高级英语第六课

1. When she was eleven, Clara, like her brother Alan before her, acquired a Grammar School place. Her mother, although of the mentality that refuses such places because of the price of the uniform, was luckily not in a social or financial position where she could reasonably do so, and although she was often unreasonable enough, she did not like to appear to be so in the eyes of the whole neighbourhood, so she constrained her parsimony and her innate distrust in education into selecting the less distinguished of the schools available, on the grounds that the bus fare was cheaper. It was a large, rather forbidding and gloomy building, called Battersby Grammar School, and it was on the fringe of that decayed, desolate, once-grand grey fringe that surrounds the centres of most cities; the houses in this area, large and terraced and of some dignity, had been long abandoned by the middle classes, and were now occupied by families who could not afford to live anywhere else. An occasional member of the fugitive genteel stuck it grimly out until death; once Clara was accosted by an old lady, battered and ragged and bent, who said as she walked along, and in accents of refined madness, that once the people that lived there had held their heads up high. Clara, a poor audience with her twisted knee socks, did not know what she meant.

克莱拉11岁时，像她哥哥艾伦一样，进入一所公立中学。按她母亲的想法，是反对她上这类学校的，因为学校制服费太贵。幸亏她的社会地位和经济情况都还过得去，她也就没有充足的理由反对女儿入学。她办事常常不讲情理，可又不愿意在左邻右舍的眼里看来是个不讲道理的人。因此，她终于抑制住她的吝啬和天生的对教育的怀疑，给她女儿选了一所不那么有声望的中学，理由是往返的公共汽车费比较便宜。学校叫巴特斯比中学。那是一幢高大、阴暗、令人望而生畏的建筑，坐落在市中心的边缘。这些围绕市中心建造起来一栋栋房屋，多少年前还巍巍壮观，如今却一片凋零、衰败、荒凉。那些高大的、建有路台、颇有气势的座座住宅早已被一度居住的中产阶级所遗弃。新来的这些住户嫌别处房租贵，住不起，才搬到这里来。偶尔，在逃离此地的上流家族中，也会有个把人在这里硬顶下去，直到老死。有一次，一个萎靡不振，衣衫褴褛，弯腰驼背的老妇同克莱拉搭话。她一边走一边用一种典雅的迷恋之情的口吻说，过去住在这一带的可都是些很神气的人。克莱拉，这个穿着一双扭歪了的长袜的不善于领会的听者，根本不明白她说的是什么意思。

P1

1. Jerusalem: 耶路撒冷板凳（伊斯兰教，犹太教和基督教的“圣地”）

2. mentality: characteristic attitude of mind; mind, understanding, judgment, perception, intelligence

3. unreasonable: irrational, illogical, absurd, nonsensical, stubborn

4. in the eyes of=in one’s eyes: in the judgment of 在……心目中，在……看来

5. constrain: to make someone do something by force or by strongly persuading, (of conscience, inner forces) compel

6. on the grounds of: (for saying, doing, or believing sth.) because of…

7. on the fringe of: edge, the part further from the center

8. stick it out: to continue in spite of, difficulties, refuse to yield

9. in accents of : in tender accents, in a kind of voice

10. battered: worn out or shapeless (clothes

11. parsimony: excessive carefulness in using money, careful use of money, ungenerousness, saving, thrift, miser

12. innate: (of a quality) in one’s Nature, possessed from birth; instinctive, natural, intuitive, inborn, inherent, intrinsic

13. decay: to go bad, to lose power

14. desolate: in a ruined, neglected state

15. fugitive: running away (from justice, danger, etc.)

16. genteel: upper classes of society

17. grim: stern, severe, without mercy; gloomy, sullen, unyielding

18. accost: to go up to and speak to (esp. a stranger)

19. madness: a state of being mad

20. Grammar school: Until the middle 1950’s there were 2 types of secondary school ( in U.K.). Children sat an exam at age 10 (called the Eleven Plus exam). The 20% who passed went to grammar school and had an academic education to age 16 or 18. The 80% failures went to modern school to age 16 and had a general, practical-oriented education. There were also a few secondary technical schools. From the 1950’s these schools were merged to form one comprehensive school for all children aged 11 to 16 or 18. The old grammar schools insisted on a quite expensive school uniform while the modern school usually didn’t. The comprehensive school does.

Note: public schools in Britain are private secondary schools, while public schools in US are local authority public schools and private schools are called private schools.

21. selecting the less distinguished of the schools available: schools have varying reputations. She had no respect for education so didn’t care about the quality of the school.

22. Long abandoned by the middle classes: It is a residential tendency in the course of urbanization for well-off middle class families to move out of the central part of the city to the suburbs, while the poorer families move into the once grand but now decayed and crowded city residential areas.

23. Clara was accosted by an old lady: The old lady stopped Clara in the street and started talking to her.

24. The people that lived here had held their heads up high: She referred to the middle class people who used to live in this area. They were confident people with unquestioned self-pride. Here was a bitter nostalgic feeling, for she had been one of them but was now poor.

25. Clara, a poor audience: Being a girl of eleven she didn’t know what the old lady was talking about and wasn’t interested.

