云端的天堂

本文选自经济学人的Books and arts 版块，是大卫·麦库卢（David McCullough）的新书《莱特兄弟》的一篇书评。书中描述了莱特兄弟如何排除万难，历尽险阻将人类第一架飞行器送上蓝天，同时它也是对莱特兄弟以及人类的冒险精神的致敬。

文章音频

Heavens above

翻译：@Nora，校对@Eric

Those magnificent men in their flying machines

飞行器里的好小伙

The Wright Brothers. By David McCullough. Simon & Schuster; 320 pages; $30.

《莱特兄弟》；大卫·麦库卢（David McCullough）著；西蒙与舒斯特出版公司（ Simon & Schuster）出版；320 页；30美元。

THE journey from nutter to genius can be short. For Wilbur and Orville Wright, inventors of the aeroplane, it took just 12 seconds. In 1903 their 605-pound (274-kilo) contraption, dubbed the “Flyer”, lifted off the sand dunes of North Carolina and stayed aloft just long enough to make history. Elated, the brothers quickly learned to go farther, higher and faster.

疯人到天才只有一步之遥。对于飞机发明家奥维尔 ·莱特（Orville Wright ）和威尔伯·莱特（ Wilbur Wright）来说，这个过程仅花了 12秒。1903 年，他们发明的重达 605英镑（即274 千克）别名“飞行者”的奇异装置在北卡罗来纳州的一处沙丘起飞，飞行时间之长足以载入史册。莱特兄弟欣喜若狂，很快学会了如何飞得更远、更高、更快。

The Wrights broke through against great odds, as David McCullough recounts in this enjoyable, fast-paced tale. Neither had any formal engineering training. They ran a bicycle shop in Ohio and decided to build an aeroplane after reading up on gliders. Having studied books and birds, they constructed first a glider, then a motor-powered craft, to test in the windy Carolina dunes. They worked with deliberation, taking time to master the basics of flying (such as how the wind works) and spurning pointless risk. Proceeds from the bike shop funded their efforts.

正如大卫·麦库卢（ David McCullough）在这个有趣的快节奏故事中讲述的那样，莱特兄弟排除万难，取得了成功。他们之前都没有进行过正式的工程学方面的培训。他们在俄亥俄州经营着一家自行车店。在研读滑翔机相关理论后，他们决定自己造一架飞机。研究完相关书籍和鸟类后，他们首先造了一个滑翔机，然后是一个动力驱动的飞行器，试飞选在多风的卡罗莱纳州的一处沙丘进行。他们经过了深思熟虑，花时间掌握飞行的基本理论（比如气流的运行），拒绝无谓的冒险。支撑这些的资金来源于自行车店的收益。

Scepticism was intense. Plenty of people dismissed the notion that man could fly at all. Just a handful watched the historic first flight, which Orville, the pilot, described as “an uncertain, wavy, creeping sort of a flight at best”. An unfortunate element of this tale was the apathy of the American government, which poured money into a different, failing machine and batted away the Wrights’ overtures. (As a result, the brothers lost valuable time between 1905 and 1908 as they scurried to sell their invention elsewhere.) Even the media paid little heed. When the Wrights tested a plane in their Ohio hometown of Dayton, after their successful efforts in North Carolina, the Dayton Daily News ignored the story.

很多人对此表示怀疑。许多人根本不相信人能飞。只有零星几个人目睹了这历史性的首飞，驾驶者奥维尔 ·莱特（Orville Wright）说这次飞行“顶多是那种不确定的有起伏的缓慢飞行”。这个故事的不幸在于美国政府的冷漠，政府把钱大量投入到各种各样失败的机器中去，拒绝莱特兄弟的提议。（结果是，莱特兄弟失去了 1905年到1908年的宝贵时间，这期间他们匆忙去别处销售他们的发明。）甚至媒体也很少关注。莱特兄弟在北卡罗莱纳州的取得试飞成功后，他们回到家乡俄亥俄州的代顿试飞，《代顿每日新闻报》却视若无睹。

Eventually, though, they got their due. Europeans were keen, even as the Americans shrugged. So the brothers and their helpers packed off their craft to France, where Wilbur eventually performed a test flight lasting close to two minutes in 1908 and won over the doubters. “He is not a bluffer,” one Frenchman declared. The French loved Wilbur’s modesty and unpretentiousness, and the way he carefully inspected every wire and strut on his aeroplane. Wilbur feared to let anyone touch the machine, and at one point slept in a shed to guard it.

