我的祖母是一個(gè)很了不起的女人。
But it is important to remember that a steady upward path upon which the Fords embarked began with a morally complicated act.
但更重要的是,與福特家事業(yè)穩(wěn)步上升的路徑伴隨著一個(gè)道德上比較復(fù)雜的行為:
William Ford looked upon my great-great-great-grandmother with desire at a slave market in Alligator Pond and purchased her.
威廉·福特在鱷魚塘的奴隸市場(chǎng)看到我的曾曾曾祖母時(shí)十分渴慕,并花錢把她買了下來(lái)。
The slaves who were not so chosen had short and unhappy lives.
那些沒有被他人選中的奴隸,她們的結(jié)局基本上是渡過(guò)了一個(gè)短暫而不幸的人生。
In Jamaica, the plantation owners felt it made the most sense to extract the maximum possible effort from their human property while the property was still young.
在牙買加,農(nóng)場(chǎng)主趁奴隸還年輕力壯,會(huì)完全把他們的勞動(dòng)力榨取干——
To work their slaves until they they were either dead or useless, and then simply buy another round at the market.
直到他們毫無(wú)用處或死亡——這樣才有意義,然后他們到奴隸市場(chǎng)再買一個(gè)回來(lái)。
They had no trouble with the philosophical contradiction of cherishing the children they had with a slave and simultaneously thinking of slaves as property.
寵愛他們與奴隸生的孩子,同時(shí)又把奴隸看成是自己的財(cái)產(chǎn),對(duì)于這種矛盾,他們根本不會(huì)覺得麻煩。
William Thistlewood, the plantation owner, who catalogued his sexual exploits,
威廉姆·西斯特伍德是一位農(nóng)場(chǎng)主,他與那位名叫菲比的奴隸維系了一生的性關(guān)系。
had a lifelong relationship with a slave named Phibbah, whom, by all accounts, he adored, and who bore him a son.
據(jù)說(shuō),他很愛她,而且菲比為他生了一個(gè)兒子。
But to his "field" slaves, he was a monster,
但對(duì)于其他那些在地里干活的奴隸,他就像一個(gè)惡魔。
whose preferred punishment for those who tried to run away was what he called "Derby's dose."
對(duì)于那些試圖逃跑的奴隸,他用一種叫做“德貝的藥”來(lái)懲罰:
The runaway would be beaten, salt pickle, lime juice, and bird pepper rubbed into his or her open wounds.
那些逃跑的人被鞭撻,然后他們的傷口被撒上鹽水、檸檬汁和辣椒水酒。
Anther slave would defecate into the mouth of miscreant, who would then be gagged for four or five hours.
同時(shí)還讓奴隸吃糞便,使他連續(xù)嘔吐四、五個(gè)小時(shí)。
It's not surprising, then, that the brown-skinned class of Jamaica came to fetishize their lightness. It was their great advantage.
在那時(shí),牙買加褐色皮膚的人崇拜淺色膚色并不奇怪。因?yàn)檫@是他們很大的優(yōu)勢(shì)。
They scrutinized the shade of each other's skin and played the color game as ruthlessly in the end as the whites did.
他們仔細(xì)比較彼此膚色的深淺,像白人一樣無(wú)情地利用膚色來(lái)把玩地位。