No Other Choice—别无选择（乔治·布莱克）（第二章~Section 3）
My aunt Truus, short for Gertrude, my mother's youngest sister was another important person in my youth. She was the tallest of the three sisters with a rather sharp tongue and the same independent character as her mother. She had a great gift for story telling and the ability to make a quite ordinary everyday event into an interesting and amusing occurrence, imitating as she was telling it, the intonations, dialect or particularity of speech of all the persons involved. She never married and worked for a well-known Dutch banking firm. On her free Saturday afternoons she used to like taking me with her for long walks which often lasted three hours or more. I enjoyed accompanying her for during these walks she would tell me endless stories about distant relations or people in her office, whom, although I had never seen them, I got to know very well. These stories were mostly highly entertaining and at times I would shriek with laughter especially when she took people off. From these walks I have developed two lasting characteristics. One is that for me the highest form of humour remains somebody taking somebody else off. The other is that I developed the habit of listening rather than talking. So, partly out of laziness perhaps and partly out of a genuine interest in what other people have to say, I have always encouraged other people to do the talking, thus leaving myself free to listen or, occasionally, I must admit to simply switch off.
【我的姨妈特鲁厄斯（格特鲁德的简称)，是我母亲最小的妹妹，她对我童年的影响也很大。她是三姐妹中最高的一个，说话犀利，性格也和她母亲一样独立。她在讲故事方面很有天赋，能把一个很普通的日常变成有趣的故事，在她讲故事的时候，她会模仿所有涉及到的人的语调、方言或讲话的特点。她一直没有结婚，在一家著名的荷兰银行工作。在星期六下午她空闲的时候，她喜欢带我去散步，常常要走三个多小时。我很喜欢陪着她散步，因为每次散步，她都会给我讲许多关于远亲或她办公室里的人的故事，虽然我从来没有见过他们，但我对他们很熟悉。这些故事大多非常有趣，有时我会大笑，尤其是当她把人支走的时候。在这些散步的过程中，我形成了两个特点。一个是，对我来说，幽默的最高形式就是别人互相调侃；另一个是我养成了倾听而不是说话的习惯。所以，也许是出于懒惰，也许是出于对别人要说什么真正的兴趣，我总是鼓励别人来说话，这样我就有时间听了，或者，偶尔，我必须承认，我只是想休息一下。】
When I was five years old I went to the municipal primary school which was located at ten minutes' walking distance from where I lived. From the very beginning I did well at school and one way or another was always among the four best pupils of the class. My favourite subject, however, was history - Dutch history, of course, at that point - and very early on I started reading historical novels about the Eighty Years War of the Dutch republic against Spain, the early journeys of discovery of the Dutch seafarers and the sea battles of de rutter and Tromp. In this I was much encouraged by my uncle Tom, who enjoyed reading these books himself, and then passed them on to me. Special heroes for me were the princes of Orange; William the Silent, a portrait of whom was hanging in my room, his sons and his great grandson the King - stadtholder William Ⅲ. In consequence, I developed a great attachment to the House of Orange and when reading about the long drawn out struggle for power between the stadtholders and the powerful merchant oligarchy my sympathies were invariably on the side of the former.
【当我五岁的时候，我去了市立小学，它离我住的地方有十分钟的步行距离。从一开始，我在学校的表现就很好，而且无论如何我都是班里学习最好的四个学生之一。我最喜欢的科目是历史，当然是当时的荷兰历史，很早以前我就开始阅读历史小说，内容涉及荷兰共和国与西班牙的八十年战争、荷兰海员的早期探索之旅以及德鲁特和特朗普的海战。这使我深受汤姆叔叔的支持，他自己也很喜欢读这些书，然后把它们送给了我。对我来说，最喜欢的英雄是奥兰治的王子——沉默的威廉，他的画像挂在我的房间里，以及他的儿子和他的曾孙国王威廉三世。于是，我对奥兰治家族产生了极大的喜爱，当我读到统治者与强大的商业寡头之间旷日持久的权力斗争时，我的心总是站在前者一边。】
Even earlier my imagination had been peopled by Biblical heroes: Abraham and Isaac, Jacob and Esau, Joseph and his brethren, Samson, David and Saul etc. The first book I was ever given as a present was an illustrated Children's Bible. With much pleasure I listened to and later read for myself the stories of the Old Testament. Their heroes made a deep impression on me, they seemed so much more exciting than those of the New Testament with whom I found it much more difficult to identify myself.
