A SMALL DUCK was coming up the wide canal like a ship under sail, alone and full of quacking importance. The canal wound in and out through the town. There were no other ducks in sight, but this one made enough noise for many ducks. The few who heard him paid no attention, but that didn’t matter to the duck. He wasn’t frightened, but he felt himself to be a very prominent person on that canal; he owned it. Beyond the town the countryside was pleasant with green pastures and fat black and white cows. There were masses of clouds on the horizon and the skies seemed low, close to the earth, with that light which only this part of the world seems to have. The land was as flat as one’s palm, and the road climbed only to pass over the bridges that crossed the high canals. It was a lovely evening; the sun was setting over the North Sea, and the clouds took on the colouring of the setting sun.
一只小鸭子像一艘正在航行的船一样，沿着宽阔的运河而上， 自在地，嘎嘎地叫着，完全地表现出它的重要性。 运河蜿蜒着穿过城镇。 视线中没有其他鸭子，但这只鸭子对许多鸭子来说，已经足够地吵闹了。 少有人听到他，也没去注意他，但对鸭子来说，那并不重要。 他并不害怕，但在那条运河上，他感觉自己是一个非常显赫的人。 他拥有它。 在城镇的外面，乡村是令人愉快的，有绿色的牧场和肥胖的黑白奶牛。 地平线上有大量的云层， 天空似乎很低，靠近地面， 带着只有世界的这个部分才有这种光。 这片土地像手掌一样平坦， 道路上的爬坡只是为了穿越横跨在运河上的桥梁。 这是一个愉快的夜晚。 太阳落在北海上空， 云层呈现出夕照的色泽。
Great streaks of light, blue and rose, shot across the sky.
宏大的光条纹，蓝色和玫瑰色，从天空中射出。
She was the wife of a well-known man who was very high up in the government, almost at the top, but not quite. Well-dressed and quiet in manner, she had that peculiar atmosphere of power and wealth, the assurance of one long accustomed to being obeyed and getting things done. From one or two things she said, it was evident that her husband had the brains and she the drive. Together they had risen high, but just when much greater power and position were almost theirs, he had fallen desperately ill. At this point in her narrative she could hardly continue, and tears rolled down her cheeks. She had come in with smiling assurance, but it had rapidly disappeared. Sitting back, she was silent for a time, and then continued.
她是一个名人的妻子，他在政府中的地位很高， 几乎处于最高层，但并不完全如此。 她衣着得体，举止安宁，拥有权力和财富的特殊氛围， 有一种长期习惯于服从并彻底执行的保证。 从她说的一两件事来看， 很明显，她的丈夫有头脑，她有动力。 他们一起高升， 但就在更大的权力和地位几乎属于他们的时候，他却病入膏肓。 在她叙述的这一点上，她几乎无法继续，眼泪顺着她的脸颊滚落。 她带着微笑的保证进来，却很快地消失了。 她坐了下来，沉默了一会儿，然后继续。
“I have read some of your talks and have attended one or two of them. While I was listening to you, what you said meant a great deal. But these things quickly escape one, and now that I am really in great trouble I thought I would come and see you. I am sure you understand what has happened. My husband is fatally ill, and all the things we lived and worked for are falling to pieces. The party and its work will go on, but... Though there are nurses and doctors, I have been looking after him myself, and for months I have had very little sleep. I can’t bear to lose him though the doctors say there is little chance of his recovery.
“我读过你们的一些讲话，并参加了其中的一两场讲话。 当我听你说话时，你说的意义重大。 但这些事情很快就会跳过， 现在我真的遇到了很大的麻烦，我想我会来见你。 我相信你理解发生了什么。我的丈夫病得很重， 我们在生活和工作中的所有事情都碎裂了。 党派及其工作将继续，但是…… 虽然有护士和医生，但我一直在自己照顾他， 几个月来我几乎没有睡觉。 我不忍心失去他，尽管医生说他康复的机会很小。
I have thought and thought about all this, and I am almost sick with anxiety. We have no children, as you know, and we have meant a great deal to each other. And now...”
