我从未当面和她说过，但她对文学作品的这种“截肢手术”的确让我感到震惊 。我知道，安?帕契特、多萝西?塞耶斯和萨默塞特?毛姆也在我身旁气得冒烟呢，怎么能把这些他们呕心沥血写出来的文字就这样从它们原来的位置上“截肢”了呢!她挑出来的那些段落也着实吓了我一跳，比如：“以你最糟糕的一面示人，因为如果那样人们也能容忍你的话，你就能做真正的自己了 。”有时候，我会站在那儿读墙上那些书摘，手里拿着一本备受剪刀“.的小说，心里充满困惑，不知道到底是什么驱使妈妈剪下了这样一些稀奇古怪的句子 。
My own quotation collection is more hidden and delicate. I copy favoritelines into a spiral-bound journal-a Christmas present from my mother,actually—in soft, gray No. 2 pencil. This means my books remain whole. The laborrequired makes selection a cutthroat process: Do I really love these two pagesof On Chesil Beach enough to transc ribe them, word by finger-cramping word?(The answer was yes, the pages were that exquisite.)
我也摘录和收藏文字，不过我的收藏更为隐秘和精致 。我会用灰色的二号软芯铅笔把我最喜欢的句子摘抄到一个活页日记本里——事实上，这还是我妈妈送我的一份圣诞礼物呢 。也就是说，我的书都是完整的 。但因为摘抄需要工夫，因此选择哪些文字摘抄就成了一个痛苦的过程：我是不是真的喜欢《在切瑟尔海滩上》里的这两页文字?喜欢到我愿意一个字一个字地把它们抄下来，直抄到手指头都抽筋?(答案为“是”，因为这两页文字写得实在太美了 。)
My mother doesn’t know any of this. She doesn’t know I prefer copying outto cutting out. I’ve never told her that I compile quotations at all.
我妈妈一点也不知道这件事 。她不知道与剪贴相比，我更喜欢抄录 。我压根就没告诉过她我也收集自己喜欢的文字 。
There’s nothing very shocking about that; for all our chatting, we don’thave the words to begin certain conversations. My mother and I talk on the phoneat least once a week, and in some ways, we are each other’s most dedicatedlistener. She tells me about teaching English to the leathery Russian ladies atthe library where she volunteers; I tell her about job applications, coverletters, and a grant I’d like to win. We talk about my siblings, her siblings,the president, and Philip Seymour Hoffman movies. We make each other laugh sohard that I choke and she cries. But what we don’t say could fill up rooms.Fights with my father. Small failures in school. Anything, really, that piercesus.
其实这一点没什么值得大惊小怪的;尽管我们总是聊天，但对于某些特定的话题，我们总是不知道该怎么开口 。妈妈和我一个星期至少会通一次电话，从某些方面来说,我们是对方最专心的听众 。她会告诉我她在图书馆做志愿者教那些强悍的俄罗斯妇女英语时发生的事;而我会和她谈谈我找工作的事、我的求职信，还有我想要争取的补助什么的 。我们会聊我的兄弟姐妹、她的兄弟姐妹、总统，还有菲利普?塞默?霍夫曼的电影 。我们常常逗得对方大笑，笑得我喘不过气来，笑得她眼泪都流出来了 。但我们不聊的东西也很多，多得几个房间都装不下 。譬如她和我爸吵架了，又譬如我在学校遇到一些小挫折了 。事实上，所有让我们伤心的事，我们都避而不谈 。
【英文散文|经典英语散文阅读精选汇总】I like to say that my mother has never told me “I love you.” There’ssomething reassuring in its self-pitying simplicity—as if the three-word absenceexplains who I am and wins me sympathy-so I carry it with me, like a label on myback. I synthesize our cumbersome relationship with an easy shorthand: my mothernever said “I love you”. The last time my mother almost spoke the words was twoyears ago, when she called to tell me that a friend had been hospitalized.
我常常说，妈妈从来没和我说过“我爱你” 。这句有点自怜的简单话语听起来颇有些自我安慰的味道——仿佛这三个字的缺失就为我为什么成为现在的我提供了借口，还为我赢得了同情——于是，我总是把这句话挂在嘴边，就像把它贴在背上当标签一样 。对于我和妈妈之间的这种微妙关系，我总是简单地用一句“谁让她从来不说‘我爱你’”来总结 。上一次妈妈差点说出这几个字是在两年前，当时她给我打电话，告诉我她有个朋友住院了 。
I said, “I love you, Mom.” She said, “Thank you.” I haven’t said it since,but I’ve thought about it, and I’ve wondered why my mother doesn’t. A couple ofyears ago, I found a poem by Robert Hershon called “Sentimental Moment or WhyDid the Baguette Cross the Road?” that supplied words for the blank spaces I tryto understand in our conversations:

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标题：英文散文|经典英语散文阅读精选汇总( 六 )