英譯《畫楊桃》

原文作者簡介：岑桑，1926年生，廣東順德人。中共黨員。1949年畢業于中山大學社會學系。1950年參加工作，歷任廣州市影劇場公司副總經理，廣州文化出版社編輯部副主任，廣東人民出版社文藝編輯室副主任及主任、副總編輯、社長兼總編輯。《嶺南文庫》叢書執行副主編，中國作家協會廣東分會副主席。1997年中國出版工作者協會首屆伯樂獎。1942年開始發表作品。1962年加入中國作家協會。

《畫楊桃》原文：

我讀小學四年級的時候，父親開始教我畫畫兒。他對我要求很嚴，經常叮囑我：“你看見一件東西，是什么樣的，就畫成什么樣，不要想當然，畫走了樣。”

有一次，學校上圖畫課，老師把一個楊桃擺在講桌上，要同學們畫。我的座位在前排靠邊的地方，講桌上楊桃的一端正對著我。我看到的楊桃根本不像平時看到的那樣，而像是五個角的什么東西。我認認真真地看，老老實實地畫，自己覺得畫得很準確。

當我把這幅畫兒交出去的時候，有幾個同學看見了，他們哈哈大笑起來。

“楊桃是這個樣子的嗎？”

“倒不如說是五角星吧！”

老師看了看這幅畫兒，走到我的座位坐下來，審視了一下講桌上的楊桃，然后回到講臺，舉起我的畫兒問大家：“這幅畫兒畫得像不像？”

“不像！”

“它像什么？”

“像五角星！”

老師的神情變得嚴肅了。半晌，他又問道：“畫楊桃畫成了五角星，好笑嗎？”

“好——笑！”有幾個同學搶著答道，同時發出嘻嘻的笑聲。

于是，老師請這幾個同學輪流坐到我的座位上。他對第一個坐下的同學說：“現在你看看那楊桃，像你平時看到的楊桃嗎？”

“不……像。”

“那么，像什么呢？”

“像……五……角星。”

“好，下一個。”

老師讓這幾個同學回到自己的座位上，然后和顏悅色地說：“提起楊桃，大家都很熟悉。但是，看的角度不同，楊桃的樣子也就不一樣，有時候看起來真像個五角星。因此，當我們看見別人把楊桃畫成五角星的時候，不要忙著發笑，要看看人家是從什么角度看的。我們應該相信自己的眼睛，看到是什么樣的就畫成什么樣。”

這位老師的話同我父親講的是那么相似。他們的教誨使我一生受用。

On Drawing Carambolas

Chen Sang

When I was at grade four of primary school， my father began to teach me how to draw. He was strict to me and often told me： “You should draw what you see. Don’t draw according to your imagination， or you can’t draw it well.”

One day in the Art class， our teacher put a carambola on the desk and asked us to draw it on the paper. My seat was near the wall at the first row from where I could only see one end of the carambola. The carambola I saw was not like that I saw before at all， but like a pentagon. I drew it very carefully and I thought I had drawn it exactly.

When I handed in my painting， several classmates saw it and burst into laugh.

“Is this a carambola？”

“We’d better call it a pentagon！”

When the teacher saw my painting， he came to sit in my seat and had a look at the carambola on the teacher’s desk carefully. And then he went back to the platform and asked everybody： “Is this painting like a carambola？”

“No！”

“What is it like？”

“A pentagon！”

The teacher’s expression became serious. After a long while， he asked： “Is it funny to see a carambola drawn in the shape of a pentagon？”

“Yes， it’s funny！” Several classmates vied to reply quickly while laughing at me.

So， the teacher asked them to sit in my seat one by one. He told the first classmate： “Now look at the carambola， does it look like the ones you saw before？”

“No … .”

“Then like what？”

“Like … a … pentagon.”

“Ok， next.”

The teacher let these classmates go back to their own seat and said kindly： “We’re all familiar with carambolas. But a carambola looks different from different points of view. Sometimes， it really looks like a pentagon. So， when we see other people drawing a carambola into a pentagon， we should not laugh at it first， but find out which point of view they are looking from. We should believe our own eyes and draw whatever we see.”

The teacher’s words were so similar with my father’s. I’ve been enjoying the benefits of their instructions all my life.

作者簡介：馬健（1988—），男，江蘇宿遷人，云南民族大學外國語學院碩士研究生，研究方向：筆譯理論與實踐。

龍輝（1988—），男，湖南衡陽人，云南民族大學外國語學院碩士研究生，人事部英語二級筆譯，研究方向：英語筆譯研究。