海倫·凱勒自傳《我的生活》第58期

The story of Ruth, too—how Oriental it is! Yet how different is the life of these simple country folks from that of the Persian capital! Ruth is so loyal and gentle-hearted, we cannot help loving her, as she stands with the reapers amid the waving corn. Her beautiful, unselfish spirit shines out like a bright star in the night of a dark and cruel age. Love like Ruth's, love which can rise above conflicting creeds and deep-seated racial prejudices, is hard to find in all the world.

《路得記》也屬於這樣的故事——這是一個多麼具有東方情調的故事啊！然而這些淳樸的鄉下（猶太）人又是多麼難以融入波斯人的首都！路得是如此地善良而忠誠，當她和收割者們一同站在起伏的麥田裏時，我們都會禁不住對她產生喜愛之情。美麗而無私的路得如同黑暗歲月中一顆光芒四射的星辰，如果人們都懷有像路得一樣的愛心，那麼這種愛一定可以超越宗教教義和根深蒂固的種族偏見，繼而成爲普世之愛，但是你很難在世界上找到這樣的愛。

The Bible gives me a deep, comforting sense that "things seen are temporal, and things unseen are eternal."

《聖經》帶給我最深切而撫慰的感受，就是“眼目可見之物均屬過眼雲煙；眼目不可見之物實乃永恆”。

I do not remember a time since I have been capable of loving books that I have not loved Shakespeare. I cannot tell exactly when I began Lamb's "Tales from Shakespeare"; but I know that I read them at first with a child's understanding and a child's wonder. "Macbeth" seems to have impressed me most. One reading was sufficient to stamp every detail of the story upon my memory forever. For a long time the ghosts and witches pursued me even into Dreamland. I could see, absolutely see, the dagger and Lady Macbeth's little white hand—the dreadful stain was as real to me as to the grief-stricken queen.

在我喜好的書籍中當然少不了莎士比亞。我無法確切說出我是什麼時候開始讀蘭姆的《莎士比亞故事集》的，但是我知道我最初是以一個孩童的理解力和好奇心來讀莎士比亞的。《麥克白》似乎是令我印象最深的一部作品。這出悲劇的震撼力足可以讓我永遠記住其中的每一處故事情節。有很長一段時間，幽靈和女巫甚至追逐至我的夢鄉。我能看見，實實在在地看見，匕首和麥克白夫人嬌小而蒼白的手——極度悲傷的王后境況堪憂，這一幕在我看來是如此地真切，彷彿歷歷在目。

I read "King Lear" soon after "Macbeth," and I shall never forget the feeling of horror when I came to the scene in which Gloster's eyes are put out. Anger seized me, my fingers refused to move, I sat rigid for one long moment, the blood throbbing in my temples, and all the hatred that a child can feel concentrated in my heart.

在《麥克白》之後，我讀了《李爾王》。我決不會忘記格羅斯特的雙眼被弄瞎時的恐怖景象。憤怒攫住了我的內心，我的手指不再移動（讀取文字），我怔怔地坐了良久，血液在我的太陽穴裏汩汩涌動，那一刻，我體會到了一個小孩子胸中所能積蓄的所有憎恨。

I must have made the acquaintance of Shylock and Satan about the same time, for the two characters were long associated in my mind. I remember that I was sorry for them. I felt vaguely that they could not be good even if they wished to, because no one seemed willing to help them or to give them a fair chance. Even now I cannot find it in my heart to condemn them utterly. There are moments when I feel that the Shylocks, the Judases, and even the Devil, are broken spokes in the great wheel of good which shall in due time be made whole.

回想起來，我一定是在同一個時期熟悉夏洛克和撒旦的，在我的意識裏，總會把這兩個人物聯繫在一起。我記得我當時還爲他們難過了一陣子，我模模糊糊地感覺到，即使他們願意也不可能成爲好人，因爲似乎沒有人肯幫助他們，或者給他們一個公平的機會。直到現在，我也無法做到無條件地譴責他們的不義。曾經有那麼一個瞬間，我覺得像夏洛克，猶大，乃至魔鬼之流就像一根根折斷的輻條——但不管輪子被毀壞得多麼厲害，承載人類歷史的巨大車輪總會被及時地修復如初。

It seems strange that my first reading of Shakespeare should have left me so many unpleasant memories. The bright, gentle, fanciful plays—the ones I like best now—appear not to have impressed me at first, perhaps because they reflected the habitual sunshine and gaiety of a child's life. But "there is nothing more capricious than the memory of a child: what it will hold, and what it will lose."

我第一次讀莎士比亞時就留下了那麼多令人不快的回憶，這似乎顯得有些奇怪。明快、柔美而充滿幻想的戲劇——也就是我目前最喜歡的戲劇類型——最初並沒有給我留下什麼深刻的印象，這或許是因爲它們所反映的不過是一個小孩子的無憂無慮的快樂生活而已。但是“沒有什麼東西能比一個小孩子的記憶更反覆無常的了：哪些是該擁有的，哪些又是該失去的，我無從說清”。