傳奇編劇艾倫?索爾金2012雪城大學畢業(yè)演講

Thank you very much.

謝謝，謝謝大家。

Madam Chancellor, members of the Board of Trustees, members of the faculty and administration, parents and friends, honored guests and graduates, thank you for inviting me to speak today at this magnificent Commencement ceremony.

校長、校董會委員、所有教職員、各位家長和朋友、各位來賓和畢業(yè)生，感謝你們今天邀請我在這個盛大的畢業(yè)典禮上演講。

There's a story about a man and a woman who have been married for 40 years. One evening at dinner the woman turns to her husband and says, "You know, 40 years ago on our wedding day you told me that you loved me and you haven't said those words since." They sit in silence for a long moment before the husband says "If I change my mind, I'll let you know."

我先說個關于一對結婚40年夫妻的故事。某天晚餐時，妻子轉頭對丈夫說，“你知道嗎?40年前，我們結婚那天，你對我說你愛我，之后就不曾再說過這句話。”沉默了許久后，丈夫終于開口，“如果我改變了主意，會讓你知道。”

Well, it's been a long time since I sat where you sit, and I can remember looking up at my teachers with great admiration, with fondness, with gratitude and with love. Some of the teachers who were there that day are here this day and I wanted to let them know that I haven't changed my mind.

好了，我像你們這樣坐在臺下是很久以前的事了，我還記得自己滿懷敬佩、感激與喜愛之情看著臺上的老師，當時有些老師今天也在場。我想讓他們知道，我對他們的感激之情不曾改變。

There's another story. Two newborn babies are lying side by side in the hospital and they glance at each other. Ninety years later, through a remarkable coincidence, the two are back in the same hospital lying side by side in the same hospital room. They look at each other and one of them says, "So what'd you think?"

再說另一個故事。兩位新生兒并肩躺在醫(yī)院的育兒室里，彼此對看了一眼。90年后，在一個不可思議地巧合下，兩人并肩躺在同一家醫(yī)院的病房里。他們看著對方，其中一位說，“好吧，你感覺如何?”

It's going to be a very long time before you have to answer that question, but time shifts gears right now and starts to gain speed. Just ask your parents whose heads, I promise you, are exploding right now. They think they took you home from the maternity ward last month. They think you learned how to walk last week. They don't understand how you could possibly be getting a degree in something today. They listened to "Cats in the Cradle" the whole car ride here.

你們很久以后才需要回答這個問題。但物換星移，時間飛快流逝，只要問你們的父母就知道。我向你們保證，現(xiàn)在他 們的思緒必定亂成一團。在他們記憶里，彷佛上個月才將你從產(chǎn)房帶回家，彷佛你上星期才學會走路，他們不明白你們怎么可能今天就取得某個學位。他們一路聽著“搖籃里的貓”前來這里。

I'd like to say to the parents that I realized something while I was writing this speech: the last teacher your kids will have in college will be me. And that thought scared the hell out of me. Frankly, you should feel exactly the same way. But I am the father of an 11-year-old daughter, so I do know how proud you are today, how proud your daughters and your sons make you every day, and that they did just learn how to walk last week, that you'll never not be there for them, that you love them more than they'll ever know and that it doesn’t matter how many degrees get put in their hand, they will always be dumber than you are.

我想告訴各位家長，我在寫這篇演講稿時領悟到的一件事：你們孩子大學里最后一位老師將會是我。這個念頭令我膽 顫心驚。老實說，你們也應該有相同感覺。但我是一位11歲女兒的父親，所以我確實了解你們今天是多么驕傲;你們的兒女時時刻刻讓你們 感到多么自豪;他們確實上星期才學會走路;你永遠不需要為了參加他們的畢業(yè)典禮而來到這里;他們永遠不知道你有多么愛他;無論他們拿到多少個學位，他們永遠比你笨。

And make no mistake about it, you are dumb. You're a group of incredibly well-educated dumb people. I was there. We all were there. You're barely functional. There are some screw-ups headed your way. I wish I could tell you that there was a trick to avoiding the screw-ups, but the screw-ups, they're a-coming for ya. It's a combination of life being unpredictable, and you being super dumb.

