英文小说佳句欣赏

洋八路

108. 【War and Peace】‘I must take full advantage of my freedom while I’m still feeling young and strong,’ he told himself. ‘Pierre was right, if you want to be happy, you have to believe in the possibilities of happiness, and I do believe in it now. Let the dead bury the dead, but while ever there is life, you must live and be happy.’ These were his thoughts. by Leo Tolstoy. 他想了很久，终于想出了一点人生的道理。。

拙泥

原帖由 洋八路 于 2011-9-17 09:14 发表
105 【Gone with The Wind】Why, why, her mind stuttered, I believe women could manage everything in the world without men’s help – except having babies, and God knows, no woman in her right mind woul ...

"no woman in her right mind would have babies if she could help it". Agree- It is the hardest job in the world with guaranteed financial loss. Who would be so silly as to take this job if she were not programed so?

洋八路

hehe.. :)  'programed', the word you use here is intraguingly impressive...so, you think the mind of women who wish to bear children is being programmed? by whom? silly to be programmed or even sillier not to be programmed? what is the fundamental spirit of herd to have the babies, being such a painful and very cost ineffecive business?

洋八路

109 【Gone with The Wind】Well, she wouldn’t swell his conceit by complimenting him on his cleverness. She longed viciously for sharp words with which to cut him. By Margaret Mitchell -- 骄傲自大的男人。..women must use words to cut him, swell up saliva to drown him !!!

洋八路

110 【War and Peace】A Frenchman is self-assured because he seems himself devastatingly charming, mentally and physically, to men and women alike. An Englishman is self-assured on the grounds that he is a citizen of the best-organised state in the world, and also because an Englishman he always knows the right thing to do and everything he does, because he is Englishman, must be right. An Italian is self-assured because he gets excited and easily forgets himself and everybody else. A Russian is self-assured because he knows nothing, and doesn’t want to know anything because he doesn’t believe you can know anything completely. A self-assured German is the worst of he lot, the most stolid and the most disgusting, because he imagines he knows the truth through a branch of science that is entirely his invention, though he sees it as absolute truth. - Leo Tolstoy [War and Peace] translated by Anthony Briggs - 看看法国人，英国人，意大利人，俄国人，德国人的自信心 。。。

-- may I add: A Chinese man is self-assured because he finds himself smaller in size, less ghastly hair on surface, yet cleverer in all means, and also because anything he does can be always meditated to be right at last.

洋八路

111  【The Death of Ivan Ilyich】He wept over his helplessness, over his terrible loneliness, over the cruelty of people, over the cruelty of God, over the absence of God. by Leo Tolstoy. 他哭的好伤心。

洋八路

112 【The Rainbow】You mustn't expect it. Between two people, the love itself is the important thing, and that is neither you nor him. It is a thrid thing you must create. You mustn't expect it to be just your way. 婚姻的真谛? what is the third thing you must create?

洋八路

113 【Gone with The Wind】It was that endearing term, still so new to his ears, and the bright teardrops which edged her pale green eyes as she looked up pleadingly at him that won him over. By Margaret Mitchell -- 是她眼角的泪珠让他爱上了她。

洋八路

114 【Gone with The Wind】She thanked God tiredly that she had cried all her tears the night before, so now she could stand erect and dry eyed.  By Margaret Mitchell -- 感谢上帝，她昨晚已将眼泪哭干。。

洋八路

115 【The Rainbow】The sands were as ground silver, the sea moved in solid brightness, coming towards them, and she went to meet the advance of the flashing, buoyant water. She gave her breast to the moon, her belly to the flashing, heaving water. by D.H.Lawrence -- to the moon, to the water..

洋八路

116 【War and Peace】'I only know two really harmful things in life -- remorse and illness. There is never any good unless these two things are absent. Living for myself and avoiding these two evils -- that's my philosophy now.' -- by Leo Tolstoy. 悔恨和疾病，人生两大祸害。

洋八路

117 【War and Peace】As he bent over the pot, helping himself to huge spoonfuls and wolfing them down one after another, the soldiers watched him in silence. by Leo Tolstoy, translated by Anthony Briggs.  -- 狼吞？

拙泥

原帖由 洋八路 于 2011-9-21 09:15 发表
109 【Gone with The Wind】Well, she wouldn’t swell his conceit by complimenting him on his cleverness. She longed viciously for sharp words with which to cut him. By Margaret Mitchell -- 骄傲自大的男 ...

A bit harsh, but there is still respect and kindness in it. Wouldn't it be more vicious to "swell his conceit" by simply not bothering to "cut" him or even paying insincere compliments(I thought this would be the definition for the word "despise").

拙泥

原帖由 洋八路 于 2011-9-22 08:21 发表
110 【War and Peace】A Frenchman is self-assured because he seems himself devastatingly charming, mentally and physically, to men and women alike. An Englishman is self-assured on the grounds that he  ...

