LOEFFLER was my trophy intellectual. We met at a party, where he hovered around my conversational circle for a while and then came up to me and asked, "Are you with someone?"
呂弗勒是我認識的一個花瓶一樣的知識分子。我們在一次聚會上相遇，他在我談話的圈子周圍徘徊了一會兒，然后走到我面前，問我：“有人和你一起嗎？”
"Yes," I said. I'd come with my office mate, another editor.
我說：“是的?！贝_實那一天我是和一個同事一起去的，他也是個編輯。
"Come home with me," he said.
他又對我說：“跟我一起回家吧?！?/font>
I did. We sipped dry sherry on his porch until sunrise, and shortly thereafter he moved in to my small Florida home.
我真的跟他回家了。我們在他家的門廊上啜飲著干雪利酒，直到太陽升起。此后不久，他搬進了我在佛羅里達的小家。
I began displaying him almost immediately, once I'd reviewed his credentials. They were just about right: Harvard, N.E.H. grant, a fellow at Yale, two sabbaticals in Africa, where he labored at compiling a Chamba dictionary. One night I half-woke and mumbled some words, and he shook me awake: "You know what that is, don't you? It's Chamba."
自從看了他的履歷證明后，我?guī)缀趿ⅠR開始炫耀他。他從哈佛大學畢業(yè)，獲得過美國人文基金會的資助，是耶魯?shù)难芯繂T，兩次在非洲度年假，在那里辛苦的編撰他的昌巴人詞典。有天夜里我半睡半醒的時候嘟囔了幾句，結(jié)果他搖醒我，說：“你知道你說的什么嗎？知道嗎？那是昌巴語?！?/font>
But no, I don't speak Chamba, not even in my sleep. There are only about 20,000 Chamba speakers in the world. Maybe one day they'll use Loeffler's dictionary, if he ever completes it.
He has another unfinished book, on African motifs in "Finnegans Wake." He's been writing this book for about 20 years, including the two years it took to put his notes on computer when he got his first PC.
但那不是昌巴語，我不會說昌巴語，即使在夢里也不會說?，F(xiàn)在世界上說昌巴語的人只剩20000人了。如果呂弗勒的詞典完成了，也許有一天他們能用得上。
Publish or perish did him in academically. He couldn't finish his work, so he couldn't publish it, which meant he couldn't get tenure, which meant, essentially, the end of his academic career and along with it any reliable way of having an income. Oh, he got a grant at one point and also had some money from the sale of his mother's house. But mostly he lived cheaply and was happy to be supported principally by others - by me for example.
他還有另一本未完成的書，關于《芬尼根守靈》中的非洲主題。他寫這本書已經(jīng)用了大概20年時間了，其中包括他有了自己的第一臺電腦后把所有筆記錄入電腦的那兩年。學術上他要承受不出版就完蛋的局面。他完不成自己的工作，就沒辦法發(fā)表，就意味著他沒法獲得長期聘用，從本質(zhì)上說，這就意味著他的學術生涯以及于此相關的任何穩(wěn)定的收入的結(jié)束。哦，他得到過一點補助金，賣掉他母親的房子也讓他得到了一點錢。但是大多數(shù)情況上他生活的很拮據(jù)。并很高興得到別人的幫助，比如我的。
By the time I met Loeffler I'd already had a trophy husband, a man so tall and handsome and mannerly that I sometimes believed I married him just to confound my family, who long before had decided I was too stubborn and uncommunicative to attract a desirable man. That's the unspoken agenda in acquiring a trophy anything, to say to those who doubted you: Look, you were wrong.
我認識呂弗勒的時候已經(jīng)有了一個花瓶丈夫，他高大英俊，彬彬有禮，有時候我覺得我之所以嫁給他就是為了讓我們家人大吃一驚，因為他們很長時間以來都認為我太固執(zhí)，有太沉默寡言了，所以無法吸引到一個好男人。世界上最棒的事情的就是向那些懷疑你的人說，看，你錯了吧！
After I separated from my trophy husband and was left with three children and no child support or alimony (my husband, too, had arranged to have no income), I procrastinated for a long time on initiating a divorce. For one thing, I knew the whole endeavor would fall on me; I'd have to pay the fees for us both and complete the paperwork, file everything, see it through.
