【台词精读】Yes, Minister 之 The Right to Know

大噶好！

距离上一次更新又是一个多月了。前段时间比较忙，没能至少保持月更频率。不过我一有空就回来更新啦，也是很敬业了（夸夸自己www

往期传送门：Yes Minister 台词精读

场景一：Bernard 来到 Humphrey 的办公室。Humphrey 问 Bernard 最近大臣都在和些什么人开会，Bernard 如实回答。Humphrey 却对此感到不快：

- Bernard, this has to be stopped at once. - Why? - If he talks to the underlings, he may learn things we don't know. - Our position could be undermined. - If it increases our knowledge. - It is folly if it's at the expense of your authority.

Humphrey 最后这句话，可以说是是本集的要旨，尤其是当我们考虑到本集结尾 Hacker 对 Humphrey 的 危机管理的态度。

expense 的一些用法： ▸ at the expense of sb/sth; 以某人/某事物为代价 ▸ to make a joke/have a laugh at sb's expense 拿某人开玩笑/作笑料 ▸ to spare no expense (over sth); （在某事物上）不惜代价 ▸ to claim expenses 报销

Could you develop that point, please?

Humphrey 又说到 'it is not the Minister's job to run the Department.' 我们的小 Bernard, being young and green, 又抛出了（对于 Humphrey 这种老油条来说）无比天真的疑问：But what should he do then?

A Minister has three functions: First, as an advocate, making the Department's actions seem plausible to Parliament and public, he is our public relations man. Second, he is our man in Westminster, steering our legislation through Parliament. And third, he is our breadwinner. He has to fight in Cabinet for the money we need to run our Department. But, he is not here to review departmental procedures with Principals and Assistant Secretaries.

Humphrey “教育” 完 Bernard 之后，得知大臣原来只是在和一些环保/动保人士开会，顿时又表扬起 Bernard 来了，于是 Bernard 说：

- I'll try and find some more threatened species then, shall I? - You may not have to look very far. Secretaries who can't occupy their Ministers are a threatened species, actually.

Threatened Species and Where to Find Them

场景二：Hacker 在办公室里应付一群环保/动保人士。

有时 Hacker 说话太直，想到什么就说了，这不，又把自己给囧到了：

- They're all back biting and buck passing. You know what committees are like. - We are a committee. - Yes. I didn't mean your sort of committee.

backbiting 背后诽谤 buck-passing 推卸责任

Hacker 又试图讲个笑话，可是那群代表团的人还是一脸严肃。（观众的笑声倒是很给力

- We're not above nature. We're all a part of it. Men are animals too, you know. - Yes, I've just come from the House of Commons.

不一会 Bernard 来了，接口说大臣接下来还有别的会要开，机智地送走了这群人。然后还给了 Hacker 一个很公务员式的赞美：

Very polished performance. Gracious. Emollient. Said absolutely nothing. Very professional.

emollient -- attempting to avoid confrontation or anger; calming or conciliatory: the president's emollient approach to differences.

紧接着 Humphrey 也进来了，Hacker 一看到他就开始质问：

- Humphrey, do you see it as part of your job to help Ministers make fools of themselves? - I have never met one that needed any help.

Humphrey 几乎是本能地反驳了回去hhhh

Hacker 问 Humphrey 为什么让他告诉媒体新推行的法案 meant 'no loss of amenity' ，Humphrey 却说我可没说过，我让你说的是 'no significant loss of amenity'. Hacker 却觉得两者是一个意思。

There's all the difference in the world. Almost anything can be attacked as a "loss of amenity", and be defended as "not a significant loss of amenity". Which should signify one should appreciate the significance of "significant".

果然加上一个修饰语就完全不一样了。

Hacker 在推行新法案的时候并不知道法案的推行会导致 Hayward's Spinney 不再收到保护，为了让这种事情不再发生，他决定改组部门，可是 Humphrey 又要来“劝退”他：

- Minister, I have something to say to you which you may not like to hear. - Why should today be any different? - Minister, the traditional allocation of executive responsibilities has always been so determined as to liberate the ministerial incumbent from the administrative minutiae by devolving the managerial functions to those whose qualifications have better formed them for the performance of such humble offices, thereby releasing their political overlords for the more onerous duties and deliberations which are the inevitable concomitant of their exalted position.

以上又是典型的 Humphrey式的 grandiloquent.

concomitant 伴随的 ‹circumstance, characteristic› ▸ to be concomitant with sth; 伴随着某事物 ▸ the undertaking had its concomitant risks 这项事业有其相应的风险

句中的 “humble offices” 里的 “office” 特指政府机构的职位

▸ to perform the office of … 行使…的职责 ▸ a term or period of office 任期 ▸ to seek office 谋求官职 ▸ to take office 就职 ▸ to be in or hold office 在职 ▸ to leave office离职 ▸ to be out of office «party, politician» 在野 ▸ to stand British or run US for office 竞选职位 ▸ to rise to high office 升任高官

才用长篇大论把 Hacker 搞得晕头转向的，又开始油腔滑调了起来：

What I mean is that the menial chore of running a department is beneath you. You're fashioned for a nobler calling.

