1705042177
1705042178
然而，即使现在，俾斯麦也绝不想公开造反。是因为这位七十五岁的老人缺少了当年勇吗？或者他的保皇政治倾向依然是不可跨越的障碍？无论如何，他没有越界，最多就是在辞职演讲中，对国王和贵族们进行了尖锐抨击。最后他愤怒地离朝归野，丢出的石块砸到摇摇欲坠的皇宫建筑上，噼啪作响。
1705042179
1705042180
然而建筑依然屹立不倒。俾斯麦执政了二十八年。在他离去二十八年之后，旧的王朝制度才崩溃。德国的敌人终于看到了皇室的坍塌。
1705042181
1705042182
但它并没有土崩瓦解！除了敌人抽掉的石头，没有一块石头离开原来的位置。是啊，在国难当头的时刻，能工巧匠努力让这些柱石比之前更坚不可摧。而现在显而易见的是，德国人一直视为帝国基石并尊崇有加的皇室，不过徒有其表，不堪一击。
1705042183
1705042184
王国的幸存充分表明，俾斯麦在其政治方略中赋予王室的重要角色，纯粹是对他所属阶级的让步——甚至可以说他是软弱的。因为当王室败落，帝国幸存之时，俾斯麦防患于未然的方略，尽管不无传统的历史包袱，结果证明是合理的。当大风暴过去，人们环顾四周，发现俾斯麦比他自己所希望的要更有前瞻性。
1705042185
1705042186
当凡尔赛帝国建立的时候，在胜利的炮声中，凡尔赛宫玻璃画廊的金色镜子所映照的都是好战贵族的形象；勤劳的民众无处可觅。四十八年后仍然是在凡尔赛宫，帝国失败被判赔偿，金色镜子里不再有一个王室人物。欧洲最后的三个帝王，不是被砍头就是被废黜。历经二十二朝的德国王室丧失了权力，并非迫于外界强制，亦非来自内部压力，而是由于自身的腐败，由于时代的衰落，它已经完成了历史使命，正走向寿终正寝。
1705042187
1705042188
然而，两位平民在那一历史时刻被迫签字的文件，毁掉的只是威廉二世的工作，而非俾斯麦的政绩。正是威廉二世制定的那些政策，最终使德国卷入战争，而这正是俾斯麦反对的。典型的例子是，这位缔国者不主张建立外国殖民地和海军。是俾斯麦把帝国推向了胜利之巅吗？他不是仅仅将战争作为手段，为的是阻止欧洲干涉德国统一吗？之后二十年，不正是俾斯麦抵制帝国主义的倾向以及军事扩张的诱惑吗？不正是俾斯麦在尼科尔斯堡顶着国王和所有将军们的愤怒，签订了现代和平条约：没有割让领土，没有赔偿，只是表明了与敌人尽快恢复友好关系的愿望。所以，俾斯麦真的过时了吗？
1705042189
1705042190
尽管宣称效忠王室，他直到生命尽头依然愤懑不平，过着孤独的流亡生活。在他将近八十岁的时候，人们劝他平静下来，安享晚年，他从浓密的眉毛下抬眼问道：“我为什么要平静？”他与外界打交道时是坚硬的，而把全部的温情都倾注在了过世的妻子身上。这个妇人曾是他温暖的港湾。在她的身上，集中了俾斯麦对静谧、森林和家的全部渴望，这种渴望对他烦躁而纠结的性格是一种折磨；他也同样热爱行政事务和政治组织，总是忙于处理国家事务。他的政治生涯越是动荡，他的婚姻就越需要平静——它也确实是平静的。
1705042191
1705042192
俾斯麦的批判性头脑，让他很自然地转向了历史和文学创作。他天生热爱森林和打猎，是个厌恶官场的乡下人。年轻时他无所追求，逗留乡村，到了晚年，他更是长期居住在乡下。只有在这里他能够积蓄力量，然后在宰相官邸、城堡议事厅和他所蔑视的议会大厅里呼吸。在他身处的环境和他心灵的愿景之间，对峙从未停止；最终在他能够终日享受森林寂静之时，他又渴望回到他诅咒多年的混乱之中。
1705042193
1705042194
这是他的宿命。俾斯麦天性纠结，他清楚这一点。
1705042195
1705042196
他接受生活的安排，以最大的努力去工作；在六十岁时实现了三十岁时的愿景；担当欧洲大陆的仲裁者整整十年。然而，他总有一种挥之不去的恐惧，担心他一离开，所有这一切会在一夜之间消失。在他弥留的最后几个星期里，他的女儿听到他在大声为德国的未来祈祷。
1705042197
1705042198
最后，人们看到他穿着长风衣，戴着宽礼帽，像众神之王沃旦那样，表情严肃地凝视前方，在家乡古老的橡树林中独自漫步，走在两只獒犬之间。
1705042199
1705042200
（苗菊 译）
1705042201
1705042202
1705042203
1705042204
1705042206
西南联大英文课（英汉双语版） 38 THE RIDDLE OF HITLER
1705042207
1705042208
By Stephen H. Roberts
1705042209
1705042210
THE RIDDLE OF HITLER, by Stephen H. Roberts, in Harper’s Magazine, February, 1938, pp. 253, 254.