我離開丈夫后，要撫養(yǎng)三個孩子，沒有子女撫養(yǎng)費也沒有贍養(yǎng)費（我丈夫也沒有收入），所以我拖了很長時間沒有離婚。首先，我知道所有事情都要我來做，而且我還得負擔我們兩個人的費用，完成文字工作，把一切都歸檔整理好，還得想辦法讓事情順利完成。
But also I had the idea ... well, I don't know why I'm embarrassed to admit this, but I had the idea that maybe I could sell him. This was back when I lived in New York, and I imagined a wealthy Manhattan woman might spot him, a tall, handsome, well-spoken man, and think that, even as an escort, he was worth something. So she would ask me to divorce him, and I would say to her, "I'll sell him to you."
但是我還有一種想法……恩，我不知道為什么承認這一點讓我很尷尬，但是我確實有這樣的想法，或許我可以賣掉他。我在紐約生活時這種想法又回到了我的頭腦中，我想象著一個富有的曼哈頓女人或許會現(xiàn)場買了他，畢竟他是個高大英俊，善于言辭的男人，想想吧，最算是給人做護衛(wèi)者，他也應該值點錢吧。所以她可能會要求我跟他離婚，然后我會跟她說：“好吧，我把他賣給你?！?/font>
Just such a woman ran over his foot one day, as he stood waiting for the light at Lexington and 59th Street. She jumped out of her Lexus and apologized profusely, but unfortunately he did not get her name or phone number. I would have called her, definitely.
有一天，當他在列克星敦的59街等待綠燈時，有這樣一個女人開車碾過他的腳，然后她跳下自己的雷克薩斯向他大表歉意，但不幸的是他沒有要她的名字和電話號碼。不然我一定打電話給她。
Trophy intellectuals also are not without selling points. For example you never have to do any research. When I asked Loeffler a question - "How important is sequential order in narrative presentation?" - he gave me the answer.
這個花瓶一樣的知識分子也不是沒有賣點。比如，跟他在一起，你可以不用被迫去做任何研究。當我問他一個問題時，比如“在敘事性報告中相繼次序有多重要？”他就會告訴我答案。
Loeffler was best at small parties. At big parties he got lost. It was different with my trophy husband. His height caused him to stand out. I remember flirting with an average-size mathematician at a party. He asked me to point out my husband. When I did, he exclaimed enviously, "Oh, wouldn't he be the tallest man here?" And it seemed entirely natural for him to say that. It's the sort of thing that happens when you have a trophy husband.WITH a trophy intellectual you sacrifice height for hair, or at least that was the case with Loeffler, whose thick hair grows like a furious wind-whipped fern forest from his forehead. And he has the other stuff, too: the piercing eyes, the knitted brow, the sudden rewarding laughter.
在小型聚會上呂弗勒是最棒的，在大型聚會上他就不行了。這和我的花瓶丈夫不同，我丈夫的身高讓他非常引人注目。我記得又一次在聚會上和一個中等身材的數(shù)學家調(diào)情時，他讓我指出哪個是我丈夫，我照做了，結(jié)果他嫉妒的大叫：“哦，他是這里最高的人！”這話對他來說似乎還真是合適。如果你有個花瓶丈夫，這應該是常事。
But with a trophy intellectual (or a trophy husband for that matter) you also sacrifice basic competence and assistance in life's demands for raffish charm or good looks or a kind of precious companionship. And the play of power, in a trophy relationship, goes like this: You can ask your trophy to do something, but you cannot expect.
和一個花瓶知識分子在一起其實就是犧牲身高換頭發(fā)，至少這句話對呂弗勒來說很合適，他前額上厚厚的頭發(fā)就像是狂風中的蕨類植物叢。此外，他還有其他一些吸引人的東西，比如充滿諷刺意味的眼睛，緊蹙的眉頭和突然爆發(fā)的鼓勵式的笑聲。
For example I asked both my trophy husband and my trophy intellectual to take out the trash, and neither knew what I was talking about. I also asked both to get a job, but that suggestion went nowhere as well.
但是和花瓶知識分子（或者花瓶丈夫，就像我一樣）在一起，你也要為這些俗艷的魅力、美貌或珍貴的友誼犧牲掉生活中基本能力和幫助。在這種華而不實的關系中，事情會是這個樣子：你可以要求那個花瓶男人去做什么事，但不能報什么希望。
For example I asked both my trophy husband and my trophy intellectual to take out the trash, and neither knew what I was talking about. I also asked both to get a job, but that suggestion went nowhere as well.
