美国国家公共电台 NPR Former First Lady Barbara Bush Dies At 92

 

ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:

Former first lady Barbara Bush has died. She was 92 years old and had suffered from heart problems. Mrs. Bush opted² to discontinue medical treatment over the weekend and focus instead on comfort care. That's according to the office of her husband, former President George H.W. Bush. A statement from her son, former president George W. Bush, called her a woman unlike any other who brought levity³, love and literacy to millions.

Mrs. Bush will go down in history as one of just two women in the United States to be both the wife of a U.S. president and also the mother of one. NPR's Tovia Smith has this look back at her life.

TOVIA SMITH, BYLINE⁴: From the moment she moved into the White House, Barbara Bush made it clear she was going to be a different kind of first lady than her very glamorous⁵ predecessor⁶, Nancy Reagan.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

BARBARA BUSH: And speaking of glamour⁷, I want you all to look at me very carefully.

(LAUGHTER)

SMITH: She was as famous for her undyed hair and fake pearls as she was for her self-deprecating humor.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

BUSH: Please notice the hair, the makeup⁸, designer clothes.

(LAUGHTER)

MYRA GUTIN: Barbara Bush certainly wasn't afraid to laugh at herself. And I think she worked very hard to show that she was just a real person. She was not Nancy Reagan, who's a size two.

SMITH: First Lady biographer Myra Gutin says it's why Bush was so popular. She was a throwback to old-fashioned values, and she pushed back against popular conventions of beauty.

GUTIN: One time she said to a reporter, my mail is telling me that there are a lot of fat and overweight ladies in this country who are really happy that I'm going to be in the White House. That's vintage Barbara Bush.

SMITH: Her down-to-earth image was all the more remarkable⁹ for someone who grew up in a suburb of Manhattan as part of the aristocracy and married aristocracy as well. The daughter of a magazine publisher and granddaughter of a state Supreme¹⁰ Court justice, Barbara Pierce was home from boarding school at a Holiday dance when she met George Herbert Walker Bush, son of a U.S. senator from a prominent Yankee family.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

BUSH: Sweet 16 and never been kissed has been written about me, and it was true.

SMITH: In her memoir¹², Bush describes falling head over heels.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

BUSH: I floated into my room and kept the poor girl I was rooming with awake all night while I made her listen to how Poppy Bush was the greatest living human on the face of the Earth.

SMITH: They got engaged just before Bush shipped off to war. And she dropped out of Smith College when he returned to become Mrs. George Bush. She would then make some 30 moves following her husband through naval¹³ training to Yale, where she delivered the first of their six children, George W. Bush, and then to Texas, where Bush would start his career in the oil business. Political aide and family friend Chase Untermeyer says that was a formative experience for this elite¹⁴ young woman from the East.

CHASE UNTERMEYER: No matter what your background is, if you go to dusty West Texas in the late 1940s, you are very much down-to-earth 'cause the earth is all around you. There wasn't much fanciness about that lifestyle, and it was a great leveler.

SMITH: Barbara Bush spent her 20s and 30s in the traditional role of wife and mother. When her husband dove into politics, she dutifully took on the role of political wife and campaigned for him, though longtime family friend Rob Mossbacher Jr. says her supportiveness should not be mistaken for submissiveness.

ROBERT MOSBACHER JR: She was as far away from a Stepford wife or some sort of mamby-pamby (ph), you know, sweetness and light that you could get.

SMITH: Indeed known as the Silver Fox, Barbara Bush could be as tough as she could be charming. The rough-and-tumble of politics roiled¹⁵ her at times, especially, she said, when attacks were aimed at her son, George W. Bush. Her grandkids named her the enforcer.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

BUSH: Sometimes I just want to give people a piece of my mind.

(CHEERING, APPLAUSE)

BUSH: But of course, as George would say - wouldn't be prudent¹⁶.

(LAUGHTER)

SMITH: When her other son, Jeb Bush, first considered running for president, too, Barbara Bush demurred¹⁷, we've had enough Bushes. But in 2015 when he jumped in, she changed her tune¹⁸. And at 90, she hit the campaign trail to try and elect a third President Bush.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

BUSH: He's everything we need in a president.

