《浮生六记》英译(1.19)

卷一 闺房记乐（19）  作者：沈复         

迁仓米巷，余颜其卧楼曰“宾香阁”，盖以芸名而取如宾意也。院窄墙高，一无可取。后有厢楼，通藏书处，开窗对陆氏废园，但有荒凉之象。沧浪风景，时切芸怀。有老妪居金母桥之东、埂巷之北，绕屋皆菜圃，编篱为门，门外有池约亩许，花光树影，错杂篱边，其地即元末张士诚王府废基也。屋西数武，瓦砾堆成土山，登其巅可远眺，地旷人稀，颇饶野趣。妪偶言及，芸神往不置，谓余曰：“自别沧浪，梦魂常绕，每不得已而思其次，其老妪之居乎？”余曰：“连朝秋暑灼人，正思得一清凉地以消长昼，卿若愿往，我先观其家可居，即袱被而往，作一月盘桓何如？” 芸曰：“恐堂上不许。”余曰：“我自请之。”越日至其地，屋仅二间，前后隔而为四，纸窗竹榻，颇有幽趣。老妪知余意，欣然出其卧室为赁，四壁糊以白纸，顿觉改观。于是禀知吾母，挈芸居焉。邻仅老夫妇二人，灌园为业，知余夫妇避暑于此，先来通殷勤，并钓池鱼、摘园蔬为馈，偿其价，不受，芸作鞋报之，始谢而受。时方七月，绿树阴浓，水面风来，蝉鸣聒耳。邻老又为制鱼竿，与芸垂钓于柳阴深处。日落时登土山观晚霞夕照，随意联吟，有“兽云吞落日，弓月弹流星”之句。少焉月印池中，虫声四起，设竹榻于篱下，老妪报酒温饭熟，遂就月光对酌，微醺而饭。浴罢则凉鞋蕉扇，或坐或卧，听邻老谈因果报应事。三鼓归卧，周体清凉，几不知身居城市矣。篱边倩邻老购菊，遍植之。九月花开，又与芸居十日。吾母亦欣然来观，持螯对菊，赏玩竟日。芸喜曰：“他年当与君卜筑于此，买绕屋菜园十亩，课仆妪，植瓜蔬，以供薪水。君画我绣，以为持酒之需。布衣菜饭，可乐终身，不必作远游计也。”余深然之。今即得有境地，而知己沦亡，可胜浩叹！         

林语堂  译：

Six Chapters of A Floating Life

Chapter One: Wedded Bliss （19）

By Shen Fu

After we had moved to Ts' angmi Alley, I called our bedroom the "Tower of My Guest's Fragrance," with a reference to Yun's name, ①and to the story of Liang Hung and Meng Kuang who, as husband and wife, were always courteous to each other "like guests." We rather disliked the house because the walls were too high and the courtyard was too small. At the back, there was another house, leading to the library. Looking out of the window at the back, one could see the old garden of Mr. Loh then in a dilapidated condition, Yun's thoughts still hovered about the beautiful scenery of the T'sanglang Pavilion.

At this time, there was an old peasant woman living on the east of Mother Gold's Bridge and the north of Kenghsiang. Her little cottage was surrounded on all sides by vegetable fields and had a wicker gate. Outside the gate, there was a pond about thirty yards across, and a wilderness of flowers and trees covered the sides of the hedgerow. This was the old site of the home of Chang Ssuch'eng at the end of the Yuan Dynasty. A few paces to the west of the cottage, there was a mound filled with broken bricks, from the top of which one could command a view of the surrounding territory, which was an open country with a stretch of wild vegetation.

① "Yun" in Chinese means a fragrant weed—Tr

Once the old woman happened to mention the place, and Yun kept on thinking about it. So she said to me one day, "Since leaving the Ts'anglang Pavilion, I have been dreaming about it all the time. As we cannot live there, we must put up with the second best. I have a great idea to go and live in the old woman's cottage." "I have been thinking, too," I said, "of a place to go to and spend the long summer days. If you think you' 11 like the place, I'll go ahead and take a look. If it is satisfactory, we can carry our beddings along and go and stay there for a month. How about it? I'm afraid mother won't allow us." "Oh! I'll see to that," I told her. So the next day, I went there and found that the cottage consisted only of two rooms, which were partitioned into four. With paper windows and bamboo beds, the house would be quite a delightfully cool place to stay in.

The old woman knew what I wanted and gladly rented me her bedroom, which then looked quite new, when I had repapered the walls. I then informed my mother of it and went to stay there with Yun.

Our only neighbors were an old couple who raised vegetables for the market. They knew that we were going to stay there for the summer, and came and called on us, bringing us some fish from the pond and vegetables from their own fields. We offered to pay for them, but they wouldn’t take any money, and afterwards Yu made pair of shoes for each of them, which they were finally persuaded to accept.

This was in the seventh moon when the trees cast a green shade over the place. The summer breeze blew over the water of the pond, and cicadas filled the air with their singing the whole day. Our old neighbour also made a fishing rod for us, and we used to angle together under the shade of the willow trees. Late in the afternoons, we would go up on the mound to have a look at the evening glow and compose lines of poetry, when we felt so inclined. Two of the best lines were:

"Beast-clouds swallow the sinking sun,

And the bow-moon shoots the falling stars."

After a while, the moon cut her image in the water, insects began to chirp all round, and we placed a bamboo bed near the hedgerow to sit or lie upon. The old woman then would inform us that wine had been warmed up and dinner prepared, and we would sit down to have a little drink under the moon before our meal. Then after bath, we would put on our slippers and carry a fan, and lie or sit there, listening to old tales of retribution told by our neighbour. When we came in to sleep about midnight, we felt nice and cool all over the body, almost forgetting that we were living in a city.

There along the hedgerow, we asked the gardener to plant chrysanthemums. The flowers bloomed in the ninth moon, and we continued to stay there for another ten days. My mother was also quite delighted and came to see us there. So we ate crabs in the midst of chrysanthemums and whiled away the whole day.

Yun was quite enchanted with all this and said, "Some day we must build a cottage here. We'll buy ten mow of ground around the cottage, and see to our servants planting in the fields vegetables and melons to be sold for the expenses of our daily meals. You will paint and I will do embroidery, from which we could make enough money to buy wine for entertaining our friends who will gather here together to compose poems. Thus, clad in simple gowns and eating simple meals, we could live a very happy life together without going any where." I fully agreed with her. Now the place is still there, while my bosom friend is dead. Alas! such is life!