我思考过这一切，我几乎被焦虑所压倒。 如你所知，我们没有孩子，我们对彼此来说意义重大。而现在……”
Do you really want to talk seriously and go into things? “I feel so desperate and confused, I don’t believe I am capable of serious thinking; but I must come to some kind of clarity within myself.”
你真的想认真地谈论并进入这些事情吗？ “我感到如此地绝望与困惑，我不相信我有能力认真地思考； 但我必须在自己的内在找到某种清晰的东西。”
Do you love your husband, or do you love the things which came about through him? “I love...” She was too shocked to continue.
你是爱你的丈夫，还是爱通过他而得到的东西？ “我爱……” 她太震惊了，无法继续。
Please do not think the question brutal, but you will have to find the true answer to it, otherwise sorrow will always be there. In uncovering the truth of that question there may be the discovery of what love is. “In my present state I cannot think it all out.”
请不要认为这个问题很残酷， 但你必须找到真正的答案，否则悲伤将永远存在。 在揭开这个问题的真相的时候，就可能会发现爱是什么。 “在我目前的状态下，我无法想清楚这一切。”
But has not this problem of love passed through your mind? “Once, perhaps, but I quickly got away from it. I always had so much to do before he was ill; and now, of course, all thinking is pain. Did I love him because of the position and power that went with him, or did I simply love him? I am already talking of him as though he were not! I really don’t know in what way I love him. At present I am too confused, and my brain refuses to work. If I may, I would like to come back another time, perhaps after I have accepted the inevitable.”
但是，爱的这个问题不是在你的脑海中转过吗？ “也许有一次，但我很快就摆脱了它。 在他生病之前，我总是有很多事情要做。 当然，现在所有的思考都是痛苦。 我爱他是因为他的地位和权力，还是我只是爱他？ 我在谈论他的时候，好像不是他！ 我真的不知道我以什么样的方式在爱他。 目前的我太迷茫了，我的大脑拒绝工作。 如果可以的话，我想下次再来， 也许在我接受了不可避免的事情之后。”
If I may point out, acceptance is also a form of death.
如果我可以指出，接受也是死亡的一种形式。
Several months passed before we met again. The papers had been full of his death, and now he too was forgotten. His death had left marks on her face, and soon bitterness and resentment were showing themselves in her talk. “I haven’t talked to anyone about all these things,” she explained. “I just withdrew from all my past activities and buried myself in the country. It has been terrible, and I hope you won’t mind if I just talk a little. All my life I have been tremendously ambitious, and before marrying I indulged in good works of every kind. Soon after I married, and largely because of my husband,
几个月过去了，我们才再次见面。 报纸上写满了他的去世，现在他也被遗忘了。 他的死亡，在她的脸上留下了痕迹， 很快，痛苦和怨恨在她的谈话中显现出来。 “我没有和任何人谈论过所有这些事情，”她解释说。 “我只是退出了我过去的所有活动，把自己埋在乡下。 这太可怕了，我希望你不会介意我只是说一点。 在我的一生中，我一直雄心勃勃， 在结婚之前，我沉迷于各种善行。 我结婚后不久，主要是因为我的丈夫，
I left all the petty wrangling of good works and plunged into politics with my whole heart. It was a much wider field of struggle and I enjoyed every minute of it, the ups and the downs, the intrigues and the jealousies. My husband was brilliant in his quiet way, and with my driving ambition we were always moving up. As we had no children, all my time and thought were given over to furthering my husband. We worked together splendidly, complementing each other in an extraordinary way. Everything was going as we had planned, but I always had a gnawing fear that it was all going too well. Then one day, two years ago, when my husband was being examined for some minor trouble, the doctor said there was a growth which must be examined immediately. It was malignant. For a time we were able to keep the whole thing a dead secret; but six months ago it all began again, and it has been a pretty terrible ordeal. When I last came to see you I was too distressed and miserable to think, but perhaps I can now look at things with a little more clarity. Your question disturbed me more than I can tell you. You may remember that you asked me if I loved my husband, or the things that went with him. I have thought a great deal about it; but is it not too complex a problem to be answered by oneself?”
