<span style="font-weight: 400;">The Age of Rudeness</span>
As the social contract frays, what does it mean to be polite?
随着社会契约的磨损，礼貌意味着什么？
I n a world as unmannerly as this one, how is it best to speak?
在一个如此不礼貌的世界里，怎样说话才是最好的呢？
There’s no need to be rude, I say to the man in the packed hall at passport control.
“没必要粗鲁，”我对护照检查大厅里挤满人的人说。
There are people everywhere, and his job is to send them into the right queues.
到处都有人，他的工作就是把他们送到正确的队列。
I have been watching him shout at them.
我一直看着他对他们大喊大叫。
I have watched the obsessive way he notices them, to pick on them.
我观察到他对他们的关注、对他们的挑剔。
There’s no need to be rude, I say.
我说，没必要粗鲁。
This is an airport, a place of transit.
这是一个机场，一个中转地。
There are all sorts of people here, people of different ages, races and nationalities, people in myriad sets of circumstances.
这里有各种各样的人，不同年龄、种族和国籍的人，处于各种情况的人。
In this customs hall, there are so many different versions of living that it seems possible that no one version could ever be agreed on.
在这个海关大厅里，有如此多不同的生活版本，似乎没有一个版本可以达成一致。
Does it follow, then, that nothing that happens here really matters?
那么，这里发生的一切是否真的无关紧要呢？
The man is wearing a uniform, though not a very impressive one: a white short-sleeved synthetic shirt, black synthetic trousers, a cheap tie with the airport’s insignia on it.
这名男子穿着一套制服，虽然不是很令人印象深刻：一件白色短袖合成纤维衬衫，黑色合成纤维裤子，一条带有机场徽章的廉价领带。
It is no different from the uniform a bus driver might wear, or someone at a car-rental desk, someone who lacks any meaningful authority while also being forced into constant interaction with members of the public, someone for whom the operation of character is both nothing and everything.
这与公交车司机可能穿的制服，或者汽车租赁柜台的人没有什么不同，他们缺乏任何有意义的权威，同时又被迫与公众不断互动，对他们来说，性格的运作既什么也不是一切。
He is angry.
他很生气。
His face is red, and his expression is unpleasant.
他脸色涨红，神情不太好。
He looks at me — a woman of 48 traveling alone, a woman who doubtless exhibits some signs of the privileged life she has led — with loathing.
他用厌恶的眼神看着我——一个独自旅行的 48 岁女人，毫无疑问，她表现出了她所过的特权生活的一些迹象。
Apparently it is I, not he, who has broken the social code.
显然是我，而不是他，打破了社会准则。
Apparently it was rude of me to accuse him of rudeness.
显然我指责他无礼是很无礼的。
The social code remains unwritten, and it has always interested me how many problems this poses in the matter of ascertaining the truth.
社会规范仍然没有成文，我一直很感兴趣的是，这在查明真相的问题上带来了多少问题。
The truth often appears in the guise of a threat to the social code.
真相常常以对社会准则的威胁为幌子出现。
It has this in common with rudeness.
这与粗鲁有共同之处。
When people tell the truth, they can experience a feeling of release from pretense that is perhaps similar to the release of rudeness.
当人们说真话时，他们可以体验到一种从伪装中解脱出来的感觉，这种感觉或许类似于摆脱无礼的感觉。
It might follow that people can mistake truth for rudeness, and rudeness for truth.
由此看来，人们可能会将真理误认为是粗鲁，又将粗鲁误认为是真理。
It may only be by examining the aftermath of each that it becomes possible to prove which was which.
也许只有通过检查每一个事件的后果，才有可能证明哪个是哪个。
The queue moves forward.
队列向前移动。
I reach passport control, and I pass through it, and the man is left behind.
我到达护照检查处，通过了它，那个人被留在了后面。
In recounting this incident afterward, I find myself running into difficulties.
后来回忆起这件事，我发现自己遇到了困难。
For instance, I find myself relying on the details of the man’s physical ugliness to prove the badness of his character.
例如，我发现自己依靠这个人外表丑陋的细节来证明他性格的恶劣。
Searching for a specific example of someone else’s being upset or offended by him, the only person I can prove he offended was me.
在寻找别人对他感到不安或冒犯的具体例子时，我唯一能证明他冒犯的人就是我。
On another day, a perfectly polite man is probably to be found directing the crowds in the customs hall, assisting the elderly, apologizing for the crush, helpfully explaining things to people whose English is uncertain: He would make a good story about individuality as the basis for all hope.
有一天，你可能会发现一个非常有礼貌的人在海关大厅里指挥人群，帮助老人，为拥挤道歉，向不懂英语的人提供帮助解释事情：他会写一个关于个性的好故事，作为所有希望的基础。
By telling this story, I am trying to substantiate my fear that discrimination and bullying are used against people trying to enter Britain, my country.
通过讲述这个故事，我试图证实我的担心，即歧视和欺凌行为会针对试图进入我的国家英国的人。
There are many people who don’t have this fear.
有很多人没有这种恐惧。
To them, my story proves only one thing, which is that I once met a rude man in an airport.
对他们来说，我的故事只证明了一件事，那就是我曾经在机场遇到一个粗鲁的人。
I might even have inadvertently made them pity him.
我什至可能无意中让他们可怜他。
I, the teller of this tale, would have to demonstrate that under the same circumstances, I would have behaved better.
我，这个故事的讲述者，必须证明，在同样的情况下，我会表现得更好。
In the event, all I did was criticize him.
结果我只是批评他。
I made him angrier; perhaps he took it out on the next person in the queue.
我让他更生气了；也许他把气发泄在队列中的下一个人身上。
To top it all off, I admit that he accuses me of precisely the same failing: rudeness.
最重要的是，我承认他指责我同样的缺点：粗鲁。
Anyone hearing the story will at this point stop thinking about the moral problem of rudeness and start thinking about me.
任何听到这个故事的人此时都会停止思考无礼的道德问题，并开始思考我。
I have damaged my own narrative authority: Might I be to blame after all?
我已经损害了自己的叙述权威：我到底应该受到责备吗？
By including that detail — true though it is — I am giving the man a platform for his point of view.
通过包含这个细节——尽管这是事实——我为这个人提供了一个表达他的观点的平台。
In most of my stories, I allow the truth to look after itself.
在我的大部分故事中，我都让真相自然发展。
In this one, I’m not sure that it can.
在这一点上，我不确定它可以。
For all these reasons, the story doesn’t work as it should.
由于所有这些原因，这个故事并没有达到应有的效果。
Why, then, if it proves nothing, is this a story I persist in telling?
既然不能证明什么，为什么我还要坚持讲这个故事呢？
The answer: because I don’t understand it.
答案是：因为我不明白。
I don’t understand it, and I feel that the thing I don’t understand about it — indeed the mere fact of not understanding — is significant.
我不明白，而且我觉得我不明白的事情——事实上，仅仅是不理解这一事实——是很重要的。
Another day, another airport.