不过，莱特兄弟最终还是如愿以偿。欧洲人对此满怀热情，而美国人甚至对此不屑一顾。所以，莱特兄弟和他们的助手把他们的飞行器打包发往法国。 1908年，威尔伯最后在法国持续了几乎两分钟的示范飞行并且打破了大众的质疑。一位法国人表明：“他没有吹牛”。这位法国人喜欢威尔伯的谦逊和朴实以及威尔伯会仔细检查他飞机上每一根电线和撑杆的做法。威尔伯不敢让任何人触碰他的机器，并且一度睡在小棚屋里来守护它。

This sentimental approach is at the heart of the book. “The Wright Brothers” lacks the heft of Mr McCullough’s two Pulitzer prize-winning works, on the American presidents John Adams and Harry Truman. He skims past the complexities in the service of a fun, fast ride. Why did Orville, who outlived his brother by decades, shun his sister Katharine (who had nursed him back after a nasty aeroplane accident) after she married? Why did the aviation field develop so quickly in the early 1900s, and why was France so especially keen to be involved? Also mentioned only briefly is the legacy of the Wright brothers’aeroplane company. It lives on as the Curtiss-Wright Corporation, an industrial technology specialist, though its aircraft-making heyday was many decades ago.

这种煽情的叙述是整本书的实质。《莱特兄弟》没有像麦库卢先生得到普利策奖的两部作品―关于美国总统约翰 ·亚当（John Adams ）和哈里·杜鲁门（ Harry Truman） 有影响力。此书中他只为读者读得愉快轻松而掠去了其中的复杂。为什么比他的哥哥多活几十年的奥维尔在她妹妹凯瑟琳（Katharine）（奥维尔发生严重的飞机事故后凯瑟琳照顾他直至康复）结婚后刻意回避她？为什么航空领域在 20世纪初期发展如此迅速？为什么法国对此尤为关注？关于莱特兄弟航空公司的遗产归属的叙述也只有寥寥几笔。尽管属于莱特航空公司的飞机制造的鼎盛期是在几十年前，但它依旧存活于工业技术行家柯蒂斯-莱特公司中。（译者注：莱特航空公司（前莱特-马丁）和柯蒂斯公司最终在1929年合并成为今天的柯蒂斯-莱特公司，但这两家工司曾有过很大的摩擦，还因航空专利问题闹上了法庭）

Perhaps the Wright brothers’ most significant achievement was that neither died in flight. Recognising the danger, Wilbur and Orville never flew together until 1910, years after their debut, in the interest of preserving one brother’s life. They had a few crashes, one of which killed a passenger. But by 1909 Wilbur was confidently piloting a craft around the Statue of Liberty (albeit with a canoe underneath lest he fell into the water), and Orville soared above 2,700 feet (820 metres) in 1910 . The first Flyer and its successors excelled because the brothers were so careful. These are fine things to daydream about next time you take to the skies. For aeroplane reading, “The Wright Brothers” is hard to beat.

或许莱特兄弟最具意义的成就是两人都没有死于飞行事故。他们知道危险所在，所以他们从不同机飞行直至首飞多年后的1910年，这是为了保障其中一个人的安全。他们也经历过几次飞机事故，其中一次事故有一名乘客丧生。但1909年，威尔伯信心十足地驾驶飞机绕自由女神像盘旋飞行（尽管底下准备了一艘独木舟以防他坠入水中），而且在1910年，奥维尔飞行高度超过2700英尺（即820 米）。飞行者一号及后续的飞行器一代胜过一代，因为莱特兄弟是如此谨慎细心。在飞机领域的书籍方面，这本《莱特兄弟》无书能敌。

From the print edition: Books and arts

笔记本：

1. 影片剧情简介：1910年，“飞行器”是那个时代风行一时的事物。然而正因为它刚刚诞生，一切还处于起步阶段。英国每日邮报主编劳德·罗恩斯（罗伯特·莫利 Robert Morley饰）策划组织了一场从伦敦飞往巴黎的竞赛。而这次竞赛的目的，就是为了彰显英国种族的优越。如果一切都按照预期发展，不出所料的，他的女婿理查德·梅斯（詹姆斯·福克斯 James Fox饰）将赢得比赛。竞赛的新闻一经发出，就得到了来自世界各地飞行器爱好者的踊跃报名。然而这场本该是冒险者的比赛，却成为了一场争夺帕特里夏·罗恩斯利（莎拉·米尔斯 Sarah Miles饰）感情的竞赛。

