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● her：船习惯用阴性代名词代替。
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● under the spread of big canvas：巨帆张起，Michael站在下面。
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● in him：在他身体里面。the wild blood加强前面的the blood…for the wild ocean：他有爱好海洋的血，流浪人的血。
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● boss：主人。红脸汉虽不能出海远航，他的心未尝不追随Michael于海上焉，所以他的眼睛往前看。
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Mary watched The Golden Barque moving away, the grotesque figure standing by the tiller. She stayed there until a pale moon was shining below her, turning over a little trinket in her fingers. At last she dropped it into the water.
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It made a little splash, and the vision of the crescent was broken.
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● 船又开走了，可是掌舵的是那个怪模样（grotesque）的人了。
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● a pale moon：这个景致前面已出现过。景犹是也，船犹是也，唯人事之变迁大矣。
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● a little trinket：不用the，而用a，好像这是任何一件首饰而已。事实上，读者当然知道这是那一件了。
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● the crescent：新月。河里起了一些水花，新月的影子也破碎了。这是具体生动的描写，然而也有象征的意义。象征些什么，这里也不用说了。
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现代英文选评注 University Days大学生活回忆
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James G. Thurber (1894—1961)
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作者瑟勃出生于美国俄亥俄（Ohio）州之Columbus。他是美国现代幽默大师，文画双绝。他的漫画以臃肿而懦弱的男人，臃肿而凶横的女人，以及神经质的狗为题材，最能反映病态的西方文明社会。他的著作很多，如Further Fables for Our Time，所收为供成人阅读的伊索寓言式的故事。这篇《大学生活回忆》原为他的自传My Life and Hard Times（1933）里的一章，现在选择“植物学课”和“经济学课”的几段，在这里发表。（录自Modern Library出版的《美国最佳幽默小说集》（Best American Humorous Short Stories）。美国式的幽默，通常以胡闹与胡说（nonsense）为主，不一定有什么尖刻的讽刺，或是高尚的含义。中国近代知识分子，大多推崇高级的幽默，而鄙视低级的滑稽。其实喜剧与悲剧，历史同样久远；喜剧主要的目的是叫人笑，并不一定有什么明确的教训。莎士比亚的幽默，胡闹与胡说的成份很多，但是莎士比亚的喜剧天才，同他的悲剧天才一样受到举世的称颂。这几段文章的描写可能夸张，记事不一定忠实，问题是看读者觉得好笑不好笑了。
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I passed all the other courses that I took at my University, but I could never pass botany. This was because all botany students had to spend several hours a week in a laboratory looking through a microscope at plant cells, and I could never see through a microscope. I never once saw a cell through a microscope. This used to enrage my instructor. He would wander around the laboratory pleased with the progress all the students were making in drawing the involved and, so I am told, interesting structure of flower cells, until he came to me. I would just be standing there. “I can’t see anything,” I would say. He would begin patiently enough, explaining how anybody can see through a microscope, but he would always end up in a fury, claiming that I could too see through a microscope but just pretend that I couldn’t. “It takes away from the beauty of flowers anyway,” I used to tell him. “We are not concerned with beauty in this course,” he would say. “We are concerned solely with what I may call the mechanics of flars,” “Well,” I’d say, “I can’t see anything.” “Try it just once again,” he’d say, and I would put my eye to the microscope and see nothing at all, except now and again a nebulous milky substance—a phenomenon of maladjustment. You were supposed to see a vivid, restless clockwork of sharply defined plant cells, “I see what looks like a lot of milk,” I would tell him. This, he claimed, was the result of my not having adjusted the microscope properly, so he would readjust it for me, or rather, for himself. And I would look again and see milk.
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● that I took的took有“修读”之意。my University指Ohio State University。
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● botany students：修植物学的学生。（同样的，English students 指修读英语的学生。）microscope：显微镜。plant cells：植物细胞。I could never see：事实上，Thurber确有眼疾，近年几已成盲人。他写稿时，字写得很大，一张纸上只写寥寥数十字。但他仍写文作画不辍，精神可佩。
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● instructor：狭义是“讲师”（大学教员的一个等级），广义是“授课的先生”。这儿用的是广义，因为这位先生是一个“教授”。
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● He would：这一段里would用得很多，表示过去的习惯。pleased是过去分词，形容主语He，教授看见全班学生在画细胞图，心里很高兴。the progress all the students were making：这里progress的意思，不是“进步”，而是“进行”——先画了一个轮廓，然后愈画愈详细。structure：（花卉细胞之）结构。这种结构是复杂的（involved），据说（so I am told）也是有趣的。
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● standing there：大家都在埋头作画，我只是站着。
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● end up：他开头很耐心地对我解释，显微镜里的细胞是人人看得见的；最后总要大发雷霆（fury），说我一定也看得见的，只是假装（pretending）看不见而已。claim=to assert or maintain as a fact。
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● It takes away from中的It指在显微镜中看花这件事。takes在这里是不及物动词。takes away from：减损。anyway：不管显微镜里看得见看不见细胞。
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● concerned with：所关心者，所注意者。
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● mechanics：机械结构之学。花是有生命的东西，当然和没有生命的机械不同，但是细胞的结构，其配合整齐，亦可与机械结构相比。故教授说“我可以称之为花的机械结构的学问”。flars：教授读flowers时，嘴张得太大，读成了这个音。
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