26. her mother, though having the understanding that rejects these grammar schools because of the necessary spending, was fortunately able to pay for this and considering her social and financial situation and particularly her position and image in her neighbourhood, she did not refuse the idea and chose any ordinary grammar school for her daughter, Clara.

2. The shabbiness of the district and the dingy gloom of the school itself meant nothing to Clara. To her, the building was endlessly exciting, and she liked it for all the reasons that most people would specify as particular causes for dislike. She liked its huge, barn-like, inhuman bleakness, its corridors shoulder-high in dark green, shoulder-to-ceiling in pale peppermint, its vast lukewarm radiators, its muddy echoing boards, its tall, high, dirty windows. She liked the cloakrooms and the lockers, the sense of institution, the rows and rows of washbowls and lavatories, the accessibility of the drinking fountains. She liked the way it stood, distinct and certain, rising out of the level muddy waste of grass and tarmac that generously surrounded it: a bomb had fallen during the war, on a neighbouring chapel, and the site had been levelled out and was now an unofficial part of the school's playgrounds. The whole area was of a bleak airiness, and a cold wind seemed to blow incessantly upon it, turning the knees and knuckles of the girls pink and blue, and snatching away their obligatory berets the moment they emerged from the school porch. Clara did not mind the cold, for she liked anything that was not small and cramped and heartlessly cosy; she liked the nameless multitudes that tramped mud on the cloakroom floors and left hairs in the cloakroom basins, and liked them because they were nameless, because they were not her mother and Alan and Arthur. Domesticity appalled her, and she nourished in it, despite a yearning for the comfortlessly grand.

住宅区的穷街陋巷，学校的阴暗无光，对克莱拉说来都无所谓。学校那幢阴暗的大楼给她带来了无尽的振奋和欢乐。大多数人对这幢楼的厌恶的种种非议恰巧是她心目中的可爱之处。这幢建筑那种庞大的，谷仓似的，冷酷的惨淡凄凉，走廊两边齐肩的一片墨绿，墨绿色上方直到天花板的一片淡淡薄荷色，宽大的、半冷不热的暖汽片，沾满了泥土的发出回音的地板，高大肮脏的窗户，这一切都叫她欢喜。她喜欢楼里的衣帽间和存衣柜，以及大楼给人的那种机关单位的感觉；她喜欢那一排又一排的洗脸盆和厕所，那些就近安设的喷嘴饮水龙头。她喜欢大楼傲然挺立在一片泥泞的平地上，周围布满了青草和柏油碎石。上次大战期间，一颗炸弹落在附近的教堂，把教堂炸坏了。后来教堂拆除，地填平，这块地方就非正式地成了学校运动场的一部分。整个地区显得萧瑟空旷，冷风似乎刮个没完，吹得女孩子们的膝盖和指关节红一块，紫一块；只要她们从学校的门廊一出来，无情的冷风就会把规定必须戴在头上的贝雷帽掀掉。克莱拉却不介意这寒冷；任何东西，只要不是狭小、局促和毫无情意的温暖，她都喜爱。衣帽间地板上，那些说不上姓名的人群踩踏后留下的泥土，衣帽间脸盆里留下的头发，都会引起她的喜爱。她喜欢这些东西，因为它们是无名的，因为它们不是她的母亲，不是艾伦，也不是亚瑟。狭隘的家庭生活使她生厌。她在这样一个小天地里长大，然而却渴望那种并无舒适安逸可言的壮丽宏伟。

P2

1. dingy: dirty-looking, not fresh, faded, gloomy, dismal, shabby, dusty, drab/bright, radiant, glittering, shining, cheerful

2. endlessly: extremely, infinitely, profoundly

3. specify: to mention definitely, indicate, particularize, describe

4. bleakness: (of place) without shelter from cold wind; cold and cheerless

5. inhuman: unfeeling, heartless, merciless, pitiless

6. lukewarm: moderate warm; neither very warm nor very cold

7. accessibility: easy to get, sth. available

8. tarmac: mixtrue of tar and gravels

9. obligatory: required, compulsory, mandatory, binding

10. beret: round hat

11. incessantly: often repeatedly

12. cramp: to keep in a narrow place

13. cozy: warm and comfortable

14. tramp: trudge, walk, wander, ramble, rove, roam

15. domesticity: family life

16. appall: to fill with fear and terror; horrify, shock, offend, outrage, disgust, terrify

17. yearning: longing, expecting, hoping

18. The shabbiness…and the dingy gloom…meant nothing to Clara: Clara did not care how shabby the district was and how dirty and dark the school looked. This whole paragraph describes her peculiar taste for everything in the school. Only a girl who was tired of everyday home life and yearned to see the outside world could have such a psychology.

19. during the war: the Second World War

20. The whole area was of a bleak airness: The school was situated in an open area, having no surrounding buildings.

21. obligatory berets: Bretes were a required part of the school uniform. As can be inferred from the text, the school uniform consists of, apart from beret, skirt, blouse, knee socks, and probably tie (girls’ school uniform usually includes tie), or scarf. Every school had its own colour and style of uniform.