比如，我讓我的花瓶丈夫或者花瓶知識分子去把垃圾倒掉，但他們都不知道我在說什么。我也曾讓他們兩個去找工作，但也沒起什么作用。
Decisions on entertaining, new clothes, major purchases (washing machines, vacuum cleaners), whether we could afford Europe this year - this all fell to me. The debit side of this much responsibility was that all of our negative experiences, acquisitions and travel were my fault. On the credit side, of course, was that all positive results ended up in my column as well.
而招待客人、買新衣服、買主要的家電（比如洗衣機、吸塵器），以及我們今年是否能夠負擔得起去歐洲的旅費，等等，這一切都落在了我身上。如果沒招待好客人，沒買好東西，旅行不愉快，那就是我的錯，就要由我來負責。當然了，如果做得好，賬單也全部歸我。
再好也不屬于我(下）----
I loved dressing both of my trophies. When my trophy husband and I separated, there was a whole wardrobe of Saks Fifth Avenue shirts at the laundry that was lost to history because neither one of us would pick up the laundry, he too passive, I too stubborn. He had ties to die for and a collection of cashmere socks that I used to wash by hand.
我喜歡打扮我的兩個花瓶男人。當我和我的花瓶丈夫分開后，有一衣櫥從薩克斯第五大道精品百貨店買來的襯衫被丟在洗衣店里沒人去領，因為我們倆都不會去，他太被動，而我太固執(zhí)。他只剩了領帶和一堆上羊絨襪，因為平時這些都是我來手洗。
He eventually wound up with a baby boomer who supported him with her great career and big salary while he made her breakfast, went out for the paper, ironed her clothes, packed her lunch: all those tasks I never could seem to get out of him. I could weep when I think of the care I lavished on his socks.
最后，他被一個在嬰兒潮時期出生的女人迷住了，那個女人有很好的工作和收入，能夠供養(yǎng)他，而他給她做早餐，幫她拿報紙、熨衣服，給她做午餐便當，他從來沒有為我做過這些。每當我想到我曾經(jīng)那么精心的照顧他，我就要哭。
Dressing Loeffler was much harder. He wouldn't let me take him shopping. He bought his clothes at the Goodwill on Federal Highway and the Church Mouse in Palm Beach. This meant he got the castoffs of the guys who went to St. Mark's and Harvard or Yale, so he was able to stay within his learned dress code.
打扮呂弗勒就難得多了，他不讓我?guī)ド痰?。他自己在?lián)邦大道的Goodwill以及棕櫚灘的Church Mouse買衣服。這也就意味著他能夠買到那些去了圣馬克、哈佛或耶魯?shù)募一飩儝仐壍囊路?，所以他能夠保持把自己打扮的像個知識淵博的人。
Once we were all dressed up, standing in line for tickets at the Society of the Four Arts, a peculiarly Palm Beach institution. If you're not a member, you can't buy tickets. But if you're standing at the box office, appropriately dressed, and there are unused members' tickets, you are allowed to purchase them. We were there because Loeffler was in love with Frederica von Stade.
I was happy about Loeffler's eccentric crushes. They were always appropriate for a trophy intellectual. He also adored Jamaica Kincaid and Jeanette Winterson. Some women feel threatened if their men exhibit any outward-directed passion. But I felt our relationship was enriched by these passions. Loeffler's passions were bread and wine to me.
一旦我們都穿著得體，那就是在排隊買Society of the Four Arts的票，這是一家位于棕櫚灘的特殊機構(gòu)。如果不是這里的會員你就買不到票。但是如果穿著得體的站在賣票間里，也可以購買非會員票。我們?nèi)ツ抢?，是因為呂弗勒喜歡弗德莉卡·馮·斯塔德（美國次女高音）。我對呂弗勒古怪的愛好感到高興。知識分子都有一些古怪的癖好。他還崇拜牙買加·琴凱德和珍妮特·溫特森。有些女人在他們的男人對其他女人充滿熱情時會覺得受到了威脅，而我覺得這種熱情讓我和呂弗勒的關系更加充實。他的熱情對我來說就是面包和酒。
But coming up with appropriate dress for this concert was proving to be a problem. After going through boxes and boxes, Loeffler finally found a $10 tux at Goodwill, and I discovered I fit into my youngest daughter's prom dress.
