評(píng)論
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I had been trying to live in two worlds: spending time in China, improving my Mandarin, learning what I could of Chinese history, of my grandparents' pasts. Then there was my American life. Classes, jobs, money, rent, Netflix, friends, growing older. What country, what story, what character, what experience can I claim? Do I want to tell the story of my grandparents, or do I feel that, to do justice to them, I have to?
我一直想要生活在兩個(gè)世界里：在中國待一段時(shí)間，提高我的普通話水平，盡我所能學(xué)習(xí)中國歷史，了解爺爺奶奶的過去。然后是我的美國生活。課程、工作、金錢、租金、網(wǎng)飛、朋友、變老。什么國家，什么故事，什么性格，什么經(jīng)歷？我是想講我爺爺奶奶的故事呢，還是覺得，為了公平對(duì)待他們，我必須講？
In an essay titled No Reconciliation Allowed, Said revisits the varied landscape of his childhood. He was born in Jerusalem, spent his childhood as a refugee in Egypt, was educated in elite English-language schools, before building his career in the US. "Why, I remember asking myself, could I not have had a simple background … ?" he asks, " … all Egyptian, or all something else, and not have had to face the daily rigours of questions that led back to words that seemed to lack a stable origin?"
在一篇名為《不允許和解》的文章中，賽義德重溫了他童年時(shí)多姿多彩的風(fēng)景。他出生于耶路撒冷，以難民的身份在埃及度過童年，在精英英語學(xué)校接受教育，后來在美國開創(chuàng)了自己的事業(yè)。“我記得我問自己，為什么我沒有一個(gè)簡單的背景……？”他問道，“……所有的埃及人，或者其他什么人，不用每天面對(duì)嚴(yán)峻的問題，那些問題讓我們回到那些似乎缺乏穩(wěn)定來源的詞上來？”
I will go back to China to visit my grandparents' graves. Meanwhile, the old apartment in Hefei has been sold. When my brother and I were children, there were so many people who gathered in that apartment. Now the generations have scattered. My aunts grow greyer every year, and my cousin's children, mostly strangers to me, will soon be teenagers. My three oldest cousins are married, and some have moved to other cities or emigrated to the US. Before, Hefei felt like the core of the family and we, the ones in the US, were the outliers, the moons in orbit around the planet. Now we are all dispersed.
我要回中國給爺爺奶奶掃墓。與此同時(shí)，合肥市的舊公寓已經(jīng)出售。當(dāng)哥哥和我還是孩子的時(shí)候，有很多人聚集在那個(gè)公寓里。現(xiàn)在幾代人都散了。姑姑們的頭發(fā)一年比一年白，而堂姐的孩子們——大多是我不認(rèn)識(shí)的人——也將很快步入青少年時(shí)代。我那三個(gè)最年長的表兄弟姐妹都結(jié)婚了，有些已經(jīng)搬到其他城市或移民到了美國。以前，合肥就像是這個(gè)大家族的核心，而我們這些在美國的人，是局外人，是繞著地球軌道運(yùn)行的衛(wèi)星，現(xiàn)在我們都散去了。
I wonder what life will be left for me in China in the future. I've long nursed vague plans of moving back to China to live for a few years, to get to know it better and solidify my place there. But with each year that passes in the US, such a move gets harder and harder to make. I wonder at what point I will have to choose – or if, with the passage of time, a choice was already made for me.
我想知道我將來在中國還有什么生活。長期以來我一直有一個(gè)模糊的計(jì)劃，打算回中國生活幾年以便更好地了解中國，鞏固我在那里的地位。但在美國，隨著時(shí)間的推移，這樣的舉措變得越來越難實(shí)施。我不知道在什么時(shí)候我將不得不做出選擇——或者，隨著時(shí)間的推移，我已經(jīng)做出了選擇。