22. anything that was not…heartlessly cozy: anything that made people feel bad though providing physical comfort

23. the comfortlessly grand: the impressive, magnificent outside world though it might be as comfortable as home could be.

3. She liked, too, the work. She found it easy: to begin with, she found everything easy, as her memory for facts was remarkable, and it was only as she grew older that she began to notice in herself slight doubts about her ability to pursue higher physics and mathematics. The subject known, broadly, as Science, was at first her favourite, because she liked playing with Bunsen burners: at home she was not allowed even to switch on the gas fire. She liked it also because of the power which she most rapidly acquired over Mrs. Hill, her science teacher: the first power of her life.

她也喜爱她的功课。学校的功课对她说来并不难。从上学起，她就觉得一切都容易。她有天赋过人的记忆力；只是在稍长时她才开始有点怀疑她是否有攻读高等物理和数学的才能。她起初对统称为理科的课程很有兴趣，因为她喜欢玩本生灯；而在家里，连煤气灶都不允许她用。她喜欢这门课程，还因为她很快就获得了能左右她的理科教师希尔夫人的力量。这是她一生中第一次获得这种力量。

P3

1. Bunsen burner: a burner used in practical scientific work, in which gas is mixed with air before burning. It is named after Robert Wilhelm (1811-1899), German chemist. 本生灯

4. Mrs. Hill was a small, plump, middle-aged woman, with fine frizzy hair which she encased in a fine frizzy hair net; she always wore a purple and blue flowered pinny, a garment more in keeping with an aunt or a cleaner than with a lover of science. She handled her apparatus with the efficient familiarity with which other women handle their baking boards and rolling pins; years of housework had left their mark on her. She had no children, but unlike most of the staff, she had a husband, and the girls could detect in her manner a faint abstraction, a slight absence from the ingrown matters of school life. She was set apart, by her overall and her laboratory and her marital status, which was lucky for her, as her position otherwise would have been truly grim. For she was of those born failures as a disciplinarian, one of those teachers whose classes know they can do anything they want. If she had been an ordinary teacher, trying to teach an ordinary sedentary subject like history or Latin, she would have been mercilessly flouted and mocked, but as it was she managed to get by. For one thing, her subject was in itself appealing to most of the girls, or at least intermittently so; they enjoyed watching crystals grow, and weighing small things on small scales, and making little bits of sodium whizz round saucers of water, so they quite voluntarily offered her their attention from time to time. But her great quality was a capacity for being genuinely impervious to inattention. She did not really care whether people listened or not; she was interested herself in what she was saying, and she was quite happy to potter about from bench to bench watching people writing their diaries when they should have been writing up their experiments. Her blackboard technique was also extremely idiosyncratic; she would write up equations, get them wrong, mumble to herself, rub them out, look them up in a book, and all this without any suspicion that she might be forfeiting the confidence of her pupils.

希尔夫人是一位身材矮小，胖乎乎的中年妇女，一头细细的曲卷头发笼在一个细细的卷结的发网里。她总是穿一件紫蓝相间的花围裙。这样的穿着对一个大婶子或清洁工人说来倒满合适；穿在一个科学爱好者身上，就不那么协调了。她操纵仪器就像其他妇女使用面包烘盘和擀面杖那样熟练。长年的家务在她的身上留下了痕迹。她没有孩子。可是，不同于大多数女教师的是，她有丈夫，女孩子们能从她的举止中窥察出那种隐约可见的心不在焉和对学校生活中固有的那些事情的漫不经心。她身上那件宽大的罩衫，她在实验室的工作和她已婚的身份，使她幸运地置身世外；要不然的话，她的境遇可真会是够凄凉的了。在实施纪律方面，她生来就是一个失败者。她属于那类教师，班上的学生想干什么就干什么。如果她是个平常的教师，教一门像历史或拉丁文那样需要学生久坐的一般课程，人们准会无情的藐视她，嘲笑她。可她却好歹混下来了。因为她教的课程本身对女孩子们是有吸引力的，或者至少断断续续地是这样。她们喜欢看结晶体膨胀，喜欢在小天平上量小东西，喜欢在盛水的浅碟子里放进几小片钠，让钠在水里飕飕地旋转。所以，她们常常是自觉自愿地聚精会神。可是她最大的优点在于能够对学生不注意听讲，做到真正的无动于衷。学生们究竟是听她讲还是不听她讲，她都毫不介意。她只是一味地对她自己滔滔不绝的讲述发生兴趣。她很愉快地在教室里的凳子间逛来逛去，睁眼瞧着学生们在那里写自己的日记，而不是在认真地做实验练习。她写黑板的技巧别具一格。她把方程式写在黑板上，写错了，又喃喃自语地把它擦掉，再在书里查阅。她这样做时全然不理会这是否会断送学生对她的信任。

P4

1. plump: rounded, fat in a pleasant-looking way

2. frizzy: curled

3. encase: to surround or cover as a case

4. pinny: a loose garment that does not cover the arms

5. keep with: in keeping with; suitable to

6. abstraction: the state of not attending to what is going on absent-mindedness

7. ingrown: ingrowing, growing inwards

8. sedentary: spending much of their time seated

9. flout: to oppose, to treat with contempt

10. mock: to make fun

11. intermittently: not continuously; happening, then stopping, then happening again

