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“It’s what I called her. You see, Biddy was fifteen years older than I. Forty-seven when we played Shakespeare.”
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● 这位伶人脱口而出地说起了Biddy这个名字。这是个昵称，又像是个女人的名字，无怪听的人以为是他太太的名字了。
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● glamorous：美得迷人的。glamorous原义是“有魔力的”，有些出版较早的字典，恐怕还只列这样一个解释。近年来这个字似乎专指“惑阳城，迷下蔡”的那种“妖艳”，和“魔法，妖法”已经脱离关系了。beauteous用作“美”解，则古人诗中常见，是一个比较有书卷气的字眼。总之，glamorous（作这个解释）是个通俗的新字，beauteous是个古雅的老字，这位伶人是这两种字都喜欢用。
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Alice Harvey shook her head in bewilderment, and then, in spite of herself, she laughed; but only because it was also fantastic, beyond belief. “About that business of make-believe,” she managed to say, “do you really, Mr. Douglas, do you actually expect me to take you seriously when—” She flushed, trying to find an illustration for what she meant. “Well, for instance, the thrilling scene where Juliet comes on alone and launches that long speech that ends with something like
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Give me my Romeo; and, when he shall die,
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Take him and cut him out in little stars,…
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I mean, do you actually mean to sit there and tell us, Mr. Douglas, that—that Constance Hope wasn’t moved when she spoke those lines? Wasn’t carried away?”
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● 舞台上的朱丽叶，事实上已经是四十七岁的中年妇人了，难怪我们这位女主人摇摇她的头，不知所措了。
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● in spite of herself：不能控制自己。
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● 四十七岁的妇人能演十四岁的朱丽叶，而且演得非常之好，看戏的人大受感动，现在想想，未免好笑。但是另外还有一点可笑之处（because…also）：虽然这位伶人不会骗人，但事情毕竟荒唐（fantastic），令人难以置信。
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● make-believe：演戏本来是以假作真的。she managed to say：好容易才想出这句话来说。她虽然想了这句话来说，但是话说得还是断断续续。这句话很长，句法转了好几次：
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● do you actually是重复do you really。to take you seriously相信你不是在开玩笑。when以后，句子做不下去了，她就换一种说法。flushed：脸红。an illustration：用以说明的例子。
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● thrilling scene：动人的一场戏。原剧第三幕第二场，朱丽叶一个人出场，开始（launches）大段独白。这段话是朱丽叶的祷告，她求太阳快些下去，夜快些来。“把罗密欧赏赐给我！他死后，你再把他带到天上去，分散成为点点繁星……”
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● Well, for instance…这句话没有说完，她又换了一句。I mean：这两个字是很有用的成语，自己觉得话说不清楚，不得不反复说明时，这两个字就用得着。
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● sit there：坐在那里（餐厅的那张椅子上）。
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● 朱丽叶那一段话很动人的，岂有演员自己反不受感动之理？carried away：出神，着迷。
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“I’ll tell you how carried away she was,” he said. “Naturally I remember that scene well—God, I hear it in my sleep, to this day, Capulet’s orchard, just before intermission. Biddy hadn’t been in the previous scene, but I was. When I came off-stage, I always found her standing there in the wings waiting, smoking a cigarette—against all the rules, of course, but that was Biddy, a law unto herself. When she heard the cue, she handed me the cigarette and went on. It was a long scene, with the Nurse. Biddy kept on hoping, but in vain. She always had to light a new one, and cursed the Nurse for being so slow with her lines that she wasted a whole cigarette.”
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● hear it：这一段戏词，他念念不忘，现在时隔多年，他在睡梦中似乎还听得见。
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● Capulet’s orchard：Capulet是朱丽叶的姓氏，他们家的果园，是那场戏的背景。intermission：休息时间。
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● the previous scene：第三幕第一场，即罗密欧击毙Tybalt的那一场。那场戏中没有朱丽叶的戏。
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● off-stage：这是个形容词（这里应该是形容主语I）；解作“在后台”。
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● wings：舞台的侧面（此字用复数形式）。against all the rules：翻遍后台管理规则，没有一条是容许演员在那种地方抽烟的。可是这位演员与众不同：她是Biddy，她可以率性行事。unto就是to，这是个古字。（类似的例子：until就是till，但till和until是一样适用的。）a law unto oneself是成语，解作“不可以常理来规定”。例如：A child is often a law unto itself. 小孩常有小孩自己的办法。
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● cue：上一场的最后几句话（朱丽叶听见了，就预备出场。此字也可解作同一场另一演员一段对白的最后几个字，演员听见了，就预备接口说话。）
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● Nurse：朱丽叶的乳娘是戏里一个重要角色。
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● kept on hoping：这句话意义不大清楚，但看后面两句，便知她是希望这场戏早点结束，回去抽那枝香烟！
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