unit3

研究生英语

Why Harry's Hot?

1

J. K. Rowling swears she never saw it coming.

J．K．罗琳发誓说自己从来没有过这种预想。

In her wildest dreams, she didn't think her Harry Potter books would appeal to more than a handful of readers.

她做梦也没有想到会有那么多人对她的书感兴趣。

"I never expected a lot of people to like them," she insisted in a recent interview.

“我从来没有指望过有这么多人喜欢它，”在最近的一次访谈中她仍然这样说，

"Well, it turned out I was very wrong, obviously.

“可是，很显然，我大错特错了。

It strikes a chord with an enormous number of people."

它在许多人心中产生了共鸣。”

That's putting it mildly.

她说得很委婉。

With 35 million copies in print, in 35 languages, the first three Harry Potter books have earned a conservatively estimated $480 million in three years.

《哈利波特》系列丛书的前三册被翻译成了35种语言，已出版3,500万册，据保守估计，这三册书在三年时间里已经赚了四亿八千万美金。

And that was just the warm-up.

而这还只是个开始。

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With a first printing of 5.3 million copies and advance orders topping 1.8 million, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, the fourth installment of the series,

《哈里波特》系列丛书的第四册《哈利波特与火焰杯》初版530万册，加上高达180万册的订单，

promises to break every bookselling record.

有望创造新的畅销书销售记录。

Jack Morrissey, 12, plainly speaks for a generation of readers

12岁的杰克·莫里西的话很清楚地表达了他们这一代读者的想法。

when he says, "The Harry Potter books are like life, but better."

他说：“《哈利波特》就如同生活，但比生活更美好。”

2

Amazingly, Rowling keeps her several plotlines clear of each other until the end,

让人称奇的是，罗琳让每一册书的情节相互独立，但最后，

when she deftly brings everything together in a cataclysmic conclusion. 她却能够巧妙地把它们衔接起来，形成一个意想不到的结局。

For pure narrative power,

单从叙述能力而言，

this is the best Potter book yet.

《哈利波特与火焰杯》也是《哈利波特》系列丛书中最好的一本。

3

When the book finally went on sale at 12:01 am. Saturday,

当这本书终于在星期六午夜12：01面市时，

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thousands of children in Britain and North America rushed to claim their copies.

在英国和北美，成千上万的孩子争相购买。

Bookstores hosted pajama parties, hired magicians and served cookies and punch,

书店举办了睡衣派对，邀请了一些魔术师表演，并提供曲奇饼和潘趣酒，

but nobody needed to lift the spirits of these crowds.

可是没人需要这些，因为人们个个情绪高涨。

In one case, customers made such a big, happy noise that neighbors called the cops.

有一次，顾客们发出了巨大的欢呼声，以致邻居们实在难以忍受而报了警。

At a Borders in Charlotte, N.C., Erin Rankin, 12,

在美国北卡罗来纳州的夏洛特市“边界”连锁书店，12岁的艾琳·兰金

quickly thumbed to the back as soon as she got her copy.

一拿到书就快速翻到最后一页。

“I heard that a major character dies, and I really want to find out who," she said.

“我听说有一个主角死了，我真的很想知道是谁，”她说。

But minutes later she gave up.

但是几分钟后她放弃了。

“I just can't do it.

“我做不到，

I can't read the end first."

我不能先看书的结尾。”

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4

The only sour note in all the songs of joy over this phenomenon

在对“哈利波特”现象的一路欢歌中，出现的唯一一个不和谐音符

has come from some parents and conservative religious leaders 来自于一些父母和保守的宗教领袖。

who say Rowling advocates witchcraft.

他们认为罗琳在宣扬巫术。

reading of the books has been challenged in 25 school districts in at least 17 states,

至少在17个州的25所学校校区内，阅读《哈利波特》受到了质疑，而

and the books have been banned in schools in Kansas and Colorado. 在堪萨斯州和科罗拉多州的学校里，《哈利波特》系列丛书则被明令禁止。

But that's nothing new, says Michael Patrick Hearn, a children's book scholar and editor of The Annotated Wizard of Oz.