12. whiz: sound of something rushing through the air; to move very fast, often with a noisy sound

13. genuinely: really

14. impervious: not influenced by; invulnerable, immune to, untouched by, inaccessible, absolutely indifferent to

15. inattention: absent-mindedness

16. potter: to work or move with little energy

17. potter about: to move about a place slowly, doing some unimportant things

18. idiosyncratic: peculiar way of thinking or behaving

19. mumble: mutter, murmur, utter distinctly

20. suspicion: feeling that something is wrong

21. forfeit: to suffer the loss of something; lose because of some offence, waste, surrender, yield

22. detect: discover, uncover, notice, perceive

23. disciplinarian: a person who is good at making people obey orders

24. get by: continue to live, often in spite of difficulties, survive, to be accepted, to be passed or accepted by someone (something)

25. pinny, a garment more in keeping with an aunt: “Pinny”is the child’s name for “pinafore”, an apron like over-all worn over a dress to keep it clean. Wearing it, Mrs. Hill looked more like a housewife than a science teacher. This is actually what Clara and her classmates thought of Mrs. Hill. So it is more vivid to use the word “pinny”instead of “pinafore”.

26. She always wore a purple and blue flowered pinny, a garment more in keeping with an aunt or a cleaner than with a lover of science. : the clothes she wore were more suitable for an old housewife or it a cleaner than for a well educated woman (a teacher of science).

27. and the girl could detect in her manner a faint abstraction, a slight absence from the ingrown matters of school life.: In her manner the girls could discover somewhat absentmindedness, a somewhat indifference to the matters (affairs) going on inside the school.

28. she was set apart: She was considered as an outsider of the school matters.

5. The girls, although they did not know it, found her relaxing. They affected to despise her, but they did not find their contempt a strain, whereas the other really bad disciplinarian in the school, a Geography mistress, one Miss Riley, inflicted on them an intolerable suffering, for they felt themselves compelled to torment her, and she would sit before them, thin and pretty

and anguished, making vain attempts to restore order, miserably transparent in her misery, and unable to conceal the depths of her humiliation depths which frightened them, but which they could not leave unplumbed. Mrs. Hill, on the other hand, with her vague indifference, did not rouse their cruelty, so their behaviour in her classes left them unashamed. Their behaviour was at times appalling; when little they would spend long stretches of each class on the floor behind the benches, playing with bits of mercury, pricking it with needles and pen nibs, watching it slip into the coarse splintery cracks of the dusty floorboards, and forcing it out again, marvelling at the way it shrugged the dirt off its rounded shoulders. When older, bored with such simple pleasures, they sought now diversions, such as burning holes in the benches with the Bunsen burners. On one occasion Clara's class purchased a pound of sausages, took them in with them, and roasted them on one of the burners, and ate them, in full scent and in fairly good view; Mrs. Hill appeared not to notice, and talked quietly on of Boyle's law. Clara did not enjoy her sausage, for it was burned black on the outside and raw in the middle, and her mother had told her that it was impossible not to get worms from raw sausage meat, but the taste of the damp mince with its bitter crust remained a strong reminder of illicit pleasure.

女孩子们在她面前感到很轻松，虽然她们自己并不明白这一点。她们故意看不起她，可是这种轻蔑并不使她们精神紧张难受。然而，学校里另一个真的管不住学生的地理教师，一位叫赖利的小姐，却使她们蒙受难以忍耐的痛苦。因为她们感到非折磨她不可。这位清瘦、漂亮、苦恼的赖利小姐总是坐在她们面前，徒劳地想方设法恢复课堂秩序。她的痛苦无情地流露出来，她无法掩饰她内心深处的羞辱。这种内心深处的羞辱使她们惊恐，却又挑逗她们去进行探测。而希尔夫人对一切都处之冷漠，倒反而不能唤起她们身上的残酷心理。因此，她们在她的课堂上的所作所为不会使她们感到羞愧。有时她们的举动简直令人感到震惊。年纪小时，在一节课的大段时间里，她们会蹲在凳子后面的地板上，弄着几滴水银玩，用针和笔尖刺水银，瞧着水银珠滚进粗糙的、锯齿状的，布满灰尘的地板裂缝里，然后又把水银挑出来，惊异地发觉水银怎样把尘土从它的圆肩膀上甩掉。年纪稍长后，她们就觉得这种简单的娱乐无聊，于是寻找新的消遣方法，例如用本生灯在凳子上烧个洞之类。有一次，克莱拉所在的那个班买了一磅香肠，把香肠带进教室，用本生灯烤熟了，香味扑鼻，而且相当不避人耳目地吃了起来。希尔夫人装着什么也没有看见，仍旧慢条斯理地讲解波义耳定律。克莱拉并不觉得这香肠好吃，因为香肠外面烤焦了，里面还是生的。她的母亲曾对她说，生吃香肠肉肯定要长蛔虫。可是，阴湿的肉馅和苦涩的表皮混在一起的那种怪味却使她难忘偷着寻欢作乐的情趣。

P5

1. relaxing: calming, soothing, cooling, at ease, calm

2. affect: to cause feelings of sorrow, anger, love…to cause some result

3. strain: pressure, tension, suffering

4. inflict: to cause to suffer; to force something unwanted and unpleasant on sb.

