美国国家公共电台 NPR--A new book about grief has its roots in the long-lost diaries of a 9/11 victim

A new book about grief has its roots in the long-lost diaries of a 9/11 victim

Transcript¹

Bobby McIlvaine was killed on 9/11 at age 26. The Atlantic writer Jennifer Senior, who knew him, read his diaries. They were the basis for a Pulitzer Prize-winning essay that she's turned into a book.

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

Bobby McIlvaine was just 26 years old on September 11, 2001. He was at the World Trade Center by chance, helping² a colleague set up for a banking³ presentation. And he was killed. The Atlantic writer Jennifer Senior knew Bobby well. His parents let her read his journals, and then she wrote about him in what would become a Pulitzer Prize-winning essay. She told Rachel Martin how she felt compelled to investigate his life.

JENNIFER SENIOR: He was an avid⁴ diarist, and he had a diary sitting on his desk on September 11 that his father gave to the woman that he was going to marry, that Bobby was going to marry.

RACHEL MARTIN, BYLINE⁵: Her name is Jen.

SENIOR: Her name was Jen. Yes. And, you know, he was in this fugue state as he was cleaning out Bobby's room. And Jen was with him. And Jen took one look at that diary, saw that her name was all over it, and said, may I have this? And his father said, yes, yes, of course. Take it. Maybe you'll find something in there that will be useful for the eulogy⁶. He was trying to be kind. And Bobby's mother, when she found this out, was so upset and said, how can you give away the last thing our son ever wrote? It was - it's a chance to have - to hear his voice one more time, to, in a weird⁷ way, be in conversation with him, to hear fresh conversation from him. This was a chance to hear their son, who was a good writer and had a lively mind. And when she asked Jen, his fiancee, for this diary, she never got it back. Jen wouldn't give it back. And I became obsessed⁸ with this thing, just as Helen did. I could not understand why. Why would you not give this back to a mother? And I just became bound and determined⁹ to get this diary back.

MARTIN: Over all these years, you had just had Bobby's mom, Helen - her version of this story.

SENIOR: That is exactly right. It did not occur to me that there could be a perfectly¹⁰ humane¹¹, plausible¹², sympathetic, really profound goose-pimpling explanation for why Jen may have wanted to hang on to this diary.

MARTIN: What happened when you tracked Jen down and confronted her about this? I don't know if confront is the right word. Seems probably more aggressive than it actually was.

SENIOR: She was extraordinarily¹³ gracious. I wrote her this very gingerly note. You know, I said to her, you know, that I really wanted to just ask her about how she was processing this trauma¹⁴ 20 years in. She wrote me back this incredibly nice note, saying that she had a very fond memory of the two of us talking right after we had discovered that Bobby had died. I have no memory of this at all, which just shows how funny our memories are. I mean, to some degree, this book is about - the piece is about how flawed our memories are, particularly when it comes to trauma. But she couldn't have been more gracious, and she was ready to share it. And she had contemplated¹⁵ it. And she was, I think, in a funny way, grateful for the opportunity.

MARTIN: She was grateful for the opportunity to talk with you, to sit and share memories. And in the end, what did you learn about her motivations for keeping the journal?

SENIOR: Oh, but if I tell that, I give away.

MARTIN: Oh, we don't have to. Oh, no, we don't have to.

SENIOR: (Laughter).

MARTIN: I always am nervous about keeping spoilers.

SENIOR: Oh, no. I love that you asked. I love that you asked. Well, here's what I will say.

MARTIN: OK.

SENIOR: The last page you read it - and I meant it. I mean, the hair - every hair on the back of my neck was, you know, standing¹⁶ up. It was - when Helen finally saw it - because Jen gave me permission to Xerox¹⁷ it - you know, Helen said, oh, my God, how could she not have held on to it? I mean, I would have had to have given her this diary if I'd known what was in it. I mean, this is a 26-year-old young man, right? I think Helen made the mistake of thinking that there was going to be a lot of material in there about her because in his previous diaries, of course, in the diaries of a teenager, many of the ones that she'd seen, he talks about his family. But he had just fallen in love. A lot of this diary was about Jen. And I'm not going to say all the various things that were in there. And some of them are also about grief, coincidentally. And so what - so it made it doubly interesting because his diary wasn't just kind of this historical artifact with kind of a crystal ball. It kind of had all of these pearls of wisdom about how to grieve. And no one could have predicted that.

MARTIN: There's a subplot in this story about this marriage between...

SENIOR: Yes.

MARTIN: ...Helen and Bob Sr.

SENIOR: Yes.

MARTIN: And wow, the grace that she extends to him as he is working through a lot of questions about how his kid died, right? And there's not information - they don't know what his last moments were like. And so Bob Sr. starts to fill the vacuum with a lot of conspiracy¹⁸ theories. How did Helen absorb all that?

SENIOR: Grace is such a perfect word, and it's exactly right. I mean, he decided¹⁹ that the government was involved. This was an inside job. He went down a rabbit hole. She couldn't have cared less. In fact, she was - I wouldn't say hostile to this idea, but she really wanted no part of it. She didn't want to think about 9/11. She didn't want to think about 9/11 conspiracy theories. I mean, while she wanted to grieve in her own way, there was a grief counselor²⁰ who told them early on - and this was a very useful metaphor²¹ for them - that when someone dies, you have to imagine that you are at the top of a mountain, and you all have a broken leg. So you can't help each other get down the mountain. You're going to have to get down in your own way. And so this was his way.