我离开了所有关于行善的小争吵，全心全意地投入到政治中。 这是一个更广泛的斗争领域， 我享受它的每一分钟，起起落落，阴谋和嫉妒。 我的丈夫以他隐秘的方式而非常出色， 凭借着我的驱动性的雄心，我们总是向上攀升。 由于我们没有孩子，我所有的时间和想法都花在了推动我丈夫的脚步上。 我们一起工作，非常出色，以非凡的方式相互补充。 一切都按照我们的计划进行， 但我总是担心一切都太顺利了。 然后，两年前的一天，当我丈夫接受一些小麻烦的检查时， 医生说有一个必须立即检查的生长。它是恶性的。 有一段时间里，我们能够将整个事情保密。 但六个月前，这一切又开始了，这是一次非常可怕的折磨。 当我最后一次来看你时，我太压抑，太痛苦了，无法思考， 但也许我现在可以更清晰地看待事情。 你的问题让我感到不安，比我能告诉你的还要多。 你可能还记得你问我是否爱我的丈夫，或者与他相关的东西。 我对此想了很多。 但是，它不是一个太复杂的问题，以至于难以回答吗？”
Perhaps; but unless one finds out what love is, there will always be pain and sad disappointments. And it is difficult to discover where love ends and confusion begins, is it not? “You are asking if my love for my husband was unmixed with my love for position and power. Did I love my husband because he gave me the means for the fulfilment of my ambition? It is partly this, and also the love of the man. Love is a mixture of so many things.”
也许； 但除非一个人发现什么是爱，否则总会有痛苦与悲伤的失望。 而且很难发现：爱在哪里结束，困惑从哪里开始，不是吗？ “你在问，我对丈夫的爱是否与我对地位和权力的爱没有混合在一起。 我爱我的丈夫，是因为他给了我实现我雄心的手段吗？ 一部分原因在于此，也体现了男人的爱。爱是很多东西的混合体。”
Is it love when there is complete identification with another? And is not this identification a roundabout way of giving importance to oneself? Is it love when there is the sorrow of loneliness, the pain of being deprived of the things that seemingly gave significance to life? To be cut off from the ways of self-fulfilment, from the things that the self has lived on, is the denial of self-importance, and this brings about disenchantment, bitterness, the misery of isolation. And is this misery love?
当与另一个人完全认同时，是爱吗？ 这种认同难道不是一种赋予自我重要性的迂回方式吗？ 当存在着孤独的悲伤， 存在着剥夺了似乎赋予生命意义的东西的痛苦时，有爱吗？ 切断了自足的方式，切断了自身赖以生存的东西， 就是对自重的拒绝，这样就带来了幻灭、苦涩、孤独的痛苦。 这种痛苦是爱吗？
“You are trying to tell me, are you not, that I did not love my husband at all? I am really appalled at myself when you put it that way. And there is no other way to put it, is there? I had never thought about all this, and only when the blow struck was there any real sorrow in my life. Of course, to have had no children was a great disappointment, but it was tempered by the fact that I had my husband and the work. I suppose they became my children. There is a fearful finality about death. Suddenly I find myself alone, without anything to work for, put aside and forgotten. I now realize the truth of what you say; but if you had said these things to me three or four years ago, I would not have listened to you. I wonder if I have been listening to you even now, or merely seeking out reasons to justify myself! May I come and talk to you again?”
“你是想告诉我，你不是，我根本不爱我的丈夫？ 当你这样说的时候，我真的很震惊自己。 而且没有其他方法可以表达它，是吗？ 我从来没有想过这一切， 只有当打击袭来时，我的生活中才有任何真正的悲伤。 当然，没有孩子是一个很大的失望， 但事实是，我有我的丈夫和工作，这一点被缓和了。 我把他们当成了我的孩子。关于死亡有一个可怕的结局。 突然间，我发现自己孤身一人，没有任何东西可以为之而工作，我搁浅了，被遗忘了。 我现在意识到你所说的是真的。 但是如果你在三四年前对我说这些话，我就不会听进去。 我想知道我是否一直在听你说话， 或者只是在寻找理由来证明自己是正当的！我可以再来和你谈谈吗？”