I feel that this award was not made to me as a man, but to my work, a life’ work in the agony and sweat of the human spirit. Not for glory and least of all, for profit, but to create out of the material of the human spirit something which did not exist before. So this award is only mine in trust. It would not be difficult to find a dedication for the money part of it, commensurate for the purpose and significance of its origin. But I would like to do the same with the acclaim too by using this moment as a pinnacle from which I might be listened to by the young men and woman, already dedicated to the same anguish and travail, among whom is already that one who will someday stand here where I am standing.
我認為這個獎項不是授給我個人而是授給我的工作---------一項艱辛而痛苦的畢生投入的人類精神的工作,既不為名也不土利,而是要從人類的精神原材料中創(chuàng)造一些前所未有的東西。因此這個獎項我只是代為保管。要該獎項的款項按照最初的目的和意義并不難。但我更歡迎這樣做,利用這一時機,把它作為一個頂點,向聽我話的有志于此的年輕人發(fā)出號召,他們中必定有人會站在我今天的位置。
Our tragedy today is a general and universal physical fear so long sustained by now that we can even bear it. There are no longer problems of spirit. There is only the question: when will I be blown up? Because of this, the young man or woman writing today has forgotten the problem of the human heart in conflict with itself which along can make good writing because only that is worth writing about, worth the agony and the sweat.
He must learn them again. He must teach himself that the basest of all things is to be afraid; and, teaching himself that, forget if forever, leaving no room in his workshop for anything but the old verities and truths of the heart, the old universal truths lacking which any story is ephemeral and doomed ---- love and honor and pity and pride and compassion and sacrifice.
當今,我們的悲劇是種非常普遍的生理恐懼,到現(xiàn)如今,這種恐懼存在已久,以至于我們已經習慣它。他們不再是精神問題。現(xiàn)在只有一個問題:我將何時毀滅?鑒于此,如今的年輕作家們已經忘記了人心之間的沖突問題,寂寞可以造就一個優(yōu)秀的作家,只是因為寫作需要如此,需要無盡痛苦和辛勤汗水。他必須得不斷學習這些。最根本的問題是害怕,他必須教會自己永遠忘記害怕,用古老的真理和真相填滿自己的工作室,如果故事缺少普遍的真理,那都是曇花一現(xiàn)——這些真理是愛與榮耀,憐憫與自豪,同情與犧牲。
Until he does so, he labors under a curse. He writes not of love but of lust, of defeats in which nobody loses anything of value, of victories without hope and, worst of all, without pity or compassion. His griefs grieve on no universal bones, leaving no scars. He writes not of the heart but of the glands. Until he relearns these things, he vill write as though he stood among and watch the end of man. I decline to accept the end of man. It is esay enough to say that man is immortal simply because he will endure: that when the last ding-dong of doom has clanged and faded from the last worthless rock hanging tideless in the last red and dying evening, that even then there vill still be one more sound: that of his puny inexhaustible voice, still talking. I refuse to accept this.
在他這么做之前,他都只會處在魔鬼的詛咒中寫作。他寫的不是愛情而是情欲,失敗者們不會失去真正有價值的東西,而勝利者們也不會產生任何的希望,最為可悲的是,他們都喪失了憐憫和同情。他的悲痛欲絕并沒有深入普世的精髓,沒有留下印痕。他的作品沒有靈魂,只有腺體。在他理解這些東西之前,他的作品就好像他本人站在人群之中冷眼旁觀人類的終結。我堅決不會接受這樣一個人類的結局。講述人類是永生不死的相當簡單,只需他能夠撐下去;最后審判的鐘聲已經敲響了并消彌在最后一塊沒有意義的巖石,最后的日落消逝在死一般寂靜的海平線,死亡的夜晚開始漫延,即使還有一點殘音也是無力卻綿綿不斷的呻吟,依舊訴說著。我堅決拒絕這個。
I believe that man will not merely endure: he will prevail. He is immortal, not because he along among creatures has an inexhaustible voice, but because he was a soul, a spirit capable of compassion and sacrifice and endurance. The poet’s, the writer’s duty is to write about these things. It is his privilege to help man endure by lifting his heart, by reminding him of the courage and honor and hope and pride and compassion and pity and sacrifice which have been the glory of his past. The poet’s voice need not merely be the record of man, it can be one of the props, the pillars to help him endure and prevail.
我相信人類不僅僅是聽命死撐;人類會迎難戰(zhàn)勝一切。人類會得到永生,不是因為他是會發(fā)出連續(xù)呻吟孤獨生物中的一分子,而是因為他有靈魂,他的心靈能夠擁有同情、犧牲和忍耐。詩人和作家的本職是創(chuàng)作出這些東西。他有這個權力幫助他們學會包容,通過提升他們的內心,喚起他們過去的榮耀,如勇氣、尊敬、希望、自豪、同情、憐憫和奉獻犧牲。詩人不僅需要成為一個人類的記錄員,他還需要成為一個能幫助人類學會包容和克服困難的棟梁。