又一天，另一个机场。
This time the situation is clearer: My country has recently voted to leave the European Union, and rudeness is rampant.
这次情况更加清晰：我国最近公投脱欧，粗鲁行为猖獗。
People treat one another with a contempt that they do not trouble to conceal.
人们不遗余力地互相蔑视。
The people in uniforms — the airport officials — exercise their faux power with uncommon ugliness, while the rest of us look suspiciously at one another, not sure what to expect of this new, unscripted reality, wondering which side the other person is on.
穿着制服的人——机场官员——以一种罕见的丑陋方式行使着他们的虚假权力，而我们其他人则怀疑地看着彼此，不确定对这个新的、即兴的现实会发生什么，想知道对方站在哪一边。
It is already being said that this situation has arisen out of hatred, but it seems to me that if that is true, then the hatred is of self.
已经有人说，这种情况是出于仇恨而产生的，但在我看来，如果这是真的，那么仇恨就是自我仇恨。
The uniformed woman at security bangs the gray plastic trays one after another onto the conveyor belt with a violence that seems to be a request for attention.
安检处的一名身穿制服的女士将灰色塑料托盘一个接一个地敲到传送带上，其暴力动作似乎是在寻求关注。
At every opportunity, she makes it clear that she has relinquished self-control: Her nature has been let loose, like an animal from its cage.
每次有机会，她都会明确表示她已经放弃了自我控制：她的本性已经被释放，就像一只从笼子里出来的动物一样。
She abuses, without exception, every person who passes along her queue, while seeming not to address any single one of them: We are no longer individuals; we are a herd enduring the drover’s lash, heads down and silent.
她无一例外地谩骂每一个经过她队列的人，却似乎没有针对其中任何一个人：我们不再是个体；我们不再是一个人；我们不再是一个人；我们不再是一个人；我们不再是一个人；我们不再是一个人；我们不再是个体。我们是一群忍受牧牛人鞭打的牛群，低着头，沉默不语。
She looks unhealthy, her face covered with sore-looking red spots, her shapeless white body almost writhing with its own anger, as though it wishes only to transgress its boundaries, to escape itself in an act of brutality.
她看起来很不健康，脸上布满了看起来很痛的红斑，那无形的白色身体几乎因自己的愤怒而翻滚，仿佛它只是想超越自己的界限，以一种残暴的行为来逃避自己。
The person in front of me in the queue is a well-groomed black woman.
队列中排在我前面的是一位衣着考究的黑人女性。
She is traveling with a child, a pretty girl with neatly plaited hair.
她带着一个孩子旅行，孩子是一个漂亮的女孩，头发编得整齐。
She has put two large clear bags of cosmetics and creams in her tray, but this, apparently, is not allowed; she is permitted only a single bag.
她在托盘里放了两大透明袋子的化妆品和面霜，但这显然是不允许的；她只被允许携带一个包。
The uniformed woman halts the queue and slowly and deliberately holds up the two bags, looking fixedly at their owner.
穿制服的女人停下了队伍，缓慢而刻意地举起两个袋子，目不转睛地看着它们的主人。
The woman explains that because two of them are traveling, she has assumed that they are entitled to two bags.
该女士解释说，由于其中两人正在旅行，她认为他们有权获得两件行李。
Her voice is quiet and polite.
她的声音安静而有礼貌。
The little girl gazes ahead with wide, unblinking eyes.
小女孩睁着大大的眼睛，一眨不眨地注视着前方。
You assumed wrong, the uniformed woman says.
“你假设错了，”穿制服的女人说。
Her horrible relish for the situation is apparent.
她对这种情况的可怕兴趣是显而易见的。
She has been waiting, it is clear, to fasten on someone and has found her victim.
很明显，她一直在等待抓住某人，并找到了她的受害者。
You don’t get away with that, she says, grimacing and shaking her head.
她说，你不可能逃脱惩罚，一边做鬼脸，一边摇头。
Where do people like you get your ideas from?
像你这样的人从哪里得到你的想法？
The rest of us watch while she makes the woman unpack the bags and then decide which of her possessions are to be thrown away.
我们其他人看着她让女人打开袋子，然后决定扔掉她的哪些物品。
They are mostly new and expensive-looking.
它们大多是新的并且看起来很昂贵。
In another situation, their scented femininity might have seemed to mock the ugliness of the woman superintending their destruction with folded arms and a jeering expression on her face.
在另一种情况下，它们散发出的女性气息似乎是在嘲笑那个双手抱胸、脸上带着嘲笑表情、监督着它们毁灭的女人的丑陋。
The other woman’s slender, varnished fingers are shaking as she scrabbles with the various pots and jars.
另一个女人的修长、涂着清漆的手指在摸索着各种罐子和罐子时在颤抖。
She keeps dropping things, her head bowed, her lower lip caught in her teeth.
她不断地掉东西，低着头，下唇被牙齿咬住。
The uniformed woman’s unremitting commentary on these events is so unpleasant that I realize she is half-demented with what would seem to be the combination of power and powerlessness.
那个穿制服的女人对这些事件不断的评论是如此令人不快，以至于我意识到她已经处于半疯狂状态，似乎是权力与无能为力的结合。
No one intervenes.
没有人干预。
I do not inform her that there is no need to be rude.
我没有告诉她没有必要粗鲁。
Instead, as I increasingly seem to in such situations these days, I wonder what Jesus would have done.
相反，正如我这些天越来越多地遇到这种情况一样，我想知道耶稣会怎么做。
My traveling companion — a painter — is the politest person I know, but I have noticed that he does not often take up arms on another person’s behalf.
我的旅伴——一位画家——是我认识的最有礼貌的人，但我注意到他并不经常为他人拿起武器。
He dislikes conflict.
他不喜欢冲突。
When it is our turn in the queue, the uniformed woman stares at the bag he has placed in the tray.
当轮到我们排队时，穿着制服的女士盯着他放在托盘上的袋子。
It contains his tubes of paint.
里面装着他的油漆管。
They are crumpled and bespattered with use, and there are so many of them that the bag can’t close at the top.
它们因使用而变得皱巴巴、污迹斑斑，而且数量太多，袋子顶部无法合上。
She folds her arms.
她抱起双臂。
He looks at her in silence.
他默默地看着她。
He is looking directly into her eyes.
他直视着她的眼睛。
He stands completely quiet and still.
他完全安静地站着。
The look goes on for a very long time.
这种表情持续了很长一段时间。
Her eyes are small and pale blue and impotent: I did not notice them until now.
她的眼睛很小，呈淡蓝色，无能：直到现在我才注意到它们。
My friend neither blinks nor looks away, and the woman is forced to hold herself there as the seconds tick by, her small eyes open and straining.
我的朋友既没有眨眼，也没有移开视线，随着时间的流逝，那个女人被迫保持在那里，她的小眼睛睁着，紧张。
During those seconds, it seems as if layers of her are being removed: She is being simplified, put in order, by being looked at.