但是作为儿童图书专家和《绿野仙踪》的编辑，迈克尔·帕特里克·赫恩觉得这并不奇怪。

"Any kind of magic is considered evil by some people," he says. “无论何种魔法都会被有些人视为邪恶，”他说，

"The Wizard of Oz was attacked by fundamentalists in the mid-1980s." “《绿野仙踪》就曾经在80年代中期遭到正统派基督教徒们的抨击。”

5

But perhaps the most curious thing about the Potter phenomenon, especially given that it is all about books, is that almost no one has taken

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the time to say how good— or bad—these books are.

但是对于“哈利波特”现象最让人感到好奇的事情可能是几乎没有人会花时间去讨论这些书有多 好或者多糟，尤其是当这些评论仅仅涉及书本身的时候。

The other day my 11-year-old daughter asked me if I thought Harry Potter was a classic.

有一天，11岁的女儿问我是否认为《哈利波特》是经典之作，

I gave her, I'm afraid, one of those adult-sounding answers when I said, 我给出了一个恐怕听起来十分成人化的回答，

"Time will tell."

“时间会证明一切的。”

This was not an outright lie.

这不能算是一个彻头彻尾的谎言，

There's no telling which books will survive from one generation to the next.

因为谁也没有办法预测有哪一本书能够代代相传。

But the fact is, I was hedging.

但事实上，我在闪烁其词。

What my daughter really wanted to know was how well J. K. Rowling stacks up against the likes of Robert Louis Stevenson or Madeleine L'Engle.

我女儿真正想知道的是：与罗伯特·路易斯·史蒂文森和马德琳·英格这一类人相比较，罗琳到 底有多棒。

6

I could have told her that I thought they were beautifully crafted works

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of entertainment,

我本可以告诉她我认为这些书是精心构思的通俗作品，

the literary equivalent of Steven Spielberg.

是堪比史蒂文·斯皮尔伯格之电影的文学作品。

I could also have told her I thought the Potter books were derivative. 本来我还可以告诉她我认为《哈利波特》系列丛书没有什么新意，

They share so many elements with so many children's classics

它们与众多儿童经典作品有太多相似之处，

that sometimes it seems as though Rowling had assembled her novels from a kit.

所以有时候会给读者一种感觉，仿佛罗琳组装编织了这些故事。

However, these novels amount to much more than just the sum of their parts.

但是，这些故事绝对不仅仅是各个部分的简单相加。

The crucial aspect of their appeal is that they can be read by children and adults with equal pleasure.

它们如此受欢迎的关键之处就在于无论是大人还是小孩都能够从阅读中获得乐趣。

Only the best authors—and they can be as different as Dr. Seuss and Philip Pullman" and, yes, J.|K. Rowling—can pull that off.

只有最好的作家——他们能够与苏斯博士和菲利普·普尔曼，当然还有罗琳一样与众不同——才能够做到这一点。

7

P. L. Travers, the author of the Mary Poppins books, put it best when she wrote,

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《(欢乐满人间》的作者帕梅拉·林登·特拉弗斯概括得精辟至极。她写到，

"You do not chop off a section of your imaginative substance and make a book specifically for children,

“你不能把你想象的东西砍掉一部分然后写成一本专给孩子看的书，

for—if you are honest— you have, in fact, no idea where childhood ends and maturity begins.

坦白地说，因为事实上你根本无从知道童年究竟是什么时候结束，而成人期又是什么时候开始的。

It is all endless and all one. ”

它们相互连接、浑然一体。”

There is plenty for children and adults to enjoy in Rowling's books, starting with their language.

在罗琳的书中，从语言开始，就有足够多的让大人和孩子都喜欢的东西。

Her prose may be unadorned,

也许她文风朴实，

but her way with naming people and things reveals a quirky and original talent.

但是她给人和物取名的方式显示了独特的原创才能。

8

The best writers remember what it is like to be a child with astonishing intensity.

优秀作家关注孩子特点的能力达到惊人的程度。

Time and again, Rowling articulates just how defenseless even the bravest children often feel.

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罗琳不只一次地清楚表达出，即便是最勇敢的孩子也经常会表现得那么无助。

Near the end of the second book Dumbledore, the wise and protective headmaster, is banished from Hogwarts.

在《哈利波特》(二)中，当那位智慧的、对学生呵护有加的魔法学校校长邓布利多被驱逐出霍格 华兹时，

This terrifies Harry and his schoolmates—"With Dumbledore gone, fear had spread as never before"—and it terrified me.

