美国国家公共电台 NPR Kazuo Ishiguro Is Awarded Nobel Prize In Literature

 

ROBERT SIEGEL, HOST:

This year's Nobel Prize for literature goes to a Japanese-born British writer who is best known for his 1989 novel "The Remains¹ Of The Day." The movie adaptation starred Anthony Hopkins as a deeply repressed butler who can't handle his feelings for a housekeeper² played by Emma Thompson.

(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "THE REMAINS OF THE DAY")

EMMA THOMPSON: (As Miss Kenton) Can it be that our Mr. Stevens is flesh and blood after all and he cannot trust himself?

ANTHONY HOPKINS: (As James Stevens) You know what I'm doing, Miss Kenton? I'm placing my thoughts elsewhere while you chatter³ away.

SIEGEL: The Swedish Academy said Kazuo Ishiguro's writing uncovered the abyss beneath our illusory sense of connection with the world. NPR's Neda Ulaby has more.

NEDA ULABY, BYLINE⁴: Kazuo Ishiguro was not to the manor⁵ born.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED BROADCAST)

KAZUO ISHIGURO: I've never met an English butler, actually.

ULABY: That's Ishiguro on WHYY's Fresh Air back in 1995. After the book came out, though, he said he did correspond with some of them. He moved to England from Japan when he was 5. Ishiguro's work is often about memory, myth and nostalgia⁶. And politically, he says, most of us are kind of like butlers.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED BROADCAST)

ISHIGURO: We are very far away from where the big decisions are made. And yet although we live in a democracy and we're supposed to be in charge, in practice what we end up doing is we end up doing our little jobs to the best of our ability and just kind of offer up our little contribution, hoping that the organization we work for, the boss we work for, the cause we work for is a good one.

ULABY: Before he became a best-selling author Ishiguro was a social worker helping⁷ homeless people, and for a while he wanted to be a musician. His first two novels were set in Japan even though at that point he had not been back. Ishiguro was born in Nagasaki less than a decade after it was bombed by the United States. He says the family tended to talk about it indirectly⁸.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED BROADCAST)

ISHIGURO: That was the building that was built after the atomic bomb or that bridge used to be there until the atomic bomb. And occasionally somebody would be talking about some person who disappeared.

ULABY: In a way that informed Ishiguro's next best-seller, "Never Let Me Go," also made into a film.

(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "NEVER LET ME GO")

SALLY HAWKINS: (As Miss Lucy) None of you will go to America. None of you will work in supermarkets. None of you will do anything except live the life that has already been set out for you.

ULABY: The novel is about cloned children. They're bred for their organs and live passively in a boarding school until their bodies are harvested. Ishiguro wanted to create a world where genetic⁹ engineering is as dangerous as nuclear power. And as he told NPR in 2010, he wanted to explore self-deception and how you make peace with a life beyond your control.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED BROADCAST)

ISHIGURO: What interests me is the surprising, enormous extent to which most people accept the fate that's been given to them and find some dignity.

ULABY: Ishiguro, who's 62, is part of a generation of Anglophone authors who include Peter Carey, Salman Rushdie and Michael Ondaatje. All have been published by Sonny Mehta. The editor-in-chief of Knopf woke up today to the news of Ishiguro's win.

SONNY MEHTA: It was unexpected but hugely deserved.

ULABY: Mehta's company has ordered up 200,000 copies of Ishiguro's novels, including his most recent, "Buried Giant." He's also delighted, he says, because Ishiguro is such a sweetheart.

MEHTA: He's absolutely the most charming guy you could hope to meet. And reading him is like meeting him.

ULABY: Kazuo Ishiguro has written seven novels, a book of short stories, a handful of screenplays and lyrics¹⁰ for more than a hundred songs. He's said he sees his lyrics as far more autobiographical than his fiction - that is, his Nobel Prize-winning fiction. Neda Ulaby, NPR News.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "BREAKFAST ON THE MORNING TRAM")

STACEY KENT: (Singing) So here you are in this city with a shattered heart it seems, though when you arrived you thought you'd have...

1 remains   

n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹

参考例句：

• He ate the remains of food hungrily.他狼吞虎咽地吃剩余的食物。
• The remains of the meal were fed to the dog.残羹剩饭喂狗了。

2 housekeeper   

n.管理家务的主妇，女管家

参考例句：

• A spotless stove told us that his mother is a diligent housekeeper.炉子清洁无瑕就表明他母亲是个勤劳的主妇。
• She is an economical housekeeper and feeds her family cheaply.她节约持家，一家人吃得很省。

3 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。

4 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。

5 manor   

n.庄园，领地

参考例句：

• The builder of the manor house is a direct ancestor of the present owner.建造这幢庄园的人就是它现在主人的一个直系祖先。
• I am not lord of the manor,but its lady.我并非此地的领主，而是这儿的女主人。

6 nostalgia   

n.怀乡病，留恋过去，怀旧

参考例句：

• He might be influenced by nostalgia for his happy youth.也许是对年轻时幸福时光的怀恋影响了他。
• I was filled with nostalgia by hearing my favourite old song.我听到这首喜爱的旧歌，心中充满了怀旧之情。

7 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。

8 indirectly   

adv.间接地，不直接了当地

参考例句：

• I heard the news indirectly.这消息我是间接听来的。
• They were approached indirectly through an intermediary.通过一位中间人，他们进行了间接接触。

9 genetic   

adj.遗传的，遗传学的

参考例句：

• It's very difficult to treat genetic diseases.遗传性疾病治疗起来很困难。
• Each daughter cell can receive a full complement of the genetic information.每个子细胞可以收到遗传信息的一个完全补偿物。

10 lyrics   

n.歌词

参考例句：

• music and lyrics by Rodgers and Hart 由罗杰斯和哈特作词作曲
• The book contains lyrics and guitar tablatures for over 100 songs. 这本书有100多首歌的歌词和吉他奏法谱。