海外头条总编审   王 在 军   （中国）

海外头条副编审 Wendy温迪（英国）

海 外 头 条总 编   火 凤  凰 （海外）

图片选自百度

英文诵读：龚如仲（美国）

中文播音：琬   乔（中国）

The Plague

By Albert Camus

Page 30

In fact, like our fellow citizens, Rieux was caught off his guard, and we should understand his hesitations in the light of this fact; and similarly understand how he was torn between conflicting fears and confidence. When a war breaks out, people say: “it’s stupid; it can’t last long.” But though a war may well be too stupid, that doesn’t prevent its lasting. Stupidity has a knack of getting its way; as we should see if we were not always so much wrapped up in ourselves.

In this respect our townsfolk were like everybody else, wrapped up in themselves; in other words they were humanists: they disbelieved in pestilences. A pestilence isn’t a thing made to man’s measure; therefore, we tell ourselves that pestilence is a mere bogy of the mind, a bad dream that will pass away. But it doesn’t always pass away, and, from one bad dream to another, it is men who pass away, and the humanists first of all, because they haven’t taken any precautions. Our townsfolk were not more to blame than others; they forgot to be modest, that was all, and thought everything still was possible for them; which presupposed that pestilences were impossible. They went on doing business, arranged for journeys, and formed views. How should they have given a thought to anything like plague, which rules out any future, cancels journeys , silences the exchange of views? They fancied themselves free, and no one will ever be free so long as there are pestilences.

Indeed, even after Dr. Rieux had admitted in his friend’s company that a handful of persons, scattered about the town, had without warning died of plague, the danger still remained fantastically unreal. For the simple reason that, when a man is a doctor, he comes to have his own ideas of physical suffering, and to acquire somewhat more imagination than the average. Looking from his window at the town, outwardly quite unchanged, the doctor felt little more than a faint qualm for the future, a vague unease.

He tried to recall what he had read about the disease. Figures floated across his memory, and he recalled that some thirty or so great plagues known to history had accounted for nearly hundred million deaths. But what are a hundred million deaths? When one has served in a war, one hardly knows what a dead man is, after a while. And since a dead man has no substance unless one has actually seen him dead, a hundred million corpses broadcast through history are no more than a puff of smoke in the imagination. The doctor remembered the plague at Constantinople that, according to Procopius, caused ten thousand deaths in a single day. Ten thousand death made about five times the audience in a biggish cinema. Yes, that was how it should be done. You should collect the people at the exits of five picture houses, you should lead them to a city square and make them die in heaps if you wanted to get a clear notion of what it means. Then at least you could add some familiar faces to the anonymous mass. But naturally that was impossible to put into practice; moreover, what man knows ten thousand faces? In any case the figures of those old historians, like Procopius, weren’t to be relied on; that was common knowledge. Seventy years ago, at Canton, forty thousand rats died of plague before the disease spread to the inhabitants. But, again, in the Canton epidemic there was no reliable way of counting up the rats. A very rough estimate was all that could be made, with, obviously, a wide margin for error. “Let’s see,” the doctor murmured to himself, “supposing the length of a rat to be ten inches, forty thousand rats placed end to end would make a line of …”

《鼠疫》

作者：阿贝尔•加缪 （法国）

第30页

    的确，里厄大夫和我们的同胞一样，也是猝不及防。必须这样来理解他的游移不定。也必须这样来理解他在担心和信心之间的摇摆不定。面对一场爆发的战争，人们总是说：“打仗是愚蠢的，这仗打不久。”毫无疑问，一场战争肯定是愚蠢到家了，但是愚蠢并不妨碍战争会持续很久。人若是不总为个人着想，那么就会发现，原来愚蠢是常态。在这方面，我们的同胞又和所有人一样，他们考虑自身，换言之，他们是人本主义者：他们不相信灾祸。灾祸无法同人较量，于是就认为：灾祸不是真实的，而是一场噩梦，总会过去的。然而，并不是总能躲过，噩梦接连不断，倒是人过世了，首先就是那些人本主义者先死了，因为他们没有采取预防措施。我们的同胞，论罪过也并不比别人大，只不过他们忘记了人应当谦虚，还以为自己无所不能，感到灾难不可能发生。他们继续经营生意，准备旅行，发表议论。他们怎么能想到鼠疫会毁掉他们的前程，打消了他们的出行和辩论呢？他们自以为自主自由，殊不知只要还有灾难，人们永远也不可能自主自由。

    里厄大夫在他的朋友面前，虽然承认散居的几个患者是在毫无征兆的情况下，刚刚死于鼠疫，但是他仍认为不存在闹瘟疫的危险。不过，人若当了医生，毕竟了解病痛，也多了点儿想象力。里厄医生凭窗眺望这座并无变化的城市，隐约感到了心头萌生了不安情绪，也就是那种面对未来的轻微沮丧。他在头脑里极力搜索和收集自己对这种病症所了解的情况。一些数据在他的记忆中飘忽显现，他心中暗道：人类历史经历过三十来次鼠疫大流行，大约死了一亿人。一亿人的死亡，是个什么概念？在战争中，就连死亡一个人是怎么回事儿，也不甚了了。既然一个人丧命，只有目睹其死亡，才有一定分量，那么，一亿具尸体，排列在历史的长河中，凭想象也无非是一缕轻烟。里厄大夫想起了君士但丁堡流行的那场鼠疫，据普罗科厄斯记载：当时一天功夫就有上万人丧生。一万名死者，就是一家大型影院观众的五倍。要搞清这一点，就应该这样做：把五家这样影院的观众集中在门口，把他们带到城里的广场上，全部屠杀，将尸体堆起来，这样就能看得稍微清楚一点。至少，在这些无名尸堆上，还可以分辨清几张熟悉的面孔。自不待言，这是无法实现的。况且，谁能熟悉上万张面孔呢？就连普罗科厄斯那种人也计算不出来，这是常识。七十年前，广州闹瘟疫，在传染给居民之前，就有四万只老鼠死于鼠疫。然而，在1871年，人们还没有办法统计死老鼠，只能大致估计，显然很容易出差错。想到这里，里厄大夫自言自语道：“一只老鼠身长十英寸，那么，四万只老鼠首尾相连的话，就会长达……”

【作者简介】龚如仲 (Ralph) , 中国对外经济贸易大学英语系毕业。曾任铁道部援建坦赞铁路工作组总部英语翻译, 中国国际广播电台英语部播音员、记者, 外贸部中国轻工业品进出口总公司驻美国公司总裁, 澳大利亚利富集团驻美国公司总裁, 外贸部中国基地总公司驻美国公司总裁, 美国TA国际有限公司驻北京办事处首席代表。

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琬乔：朗诵爱好者，喜欢用声音传递世间一切美好与热爱！