发布时间 : 星期六 文章JK罗琳在哈佛2008毕业典礼上演讲稿更新完毕开始阅读a94a6ff0f90f76c661371aa7
JK罗琳在哈佛2008毕业典礼上演讲稿
President Faust, members of the Harvard Corporation and the Board of Overseers, members of the faculty, proud parents, and, above all, graduates.
The first thing I would like to say is
福斯特主席，哈佛公司和监察委员会的各位成员，各位老师、家长、全体毕业生们：
首先请允许我说一声谢谢。哈佛
‘thank you.’ Not only has Harvard given me 不仅给了我无上的荣誉，连日来为这an extraordinary honour, but the weeks of fear and nausea I have endured at the thought of giving this commencement address have made me lose weight. A win-win situation! Now all I have to do is take deep breaths, squint at the red banners and convince myself that I am at the world’s largest Gryffindor reunion.
Delivering a commencement address
个演讲经受的恐惧和紧张，更令我减肥成功。这真是一个双赢的局面。现在我要做的就是深呼吸几下，眯着眼睛看看前面的大红横幅，安慰自己正在世界上最大的魔法学院聚会上。
发表毕业演说是一个巨大的责任，至少在我回忆自己当年的毕业典
is a great responsibility; or so I thought until 礼前是这么认为的。那天做演讲的是I cast my mind back to my own graduation. The commencement speaker that day was the distinguished British philosopher
英国著名的哲学家Baroness Mary Warnock，对她演讲的回忆，对我写今
Baroness Mary Warnock. Reflecting on her 天的演讲稿，产生了极大的帮助，因speech has helped me enormously in writing this one, because it turns out that I can’t remember a single word she said. This liberating discovery enables me to proceed without any fear that I might inadvertently influence you to abandon
为我不记得她说过的任何一句话了。这个发现让我释然，让我不再担心我可能会无意中影响你放弃在商业，法律或政治上的大好前途，转而醉心于
promising careers in business, the law or politics for the giddy delights of becoming a gay wizard.
成为一个快乐的魔法师。
你们看，如果在若干年后你们还记得“快乐的魔法师”这个笑话，那
You see? If all you remember in years to come is the ‘gay wizard’ joke, I’ve come out ahead of Baroness Mary Warnock. Achievable goals: the first step to self improvement.
Actually, I have wracked my mind and heart for what I ought to say to you today. I have asked myself what I wish I had known at my own graduation, and what important lessons I have learned in the 21 years that have expired between that day and this.
就证明我已经超越了Baroness Mary Warnock。建立可实现的目标——这是提高自我的第一步。
实际上，我为今天应该和大家谈些什么绞尽了脑汁。我问自己什么是我希望早在毕业典礼上就该了解的，而从那时起到现在的21年间，我又得到了什么重要的启示。
我想到了两个答案。在这美好的
I have come up with two answers. On this wonderful day when we are gathered together to celebrate your academic
一天，当我们一起庆祝你们取得学业成就的时刻，我希望告诉你们失败有
success, I have decided to talk to you about 什么样的益处；在你们即将迈向“现the benefits of failure. And as you stand on the threshold of what is sometimes called ‘real life’, I want to extol the crucial importance of imagination.
These may seem quixotic or paradoxical choices, but please bear with me.
Looking back at the 21-year-old that I
实生活”的道路之际，我还要褒扬想象力的重要性。
这些似乎是不切实际或自相矛盾的选择，但请先容我讲完。
回顾21岁刚刚毕业时的自己，对于今天42岁的我来说，是一个稍微不太舒服的经历。可以说，我人生的前
was at graduation, is a slightly uncomfortable experience for the 42-year-old that she has become. Half my lifetime ago, I was striking an uneasy balance between the ambition I had for myself, and what those closest to me expected of me.
一部分，一直挣扎在自己的雄心和身边的人对我的期望之间。
我一直深信，自己唯一想做的事
I was convinced that the only thing I wanted to do, ever, was to write novels. However, my parents, both of whom came from impoverished backgrounds and neither of whom had been to college, took the view that my overactive imagination was an amusing personal quirk that would never pay a mortgage, or secure a pension. I know that the irony strikes with the force of a cartoon anvil, now.
So they hoped that I would take a vocational degree; I wanted to study English Literature. A compromise was reached that in retrospect satisfied nobody, and I went up to study Modern Languages. Hardly had my parents’ car rounded the corner at the end of the road than I ditched German and scuttled off down the Classics corridor.
情，就是写小说。不过，我的父母，他们都来自贫穷的背景，没有任何一人上过大学，坚持认为我过度的想象力是一个令人惊讶的个人怪癖，根本不足以让我支付按揭，或者取得足够的养老金。
我现在明白反讽就像用卡通铁砧去打击你，但...
他们希望我去拿个职业学位，而我想去攻读英国文学。最后，达成了一个双方都不甚满意的妥协：我改学现代语言。可是等到父母一走开，我立刻放弃了德语而报名学习古典文学。
我不记得将这事告诉了父母，他
I cannot remember telling my parents
们可能是在我毕业典礼那一天才发现
that I was studying Classics; they might well 的。我想，在全世界的所有专业中，have found out for the first time on graduation day. Of all the subjects on this planet, I think they would have been hard put to name one less useful than Greek mythology when it came to securing the keys to an executive bathroom.
他们也许认为，不会有比研究希腊神话更没用的专业了，根本无法换来一间独立宽敞的卫生间。
我想澄清一下：我不会因为父母的观点，而责怪他们。埋怨父母给你
I would like to make it clear, in parenthesis, that I do not blame my parents for their point of view. There is an expiry date on blaming your parents for steering you in the wrong direction; the moment you are old enough to take the wheel, responsibility lies with you. What is more, I cannot criticise my parents for hoping that I would never experience poverty. They had been poor themselves, and I have since
指错方向是有一个时间段的。当你成长到可以控制自我方向的时候，你就要自己承担责任了。尤其是，我不会因为父母希望我不要过穷日子，而责怪他们。他们一直很贫穷，我后来也一度很穷，所以我很理解他们。贫穷并不是一种高贵的经历，它带来恐惧、
been poor, and I quite agree with them that 压力、有时还有绝望，它意味着许许it is not an ennobling experience. Poverty entails fear, and stress, and sometimes depression; it means a thousand petty
多多的羞辱和艰辛。靠自己的努力摆脱贫穷，确实可以引以自豪，但贫穷
humiliations and hardships. Climbing out of 本身只有对傻瓜而言才是浪漫的。 poverty by your own efforts, that is indeed something on which to pride yourself, but poverty itself is romanticised only by fools.
What I feared most for myself at your age was not poverty, but failure.
我在你们这个年龄，最害怕的不是贫穷，而是失败。
我在您们这么大时，明显缺乏在大学学习的动力，我花了太久时间在咖啡吧写故事，而在课堂的时间却很