這是無庸置疑地，你們確實是傻子。你們是一群受過良好教育的傻子。我經(jīng)歷過這個階段，我們?nèi)冀?jīng)歷過這個階段。你們幾乎做不成什么大事?？倳幸恍┯薮赖南敕恳愕臎Q定，我希望我能告訴你們避開這些愚蠢想法的訣竅，但你依然逃不開這些愚蠢的想法，這就是導致生命變得無法預知、讓你顯得超級愚蠢的罪魁禍首。

Today is May 13th and today you graduate. Growing up, I looked at my future as a timeline of graduations in which every few years, I'd be given more freedom and reward as I passed each milestone of childhood. When I get my driver's license, my life will be like this; when I'm a senior, my life will be like that; when I go off to college, my life will be like this; when I move out of the dorms, my life will be like that; and then finally, graduation. And on graduation day, I had only one goal left, and that was to be part of professional theater. We have this in common, you and I—we want to be able to earn a living doing what we love. Whether you're a writer, mathematician, engineer, architect, butcher, baker or candlestick maker, you want an invitation to the show.

今天是5月13日，你們畢業(yè)的日子。成長過程中，每隔幾年，畢業(yè)就成了標記我未來人生進程的時間軸。每當我走過一個童年的里程碑，就得到更多的自由和獎勵。當我拿到駕照時，生活會像這樣;當我升上高中時，生活會像那樣;當我念大學時，生活會像這樣;當我搬出宿舍時，生活會像那樣;然后我終于畢業(yè)。畢業(yè)那天，我只剩下一個目標，就是成為專業(yè)劇團的一員。這是你們和我的共同點，我們都希望從事自己感興趣的工作，無論是作家、數(shù)學家、工程師、建筑師、屠夫、面包師傅或燭臺制造商，你們都希望登上屬于自己的舞臺。

Today is May 13th, and today you graduate, and today you already know what I know: to get where you're going, you have to be good, and to be good where you're going, you have to be damned good. Every once in a while, you'll succeed. Most of the time you'll fail, and most of the time the circumstances will be well beyond your control.

今天是5月13日，你們畢業(yè)的日子，我明白的道理你們也都明白。想達成目標，你必須有好的表現(xiàn);希望能有所成就，你必須拿出超乎尋常的好表現(xiàn)。偶爾你能僥幸成功，大多時候則難免經(jīng)歷失敗;大多時候，情況并非你所能掌控。

When we were casting my first movie, "A Few Good Men," we saw an actor just 10 months removed from the theater training program at UCLA. We liked him very much and we cast him in a small, but featured role as an endearingly dimwitted Marine corporal. The actor had been working as a Domino's Pizza delivery boy for 10 months, so the news that he'd just landed his first professional job and that it was in a new movie that Rob Reiner was directing, starring Tom Cruise and Jack Nicholson, was met with happiness. But as is often the case in show business, success begets success before you've even done anything, and a week later the actor's agent called. The actor had been offered the lead role in a new, as-yet-untitled Milos Forman film. He was beside himself. He felt loyalty to the first offer, but Forman after all was offering him the lead. We said we understood, no problem, good luck, we'll go with our second choice. Which, we did. And two weeks later, the Milos Forman film was scrapped. Our second choice, who was also making his professional debut, was an actor named Noah Wyle. Noah would go on to become one of the stars of the television series "ER" and hasn't stopped working since. I don't know what the first actor is doing, and I can't remember his name. Sometimes, just when you think you have the ball safely in the end zone, you're back to delivering pizzas for Domino's. Welcome to the NFL.

