经济学人31:政治家,作家迈克尔·富特

 　　Obituary；Michael Foot；

　　讣告；迈克尔·富特；

　　Michael Foot, politician and man of letters, died on March 3rd, aged¹ 96.

　　政治家、作家迈克尔·富特于本月3日仙逝，享年96岁。

　　He died a much-loved Englishman, renowed for his untidy shock of white hair, his shambling wanderings on Hampstead Heath with his dog Dizzy, his devotion to literature, and the modesty² that allowed him, when leader of the Labour Party, to stand in his anorak waiting at the bus stop. Deep into old age, half-blind, he never failed to keep up with the latest works on his great loves, Shelley and Byron, and to hold forth³ over breakfast—several eggs running all over his plate—about the latest troubles of his beloved party, and its prospects⁴ for the future.

　　他，名叫迈克尔·富特（Michael Foot），一位备受爱戴的英吉利人——带着他引人注目的一头蓬乱的白发、带着他在普斯泰德西斯公园牵着小狗迪齐蹒跚闲行的身影、带着他对文学的挚爱、还带着他任工党党魁时，身着风帽夹克在站台候车所赢得的谦逊美名——离开了人间。进入高龄后，他几近失明，雪莱和拜伦的作品，乃其至爱，一俟新评问世，他必关注；而且，在早餐（那早餐是几枚在餐盘中来回滚动的鸡蛋）时侃侃而谈，谈论他所爱戴的工党的困境和未来。

　　He was not always so popular. As a left-wing journalist working for the right-wing proprietor⁵ Max Beaverbrook before, during and after the war, the vituperative⁶ scorn of his prose injured those who did not realise that it masked a complete lack of personal malice⁷. But age and familiarity smoothed the sharp edges. “Sweet man, Michael,” remarked Anthony Crosland, a revisionist socialist⁸ who, in the 1970s, had spent most of his time fighting him.

　　迈克尔·富特并不总是备受爱戴。在二战前、中、后的一段时间，他作为一名左翼记者在右翼领袖东马克斯·弗布鲁克旗下工作，他那充满责骂鄙视的文章伤害了一些人的自尊——这些人实际上没有意识到他的文章完全不带有对个人的蓄意伤害。但时间和世故人情消融了他的锐气。“好人，迈克尔”，安东尼·克罗斯兰如是说——20世纪70年代，修正社会主义者安东尼·克罗斯兰在与迈克尔·富特的论战中度过了大部分时光。

　　The leadership of the Labour Party was not a job which—for most of his life—he sought. When Jim Callaghan stood down as leader in 1980, the two men most likely to succeed him were Denis Healey on the right and Peter Shore on the left. But Mr Foot, by then 67, had developed a certain fond vanity which was worked on by a Machiavellian⁹ trade-union leader, Clive Jenkins, to persuade him to stand. The result was the worst disaster that could have befallen Mr Foot. He won.

　　出任工党党魁不是富特一生中大部分时间里所寻求的事业。1981年，吉姆·卡拉汉作为(工党)党魁下台时，最有可能接替他的两个人是(党内)右翼派系的丹尼斯·希利和左翼派系的彼得·肖尔。 那时的富特已经67岁，心里开始滋生出几分骄傲自满，一位狡猾的工会领袖正是利用这一点，劝说他挺身参选，而最终的结果则是他最不愿意看到的——他赢了。

　　The Labour Party then was a veritable Bermuda triangle, containing both ardent¹⁰ followers¹¹ of the left-wing policies advocated by Tony Benn, and a right-wing group, led by Roy Jenkins, which was threatening to start a new centre party. Mr Foot's appeal was that, being of the left but not of the far left, he could hold this combustible¹² mixture together.

　　是时，工党是一个名副其实的百慕大三角架构，其中既有托尼·本主张的左翼政策的追随者，也有罗伊·詹金斯领导的右翼团体，后者威胁要创建一个新政党。富特的左，但又左得不太远的主张，可以将这两种易燃物揉合在一起。

　　To a degree, he did. The breakaway was contained. Mr Foot accepted most of the policies of the left, including unilateral nuclear disarmament which he had always agreed with, and many others that he hadn't. This was just enough to preserve his party broadly intact. Unfortunately, it also made it unelectable. In the 1983 general election, fought on a manifesto¹³ described by one shadow minister as “the longest suicide note in history”, the party started badly and finished worse.