　　本片荣获1966年第38届奥斯卡金像奖最佳原创剧本提名，1966年第23届金球奖电影类-音乐喜剧类最佳影片提名及音乐喜剧类最佳男主角提名。影片描写了不同国家的飞行员的个性：死板的德国人、阴险的法国人、傲慢的意大利人还有倒霉的日本人，而英国人和美国人则被刻画成互相帮助的好人。片中很多经典的桥段，被以后很多的喜剧片所争相效仿，向本片致敬。摘自豆瓣。

2. contraption a machine or device that appears strange or unnecessarily complicated, and often badly made or unsafe奇异（或过于精巧）的机器（或装置）

3. read up on something (或 read something up) acquire information about a particular subject by studying it intensively or systematically

研读，攻读；系统地研究（某一科目）

she spent the time reading up on antenatal care.

她投入时间系统研究产前保健问题

4. proceeds 此处为复数名词，意为收益、收入。作动词有以下意思：

（1）begin a course of action开始行动；进行；开展

the consortium could proceed with the plan.这一财团可以启动那计划了。

（2）move forward ,especially after reaching a certain point（尤指达到某一点后）进而做；继续from the High Street, proceed over Magdalen Bridge.

（3）(Law)start a lawsuit against someone(律)起诉人；诉讼

he may still be able to proceed against the contractor under the common law negligence rules.

他仍然可以根据普通法过失行为条例起诉承包商。

（4）(Brit. dated)advance to a higher rank, status, or education

(英，旧)晋升，（教育方面）升学，升级

he did not proceed to university in his seventeenth year.他十七岁时没有升入大学。

（5）originate from来自，出自

his claim that all power proceeded from God.他那一切力量来自上帝的断言。

5. at best 至多，充其量；顶多 under the best of condition

6. scurry vi. 急匆匆地走；使急赶；催促 n. 快步急跑，疾走；仓皇奔跑声；骤雨，骤雪；短距离赛马

7. unpretentious adj. （1）not attempting to impress others with an appearance of greater importance ,talent, or culture than is actually possessed 不夸耀的；不装模作样的；不矫饰的

（2）pleasantly simple and functional;modest朴实无华的

8. strut [str?t]n. (1) a rod or bar forming part of a framework and designed to resist compression支柱，支杆，撑杆

(2) [in sing.]a stiff, erect, and apparently arrogant or conceited gait

高傲自负、昂首挺胸的步态

that old confident strut and swagger has returned.

那种原有的目中无人、昂首阔步、大摇大摆的步态又回来了。

v.(1)walk with a stiff, erect, and apparently arrogant or conceited gait

趾高气扬地走，高视阔步

peacocks strut through the grounds.

孔雀神气活现地走过场地。

(2)brace (something) with a strut or struts支撑；撑开

the holes were close-boarded and strutted.

那些洞被木板紧密围封并加有支撑。

strut one's stuff (informal)dance or behave in a confident and expressive way(非正式)自信而富有表现力地跳舞；（行为）炫耀

9. shed n.货棚；牲口棚；工作棚;车棚 ;(澳/新西兰)剪羊棚；挤奶棚

v. (1)(of a tree or other plant) allow (leaves or fruit) to fall to the ground（叶、果实由树木等）掉落

both varieties shed leaves in winter.

两种植物在冬季都落叶。

(2)of a reptile, insect, etc.) allow (its skin or shell) to come off, to be replaced by another one that has grown underneath

（爬行动物及昆虫等）蜕皮（或脱壳）

(3)discard (something undesirable, superfluous, or outdated)

抛弃（不合意、多余或过时的东西)，取消

many firms use relocation as an opportunity to shed jobs.

许多公司利用迁址的机会取消不需要的职位。

(4)cast or give off (light)

射出，发出（光）

the full moon shed a watery light on the scene.

圆圆的月亮给夜景投下一片如水的柔光。

(5)(Brit.)accidentally allow (something) to fall off or spill

(英)（意外地）散落，掉落，洒溅

a lorry shed its load of steel bars.

一辆货车掉落了所拉载的钢条。

10. shun [??n] vi.刻意回避，有意回避

11. 关于英文引号我觉得比较特殊的用法 ：文章、报告、评论、短篇故事、诗歌、戏剧、电影等标题/篇名都用引号！

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