【早先我的想象里就充满了圣经中的英雄:亚伯拉罕和以撒，雅各和以扫，约瑟和他的弟兄，参孙，大卫和扫罗等等。我收到的第一本书是一本带插图的《儿童圣经》。我兴致勃勃地听着《旧约》里的故事，后来自己读了起来。他们的英雄给我留下了深刻的印象，他们似乎比《新约》里那些让我难以认同的英雄更令人兴奋。】
My mother's family belonged to the Remonstrant Church as the followers of the Dutch seventeenth-century theologian Arminius were called. He preached free will and universal salvation and put forward the view that because of Christ's atonement all men might be saved and not merely a pre-ordained elect, as the Dutch Reformed Church, more or less strictly adhering to Calvin's doctrine of predestination, held. The doctrinal controversies between the Arminians and the Calvinists led to civil strife in the Netherlands in the first two decades of the seventeenth century in which the rich merchant families of the large towns were generally on the side of the Arminians and the ordinary people, led by the stadtholder Maurits, son of William the Silent, on the side of the Calvinists. The struggle ended in a victory for the Calvinists when, in 1619, the Synod of sort condemned Arminius as a heretic and expelled the remonstrant from the Dutch Reformed Church. I write about this dispute in some detail as it coloured my religious and later my philosophical opinions. It might have been expected that since my family were remonstrant my sympathies would have been with the followers of Arminius. In fact they were entirely on the side of the Calvinists and the Dutch Reformed Church. This was not of course because at the age of ten or so when I read about these quarrels, I knew what free will and predestination meant or understood what the controversy was about. It was simply this: the stadtholder was on the side of the Calvinists so, therefore, was I. It was only many years later, when I was able to understand the fundamental issues, that my initial sympathies led to a genuine belief in predestination and election by grace and later in determinism.
【我母亲的家族隶属于17世纪荷兰神学家阿米纽斯的追随者所称的宣教会。他宣扬自由意志和普世救赎，并提出，由于基督的赎罪，所有人都可能得救，而不仅仅是一个预先注定的人。荷兰归正教会或多或少地遵守加尔文的宿命论。阿民念派和加尔文派之间的教义争论导致了17世纪前20年荷兰的内讧，大城镇的富商家庭通常站在阿民念派一边，而平民则由城市所有者毛利茨领导，他是沉默的威廉的儿子，站在加尔文主义者一边。这场斗争以加尔文主义者的胜利而告终，1619年，宗教会议谴责阿民念为异教徒，并将其驱逐出荷兰归正教会。我写了一些关于这个争论的细节，因为它影响了我的宗教观点，后来影响了我的哲学观点。我的家人们完全站在加尔文主义者和荷兰归正教会一边。同样我也站在加尔文一边，这当然不是因为在我十岁左右的时候，当我读到这些争论的时候，我就知道自由意志是什么意思了，也理解了争论的内容。原因很简单:这座城市的主人是站在加尔文主义者一边的，因此，我也是。只是在许多年后，当我能够理解这些基本问题时，我最初的同情才导致我真正相信宿命论，后来又相信了决定论。】
My early pleasure in books and interest in history should not be taken to mean that I did not enjoy playing with boys and girls of my own age. I had many friends both among my schoolfellows and boys and girls who lived in the neighbourhood. We played mostly in the street where the various games followed each other in a strict order established by some mysterious unwritten law governed by the seasons and just as immutable. Much of our free time we boys spent wandering on the river embankment and the many quays of the port. I enjoyed sitting on a bollard watching stately ocean liners being towed to their berths by busy small tugs. I spent many happy Wednesday afternoons, when there was no school, watching the traffic on the river and trying to determine the nationality of the ships that passed by their flags and what company they belonged to by the markings on their funnels. There is a well-known poem about Rotterdam which says that if you have spent your boyhood there you will feel at home anywhere in the world. Wherever you are you will encounter smells with which you were familiar in your youth when you played on the quayside - coffee from Brazil, spices from India, hides from Argentina, timber from Russia. Wherever you are you can say, here it smells as in Rotterdam. Perhaps that is why I have always felt quickly at home in whatever country I was predestined to live.
