最近读完了《老人与海》，非常棒的原版英文书。这是二十世纪美国著名现实主义作家海明威在沉寂十年之后，在大家的一片质疑和嘘声中，力挽狂澜推出了自认为“一辈子所能写得出的最好的作品”。
故事比较简单，风烛残年的老渔夫圣地亚哥终于在第八十五天钓到一条比他的船还要大的马林鱼。大鱼拖着船往海里走，老人靠着少量的水和食物，一个人孤独地在海上小心翼翼地和大鱼周旋。经过两天两夜地对峙，他终于杀死大鱼。由于鱼太大，只能把它拴在船边，但是在回程的路上遇到了鲨鱼的攻击，老人靠着简陋的武器，虽然奋力拼杀，最后大鱼还是被吃得几乎只剩下一具骨架。
当最后一块鱼肉被鲨鱼撕掉时，老人知道不管怎么努力，最终还是被击败了。他自问自答：“What beat me?”“ Nothing, I went out too far” 这是强者的回答，没有怪别人，只是怪自己。身边的每一样东西都是朋友。The wind is our friend, the great sea, birds, cloud and bed都是朋友。大海是la mar，小船是She， 甚至被捕获的大鱼也是brother who fought together。
这个不是很复杂的故事，或许就是作者的精神自传。年轻时的海明威风光无限，他作为战争英雄得过两次勇敢勋章，在家乡被当作英雄而受到崇拜。反映战后青年人理想失落、思想迷惘的《太阳照常升起》，被看作“迷惘一代”的宣言书。但是，40年代以后，他的创作逐渐走下坡路，1950年，发表了长篇小说《过河入林》，引来一片嘘声。身体也越来越糟，疾病缠身。随着时间的流逝，海明威却越来越感到了失败的痛苦；其实在《老人与海》的文字中，我们看到老渔夫卓越的钓鱼技术、超凡的能量和坚韧的抗争精神的同时，也能看到老人内心的孤独和年龄带来身体的困扰。透过这些文字，我们在感受到老人强大乐观内心的同时，也感受到一种悲凉的色调以及心灵的阵痛。
老渔夫每次想到大海，他都称她为la mar，是西班牙语。老人把大海当作女性，十分仁慈和美丽，但也会突然变得残暴。“The great sea has our friends and our enemies, the wind is our friend sometimes”。而对于作者，大海似乎就是他无比眷念和热爱的写作生涯和人文环境。
对于大鱼，虽然开始互相战斗，但是后来老渔夫真心希望他能成为自己的战友。“I should have chopped the bill off to fight them with. But if I had, and could have lashed it to an oar butt, what a weapon. Then we might have fought them together.” 而一波又一波的鲨鱼，他们是纯粹的敌人，是那些嘲讽自己落井下石的小人和让作者无比憎恨的政客。对于敌人，或许只能是 "clubbed desperately at what he could only feel and hear"。
老人很多次梦见狮子。黄昏暮色海滩上的狮群，是家，是最能让人安宁和最温暖的地方。而狮子是老人年轻时那个青春焕发、充满力量的自己。"After that he began to dream of ... the lions and he rested his chin on the wood of the bows with the evening off-shore breeze and he waited to see if there would be more lions and he was happy." “in his shack, the old man was sleeping again. He was still sleeping on his face and the boy was sitting by him watching him. The old man was dreaming about the lions”。而文中的小男孩笔墨不多，是海明威理想和青春的投射，是老人力量的源泉。
《老人与海》这部小说中，有大量的人物、景色、动作和心理描写。读到这些文字，才发现原来英文也可以书写得如此有意境。让人在学习英文的同时，也感受到另外一种语言的美。或许读英文版和读中文版相比，最大的好处就是你更容易发挥自己的想象力。下面抄录了几段，这些句子值得背下来。其中也有最经典的名句：人不是为失败而生的。一个人可以被毁灭，但不能给打败。“ A man is not made for defeat. A man can be destroyed but not defeated.”
>The clouds over the land now rose like mountains and the coast was only a long green line with the gray blue hills behind it. The water was a dark blue now, so dark that it was almost purple.As he looked down into it he saw the red sifting of the plankton in the dark water and the strange light the sun made now.
陆地上空的云块这时象山岗般耸立着，海岸只剩下一长条绿色的线，背后是些灰青色的小山。海水此刻呈深蓝色，深得简直发紫了。他仔细俯视着海水，只见深蓝色的水中穿梭地闪出点点红色的浮游生物，阳光这时在水中变幻出奇异的光彩。
>The old man was thin and gaunt with deep wrinkles in the back of his neck.The brown blotches of the benevolent skin cancer the sun brings from its reflection on the tropic sea were on his cheeks.The blotches ran well down the sides of his face and his hands had the deep-creased scars from handling heavy fish on the cords.But none of these scars were fresh.They were as old as erosions in a fishless desert.Everything about him was old except his eyes and they were the same color as the sea and were cheerful and undefeated.
老人消瘦而憔悴，脖颈上有些很深的皱纹。腮帮上有些褐斑，那是太阳在热带海面上反射的光线所引起的良性皮肤癌变。褐斑从他脸的两侧一直蔓延下去，他的双手常用绳索拉大鱼，留下了刻得很深的伤疤。但是这些伤疤中没有一块是新的。它们象无鱼可打的沙漠中被侵蚀的地方一般古老。他身上的一切都显得古老，除了那双眼睛，它们像海水一般蓝，是愉快而不肯认输的.
> First it was dark as a shoal in the blue water that was more than a mile deep.Then it spread like a cloud.The fish was silver and still and floated with the waves
开始颜色很暗，像湛蓝海水中的一片浅滩，至少有一英里深，接着这幽暗的浅滩如同云彩一样铺开，银亮的鱼静静随着波浪的起伏左右摇摆
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