉，表達心中無盡感激。貝拉方特的這本書中，明星自傳常有的缺點滿眼皆是：不是提一筆名人來拔高自己身價，就是報復之辭，要么自我吹捧幾句，再不就是描寫原配與孩子時，不甚殷切。所以，在對金的刻畫，更凸顯出他那份知性的溫情與平實的情懷。

　　After the 1960s, My Song goes downhill quickly, but that is hardly a surprise:maintaining fame is never as interesting as achieving it. The book is also too long. MrBelafonte s ramblings about business deals that went sour and his agonising over theextraordinary privileges his children enjoyed grow tedious. And then there is his politicaljudgment. Standing with Martin Luther King junior to fight injustice and oppression is quitedifferent from standing with practised political oppressors such as Hugo Chvez and FidelCastro. Still, Mr Belafonte does have a remarkable song to sing. Given its breadth, and thewelcome disappearance of the segregated world in which it began, such a song will not besung again.

　　上世紀60年代后，貝拉方特唱不動了，事業迅速下滑。但這并不奇怪：追逐名譽時，人們總是樂此不疲，但要永葆不衰，可就難咯。這本同名自傳也夠冗長的: 不是漫談生意不順，就講孩子享受優待，當爹的很是焦慮的事，讀著讀著也覺得無聊。書中還敘述了其個人的政治判斷：他既和老練得政治壓迫者有過交情，也曾與馬丁路德金并肩，同歧視，壓迫做過斗爭。兩者意義卻大不相同。不過，貝拉方特還真有一首別致的歌要唱，但一來這歌受眾不廣，二來它出爐于種族隔離的時代，如今，人們早已敞開胸懷，愈合這個世界，如此看來⒆，此曲恐為絕唱哩!

　　Twentieth-century lion

　　上世紀的名流

　　My Song: A Memoir of Art, Race and Defiance. ByHarry Belafonte;

　　《我的歌：追憶藝術，種族與反抗》哈利貝拉方特著。

　　IT ALL began with a set of Venetian blinds. In1946 a couple in a Manhattan apartment building asked their janitor, a biracial Jamaican NewYorker newly returned from naval service in the second world war, to install a set in their flat.The task completed, they gave him two theatre tickets as payment. The janitor, having nomoney for the dinner that a proper date would have included, went on his own to see Homeis the Hunter, a play about black servicemen returning to America after the war. He wasenraptured.

　　這一切要從一套百葉窗簾說起。故事發生在1946年的曼哈頓，有對夫婦想在家里安裝一套百葉窗簾，于是便叫來一位公寓清潔工，作為報酬，事后給了他兩張戲票。想來，邀人看戲起碼得請吃個飯，可無奈囊中羞澀，這清潔工就自個兒去美國黑人劇院看了場《家是獵人》。這出戲講述了一位美國黑人士兵戰后返鄉的事，看著看著這哥們就陶醉了。

　　The tenants, Clarice Taylor and Maxwell Glanville, performed in the play, which was puton by the American Negro Theatre . The janitor was, of course, Harry Belafonte.

　　劇中表演者正是那對夫婦，克萊斯泰勒與麥斯威爾格蘭維爾;而那清潔工呢，自然就是哈利貝拉方特;說來，那時二戰剛剛終了，結束海軍服役后，這個有著牙買加血統的美籍混血回到紐約，在一幢公寓里做起了清潔工。

　　In short order Mr Belafonte also found his way into the ANT, where he not only acted butmade my first friend in life, another poor, hustling West Indian named Sidney Poitier. Thetwo of them hatched get-rich-quick schemesMr Poitier wanted to market an extract ofCaribbean conch as an aphrodisiacand they shared theatre tickets: they could only afford asingle ticket between them, so one would attend before the interval and one after, then eachwould fill the other in. Mr Poitier got his break first: he took Mr Belafonte s place in a play thatthe latter, still employed as a janitor, missed because he had to collect his tenants rubbish.It took Mr Belafonte several more years of struggling, and he gained fame not as an actor,for which he had trained, but as a singer, for which he had not, filling time during theinterval at Lester Young s concerts, where his first backup band included Max Roach andCharlie Parker.

