評論
打印
I thought it useless to explain that we borrowed the word "marmalade" from French, and that it means, in that language, any kind of jam. So I said, "But didn't you eat any of the famous French food?" "What? Me?" he said. "Of course not! Give me good old English food every time! None of those fancy bits for me!" Clearly, traveling had not broadened his mind. He had gone to France determined to live there exactly as if he were in England and had judged it entirely from his own English viewpoints.
“marmalade”一詞是我們從法語中借來的，它在法語中指的是任意一種果醬。我覺得和他解釋這個是沒用的。所以我說：“你難道沒有吃任何著名的法國美食嗎？”他說：“什么？我嗎？當然沒有！我每次都吃傳統英式食物！那些花哨的不適合我！”顯然，旅游并沒有開闊他的眼界。他去法國住的時候就好像他在英國似的，做評價時也是完全從英國人的觀點出發。
This does not, of course, happen only to Englishmen in France. People of all different races, in all foreign countries, can be found judging what they see, hear, taste, and smell according to their own habits and customs. People who are better educated and who have read a lot about foreign countries tend to be more ready to accept and adjust to foreign things, but this is because their minds have already been broadened before they start traveling. In fact, it is easier to be broad-minded about foreign habits and customs if one's acquaintance with these things is limited to books and films. The Americans smile tolerantly over the absence of central heating in most English homes when they are themselves comfortably seated in armchairs in their centrally heated houses in Chicago; the Englishmen read about the sanitary arrangements in a certain tropical country, and the inhabitants of the latter read about the London fogs, and each side manages to be detached and broad-minded. But actual physical contact with things one is not used to is much more difficult to bear.
這當然不止發生在去法國旅游的英國人身上。我們可以發現，不同國家、不同種族的人都是根據自己的風俗習慣來評判自己看到的、聽到的、嘗到的、聞到的東西。受過良好教育的人和讀過很多關于外國的書籍的人更易于接受和適應外國事物，但這是因為他們的眼界在開始旅游以前就已經拓寬了。事實上，如果一個人對外國風俗習慣的了解只停留在書本和電影上，那么他對這些風俗習慣就比較容易做到寬容大度。當美國人在芝加哥的中央供暖房里的扶手椅上舒服地坐著時，聽到大多數英國人家都沒有中央供暖，只能報以寬容一笑；當英國人讀到某個熱帶國家的公共衛生設施，而該國居民讀到倫敦的大霧時，雙方都試圖去客觀和包容地看待。但真正親身接觸自己不習慣的事物卻難以忍受得多。
