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It’s annoying enough to write your idol and never get reply. So how would you feel if your admiring letter was ignored and thrown away like a piece of trash?
給偶像寫信，結果卻猶如石沉大海毫無音信，這已經(jīng)很讓人惱火了。若是那封飽含仰慕之情的信件不僅被無視，還被當做垃圾一樣扔掉時，你會作何感想呢？
That’s exactly what happened to millions of US country-pop singer Taylor Swift’s fans. They must have felt disappointed when they read in the news that hundreds of unopened fan letters had been found in a trash bin in Nashville two weeks ago. The letters had been sent from all over the world, according to WKRN.com, the local news service in Nashville, Tennessee in the US.
美國鄉(xiāng)村搖滾歌手泰勒?斯威夫特成千上萬的歌迷們就遭遇了這一幕。兩周前，在納什維爾的一處垃圾桶里發(fā)現(xiàn)了幾百封尚未開啟的歌迷來信，想必泰勒?斯威夫的歌迷們看到這則新聞時一定倍感失望。據(jù)美國田納西州納什維爾當?shù)氐男侣劸W(wǎng)站W(wǎng)KRN.com報道稱，這些信件來自世界各地。
Taylor’s management team was quick to respond, saying that the letters had been thrown out by mistake.
事后，泰勒的管理團隊馬上回應稱這些信件是被誤扔的。
“Taylor gets thousands of fan letters every day and they are delivered to her management office,” Swift’s spokeswoman Paula Erickson said in a statement. “After the letters are opened and read, they are recycled.”
“泰勒每天都會收到成千上萬封歌迷來信，而這些信都被運往她團隊的辦公室，”泰勒的發(fā)言人保拉?埃里克森在聲明中表示。“這些信在開封、閱讀后才被回收。”
Every fan secretly hopes that his or her letter will be personally read and replied to. But dealing with piles of fan mail is a big burden for most celebrities. Many of them, aware that their fans’ support is vital to their careers, hire others to read and reply to fan letters for them.
所有歌迷都默默期盼著自己的信能被偶像讀到、并親自回信。但對大多數(shù)明星來說，處理堆積成山的歌迷來信實在負擔頗重。很多明星清楚粉絲的支持對自己的演藝事業(yè)至關重要，便雇人來替自己閱讀并回復這些粉絲來信。
Sylvia Taylor has been running a fan-mail-answering service in California since 1987. She told the BBC that she and her six staff members process up to 20,000 items of mail a month on behalf of 26 celebrities. Typically, correspondence is acknowledged by a photo with a printed autograph.
自1987年起，西爾維婭泰勒在美國加州開辦了一家專門提供給粉絲回信服務的公司。她在接受BBC采訪時表示，自己和手下6名員工每個月要為26位名人處理大概20000封粉絲信件。通常會回寄一張印有明星簽名的照片作為對歌迷的答謝。
The relationship between the fan and the celebrity often exists only in the mind of the former, says Lynn Zuberbis, an expert in the psychology of fandom at the UK’s West Chester University. It stems from a deeply-rooted human need for community and belonging.
英國西徹斯特大學粉絲心理學專家林恩?祖博比斯表示，明星與粉絲之間的情感通常只是粉絲們的“一廂情愿”罷了。這源于人們?nèi)后w感和歸屬感的本性。
“It’s not about the autograph. It’s about the moment of connection,” Zuberbis told the BBC.
“這與親筆簽名無關，而是為了享有與明星溝通的瞬間。”祖博比斯在接受BBC采訪時說道。
When a celebrity replies to a fan’s letter in person, it can be a powerful experience for the fan. Writing on The Telegraph’s online blog, Nigel Farndale is nostalgic for an era when celebrities took fan letters seriously.
能夠收到明星親筆回信，對粉絲而言是個非常印象深刻的經(jīng)歷。奈杰爾?方達爾在英國電訊報網(wǎng)站的博客中寫道，他十分懷念那個明星重視粉絲來信的時代。
Bill Wyman, the former bassist of the Rolling Stones, for example, used to write around a dozen letters a day in the 1960s. It passed the time when they were stuck on tour buses or waiting around hotels before a concert.
上世紀60年代，滾石樂隊的前貝斯手比爾?懷曼曾每天回十幾封信。有時身在旅途巴士上，或者在演唱會前在酒店周圍，他們通過這種方式來打發(fā)時間。
Replying to fans is a good long-term investment because it buys their loyalty, Farndale said. He wrote a letter to UK actor Stephen Fry when he was 19. To his surprise, Fry wrote back with a long and witty letter.
方達爾說，給粉絲回信是一項不錯的長線投資，因為這樣可以換來他們的忠實追隨。他曾在19歲時寫信給英國演員斯蒂芬?弗雷。令他倍感驚喜的是，弗雷回復給他一封幽默風趣的長信。
“Whenever I see Stephen Fry being criticized in the press for being pompous, or whatever,” Farndale says: “I always feel protective toward him.”
方達爾說：“每當我看到媒體批評弗雷自負或其他什么，我總是會站在他那一邊。”