在那几秒钟里，她的各个层面似乎都被移除了：她通过被人的注视而被简化、整理。
He is giving her his full attention, and I watch the strange transformation occur.
他全神贯注地关注着她，我看着奇怪的转变发生。
Finally he speaks.
最后他说话了。
Well, sir, she says, if you’re traveling with this lady, she might have room in her bag.
好吧，先生，她说，如果您和这位女士一起旅行，她的包里可能有空间。
Neither of them looks at me — they are still looking at each other.
他们俩都没有看我——他们仍然互相看着对方。
I proffer my bag, and the woman herself transfers the paints from one bag to the other.
我递上我的包，那位女士亲自将颜料从一个包转移到另一个包中。
Her hands labor to do it with care and exactitude: It takes her a long time.
她的双手小心翼翼、精确地完成这件事：这花了她很长时间。
Finally she seals the bag and lays it gently back in the tray.
最后，她密封袋子并轻轻地将其放回托盘中。
Now that he has won this victory, I want him to use it to reprimand her, not just for her behavior toward the black woman in the queue but for all the wrongs her behavior represents; for the fact that it’s safer to be him, and always has been.
既然他赢得了这场胜利，我希望他用它来谴责她，不仅是因为她对队列中的黑人妇女的行为，而且是因为她的行为所代表的所有错误；事实上，做他更安全，而且一直如此。
He does not reprimand her.
他没有斥责她。
He smiles at her politely.
他礼貌地对她微笑。
It would have been a shame to throw them away, wouldn’t it?
如果把它们扔掉，那就太可惜了，不是吗？
she says.
她说。
Society organizes itself very efficiently to punish, silence or disown truth-tellers.
社会非常有效地组织起来惩罚、压制或否认说真话的人。
Rudeness, on the other hand, is often welcomed in the manner of a false god.
另一方面，粗鲁的行为往往会受到假神的欢迎。
Later still, regret at the punishment of the truth-teller can build into powerful feelings of worship, whereas rudeness will be disowned.
再后来，对说真话的人受到惩罚的悔恨可以形成强烈的崇拜感，而粗鲁行为将被否认。
Are people rude because they are unhappy?
人们粗鲁是因为他们不快乐吗？
Is rudeness like nakedness, a state deserving the tact and mercy of the clothed?
粗鲁是否与赤身裸体一样，是一种值得穿衣服的人机智和怜悯的状态？
If we are polite to rude people, perhaps we give them back their dignity; yet the obsessiveness of the rude presents certain challenges to the proponents of civilized behavior.
如果我们对粗鲁的人有礼貌，也许我们还给他们尊严；然而，粗鲁的行为给文明行为的支持者带来了一定的挑战。
It is an act of disinhibition: Like a narcotic, it offers a sensation of glorious release from jailers no one else can see.
这是一种解除抑制的行为：就像麻醉剂一样，它提供了一种从狱卒中获得光荣释放的感觉，而其他人看不到这种感觉。
In the recollection of events, rudeness often has a role to play in the moral construction of a drama: It is the outward sign of an inward or unseen calamity.
在对事件的回忆中，粗鲁常常在戏剧的道德建构中发挥作用：它是内在或看不见的灾难的外在迹象。
Rudeness itself is not the calamity.
粗鲁本身并不是灾难。
It is the harbinger, not the manifestation, of evil.
它是邪恶的预兆，而不是邪恶的表现。
In the Bible, Satan is not rude — he is usually rather charming — but the people who act in his service are.
在圣经中，撒旦并不粗鲁——他通常相当有魅力——但为他服务的人却很粗鲁。
Jesus, on the other hand, often comes across as somewhat terse.
另一方面，耶稣常常显得有些简洁。
Indeed, many of the people he encounters find him direct to the point of rudeness.
事实上，他遇到的许多人都认为他的行为已经到了粗鲁的地步。
The test, it is clear, is to tell rudeness from truth, and in the Bible that test is often failed.
很明显，这个测试是为了区分粗鲁和真理，而在圣经中，这个测试经常失败。
An unambiguous event — violence — is therefore required.
因此，需要一个明确的事件——暴力。
The episode of the crucifixion is an orgy of rudeness whose villains are impossible to miss.
受难的情节是一场粗鲁的狂欢，其中的恶棍是不可能错过的。
The uncouth conduct of the Roman soldiers at the foot of the cross, for instance, can be seen in no other light: Anyone thinking that Jesus could have done a bit more to avoid his fate is offered this lasting example of humanity’s incurable awfulness.
例如，罗马士兵在十字架下的粗鲁行为，无法从其他角度看出：任何认为耶稣可以做更多事情来避免自己命运的人，都被提供了这个人类无法治愈的可怕的持久例子。
They know not what they do, was Jesus’ comment on his tormentors.
这是耶稣对那些折磨他的人的评论，他们不知道自己在做什么。
Forgive them.
原谅他们。
In the United Kingdom, the arguments rage over the rights and wrongs of the Brexit referendum result.
在英国，关于脱欧公投结果的是非的争论十分激烈。
I begin to think this is what it must be like to be the child of divorcing parents.
我开始想这就是离婚父母的孩子应该有的样子。
Before, there was one truth, one story, one reality; now there are two.
以前，只有一种真理、一种故事、一种现实；现在，只有一种真理、一种故事、一种现实。现在有两个。
Each side accuses the other, and amid the raised voices, the unappeasable points of view, the vitriol and distress, the obfuscation and exaggeration and blame, the only thing that is demonstrably clear is that one side is ruder than the other.
每一方都互相指责，在高调的声音、难以平息的观点、尖酸刻薄、苦恼、混淆、夸张和指责中，唯一明显的是一方比另一方更粗鲁。
It seems to me that even if you didn’t know what they were arguing about, you would have to come to that conclusion.
在我看来，即使你不知道他们在争论什么，你也必须得出这样的结论。
In the aftermath of their victory, the winners are markedly unmagnanimous.
胜利之后，胜利者明显不宽容。
They brand those who voted the other way as a liberal elite, patronizing, self-interested, out of touch with real life.
他们将那些投票反对的人称为自由派精英，居高临下、自私自利、脱离现实生活。
The liberal elite are characterized as bad losers, as though the vote were a football match.
自由派精英被描述为糟糕的失败者，就好像投票是一场足球比赛一样。
When they protest against or complain about the result and its consequences, they are immediately belittled and shouted down.
当他们抗议或抱怨结果及其后果时，他们立即受到贬低和斥责。
In the weeks before the vote, the eventual victors’ own handling of language resembled a small child’s handling of an explosive device: They appeared to have no idea of its dangers or power.
在投票前的几周内，最终胜利者自己对语言的处理就像一个小孩子对爆炸装置的处理：他们似乎不知道其危险或威力。
They used phrases like “We want our country back” and “Take back control” that were open to any and every interpretation.
他们使用了诸如“我们希望夺回我们的国家”和“收回控制权”之类的短语，这些短语可以有任何解释。
Now they complain that they have been misrepresented as racist, xenophobic, ignorant.
