考研·翻译硕士：谢百魁·英译·周密·观潮

周密·《观潮》英译

浙江之潮，天下之伟观也。自既望以至十八日为盛。方其远出海门，仅如银线；既而渐近，则玉城雪岭际天而来，大声如雷霆，震撼激射，吞天沃日，势极雄豪。杨诚斋诗云：“海涌银为郭，江横玉系腰”者是也。

每岁京尹出浙江亭教阅水军，艨艟数百，分列两岸；既而尽奔腾分合五阵之势，并有乘骑、弄旗、标枪、舞刀于水面者，如履平地。倏尔黄烟四起，人物略不相睹，水爆轰震，声如崩山；烟消波静，则一舸无迹，仅有敌船为火所焚，随波而逝。

吴儿善泅者数百，皆披发文身，手持十幅大彩旗，争先鼓勇，溯迎而上，出没于鲸波万仞中，腾身百变，而旗尾略不沾湿，以此夸能。而富民官宦，争赏银彩。

江干上下十余里间，珠翠罗绮溢目，车马塞途，饮食百物皆倍穹常时，而僦赁看幕，虽席地不容间也。禁中例观潮于“天开图画”。高台下瞰，如在指掌。都民遥瞻黄伞雉扇于九霄之上，真若萧台篷岛也。

Viewing Tidal Waves

Zhou Mi

Tidal waves of the Zhejiang River are a grandiose spectacle in the world. The climax comes between the sixteenth and the eighteenth of the lunar month. Emerging far from the estuary, they merely look like a silver thread. But with their gradual approach they seem to be jade walls and snow-capped mountain ridges descending from heaven. They rumble like thunders, shake with tremors, spurt sprays and seem to be swallowing the sky and laving the sun, showing Yang Chengzhai’s verses: “The sea pours out many towns of silver and a jade sash is tied across the river.”

Every year the mayor of the capital would come to Zhejiang Province to review the fleet. Several hundred battleships were lined along both banks of the river and performed in full the “five-formation” manoeuvre, now dashing and skipping, now dividing and joining, with soldiers riding horses, flourishing flags, holding erect spears, playing swords in the waves, as if they were doing all his on level ground. Then a sudden burst of yellow smoke caused the men to be almost entirely invisible, and a shell exploded with an earsplitting crashing sound like that of a landslide. When the smoke dissipated and the waves calmed down, not even a single ship could be seen. Only the mock hostile craft was found to be burning and vanishing with the currents.

Several hundred good swimmers from among the local people, with loosened hair and tattooed bodies, held ten big coloured banners and, contending with courage for first positions, braved the currents, now rising from and now sinking into the towering tidal waves, and then leaping up in a hundred postures without the tails of the banners wetted in the least by the water, thus flaunting their skill of swimming. The millionaires and dignitaries vied with each other in awarding them with silver.

The banks within a distance of over a dozen li were congested with carriages and pair, and gleamed with pearls and sapphires as well as silk and satin. Food, drinks and miscellaneous goods had their prices doubled as compared with ordinary days. As for the tents on hire, they took up all the ground even to the last inch. The royal household, as a rule, viewed the tidal waves on the Heaven-Wrought-Picture Platform in the Palace. Looking over the river, they could see the whole scene as distinctly as if it were enacted in their face. The people of the capital, glancing after at the yellow silk umbrellas and pheasant-feathered fans of the royal persons, had a vision of paradise.（谢百魁 译）