雙語名著·追風(fēng)箏的人 The Kite Runner(34)

12歲的阿富汗富家少爺阿米爾與仆人哈桑情同手足。然而，在一場風(fēng)箏比賽后，發(fā)生了一件悲慘不堪的事，阿米爾為自己的懦弱感到自責(zé)和痛苦，逼走了哈桑，不久，自己也跟隨父親逃往美國。

成年后的阿米爾始終無法原諒自己當(dāng)年對哈桑的背叛。為了贖罪，阿米爾再度踏上暌違二十多年的故鄉(xiāng)，希望能為不幸的好友盡最后一點心力，卻發(fā)現(xiàn)一個驚天謊言，兒時的噩夢再度重演，阿米爾該如何抉擇?

故事如此殘忍而又美麗，作者以溫暖細(xì)膩的筆法勾勒人性的本質(zhì)與救贖，讀來令人蕩氣回腸。

下面就跟小編一起來欣賞雙語名著·追風(fēng)箏的人 The Kite Runner(34)的精彩內(nèi)容吧！

EVERY WINTER, districts in Kabul held a kite-fighting tournament. And if you were a boy living in Kabul, the day of the tournament was undeniably the highlight of the cold season. I never slept the night before the tournament. I'd roll from side to side, make shadow animals on the wall, even sit on the balcony in the dark, a blanket wrapped around me. I felt like a soldier trying to sleep in the trenches the night before a major battle. And that wasn't so far off. In Kabul, fighting kites was a little like going to war.
每年冬天，喀布爾的各個城區(qū)會舉辦風(fēng)箏比賽。如果你是生活在喀布爾的孩子，那么比賽那天，無疑是這個寒冷季節(jié)最令人振奮的時候。每次比賽前夜我都會失眠，我會輾轉(zhuǎn)反側(cè)，雙手借著燈光在墻上投射出動物形狀的影子，甚至裹條毛毯，在一片漆黑中到陽臺上呆坐。我像是個士兵，大戰(zhàn)來臨前夜試圖在戰(zhàn)壕上入睡。其實也差不多，在喀布爾，斗風(fēng)箏跟上戰(zhàn)場有點相像。

As with any war, you had to ready yourself for battle. For a while, Hassan and I used to build our own kites. We saved our weekly allowances in the fall, dropped the money in a little porcelain horse Raba had brought one time from Herat. When the winds of winter began to blow and snow fell in chunks, we undid the snap under the horse's belly. We went to the bazaar and bought bamboo, glue, string, and paper. We spent hours every day shaving bamboo for the center and cross spars, cutting the thin tissue paper which made for easy dipping and recovery And then, of course, we had to make our own string, or tar. If the kite was the gun, then "tar", the glass-coated cutting line, was the bullet in the chamber. We'd go out in the yard and feed up to five hundred feet of string through a mixture of ground glass and glue. We'd then hang the line between the trees, leave it to dry. The next day, we'd wind the battle-ready line around a wooden spool. By the time the snow melted and the rains of spring swept in, every boy in Kabul bore telltale horizontal gashes on his fingers from a whole winter of fighting kites. I remember how my classmates and I used to huddle, compare our battle scars on the first day of school. The cuts stung and didn't heal for a couple of weeks, but I didn't mind. They were reminders of a beloved season that had once again passed too quickly. Then the class captain would blow his whistle and we'd march in a single file to our classrooms, longing for winter already, greeted instead by the specter of yet another long school year.
跟任何戰(zhàn)爭一樣，你必須為自己做好準(zhǔn)備。有那么一陣，哈桑和我經(jīng)常自己制作風(fēng)箏。秋天開始，我們每周省下一點零用錢，投進爸爸從赫拉特買來的瓷馬里面。到得寒風(fēng)呼嘯、雪花飛舞的時候，我們揭開瓷馬腹部的蓋子，到市場去買竹子、膠水、線、紙。我們每天花幾個小時，打造風(fēng)箏的骨架，剪裁那些讓風(fēng)箏更加靈動的薄棉紙。再接著，我們當(dāng)然還得自己準(zhǔn)備線。如果風(fēng)箏是槍，那么綴有玻璃屑的線就是膛里的子彈。我們得走到院子里，把五百英尺線放進一桶混有玻璃屑的膠水里面，接著把線掛在樹上，讓它風(fēng)干。第二天，我們會把這為戰(zhàn)斗準(zhǔn)備的線纏繞在一個木軸上。等到雪花融化、春雨綿綿，喀布爾每個孩子的手指上，都會有一些橫切的傷口，那是斗了一個冬天的風(fēng)箏留下的證據(jù)。我記得開學(xué)那天，同學(xué)們擠在一起，比較各自的戰(zhàn)傷。傷口很痛，幾個星期都好不了，但我毫不在意。我們的冬天總是那樣匆匆來了又走，傷疤提醒我們懷念那個最令人喜愛的季節(jié)。接著班長會吹口哨，我們排成一列，走進教室，心中已然渴望冬季的到來，但招呼我們的是又一個幽靈般的漫長學(xué)年。