【我早年对读书的乐趣和对历史的兴趣，不应被视为我不喜欢和同龄的男孩女孩们一起玩。我有很多朋友，既有同学，也有住在附近的男孩和女孩。我们大部分时间都在街上玩，各种游戏按照严格的顺序进行，这是由一些神秘的不成文的规律所决定的，这些规律受季节的影响，而且是一成不变的。我们男孩的大部分空闲时间都是在河堤和港口的许多码头上闲逛。我喜欢坐在系柱上，看着华丽的远洋客轮被忙碌的小拖船拖到它们的泊位上。我度过了许多快乐的没有课的星期三下午，我看着河上的车辆，试图通过它们的旗帜来确定它们的国籍，通过烟囱上的标记来确定它们属于哪一队。有一首关于鹿特丹的著名诗说，如果你在那里度过童年，你会在世界上任何地方感到像在家一样。无论你身在何处，你都会闻到你年轻时在码头玩耍时熟悉的气味——巴西的咖啡、印度的香料、阿根廷的皮革、俄罗斯的木材。无论你在哪里，你都可以说，这里闻起来就像鹿特丹。也许这就是为什么无论我命中注定要生活在哪个国家，我总是很快就感到像在家里一样。】
My relations with my sisters were very close and have remained so throughout our lives. We somehow felt that we were bound by a common destiny which nothing could sunder. There was only a difference of one year between us and so we played quite a lot together and with each other's friends. One of our favourite games was to play 'doctor'. I would transform the bathroom into a sort of operating theatre in which I was the doctor and my sisters were the patients. Or I would transform the attic into a church with benches made from boards and a makeshift pulpit. I, dressed in an old black gown of my grandmother would be the minister and my sisters would be the congregation. It is true, I enjoyed this game more than they did and I sometimes had to resort to bribery to get them to agree to join in.
【我和我的姐妹们的关系非常亲密，并且在我们的一生中一直如此。不知何故，我们感到共同的命运把我们连在一起，什么也拆不开。我们只差了一年，所以我们经常一起玩，和彼此的朋友一起玩。我们最喜欢的游戏之一是扮演“医生”。我会把浴室改造成一种手术室，我是医生，我的姐妹是病人。或者，我会把阁楼改造成一个教堂，用木板做成长凳和一个临时的讲坛。我，穿着一件黑色的旧礼服，我的祖母会是牧师，我的姐妹会是会众。的确，我比他们更喜欢玩这个游戏，有时我不得不通过贿赂来让他们同意加入。】
Then in 1929 came the Wall Street crash. As the world crisis gathered strength it began to affect the fortunes of our family. As a result of the heavy slump in world trade many ships were laid up and, of course, no new ones were being built. This directly affected my father's business. Though he manufactured other leather articles as well, the bulk of his trade was the leather gloves, used by riveters in the dockyards. When they were laid off, no new orders for gloves were naturally forthcoming and he in turn had to sack a number of his work people. The firm of my aunt's husband, who was a grain dealer, was also badly affected and eventually went bankrupt. Like several other ruined and embittered middle-class people my aunt and uncle began to look towards national-socialism for salvation. At home the daily conversation centred round the ups and downs of business, the difficulties of paying creditors, how many people and who should be sacked and who kept on, whether there were signs that things were getting better or, on the contrary, worse. It was not only at home, but in the streets also that one noticed everywhere the signs of economic crisis. Shops in glaring red figures slashed prices in a desperate attempt to attract customers, many went bust and had to close down. Hundreds of thousands of people were soon without employment. They gathered every day around the labour exchanges where they had to have their cards stamped to prove that they were not clandestinely employed and therefore entitled to the modest unemployment benefit which was just enough to keep their families alive. Often there were meetings and demonstrations. The Salvation Army organised soup kitchens and collected clothes to help the needy. In my school there were several boys whose fathers were without work. I cannot say that at the age of ten or twelve this called forth a feeling of revolt in me against the injustice of a system which engendered all the misery I saw around me, but rather one of resignation as in the face of some enormous natural calamity which man was powerless to avert and had to accept as he had to accept illness and death. Indeed illness and death became inseparably linked in my memory with the world crisis.
