Winston Churchill could never see the point of silence. He was drunk on words, and he wanted everyone else to share the intoxication.
溫斯頓·丘吉爾從來都不會保持緘默。他醉心于言語,希望其他人同樣能陶醉其中。
Back home from the empire in 1900, he defied his father's pessimism by following him into politics.
1900年,丘吉爾回到故鄉,不顧父親的悲觀看法,循著他的腳步踏入政壇。
And once he had discovered he'd got the gift of the gab, he let the eloquence rip, drafting and rehearsing his speeches like some great trouper of the Edwardian stage.
而他發現自己擁有的辯才后便充分發揮,同愛德華七世時代舞臺上那些偉大演員一樣,開始起草和排練他的演講。
Unlike many politicians, Churchill didn't learn the art of public speaking from posh debating societies.
不同于許多政客,丘吉爾的演講藝術并非來自時髦的辯論社團。
He cut his teeth as an orator up here in the industrial north, on soap boxes, from the tops of buses, and in music halls, where he really had to earn the cheers.
作為一名演說家,他臥薪嘗膽,在北方工業區,在臨時講臺上,在公汽頂上,在音樂會上,這些他真正需要獲得掌聲的地方演講。
Winston's irrepressible activism made it impossible for him to stay a Tory.
溫斯頓不加掩飾的激進主義,使得他無法保持保守黨姿態。
When he defected to the Liberals in 1904, he joined a party joyously hammering the nails into the coffin of Victorian England.
1904年他叛變到自由黨,他愉快地加入了這個親手埋葬維多利亞英國的政黨。
We don't usually think of Churchill as a radical, but all sorts of social reforms poured from his fertile mind.
我們通常并不認為丘吉爾是一名激進分子,但種種社會改革方案從他富有想象力的腦海中誕生。
Labour exchanges, unemployment insurance, cleaning up sweatshops.
勞工介紹所,失業保險,取締血汗工廠。
But Churchill's radicalism too often played second fiddle to his grandstanding egotism.
但丘吉爾的激進主義往往是源于他嘩眾取眾的自我主義。
As Home Secretary, he was a bit too eager to treat politics like battles, a bit too trigger-happy, deploying troops against strikers, treating suffragettes like prisoners of war.
作為一名內政大臣,他有些過度渴望將政治看做戰爭,過度好戰了,部署軍隊對抗罷工者,將婦女參政權論者當做戰俘對待。

It made sense, then, to use this boiling, piston-driven belligerence where it could do some good.
利用這種激進、好戰的作風去處理某些事務,好像非常合適。
At 36, Churchill was made First Lord of the Admiralty. Three years later, the world was at war.
36歲時,丘吉爾被任命為海軍大臣。三年后,世界大戰爆發。
Gallipoli 1915, 52,000 allied troops perish in Turkey. A bloody fiasco, and an expedition championed by Winston Churchill.
1915年的加利波利,五萬二千名聯軍在土耳其喪命。這是在丘吉爾倡導下一次徹底慘敗的遠征。
Overnight, Churchill went from being the shooting star of the war government to its burnt-out meteor.
一夜間,丘吉爾這顆戰時政府的新星黯然隕落。
Accused, not altogether fairly, of recklessness and incompetence, the Tories paid him back for his treachery by booting him out of office.
他被指責,雖然并不完全公正,稱其草率行事,碌碌無為,保守黨為報復其叛黨,將他逐出內閣。
Stung by the humiliation and tortured by guilt for his part in the massacre at Gallipoli, Churchill crashed into one of his "Black dog" Depressions.
屈辱感刺痛了他,加利波利大屠殺給帶來的內疚也折磨著他,丘吉爾陷入到無比的沮喪中。
Churchill did his penance in the trenches of Flanders, using his old army connections, so that a politician could demote himself to a Tommy.
之后丘吉爾動用他在軍隊的人脈,這名政客自降身份當了兵,到弗蘭德斯的戰壕里參戰贖罪。
On the 23rd November, 1915, he wrote to his wife Clemmie.
1915年11月23日,他寫信給妻子克萊米。
My darling, we've finished our first 48 hours in the trenches.
親愛的,我們已經度過了在戰壕中的第一個48小時。
I've spent the morning in a hot bath, engineered with some difficulty. Filth and rubbish everywhere.
我在早上洗了個熱水澡,其過程頗為艱辛。污物和垃圾隨處可見。
Graves built into the defences and scattered about promiscuously. Feet and clothing breaking through the soil.
防御工事旁,到處是草草堆成的墳墓。浮土之下,露出雙腳和衣服。
In the dazzling moonlight, troops of enormous rats creep and glide to the unceasing accompaniment of rifle and machine guns.
在明亮的月光下,老鼠組建的部隊在步槍和機關槍持續地轟鳴聲中穿梭游走。
Life on the front line was expiation for Churchill. He'd served his time.
對于丘吉爾來說,前線的生活是種贖罪。他奉獻了他的光陰。
Now he could look soldiers and the House of Commons in the eye again.
現在他可以再次正視士兵和下議院了。