Damaged but still standing

虽毁但依然挺立

France agonises over the fire that devastated Notre Dame

大火烧毁了巴黎圣母院，法国为此心痛

Notre Dame/巴黎圣母院

agonise /感到苦闷；挣扎

President Emmanuel Macron finds words of solace

法国总统埃马纽埃尔•马克龙(Emmanuel Macron)找到了安慰的话

Solace/安慰；慰藉；安慰之物

Apr 17th 2019 | PARIS

THE CATHEDRAL of Notre Dame is a “majestic and sublime edifice”, a “vast symphony in stone”, wrote Victor Hugo. “Every surface, every stone of this venerable pile, is a page of the history not only of the country, but of science and of art.” The devastating fire that broke out on April 15th, and destroyed much of the gothic cathedral’s wood-timbered roof and spire, stunned and distressed the French with a force that far exceeded the building’s religious significance. As the flames engulfed the roof, President Emmanuel Macron spoke for many across France when he tweeted that he was witnessing “part of us burn”.

巴黎圣母院是一座“宏伟而崇高的建筑”，维克多·雨果曾写道，它是“石雕成的宏伟交响曲”。“这座古老建筑的每一处表面，每一块石头，不仅是这个国家的历史，也是科学界和艺术界的历史。这场毁灭性的大火于4月15日爆发，摧毁了这座哥特式大教堂的大部分木质屋顶和塔尖，令法国人震惊和痛苦，其力量远远超过了这座建筑的宗教意义。大火吞噬了屋顶，法国总统埃马纽埃尔·马克龙在推特上说，他目睹了“我们的一部分被烧毁”，这代表了法国各地的许多人。

词汇

THE CATHEDRAL of Notre Dame/巴黎圣母院

Majestic/ 庄严的；宏伟的

Sublime/  庄严的；令人崇敬的；

Edifice/大厦；大建筑物

Venerable/庄严的，值得尊敬的；珍贵的

【区分vulnerable/易受攻击的，易受…的攻击】

Gothic/哥特式的；野蛮的

Engulfed/  吞没；吞食

Why has the fire at Notre Dame stirred such emotion in France? In a city of broad vistas and stolen glimpses, it serves as a fixed point for Parisians; a stable presence that emerges reliably into view, like a much-loved aunt, from bridges across the river Seine. Visited by 13m tourists a year, the cathedral has been the backdrop to countless expressions of awe and romance, as well as been-there selfies. Locals may be riled by the narcissistic crowds, but are proud of what draws them. The 850-year-old cathedral is a national landmark that offers something particular: a form of timelessness, drama and spirituality, to set against the modernity and engineering prowess of the Eiffel Tower.

为什么圣母大学的大火会在法国引起如此大的反响?在城市的广袤视角下悄悄瞥上一眼，对巴黎人来说，这巴黎圣母院，就好似一位深受喜爱的阿姨，站立在塞纳河对面的桥头上，构成一幅和谐美好的画面。每年有1300万游客前来参观，对于那些游客们，包括是那些需要自拍的，大教堂已然成为无数游客烘托，表达敬畏和浪漫的背景，也成为人们在教堂自拍的背景。当地人或许会被这些自恋的（自拍）人群激怒，但也为他们有着这座吸引人的巴黎圣母院而自豪。这座有着850年历史的大教堂是一个国家地标，它提供了一些特别的含义:一种永恒、戏剧和灵性的存在，与埃菲尔铁塔的现代性和工程性形成鲜明对比。

词汇

Vistas/远景，狭长的街景

Narcissistic/  自恋的；自我陶醉的

Backdrop/背景；背景幕

Rile/  激怒；搅浑；惹怒

Narcissistic/自恋的；自我陶醉的

Spirituality/灵性；精神性

On the night, as firefighters struggled to control the blaze, it looked for a stretch as if the centuries were dissolving in flames. For Parisians, watching in eerie silence on the bridges, the wait was agonising. In his preface to “The Hunchback of Notre Dame”, the novel that reawakened the French to the cathedral’s splendour, Hugo had warned darkly that “soon, perhaps, the Cathedral itself will have vanished from the face of the earth.” As the fire blazed, the visceral fear that Hugo might have been right seemed to touch a profound yearning for Our Lady to survive.

当天晚上，消防队员奋力控制火势时，一时间，大火似乎在吞噬着几个世纪。对于巴黎人来说，在可怕的寂静站在大桥上（看着巴黎圣母院在不断被火焰吞没），这是一种煎熬般的等待（等待快点灭火）。雨果在《巴黎圣母院-钟楼怪人》(The Hunchback of Notre Dame)的序言中曾悲观地警告说，“也许很快，这座教堂本身就会从地球上消失。“而这部小说，唤醒了法国人对这座辉煌的教堂的认识。如今，随着大火熊熊燃烧，对雨果可能是对的发自内心的恐惧似乎触动了我们对这位女士（上一段将巴黎圣母院比作女士）生存的深切渴望。

词汇

Stretch/  伸展,张开；

Eerie/  可怕的；怪异的

Agonising/烦恼的；苦闷的

Splendour/显赫（等于splendor）；光彩壮丽

Visceral/内脏的；出于本能的；

The cathedral had withstood ransacking during the wars of religion, looting during the revolution, two world wars and Nazi occupation, becoming an emblem of resistance in the face of a constantly disrupted history. More than this, Notre Dame is a product of the paradoxes of that history. It is where an emperor, Napoleon, was crowned in 1804, and where the founder of modern republican France, Charles de Gaulle, was remembered upon his death. It was at once a living place of worship for the French Catholic church, and the property of the French secular state: a symbol in itself of the country’s history and its present, in all its glorious contradictions.

这座大教堂在宗教战争期间经受住了洗劫，在法国大革*命时期经受住了抢劫，在两次世界大战期间经受住了纳粹的占领，这使得她在一段不断被破坏的历史面前成为了反抗的象征。不仅如此，圣母院还是那段历史悖论的产物。1804年，一位皇帝拿破仑在这里加冕，现代共和法国的奠基人戴高乐也在这里去世。对法国天主教会来说，它是一个活生生的敬拜场所，也是法国永恒的国家的财产:它本身就是法国历史和现状的象征，也是它所有光辉矛盾的象征。

词汇

Ransack/洗劫，掠夺；遍寻

Emblem/象征；徽章；符号

Secular/世俗的；长期的；现世的；不朽的

Note[contradictions-矛盾；paradoxes-悖论]

As he visited the site shortly before midnight, Mr Macron, so often perceived as out of touch, for once found the right words to express this. “Notre Dame de Paris is our history, our literature,” he declared. “The place where we have lived all our great moments, epidemics, wars and liberation. It is the epicentre of our lives and the point from which we measure distance from Paris. This history, it is ours and it is burning.”

经常被认为与外界脱节的马克龙，他在午夜前不久赶到了巴黎圣母院现场，一刻间，他以透彻的语句表达了他与法国民众的痛苦之情。“巴黎圣母院是我们历史和文学上的奇迹，”他宣称，“她见证了我们所有伟大的时刻，流行病、战争和解放事业。它是我们生活的中心，也是我们衡量与巴黎距离的起点（个人认为代表着文明里程碑的意义，一种文明的起点）。这是属于我们的历史，而现在她在燃烧。”

词汇

out of touch/与现实生活等脱节的

Epicentre/震中