　　在一定程度上，富特做到了这一点。党内分裂得到控制。富特接受了左派的大部分政策，包括他一直主张的单方面核裁军以及他过去不曾赞同的其他一些政策。他的这些举措仅可大体上保持党内团结。遗憾的是，这些举措未能确保他成功连任。1983年大选期间，由于富特发表了被一位影子大臣形容为“历史上篇幅最长的遗书”的竞选政纲，致使工党开局不顺，结果更糟。

　　Even before the election, Mr Foot was not an effective leader. He dithered terribly. At one point, he insisted in the Commons that Peter Tatchell, a left-winger, would never be a Labour candidate while he was leader. A little later, he decided¹⁴ that he could be. Most voters could not conceive of him as a plausible¹⁵ prime minister. He seemed to come from another age, perhaps the 19th century, a West Country radical¹⁶ in his family's best tradition. He could not get the hang of television, and horrified¹⁷ the country by appearing at the Cenotaph one Remembrance Day in a short, scruffy¹⁸ coat. By the time he stepped down gratefully after his defeat, he seemed a tragi-comic figure.

　　即使在选举前，富特先生也算不上是一个卓有成效的领导人。他相当地优柔寡断。有一次，当时他还是工党领导人时，他在下院坚持说左翼成员彼得·塔契尔永远不能成为工党的候选人。过了一会儿，他又断定他会是候选人。多数选民无法想象他真的成为首相。他似乎来自另一个时代——或许就是来自19世纪吧，他是一位那个世纪英国西南部的、带着所在团队优良传统的激进分子。他不懂如何在电视机上秀形象，而令举国震惊的是，他于荣军纪念日在和平纪念碑出席纪念活动时，身着短裤、衣冠不整。他在竞选落败后，却带着感激引退的行为，令人感觉他是一位悲喜剧式的人物。

　　His political judgment¹⁹ was dodgy from the beginning. In 1974-75, when he first went into government as employment secretary, he was responsible for relations with the trade unions. In the words of one cabinet member of the time, “The relationship was one of give-and-take. The government gave and they took.” Industrial subsidies²⁰, housing subsidies, even food subsidies flowed out in an effort to buy low pay settlements. All were enthusiastically supported by Mr Foot. None made a jot²¹ of difference to escalating²² wage agreements.

　　富特的政治辨别力自始就不怎么样。 1974至75年期间，他第一次进入政府内阁，出任劳工部大臣，在处理与工会的关系上，他是应受指责的。用当时一位政府内阁成员的话说：“这种相互妥协的关系变成一边倒。政府给，他们取”。工业补贴、住房补贴、甚至食物补贴大量花掉，以求与工会达成低工资协议。所有这一切都得到了富特先生满腔热忱的支持。但在免于形成高工资协议上毫无效果。

　　Mr Foot was slow to realise this. But once he had, he entered perhaps the most effective period of his political life. In an extraordinary speech to his party's conference in 1976, he quoted Joseph Conrad: “Always facing it, Captain MacWhir. That's the way to get through. Always facing it—that's the way we've got to solve this problem.” By 1978 the economy was back on an even keel and Labour was neck-and-neck in the polls.

　　富特意识到这一点是缓慢的。但是，一旦他意识到了，就进入了也许是他政治生涯中最卓有成效的时期。在1976年工党年会上的一次特别演讲中，他引用约瑟夫·康拉德的话：“麦克惠尔船长，总得面对现实，这才是到达目的地的办法。总得面对现实——这才是我们不得不解决此麻烦的办法”。到1978年时，经济又回复平稳，且工党在民调中的支持率也与经济的转好同步上升。

　　But Mr Foot, by then the leader of the House of Commons, convinced himself that his party would lose an election that October. More important, he convinced the prime minister. The election was postponed²³ to the spring of 1979. The “winter of discontent”, with widespread strikes, intervened.This was the first of two elections which Mr Foot delivered to Margaret Thatcher²⁴ on a plate.

　　不过，时任下议院领袖的富特自我确认，他所在的工党将会在10月的大选中落马。尤其是，他也使首相(即当时由工党出任的首相詹姆斯·卡拉汉)认识到这一点。因伴之以大罢工的“不满的冬天”事件的影响，10月份的选举被推迟到1979年的春天。这次选举是富特两次轻易将胜选权让渡给撒切尔夫人中的第一次。

　　He could seem unworldly. As a minister, he once boarded a plane to a Socialist International conference in Europe without a penny in foreign currency, carrying only a leather-bound volume of Hazlitt. Yet in one sense, he was entirely²⁵ worldly. He had an instinctive²⁶ understanding of people. He wrote beautifully and, after overcoming a stammer²⁷, was a wonderful orator²⁸: humorous, self-deprecating, empathetic. He could be a hater—anyone who failed to perceive the genius of his hero Aneurin Bevan, whose biography he wrote, had best look out—but he was incapable²⁹ of sustained malevolence³⁰.

