《古都的秋》|原作 朱自清|英譯 徐英才|誦讀 李莉（中文誦讀）
https://www.ximalaya.com/renwen/9925600/226252499
《古都的秋》|原作 朱自清|英譯 徐英才|誦讀 李莉（英文誦讀）
https://www.ximalaya.com/renwen/9925600/227643843
摘自徐英才的《英譯中國經典散文選》
故都的秋
鬱達夫
秋天，無論在什麽地方的秋天，總是好的；可是啊，北國的秋，卻特別地來得清，來得靜，來得悲涼。我的不遠千裏，要從杭州趕上青島，更要從青島趕上北平來的理由，也不過想飽嚐一嚐這“秋”，這故都的秋味。
江南，秋當然也是有的；但草木雕得慢，空氣來得潤，天的顏色顯得淡，並且又時常多雨而少風；一個人夾在蘇州上海杭州，或廈門香港廣州的市民中間，渾渾沌沌地過去，隻能感到一點點清涼，秋的味，秋的色，秋的意境與姿態，總看不飽，嚐不透，賞玩不到十足。秋並不是名花，也並不是美酒，那一種半開， 半醉的狀態，在領略秋的過程上，是不合適的。
不逢北國之秋，已將近十餘年了。在南方每年到了秋天，總要想起陶然亭的蘆花，釣魚台的柳影，西山的蟲唱，玉泉的夜月，潭柘寺的鍾聲。在北平即使不出門去罷，就是在皇城人海之中，租人家一椽破屋來住著，早晨起來，泡一碗濃茶、向院子一坐，你也能看得到很高很高的碧綠的天色，聽得到青天下馴鴿的飛聲。從槐樹葉底，朝東細數著一絲一絲漏下來的日光，或在破壁腰中，靜對著象喇叭似的牽牛花（朝榮）的藍朵，自然而然地也能夠感覺到十分的秋意。說到了牽牛花，我以為以藍色或白色者為佳，紫黑色次之，淡紅色最下。最好，還要在牽牛花底，教長著幾根疏疏落落的尖細且長的秋草，使作陪襯。
北國的槐樹，也是一種能使人聯想起秋來的點綴。象花而又不是花的那一種落蕊，早晨起來，會鋪得滿地。腳踏上去，聲音也沒有，氣味也沒有，隻能感出一點點極微細極柔軟的觸覺。掃街的在樹影下一陣掃後，灰土上留下來的一條條掃帚的絲紋，看起來既覺得細膩，又覺得清閑，潛意識下並且還覺得有點兒落寞，古人所說的梧桐一葉而天下知秋的遙想，大約也就在這些深沈的地方。
秋蟬的衰弱的殘聲，更是北國的特產；因為北平處處全長著樹，屋子又低，所以無論在什麽地方，都聽得見它們的啼唱。在南方是非要上郊外或山上去才聽得到的。這秋蟬的嘶叫，在北平可和蟋蟀耗子一樣，簡直象是家家戶戶都養在家裏的家蟲。
還有秋雨哩，北方的秋雨，也似乎比南方的下得奇，下得有味，下得更象樣。
在灰沈沈的天底下，忽而來一陣涼風，便息列索落地下起雨來了。一層雨過，雲漸漸地卷向了西去，天又青了，太陽又露出臉來了；著著很厚的青布單衣或夾襖曲都市閑人，咬著煙管，在雨後的斜橋影裏，上橋頭樹底下去一立，遇見熟人，便會用了緩慢悠閑的聲調，微歎著互答著的說：
“唉，天可真涼了─—”（這了字念得很高，拖得很長。）
“可不是麽？一層秋雨一層涼了！”
北方人念陣字，總老象是層字，平平仄仄起來，這念錯的歧韻，倒來得正好11。
北方的果樹，到秋來，也是一種奇景。第一是棗子樹；屋角，牆頭，茅房邊上12，灶房門口，它都會一株株地長大起來。象橄欖又象鴿蛋似的這棗子顆兒，在小橢圓形的細葉中間，顯出淡綠微黃的顏色的時候，正是秋的全盛時期；等棗樹葉落，棗子紅完，西北風就要起來了，北方便是塵沙灰土的世界，隻有這棗子、柿子、葡萄，成熟到八九分的七八月之交，是北國的清秋的佳日，是一年之中最好也沒有的黃金季節。
有些批評家說，中國的文人學士，尤其是詩人，都帶著很濃厚的頹廢色彩，所以中國的詩文裏，頌讚秋的文字特別的多。但外國的詩人，又何嚐不然？ 我雖則外國詩文念得不多，也不想開出賬來，做一篇秋的詩歌散文鈔，但你若去翻一翻英德法意等詩人的集子，或各國的詩文的An-thology來，總能夠看到許多關於秋的歌頌與悲啼。
各著名的大詩人的長篇田園詩或四季詩裏，也總以關於秋的部分寫得最出色而最有味。足見有感覺的動物，有情趣的人類，對於秋，總是一樣的能特別引起深沈，幽遠，嚴厲，蕭索的感觸來的。不單是詩人，就是被關閉在牢獄裏的囚犯，到了秋天，我想也一定會感到一種不能自己的深情；秋之於人，何嚐有國別，更何嚐有人種階級的區別呢？不過在中國，文字裏有一個“秋士”的成語，讀本裏又有著很普遍的歐陽子的《秋聲》與蘇東坡的《赤壁賦》等，就覺得中國的文人，與秋的關係特別深了。可是這秋的深味，尤其是中國的秋的深味，非要在北方，才感受得到底。
南國之秋，當然是也有它的特異的地方的，比如廿四橋的明月，錢塘江的秋潮，普陀山的涼霧，荔枝灣的殘荷等等，可是色彩不濃，回味不永。比起北國的秋來，正象是黃酒之與白幹，稀飯之與饃饃，鱸魚之與大蟹，黃犬之與駱駝。
秋天，這北國的秋天，若留得住的話，我願把壽命的三分之二折去，換得一個三分之一的零頭。
Autumn in My Old Capital
Yu Dafu
Autumn, no matter where it happens, is always appealing, but autumn in Northern China, especially, is less diluted, quieter, and more melancholy. It is merely for the purpose of fully tasting these “flavors”—the autumnal flavors of my old capital—that I braved the long trip from Hangzhou to Qingdao and then to Peiping.
