一句一译的安徒生童话 第3章 小美人鱼 The Little Mermaid 续 (第1/5页)

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于是她向老祖母请教，老祖母对上面的世界了如指掌，她非常正确地称之为海面上的陆地。

Then she applied to her old grandmother, who knew all about the upper world, which she very rightly called the lands above the sea.

“如果人类不被淹死，” 小美人鱼问道，“他们能永远活着吗？他们是否像我们在海里一样永远不死呢？”

“If human beings are not drowned,” asked the little mermaid, “can they live forever? do they never die as we do here in the sea?”

“是的，” 老妇人回答说，“他们也必须死，而且他们的寿命甚至比我们的还短。”

“Yes,” replied the old lady, “they must also die, and their term of life is even shorter than ours.

我们有时能活到三百岁，但当我们在这里不复存在时，我们只会变成水面上的泡沫，而且我们在海底甚至连一个埋葬我们所爱的人的坟墓都没有。

We sometimes live to three hundred years, but when we cease to exist here we only become the foam on the surface of the water, and we have not even a grave down here of those we love.

我们没有不朽的灵魂，我们永远不会再活过来；

We have not immortal souls, we shall never live again;

但是，就像绿色的海藻一样，一旦被割掉，就再也不能茁壮成长。

but, like the green sea - weed, when once it has been cut off, we can never flourish more.

相反，人类有一个永远活着的灵魂，在肉体化为尘土之后仍然活着。

Human beings, on the contrary, have a soul which lives forever, lives after the body has been turned to dust.

它穿过清澈纯净、繁星闪烁之上的空气飞升。

It rises up through the clear, pure air beyond the glittering stars.

就像我们浮出水面，看到地球上所有的陆地一样，他们也会飞升向我们永远无法看到的未知而荣耀的地方。

As we rise out of the water, and behold all the land of the earth, so do they rise to unknown and glorious regions which we shall never see.”

“为什么我们没有不朽的灵魂呢？”

“Why have not we an immortal soul?”

小美人鱼悲伤地问道；

asked the little mermaid mournfully;

“我愿意欣然放弃我能活的数百年时光，只为做一天的人类，并且有希望了解星空之上那个荣耀世界的幸福。”

“I would give gladly all the hundreds of years that I have to live, to be a human being only for one day, and to have the hope of knowing the happiness of that glorious world above the stars.”

“你可不能那样想，” 老妇人说；

“You must not think of that,” said the old woman;

“我们觉得自己比人类幸福得多，也富裕得多。”

“we feel ourselves to be much happier and much better off than human beings.”

“那么我将会死去，” 小美人鱼说，“并且我将作为海的泡沫四处飘荡，再也听不到海浪的音乐，看不到美丽的花朵，也看不到红日了。有没有什么办法能让我获得一个不朽的灵魂呢？”

“So I shall die,” said the little mermaid, “and as the foam of the sea I shall be driven about never again to hear the music of the waves, or to see the pretty flowers nor the red sun. Is there anything I can do to win an immortal soul?”

“没有，” 老妇人说，“除非一个男人如此爱你，以至于你对他来说比他的父亲或母亲还重要；

“No,” said the old woman, “unless a man were to love you so much that you were more to him than his father or mother;

并且如果他所有的思想和全部的爱都集中在你身上，牧师将他的右手放在你的手里，而且他承诺今生来世都对你忠诚，那么他的灵魂就会溜进你的身体，你就会获得一份人类未来的幸福。

and if all his thoughts and all his love were fixed upon you, and the priest placed his right hand in yours, and he promised to be true to you here and hereafter, then his soul would glide into your body and you would obtain a share in the future happiness of mankind.

他会给你一个灵魂，同时自己也保留灵魂；

He would give a soul to you and retain his own as well;

但这永远不可能发生。

but this can never happen.

你的鱼尾，在我们看来是如此美丽，但在陆地上却被认为非常丑陋；

Your fish’s tail, which amongst us is considered so beautiful, is thought on earth to be quite ugly;

他们不懂（我们的美），而且他们认为必须有两个粗壮的支撑物，他们称之为腿，才显得英俊。

they do not know any better, and they think it necessary to have two stout props, which they call legs, in order to be handsome.”

然后小美人鱼叹了口气，悲伤地看着自己的鱼尾。

Then the little mermaid sighed, and looked sorrowfully at her fish’s tail.

“让我们快乐起来吧，” 老妇人说，“在我们必须度过的三百年里跳跃嬉戏，这时间真的够长了；

“Let us be happy,” said the old lady, “and dart and spring about during the three hundred years that we have to live, which is really quite long enough;

之后我们就能更好地休息了。

after that we can rest ourselves all the better.

今晚我们将有一场宫廷舞会。”

This evening we are going to have a court ball.”

这是我们在陆地上永远看不到的壮丽景象之一。

It is one of those splendid sights which we can never see on earth.

大舞厅的墙壁和天花板是由厚实但透明的水晶制成的。

The walls and the ceiling of the large ball - room were of thick, but transparent crystal.

成百个巨大的贝壳，有些是深红色的，有些是草绿色的，一排排地立在两边，贝壳里有蓝色的火焰，照亮了整个大厅，并且透过墙壁闪耀着，这样大海也被照亮了。

May hundreds of colossal shells, some of a deep red, others of a grass green, stood on each side in rows, with blue fire in them, which lighted up the whole saloon, and shone through the walls, so that the sea was also illuminated.

数不清的大大小小的鱼游过水晶墙壁；

Innumerable fishes, great and small, swam past the crystal walls;

有些鱼的鳞片闪耀着紫色的光辉，而另一些则像金银一样闪亮。

on some of them the scales glowed with a purple brilliancy, and on others they shone like silver and gold.