5. torment: to annoy, to cause to suffer great pain or suffering in mind or body

6. anguished: distress, painful, agony, suffering, misery, grief

7. transparent: clear, easily understood

8. plumb: to get to the root of

9. unplumbed: unmeasured, unfathomed, undetected

10. appalling: frightening, scaring, horrible

11. stretches: long full and uninteresting hours (time)

12. marvel: be overwhelmed, be struck with wonder, be amazed (astonished)

13. splintery: full of bits of hard material (wood, metal, glass, et.)

14. shrug: to lift (the shoulders) slightly, shake, get rid of

15. diversion: giving variety to, something which turns the attention from serous things

16. illicit: unlawful, forbidden, illegal, illegitimate, impermissible/ permissible

17. mince: (mince meat) meat cut into small pieces mixed with dried fruits

18. crust: the hard outer covering

19. in full scent and in fairly good view: there was a strong sweat smell of the sausage and everything was going on before Mrs. Hill

20. They affected to despise her…which they could to leave unplumbed. : This complex sentence and the sentence that follows contain three layers of ideas: how the girls treated the two teachers, how the teachers were affected, and how the girls felt about their behavior. The girls habitually tended to despise Mrs. Hill, but as Mrs. Hill was indifferent to their behavior, they did not find their contempt a severe pressure on themselves. Bt they tormented Miss Riley, because she couldn’t defend herself against them. Their cruelty made her so angry and anguished that she could not conceal her misery and humiliation. This frightened the girls, for they had not thought she would be like this. After all, girls were girls trying out their power over a grown-up. The fear they felt made them suffer but they could not stop themselves and were driven to torment her more and more.

21. Boyle’s law: the statement that at constant temperatrue the volume of a given mass of gas is inversely proportional to its pressure. It was formulated by Robert Boyle, an Anglo-Irish scientist, in 1662.

6. Mrs. Hill took a fancy to Clara. Clara, when she became aware of it, was not displeased, because although the other girls laughed, she knew enough of the world to know that no affection, however oddly won or placed, is laughable or negligible. Other teachers and other girls were forever taking fancies to each other, but there was something strangely eccentric about Mrs. Hill's fancy, just as her whole position in the school was eccentric. It was in no way intense, and indeed coming from such a figure it could not help but appear a little maternal; Mrs. Hill did not seem to discover anything odd in her own attitude, and would consult Clara's opinion without any attempts at subterfuge or bravado; she would defer to Clara's position in the class by outrageously open remarks such as "Now, Clara, you're the only girl likely to remember what I said last week", or "Well, I suppose I'm wasting my breath on all but Clara Maugham." This frankness was so unprecedented that the girls could not resent it; they could not, in the context of school behaviour, take it seriously enough to resent it. They giggled about it, and Clara giggled too, and that was that. Clara even grew quite fond of Mrs. Hill, and proud of herself for feeling fond of one so odd.

希尔夫人喜欢克莱拉。当克莱拉察觉到这一点时，她并不感到不高兴。尽管其他女孩子笑话她，可她已经懂事了，她知道感情这个东西，不管它得来多么奇特，也不管它给得多么奇特，是不容讥笑和玩忽的。别的教师和女孩子也总是相互喜爱。但是，希尔夫人对她的爱，正如她在学校的地位一样，与众不同。这种爱并不强烈；来自她这样一个人，总不免多少像是母爱。希尔夫人似乎并不察觉自己态度上有任何古怪之处。她同克莱拉商量事情的时候，从来不转弯抹角，也不大肆宣扬。她常常用一些毫不掩饰以至令人难受的言辞来表达她对克莱拉在班上的地位的尊重，她会说，“好了，克莱拉，只有你可能记得我上星期讲的话”，或者说，“好啦，我看除了克莱拉·毛姆以外，我对你们全班讲的都是白费力气。”这种没有先例的坦率劲儿倒使女孩子们难以对此表示不满。

从学校的规矩看，她们也不能对希尔夫人这种表现过分当真而忿忿不平。她们只是咯咯地笑两声，克莱拉也跟着笑笑，如此而已。克莱拉甚至逐渐地对希尔夫人产生了好感，并且因为自己能喜欢这样一个古怪的人物感到得意。

P6

1. take a fancy to (for): to like; show one’s liking for, be fond of

2. take or catch a fancy of: try to win sb’s favour or attention

3. negligible: unimportant, trifling, inconsequential, insignificant, trivial, small

4. eccentric: not normal

5. subterfuge: trick, excuse, attempt to gain one’s aim secretly

6. bravado: display of boldness; the (often unnecessary) showing one’s courage and boldness to say something in a loud and showy way

7. defer (to): pay respect to, accede

8. outrageous: offensive, shocking, exasperatingly, excessively\

9. unprecedented: unparalleled, unique, without match

10. resent: hare, dislike, disgust

11. potentially: latently

12. classy: fashionable, of high class or rank

13. in the context of: the general conditions in which an event or action takes place

14. it could not help but appear a little maternal: the fancy from Mrs. Hill makes one feel somewhat from a loving mother.

