地道表达
- 1.Edmund Burke famously cautioned that “the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” I have been reminded of Burke’s words as I have observed the behavior of US business leaders in Davos over the last few days. They know better but in their public rhetoric they have embraced and enabled our new president and his policies.
rhetoric n.the art of effective or persuasive speaking or writing, especially the exploitation of figures of speech and other compositional techniques. 在他们的公开言论中...
embraced and enabled our new president and his policies
译作:拥护我们的新总统和他的政策，坐视这一切发生。
此处值得琢磨的是"enable"的译法,解释为使...有可能发生
- 2.I understand and sympathise with the pressures they feel. I used to remind my colleagues in the Obama White House that “confidence is the cheapest form of stimulus”. There is a clear case for corporate tax reform, for some targeted regulatory relief and a more positive government attitude towards business. Businesses who get on the wrong side of the new president have lost billions of dollars of value in 60 seconds because of a tweet.And you cannot hope to have influence on an administration you go out of the way to condemn.
""go out of the way to do sth=to try very hard to do something
译作大力的谴责。这处表达值得记录并加以运用
e.g He went out of the way to make propaganda for his election.
- 3.and more generally to step away from underwriting an open global system
(1)step away from=avoid=evade from
(2)underwrite vt.
sign and accept liability under (an insurance policy), thus guaranteeing payment in case loss or damage occurs.
e.g "the policy, underwritten at Lloyd's, indemnifies trustees against loss arising from wrongful acts"(of a bank or other financial institution) pledge to buy all the unsold shares in (an issue of new shares).
e.g. "the purchase is being paid for by a share issue, which has been underwritten"
专业知识
-
1.Davos
著名的世界经济论坛，因会议选址位于瑞士的达沃斯山而得名。
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2.Edmund Burke
留有笔者所提及的“the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” “邪恶取得胜利的唯一必要条件是正直的人袖手旁观”箴言的创作者。
语言分析
- 1.Edmund Burke famously cautioned that “the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”
此处的adv+v的表达区别于以往的v+adv的形式，如he ate that
ice cream happily.而此处的表达更为符合中文的语序，但此处的译法却并非简单的“他开心地吃着冰淇淋”这般简单，而要再次对"caution"这个名动双性的词进行额外处理——“埃德蒙•伯克(Edmund Burke)曾发出著名的告诫”
- 2.the spectacle of financiers who three months ago were telling anyone who would listen that they would never do business with a Trump company rushing to praise the new administration;
(1)spectacles of
(2)who three months ago were 中“three months ago”的位置，这种不同于中文语序的插入时间形式总是在外刊中出现，给自己很地道却又难以模仿的感觉，还是注意多看多学。
