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1、Genius and the Craftsman 天才与工匠Many people admire writers for their exquisite stories, but few of them know with what painstaking efforts writers work to bring a story into the world. The following essay discusses the process of conceiving a story and developing it into a perfect work of art. 许多人羡慕作家
2、们的精彩小说，但却很少有人知道作家们是如何辛勤笔耕才使一篇小说问世的。以下的短文将讨论小说的酝酿过程，以及作家是如何将这小说雕琢成一件精致完美的艺术品 。Once on the edge of a woods at twilight I came upon a small peach tree in flower. I stayed there watching until the light was gone. I saw nothing of the trees origin, nothing of the might which had forced open a pit you cou
3、ld break your teeth on, and nothing of the principle which held it separate from the oaks and the grasses. All that appeared to me was a profound and eerie grace. 有一次，我在暮色中来到小树林边一棵鲜花盛开的小桃树前。我久久站在那里凝视着，直到最后一道光线消逝。我看不到那树原先的模样，看不见曾穿透果核，能崩碎你的牙齿的力量，也看不到那使它与橡树和绿草相区别的原则。显现在我面前的，是一种深邃而神秘的魅力。So it is with th
4、e reader who comes upon an outstanding story: spellbound, he takes it to his heart, no question asked. 当读者读到一部杰出的小说时，他也会这样如痴如狂，欲将小说字字句句刻骨铭心，不提出任何问题。But even the beginning writer knows there is more to a storys life than the body of words which carries it into the world, and that it does not begin wi
5、th writing, but with conception in the dark of the mind.但即使是个初学写作者也知道，除那将小说带到世上的文字之外，还有更多的构成小说生命的因素，小说的生命并不始于写作，而始于内心深处的构思。 It is not necessary to understand the creative function in order to produce original work. Centuries of art, philosophy and science have emerged from the minds of people who ma
6、y not even have suspected the inner process. It seems to me, however, that at least a degree of understanding of the creative event increases our wisdom in dealing with the emerging story by making us aware of two things. 要创作出有独创性的作品，并不要求懂得创造的功能。多少世纪以来的艺术、哲学及科学创造都出自人们的头脑，而创造者也许从未想到去关注创造的内在过程。然而，在我看来
7、，对创造工作一定程度的了解 ，至少会使我们通过知道两个事实，增长我们处理正在出现的故事的智慧。First, genius is not the exclusive property of the master craftsman; it is the creative function of the human mind. There is no mastery without it, and there is no person without it, however undeveloped it may be. Mastery is genius afoot. It is genius c
8、ultivated, developed, and exercised. Your genius works at the level of origins; its business is to create; it is the creator of your story. 首先，天赋不是掌握了技艺的艺术家独有的特性，而是人脑的创造性功能。不仅所有对技艺的掌握都含有天赋，而且每个人都具有天赋，无论他的天赋发展是何等不充分。对技艺的掌握是天赋的显现，是 经过培养的，发展了的和受过训练的天赋。你的天赋在最原始的层面上起作用。它的任务就是创造。它是你的故事的创造者。Second, the bod
9、y of words that carries your story into the world is the work of the craftsmans labor, which is as conscious, as canny, and as practical as that of the bricklayer. While genius is a natural part of our mental equipment, like perception, memory, and imagination, craftsmanship is not. It must be learn
10、ed. It is learned by practice, and by practice it is mastered. If the stories that rise within us are to emerge and flourish, each must be provided with a strong, handsome body of words, and only sound craftsmanship can provide this. 第二，将你的小说带进世界的文字是艺术家的工作，它就和一个泥瓦匠的工作一样 ，有意识、谨慎而实实在在。天赋正如理解力、记忆力和想象力一
11、样是我们的精神禀赋中的天然部分，而技艺却不是。它必须通过实践才能学到，并要通过实践才能掌握。如果要使在我们内心深处浮现的故事跃然纸上，光彩照人，那么，每个故事都须有感染力极强的优雅文笔。只有健全的技艺才能使我们做到这一点。How is a story conceived? It is said that we write from the first twenty years of our lives, perhaps from the first five; it may depend on the individual, as so much does in writing. In any
12、 case, the lucid impressions of childhood and early youth, more or less unconditioned, unexplained, unchecked, lie in the memory, live and timeless. Enigma, wonder, fear, rapture, grandeur, and trivia in every degree and combination, these early impressions throb and wait for what? Completion of som
13、e kind? For recognition of their own peculiar truth? It would seem their wounds want lancing; their secret knowledge wants telling; the discoveries would be shared, and woes admitted, and the airy tracery of beauty given form. 一个故事是如何酝酿成的呢？据说，我们从一生中的前二十年，或许前五年起就开始写作。这可能取决于个人，而写作中的很多事都取决于个人。无论如何，童年和少
14、年时期的清晰印象，或多或少无条件地存在于我们的记忆中，未被解释，不受约束，而且栩栩如生，永不磨灭。困惑、徬徨、畏惧、喜悦、辉煌和平庸，在各种程度上以各种形式组合在一起。这些对往事的印象在心中悸动着。它们在等待什么？是在等待 某种圆满的结果？还是对它们特有的真理的认可？似乎它们的创伤需要切开，隐秘的见解需要表露，发现需要与人分享，苦恼需要承认，这种飘渺的美需要形式。Thus variously laden we move through life, and now and then an experience, often slight, prices the memory and seizes
15、 upon one of those live, expectant impressions of long age, and a quickening1 takes place. 我们就这样背负着各种任务渡过一生。时而,一个常常是小小的体验，撬开了记忆之门，抓住了这些虽已年代久远，却依然栩栩如生，呼之欲出的印象。于是，故事就如种子一般开始萌动。This happens to everyone and more often than is known. But there are times when it happens to the creative writer and causes h
16、im to catch his breath because he knows that the seed of a story has quickened and has begun a life of its own. Like any seed, the seed of a story has its own principle of growth which employs a process of intelligent selection, drawing from the unconscious minds vast treasury of experience that it needs to fulfill its inherent form: there come together people and their ways, with weather and times and places, and the souls of things. In short, there is