现在他们抱怨说他们被歪曲为种族主义者、仇外者和无知者。
They are keen to end the argument, to quit the field of language where only the headachy prospect of detailed analysis remains, to take their dubious verbal victory and run for the hills.
他们渴望结束争论，退出语言领域，因为那里只剩下令人头疼的详细分析前景，带着可疑的口头胜利逃走。
They have a blunt phrase they use in the hope of its being the last word, and it is characteristically rude: “You lost.
他们使用了一个直率的短语，希望它能成为最后一句话，而且这句话具有典型的粗鲁性：“你输了。
Get over it.”
克服它吧。”
The liberal elite, meanwhile, have evolved a theory: It is their belief that many of the people who voted to leave the European Union now regret their decision.
与此同时，自由派精英已经形成了一种理论：他们相信，许多投票支持脱欧的人现在都对自己的决定感到后悔。
There is no more tenuous comfort than that which rests on the possibility of another’s remorse.
没有什么比基于他人悔恨的可能性更脆弱的安慰了。
In psychoanalysis, events are reconstructed in the knowledge of their outcome: The therapeutic properties of narrative lie in its capacity to ascribe meaning to sufferings that at the time seemed to have no purpose.
在精神分析中，事件是根据其结果的知识来重建的：叙事的治疗特性在于它能够为当时似乎没有目的的痛苦赋予意义。
The liberal elite are in shock; they fall upon the notion of the victors’ regret as a palliative for their mental distress, but because the referendum result is irreversible, this narrative must adopt the form of tragedy.
自由派精英感到震惊；他们认为胜利者的遗憾是对他们精神痛苦的一种缓解，但由于公投结果是不可逆转的，这种叙述必须采用悲剧的形式。
Unlike the victors, the losers are loquacious.
与胜利者不同，失败者是喋喋不休的。
They render the logic of their suffering with exactitude and skill, waxing to new expressive heights.
他们以精确而技巧的方式呈现了他们苦难的逻辑，达到了新的表达高度。
The deluge of fine writing that follows the referendum contrasts strangely with the reticence that preceded it.
公投之后涌现的大量优秀文章与公投之前的沉默形成了奇怪的对比。
The liberal elite are defending their reality, but too late.
自由派精英正在捍卫他们的现实，但为时已晚。
Some urge a show of tolerance and understanding; others talk about the various stages of grief; others still call for courage in standing up for the values of liberalism.
一些人敦促表现出宽容和理解；其他人谈论悲伤的各个阶段；其他人仍然呼吁有勇气捍卫自由主义价值观。
These are fine performances, but it is unclear whom they are for.
这些都是很好的表演，但尚不清楚它们是为谁而做的。
I have often noticed how people begin to narrate out loud when in the presence of mute creatures, a dog, say, or a baby: Who is the silent witness to this verbal outpouring?
我经常注意到，当人们面对沉默的生物（例如狗或婴儿）时，他们如何开始大声叙述：谁是这种言语倾诉的无声见证人？
Meanwhile, in the Essex town of Harlow, a Polish man is murdered in the street by a gang of white youths who apparently heard him speaking his native language.
与此同时，在埃塞克斯郡的哈洛镇，一名波兰男子在街上被一群白人青年杀害，这些白人青年显然听到他说的是自己的母语。
How can we ascertain the moral status of rudeness?
我们如何确定粗鲁行为的道德地位？
Children are the members of our society most often accused of being rude; they are also the most innocent.
儿童是我们社会中最常被指责粗鲁的成员。他们也是最无辜的。
We teach children that it is rude to be honest, to say, “This tastes disgusting” or “That lady is fat.” We also teach them that it is rude to disrespect our authority.
我们教导孩子们，诚实地说“这味道很恶心”或“那位女士很胖”是不礼貌的。我们还告诉他们，不尊重我们的权威是不礼貌的。
We give them orders: We say, “Sit still” or “Go to your room.” At a certain point, I got into the habit, when addressing my children, of asking myself whether I would speak in the same way to an adult and discovered that in nearly every case the answer was no. At that time, I understood rudeness to be essentially a matter of verbal transgression: It could be defined within the morality of language, without needing to prove itself in a concrete act.
我们给他们命令：我们说“别动”或“回你的房间去”。在某个时候，我养成了一个习惯，当我对我的孩子说话时，我会问自己是否会以同样的方式对成年人说话，结果发现几乎在所有情况下答案都是否定的。那时我的理解是，粗鲁本质上是一种言语上的越轨问题：可以用语言的道德来定义它，而不需要用具体的行为来证明自己。
A concrete act makes language irrelevant.
具体的行动使语言变得无关紧要。
Once words have been superseded by actions, the time for talking has passed.
一旦言语被行动所取代，空谈的时间就过去了。
Rudeness, then, needs to serve as a barrier to action.
因此，粗鲁需要成为行动的障碍。
It is what separates thought from deed; it is the moment when wrongdoing can be identified, in time to stop the wrong from having to occur.
这就是思想与行动的区别。这是可以识别错误行为并及时阻止错误发生的时刻。
Does it follow, then, that a bigoted remark — however ugly to hear — is an important public interface between idea and action?
那么，是否可以得出这样的结论：偏执的言论——无论听起来多么难听——是想法与行动之间重要的公共接口？
Is rudeness a fundamental aspect of civilization’s immunity, a kind of antibody that is mobilized by the contagious presence of evil?
粗鲁是文明免疫力的一个基本方面，是一种因邪恶的传染性而动员起来的抗体吗？
In the United States, Hillary Clinton calls half the supporters of Donald Trump “a basket of deplorables.” At first the remark impressed me.
在美国，希拉里·克林顿称唐纳德·特朗普的半数支持者是“一篮子可悲之人”。起初这句话让我印象深刻。
I approved of Clinton for her courage and honesty, while reflecting on her curious choice of words.
我赞赏克林顿的勇气和诚实，同时反思她奇怪的措辞选择。
“Basket of deplorables” almost sounded like a phrase from Dr. Seuss: It would be typical of him to put deplorables in a basket, for the moral amusement of his young readers.
“一篮子可悲的东西”听起来几乎就像苏斯博士的一句话：他把可悲的东西放在一个篮子里，以供他的年轻读者进行道德娱乐，这是他的典型做法。
A sack or a box of deplorables wouldn’t be the same thing at all, and a swamp of deplorables is too Dante-esque; but a basket is just the kind of zany, cheerful container that makes light of the deplorables while still putting them in their place.
一袋或一盒可悲的东西根本不是同一回事，而一大堆可悲的东西就太但丁式了；但篮子就是一种滑稽、令人愉快的容器，它可以让可悲的东西变得轻淡，同时又把它们放在原来的位置。
It quickly became clear, however, that as a public utterance, the phrase was malfunctioning.
然而，很快人们就发现，作为一种公开言论，这句话是有问题的。
The basket began to speak, to distinguish itself: Inside it were a number of offended individuals.