Autumn, of course, also happens in the south, but in a southern autumn, the flora is slower to wither, the air is denser with moisture, the sky is lighter in color, and it is more often rainy than windy. Muddling along as a loner, engulfed among the residents of the near southern cities like Suzhou, Shanghai, or Hangzhou, or the far southern ones like Xiamen, Hong Kong, or Guangzhou, I can only feel a little bit of the pureness and melancholy of autumn. There, I have never seen enough of the views of autumn, tasted enough of flavors of autumn, or explored enough of the poetic imagery of autumn. Autumn is neither a famous flower nor a luscious wine. That state of half-blooming and half-intoxication is not appropriate to the understanding of the season.
It has been more than a decade since I last experienced autumn in the north. In the south, every year when autumn came, I would always miss the reed catkins at the Joyous Pavilion, the willow silhouettes by the Fishing Tower, the chirping of insects in the West Hills, the midnight moon above the Jade Spring, and the chiming of the bells from the Poolside Mulberry Temple. In Beijing, however, even though you stay at home—say, you reside in a dilapidated rented house in the imperial city, with a sea of inhabitants, and you get up in the morning, making a bowl of strong tea, and sit in a spot facing the entire yard—you can also see the azure color high in the sky and hear the noise the domesticated pigeons make when they fly under the blue sky. From beneath a locust tree, counting strip after strip of sunbeams dripping down from the east through the foliage or quietly looking at the blue flowers of trumpet-shaped morning glories rooted in the middle of a broken wall, you will also automatically get a deep sense of autumn. Speaking of morning glories, I think the blue or white flowers are the best, the purple-blacks come next, and the light-reds rank last. If there are a few long, thin autumn grasses loosely spread out under them to set them off, so much the better.
The northern locust tree is yet another scenic element that would make people think of autumn. When you get up in the morning, you will see stamens and pistils—which look like flowers, but are actually not—all over the ground. When you step on them, you don’t hear anything or smell anything; you only have an extremely light and soft feeling of contact. After the street cleaner sweeps the tree-shaded ground, you will see strip after strip of sweeping marks on the earth. They look delicate and inspire a sense of leisure, and your subconscious mind will even register a little feeling of desolation. This is perhaps where lies the profound meaning of the ancient poetic line that “A falling leaf from a Chinese parasol manifests the arrival of autumn.”
