精美英文欣赏:固定电话的消亡

Is This the Death of Telephone?

固定电话的消亡

The demise¹ of the landline has gone almost unnoticed.

固定电话的消亡几乎是无声无息的。

After all, the din² of mundane³ phone chatter⁴ is all around us-on the bus, at the next table in a restaurant.

毕竟，我们身边仍然充斥着日常电话聊天的嘈杂声-无论是在公交车上，还是在餐馆的邻桌处。

What difference does it make whether the cables lie underground or not?

电话线是否埋在地下对我我们来说又有什么区别呢？

A lot, actually.

实际上，有很大区别。

The death of the landline is a cultural shift that affects our personal and public lives.

固定电话的消亡是一场影响着我们个人和公共生活的文化变革。

It has freed us from our groupings-in the office,where email has disconnected us from what the people who sit three feet away do all day,and even more significantly, at home.

它将我们从群体中分解出来-在办公室，电子邮件切断了距离仅咫尺之遥的同事间的交流；但更为显著的是它对家庭的影响。

In any household in the days before mobiles took over,the landline served as a switchboard for everyone's connections outside the home.

在手机一统天下之前，固定电话是家庭成员与外界交流的中转站。

The phone rang, you answered it,you asked who was calling,and then you passed the phone over.

铃声响起，你拿起电话，询问是谁，然后将话筒递给对方要找的人。

Everyone knew who called you, and how long you spoke⁵ for.

每个人都会知道谁找了你，你们聊了多久。

Within families, couples, flatmates,it was a kind of invisible knowledge map about the state of everyone's romantic and social lives,and one we took for granted.

家人，夫妻和室友间存在着一张刻画每个人的恋爱和社交生活的隐形认知地图，我们曾经认为这一切都是理所当然的。

Now, we are all freelance operatives.

而如今我们都变成了独立的操作员。

And devoted⁶ though we are to our mobiles,most of the time we aren't talking but typing.

尽管我们钟情于手机，但大部分时间我们并不是在用它聊天，而是在打字。

Comic Relief this year heavily promoted the option to donate by text,to save you having to actually speak to anyone.

慈善机构Comic Relief今年大力推广短信捐款，使你无须跟任何人交谈。

Office culture has become increasingly silent.

办公室文化变得愈发安静。

As someone who learned how to do my job as a junior by listening to people around me-editors commissioning, writers interviewing-I wonder how today's young people learn the ropes.

在我刚入行时，我是通过聆听周围人来学会如果工作的-编辑怎样分派任务，撰稿人怎样采访对象-这让我不禁好奇，现在的年轻人是怎样学会这些技巧的。

Now that the corner office is as retrospective as Mad Men,open-plan culture demands a level of quiet.

既然位于角落的豪华办公室意见是属于《广告狂人》那个时代的古董了，开放的办公隔间确实需要一定程度的安静。

But it's odd, on a personal as well as a professional level.

但不论从哪个角度还是专业角度来说，这种安静都是古怪的。

When I started work,you knew everything about the person who sat next to you,because they had no choice but to conduct their relationships with their lover,their mother, their bank manager from their desk phone,while you had no choice but to pretend not to listen.

在我刚开始工作的年代，你会了解坐在你旁边的同事的一切。因为他们不得不使用桌上的固定电话打给自己的请人，妈妈和银行经理，而你也不得不假装什么都没听到。

These days, all you overhear is the clatter⁷ of typing,the lull⁸ while they wait for a response,and then the rapt concentration when the emailed reply appears.

如今，你无意中听到的只有键盘的敲击声，他们等待回复时的沉寂，以及收到邮件回复时的专注。

1 demise   

n.死亡；v.让渡，遗赠，转让

参考例句：

• He praised the union's aims but predicted its early demise.他赞扬协会的目标，但预期这一协会很快会消亡。
• The war brought about the industry's sudden demise.战争道致这个行业就这么突然垮了。

2 din   

n.喧闹声，嘈杂声

参考例句：

• The bustle and din gradually faded to silence as night advanced.随着夜越来越深，喧闹声逐渐沉寂。
• They tried to make themselves heard over the din of the crowd.他们力图让自己的声音盖过人群的喧闹声。

3 mundane   

adj.平凡的；尘世的；宇宙的

参考例句：

• I hope I can get an interesting job and not something mundane.我希望我可以得到的是一份有趣的工作，而不是一份平凡无奇的。
• I find it humorous sometimes that even the most mundane occurrences can have an impact on our awareness.我发现生活有时挺诙谐的，即使是最平凡的事情也能影响我们的感知。

4 chatter   

vi.／n.喋喋不休；短促尖叫；(牙齿)打战

参考例句：

• Her continuous chatter vexes me.她的喋喋不休使我烦透了。
• I've had enough of their continual chatter.我已厌烦了他们喋喋不休的闲谈。

5 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

6 devoted   

adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的

参考例句：

• He devoted his life to the educational cause of the motherland.他为祖国的教育事业贡献了一生。
• We devoted a lengthy and full discussion to this topic.我们对这个题目进行了长时间的充分讨论。

7 clatter   

v./n.(使)发出连续而清脆的撞击声

参考例句：

• The dishes and bowls slid together with a clatter.碟子碗碰得丁丁当当的。
• Don't clatter your knives and forks.别把刀叉碰得咔哒响。

8 lull   

v.使安静，使入睡，缓和，哄骗；n.暂停，间歇

参考例句：

• The drug put Simpson in a lull for thirty minutes.药物使辛普森安静了30分钟。
• Ground fighting flared up again after a two-week lull.经过两个星期的平静之后，地面战又突然爆发了。