一条宽阔的溪流穿过大厅，男美人鱼和女美人鱼随着自己甜美歌声的韵律在溪流中跳舞。

Through the halls flowed a broad stream, and in it danced the mermen and the mermaids to the music of their own sweet singing.

陆地上没有人有他们那样可爱的嗓音。

No one on earth has such a lovely voice as theirs.

小美人鱼比他们所有人唱得都更甜美。

The little mermaid sang more sweetly than them all.

整个宫廷都用手和尾巴为她鼓掌；

The whole court applauded her with hands and tails;

有那么一瞬间，她的心里感到十分欢快，因为她知道自己有着世上或海里最美妙的嗓音。

and for a moment her heart felt quite gay, for she knew she had the loveliest voice of any on earth or in the sea.

但她很快又想起了上面的世界，因为她无法忘记迷人的王子，也无法忘记自己没有像他那样不朽的灵魂的悲伤；

But she soon thought again of the world above her, for she could not forget the charming prince, nor her sorrow that she had not an immortal soul like his;

因此她悄悄地从父亲的宫殿溜了出去，当宫殿里一切都是欢乐和歌声的时候，她却独自悲伤地坐在自己的小花园里。

therefore she crept away silently out of her father’s palace, and while everything within was gladness and song, she sat in her own little garden sorrowful and alone.

然后她听到号角声在水中回荡，心想 ——“他肯定正在海面上航行呢，他就是我愿望所系之人，我愿意将自己一生的幸福交托到他手中。

Then she heard the bugle sounding through the water, and thought— “He is certainly sailing above, he on whom my wishes depend, and in whose hands I should like to place the happiness of my life.

我要为他冒险一切，去赢得一个不朽的灵魂，当我的姐妹们在我父亲的宫殿里跳舞时，我要去找海巫婆，我一直非常害怕她，但她能给我建议和帮助。”

I will venture all for him, and to win an immortal soul, while my sisters are dancing in my father’s palace, I will go to the sea witch, of whom I have always been so much afraid, but she can give me counsel and help.”

于是小美人鱼走出她的花园，踏上通往冒着泡沫的漩涡的路，巫婆就住在漩涡后面。

And then the little mermaid went out from her garden, and took the road to the foaming whirlpools, behind which the sorceress lived.

她以前从未走过那条路：

She had never been that way before:

那里既没有花也没有草生长；

neither flowers nor grass grew there;

只有光秃秃、灰蒙蒙的沙地一直延伸到漩涡处，在那里，水就像冒着泡沫的水车，把它卷住的一切东西都卷起来，然后抛进无底的深渊。

nothing but bare, gray, sandy ground stretched out to the whirlpool, where the water, like foaming mill - wheels, whirled round everything that it seized, and cast it into the fathomless deep.

小美人鱼必须穿过这些湍急的漩涡中间，才能到达海巫婆的领地；

Through the midst of these crushing whirlpools the little mermaid was obliged to pass, to reach the dominions of the sea witch;

而且在很长一段距离内，唯一的路正好要穿过一大片温热、冒泡的泥潭，巫婆称这片泥潭为她的泥炭沼。

and also for a long distance the only road lay right across a quantity of warm, bubbling mire, called by the witch her turfmoor.

在这片泥潭的那一边矗立着她的房子，房子位于一片奇特的森林中央，这片森林里所有的树木和花朵都是珊瑚虫，半是动物半是植物；

Beyond this stood her house, in the centre of a strange forest, in which all the trees and flowers were polypi, half animals and half plants;

它们看起来像从地里长出一百个头的蛇。

they looked like serpents with a hundred heads growing out of the ground.

树枝是长长的黏糊糊的手臂，手指像柔软的蠕虫，从根部到顶部一节一节地移动。

The branches were long slimy arms, with fingers like flexible worms, moving limb after limb from the root to the top.

海里能抓到的东西它们都抓，而且抓得紧紧的，所以没有东西能从它们的爪子下逃脱。

All that could be reached in the sea they seized upon, and held fast, so that it never escaped from their clutches.

小美人鱼看到眼前的景象非常惊恐，她站着不动，心因恐惧而跳动，她差一点就转身回去了；

The little mermaid was so alarmed at what she saw, that she stood still, and her heart beat with fear, and she was very nearly turning back;

但是她想到了王子，想到了她渴望得到的人类灵魂，她又鼓起了勇气。

but she thought of the prince, and of the human soul for which she longed, and her courage returned.

她把长长的飘动的头发盘在头上，这样珊瑚虫就抓不到它了。

She fastened her long flowing hair round her head, so that the polypi might not seize hold of it.

她双手交叉放在胸前，然后像鱼在水中穿梭一样向前冲去，在她两侧伸展着的丑陋珊瑚虫柔软的手臂和手指间穿梭。

She laid her hands together across her bosom, and then she darted forward as a fish shoots through the water, between the supple arms and fingers of the ugly polypi, which were stretched out on each side of her.

她看到每个珊瑚虫都用它众多的小手臂紧紧抓住它抓到的东西，就好像那些是铁箍一样。

She saw that each held in its grasp something it had seized with its numerous little arms, as if they were iron bands.

在海上遇难并沉入深水的人类的白色尸骨、陆地动物的尸骨、船桨、船舵和船舱都被它们紧紧抓住；

The white skeletons of human beings who had perished at sea, and had sunk down into the deep waters, skeletons of land animals, oars, rudders, and chests of ships were lying tightly grasped by their clinging arms;

甚至还有一个被它们抓住并勒死的小美人鱼；

even a little mermaid, whom they had caught and strangled;