15. but appear a little maternal: A mother is supposed to show her fondness for her child openly, directly, without pretence. That was why she consulted Clara’s opinion without any excuse or hesitation, forgetting her position as a teacher.

16. in the context of school behavior: In school the pupils should respect the teachers and the teachers should not show they had favourites. Mrs. Hill’s behaviour was so unconventional that the girls regarded Mrs. Hill’s remarks as odd and maternal, and could not take them seriously enough to resent them.

7. The case of Miss Haines was a different question altogether. Miss Haines too favoured Clara, but being young and honourable she made every effort to conceal it. French was her subject, and she was potentially the classiest teacher in the school. She liked Clara because Clara was bright, and for no other reason: she had no need to like her for any other reason, as she was well equipped with a busy social life and a lover. The girls respected her because she had nerve and a good front of confidence, and because she possessed a very smart line in jerseys and fancy stockings, and wore shoes so fashionable that to the untrained eye they looked positively orthopaedic. Clara was not fully aware of Miss Haines' interest, because it was hidden by a sharp and brisk demeanour, and by an almost excessive severity, so she worked all the harder in her efforts to impress. It was not until she reached the age of specialization that she realized how well she had succeeded, although she had had her suspicions: but at the age of fifteen, at the moment of choice, the moment from which the Arts stretched away in one direction and the Sciences in another, never to meet again, she realized that Mrs. Hiss and Miss Haines had actually been fighting over her. The knowledge gave her an inexplicably profound satisfaction. She never for a moment thought of deserting French for Mrs. Hill, having encountered amongst other things some nasty problems about the nature of electricity, but she did enjoy the sensation of flirtation: she spent a long time making her mind

up, and finally was summoned by the headmistress, who told her she ought to stick to Sciences, because they offered better prospects. Whereupon she came out into the open and said she would choose Arts.

海恩斯小姐却完全是另一种情况了。海恩斯小姐也喜欢克莱拉，可是因为自己年轻，受人尊敬，总是千方百计地去掩饰她对克莱拉的喜爱。她教法语，最有可能成为学校里最讲究最时髦的教师。她喜欢克莱拉，只是因为她聪慧，没有别的什么原因。她无需为其他理由去喜欢她，她有自己繁忙的社交生活，她有自己的情人。女孩子们尊敬她，因为她有胆量，外表充满信心，因为她穿上紧身的毛线衫和漂亮的长袜时身体的线条很美，她穿的鞋子是那样的时髦，在这些见世面不多的女孩子的眼里，这样的鞋子肯定是为了矫正脚形才穿的。克莱拉并没有充分察觉海恩斯小姐对她的关注，因为这种关注被她那机警、利索的仪态所掩盖，被她那几乎过分的严厉所掩盖。于是，她加倍努力去博得老师的青睐。只是到了该分专业学习的年龄时，她才意识到她干得多么漂亮，虽然她过去也曾疑心过，觉得海恩斯小姐喜欢她。但她这时15岁了；学文科还是学理科，做出选择的时刻已经来临；文科和理科分道扬镳的时刻已经来临，这时她才意识到，希尔夫人同—海恩斯小姐其实一直在争夺她。明白了这一点使她心里有一种说不出来的高兴。她本来就没有想过要讨好希尔夫人而放弃法语，因为在数、理、化等课程中她已经碰到不少难题，诸如电的性质之类。但是，她觉得在做出选择之前故意多花些时间，在两者之间举棋不定，像调情似的，确有一番风趣。最后还是女校长把她叫了去，要她坚持学理科，因为理科更有发展前途。于是，她就公开宣布说她要选文科。

P7

1. jersey: close-fitting knitted woolen garment, or fine woolen dress for ladies

2. nerve: courage, strength or control of mind

3. a good front of confidence: a good appearance of confidence, a show of one’s confidence

4. positively: firm, absolute, decisive, definite, sure, certain

5. orthopaedic: curving of deformities, concerning or used in orthopaedics; putting straight or preventing unusual shaped bones, the branch med of this

6. brisk: quick, and active

7. demeanor: way of behaving, outward manner, conduct, appearance, deportment, comportment

8. excessive: much, extreme

9. severity: the state or quality of being severe, a severe act or state

10. impress: to make the importance of something clear

11. specialization: specialty

12. inexplicably: that cannot be explained; incomprehensively, unaccountably

13. nasty: awful, unpleasant, distasteful, disagreeable, disgusting/pleasant, enjoyable, nice

14. flirtation: to make love for amusement; (of a woman) the act of having a way to attract others’interest and attention

15. stick to: keep to, cling to, go on having, hang on to

16. prospect: chance of success; (rare) expectation of wealth in the futrue

17. whereupon: at once, after that

18. come out into the open: go express one’s idea clearly, publicly, openly

19. they looked positively orthopedic: Her shoes were narrow, straight, and fit so well that they looked like those used to cure foot deformities.

