評論
打印
Love is a Fallacy
第五課愛情就是謬誤
MaxShulman
馬克斯舒爾曼
Charles Lamb, as merry and enterprising a fellow as you will meet in a month of Sundays, unfettered the informal essay with his memorable Old China and Dream's Child ren. There follows an informal essay that ventures even beyond Lamb's frontier, indeed, "informal" may not be quite the right word to describe this essay; "limp" or " flaccid" or possibly "spongy" are perhaps more appropriate.
查爾斯.蘭姆是一個世所罕見的性情歡快、富有進取心的人，他那筆下的散文《古瓷器》和《夢中的孩子》無拘無束、自由奔放。實在令人難忘。下面這篇文章比蘭姆的作品更加自由奔放。實際上，用"自由奔放"的字眼來形容這篇文章并不十分確切，或許用"柔軟"、"輕松"或"輕軟而富有彈性"更為恰如其分。
Vague though its category, it is without doubt an essay. It develops an argument; it cites instances; it reaches a conclusion. Could Carlyle do more? Could Ruskin?
盡管很難說清這篇文章是屬于哪一類，但可以肯定它是一篇散文小品文。它提出了論點。引用了許多例證，并得出了結論。卡菜爾能寫得更好嗎?羅斯金呢?
Read, then, the following essay which undertakes to demonstrate that logic, far from being a dry, pedantic discipline, is a living, breathing thing, full of beauty,passion, and trauma --Author's Note
這篇文章意在論證邏輯學非但不枯燥乏味而且活潑、清新、富于關感和激情，并給人以啟迪。諸位不妨一讀。作者注
Cool was I and logical. Keen, calculating, perspicacious , acute and astute--I was all of these. My brain was as powerful as a dynamo, as precise as a chemist'sscales, as penetrating as a scalpel. And-think of it! --I was only eighteen.
我這個人頭腦冷靜，邏輯思維能力強。敏銳、慎重、聰慧、深刻、機智一一這些就是我的特點。我的大腦像發電機一樣發達，孳化學家的天平一樣精確，像手術刀一樣鋒利。你知道嗎?我才十八歲呀。
It is not often that one so young has such a giant intellect. Take, for example, Petey Butch, my roommate at the University of Minnesota.
年紀這么輕而智力又如此非凡的人并不常有。就拿在明尼蘇達大學跟我同住一個房間的皮蒂·伯奇來說吧，