篮子开始说话，开始区分自己：里面有一些被冒犯的人。
Clinton had made the mistake of being rude.
克林顿犯了一个粗鲁的错误。
The “basket of deplorables” wasn’t Dr. Seuss after all.
“一篮子可悲者”毕竟不是苏斯博士。
It was the snobbish language of the liberal elite, caught committing the elemental moral crime of negating individual human value.
这是自由派精英的势利语言，他们被发现犯下了否定个人人类价值的基本道德罪行。
Yet Clinton’s adversary regularly committed this crime with impunity.
然而克林顿的对手经常犯下这种罪行而不受惩罚。
Were Clinton’s and Trump’s two different kinds of rudeness?
克林顿和特朗普的粗鲁行为是两种不同的吗？
In Britain, a man tweets that someone should “Jo Cox” Anna Soubry.
在英国，一名男子在推特上说有人应该“乔·考克斯”安娜·苏布里。
The amorality of the English tongue: In the run-up to the referendum, Jo Cox, a member of Parliament, was shot and stabbed to death by a far-right nationalist; to “Jo Cox” someone is to murder a female member of Parliament who advocates remaining in the European Union.
英语语言的不道德性：在公投前夕，国会议员乔·考克斯被极右翼民族主义者开枪刺死；对“乔·考克斯”来说，有人要谋杀一名主张留在欧盟的女议员。
The man who posts the tweet is arrested.
发布这条推文的男子已被捕。
The police, it seems, are trying to get on top of our verbal problems.
警察似乎正在努力解决我们的言语问题。
It has now become commonplace for proponents of liberal values to receive death threats.
如今，自由主义价值观的支持者收到死亡威胁已经司空见惯。
The death threat, I suppose, is the extreme of rudeness: It is the place where word finally has to be taken as deed, where civilization’s immunity reaches the point of breakdown.
我想，死亡威胁是粗鲁的极端：在这里，言语最终必须被视为行动，文明的免疫力达到崩溃的地步。
“I could kill you,” my mother often used to say to me, and I didn’t know whether to believe her or not.
“我可以杀了你，”我母亲经常对我说，我不知道是否相信她。
It is true that I frequently fell foul of her and others through my habit of outspokenness.
确实，由于我直言不讳的习惯，我经常与她和其他人发生冲突。
The sharpness of my phrases maddened her.
我的言语尖刻使她恼怒。
I was quite capable of the basket-of-deplorables mistake, the confusion of cleverness with insult, the belief in language as an ultimate good, the serving of which was its own reward.
我很容易犯一篮子可悲的错误，将聪明与侮辱混为一谈，相信语言是终极的善，语言的服务本身就是回报。
No one could mind what you said if you said it with sufficient skill, could they?
如果你说得足够有技巧，没有人会介意你说的话，不是吗？
Later I came to believe that the good of language lay entirely in its relationship to truth.
后来我开始相信语言的好处完全在于它与真理的关系。
Language was a system through which right and wrong — truth and untruth — could be infallibly identified.
语言是一个系统，通过它可以准确无误地识别正确与错误——真理与谎言。
Honesty, so long as it was absolute, was a means for individuals to understand all good and evil.
诚实，只要是绝对的，就是个人理解所有善恶的一种手段。
The liberal elite, as far as I am aware, do not make death threats.
据我所知，自由派精英不会发出死亡威胁。
Is this because they have better manners?
这是因为他们有更好的礼仪吗？
Do they in fact wish that their enemies were dead but would just never say so?
他们是否真的希望他们的敌人死掉但只是从不这么说？
And if they do wish it — albeit politely, in the manner of a white lie — is the sin somehow less cardinal for being courteous?
如果他们确实希望这样做——尽管是以善意的谎言的方式礼貌地表达——那么这种罪孽是否会因为礼貌而变得不那么重要呢？
The anti-liberals do not seem to find their own penchant for death threats problematic.
反自由主义者似乎并不认为自己对死亡威胁的偏好有问题。
In America, Trump even makes a veiled one against Clinton.
在美国，特朗普甚至对克林顿进行了暗暗攻击。
We are told by the newspapers that Trump invited the Clintons to his wedding, that their daughters are good friends.
报纸告诉我们，特朗普邀请克林顿夫妇参加他的婚礼，他们的女儿是好朋友。
Is this verbal violence, then, simply incompetence?
那么，这种言语暴力仅仅是无能吗？
Is it the verbal equivalent of someone who has not learned the piano sitting down and trying to play Rachmaninoff’s Third?
这是否相当于一个没有学过钢琴的人坐下来尝试演奏拉赫玛尼诺夫的第三首？
The rudeness of these public figures gives pleasure and relief, it is clear, to their audiences.
显然，这些公众人物的粗鲁行为给他们的观众带来了愉悦和宽慰。
Perhaps what they experience is not the possibility of actual violence but a sort of intellectual unbuttoning, a freedom from the constraint of language.
也许他们所经历的并不是实际暴力的可能性，而是一种智力上的解开，一种摆脱语言束缚的自由。
Perhaps they have lived lives in which they have been continually outplayed in the field of articulation, but of this new skill — rudeness — they find that they are the masters.
也许他们在生活中在表达方面不断被击败，但在这种新技能——粗鲁——方面他们发现自己是主人。
My mother’s death threats undoubtedly arose from her frustration with my own use of language.
我母亲的死亡威胁无疑是因为她对我自己使用语言的不满。
What I did not take into account when I spoke to her was the difference in our social positions.
当我和她说话时，我没有考虑到我们社会地位的差异。
She was a housewife with little education and a rapidly retreating beauty, for whom life was a process of discovering that no greatness had been held in store for her.
她是一位没有受过多少教育的家庭主妇，美貌迅速退却，对她来说，生活就是一个发现自己没有什么伟大的过程。
She did such things for me as cook and clean, while I was on my way to university and liberty.
当我正在上大学和自由的路上时，她为我做了一些事情，比如做饭和打扫卫生。
Yet to my mind, she had an extraordinary power, the power to blacken my mental outlook and ruin my prospect of life.
但在我看来，她拥有一种非凡的力量，能够抹黑我的精神面貌，毁掉我的人生前景。
When I spoke to her, I thought I was addressing a tyrant in whose overthrow my only weapons were words.
当我和她说话时，我以为我是在对一个暴君说话，而他推翻我的唯一武器就是言语。
But words were the very things that roused her to violence, because at her life’s core, she had been separated from them.
但正是言语激起了她的暴力，因为在她生命的核心，她已经与言语分离了。
Her labor, her maternal identity, her status were all outside the language economy.
她的劳动、她的母亲身份、她的地位都在语言经济之外。
Instead, she formulated a story of herself whose simplifications and lies infuriated me.
相反，她编造了一个关于自己的故事，其简单化和谎言激怒了我。
I aimed to correct her with truth — perhaps I thought that if only I could insult her with sufficient accuracy, we would be reconciled — but she refused to be corrected, to be chastened.
