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But, like Einstein, he had no school or following and had produced very few students. He had essentially no collaborators. Once, when asked about this, he remarked that "the really good ideas in physics are had by only one person. That seems to apply to poetry as well. He taught his classes in the quantum theory at Cambridge University, where he held Newton's Lucasian chair, by, literally, reading in his precise, clipped way from his great text on the subject. When this was remarked on, he replied that he had given the subject a good deal of thought and that there was no better way to present it.
但是跟愛因斯坦一樣，他沒有建立學派，沒有追隨者，也沒有培養出幾個學生。基本上也沒有合作者。有一次被問及此事時，他說：“物理學上真正有價值的見地，只屬于個人。”這個說法好像對詩歌也挺合適。他曾經在劍橋大學教授量子理論課程，在那里他坐著牛頓曾經執掌過的盧卡斯教授的席位，在教授課程時他以一種梢確的、掐頭去尾的方式念著與課題有關的他本人的著作中的東西。當有人對此質疑時，他回答說他對該課題鉆研至深，但沒有更好的方式演示出來。
At the institute we had a weekly physics seminar over which Oppenheimer presided, often interrupting the speaker. Early in the fall we were in the midst of one of these—there were about forty people in attendance in a rather small room—when the door opened. In walked Dirac. I had never seen him before, but I had often seen pictures of him. The real thing was much better. He wore much of a blue suit—trousers, shirt, tie, and, as I recall, a sweater——but what made an indelible impression were the thigh-length muddy rubber boots. It turned out that he was spending a good deal of time in the woods near the institute with an ax, chopping a path in the general direction of Trenton. Some years later, when I had begun writing for The New Yorker and attempted a profile of Dirac, he suggested that we might conduct some of the sessions while clearing this path. He was apparently still working on it.
在研究院有一個每周一次由奧本海默主持的物理學研討會，他還是不停地打斷發言者。初秋的一天，其中一個研討會正在進行，當時那個小房間容納了大約有40余位與會者。這時門開了，狄拉克走了進來。我以前從來沒有見過他，不過經常看到他的照片。他本人比照片好多了。他大致穿的是藍色的套裝——西褲、襯衫、領帶，還有，我記得他還穿著一件毛衫。但是真正給人留下刻骨難忘的印象的是他的那雙過膝的、粘滿污泥的橡膠靴。后來證明他是在離研究院不遠的樹林里用了很長的時間手持板斧朝特頓大致的方向開辟一條小路。幾年以后，當我開始給《紐約人》雜志撰稿時，試閣要一個狄拉兌的個人簡介，他建議我們可以一邊淸理那條小路一邊找一些時間來談這件事。很明顯他仍然在從事著這項工作。
Now it is some twenty-five years later. The sun has not yet come up, and I am driving across the state of New Jersey with my companion. We have left New York at about 5 A.M. so that I will arrive in time for a midmorning lecture.
現在大約25年過去了。太陽還沒有升起，我正駕車和我的女友穿越新澤西州。我們大約在早晨五點鐘離開紐約，這樣我才能及時到會做一個安排在上午的講座。
