美国国家公共电台 NPR--Remembering longtime NPR foreign correspondent Anne Garrels who died at 71

Remembering longtime NPR foreign correspondent Anne Garrels who died at 71

Transcript¹

NPR's Rachel Martin speaks with Columbia Journalism² School Professor Emerita Ann Cooper about her friend, former NPR foreign correspondent Anne Garrels.

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

In September 2001, an NPR correspondent came on the line from Afghanistan. Anne Garrels was there soon after the 9/11 attacks, as the U.S. prepared to go to war. The first line of her report could summarize her career.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR BROADCAST)

ANNE GARRELS: I'm about as far away from you, I think, as I could possibly be. I'm in Faizabad, which is the only city in northeastern Afghanistan.

INSKEEP: Anne Garrels introduced Americans to people in many faraway places. She's died at 71 after living years with lung cancer. During the wars that followed 9/11, Garrels constantly sought the perspectives of people on the ground. When the U.S. prepared to attack Iraq in 2003, she was one of the few U.S. correspondents to stay in Baghdad as U.S. bombs began falling.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR BROADCAST)

GARRELS: Just from my window alone, I can see eight sites that have been hit, vast plumes³ of dark smoke billowing out. And now it appears they've set fire to trenches⁴ around - the Iraqi forces have set fire to - begun to set fire to trenches around Baghdad. These are full of heavy oil. It's something they've done in prior wars.

INSKEEP: The sort of details she would know, having covered many wars. Garrels traveled with U.S. Marines as a seemingly easy victory turned into house-to-house combat in Fallujah.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR BROADCAST)

GARRELS: When it's not the thought of mortars⁵ or grenades, there's the constant buzz of a Dragon Eye pilotless airplane hovering⁶ overhead, as its video cameras beam real-time images back to the base. Corporal Jason Hampton (ph) says the units know only what's happening a block or two away, and that's about it.

JASON HAMPTON: You just keep rolling with the punches, and you keep going 'cause it's no longer about fighting for whatever cause it's for. It's just fighting to keep the buddies⁷ around you, you know, safe or fighting, you know, to keep yourself and your buddies alive.

INSKEEP: And when she came out of Iraq, she talked with us about the experience.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR BROADCAST)

INSKEEP: Does this story become personal to you in any way?

GARRELS: Of course, it becomes personal. I have translators who work with me every day, who put their life at risk. They're doing it for a lot more than just the money; they're doing it because they're trying to find some kind of truth themselves in madness.

INSKEEP: Anne Garrels' search for truths abroad began when she studied Russian in college. She moved to the Soviet⁸ Union in the 1970s, working for ABC News as one of the few women in her profession at that time. Soviet officials expelled her, but she made it back as an NPR correspondent in time to see the Soviet Union fall.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR BROADCAST)

GARRELS: By early this morning, kiosks in Moscow had been cleaned out of newspapers. People here are desperate for any piece of information about events that affect both their daily lives and their future. Today's headlines reported the potential death blow to the Communist Party.

INSKEEP: Years later, she met a man who was still maintaining the body of the Soviet Union's founder⁹, Vladimir Lenin.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR BROADCAST)

GARRELS: According to Yuri Romakov, Lenin is in excellent shape - for a corpse¹⁰, that is. Of the two, Lenin at 126 is looking a lot better than Romakov, who's 75. He's been tending his mummy since he was...

INSKEEP: One of the other stories Garrels covered in those years was the independence of the former Soviet Republic of Ukraine, a story now back in the news.

RACHEL MARTIN, HOST:

One of Anne's colleagues over the years was Ann Cooper, who is now professor emerita at the Columbia Journalism School, and she joins us now. Ann, thanks for being here.

ANN COOPER: Yes, thank you.

MARTIN: What struck you as you heard Annie's voice in those reports?

COOPER: Well, you know, the obituaries¹¹ talk about this fearless war correspondent. And of course, her reporting from Iraq was memorable¹², and I suppose if you report on the war in Iraq and write a book called "Naked In Baghdad," it's hard to escape that label.

MARTIN: Right.

COOPER: But for me, what really set Annie (ph) apart as a journalist was her decades of reporting on the Soviet Union and then Russia after the Soviet collapse¹³. You know, Steve mentioned she went first as a TV reporter for ABC, a different kind of risk. You walked out on the street with a TV camera in Moscow in those days, you were going to get harassed¹⁴. People were going to run away from you. Nobody wanted to talk to her because it was just too dangerous. So she talked to the few people who were not scared, like Andrei Sakharov and other prominent dissidents like Roy Medvedev and Sergei Kovalyov. And, you know, as Steve pointed¹⁵ out, she did get expelled, couldn't come back for six years. When she came back in 1988, I was NPR's Moscow correspondent. Everything was changing, and I could be her guide, to some extent, to what was going on.