我的目的是用事实纠正她——也许我认为只要我能足够准确地侮辱她，我们就会和解——但她拒绝被纠正，被惩罚。
In the end, she won by being prepared to sacrifice the moral basis of language.
最终，她因准备牺牲语言的道德基础而获胜。
She didn’t care what she said, or rather, she exacted from words the licentious pleasures of misuse; in so doing, she took my weapon and broke it before my eyes.
她不在乎自己说什么，或者更确切地说，她从言语中索取滥用的淫荡乐趣；在这样做的过程中，她夺走了我的武器，并在我眼前将其打碎。
She made fun of me for the words I used, and I couldn’t respond by threatening her with death.
她因为我的用词而取笑我，而我却无法用死亡威胁她来回应。
I couldn’t say “I could kill you” because it wasn’t true, and in language I had staked everything on telling the truth.
我不能说“我可以杀了你”，因为那不是真的，而在语言上，我已经赌上了一切，说实话。
If inequality is the basis on which language breaks down, how is it best to speak?
如果不平等是语言崩溃的基础，那么怎样说话才是最好的呢？
In a clothes shop in London, I sift through the rails, looking for something to wear.
在伦敦的一家服装店里，我在栏杆中筛选，寻找可以穿的衣服。
The instant I came in, the assistant bounded up to me and recited what was obviously a set of phrases scripted by the management.
我一进来，助理就跳到我面前，背诵了一套显然是管理层写的短语。
I dislike being spoken to in this way, though I realize the assistant doesn’t do so out of choice.
我不喜欢以这种方式与我说话，尽管我意识到助理这样做并不是出于自愿。
I told her I was fine.
我告诉她我很好。
I told her I would find her if I needed anything.
我告诉她，如果我需要什么，我会找到她。
But a few minutes later, she’s back.
但几分钟后，她回来了。
The truth?
真相？
It’s been a day of anxiety and self-criticism, of worry about children and money, and now to top it all off, I’ve made the mistake of coming here in the unfounded belief that it will make me look nicer, and that making myself look nicer will help.
这是焦虑和自我批评的一天，是对孩子和金钱的担忧，而现在最糟糕的是，我犯了一个错误，带着毫无根据的信念来到这里，认为这会让我看起来更好，而让自己看起来更好会有所帮助。
There’s a pause in which perhaps she is waiting for me to ask her about her own day in return, which I don’t.
中间有一段停顿，也许她是在等我问她今天过得怎么样，但我没有。
Did I tell you, she says, that we have other sizes downstairs?
她说，我有没有告诉过你，我们楼下还有其他尺寸的衣服？
If you want something in another size, she says, you just have to ask me.
她说，如果你想要其他尺寸的东西，你只需要问我即可。
I turn back to the rails and find that if anything, my delusion has been strengthened by this exchange, which has made me feel ugly and unlikable and in more need than ever of transformation.
我转回铁轨，发现如果说有什么不同的话，那就是这次交流强化了我的错觉，这让我感到丑陋、不讨人喜欢，比以往任何时候都更需要转变。
I take out a dress.
我拿出一件衣服。
It is blue.
它是蓝色的。
I look at it on its hanger.
我看着它挂在衣架上。
Good choice, the assistant says.
助理说，不错的选择。
I love that dress.
我喜欢那件衣服。
The color’s amazing.
颜色太棒了。
Immediately I put it back on the rail.
我立即把它放回铁轨上。
I move away a little.
我走开一点。
After a while, I begin to forget about the assistant.
过了一段时间，我开始忘记那个助理。
I think about clothes, their strange promise, the way their problems so resemble the problems of love.
我想到衣服，想到它们奇怪的承诺，想到它们的问题与爱情问题如此相似。
I take out another dress, this one wine-colored and dramatic.
我拿出另一件裙子，酒红色的，引人注目。
God, that would look amazing, the assistant says.
天哪，那看起来太棒了，助理说。
Is it the right size?
尺寸合适吗？
Shall I put it in the fitting room for you?
要我把它放在试衣间给你吗？
she says.
她说。
It’s just easier, isn’t it?
这更容易，不是吗？
Then you’ve got your hands free while you keep browsing.
这样您就可以在继续浏览时解放双手。
For the first time, I look at her.
我第一次看着她。
She has a broad face and a wide mouth with which she smiles continually, desperately.
她有一张宽阔的脸和一张宽大的嘴巴，脸上不断地绝望地微笑着。
I wonder whether the width of her smile was a factor in her being given this job.
我想知道她笑容的宽度是否是她获得这份工作的一个因素。
She is older than I expected.
她比我想象的要老。
Her face is lined, and despite her efforts, the mouth betrays some knowledge of sorrow.
她的脸上布满皱纹，尽管她很努力，但她的嘴里还是流露出一些悲伤的情绪。
I give her the dress, and she goes away.
我把衣服给了她，然后她就走了。
I find that I no longer want to be in the shop.
我发现我不想再呆在店里了。
I don’t want to try on the dress.
我不想试穿这件衣服。
I don’t want to take my clothes off or look at myself in a mirror.
我不想脱掉衣服，也不想照镜子。
I consider quietly leaving while the assistant is gone, but the fact that I have caused the dress to be put in the fitting room is too significant.
我想趁助理不在的时候悄悄离开，但我把裙子放到试衣间里这件事太有意义了。
Perhaps it will be transformative after all.
也许它终究会带来变革。
On my way there, I meet the assistant, who is on her way out.
在去那里的路上，我遇到了正在出去的助理。
She widens her eyes and raises her hands in mock dismay.
她睁大眼睛，假装沮丧地举起双手。
I wasn’t expecting you to be so quick!
我没想到你这么快！
she exclaims.
她惊呼道。
Didn’t you find anything else you liked?
你没有找到其他你喜欢的东西吗？
God, I know exactly what you mean, she says.
天哪，我完全明白你的意思，她说。
We’re all in such a hurry.
我们都很着急。
There just isn’t time to stop, is there?
根本没有时间停下来，不是吗？
The fitting rooms are empty: There aren’t any other customers.
试衣间空无一人：没有其他顾客。
The assistant hovers behind me while I go into the cubicle where she has hung the dress.
当我走进她挂衣服的小隔间时，助理在我身后徘徊。
I wonder whether she will actually follow me in.
我想知道她是否真的会跟着我进去。
I pull the curtain behind me and feel a sense of relief.
我拉开身后的窗帘，有一种如释重负的感觉。
My reflection in the mirror is glaring and strange.
镜子里的我的倒影刺眼而奇怪。
I have stood in such boxlike spaces before, alone with myself, and these moments seem connected to one another in a way I can’t quite specify.
我以前曾站在这样的盒子般的空间里，独自一人，这些时刻似乎以一种我无法具体说明的方式相互联系。
It is as though life is a board game, and here is the starting point to which I keep finding myself unexpectedly returned.