　　富特似乎天生不谙世故。作为一位大臣，他曾经在没有一分外币的情况下，仅携带一本黑兹利特的皮面装订书籍，就登上一架飞机，去欧洲出席一个“国际社会主义者”会议。但在某种意义上说，他又老于世故。他对民众悲喜如天才般洞若观火。他文笔优美，而且在克服口吃后成了优秀的演说家，他幽默诙谐、自嘲自谦、善解人意。他也会恨人的—— 如果还有谁看不到富特所撰写的传记中的主人公安奈林·贝文的天才的话， 那可就要小心点——不过他虽然会恨人， 恨意却从不长久。

　　Over the last few years of his life, Mr Foot contemplated³¹ writing a serious work of socialist philosophy. Instead, he embarked³² on a biography of an eccentric literary genius, H.G. Wells. In the end, that seemed to suit him better.

　　在富特生命的最后几年，他打算写一部关于社会主义思想体系的严肃著作。相反，他却写起了一部关于一位超乎寻常的文学天才HG威尔斯的传记来。也许，后者于他更适合。

1 aged   

adj.年老的，陈年的

参考例句：

• He had put on weight and aged a little.他胖了，也老点了。
• He is aged,but his memory is still good.他已年老，然而记忆力还好。

2 modesty   

n.谦逊，虚心，端庄，稳重，羞怯，朴素

参考例句：

• Industry and modesty are the chief factors of his success.勤奋和谦虚是他成功的主要因素。
• As conceit makes one lag behind,so modesty helps one make progress.骄傲使人落后，谦虚使人进步。

3 forth   

adv.向前；向外，往外

参考例句：

• The wind moved the trees gently back and forth.风吹得树轻轻地来回摇晃。
• He gave forth a series of works in rapid succession.他很快连续发表了一系列的作品。

4 prospects   

n.希望，前途(恒为复数)

参考例句：

• There is a mood of pessimism in the company about future job prospects. 公司中有一种对工作前景悲观的情绪。
• They are less sanguine about the company's long-term prospects. 他们对公司的远景不那么乐观。

5 proprietor   

n.所有人；业主；经营者

参考例句：

• The proprietor was an old acquaintance of his.业主是他的一位旧相识。
• The proprietor of the corner grocery was a strange thing in my life.拐角杂货店店主是我生活中的一个怪物。

6 vituperative   

adj.谩骂的；斥责的

参考例句：

• He is often the victim of vituperative remarks concerning his wealth.他经常因为富有而受到辱骂。
• I was really taken aback by their vituperative animosity toward the Soviet Union.他们对苏联如此深恶痛绝，着实令我吃惊。

7 malice   

n.恶意，怨恨，蓄意；[律]预谋

参考例句：

• I detected a suggestion of malice in his remarks.我觉察出他说的话略带恶意。
• There was a strong current of malice in many of his portraits.他的许多肖像画中都透着一股强烈的怨恨。

8 socialist   

n.社会主义者；adj.社会主义的

参考例句：

• China is a socialist country,and a developing country as well.中国是一个社会主义国家，也是一个发展中国家。
• His father was an ardent socialist.他父亲是一个热情的社会主义者。

9 machiavellian   

adj.权谋的，狡诈的

参考例句：

• A Machiavellian plot was suspected.人们怀疑背后有不可告人的阴谋。
• In this layer,Obama implied American policies that are cautious and Machiavellian.在这个层面，奥巴马含蓄地表达了美国的谨慎、权谋的（新）政策。

10 ardent   

adj.热情的，热烈的，强烈的，烈性的

参考例句：

• He's an ardent supporter of the local football team.他是本地足球队的热情支持者。
• Ardent expectations were held by his parents for his college career.他父母对他的大学学习抱着殷切的期望。

11 followers   

追随者( follower的名词复数 )； 用户； 契据的附面； 从动件

参考例句：

• the followers of Mahatma Gandhi 圣雄甘地的拥护者
• The reformer soon gathered a band of followers round him. 改革者很快就获得一群追随者支持他。

12 combustible   

a. 易燃的,可燃的; n. 易燃物,可燃物

参考例句：

• Don't smoke near combustible materials. 别在易燃的材料附近吸烟。
• We mustn't take combustible goods aboard. 我们不可带易燃品上车。