【然后在1929年，华尔街崩盘了。随着世界经济危机的加剧，它开始影响到我们家族的命运。由于世界贸易的严重萧条，许多船只被搁置起来，当然，也没有建造新的船只。这直接影响了我父亲的生意。虽然他也生产其他皮革制品，但他的主要贸易是造船厂里的铆工使用的皮手套。当他们被解雇时，自然不会有新的手套订单，于是他不得不解雇了一些员工。我姑姑的丈夫是一个粮食商，他的公司也受到了严重的影响，最终破产了。像其他几位破产和痛苦的中产阶级一样，我的婶婶和叔叔开始指望国家社会主义来拯救他们。在家里，他们的日常谈话集中在生意的起起落落、偿还债主的困难、有多少人和哪些人应该被解雇，哪些人应该继续留职，是否有迹象表明情况正在好转，或者相反，情况正在恶化。不仅在家里，在街上也随处可见经济危机的迹象。商店在醒目的红色数字大幅削减价格，以吸引顾客，许多破产和不得不关闭。数十万人很快就失业了。他们每天都聚集在劳工交易所附近，在那里，他们必须让他们的证件盖章，以证明他们不是被秘密雇用的，因此他们有资格获得适度的失业救济金，这只够维持他们家人的生活。经常有会议和示威。救世军组织了施粥站，收集衣服来帮助有需要的人。在我的学校里，有几个男孩的父亲没有工作。我不能说，在我十岁或十二岁的时候，这激起了我对造成我周围所有苦难的不公正制度的反抗，而是一种听天由命的感觉，就像面对某种巨大的自然灾害，人们无力避免，不得不接受，就像他不得不接受疾病和死亡一样。事实上，在我的记忆中，疾病和死亡与世界危机是密不可分的。】
As a result of constant financial worries, the struggle to keep his business going and the uncertainty of the future my father's already frail health began to deteriorate rapidly. When he came home from work he was often so exhausted that he could mount the stairs only with difficulty. On Boxing Day 1934 he took to his bed and did not get up again. My mother called the doctor who ordered him to be taken at once to hospital. The next day lung cancer was diagnosed and my mother was told that there was no hope of recovery.
【由于不断的经济上的担忧，维持生意的努力和对未来的不确定性，我父亲本已虚弱的身体开始迅速恶化。当他下班回家时，他常常筋疲力尽，爬楼梯都很吃力。1934年节礼日，他躺在床上再也没有起来。我妈妈打电话给医生，医生命令马上把他送到医院。第二天他被诊断为肺癌,我母亲被告知没有康复的希望。】
This was the beginning of a difficult period. My mother had to take over the day to day running of my father's business in his absence and try to save what could be saved. Instead of looking after the home, she now had to go every day to work in Rotterdam. In addition, she wanted naturally to visit my father as often as possible. This was a great strain on her. To make sure that even if she could not go herself to the hospital somebody would come to see him, I took to going there every day after school often accompanied by my sisters. From the very beginning my mother had told us that there was no hope of him getting better. Even so I don't think it really sank in and part of me continued to believe that one day he would return home again. Although my father had not taken a very direct part in our upbringing, apart from of course providing for us, we loved him dearly and could not imagine life without him. As for my father himself, though he realised that he was very ill, I do not think he believed until perhaps the very last days that he was dying. He often talked about what he would do when he got out of hospital. One of his plans was to go and stay for a while with his mother, who was living in Nice at the time, to fully recover.
【这是一段艰难时期的开始。我父亲不在的时候，我母亲必须接管他的日常生意，并尽力挽救能挽救的东西。她现在不得不每天去鹿特丹上班，而不是照顾家庭。此外，她自然希望尽可能多地去看望我的父亲。这对她来说是很大的压力。为了确保即使她自己不能去医院，也会有人来看他，我每天放学后都和姐姐们一起去医院。从一开始，我母亲就告诉我们，他没有好转的希望。即便如此，我内心仍有一份期待，有一天他会再次回家。虽然父亲在我们的成长过程中并没有直接参与到我们的成长过程中，但除了供养我们之外，我们非常爱他，无法想象没有他的生活。至于我的父亲本人，尽管他意识到自己病得很重，但我想他大概直到最后几天才相信自己即将死去。他经常谈论他出院后会做什么。他的计划之一就是去他的母亲那里住一段时间，以便完全康复。当时他的母亲住在尼斯。】