但是要為參加這場音樂會找到得體的衣服可是個問題。在遍尋之后，呂弗勒終于在Goodwill找到了一件10美元的晚禮服，而我發(fā)現(xiàn)我小女兒在班級舞會上穿的禮服很適合我。
We looked good. Rather, we looked good up close. From a distance, you could see that the crotch of Loeffler's tux pants fell at about knee level.
我們看上去很好。更確切的說，我們接近于看上去很好。從遠處看，你可以看到呂弗勒禮服的褲襠都要掉到膝蓋了。
When the von Stade concert was over, a woman sidled up to Loeffler and asked him a question. Soon he was arguing, his usual style of conversation. I moved a bit closer, curious to know what they were saying. Oh, no, she was arguing that everybody's reality is equally valid and that therefore there is no reality.
馮·斯塔德的演唱會結(jié)束后，一位女士走到呂弗勒面前問了他一個問題。很快他就以他一貫的談話方式說了起來。我靠近一點，想聽清楚他們在說什么。哦，不，她在說每個人的實體都是同樣有效的，所以沒有什么實體。
I knew what Loeffler thought of that.
我知道呂弗勒對這一點怎么看。
He looked over and inclined his head, which meant that he was ready to leave and wanted me to drag him away. I went over and said in a loud voice: "Your plane is at 8 in the morning. If you have any packing left to do, you'd better do it tonight."
他向上看并歪著頭，這意味著他準備離開，并希望我把他拖走。于是我走過去，大聲說：“你的航班是明天早上8點鐘，如果你想打包行李，那最好是今天晚上弄好。”
He looked surprised, as if a stranger had told him that he had been elected to some office. "Me?" he seemed to say, although the tickets were in his jacket pocket.
他看上去很驚訝，就好像一個陌生人告訴他他已經(jīng)被某件辦公室錄用一樣。他好像在說“我嗎？”盡管機票就在他的衣服口袋里。
He bowed to the Palm Beach woman, and we left, possibly looking more ridiculous as we moved farther away.
他向這個棕櫚灘女人鞠了個躬，然后和我一起離開了，也許當我們走遠的時候看上去更可笑。
And the next day there would be a farewell at the door, me still in my nightgown, Loeffler in his Church Mouse good suit and fresh white shirt, shaved and shining, on his way to Oaxaca, Mexico, to observe the Day of the Dead. And from that day on he would be dead to me, as he, in Oaxaca, would fall in love with someone else, and they would run away together, and it would be left to me to gather his notes and manuscripts and mail them off to him.
第二天我們將在門口道別，我仍然穿著我的睡衣，而他穿著從Church Mouse買來的上等西裝和新鮮的白襯衫，胡子刮得干干凈凈，出發(fā)去墨西哥的瓦哈卡，慶祝墨西哥的傳統(tǒng)節(jié)日亡靈節(jié)。從這一天開始，他對我來說以及死了，因為他在瓦哈卡愛上了別人，他們將一起離開，而我將會把他所有的筆記手稿整理好郵寄給他。
In such a relationship one is always the dreamer, and it falls to the other to be the practical party. With my two trophies I'd always been stuck in the role of the practical party. I'd been the one with the job, the means, the power and the will. And I suppose I liked that part of it. But over the long haul it wore me out.
在這樣一種關系中，總有一個人是夢想家，而另一個人就要成為承擔現(xiàn)實的角色。和這兩個人在一起，我都擺脫不了做承擔現(xiàn)實的角色的命運。我是這樣一個角色，要工作，要想辦法，要有能力，要有意志。我想我喜歡這樣，只是長期下來，這讓我筋疲力盡了。
What I'm looking for now is someone useful, a working man, a classic, the low-cut jeans. If he's not a plumber, he'll work at the power company or maybe BellSouth. He'll be someone I can watch football and basketball with, ice hockey even. No upkeep, no display, no occasions. Just a man who's hard working, dependable, loyal and in possession of necessary skills.
我現(xiàn)在找的是個有用的人，一個有工作的人，一個典型的、穿著低腰牛仔褲的人。如果不是水管工，在電力公司或者貝爾南方工作也行。他是那種我可以和他一起看足球、籃球甚至冰球的男人。不用保養(yǎng)、不用炫耀、不用去這種那種場合。只是一個男人，他努力工作，可以依靠，對我忠誠，擁有必要的技能。
Two mounted heads on my wall are enough.
有兩個前車之鑒對我來說已經(jīng)夠了。
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