當我第一部電影《軍官與魔鬼》開拍時，劇組里有位十個月前才修完加州大學洛杉磯分校戲劇表演課程的演員。他很討人喜歡，我們讓他擔任一個不是很重要、但十分顯眼的角色-一位傻氣而討喜的海軍下士。這位演員在Domino披薩擔任了10個月的外送員，所以首次獲得參與一部新電影演出的機會令他十分興奮。這部電影由Rob Reiner導演，湯姆.克魯斯和杰克.尼克遜主演。但如同演藝圈經(jīng)常發(fā)生的情形：在你還來不及完成任何事之前，成功的機會便接踵而來。一 星期后，這位演員的經(jīng)紀人致電給劇組：米洛斯·福爾曼一部尚未命名的電影邀請這位演員擔任主角。他欣喜若狂，雖然他認為應該對第一個機會展現(xiàn)忠誠，但畢竟福爾曼讓他擔任主角。我們回復說，我們了解，沒問題，祝你好運，我們將采用第二順位的角色選擇，我們確實這么做了。兩星期后，米洛斯·福爾曼這部影片停拍，我們的第二選擇——也是一位職業(yè)生涯中首次獲得演出機會的演員，這位演員名叫Noah Wyle。Noah之后成為電視影集《急診室的春天》主角之一，至今仍在演藝圈大放異彩。我不知道第一位演員現(xiàn)況如何，甚至想不起他的名字。有時候，就在你以為自己安全達陣時，卻得回到Domino送披薩。歡迎來到野蠻世界。

 

 

In the summer of 1983, after I graduated, I moved to New York to begin my life as a struggling writer. I got a series of survival jobs that included bartending, ticket-taking, telemarketing, limo driving, and dressing up as a moose to pass out leaflets in a mall. I ran into a woman who'd been a senior here when I was a freshman. I asked her how it was going and how she felt Syracuse had prepared her for the early stages of her career. She said, "Well, the thing is, after three years you start to forget everything they taught you in college. But once you've done that, you'll be fine." I laughed because I thought it was funny and also because I wanted to ask her out, but I also think she was wrong.

1983年畢業(yè)后那個夏天，我搬到紐約，開始艱苦的寫作生涯。我做過許多賴以糊口的工作，包括酒保、收票員、電話推銷員、豪華轎車司機、穿著麋鹿裝在商場里發(fā)傳單。我曾遇見一位雪城大學的學姐，我問她近況如何，她認為雪城大學對她早期職業(yè)生涯提供了什么幫助。她說，“嗯，事實上，畢業(yè)三年后，你就會開始把學校所教的全都忘光;但一旦到了這個階段，你就會開始漸入佳境。”我忍不住大笑，因為我覺得這十分荒謬，也有部分原因是我想約她出去。但我還是認為她的想法并不正確。

As a freshman drama student—and this story is now becoming famous—I had a play analysis class—it was part of my requirement. The professor was Gerardine Clark. If anybody was wondering, the drama students are sitting over there. The play analysis class met for 90 minutes twice a week. We read two plays a week and we took a 20-question true or false quiz at the beginning of the session that tested little more than whether or not we'd read the play. The problem was that the class was at 8:30 in the morning, it met all the way down on East Genesee, I lived all the way up at Brewster/Boland, and I don't know if you've noticed, but from time to time the city of Syracuse experiences inclement weather. All this going to class and reading and walking through snow, wind chill that's apparently powered by jet engines, was having a negative effect on my social life in general and my sleeping in particular. At one point, being quizzed on "Death of a Salesman," a play I had not read, I gave an answer that indicated that I wasn't aware that at the end of the play the salesman dies. And I failed the class. I had to repeat it my sophomore year; it was depressing, frustrating and deeply embarrassing. And it was without a doubt the single most significant event that occurred in my evolution as a writer. I showed up my sophomore year and I went to class, and I paid attention, and we read plays and I paid attention, and we discussed structure and tempo and intention and obstacle, possible improbabilities, improbable impossibilities, and I paid attention, and by God when I got my grades at the end of the year, I'd turned that F into a D. I'm joking: it was pass/fail.