I mean, the only exception that I think one could take to that metaphor, which someone pointed²² out to me, is Bob Sr. doesn't even seem to want to get down the mountain, right? He wants to live in his grief. He's in this, like, kind of glass house of sorrow. And what's amazing to me is that Helen has accepted that and said, he doesn't want to get down. You know, he's going to stay right here with his grief.

(SOUNDBITE OF SOLIDEO'S "JESUS SAUVE")

INSKEEP: Jennifer Senior, speaking with our friend Rachel Martin about her essay "On Grief."

(SOUNDBITE OF SOLIDEO'S "JESUS SAUVE")

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 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。

3 banking   

n.银行业，银行学，金融业

参考例句：

• John is launching his son on a career in banking.约翰打算让儿子在银行界谋一个新职位。
• He possesses an extensive knowledge of banking.他具有广博的银行业务知识。

4 avid   

adj.热心的；贪婪的；渴望的；劲头十足的

参考例句：

• He is rich,but he is still avid of more money.他很富有,但他还想贪图更多的钱。
• She was avid for praise from her coach.那女孩渴望得到教练的称赞。

5 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

6 eulogy   

n.颂词；颂扬

参考例句：

• He needs no eulogy from me or from any other man. 他不需要我或者任何一个人来称颂。
• Mr.Garth gave a long eulogy about their achievements in the research.加思先生对他们的研究成果大大地颂扬了一番。

7 weird   

adj.古怪的，离奇的；怪诞的，神秘而可怕的

参考例句：

• From his weird behaviour,he seems a bit of an oddity.从他不寻常的行为看来，他好像有点怪。
• His weird clothes really gas me.他的怪衣裳简直笑死人。

8 obsessed   

adj.心神不宁的,鬼迷心窍的,沉迷的

参考例句：

• He's obsessed by computers. 他迷上了电脑。
• The fear of death obsessed him throughout his old life. 他晚年一直受着死亡恐惧的困扰。

9 determined   

adj.坚定的；有决心的

参考例句：

• I have determined on going to Tibet after graduation.我已决定毕业后去西藏。
• He determined to view the rooms behind the office.他决定查看一下办公室后面的房间。

10 perfectly   

adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地

参考例句：

• The witnesses were each perfectly certain of what they said.证人们个个对自己所说的话十分肯定。
• Everything that we're doing is all perfectly above board.我们做的每件事情都是光明正大的。

11 humane   

adj.人道的，富有同情心的

参考例句：

• Is it humane to kill animals for food?宰杀牲畜来吃合乎人道吗？
• Their aim is for a more just and humane society.他们的目标是建立一个更加公正、博爱的社会。

12 plausible   

adj.似真实的，似乎有理的，似乎可信的

参考例句：

• His story sounded plausible.他说的那番话似乎是真实的。
• Her story sounded perfectly plausible.她的说辞听起来言之有理。

13 extraordinarily   

adv.格外地；极端地

参考例句：

• She is an extraordinarily beautiful girl.她是个美丽非凡的姑娘。
• The sea was extraordinarily calm that morning.那天清晨，大海出奇地宁静。

14 trauma   

n.外伤，精神创伤

参考例句：

• Counselling is helping him work through this trauma.心理辅导正帮助他面对痛苦。
• The phobia may have its root in a childhood trauma.恐惧症可能源于童年时期的创伤。

15 contemplated   

adj. 预期的 动词contemplate的过去分词形式

参考例句：

• The doctor contemplated the difficult operation he had to perform. 医生仔细地考虑他所要做的棘手的手术。
• The government has contemplated reforming the entire tax system. 政府打算改革整个税收体制。

16 standing   

n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的

参考例句：

• After the earthquake only a few houses were left standing.地震过后只有几幢房屋还立着。
• They're standing out against any change in the law.他们坚决反对对法律做任何修改。

17 xerox   

n./v.施乐复印机，静电复印

参考例句：

• Xerox and Lucent are two more high-tech companies run by women.施乐和朗讯是另外两家由女性经营的大科技公司。
• You cannot take it home,but you can xerox it.你不能把它带回家，但可以复印。

18 conspiracy   

n.阴谋，密谋，共谋

参考例句：

• The men were found guilty of conspiracy to murder.这些人被裁决犯有阴谋杀人罪。
• He claimed that it was all a conspiracy against him.他声称这一切都是一场针对他的阴谋。

19 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

20 counselor   

n.顾问，法律顾问

参考例句：

• The counselor gave us some disinterested advice.顾问给了我们一些无私的忠告。
• Chinese commercial counselor's office in foreign countries.中国驻国外商务参赞处。

21 metaphor   

n.隐喻，暗喻

参考例句：

• Using metaphor,we say that computers have senses and a memory.打个比方，我们可以说计算机有感觉和记忆力。
• In poetry the rose is often a metaphor for love.玫瑰在诗中通常作为爱的象征。

22 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。