▸ to fashion sth into sth; 把某物做成某物 ▸ to fashion sth out of or from sth; 用某物制作某物

场景三：Hacker 家，Hacker 在餐桌上看公文，他的女儿 Lucy 过了中午才现身：

- He hasn't seen you for a while. - I was having a lie-in. - Better than a sit-in, I suppose.

lie/sleep in 睡懒觉 sit-in 静坐抗议

不得不说，英语里的介词梗真是百玩不腻啊。另外一个是在故园风雨后里Charles的爸爸戏弄Charles带回家的一个朋友的时候玩的 “in business/ on business”（前者是经商，后者是出差）的梗。

Lucy 看到了卫报上的 “Hacker the badger butcher”。身为左派的她对自己的父亲的作为很是不屑，Hacker 试图辩驳，没想到又被自己女儿顶回去（真是食物链底端啊...

- If a few badgers die for the sake of a masterplan that will save Britain's natural heritage, tough. - A masterplan, mein Fuhrer. The end justifies the means? It's because badgers can't vote. If badgers had votes, you wouldn't be exterminating them. You'd be at Hayward's Spinney, shaking paws, and kissing cubs, ingratiating yourself the way you always do.

▸ to ingratiate oneself with sb 巴结某人 ▸ master-plan 总体规划

▸ the end justifies the means wrong or unfair methods may be used if the overall goal is good: we excuse our greed by claiming that the end justifies the means.

source: The Complete Yes Minister

Anne 表面上好像站在 Hacker 那边，可是她这番话让 Hacker 显得更滑稽了：

Those Civil Servants may be always kowtowing to Daddy, but they never take any notice of him.

kowtow 卑躬屈膝 ▸ to kowtow to sb/sth; 在某人/某事物面前唯唯诺诺 ▸ to kowtow to convention 屈从于习俗

（细心的你或许发现了，Kowtow 来自于中文的 “磕头”

场景四：老公务员们给小Bernard 传授心得（误）：

- There are four words if you want a Minister to accept a proposal. Quick. Simple. Popular. Cheap. And there are four words for a proposal if you want it thrown out. Complicated. Lengthy. Expensive. Controversial. And to be really sure the Minister doesn't accept it, you say the decision is courageous. - Worse than "controversial"? - "Controversial" means "this'll lose your votes". "Courageous" means "this will lose you the election".

Silly Boy!

场景四：Bernard 看到了大臣女儿给大臣的信，信上说她和她男友要进行一项名为 “save the badgers” 的夜间抗议。Humphrey 觉得没什么大不了的，可 Bernard 告诉 Humphrey 他们要进行的是裸体抗议。

- This puts a different complexion on it. - Yes. Especially in this weather.

▸ to put a (whole) new complexion on sth; 赋予某事物（全）新的面貌

然而 complexion 还有肤色的意思 ▸ to have a clear/bad/fair/dark complexion肤色光洁/差/白皙/黝黑 ▸ to have a spotty complexion 皮肤有雀斑

（编剧太坏太有才了哈哈哈

Especially in this weather.

无独有偶，紧接着又有一个 pun. Hacker 姗姗来迟，Humphrey 正准备告诉他裸体抗议的事情：

- I have a confession to make. - That's a change. - Well, come on, Humphrey, make a clean breast of it. - Not the happiest of phrases under the circumstances.

▸ to make a clean breast of sth 坦陈某事

- I have to confess that the badgers may be a somewhat bigger story than we thought. - Don't tell me they're going to have kittens. - It is not the badgers who are going to have kittens.

▸ to have kittens British figurative informal 焦躁不安

（这里破烂熊把 'have kittens' 翻译成 “下崽” 了，遇到不熟悉的词 or 直译不对劲的时候我们还是要多查字典！

在 Lucy 来电话之前， Hacker 和 Bernard 有这样一段对话：

- Do you mean that when the chips are down, you're on my side, not Humphrey's? - Minister, it's my job to see the chips stay up.

▸ when the chips are down informal 在关键时刻

chip 这个词有很多意思，也有很多成语，我之前在 Economy Drive 的帖子里总结过一些。

另外，个人觉得 Bernard 这个回答特别机智，大家可以好好体会体会。

然后 Lucy 来电话了，还开始倒数了，数到五的时候，Humphrey 拿着一份文件回来了

I have just seen the latest report from the Government's inspectors, which throws new light on the issue.

throw (or cast or shed) light on help to explain (something) by providing further information about it: no one could shed any light on the mysterious car accident.

Humphrey 拿起电话，油腔滑调地向 Lucy 问了个好，接着讲了一个房地产商的小计谋。让这个假想的房地产商背完锅以后，他还“好心”提醒了大臣的女儿：

It would be a pity to play into the developer's hands.

play into someone's hands act in such a way as unintentionally to give someone an advantage: overreaction to the threats would be playing into the hands of the terrorists.

于是，本集以 Humphrey 单枪匹马平定风波告终。而 Hacker 也似乎在某种程度上同意了 Humphrey 之前所说的 “there're some things that it is better for a Minister not to know”，Humphrey 又赢了一次。

小发现：本集居然也没有以 “yes minister” 结束呢！

p.s. 最近在ebay买了精装版的 The Complete Yes Minister，写这篇的时候顺便读了关于本集的片段，书里的内容以 Hacker 的日记为主，另外还穿插了 Humphrey 和 Bernard 传的memo 以及报纸节选什么的。总之还挺多 Hacker 的内心os的，看完感觉 Hacker 更萌了哈哈哈