13 manifesto   

n.宣言，声明

参考例句：

• I was involved in the preparation of Labour's manifesto.我参与了工党宣言的起草工作。
• His manifesto promised measures to protect them.他在宣言里保证要为他们采取保护措施。

14 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。

15 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。

16 radical   

n.激进份子，原子团，根号；adj.根本的，激进的，彻底的

参考例句：

• The patient got a radical cure in the hospital.病人在医院得到了根治。
• She is radical in her demands.她的要求十分偏激。

17 horrified   

a.(表现出)恐惧的

参考例句：

• The whole country was horrified by the killings. 全国都对这些凶杀案感到大为震惊。
• We were horrified at the conditions prevailing in local prisons. 地方监狱的普遍状况让我们震惊。

18 scruffy   

adj.肮脏的，不洁的

参考例句：

• Despite her scruffy clothes,there was an air of sophistication about her.尽管她衣衫褴褛，但神态老练世故。
• His scruffy appearance does not reflect his character.他邋遢的外表并不反映他的性格。

19 judgment   

n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见

参考例句：

• The chairman flatters himself on his judgment of people.主席自认为他审视人比别人高明。
• He's a man of excellent judgment.他眼力过人。

20 subsidies   

n.补贴，津贴，补助金( subsidy的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• European agriculture ministers failed to break the deadlock over farm subsidies. 欧洲各国农业部长在农业补贴问题上未能打破僵局。
• Agricultural subsidies absorb about half the EU's income. 农业补贴占去了欧盟收入的大约一半。 来自《简明英汉词典》

21 jot   

n.少量；vi.草草记下；vt.匆匆写下

参考例句：

• I'll jot down their address before I forget it.我得赶快把他们的地址写下来，免得忘了。
• There is not a jot of evidence to say it does them any good.没有丝毫的证据显示这对他们有任何好处。

22 escalating   

v.（使）逐步升级( escalate的现在分词 )；（使）逐步扩大；（使）更高；（使）更大

参考例句：

• The cost of living is escalating. 生活费用在迅速上涨。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The cost of living is escalating in the country. 这个国家的生活费用在上涨。 来自辞典例句

23 postponed   

vt.& vi.延期，缓办，（使）延迟vt.把…放在次要地位；[语]把…放在后面（或句尾）vi.（疟疾等）延缓发作（或复发）

参考例句：

• The trial was postponed indefinitely. 审讯无限期延迟。
• The game has already been postponed three times. 这场比赛已经三度延期了。

24 thatcher   

n.茅屋匠

参考例句：

• Tom Sawyer was in the skiff that bore Judge Thatcher. 汤姆 - 索亚和撒切尔法官同乘一条小艇。 来自英汉文学 - 汤姆历险
• Mrs. Thatcher was almost crazed; and Aunt Polly, also. 撒切尔夫人几乎神经失常，还有波莉姨妈也是。 来自英汉文学 - 汤姆历险

25 entirely   

ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地

参考例句：

• The fire was entirely caused by their neglect of duty. 那场火灾完全是由于他们失职而引起的。
• His life was entirely given up to the educational work. 他的一生统统献给了教育工作。

26 instinctive   

adj.(出于)本能的；直觉的；(出于)天性的

参考例句：

• He tried to conceal his instinctive revulsion at the idea.他试图饰盖自己对这一想法本能的厌恶。
• Animals have an instinctive fear of fire.动物本能地怕火。

27 stammer   

n.结巴，口吃；v.结结巴巴地说

参考例句：

• He's got a bad stammer.他口吃非常严重。
• We must not try to play off the boy troubled with a stammer.我们不可以取笑这个有口吃病的男孩。

28 orator   

n.演说者，演讲者，雄辩家

参考例句：

• He was so eloquent that he cut down the finest orator.他能言善辩，胜过最好的演说家。
• The orator gestured vigorously while speaking.这位演讲者讲话时用力地做手势。

29 incapable   

adj.无能力的，不能做某事的

参考例句：

• He would be incapable of committing such a cruel deed.他不会做出这么残忍的事。
• Computers are incapable of creative thought.计算机不会创造性地思维。

30 malevolence   

n.恶意，狠毒

参考例句：

• I had always been aware of a frame of malevolence under his urbanity. 我常常觉察到，在他温文尔雅的下面掩藏着一种恶意。 来自辞典例句

31 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。

32 embarked   

乘船( embark的过去式和过去分词 )； 装载； 从事

参考例句：

• We stood on the pier and watched as they embarked. 我们站在突码头上目送他们登船。
• She embarked on a discourse about the town's origins. 她开始讲本市的起源。