生活就像一场棋盘游戏，而这就是我不断发现自己意外回归的起点。
I take off my clothes.
我脱掉衣服。
This suddenly seems like an extraordinary thing to do in an unfamiliar room in a street in central London.
在伦敦市中心街道上一个陌生的房间里，这突然看起来像是一件非同寻常的事情。
Through the gap in the curtain I can see into a dingy back room whose door has been left open.
透过窗帘的缝隙，我可以看到后面一间肮脏的房间，门开着。
There are pipes running up the walls, a small fridge, a kettle, a box of tea bags.
墙上有管道、小冰箱、水壶、一盒茶包。
Someone has hung a coat on a hook.
有人把一件外套挂在钩子上。
I realize that the theater of this shop is about to break down, and that the assistant’s manner — her bad acting, her inability to disguise herself in her role — is partly to blame.
我意识到这家商店的剧院即将崩溃，而助理的态度——她的糟糕表演，她无法掩饰自己的角色——是部分原因。
I am standing there in my underwear, and her voice is so loud and close that I nearly jump out of my skin.
我穿着内衣站在那里，她的声音又大又近，让我差点从皮肤上跳出来。
I can hear the rustle of her clothes and the scraping sound of her nylon tights.
我能听到她衣服的沙沙声和尼龙裤袜的刮擦声。
She is standing right outside the curtain.
她就站在帘子外面。
Why don’t you come out?
你为什么不出来？
she says.
她说。
I can give you a second opinion.
我可以给你第二个意见。
Suddenly I am angry.
突然我很生气。
I forget to feel sorry for her; I forget that she did not choose to say these things; I forget that she is perhaps in the wrong job.
我忘记了为她感到难过；我忘记了她没有选择说这些话；她没有选择说这些话。我忘记了她可能做错了工作。
I feel trapped, humiliated, misunderstood.
我感到被困住、被羞辱、被误解。
I feel that people always have a choice where language is concerned, that the moral and relational basis of our existence depends on that principle.
我觉得人们在语言方面总是有选择，我们存在的道德和关系基础取决于这一原则。
I wish to tell her that there are those who have sacrificed themselves to defend it.
我想告诉她，有人为了捍卫它而牺牲了自己。
If we stop speaking to one another as individuals, I want to say to her, if we allow language to become a tool of coercion, then we are lost.
我想对她说，如果我们停止作为个体彼此交谈，如果我们允许语言成为一种胁迫工具，那么我们就会迷失方向。
There is a silence outside the curtain.
帘外一片寂静。
Then I hear the rustling of her clothes as she starts to move away.
然后我听到她的衣服沙沙作响，她开始走开。
All right then, she says, in a voice that for the first time I can identify as hers.
好吧，她说，我第一次用一种我能认出来是她的声音。
It is a flat voice, disaffected, a voice that expresses no surprise when things turn out badly.
这是一种平淡、不满的声音，当事情变得糟糕时，这种声音并不表现出惊讶。
I put my clothes back on and take the dress on its hanger and leave the cubicle.
我重新穿上衣服，把衣服挂在衣架上，然后离开了隔间。
The assistant is standing with her back to me on the empty shop floor, her arms folded across her chest, looking out the window.
助理背对着我站在空荡荡的车间地板上，双臂交叉在胸前，看着窗外。
She does not ask me how I got on or whether I liked the dress and intend to buy it.
她没有问我穿得怎么样，也没有问我是否喜欢这件衣服并打算买它。
She does not offer to take the dress from me and hang it back on its rail.
她并没有提出从我手中拿走裙子并将其挂回衣杆上。
She is offended, and she is very deliberately showing it.
她很生气，而且她是故意表现出来的。
We are, then, equal at least in our lack of self-control.
那么，至少在缺乏自制力方面，我们是平等的。
I hang up the dress myself.
我自己把衣服挂起来。
She gives a small start and utters a sound.
她微微一惊，并发出声音。
She is trying to say something: She is searching, I see, for one of her scripted phrases in the effort to reassume her persona.
她试图说些什么：我明白，她正在寻找她的脚本短语之一，以努力重新展现她的角色。
Falteringly, she half-smiles, but her mouth is turned down at the corners like a clown’s.
她支吾着，似笑非笑，但嘴角却像小丑一样下垂。
I imagine her going home this evening, unhappy.
我想象她今天晚上会不高兴地回家。
When I tell the story afterward, making myself both its villain and its butt, it goes like this: I, currently dismayed by the sudden ascent of rudeness in our world and wondering what it means, am betrayed into rudeness myself by a personal sensitivity to language that causes me to do the very thing I despise, which is fail to recognize another human’s individuality.
当我后来讲述这个故事时，让自己既是恶棍，又是它的屁股，故事是这样的：目前，我对世界上突然出现的粗鲁行为感到沮丧，并想知道这意味着什么，但个人对语言的敏感使我做出了我所鄙视的事情，这使我自己也变得粗鲁，这就是无法识别另一个人的个性。
But the person I tell it to doesn’t hear it that way at all.
但我告诉的人根本不这么认为。
He hears it as a story about how annoying shop assistants are.
他听到这是一个关于店员有多么烦人的故事。
I hate it when they do that, he says.
“我讨厌他们这样做，”他说。
It was good you made an issue of it.
很高兴你提出了这个问题。
Maybe she’ll give feedback to the management, and they’ll stop making people say all that stuff.
也许她会向管理层提供反馈，他们就会停止让人们说这些话。
What Jesus did was sacrifice himself, use his body to translate word to deed, to make evil visible.
耶稣所做的就是牺牲自己，用他的身体将言语转化为行动，使邪恶变得可见。
While being crucified, he remained for the most part polite.
当他被钉在十字架上时，他大部分时间仍然保持礼貌。
He gave others much to regret.
他给了别人很多遗憾。
Their regret sustained 2,000 years of Christianity.
他们的悔恨维系了基督教2000年的历史。
Is regret, then, the most powerful emotion after all?
那么，后悔到底是最强烈的情感吗？
My mother and I don’t speak to each other anymore, but I’ve been thinking about her lately.
我和妈妈不再说话了，但我最近一直在想她。
I’ve been thinking about facts, about how they get stronger and clearer, while points of view fade or change.
我一直在思考事实，思考它们如何变得更加有力和清晰，而观点却逐渐消失或改变。
The loss of the parent-child relationship is a fact.
亲子关系的破裂是事实。
It is also a failure.
这也是一个失败。
It is regrettable.
令人遗憾的是。
The last time my parents spoke to me, my father said something very rude.
上次我父母跟我说话时，我父亲说了一些非常粗鲁的话。
He said I was full of shit.
他说我满脑子都是屎。
He put the phone down straight away after he said it, and I have not heard from him again.
说完他就直接挂断了电话，之后我就再也没有他的消息了。
For a long time afterward, I was profoundly disturbed by his words: For my father to speak to me of shit, and claim that I was full of it, seemed to remove my basis for existing.
