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悲惨世界|Les Miserables

Part 3 Book 2 Chapter 5 Basque and Nicolette

属类: 双语小说 【分类】世界名著 -[作者: 维克多-雨果] 阅读:[104375]
Part 3 Book 2 Chapter 5 Basque and Nicolette
19世纪30年代的法国。富人乘坐马车,用金餐具吃喝。穷人没有工作,没有食物,没有希望——他们是穷苦人,起义一触即发。法国人民还记得1789年的法国大革命。当时,民众在巴黎街头筑起街垒,死去的人数以千计。这样的时刻又要到来了吗? 这是冉阿让的故事。他坐了19年的牢,终于恢复了自由身。可是,他怎么生活,到哪里去找工作呢?像他这样一个人,还有什么希望呢?这也是沙威的故事,他是一个督察,一个残忍的人,一个冷酷的人。他的人生只有一个目标——把冉阿让再次送进大牢。这还是芳汀的故事,芳汀和她的女儿珂赛特。她们的故事是怎样改变了冉阿让的一生?这也是马吕斯的故事。他是巴黎的一名学生,做好了为起义而牺牲的准备——或是为爱情而死。最后,还有伽弗洛什——一个在巴黎街头流浪的孩子,他没有家,没有亲人,没有鞋穿……可他的脸上总是挂着笑容,心中总是有歌儿在欢唱。
不过,我们要先从冉阿让讲起……
France in the 1830s. The rich ride in carriages, and eat from gold plates. The poor have no work, no food, no hope – they are Les Misérables, and rebellion is in the air. France remembers the French Revolution in 1789, when the people built barricades in the streets of Paris, and the dead were counted in thousands. Is that time coming again?
This is the story of Jean Valjean. A prisoner for nineteen years, now at last he is a free man. But how can he live, where can he find work? What hope is there for a man like him? It is also the story of Javert, a police inspector, a cruel man, a hard man. He wants one thing in life – to send Valjean back to prison. And it is Fantine’s story too, Fantine and her daughter Cosette. How does their story change Valjean’s life? And it is also Marius’s story. He is a student in Paris, ready to die for the rebellion – or for love. And last, there is Gavroche – a boy of the Paris streets, with no home, no family, no shoes... But a boy with a smile on his face and a song in his heart.
But we begin with Jean Valjean...
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他有一些理论。下面便是一种:“当一个男人热爱一些女人而他自己又有妻室,他不大关心她,而她呢,模样儿丑,脾气坏,有合法地位,具备各种权利,稳坐在法律上,必要时还拈酸吃醋,那他只有一个办法来脱离烦恼,获得和平,那就是把家产交给妻子管理。宣告逊位,换取自由。那么一来,太太便有事可做了,如醉如痴地管理现钱,直到满手铜绿。指挥佃户,培养长工,召集法律顾问,主持公证人会议,说服讼棍,访问刑名师爷,出席法庭,草拟契约,口授合同,自以为当了家又作了主,卖出,买进,处理问题,发号施令,担保又受牵累,订约又解约,出让,租让,转让,布置,移置,攒聚,浪费。她作些傻事,幸福无边,自鸣得意,她有了安慰。当她丈夫轻视她时,她却在替丈夫倾家荡产方面得到了满足。”这一理论是吉诺曼先生躬行实践了的,并且成了他的历史。他的女人,后娶的那个,替他经管家产,结果是到他当鳏夫的那天,剩下的产业刚够他过活,他几乎把所有的东西都抵押出去,才得一万五千法郎左右的年息,其中的四分之三还得随他本人化为乌有。他没有迟疑,因为他用不着怎么考虑留遗产的问题。况且他见过,遗产是会遭到风险的,例如转变为“公有财产”;他还亲身遭受国营投资事业之害,他对国营事业的总帐册没有多大信心。“全是坎康波瓦街①的那套把戏!”他常那样说。他在受难修女街的那所房子,我们说过,是他自己的。他经常用两个用人,“一雄一雌”。用人进门时吉诺曼先生便要替他改名字。对于男用人,他按他们的省籍喊:尼姆佬,弗朗什-孔泰佬,普瓦图佬,庇卡底佬。他最后的男用人是一个五十五岁、肠肥气喘、跑不了二十步的大块头,但是,因为他生在巴荣纳,吉诺曼先生便叫他做巴斯克②佬。至于他家里的女用人,一概叫妮珂莱特(即使是我们在后面要谈到的马依妈妈也一样)。一天,来了一个厨娘,一位名厨,身材高大,属于看门妇人的那种魁伟类型。“您希望每月赚多少工资?”“三十法郎。”“您叫什么名字?”“奥林匹。”“你的工资,我给五十法郎,你的名字却得叫妮珂莱特。”

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①摄政时期(1715-1723),法国王朝聘用苏格兰人劳氏(Law)管理财政,劳氏在法国建立银行网,使许多人破产。劳氏银行设在巴黎坎康波瓦街。

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②巴斯克(Basque),法国西南与西班牙交界一带的名称,巴荣纳(Bayonne)是该地一城市。

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He had theories. Here is one of them: "When a man is passionately fond of women, and when he has himself a wife for whom he cares bud little, who is homely, cross, d gitimate, with plenty of rights, perched on the code, and jealous at need, there is but one way of extricating himself from the quandry and of procuring peace, and that is to let his wife control the purse-strings. This abdication sets him free. Then his wife busies herself, grows passionately fond of handling coin, gets her fingers covered with verdigris in the process, undertakes the education of half-share tenants and the training of farmers, convokes lawyers, presides over notaries, harangues scriveners, visits limbs of the law, follows lawsuits, draws up leases, dictates contracts, feels herself the sovereign, sells, buys, regulates, promises and compromises, binds fast and annuls, yields, concedes and retrocedes, arran`Ds, disarranges, hoards, lavishaa; she commits follies, a supreme and personal delight, and that consoles her. While her husband disdains her, she has the satisfaction of ruining her husband." This theory M. Gillenormand had himself applied, and it had become his history. His wife--the second one--had administered his fortune in such a manner that, one fine day, when M. Gillenormand found himself a widower, there remained to him just sufficient to live on, by sinking nearly the whole of it in an annuity of fifteen thousand francs, three-quarters of which would expire with him. He had not hesitated on this point, not being anxious to leave a property behind him. Besides, he had noticed that patrimonies are subject to adventures, and, for instance, become national property; he had been present at the avatars of consolidated three per cents, and he had no great faith in the Great Book of the Public Debt. "All that’s the Rue Quincampois!" he said. His house in the Rue Filles-du-Clavaire belonged to him, as we have already stated. He had two servants, "a male and a female." When a servant entered his establishment, M. Gillenormand re-baptized him. He bestowed on the men the name of their province: Nimois, Comtois, Poitevin, Picard. His last valet was a big, foundered, short-winded fellow of fifty-five, who was incapable of running twenty paces; but, as he had been born at Bayonne, M. Gillenormand called him Basque. All the female servants in his house were called Nicolette (even the Magnon, of whom we shall hear more farther on). One day, a haughty cook, a cordon bleu, of the lofty race of porters, presented herself. "How much wages do you want a month?" asked M. Gillenormand. "Thirty francs." "What is your name?" "Olympie." "You shall have fifty francs, and you shall be called Nicolette."

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