(CHEERING, APPLAUSE)

SMITH: True to her character, Bush couldn't hold back when she was asked by CNN about Jeb's then-bitter-rival Donald Trump¹⁹, who had called her son dumb as a rock.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

BUSH: I'm sick of him. I don't understand why people are for him.

SMITH: Perhaps her best-known barb¹ was aimed at her husband's 1984 vice²⁰ presidential opponent, Geraldine Ferraro, who was attacking George W. Bush for being rich and out of touch. Mrs. Bush shot back that she couldn't say what Ferraro was, but it rhymed with rich.

CRAIG FULLER: It was just kind of spontaneous quip that might best not be made public.

SMITH: Former Bush aide Craig Fuller...

FULLER: You didn't find her backing down. I would say that was pretty characteristic.

SMITH: On policy issues, however, Mrs. Bush treaded more lightly. For example, she was said to privately²¹ support abortion²² rights but on the record would hold her tongue.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

BUSH: I believe if you are an elected official, you can speak up, but if you haven't run for dogcatcher - never publicly.

SMITH: Mrs. Bush also tried to avoid making waves in selecting her pet cause of literacy.

(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "SESAME STREET")

BUSH: (As herself) Hello. Nice to see you again, Big Bird.

CAROLL SPINNEY: (As Big Bird) Oh, it's nice to see you, too.

SMITH: She tirelessly promoted literacy as a way to help solve everything from teen pregnancy²³ and inner-city violence to AIDS.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

BUSH: That if every man, woman and child in America could read, write and comprehend, we could find easier answers to so many of our other social problems.

SMITH: Mrs. Bush was also a bestselling author beloved for the books she wrote in the voice of her dog Millie. But her role as first lady, wife and mother also sparked something of a backlash when she was picked to speak at Wellesley College commencement in 1990. Students protested that a woman most famous for her husband's career was not a good role model. But true to form, Barbara Bush took no prisoners, telling grads that families should trump career.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

BUSH: At the end of your life, you will never regret not having passed one more test, winning one more verdict or not closing one more deal. You will regret time not spent with a husband, a child, a friend or a parent.

SMITH: Mrs. Bush's personal life included challenges, including the death of a 3-year-old daughter from leukemia and, years later, a bout¹¹ of depression that left her feeling, as she put it, like driving into a tree. But all in all, Barbara Bush considered herself blessed, especially, as she's often said, for who she married.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

BUSH: George Bush gave me the greatest life ever any living human could have ever had, truthfully.

(APPLAUSE)

SMITH: Tovia Smith, NPR News.

1 barb   

n.（鱼钩等的）倒钩，倒刺

参考例句：

• The barb of his wit made us wince.他那锋芒毕露的机智使我们退避三舍。
• A fish hook has a barb to prevent the fish from escaping after being hooked.鱼钩上都有一个倒钩以防上了钩的鱼逃走。

2 opted   

v.选择，挑选( opt的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• She was co-opted onto the board. 她获增选为董事会成员。
• After graduating she opted for a career in music. 毕业后她选择了从事音乐工作。

3 levity   

n.轻率，轻浮，不稳定，多变

参考例句：

• His remarks injected a note of levity into the proceedings.他的话将一丝轻率带入了议事过程中。
• At the time,Arnold had disapproved of such levity.那时候的阿诺德对这种轻浮行为很看不惯。

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 glamorous   

adj.富有魅力的；美丽动人的；令人向往的

参考例句：

• The south coast is less glamorous but full of clean and attractive hotels.南海岸魅力稍逊，但却有很多干净漂亮的宾馆。
• It is hard work and not a glamorous job as portrayed by the media.这是份苦差，并非像媒体描绘的那般令人向往。

6 predecessor   

n.前辈，前任

参考例句：

• It will share the fate of its predecessor.它将遭受与前者同样的命运。
• The new ambassador is more mature than his predecessor.新大使比他的前任更成熟一些。

7 glamour   

n.魔力，魅力；vt.迷住

参考例句：

• Foreign travel has lost its glamour for her.到国外旅行对她已失去吸引力了。
• The moonlight cast a glamour over the scene.月光给景色增添了魅力。

