【原】译读经典 | 老人与海（十二）：漂亮的僧帽水母和优雅的大海龟

语文英语一起学 2020-02-19

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今天我们来认识一下两种水生动物，一个是漂亮但有毒的僧帽水母，又叫“葡萄牙战舰”。文章中会有它的图片，大家可以发挥想象，猜一猜僧帽水母又叫“葡萄牙战舰”。另一种是优雅从容的大海龟，它们会吞噬僧帽水母。

2020年2月19日

星期三

正月二十六雨水

sift [sɪft] v. 撒下

formalize ['fɔrməlaɪz] v. 定形

bleach [bliːtʃ] v. 漂白

mysticism ['mɪstɪsɪzm] n. 神秘

churn [tʃɜːn] v. 搅动

taut [tɔːt] adj. 拉紧的

僧帽水母

The clouds over the land now rose like mountains and the coast was only a long green line with the gray blue hills behind it. The water was a dark blue now, so dark that it was almost purple. As he looked down into it he saw the red sifting of the plankton(浮游生物） in the dark water and the strange light the sun made now. He watched his lines to see them go straight down out of sight into the water and he was happy to see so much plankton because it meant fish. The strange light the sun made in the water, now that the sun was higher, meant good weather and so did the shape of the clouds over the land. But the bird was almost out of sight now and nothing showed on the surface of the water but some patches of yellow, sun-bleached Sargasso weed（马尾藻） and the purple, formalized, iridescent（彩虹色的）, gelatinous（凝胶状的） bladder of a Portuguese man-of-war floating dose beside the boat. It turned on its side and then righted itself. It floated cheerfully as a bubble with its long deadly purple filaments trailing a yard behind it in the water.

"Agua mala（西班牙语，字面意思是被污染的海水）," the man said. "You whore."

▲ 被冲上百慕达海滩的僧帽水母（摄影：Rruss）

厘米译

陆地上空的云朵像山峦一般涌起，海岸只剩一条长长的绿线，后面是灰蓝色的山脉。海水现在是深蓝色，深得发紫。老人往下看时，看到了深水中点点红色的浮游生物，以及此刻阳光变幻出的奇异光彩。他盯着钓绳，看着它们没入水中，消失不见。看见这么多浮游生物，他非常高兴，因为这意味着附近有鱼。太阳升得更高了，阳光在水中变幻出的奇异光彩，意味着天气晴朗，陆地上空的云朵形状也能说明这一点。不过，这时候几乎看不见那只鸟儿了，水面上什么也没有，只有几块被太阳晒得发白的黄色马尾藻，还有在船边浮动的僧帽水母，它的紫色胶状气囊有一定的外形，色彩斑斓。它转向一边，随即恢复原状，像个气泡一样欢快地漂浮着，致命的紫色长触须，在水里往后拖了足足一码长。

“ Agua mala，”老人说，“你这婊子。”

▲ 一只好看的水母

海龟

From where he swung lightly against his oars he looked down into the water and saw the tiny fish that were coloured like the trailing filaments and swam between them and under the small shade the bubble made as it drifted. They were immune to its poison. But men were not and when same of the filaments would catch on a line and rest there slimy and purple while the old man was working a fish, he would have welts and sores on his arms and hands of the sort that poison ivy or poison oak can give. But these poisonings from the agua mala came quickly and struck like a whiplash.

The iridescent bubbles were beautiful. But they were the falsest thing in the sea and the old man loved to see the big sea turtles eating them. The turtles saw them, approached them from the front, then shut their eyes so they were completely carapaced and ate them filaments and all. The old man loved to see the turtles eat them and he loved to walk on them on the beach after a storm and hear them pop when he stepped on them with the horny soles of his feet.

He loved green turtles and hawk-bills with their elegance and speed and their great value and he had a friendly contempt for the huge, stupid loggerheads, yellow in their armour-plating, strange in their love-making, and happily eating the Portuguese men-of-war with their eyes shut.

厘米译

他一边轻轻地划着桨，一边往下看向水中，看见了一种小鱼，颜色和水母拖着的触须很像，它们穿梭在僧帽水母之间，穿梭在漂浮的气泡所形成的小块阴影下。它们不怕水母的毒素。可是人就不同了。那些触须会缠在钓绳上，留下紫色的粘液，老人拉鱼的时候，胳膊和手上就会出现伤痕和疮痛，就像被毒叶藤或毒橡树感染了那样，不过，这些水母的毒素发作很快，疼起来像被鞭子抽打一样。

这些色彩斑斓的气泡的确很美，但却是海洋中里最具欺骗性的东西，老人喜欢看着大海龟把它们吃掉。海龟一看到水母，就从正面逼近，然后闭上眼睛，让身体全部被龟壳裹住，最后把水母连同触须一并吃掉。老人喜欢看海龟吃水母，他还喜欢在暴风雨过后去海滩上，用长茧的脚掌踩它们的背，听它们发出“啪”的爆裂声。

他喜欢绿海龟（青海龟）和玳瑁，它们优雅，敏捷，价值很高。对那些大个儿的、笨拙的蠵龟，老人不太瞧得上，但也没什么恶意。它们的龟甲是黄色的，交配方式有些奇特，总是愉悦地闭着眼吞掉僧帽水母。