當我身為戲劇系大一新生時-這個故事已越來越出名-我修了一堂戲劇分析課-這是必修課程之一，指導教授是 Gerardine Clark。如果有人想知道這些歡呼是怎么回事，戲劇系學生坐在那里。戲劇分析課每周上兩次，每次九十分鐘，每星期得研讀兩部劇本，每堂課開始時，會舉行一場二十題是非題的小考，測驗我們是否預習了劇本。問題是，這是早上八點三十分的課，上課地點在East Genesee街尾，我住在Brewster/Boland街 頭。不知道你們是否注意到，雪城市的氣候經(jīng)常十分惡劣，我總是得在風雪交加中前往學校上課， 刺骨的寒風簡直像從噴射機引擎中噴出似的，這對我的社交生活產(chǎn)生不少負面影響，尤其是睡眠質量。某次小考的內(nèi)容是關于《推銷員之死》，我并未事先預習這出 戲劇，我寫出的答案顯示，我不知道劇終時那位推銷員是不是死了。這門課沒有及格。我不得不在大二時重修，這令我十分沮喪、深感羞愧。毫無疑問地，這是我邁向作家之路過程中最刻骨銘心的事。大二時，我孜孜不倦地參與這門課程，用心研讀劇本，討論每一部劇本的架構、節(jié)奏、寓意及轉折點，反復地 思考探索。我投注了全副心力，確實，當我在期末收到成績單時，成績從F進步到D。開個玩笑;這堂課只有過與不過的分別。

But I stood at the back of the Eisenhower Theater at the Kennedy Center in Washington watching a pre-Broadway tryout of my plays, knowing that when the curtain came down, I could go back to my hotel room and fix the problem in the second act with the tools that Gerry Clark gave me. Eight years ago, I was introduced to Arthur Miller at a Dramatists Guild function and we spent a good part of the evening talking. A few weeks later when he came down with the flu he called and asked if I could fill in for him as a guest lecturer at NYU. The subject was "Death of a Salesman." You made a good decision coming to school here.

但當我站在華盛頓肯尼迪表演藝術中心的Eisenhower劇場，觀看我的劇作在進駐百老匯之前舉行的試演時，心里想著，落幕之后，我就能回酒店房間，使用從Gerry Clark(其著作曾改編成著名戲劇)作品學到的技巧，修改第二幕的瑕疵。八年前，阿瑟.米勒(美國傳奇劇作家)將我引介給美京劇作家協(xié)會，當晚我們相談 甚歡。幾星期后，他罹患流行感冒，打電話問我是否能代替他出席紐約大學的客座演講，演講主題正是《推銷員之死》。來雪城大學念書確實是明智的選擇。

I've made some bad decisions. I lost a decade of my life to cocaine addiction. You know how I got addicted to cocaine? I tried it. The problem with drugs is that they work, right up until the moment that they decimate your life. Try cocaine, and you'll become addicted to it. Become addicted to cocaine, and you will either be dead, or you will wish you were dead, but it will only be one or the other. My big fear was that I wasn't going to be able to write without it. There was no way I was going to be able to write without it. Last year I celebrated my 11-year anniversary of not using coke. Thank you. In that 11 years, I've written three television series, three movies, a Broadway play, won the Academy Award and taught my daughter all the lyrics to "Pirates of Penzance." I have good friends.