But it quickly became apparent that Hassan and I were better kite fighters than kite makers. Some flaw or other in our design always spelled its doom. So Baba started taking us to Saifo's to buy our kites. Saifo was a nearly blind old man who was a "moochi" by profession--a shoe repairman. But he was also the city's most famous kite maker, working out of a tiny hovel on Jadeh Maywand, the crowded street south of the muddy banks of the Kabul River. I remember you had to crouch to enter the prison cell-sized store, and then had to lift a trapdoor to creep down a set of wooden steps to the dank basement where Saifo stored his coveted kites. Baba would buy us each three identical kites and spools of glass string. If I changed my mind and asked for a bigger and fancier kite, Baba would buy it for me--but then he'd buy it for Hassan too. Sometimes I wished he wouldn't do that. Wished he'd let me be the favorite.
但是沒隔多久，事實證明我和哈桑造風(fēng)箏實在不行，斗風(fēng)箏倒是好手。我們設(shè)計的風(fēng)箏總是有這樣或那樣的問題，難逃悲慘的命運。所以爸爸開始帶我們?nèi)トサ牡昀镔I風(fēng)箏。塞弗是個近乎瞎眼的老人，以替人修鞋為生，但他也是全城最著名的造風(fēng)箏高手。他的小作坊在擁擠的雅德梅灣大道上，也就是喀布爾河泥濘的南岸那邊。爸爸會給我們每人買三個同樣的風(fēng)箏和幾軸玻璃線。如果我改變主意，求爸爸給我買個更大、更好看的風(fēng)箏，爸爸會買給我，可是也會給哈桑買一個。有時我希望他別給哈桑買，希望他最疼我。

The kite-fighting tournament was an old winter tradition in Afghanistan. It started early in the morning on the day of the contest and didn't end until only the winning kite flew in the sky--I remember one year the tournament outlasted daylight. People gathered on sidewalks and roofs to cheer for their kids. The streets filled with kite fighters, jerking and tugging on their lines, squinting up to the sky, trying to gain position to cut the opponent's line. Every kite fighter had an assistant--in my case, Hassan--who held the spool and fed the line.
斗風(fēng)箏比賽是阿富汗古老的冬日風(fēng)俗。比賽一大清早就開始，直到僅剩一只勝出的風(fēng)箏在空中翱翔才告結(jié)束。我記得有一年，比賽到了天黑還沒終結(jié)。人們在人行道上，在屋頂上，為自家的孩子鼓勁加油。街道上滿是風(fēng)箏斗士，手里的線時而猛拉、時而速放，目不轉(zhuǎn)睛地仰望天空，力圖占個好位置，以便割斷敵手的風(fēng)箏線。每個斗風(fēng)箏的人都有助手，幫忙收放風(fēng)箏線。我的助手是哈桑。