This is an interesting one,haha..
Re: Frenchman
"Davastatingly charming"- here "davastatingly" may be translated as " 一塌糊涂"， I suppose?
Re: German
Is this why Germany boasts the greatest philosophers in the world?
Re: Chinese man
There is a hint of Joe Wong's style,

拙泥

原帖由 洋八路 于 2011-6-26 12:16 发表
88. The world is made up of a mass of people and a few individuals. D.H.Lawrence [The Plumed Serpent]


-- should we be sad with this statement? probably not, as there is no evidence showing the indiv ...

The "individuals" have higher risks of either killing themselves by trying to solve unsolvable problems or being killed by governments that only want to see "a mass of people", sadly.

洋八路

原帖由 拙泥 于 2011-9-30 04:39 发表


A bit harsh, but there is still respect and kindness in it. Wouldn't it be more vicious to "swell his conceit" by simply not bothering to "cut" him or even paying insincere compliments(I thought thi ...

are you trying to say: A bit harsh, but there is still some respect and kindness in it. Wouldn't it be more vicious to despise him by simply not bothering to "cut" him or even paying insincere compliments. - simply 不理他,这个应该是最有效，最牛鼻的手段。一旦你不注意他，他的高傲就是瓮低抽薪，燃烧不起来，他就会非常非常的可怜。。

洋八路

原帖由 拙泥 于 2011-9-30 04:54 发表


This is an interesting one,haha..
Re: Frenchman
"Davastatingly charming"- here "davastatingly" may be translated as " 一塌糊涂"， I suppose?
Re: German
Is this why Germany boasts the greatest philosop ...

不太好翻译 -- 法国人觉得自己有一塌糊涂的魅力？还是法国人感觉自己魅力得一塌糊涂？。。无穷的魅力，不可比拟的，致命的，超凡的，无可救药的，战无不胜的。。

Joe Wang 是谁？我这里说的中国男人是，体积小，体毛少，但聪明手段过人，做事情（不管好与坏）最终都可以自己正确自己。。比如黑厚，比如成王败寇，比如贪官二奶，比如腐败关系，最终好象都可以合理化，因为不信天不信地，自己怎么做想着想着最后都对了。。

洋八路

118 【War and Peace】When your head’s chopped off you don’t worry about your hairstyle. by Leo Tolstoy, translated by Anthony Briggs. 是真的顾不上了。

拙泥

It reminds me a discussion with a friend about our difference in personality. She would "cut" him with sharp words when fighting with hubby, while I would simply say nothing and depise him. We agreed that she is more charitable, or rather I am more vicious.

When reading the sentence, strangely I see more forgiving nature in her.

拙泥

Sometimes I find it interesting to see very similar way of thinking in Chinese and English, which is reflected in literate translation. For example, 青岛方言中的"一等!", 和英语中的"hang on!" . It's effectiveness in conversaion and even the facial expression when these words are spoken are strikingly similar. I thought "davastadedly (charming)" and "(魅力,帅)得一塌糊涂" might be another example.

拙泥

Re:中国男人
This is an interesting point.

洋八路

原帖由 拙泥 于 2011-10-1 00:12 发表
It reminds me a discussion with a friend about our difference in personality. She would "cut" him with sharp words when fighting with hubby, while I would simply say nothing and depise him. We agreed  ...

well, if we take one more glimpse of the perception, the party who do not bother to 'cut', could be literally considered even more conceited than the one being despised in the first place, and walking away may not be justified as the righteous or having a higher moral ground or the better feeling being a winner, after all, conceitedness is admittedly quite a human nautre, though being so skewed, but annihilating the path to mutual understanding is destructive and the cruelest above all the human's erred living practice....

洋八路

119 【War and Peace】He sang not like a singer who knows he has an audience, but more like a bird: obviously, he just needed to sing, in a way that sometimes you just have to stretch your limbs or go for a walk, and the sound of his singing was always light, sweet,plangent, almost feminine, and his face as he sang was very serious. by Leo Tolstoy -- 鸟叫无需听众？好像也是为了吸引异性吧。。

洋八路

120 【The Death of Ivan Ilyich】Again minute followed minute, hour hour, always the same, and always without end, and always more frightening the inevitable end. by Leo Tolstoy. 死亡临近，分秒煎熬。

sky_1980s

谢谢分享！！！！！！！

洋八路

121 【Wuthering Heights】The expression of her face seemed disturbed and anxious. Her lips were half asunder as if she meant to speak; and she drew a breath, but it escaped in a sigh, instead of a sentence. by Emily Bronte. - 欲言又止。。

洋八路

122 【Gone with The Wind】‘Do you mean to call me a coward?’ she was ruffling like a hen. - By Margaret Mitchell -- 想象一下- ruffling like a hen..

拙泥

Oh dear... I am beyond redemption

拙泥

You think so? I thought that birds sing at dawn to celebrate a new day and  sing at sunset simply to make it more beautiful.

洋八路

原帖由 拙泥 于 2011-10-5 00:31 发表
Oh dear... I am beyond redemption

Australian banks are the healthiest on current earth.. so not need to worry.. there is plenty of paper money to redeem your dignity..