我曾誤入歧途。因為古柯堿成癮，浪費了生命中寶貴的十年。你們知道我怎么會染上古柯堿毒癮嗎?我只是試了一口。毒品最大的問題在于它們確實有用，直到摧毀你人生那一刻。只要試一 口，你就萬劫不復。一旦染上毒癮，你不是吸毒而死，就是生不如死，但總是逃不出這兩 種悲慘的命運。我最大的恐懼是，沒有它我會失去寫作靈感，沒有它我根本無法寫作。上個月我慶祝了戒毒11周年。謝謝。這11年來，我寫了三部電視系列影集、三部電影、一出百老匯戲劇、榮獲奧斯卡獎，并教會我女兒整出《彭贊斯的海盜》(音樂劇)的歌詞。我有許多好朋友。

You'll meet a lot of people who, to put it simply, don't know what they're talking about. In 1970 a CBS executive famously said that there were four things that we would never, ever see on television: a divorced person, a Jewish person, a person living in New York City and a man with a moustache. By 1980, every show on television was about a divorced Jew who lives in New York City and goes on a blind date with Tom Selleck.

你會遇見許多人，簡單來說，總是滿口胡言。1970年代，CBS將一句名言奉為圭臬：有四種角色絕不可能出現(xiàn) 在電視屏幕上-離婚的人、猶太人、紐約居民和蓄胡男子。到了1980年代，每部電視節(jié)目的內(nèi)容都是描寫住在紐約市的離婚猶太人，并和湯姆·謝立克(知名演員，蓄胡)進行盲目約會。

Develop your own compass, and trust it. Take risks, dare to fail, remember the first person through the wall always gets hurt. My junior and senior years at Syracuse, I shared a five-bedroom apartment at the top of East Adams with four roommates, one of whom was a fellow theater major named Chris. Chris was a sweet guy with a sly sense of humor and a sunny stage presence. He was born out of his time, and would have felt most at home playing Mickey Rooney's sidekick in "Babes on Broadway." I had subscriptions back then to Time and Newsweek. Chris used to enjoy making fun of what he felt was an odd interest in world events that had nothing to do with the arts. I lost touch with Chris after we graduated and so I'm not quite certain when he died. But I remember about a year and a half after the last time I saw him, I read an article in Newsweek about a virus that was burning its way across the country. The Centers for Disease Control was calling it "Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome" or AIDS for short. And they were asking the White House for $35 million for research, care and cure. The White House felt that $35 million was way too much money to spend on a disease that was only affecting homosexuals, and they passed. Which I'm sure they wouldn't have done if they'd known that $35 million was a steal compared to the $2 billion it would cost only 10 years later.Am I saying that Chris would be alive today if only he'd read Newsweek? Of course not. But it seems to me that more and more we've come to expect less and less of each other, and that's got to change. Your friends, your family, this school expect more of you than vocational success.

掌握自己的指南針，并相信它;勇于冒險、不怕失敗;記住，第一位沖破高墻的人總不免受傷。我大三和大四時，在 East Adams街盡頭和四位室友分租一棟五間臥室的公寓，其中一位名叫Chris的室友主修戲劇。Chris是個可愛的家伙，有著狡黠幽默感，總是在舞臺上扮 演陽光男孩角色。他生不逢時，最擅長扮演《百老匯的小鬼》中Mickey Rooney伙伴那種角色。當時我訂閱了《時代雜志》和《新聞周刊》;Chris感興趣的是一些千奇百怪、跟藝術無關的事物。畢業(yè)后，我與Chris失去 聯(lián)絡，所以不確定Chris是何時過世的。但我記得，大約在最后一次見到他一年半之后，我在《新聞周刊》上讀到一篇文章，關于某種病毒正在全國蔓延的報導，疾病控制與預防中心稱它為“獲得性免疫缺陷綜合癥”，簡稱艾滋病。他們向白宮申請3500萬美元的研究、照護和治療經(jīng)費，白宮認為，將3500萬美元花 在某種只會感染同性戀的疾病上太過昂貴，拒絕了這項申請。我敢肯定，如果他們知道，比起10年后花在治療上的20億美元，3500萬美元不過是九牛一毛， 當初就不會拒絕。我的意思是，只要Chris閱讀《新聞周刊》，今天就能好好活著嗎?當然不是。但在我看來，當我們期待越多，了解的就越少，這是必須改變 的現(xiàn)象。你的朋友、你的家人、這所學校對你的期待，不僅是職場上的成就。