此后很长一段时间，我都对他的话深感不安：父亲对我说狗屎，还说我充满了狗屎，似乎消除了我存在的基础。
Yet he was half of me: It was, I realized, for that reason that he felt he could speak to me the way he did.
然而他是我的一半：我意识到，正是因为这个原因，他觉得他可以像他那样对我说话。
I was his child; he forgot that I was as real as he.
我是他的孩子；他忘记了我和他一样真实。
It could be said that one-half of our country has told the other it is full of shit, deliberately choosing those words because it knows that their object finds rudeness — the desecration of language — especially upsetting.
可以说，我们国家的一半人告诉另一半人，这个国家充满了狗屎，故意选择这些词，因为它知道他们的对象认为粗鲁——对语言的亵渎——尤其令人不安。
In Sophocles’ play “Philoctetes,” the man who suffers most is also the man with the most powerful weapon, an infallible bow that could be said to represent the concept of accuracy.
在索福克勒斯的戏剧《菲罗克忒忒斯》中，受苦最深的人也是拥有最强大武器的人，一把万无一失的弓，可以说代表了精确的概念。
The hardhearted Odysseus abandoned the wounded Philoctetes on an island, only to discover 10 years later that the Trojan War could not be won without Philoctetes’ bow.
铁石心肠的奥德修斯将受伤的菲罗克忒忒斯遗弃在一座岛上，十年后才发现，没有菲罗克忒忒斯的弓，特洛伊战争就无法获胜。
He returns to the island determined to get the bow by any means.
他回到岛上，决心不惜一切代价拿到弓。
For his part, Philoctetes has spent 10 years in almost unendurable pain: It is decreed that he cannot be healed other than by the physician Asclepius at Troy, yet he would rather die than help Odysseus by returning with him.
就菲罗克忒忒斯而言，他已经在几乎难以忍受的痛苦中度过了十年：按照规定，除了特洛伊的医生阿斯克勒庇俄斯之外，他无法治愈，但他宁愿死也不愿与奥德修斯一起返回来帮助他。
Time has done nothing to break down the impasse: Philoctetes still can’t forgive Odysseus; Odysseus still can’t grasp the moral sensitivity of Philoctetes.
时间并没有打破僵局：菲罗克忒忒斯仍然无法原谅奥德修斯；奥德修斯仍然无法领会菲罗克忒忒斯的道德敏感性。
It is for the third actor, Neoptolemus, a boy of pure heart, to resolve the standoff and bring an end to war and pain.
第三个演员，涅奥普托勒摩斯，一个心地纯洁的男孩，要解决僵局并结束战争和痛苦。
Odysseus urges Neoptolemus to befriend Philoctetes in order to steal the bow, claiming it is for the greater good.
奥德修斯敦促尼奥普托勒摩斯与菲罗克忒忒斯成为朋友，以便偷走弓，声称这是为了更大的利益。
Philoctetes, meanwhile, tells Neoptolemus the story of his dreadful sufferings and elicits his empathy and pity.
与此同时，菲罗克忒忒斯向涅俄普托勒摩斯讲述了他所遭受的可怕痛苦的故事，并引起了他的同情和怜悯。
In his dilemma, Neoptolemus realizes two things: that wrong is never justified by being carried out under orders, and that the bow is meaningless without Philoctetes himself.
在他的困境中，涅奥普托勒摩斯认识到两件事：服从命令永远不会成为错误的理由，而且如果没有菲罗克忒忒斯本人，弓就没有意义。
The moral power of individuality and the poetic power of suffering are the two indispensable components of truth.
个体的道德力量和苦难的诗意力量是真理不可或缺的两个组成部分。
For his part, Neoptolemus might be said to represent the concept of good manners.
就涅奥普托勒摩斯而言，他可以说代表了良好举止的概念。
In this drama, the expressive man and the rude man need each other, but without the man of manners, they will never be reconciled.
在这部剧中，表现力强的男人和粗鲁的男人互相需要，但没有礼貌的男人，他们永远不会和解。
“Make her stop!” my daughters used to beg me when they were younger and one was doing something the other didn’t like.
“让她住手！”我的女儿们小时候常常求我，其中一个做了另一个不喜欢的事情。
In other words: Restore to me the primacy of my version; rid me of this challenge to the experience of being me.
换句话说：恢复我的版本的首要地位；让我摆脱了对做我自己的体验的挑战。
One might say that what they wanted was justice, impartiality — but impartiality, I usually discovered, was not easy to attain.
有人可能会说，他们想要的是正义、公正——但我通常发现，公正并不容易实现。
There were always two sides to their stories, and I lacked the ability to turn them into one.
他们的故事总是有正反两面，而我却没有能力将它们合二为一。
I have prided myself on my willingness to object to injustices, to speak my mind when I thought I saw wrong being done.
我为自己愿意反对不公正而感到自豪，当我认为自己看到错误时，我愿意说出自己的想法。
But perhaps all I was ever doing was trying to make it stop, trying to return the world to something I could bear to live in, without necessarily understanding it first.
但也许我所做的一切只是试图让它停止，试图让世界回到我可以忍受生活的状态，而不必首先理解它。
It strikes me that good manners would be the thing to aim for in the current situation.
我觉得在目前的情况下，良好的举止才是我们应该追求的目标。
I have made a resolution, which is to be more polite.
我已经下了一个决心，那就是更加礼貌一些。
I don’t know what good it will do: This might be a dangerous time for politeness.
我不知道这有什么好处：这可能是礼貌的危险时刻。
It might involve sacrifices.
这可能涉及牺牲。
It might involve turning the other cheek.
这可能需要转动另一边脸。
A friend of mine says this is the beginning of the end of the global order: He says that in a couple of decades’ time, we’ll be eating rats and tulip bulbs, as people have done before in times of social collapse.
我的一个朋友说，这是全球秩序终结的开始：他说，几十年后，我们将吃老鼠和郁金香球茎，就像人们在社会崩溃时期所做的那样。
I consider the role that good manners might play in the sphere of rat-eating, and it seems to me an important one.
我认为良好的举止在食鼠领域可能发挥的作用，在我看来这是一个重要的作用。
As one who has never been tested, who has never endured famine or war or extremism or even discrimination, and who therefore perhaps does not know whether she is true or false, brave or a coward, selfless or self-serving, righteous or misled, it would be good to have something to navigate by.
作为一个从未经历过考验、从未经历过饥荒、战争、极端主义甚至歧视的人，因此也许不知道自己是真还是假、勇敢还是懦夫、无私还是自私、正义还是被误导，如果有一些东西可以指引，那就太好了。
Rachel Cusk is the author of several novels, including “Outline,” which was one of the The Times’s 10 Best Books of 2015, and most recently “Transit.” She last wrote for the magazine about making house .
雷切尔·卡斯克 (Rachel Cusk) 是多本小说的作者，其中包括被《泰晤士报》评为 2015 年十佳图书之一的《Outline》，以及最近出版的《Transit》。她最后一次为杂志撰写有关建造房屋的文章。