　　不久后，貝拉方特也找到了通往美國黑人劇院的門路。在那兒，他不僅演戲，還結實了生命中第一個朋友 西德尼波蒂埃。和貝拉方特一樣，這個來自西印度群島的小伙兒生活拮據，為了生計四處奔波。私下里，二人策劃了快速致富的計劃：加勒比貝殼的提取物可拿來當春藥使，波蒂埃就想帶著貨去市場賣;此外，哥倆還共用一張戲票。由于只付得起一張票錢，兩人就以幕間休息為準，你來半場，我來半場，互換位置。波蒂埃首先打開局面，并在一出戲中擠掉了貝拉方特的戲份。而貝拉方特仍舊干著清潔，因為他還得打掃房客的垃圾，遺憾得錯過了機會。又是幾年過去了，經過奮斗，貝拉方特終于獲得成功。這一次，他沒有拾起老本去演戲，而選擇從未訓練過的職業，做起了歌手：李斯特楊的音樂會上，幕間休息時常見他一展歌喉，那時，在他最初伴奏樂隊里還有著像麥克斯羅奇，查理帕克這樣的人物。

　　Looming over both this book and its subject s life are two ghosts: Millie, his formidable,perpetually dissatisfied mother; and Paul Robeson, whose combination of entertainmentand political activism⑾ forged a path that Mr Belafonte would follow. But whereas Robeson sactivism ran headlong into early cold-war paranoia, blacklists and McCarthyism, MrBelafonte was luckier: his career rose more or less in tandem with the American civil-rightsmovement.

　　不論是本書還是貝拉方特的一生中，總有兩朵陰霾不肯散去：一個是他的母親米勒。這女人讓人敬畏，而且永不知滿足。另一個則是保羅羅貝孫，他將娛樂與政治激進主義糅合，鋪下前路，好讓貝拉方特遵循。然而，正是他的激進行為，讓其猛然栽入早期冷戰妄想與麥卡錫主義中，并在各種黑名單上記錄在案，與之相比，貝拉方特幸運多了：其職業生涯的崛起，多多少少與美國民權運動相連。

　　Martin Luther King junior sought him out in 1956, just a few months after rising to fameduring the Montgomery bus boycott⒀. King was then 26, and a preacher at the DexterAvenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, while Mr Belafonte was 28 and newly crownedAmerica s Negro matine idol. Mr Belafonte was sceptical of both religion and non-violence, but was won over by King s humility. There is an especiallytouching scene from nine years later in which, following a celebrity-studded civil-rightsfund-raiser in Paris, King, then a Nobel peace-prize winner, serves food to the assembledstars as an exercise in humility, an act of abject gratitude to all these stars for coming outfor him. In a book that is riddled with many of the usual faults of celebrity autobiographyname-dropping, score-settling, preening and a rather ungallant treatment of his first wifeand some of his childrenMr Belafonte s portrayal of King stands out for its unfussy warmthand unhagiographical affection.

　　1956年，蒙哥馬利市爆發巴士抵制運動，一名來自德克斯特大街浸信會教堂的牧師聲名鵲起。他，就是馬丁路德金。幾個月后，時年26歲的金找到貝拉方特，那時，后者28歲，新得美譽通吃美國婦女的小黑哥。貝拉方特不信教，也不信非暴力，卻因金的謙遜而折服。九年后的一幕最是感人心脾：那是在巴黎舉行的一場民權籌款會，到場的盡是知名人士，金，這位諾貝爾和平獎桂冠竟為在場的群星盛放實物， 以此向為他而來的群星們行以謙恭之舉，表達心中無盡感激。貝拉方特的這本書中，明星自傳常有的缺點滿眼皆是：不是提一筆名人來拔高自己身價，就是報復之辭，要么自我吹捧幾句，再不就是描寫原配與孩子時，不甚殷切。所以，在對金的刻畫，更凸顯出他那份知性的溫情與平實的情懷。

　　After the 1960s, My Song goes downhill quickly, but that is hardly a surprise:maintaining fame is never as interesting as achieving it. The book is also too long. MrBelafonte s ramblings about business deals that went sour and his agonising over theextraordinary privileges his children enjoyed grow tedious. And then there is his politicaljudgment. Standing with Martin Luther King junior to fight injustice and oppression is quitedifferent from standing with practised political oppressors such as Hugo Chvez and FidelCastro. Still, Mr Belafonte does have a remarkable song to sing. Given its breadth, and thewelcome disappearance of the segregated world in which it began, such a song will not besung again.

　　上世紀60年代后，貝拉方特唱不動了，事業迅速下滑。但這并不奇怪：追逐名譽時，人們總是樂此不疲，但要永葆不衰，可就難咯。這本同名自傳也夠冗長的: 不是漫談生意不順，就講孩子享受優待，當爹的很是焦慮的事，讀著讀著也覺得無聊。書中還敘述了其個人的政治判斷：他既和老練得政治壓迫者有過交情，也曾與馬丁路德金并肩，同歧視，壓迫做過斗爭。兩者意義卻大不相同。不過，貝拉方特還真有一首別致的歌要唱，但一來這歌受眾不廣，二來它出爐于種族隔離的時代，如今，人們早已敞開胸懷，愈合這個世界，如此看來⒆，此曲恐為絕唱哩!