1、 总之,不止一次,我悲哀地意识到,我爱上她毫无常理可言,是注定没有希望,是彻底的痴心妄想。总之,我还是要去爱她,因为我虔诚的相信,她代表着人类之美之极致。(注:译文版本颇多,这里是笔者的译文。)
Once for all; I knew to my sorrow, often and often, if not always, that I loved her against reason, against promise, against peace, against hope, against happiness, against all discouragement that could be. Once for all; I loved her none the less because I knew it, and it had no more influence in restraining me, than if I had devoutly believed her to be human perfection.
2、我有个原则:想到要做一件事,就马上去做,做下去。“Then, at the back,” said Wemmick, “out of sight, so as not to impede the idea of fortifications—for it’s a principle with me, if you have an idea, carry it out and keep it up—I don’t know whether that’s your opinion—”
3、机会不会上门来找人,只有人去找机会。 “For,” says Herbert to me, coming home to dinner on one of those special occasions, “I find the truth to be, Handel, that an opening won’t come to one, but one must go to it—so I have been.”
4、一句话,先是太胆小,明知不该做的事却不敢不做;后来也还是太胆小,明知该做的事却不敢去做。(笔者译本:总而言之,我太懦弱,明知是该做的事情却不敢做。也正因为我懦弱,明知不该做,却不敢避而远之,而是将错就错,曾做了错事。)
In a word, I was too cowardly to do what I knew to be right, as I had been too cowardly to avoid doing what I knew to be wrong.
5 水滴石穿
“Two things I can tell you,” said Estella. “First, notwithstanding the proverb that constant dropping will wear away a stone, you may set your mind at rest that these people never will—never would, in hundred years—impair your ground with Miss Havisham, in any particular, great or small. Second, I am beholden to you as the cause of their being so busy and so mean in vain, and there is my hand upon it.”
6、世界上形形色色的骗子,比起自骗自的人来,实在算不上一回事。
(笔者译文:世界上的骗子形形色色,可是比起自骗自的人来,实在算不了什么。我就是用这样的借口欺骗自己的。这真是滑天下之大稽。)
All other swindlers upon earth are nothing to the self-swindlers, and with such pretences did I cheat myself. Surely a curious thing.
7、只有真心朋友才肯和你说这种话。如果你不能顺着直道正路做到不平凡,可千万别为了要不平凡而去走邪门歪道。Which this to you the true friend say. If you can’t get to be oncommon through going straight, you’ll never get to do it through going crooked. So don’t tell no more on ’em, Pip, and live well and die happy.”
8、在任何交往中都不要伤害任何人,永远不要粗暴对待你手下的人。
9、天下最苦恼的事莫过于看不起自己的家。这里面可能有黑心的忘恩负义,这种惩罚也许是应有的报应;但是,这是一件悲惨的事情,我可以作证。
It is a most miserable thing to feel ashamed of home. There may be black ingratitude in the thing, and the punishment may be retributive and well deserved; but, that it is a miserable thing, I can testify.
10、凡事不能只看表面,要有凭有据才能作准。为人处世,这是头一条金科玉律。(笔者译:凡事不能看表面,凡事只看证据。这是不二法律。)
“Not a particle of evidence, Pip,” said Mr. Jaggers, shaking his head and gathering up his skirts. “Take nothing on its looks; take everything on evidence. There’s no better rule.”
11、我希望你总得先从平凡的学者做起,这样你才能成为一个不平凡的学者!“Well, Pip,” said Joe, “be it so or be it son’t, you must be a common scholar afore you can be a oncommon one, I should hope!
12、是你自己在说自己的坏话,是你自己自作自受。要不是你自己先败坏自己的名声,我怎么坏得了你的名声.
13、人生在世,有一条原则要记得:能够不落笔据在别人手里,那就千万不要落,因为,谁说得准啥时候被人家利用,参上一表呢?
“I’ll go round to the others in the course of the day and destroy the notes,” said Wemmick; “it’s a good rule never to leave documentary evidence if you can help it, because you don’t know when it may be put in. I’m going to take a liberty with you.—Would you mind toasting this sausage for the Aged P.?”
14、人生的长链,不论是金铸的,还是铁打的,不论是荆棘编成的,还是花朵串起来的,都是自己在特别的某一天动手去制作了第一环,否则你也就根本不会过上这样的一生。
Pause you who read this, and think for a moment of the long chain of iron or gold, of thorns or flowers, that would never have bound you, but for the formation of the first link on one memorable day.
15、夜雾散处,月华皎洁,静穆寥廓,再也看不见憧憧幽影,似乎预示着,我们再也不会分离了。
I took her hand in mine, and we went out of the ruined place; and, as the morning mists had risen long ago when I first left the forge, so, the evening mists were rising now, and in all the broad expanse of tranquil light they showed to me, I saw no shadow of another parting from her.
16. 死到临头是可怕的,但担心死后还要蒙受不白之冤,这比死亡还要可怕。
The death close before me was terrible, but far more terrible than death was the dread of being misremembered after death.
17 需要被值得信任的人担当的职位从来都是被错误的人占有着。
After well considering the matter while I was dressing at the Blue Boar in the morning, I resolved to tell my guardian that I doubted Orlick’s being the right sort of man to fill a post of trust at Miss Havisham’s. “Why, of course he is not the right sort of man, Pip,” said my guardian, comfortably satisfied beforehand on the general head, “because the man who fills the post of trust never is the right sort of man.”
18 你的境遇变了,也就改换了平时交游的人。。。从前的形影不离的旧友现在已经过时了。
“Since your change of fortune and prospects, you have changed your companions,” said Estella.
“Naturally,” said I.
“And necessarily,” she added, in a haughty tone; “what was fit company for you once, would be quite unfit company for you now.”
19 飞蛾扑火,与火有何干?
“Moths, and all sorts of ugly creatures,” replied Estella, with a glance towards him, “hover about a lighted candle. Can the candle help it?”
20 我曾听我父亲说过,这个人生得挺好看,是个情场追逐的老手。如果不是无知和偏见,谁也不会错认他是个君子,因为他完全是个小人。我父亲斩钉截铁地认定他是个伪君子。我父亲有个信念:自从有人类社会以来,凡无君子之心的人,也不会有君子之外表。我父亲认为,清漆是盖不了木头的纹路的;你清漆上得愈多,木头的纹路也就愈清楚。
I never saw him, for this happened five-and-twenty years ago (before you and I were, Handel), but I have heard my father mention that he was a showy-man, and the kind of man for the purpose. But that he was not to be, without ignorance or prejudice, mistaken for a gentleman, my father most strongly asseverates; because it is a principle of his that no man who was not a true gentleman at heart, ever was, since the world began, a true gentleman in manner. He says, no varnish can hide the grain of the wood; and that the more varnish you put on, the more the grain will express itself. - Chapter 21
21 我是一只久经风霜的老鸟啦,乳毛刚褪就开始经历种种陷阱,飞到稻草人头上落脚又有何妨?如果稻草人里面暗藏死神,有的话,那就让他出来,让我面对着他,我才会认输。(译者注:意思类似于中文里这句诗:曾经沧海难为水,除却巫山不是云)
I'm a old bird now, as has dared all manner of traps since first he was fledged, and I'm not afeerd to perch upon a scarecrow. If there's Death hid inside of it, there is, and let him come out, and I'll face him, and then I'll believe in him and not afore. - Chapter 40