Today is May 13th and today you graduate and the rules are about to change, and one of them is this: Decisions are made by those who show up. Don't ever forget that you're a citizen of this world. Don't ever forget that you're a citizen of this world, and there are things you can do to lift the human spirit, things that are easy, things that are free, things that you can do every day. Civility, respect, kindness, character. You're too good for schadenfreude, you're too good for gossip and snark, you're too good for intolerance—and since you're walking into the middle of a presidential election, it's worth mentioning that you're too good to think people who disagree with you are your enemy. Unless they went to Georgetown, in which case, they can go to hell.

今天是5月13日， 你們畢業(yè)的日子，代表你必須做出某些改變，其中一個原則如下：挺身而出者才有機會做出改變，別忘了你是這個世界的公民。別忘了你是這個世界的公民，你可以做些提升人類心靈層面的事，這些事并不困難，不過是舉手之勞，隨時隨地都能進行。文明、尊重、善良、品格;你們不會幸災樂禍;你們不會散播謠言、危言聳聽;你們不會心胸狹窄、缺乏寬容。既然你們都可能邁向競選總統(tǒng)之途，這句話值得 一提：你們不會視反對者為敵人，除非是來自喬治敦大學的人(雪城大學的死對頭)。若碰上這種情況，就叫他們下地獄吧!

Don't ever forget that a small group of thoughtful people can change the world. It's the only thing that ever has. Rehearsal's over. You're going out there now, you're going to do this thing. How you live matters. You're going to fall down, but the world doesn't care how many times you fall down, as long as it's one fewer than the number of times you get back up.

別忘了，一群深思熟慮的人可以改變世界，這是唯一的真理。人生的排練已經(jīng)結束，你們即將走出校門，開創(chuàng)真實人生，重要的是，你如何經(jīng)營自己的人生。失敗在所難免，但這個世界并不在乎你曾經(jīng)失敗過多少次，只要你能一次又一次地重新站起來。

For the class of 2012, I wish you joy. I wish you health and happiness and success, I wish you a roof, four walls, a floor and someone in your life that you care about more than you care about yourself. Someone who makes you start saying "we" where before you used to say "I" and "us" where you used to say "me." I wish you the quality of friends I have and the quality of colleagues I work with. Baseball players say they don't have to look to see if they hit a home run, they can feel it. So I wish for you a moment—a moment soon—when you really put the bat on the ball, when you really get a hold of one and drive it into the upper deck, when you feel it. When you aim high and hit your target, when just for a moment all else disappears, and you soar with wings as eagles. The moment will end as quickly as it came, and so you'll have to have it back, and so you'll get it back no matter what the obstacles. A lofty prediction, to be sure, but I flat out guarantee it.

2012年畢業(yè)生，祝福你們常懷喜悅，祝福你們健康、幸福、成功，祝福你們擁有幸福美滿的家庭，擁有某個你在 乎他勝過自己的人，某個能與你共享生活中一切喜怒哀樂的人，希望你們擁有跟我朋友和同事一樣優(yōu)秀的伙伴。棒球選手說，他們不需要緊盯著球，就能感覺自己擊出了全壘打。我期待有那么一天-在不久的將來-你們真正擊中那顆球。掌握這個機會，更上一層樓，真正擁有這份感受。當你擁有崇高目標，并盡力達成時，在一刻，一切艱辛都將煙消云散，你將如鷹般展翅翱翔。這個瞬間稍縱即逝，所以你必須繼續(xù)往目標邁進，你必須繼續(xù)往目標邁進，不論途中遭遇多少阻礙。這確實是個崇高的目標，但只要付出努力，必定能夠達成。