20. the age of specialization: the age of fifteen at which the pupils chose either the Arts course

or the Science course.

21. had actually been fighting over her: Both Mrs. Hill and Miss Haines had been trying to get Clara to take their subject.

22. She never for a moment thought of deserting French for Mrs. Hill. : She had already made up her mind to go on studying French. She never thought of giving up French so that she could be in Mrs. Hill’s class.

23. but she did enjoy the sensation of flirtation: She kept the two teachers in suspense by pretending not to have made up her mind, and she enjoyed the amusement she got from doing so.

8. On the way out of this interview, she came across Miss Haines, clad in a thin ribbed sweater in a very nice shade of mustard, with a very nice matching skirt. And Miss Haines, as Clara suddenly realized, with a curious tremor of conviction, had actually been hanging: around in the corridor waiting for her to emerge.

"Hello, Clara," said Miss Haines.

"Hello, Miss Haines, "said Clara, giving nothing.

"I hear that Miss Potts asked to see you about next year's work," said Miss Haines.

"Yes, she did," said Clara. There was a slight pause, while she relished to the full her own desirability as a pupil.

"I hope you didn't change your mind about taking up languages," said Miss Haines, finally, and with a slight constraint.

"Oh no, Miss Haines," said Clara, mercifully, smiling now. "Oh no, of course not. I told her I was frightfully keen to carry on with French. And she said I was to think it over, but I've thought it over already, really."

克莱拉同校长谈完话走出来时正巧碰上海恩斯小姐。海恩斯小姐上身穿一件薄薄的罗纹毛线衫，芥末色，深浅恰到好处，下身配一条很相称的裙子。怀着一种奇怪的信念，克莱拉突然意识到，海恩斯小姐实际上是一直呆在走廊里，等她出来。

“你好，克莱拉，”海恩斯小姐叫道。

“你好，海恩斯小姐，”克莱拉一点消息也不透露。

“听说波茨小姐叫你去谈下学年选课问题啦，”海恩斯小姐说。

“是的，叫我去了，”克莱拉答道。片刻的沉默，其间，她尽情地玩味着一个学生被老师争宠的乐趣。

“希望你没有改变主意，还是决定学语言，”海恩斯小姐最后说，讲话稍稍有点儿不自然了。

“没有，没有，海恩斯小姐，”克莱拉叫她放心，脸上带着笑。“啊，没有改变，当然没有。我对她说了，我特别想继续学法语。她要我再考虑考虑。可是，我已经考虑好了，真是这样。”

P8

1. come across: meet unexpectantly

2. clad: wear

3. ribbed: having rib-like mark, in a pattern of long thin raised lines

4. mustard: a plant with yellow flowers, somewhat yellowish

5. tremor: shaking or trembling, thrill

6. conviction: firm or assured belief

7. tremor of conviction: shaking movement caused by the excitement of understanding

(certainty/ sureness)

8. giving nothing: without any hint, revealing nothing, trying to keep it secret

9. relish sth to the full: to enjoy, to be pleased

10. desirability: delightfulness, great pleasure, satisfaction

11. constraint: a forced and unnatural manner, the condition of hiding one’s natural feeling and behaviour

12. mercifully: compassionately, kindly, sympathetically, understandingly

13. frightfully: extreme, awful, terrific

14. while she relished to the full her own desirability:

15. There was a slight pause…her own desirability as a pupil: Realizing how eager Miss Haines was to know her decision, Clara took her time to tell her. She enjoyed keeping Miss Haines on tenterhooks and anxious, and enjoyed the idea that she could be so much wanted as

a pupil.

16. said Miss Haines, finally, and with a slight constraint: With Clara giving no hint of her decision, Miss Haines could no longer control herself, and had to ask her, though diffidently.

17. said Clara, mercifully: She told Miss Haines of her decision as if showing mercy to her.

9. And Miss Haines, who had been smiling too, as she heard this, abruptly stopped smiling, and assumed once more her brisk air of challenge, and said, "Good, good," and stalked most coldly off. But Clara was not perturbed by this change of manner: she knew now what it meant.

海恩斯小姐也一直在微笑着，听到这里，突然收住了笑容，一下子又恢复了她那利索的，矜持的神态。她说了一声“好，好，”就冷冰冰地阔步走开了。海恩斯小姐态度上的这种陡然变化并没有使克莱拉感到不安，她现在已经懂得这样做的含义了。

P9

1. perturb: to trouble, to make anxious, cause to worry, put into a state of disorder, disturb, trouble, worry, distress, upset

2. abruptly: suddenly, hastily, rapidly, swiftly, instantaneously

3. brisk: quick, swift, lively, active, vigorously, alert, energetic

4. brisk air of challenge: dare, demand, dignified manner

5. stalk: steal, hunt, approach stealthily, walk stiffly, march, strut

6. she knew now what it meant: She knew the quickly-re-assumed dignified manner of the teacher was a mere cover for her inward gladness.

