中年颂

我们翻译这篇文章的理由

中年是什么，是某个年龄段还是一种状态？都觉得中年应该初步“功成名就”，事业和家庭兼得，进入平稳的人生轨道。觉得自己应该活出“理想的”样子，但仿佛又觉得这种步伐好像不适合自己。矛盾得让人痛苦，咬牙切齿。心中熊熊怒火、翻天覆地，无奈人前温良恭俭，做一个好好先生，窈窕淑女。年轻人大多鄙视中年，无奈谁都兢兢业业地为它努力。应该爱中年吗？爱吧，”包办中年”也充满了激荡，和青年时期一样“糟糕”。

——邓舒丹

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中年颂

作者：JAAMES PARKER

 译者：邓舒丹

校对：崔颖

策划：邓舒丹 & 刘蕊

It looks resolved. Sitting heavily in a chair, with settled opinions and stodgy shoes—there’s something unbudgeable about the middleaged person. The young are dewy and volatile; the old are toppling into fragility. But the middle-aged hold their ground. There’s a kind of magnetism to this solidity, this dowdy poise , this impressively median state.

中年人看起来稳若磐石。坐在椅子上颇有分量，思想观念已定，穿着过时的鞋 - 他身上有种永恒不变的气质。青年人充满生机，变化无常；老者跌跌撞撞地进入虚弱之境。唯有中年人坚守阵地。这种坚定性，老土的姿态，恰如其分的中间状态有种似磁铁般的吸引力。

Poise: noun(uncountable)

①(composure, dignity) 镇定  ▸ her admirable poise and assurance 她令人钦佩的沉着与自信 

②(graceful bearing) 仪态  ▸ the poise and grace of the dancers/models舞蹈演员/模特儿的优雅姿态

But on the inside … You’re in deep flux. A second puberty, almost. Inflammations, precarious accelerations. Dysmorphic shock in the bathroom mirror: Jesus, who is that? Strange new acts of grooming are suddenly necessary. Maybe you’ve survived a bout of something serious; you probably have a couple of fussy little private afflictions. You need ointment. It feels like a character flaw. Maybe it is a character flaw.

但是，你的精神却尤为激荡。几乎如同第二次青春期来临，像患上炎症般令人痛苦，经历着充满变故的加速时期。在浴室镜前惊觉身体的形变：天哪，那个人是谁？突然必须改头换面，穿上奇怪的新装。你可能经历了重大变故；可能心底有些难以切齿，不大不小的痛苦。你需要慰藉。这看起来像一种性格缺陷。可能这确实是一种缺陷。

For all this, though, you are weirdly and unwontedly calm, like someone riding a bicycle without using his hands. You’re not an apprentice adult anymore. You’re through the disorientation period, the Talking Heads moment —“And you may find yourself in a beautiful house / With a beautiful wife / And you may ask yourself / Well, how did I get here?” You’re through the angst and the panic attacks. You don’t yet have the wild license of old age, when you can write gnarly, scandalous poems like Frederick Seidel, or tell an interviewer—as The Who’s Pete Townshend recently did—that “it’s too late to give a fuck.” But you’re more free. The stuff that used to obsess you, those grinding circular thoughts—they’ve worn themselves out. You know yourself, quite well by now. Life has introduced you to your shadow; you’ve met your dark double, and with a bit of luck the two of you have made your accommodations. You know your friends. You love your friends, and you tell them.

尽管如此，你却怪异地违背常理，保持镇定，像一个人离开双手骑自行车一样。你已经度过了进入成年的准备阶段，度过了迷茫期——迷恋传声头乐队的时期- “你可能有个漂亮的家/有位美丽的妻子/你可能问自己/我如何抵达今日？” 你已经受了内心的焦虑与惶恐。你还没有长者放飞自我的权力，像弗雷德里克· 赛德尔那样写出极具挑战，颇受非议的诗歌，或者如皮特·汤申德最近对采访者所说：“太晚了，我***来不及了”，但你又更加自由。那些过去缠绕着你的无穷无尽，循环往复之思，现已灯枯油尽。目前为止，你已经了解自己。你已认识另一个自我，那个黑暗的双生子。凭着一点幸运，你们已经和解。你了解自己的朋友，爱他们，表达你的爱。

I’m generalizing from my own case, of course, because what else can I do? Besides, a sense at last of having some things in common with the other humans, the other wobbling bipeds—this, too, is one of the gifts of middle age. Good experience, bad experience, doesn’t matter. Experience is what you share, the raw weight of it. The lines around the eyes. The bruising of the soul. The banging up against your own boundaries, your own limits.

当然，我在总结自己的经验，因为别无他法。此外，终于始觉自身与其他人- 其他失望的两足动物- 有了共同之处，也是中年的喜悦之一。经验或好或坏，无关紧要。你分享的是经验，里面的分量是沉甸的。眼角上的皱纹，受伤的灵魂。对自己能力边界，限度的挑战。

Limits, limits, thank God for limits. Thank God for the things you cannot do, and that you know you cannot do. Thank God for the final limit: Death, who now gazes at you levelly from the foot of your bed, and with an ironical twinkle, because you still don’t completely believe in him.

限制，限制，多亏了它的存在。为那些你做不了的事，并且你知道自己不能胜任的事儿感谢上帝。感谢上帝还有最后的限制：死亡。死亡正在床脚冷静地凝视着你，露出一丝讥笑，因为你还不完全相信它。

At any rate, if you’re reading this, you’re not dead. So: Should you leap gladly, grinningly, into these contradictory middle years, when everything is speeding up and slowing down, and becoming more serious and less serious? The middle-aged person is not an idiot. Middle age is when you can throw your back out watching Netflix. The middleaged person is being consumed by life, and knows it. Feed the flame—that’s the invitation. Go up brightly.

无论如何，如果你正在读这篇文章，说明你还活着。所以，当所有一切加速减速并行，更加严肃，同时不太严肃时，你应该咧着嘴高高兴兴地迈进这些充满矛盾的中年时光吗？中年不代表愚拙。中年是你可以躺着看Netflix的时光。中年人被生活所吞噬，并对此完全自知。来助长火势吧- 这是一份邀请。愉快地迎难而上。

译者注：Netflix(Nasdaq NFLX) 成立于1997年，是一家在线影片租赁提供商，主要提供Netflix超大数量的DVD并免费递送，总部位于美国加利福尼亚州洛斯盖图。

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• 本文原载于 The Atlantic

• 原文链接：https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/01/ode-to-middle-age/603067/