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Now, I've laughed every time I've read this. And one must admire the imagination of John Lok.
我每次讀到這一段的時候，都不禁大笑起來。John Locke的想象力真的是讓人敬佩。
But what is important about his writing is that it represents the beginning of a tradition of telling African stories in the West:
但關于他這段作品極其重要的一點是，它昭示著西方社會講述非洲故事的一個傳統。
A tradition of Sub-Saharan Africa as a place of negatives, of difference, of darkness,
在這個傳統中，撒哈拉以南的非洲充滿了消極、差異以及黑暗，
of people who, in the words of the wonderful poet Rudyard Kipling, are "half devil, half child."
是偉大的詩人Rudyard Kipling筆下所形容的“半惡魔、半孩童”的奇異人種。
And so, I began to realize that my American roommate
正因此，我開始意識到我的那位美國室友
must have throughout her life seen and heard different versions of this single story,
一定在她成長的過程中看過并且聽過關于這個單一故事的不同版本，
as had a professor, who once told me that my novel was not "authentically African."
就如同之前一位曾經批判我的小說缺乏“真實的非洲感”的教授一樣。
Now, I was quite willing to contend that there were a number of things wrong with the novel, that it had failed in a number of places,
話說我倒是甘愿承認我的小說有幾處寫的不好的地方，有幾處敗筆，
but I had not quite imagined that it had failed at achieving something called African authenticity.
但我很難相像我的小說竟然會缺乏“真實的非洲感”。
In fact, I did not know what African authenticity was.
事實上，我甚至不知道“真實的非洲感”到底是個什么東西。
The professor told me that my characters were too much like him, an educated and middle-class man.
那位教授跟我說我書中的人物 都和他太接近了，都是受過教育的中產人物。
My characters drove cars. They were not starving. Therefore they were not authentically African.
我的人物會開車。他們沒有受到饑餓的困擾。正因此，他們缺少了真實的非洲感。
But I must quickly add that I too am just as guilty in the question of the single story.
我在這里不得不指出，我本人也常常被單一的故事蒙蔽雙眼。
A few years ago, I visited Mexico from the U.S.
幾年前，我從美國探訪墨西哥。
The political climate in the U.S. at the time was tense, and there were debates going on about immigration.
當時美國的政治氣候比較緊張，關于移民的辯論一直在進行著。
And, as often happens in America, immigration became synonymous with Mexicans.
而在美國，“移民”和“墨西哥人”常常被當作同義詞來使用。
There were endless stories of Mexicans as people who were fleecing the healthcare system,
關于墨西哥人的故事是源源不絕，講的都是欺詐醫療系統、
sneaking across the border, being arrested at the border, that sort of thing.
偷渡邊境、在邊境被捕之類的事情。