MARTIN: Yeah.

COOPER: But she was always my guide on understanding Russia through its history and what its people had been through.

MARTIN: She was a guide to a lot of us. I met her in Baghdad in 2007. It was my first time there. I was, frankly¹⁶, overwhelmed by that story. And she led by example. Just - she just kept doing the work, right? I mean, even when her bosses said, Annie, you need to get out, you need to take a break, she just kept going. Where did that drive come from?

COOPER: (Laughter) Well, you know, I can tell you that in Russia, the drive came from the fact that, you know, she loved the place. She loved the people. Everything fascinated her. You played a clip from her story about the guy who's in charge of maintaining Vladimir Lenin's embalmed¹⁷ corpse on Red Square. That was one of many stories that helped win her duPont-Columbia Award in 1997. She covered everything.

MARTIN: She did. And it is important to say again, until the end of her life, she was concentrated on the news, and she was fixed¹⁸ on what was happening in Ukraine. I mean, she tried to get NPR to send her there even when she was very ill.

COOPER: Yes, she did. She called me - I feel like it was about 5 minutes after the war started. And she said, I'm going to Ukraine to report. And I'm like, you're what? At that point, I don't think she weighed a hundred pounds. She was very frail¹⁹. But I just thought, who am I to tell Anne Garrels she couldn't go? You know, she and I and so many other people who've covered that country were appalled²⁰ by, you know, Russia's invasion of Ukraine and wringing²¹ our hands, saying, what can we do here? And that was her idea. Fortunately, some editors, probably some you know, resisted that. And, you know - and she understood. But she did find something that she could do, which was raising money for medical equipment, medical kits²² to help those who are wounded there. And the last time I asked, she told me that the nonprofit that she was working with had raised $1 million for assistance for Ukraine.

MARTIN: Ann Cooper, thank you so much for helping²³ us remember our friend and colleague, Anne Garrels. Thanks, Ann.

COOPER: You're welcome.

1 transcript   

n.抄本，誊本，副本，肄业证书

参考例句：

• A transcript of the tapes was presented as evidence in court.一份录音带的文字本作为证据被呈交法庭。
• They wouldn't let me have a transcript of the interview.他们拒绝给我一份采访的文字整理稿。

2 journalism   

n.新闻工作，报业

参考例句：

• He's a teacher but he does some journalism on the side.他是教师，可还兼职做一些新闻工作。
• He had an aptitude for journalism.他有从事新闻工作的才能。

3 plumes   

羽毛( plume的名词复数 )； 羽毛饰； 羽毛状物； 升上空中的羽状物

参考例句：

• The dancer wore a headdress of pink ostrich plumes. 那位舞蹈演员戴着粉色鸵鸟毛制作的头饰。
• The plumes on her bonnet barely moved as she nodded. 她点点头，那帽子的羽毛在一个劲儿颤动。

4 trenches   

深沟，地沟( trench的名词复数 )； 战壕

参考例句：

• life in the trenches 第一次世界大战期间的战壕生活
• The troops stormed the enemy's trenches and fanned out across the fields. 部队猛攻敌人的战壕，并在田野上呈扇形散开。

5 mortars   

n.迫击炮( mortar的名词复数 )；砂浆；房产；研钵

参考例句：

• They could not move their heavy mortars over the swampy ground. 他们无法把重型迫击炮移过那片沼泽地。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Where the hell are his mortars? 他有迫击炮吗？ 来自教父部分

6 hovering   

鸟( hover的现在分词 )； 靠近（某事物）； （人）徘徊； 犹豫

参考例句：

• The helicopter was hovering about 100 metres above the pad. 直升机在离发射台一百米的上空盘旋。
• I'm hovering between the concert and the play tonight. 我犹豫不决今晚是听音乐会还是看戏。

7 buddies   

n.密友( buddy的名词复数 )；同伴；弟兄；（用于称呼男子，常带怒气）家伙v.（如密友、战友、伙伴、弟兄般）交往( buddy的第三人称单数 )；做朋友；亲近（…）；伴护艾滋病人

参考例句：

• We became great buddies. 我们成了非常好的朋友。 来自辞典例句
• The two of them have become great buddies. 他们俩成了要好的朋友。 来自辞典例句