8 makeup   

n.组织；性格；化装品

参考例句：

• Those who failed the exam take a makeup exam.这次考试不及格的人必须参加补考。
• Do you think her beauty could makeup for her stupidity?你认为她的美丽能弥补她的愚蠢吗？

9 remarkable   

adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的

参考例句：

• She has made remarkable headway in her writing skills.她在写作技巧方面有了长足进步。
• These cars are remarkable for the quietness of their engines.这些汽车因发动机没有噪音而不同凡响。

10 supreme   

adj.极度的，最重要的；至高的，最高的

参考例句：

• It was the supreme moment in his life.那是他一生中最重要的时刻。
• He handed up the indictment to the supreme court.他把起诉书送交最高法院。

11 bout   

n.侵袭，发作；一次(阵，回)；拳击等比赛

参考例句：

• I was suffering with a bout of nerves.我感到一阵紧张。
• That bout of pneumonia enfeebled her.那次肺炎的发作使她虚弱了。

12 memoir   

n.[pl.]回忆录，自传；记事录

参考例句：

• He has just published a memoir in honour of his captain.他刚刚出了一本传记来纪念他的队长。
• In her memoir,the actress wrote about the bittersweet memories of her first love.在那个女演员的自传中，她写到了自己苦乐掺半的初恋。

13 naval   

adj.海军的，军舰的，船的

参考例句：

• He took part in a great naval battle.他参加了一次大海战。
• The harbour is an important naval base.该港是一个重要的海军基地。

14 elite   

n.精英阶层；实力集团；adj.杰出的，卓越的

参考例句：

• The power elite inside the government is controlling foreign policy.政府内部的一群握有实权的精英控制着对外政策。
• We have a political elite in this country.我们国家有一群政治精英。

15 roiled   

v.搅混（液体）( roil的过去式和过去分词 )；使烦恼；使不安；使生气

参考例句：

• American society is being roiled by the controversy over homosexual marriage. 当今美国社会正被有关同性恋婚姻的争论搞得不得安宁。 来自互联网
• In the past few months, instability has roiled Tibet and Tibetan-inhabited areas. 在过去的几个月里，西藏和藏人居住区不稳定。 来自互联网

16 prudent   

adj.谨慎的，有远见的，精打细算的

参考例句：

• A prudent traveller never disparages his own country.聪明的旅行者从不贬低自己的国家。
• You must school yourself to be modest and prudent.你要学会谦虚谨慎。

17 demurred   

v.表示异议，反对( demur的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• At first she demurred, but then finally agreed. 她开始表示反对，但最终还是同意了。
• They demurred at working on Sundays. 他们反对星期日工作。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

18 tune   

n.调子；和谐，协调；v.调音，调节，调整

参考例句：

• He'd written a tune,and played it to us on the piano.他写了一段曲子，并在钢琴上弹给我们听。
• The boy beat out a tune on a tin can.那男孩在易拉罐上敲出一首曲子。

19 trump   

n.王牌，法宝；v.打出王牌，吹喇叭

参考例句：

• He was never able to trump up the courage to have a showdown.他始终鼓不起勇气摊牌。
• The coach saved his star player for a trump card.教练保留他的明星选手，作为他的王牌。

20 vice   

n.坏事；恶习；[pl.]台钳，老虎钳；adj.副的

参考例句：

• He guarded himself against vice.他避免染上坏习惯。
• They are sunk in the depth of vice.他们堕入了罪恶的深渊。

21 privately   

adv.以私人的身份，悄悄地，私下地

参考例句：

• Some ministers admit privately that unemployment could continue to rise.一些部长私下承认失业率可能继续升高。
• The man privately admits that his motive is profits.那人私下承认他的动机是为了牟利。

22 abortion   

n.流产，堕胎

参考例句：

• She had an abortion at the women's health clinic.她在妇女保健医院做了流产手术。
• A number of considerations have led her to have a wilful abortion.多种考虑使她执意堕胎。

23 pregnancy   

n.怀孕，怀孕期

参考例句：

• Early pregnancy is often accompanied by nausea.怀孕早期常有恶心的现象。
• Smoking during pregnancy increases the risk of miscarriage.怀孕期吸烟会增加流产的危险。