The lingering, weak chirping of the autumnal harvest flies is even more characteristic of the north. Because there are trees everywhere and the houses are not very tall in Peiping, you can hear the harvest flies wherever you go. But in the south, you won’t be able to hear anything unless you go to the suburbs or take a trip into the hills. In Peiping, harvest flies, which are as common as crickets or mice, are like house pets for every family.
Don’t forget the autumnal rain! The autumnal rain in the north seems to fall in a way more distinctive, more flavorsome, and more akin to rain than that in the south.
Under the grey sky, after an abrupt cool wind comes the pitter-patter of rain. Soon after the brisk rain is over, the clouds begin to slowly roll to the west, the sky starts to turn blue again, and the sun pops its face out once more. A tobacco pipe between his lips, a leisurely townsman, clad in a thick lined jacket or a dark blue padded coat, would step out of the shade of the rain-washed skew bridge and stand under a bridgehead tree; when he sees someone he knows, he would let out a light sigh and say, in a slow and leisurely tone,
“Gosh, it’sss really getting chilly—” (Emphasizing the progressive “s” by highly pitching and dragging it.)
“Exactly! Hence, the saying ‘Each burstr of autumnal rain adds a burstr of chilliness!’”
When northerners pronounce the word “burst,” it always sounds like “burstr.” But, in terms of cadence, this distortion in pronunciation has the benefit of creating an accidental rhyme.
When autumn comes, the fruit trees in the north also boast of an unusual scene. The date trees should be the first kind. They grow everywhere—around the corners of houses, on walls, by outhouses, next to kitchen cabins. When the dates, like olives or pigeon eggs, begin to show their light-green and light-yellow colors amid the small oval-shaped leaves, the autumn season has reached its prime. By the time the leaves have fallen and the dates themselves have finished turning red, the northwest wind will start to blow, and this will then make the north a dusty and muddy world. The best period of an undiluted autumn in the north is at the transitional period between July and August, when dates, persimmons, and grapes are almost completely ripe. These are the golden days of the year.
Some critics say that all Chinese scholars, men of letters, and especially poets, have a strong propensity for decadence and that’s why quite a number of Chinese poems eulogize autumn. But don’t foreign poets do the same? I have neither delved much into foreign poetry nor want to make a list that will turn my pure prose into a piece of quotation-riddled lyric prose about autumn, but if you flip through a collection of poetry from Britain, Germany, France, Italy, etc. or through a poetry anthology from each of these countries, you are bound to see much eulogizing and bemoaning of the season.
The best-written and most exquisite parts of the voluminous idyllic pastoral poetry or of the verses on the four seasons produced by famous poets are those that describe autumn. This clearly reveals that all sentient animals and appreciative humans share an identical mentality toward the autumn season, which always gives them a deep, remote, serious, serious, and melancholic feeling. I believe that when autumn comes, not only poets, but even prison inmates, have deep, uncontrollable emotions. When it comes to autumn, no differences exist between nations, ethnicities or social classes. Since there is a term “autumnal scholar” in the Chinese language and some popular “autumnal verses” such as Ode to Autumnal Sounds by Ouyang Xiu and Ode to the Red Cliff by Su Shi, one would feel that the Chinese literati have a more profound relationship with autumn than their western counterparts. But this profound flavor of autumn, especially the profound flavor of a Chinese autumn, can only be tasted in the north.
Autumn in the south, of course, also has its special characteristics. Take, for instance, the bright moon over the Twenty-fourth Bridge, the autumnal tides in the Qiantang River, the cool mist on Mount Putuo, the late lotus in the Litchi Fruit Bay, etc. But none of these is deep in color, and none leaves a permanent aftertaste. Comparing a southern autumn to a northern autumn is like comparing yellow wine to white spirits, rice gruel to steamed bread, perch to big crab, or dogs to camels.
If I could keep autumn—this autumn of northern China—from leaving, I would trade two thirds of my lifetime for a life only a third as long but spent entirely in autumn.