哈利和他的同学们都感到恐惧万分。“邓布利多走了，前所未有的恐惧蔓延开来。”而这也让我很 害怕。

And in all of Rowling's books there runs an undercurrent of sadness and loss.

在罗琳所有的书中都流淌着一种潜在的伤感与迷失。

In the first book the orphaned Harry stares into the Mirror of Erised, which shows the viewer his or her utmost desires.

在《哈利波特》(一)中，变成孤儿的哈利盯着那面能够说出每个人内心深处愿望的厄里斯魔镜看，

Harry sees his dead parents.

他看见了逝去的双亲。

"Not until I'd reread what I'd written did I realize that that had been taken entirely- entirely- from how I felt about my mother's death," Rowling said.

“直到我自己重读我写过的东西，我才意识到这个情节完完全全——完完全全地——来自于我对于母亲去世的感觉，”罗琳说，

"In fact, death and bereavement and what death means, I would say, is one of the central themes in all seven books."

“事实上，我可以说，死亡、丧亲之痛以及死亡意味着什么是所有这七册书的中心主题之一。”

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Do young readers pick up on all this deep intellectualism?

而年轻的读者们能够领会这一份深刻的理性吗?

Consciously, perhaps not.

也许不能自觉地做到这一点吧。

But I don't think the books would have their broad appeal if they were only exciting tales of magical adventure,

但是我认为，如果这些书只是一些有关魔幻之旅的有趣的故事，那么它们就不可能有这么广泛的吸引力。

and I know adults would not find them so enticing.

而且我知道，那样的话成人就不会被它吸引。

9

The Harry Potter books aren't perfect.

《哈利波特》系列丛书不尽完美。

What I miss most in these novels is the presence of a great villain.

在这些丛书中我最想看到的是一个绝妙的反面角色。

And by great villain I mean an interesting villain.

我这里说的“绝妙的反面角色”是指“有趣的反面角色”。

Long John Silver is doubly frightening because he is both evil and charming.

因为高个子约翰·希尔弗既邪恶又迷人，所以他才让人更觉害怕。

If he were just all bad, he wouldn't frighten us half as much.

如果他仅仅只是坏的话，他带给我们的恐怖感会减少一大半。

Voldemort is resistible precisely because he is just bad to the bone.

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伏地魔王让人抗拒就是因为他仅仅只是一个十足的坏蛋。

That said, I should add that in the new book Rowling outdoes herself with a bad guy

这么一说，在这本新书中 罗琳超越自己 加上这样一个反面角色。

so seductive you'll never see him coming.

这个角色是如此的有魅力，你是永远也见不到的，

And he is scary.

而且他相当令人恐惧。

10

That quibble aside, Rowling’s novels are probably the best books children have ever encountered

除了这些吹毛求疵的意见，罗琳的书可能是孩子们所接触到的最好的书，

that haven't been thrust upon them by an adult.

而且阅读这些书也不是家长强加的任务。

I envy kids reading these books,

我羡慕那些阅读这些书的孩子，

because there was nothing this good when I was a boy

因为在我还是个孩子的时候，可没有这么好的东西

----nothing this good, I mean, that we found on our own, the way kids are finding Harry.

——我的意思是说，我们没有通过自己去发现有这么好的东西，不像现在的孩子，他们找到了哈 利。

We affectionately remember The Harry Boys and Nancy Drew,

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我们深深地记着哈迪男孩和南茜·朱尔，

but try rereading them and their charm fades away pretty quickly. 但是当我们尝试着重新阅读这些角色的时候，他们的魅力很快就散去了。

Rowling may not be as magisterial as Tolkien or as quirky as Dahl, 罗琳的书也许不如托尔金的书那么具有权威性，也不如达尔的作品那般跌宕起伏，

but her books introduce fledgling readers to a very high standard of entertainment.

但是她的书将涉世未深的读者带入了一个相当高的娱乐水准。

With three books left to go in the series, it's too early to pass final judgment.

《哈利波特》系列丛书还有三册尚未出版，现在下定论还为时尚早。

But considering what we've seen so far, especially in the latest volume, 但是，就目前我们看到的情况来看，特别是在最近一册，

Harry Potter has all the earmarks of a classic.

《哈利波特》具备了经典作品的所有特征。

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