10. On the bus home that day, she wondered what her parents would have to say, if she were to ask them about it. She wondered if there was the faintest chance of impressing them with the significance of her position. It was a pleasant summer afternoon, and the rows and rows and rows of houses looked unusually bright and gay in the sun; the city, like Rome, was built on a series of hills, and there were several impressive long distance views of hillsides covered with serried networks of roof tops and chimneys. This helped to alleviate the dreadful nature of the houses, which looked shocking from nearby, but which looked oddly bright and distinct and well- intentioned when glorified by mass and distance. Indeed, Clara knew from first hand experience the moral truth of the story told in The Golden Windows about the house with the golden windows, for she had once admired from a friend's house the whole dazzling,

distant, smoky layout of her own hillside. It was hard, travelling home in that bus, and surrounded by the immense, evident, and varied liberties of people and land, to believe in the small impossibilities of her own home, and she felt, as she so frequently felt, the will to believe it to be different: the truth was too grotesque and too unnatural, and her hopes were so strong that she carelessly let them wander a little, giving them a little leeway, letting them sniff and pry and explore. When she got off the bus at her usual stop, even the moderate leafiness of the district contributed to her hopes, and she saw, fleetingly, the features that caused it to be described by others as a desirable residential area. She walked down Chestnut Drive, and as she picked a leaf off a privet hedge here, and ran her hand along a row of railings there, she thought that it was not so bad after all, and that she would tell them about it: they always said, when accused of indifference, that they were interested, so she would jolly well try to make them show a hit of their interest.

那天在乘公共汽车回家的路上，她心里琢磨如果自己问父母对自己选择有什么看法，不知他们会说些什么。她琢磨着不知有没有哪怕是些微的机会使他们对自己处境的意义有个深刻的印象。这是一个令人愉快的夏日的午后，阳光下那一排排房屋显得特别明亮欢快。这个城市像罗马一样是建在一串小山包上的，山坡上布满密密的纵横交错的屋顶和烟囱，有几处地方远看景色很壮观。这有助于使房子显得不那么可怕，从近处看这些房屋糟糕得惊人；但大片房屋连在一起，距离又远，看上去使其增色不少，看上去奇怪地明亮、独特、友善。真的，克莱拉从亲身经历中懂得<金窗)中关于一所有着金黄色窗子的房子的故意的寓意是多么正确，因为有一次她在朋友家中曾赞叹过远处自己家所在的那片山坡那令人眼花缭乱、烟雾缭绕中的布局。她坐在回家路上的公共汽车中，周围的人和土地有着广阔的、显而易见的、各种各样的自由权利，要相信在自己家庭里连微不足道的小事都不允许她去做，真是太困难了；这时和她经常感到的那样，她感觉到决心要相信自己家庭不是这样：真实状态太荒唐太反常了，她的希望又是这样强烈，她就漫不经心地任它们小作遨游，给它们一些余地，让它们这儿闻闻那儿看看，探究一番。当她在平时下车的站下了公共汽车，就连这个地区具有中等数量的树木也增加了她的希望，她在一瞬间看到了使别人将这一地区描写成令人称心的居住区的特点。她沿着栗树路走去，当她从这儿的一丛私人树篱上摘下一片树叶，手滑过那儿的一排铁栏杆时，她心想终究情况还不是那么糟。她要告诉父母这一点：当她责怪父母不关心她时，他们总是说他们对她的事是关切的，那么她可就要好好设法让他们表现出一些他们的关切来了。

P10

1. serried: (of lines of ranks) close together, shoulder to shoulder

2. alleviate: to make (pain or suffering) less or easier to bear

3. well-intentioned: friendly, good-willed

4. dazzle: to make sb. unable to see clearly or act normally because of too much light

5. grotesque: combining forms in a fantastic way, weird, bizarre, fanciful, fantastic, eccentric, outlandish, absurd odd, fantastic

6. leeway: additional time, space and money that allows a chance to succeed in doing so

7. sniff: to draw air in through the nose

8. pry: to look or peep; look at secretly or find out about someone else’s private possession or affairs

9. explore: look into, examine, search into pry into, investigate, scrutinize, inquire into

10. moderate: average, ordinary, mediocre

11. fleetingly: passing quickly

12. privet: type of bush with white flowers and leaves that stay green all year round

13. hedge: a row of bush or small trees, esp. cut level from top

14. jolly well: (BE, informal) indeed, certainly (giving stress to some verb or other structure)

15. It was hard…letting them sniff and pry and explore: liberties of people and land: the wide world of the town where people were free to do various things in contrast to the confinements awaiting her in her own home.

The small impossibilities of her own home: all the little things she was not allowed to do at home

The truth: the reality at home

Letting them sniff and pry and explore: Hopes are personified. The whole sentence describes what was going on in her mind while in the bus. From the story told in the Golden Window, she knew she should find satisfaction in her own home. But seeing so many people doing what they wanted to and being surrounded by the spacious land, she felt it hard to believe the beauty she searched for lay in the undesirable reality of her home. Nevertheless, her hopes were so strong that she forced herself to believe this time it would be different, and she let her hopes wander a little.

16. the moderate leafiness of the district: There were a fair number of trees in the district and their greenness added to her hopeful mood. The next sentence also describes how her joyful feeling changed her idea about her home and parents.