《庶出的标志》第三章（第三部分，试译）

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  Cousteau 楼主 2015-01-31 18:16:51

  原文对照： He had been told by University President Azureus that a Dr Alexander, Assistant Lecturer in Biodynamics, whom Krug had never met, would come to fetch him. The man Alexander had been collecting people all evening and the President had been trying to get in touch with Krug since the early afternoon. A peppy, dynamic, efficient gentleman, Dr Alexander--one of those people who in times of disaster emerge from dull obscurity to blossom forth suddenly with permits, passes, coupons, cars, connections, lists of addresses. The University bigwigs had crumpled up helplessly, and of course no such gathering would have been possible had not a perfect organizer been evolved from the periphery of their species by a happy mutation which almost suggested the discreet intermediation of a transcendental force. One could distinguish in the dubious light the emblem (bearing a remarkable resemblance to a crushed dislocated but still writhing spider) of the new government upon a red flaglet affixed to the bonnet, when the officially sanctioned car obtained by the magician in our midst drew up at the curb which it grazed with a purposeful tyre. Krug seated himself beside the driver, who was none other than Dr Alexander himself, a pink-faced, very blond, very well-groomed man in his thirties, with a pheasant's feather in his nice green hat and a heavy opal ring on his fourth finger. His hands were very white and soft, and lay lightly on the steering wheel. Of the two (?) persons in the back Krug recognized Edmond Beuret, the Professor of French literature. _'Bonsoir, cher collègue,'__ said Beuret. _'On m'a tiré du lit au grand désespoir de ma femme. Comment va la vôtre?'__ 'A few days ago,' said Krug, 'I had the pleasure of reading your article on--' (he could not recall the name of that French general, an honest if somewhat limited historical figure who had been driven to suicide by slanderous politicians). 'Yes,' said Beuret, 'it did me good to write it. _"Les morts, les pauvres morts ont de grandes douleurs. Et quand Octobre souffle"--'__ Dr Alexander turned the wheel very gently and spoke without looking at Krug, then giving him a rapid glance, then looking again straight ahead: 'I understand, Professor, that you are going to be our saviour tonight. The fate of our Alma Mater lies in good hands.' Krug grunted noncommittally. He had not the vaguest--or was it a veiled allusion to the fact that the Ruler, colloquially known as the Toad, had been a schoolmate of his--but that would have been too silly. The car was stopped in the middle of Skotoma (ex Liberty, ex Imperial) Place by three soldiers, two policemen, and the raised hand of poor Theodor the Third who permanently wanted a lift or to go to a smaller place, teacher; but they were motioned by Dr Alexander to look at the little red and black flag--wherupon they saluted and retired into the darkness. The streets were deserted as usually happens in the gaps of history, in the _terrains vagues__ of time. Taken all in all the only live creature encountered was a young man going home from an ill-timed and apparently badly truncated fancy ball: he was dressed up as a Russian mujik--embroidered shirt spreading freely from under a tasselled sash, _culotte bouffante,__ soft crimson boots, and wrist watch. _'On va lui torcher le derrière, à ce gaillard-là,'__ remarked Professor Beuret grimly. The other--anonymous--person in the back seat, muttered something inaudible and replied to himself in an affirmative but likewise inarticulate way. 'I cannot drive much faster,' said Dr Alexander steadily looking ahead, 'because the wrestle-cap of the lower slammer is what they call muckling. If you will put your hand into my right hand pocket, Professor, you will find some cigarettes.' 'I am a non-smoker,' said Krug. 'And anyway I do not believe there are any there.' They drove on for some time in silence. 'Why?' asked Dr Alexander, gently treading, gently releasing. 'A passing thought,' said Krug. Discreetly the gentle driver allowed one hand to leave the wheel and grope, then the other. Then, after a moment, the right one again. 'I must have mislaid them,' he said after another minute of silence. 'And you, Professor, are not only a non-smoker--and not only a man of genius, everybody knows that, but also (quick glance) an exceedingly lucky gambler.' 'Eez eet zee verity,' said Beuret, suddenly shifting to English, which he knew Krug understood, and speaking it like a Frenchman in an English book, 'eez eet zee verity zat, as I have been informed by zee reliably sources, zee disposed _chef__ of the state has been captured together with a couple of other blokes (when the author gets bored by the process--or forgets) somewhere in the hills--and shot? But no, I ziss cannot credit--eet eez too orrible' (when the author remembers again). 'Probably a slight exaggeration,' observed Dr Alexander in the vernacular. 'Various kinds of ugly rumours are apt to spread nowadays, and although of course _domusta barbarn kapusta [the ugliest wives are the truest], still I do not think that in this particular case,' he trailed off with a pleasant laugh and there was another silence. O my strange native town! Your narrow lanes where the Roman once passed dream in the night of other things than do the evanescent creatures that tread your stones. O you strange town! Your every stone holds as many old memories as there are motes of dust. Every one of your grey quiet stones has seen a witch's long hair catch fire, a pale astronomer mobbed, a beggar kicked in the groin by another beggar--and the King's horses struck sparks from you, and the dandies in brown and the poets in black repaired to the coffee houses while you dripped with slops to the merry echoes of gardyloo. Town of dreams, a changing dream, O you, stone changeling. The little shops all shuttered in the clean night, the gaunt walls, the niche shared by the homeless pigeon with a sculptured churchman, the rose window, the exuded gargoyle, the jester who slapped Christ--lifeless carvings and dim life mingling their feathers... Not for the wheels of oil-maddened engines were your narrow and rough streets designed--and as the car stopped at last and bulky Beuret crawled out in the wake of his beard, the anonymous muser who had been sitting beside him was observed to split into two, producing by sudden gemination Gleeman, the frail Professor of Medieval Poetry, and the equally diminutive Yanovsky, who taught Slavic scansion--two newborn homunculi now drying on the paleolithic pavement. 'I shall lock the car and follow you presently,' said Dr Alexander with a little cough. An Italianate mendicant in picturesque rags who had overdone it by having an especially dramatic hole in the one place which normally would never have had any--the bottom of his expectant hat--stood, shaking diligently with the ague in the lamplight at the front door. Three consecutive coppers fell--and are still falling. Four silent professors flocked up the rococo stairs. But they did not have to ring or knock or anything for the door on the topmost landing was flung open to greet them by the prodigious Dr Alexander who was there already, having zoomed perhaps, up some special backstairs, or by means of those nonstop things as when I used to rise from the twinned night of the Keeweenawatin and the horrors of the Laurentian Revolution, through the ghoul-haunted Province of Perm, through Early Recent, Slightly Recent, Not so Recent, Quite Recent, Most Recent--warm, warm!--up to _my room number on _my__ hotel floor in a remote country, up, up, in one of those express elevators manned by the delicate hands--my own in a negative picture--of dark-skinned men with sinking stomachs and rising hearts, never attaining Paradise, which is not a roof garden; and from the depths of the stag-headed hall old President Azureus came at a quick pace, his arms open, his faded blue eyes beaming in advance, his long wrinkled upper lip quivering-- 'Yes, of course--how stupid of me,' thought Krug, the circle in Krug, one Krug in another one.

