Talking about the “at” sign is much more interesting if you’re not speaking English. The Wikipedia entry for @ lists names for it in over 50 other languages, many of which are colourful interpretations of its shape – and which, in true online style, often involve animal analogies.
說(shuō)起“at”符號(hào)(@)，其他外語(yǔ)比英語(yǔ)的用法有趣得多。維基百科上給出的“@”詞條列舉了50多種外語(yǔ)下的名稱(chēng)，在這之中很多都是對(duì)其形狀的生動(dòng)解釋——通常是類(lèi)比動(dòng)物的網(wǎng)絡(luò)流行語(yǔ)。
Armenians call it ishnik, meaning a “puppy” (curled up on the floor, I assume). Chinese terms include xiao laoshu in Taiwan, meaning “little mouse” and quan ei on the mainland, meaning “circled A”. Danes, meanwhile, prefer snabela (an “elephant’s trunk A”).
亞美尼亞人稱(chēng)其為“ishnik”，這是“小狗”的意思(大概是@像蜷成一團(tuán)的小狗吧)。在中國(guó)，臺(tái)灣人叫它“小老鼠”，大陸人叫它“圈A”，意思是“圈住的A”。然而，丹麥人更喜歡叫他“snabela”(大象鼻子的形狀A(yù))。
Hungarians have the less savory kukac (“worm” or “maggot”), Italians the slightly more palatable chiocciola (“snail”), while – two personal favourites – Kazakhs see a ай??ла? (“moon’s ear”) and some Germans a klammeraffe (“spider monkey”? – or, more precisely, “cling monkey”). If you’reGreek, you say papaki, meaning “little duck.”
匈牙利人的叫法“kukac” (“蟲(chóng)子”、“蛆”)最倒胃口，而意大利人的叫法chiocciola(“蝸牛”)則相對(duì)可口一些，個(gè)人最喜歡的兩種稱(chēng)呼是哈薩克人的ай??ла?(“月之耳”)和德國(guó)人klammeraffe(“蜘蛛猴”)。如果你是希臘人，你會(huì)叫它papaki，是小鴨子的意思。
There’s interest outside the animal kingdom, too. Bosnians go for ludo A (“crazy letter A”), while in Slovak it is a zavinac (“pickled fish roll”) and in Turkish a guzel A (“beautiful A”). There’s even a special Morse Code signal for @ – the only new symbol added since World War One – formed by running together the dots and dashes for the letters “A” and “C” as a single character: (·--·-·).
除了描述動(dòng)物王國(guó)，這些外語(yǔ)對(duì)@也有其它稱(chēng)呼。比如波斯尼亞人稱(chēng)之為“ludoA”(“瘋狂的字母A”)，而斯洛伐克語(yǔ)中則叫“zavinac”(“腌魚(yú)肉卷”)，土耳其語(yǔ)中是“guzelA”(“漂亮的A”)。@甚至還有特殊的摩爾斯電碼符號(hào)——這是一戰(zhàn)后唯一加入新符號(hào)——它是由點(diǎn)和橫杠構(gòu)成的單一字符(·--·-·)，意思是字母A(·-)和C(-·-·)。
All of which brings us a long way from email. For me, though, it adds a pleasant depth to the hastily tapped symbol on my keyboard: a little piece of the ancient Mediterranean lodged in modernity, and a supreme enabler of contemporary exchange.
不過(guò)這些都和電子郵件沒(méi)什么大關(guān)系。對(duì)我來(lái)說(shuō)，它可以增加打字的樂(lè)趣：這個(gè)古老的地中海符號(hào)運(yùn)用于現(xiàn)代社會(huì)，有效地促進(jìn)著當(dāng)代信息交流。