8 Soviet   

adj.苏联的，苏维埃的；n.苏维埃

参考例句：

• Zhukov was a marshal of the former Soviet Union.朱可夫是前苏联的一位元帅。
• Germany began to attack the Soviet Union in 1941.德国在1941年开始进攻苏联。

9 Founder   

n.创始者，缔造者

参考例句：

• He was extolled as the founder of their Florentine school.他被称颂为佛罗伦萨画派的鼻祖。
• According to the old tradition,Romulus was the founder of Rome.按照古老的传说，罗穆卢斯是古罗马的建国者。

10 corpse   

n.尸体，死尸

参考例句：

• What she saw was just an unfeeling corpse.她见到的只是一具全无感觉的尸体。
• The corpse was preserved from decay by embalming.尸体用香料涂抹以防腐烂。

11 obituaries   

讣告，讣闻( obituary的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Next time I read about him, I want it in the obituaries. 希望下次读到他的消息的时候，是在仆告里。
• People's obituaries are written while they're still alive? 人们在世的时候就有人给他们写讣告？

12 memorable   

adj.值得回忆的，难忘的，特别的，显著的

参考例句：

• This was indeed the most memorable day of my life.这的确是我一生中最值得怀念的日子。
• The veteran soldier has fought many memorable battles.这个老兵参加过许多难忘的战斗。

13 collapse   

vi.累倒；昏倒；倒塌；塌陷

参考例句：

• The country's economy is on the verge of collapse.国家的经济已到了崩溃的边缘。
• The engineer made a complete diagnosis of the bridge's collapse.工程师对桥的倒塌做了一次彻底的调查分析。

14 harassed   

adj. 疲倦的，厌烦的 动词harass的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• He has complained of being harassed by the police. 他投诉受到警方侵扰。
• harassed mothers with their children 带着孩子的疲惫不堪的母亲们

15 pointed   

adj.尖的，直截了当的

参考例句：

• He gave me a very sharp pointed pencil.他给我一支削得非常尖的铅笔。
• She wished to show Mrs.John Dashwood by this pointed invitation to her brother.她想通过对达茨伍德夫人提出直截了当的邀请向她的哥哥表示出来。

16 frankly   

adv.坦白地，直率地；坦率地说

参考例句：

• To speak frankly, I don't like the idea at all.老实说，我一点也不赞成这个主意。
• Frankly speaking, I'm not opposed to reform.坦率地说，我不反对改革。

17 embalmed   

adj.用防腐药物保存（尸体）的v.保存（尸体）不腐( embalm的过去式和过去分词 )；使不被遗忘；使充满香气

参考例句：

• Many fine sentiments are embalmed in poetry. 许多微妙的情感保存于诗歌中。 来自辞典例句
• In books, are embalmed the greatest thoughts of all ages. 伟大思想古今有，载入书中成不朽。 来自互联网

18 fixed   

adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的

参考例句：

• Have you two fixed on a date for the wedding yet?你们俩选定婚期了吗？
• Once the aim is fixed,we should not change it arbitrarily.目标一旦确定，我们就不应该随意改变。

19 frail   

adj.身体虚弱的；易损坏的

参考例句：

• Mrs. Warner is already 96 and too frail to live by herself.华纳太太已经九十六岁了，身体虚弱，不便独居。
• She lay in bed looking particularly frail.她躺在床上，看上去特别虚弱。

20 appalled   

v.使惊骇，使充满恐惧( appall的过去式和过去分词)adj.惊骇的；丧胆的

参考例句：

• The brutality of the crime has appalled the public. 罪行之残暴使公众大为震惊。
• They were appalled by the reports of the nuclear war. 他们被核战争的报道吓坏了。 来自《简明英汉词典》

21 wringing   

淋湿的，湿透的

参考例句：

• He was wringing wet after working in the field in the hot sun. 烈日下在田里干活使他汗流满面。
• He is wringing out the water from his swimming trunks. 他正在把游泳裤中的水绞出来。

22 kits   

衣物和装备( kit的名词复数 )； 成套用品； 配套元件

参考例句：

• Keep your kits closed and locked when not in use. 不用的话把你的装备都锁好放好。
• Gifts Articles, Toy and Games, Wooden Toys, Puzzles, Craft Kits. 采购产品礼品，玩具和游戏，木制的玩具，智力玩具，手艺装备。

23 helping   

n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的

参考例句：

• The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
• By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。