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  [已注销] 2015-02-01 16:33:58

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  昨夜星辰 2016-11-20 11:11:03

  厉害了，支持一下。之前在微博上问过上海译文的小编，这本书在他们的选题计划里，可以期待一下

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  Cousteau 楼主 2016-11-20 13:07:40

  厉害了，支持一下。之前在微博上问过上海译文的小编，这本书在他们的选题计划里，可以期待一下 厉害了，支持一下。之前在微博上问过上海译文的小编，这本书在他们的选题计划里，可以期待一下 昨夜星辰

  谢谢，如果上海译文能出的话最好。

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  昨夜星辰 2016-11-20 13:27:20

  不客气，就是不知道要等多久。博尔赫斯全集都出第二辑了，为什么我们纳博科夫的总是这么断断续续到，《天赋》是不是绝版了呀，也不出个新译本，我超爱这本。

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  Cousteau 楼主 2016-11-20 13:32:35

  不客气，就是不知道要等多久。博尔赫斯全集都出第二辑了，为什么我们纳博科夫的总是这么断断续续 不客气，就是不知道要等多久。博尔赫斯全集都出第二辑了，为什么我们纳博科夫的总是这么断断续续到，《天赋》是不是绝版了呀，也不出个新译本，我超爱这本。 ... 昨夜星辰

  您什么时候问的上海译文的编辑？我之前也隐约看到，说是上海译文在购买纳博科夫全集版权时故意没选这本的

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  昨夜星辰 2016-11-20 13:53:24

  前几天问的，最近关注了上海译文的微博才顺口问的，只问了《庶出的标志》这一本。《天赋》一直都没看到什么消息。

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  Cousteau 楼主 2016-11-20 13:59:35

  前几天问的，最近关注了上海译文的微博才顺口问的，只问了《庶出的标志》这一本。《天赋》一直都 前几天问的，最近关注了上海译文的微博才顺口问的，只问了《庶出的标志》这一本。《天赋》一直都没看到什么消息。 ... 昨夜星辰

  原来如此，谢谢。不知道从“选题计划”到见到成品要多长时间了。

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