1705042211
1705042212
Life in the new Germany has been described as “mythology brought to life.” Stephen H. Roberts’s “The Riddle to Hitler” is an attempt to get inside the godhead of this mythology. Dr. Roberts is an Australian, professor of Modern History at Sydney University, and is regarded as an authority on international affairs. Some time ago he determined to investigate the Nazi régime as thoroughly as possible. He went to Germany and was able to secure unusual privileges from the Foreign Office and the Ribbentrop Bureau. Using these privileges to the full, he spent sixteen months combing the country and amassing material. From this material Dr. Roberts has compiled a book soon to be published under the title The House that Hitler Built , and in that book this short sketch will appear.
1705042213
1705042214
A strange man, this Adolf Hitler. He is infinitely polite and courteous in his interviews, pausing perceptibly after every statement in case there is something his questioner wishes to add. He is punctilious to the point of quixotism in acknowledging the salutes of his men and in himself saluting the standards. The odd feature is that he never seems at ease in formal gatherings or when being spoken to. He seems a hunted being and is always ready to find refuge in making a miniature speech, even when one asks him a question that could be answered by a single word. In making a speech he is at least on firm ground. There he does not have to think, for he has said it all thousands of times and will keep on saying it until he dies.
1705042215
1705042216
One fundamental fact is that Hitler never has any real personal contacts. The charming pictures one sees, in which he is taking bouquets from tiny tots or grasping the horny hands of picturesque old peasants, are all arranged. They are triumphs of the photographic skill of his old friend Hoffmann: Hoffmann blots out the surrounding guards and we see the result. The Führer is never alone.The giant Bruckner is always with him, and his “suicide-brigade” of special guards surround him everywhere. He goes out in his enormous Mercedès car （specially constructed so that he can stand up in front and receive support so that he is not wearied）, and it is always preceded and followed by motor cyclists and a whole fleet of cars with S. S. men. He lives in an unnatural detachment that makes his disease of being a godhead batten on itself: the most balanced of human beings could not stand this kind of life without losing a sense of realities, and nobody would call Hitler emotionally balanced at the best of times. Most commentators make a great fuss about his diet or his celibacy; what seems to me far more important is his lack of ordinary human contacts. Abnormal himself, the constant adulation makes him pathological. He receives only the thrice-distilled views of the fanatics, intriguers, and genuine patriots round him. Nobody can tell him anything or speak frankly, still less criticize his policy or himself. He lives in a mental world of his own, more aloof than any Sun-King, and he has only the narrow mental equipment and experience of an agitator to guide him. Unless one accepts the prevalent German view that he gets his inspiration direct from God （one of the most powerful Nazis once said he had a private line to heaven! ）, one must conclude that the future of Germany and the peace of the world rest on the tangled working of the mind of one man whom not even his friends would call normal. It is the most extraordinary comment on human evolution that, in this age of scicnce and progress, the fate of mankind rests on the whimsy of an abnormal mind, infinitely more so than in the days of the old despots whom we criticize so much.
1705042217
1705042218
But the final enigma remains. Granting that Hitler is a dreamer, a creature of emotion, a man of ordinary mental caliber, a gripping orator, a simple-living Führer with an almost divine sense of his mission—how did such a man rise to power and consolidate the nation in his first four years of rule? Many reasons seem to offer partial explanations of this. He was the most popular orator during a time of political chaos and national depression; his general philosophy about Deutschland erwache! fitted in with the psychology of the nation, so that his movement became a national narcotic; he had marvelous subordinates and, with them, built up the best Party organization; his simplest mentality enabled him to carry through a complex revolution before which a mind more clearly analytical of the consequences would have quailed; and finally he became the Mythus of the German people. The man was merged in the myth, and it became his task to think and act in terms of that myth, so much so that any power in the land which might supplant his Party would probably have to keep him as nominal Führer . The Hitler myth is the dominating fact in German life to-day. Indeed, he sees himself no longer as a person but as the Crusader who has captured the Holy City—the embodiment of a nation—the living and inspired voice of Germania—Der Führer in the most mystical sense of that word—and must one ultimately add
:Der Führer-Gott ?
1705042219
1705042220
Notes
1705042221
1705042222
Adolf Hitler （1889-1945）, dictator of Germany.
1705042223
1705042224
in his interviews, when he meets persons face to face, either for a conference or for making statements to newspaper reporters.
1705042225
1705042226
punctilious, attentive to petty formality, to nice points of ceremony.
[
上一页 ]
[ :1.705042177e+09 ]
[
下一页 ]