如果一个人，他十分聪明、拥有野心、工作十分努力，那么他就有机会进入到纽约法律界的最核心层面。

　　and clearly the four men who founded the Black Rock firm fit that description.

　　很显然，最初建立黑石集团的四个人就完全符合这种描述。

　　But we know far more than that, don't we?

　　但是我们知道的要远比这些更多，不是吗？

　　Success is not a random act.

　　成功不是随随便便就可以取得的。

　　It arises out of a predictable and powerful set of circumstances and opportunities, and at this point,

　　这完全取决于你的预见能力和对环境以及机会的把握。

　　after examining the lives of Bill Joe and Bill Gates, pro hocky players and geniuses, and Joe Flom, the Janklows, and the Borgenichts,

　　回顾一下前冰球选手比尔乔伊、一位伟大的天才比尔盖茨、乔·弗洛姆、詹克洛以及鲍各尼特之后，

　　it shouldn't be hard to figure out where the perfect lawyer comes from.

　　就不难看出一名优秀的律师是从何而来的。

　　They will have been born in a demographic trough, so they had the best of New York City's public schools and the easiest time in the job market.

　　这些人可能出生在竞争压力很小的年代。并且有机会选择进入纽约最好的法学院上学，并有着很好的就业前景。

　　They will be Jewish, of course, so they had the great fortune to be locked-out of the old-line downtown law firms, on account of their "antecedents."

　　他或她可能是犹太人，并且因为其“前辈人”的一些原因被过去的法律事务所拒之门外。

　　They will have had parents who did meaningful work in the garment business, so they could have learned autonomy and complexity and the connection between effort and reward.

　　他的父母亲或许在服装行业做了很多有意义的工作，并且将工作需要有自主权、挑战性以及付出多少回报多少的想法传给了儿女。

　　They will have gone to a good school, although it doesn't have to be a great school.

　　他们会进入一所优秀的院校-也有可能并不是优秀的院校就读。

　　They don't have to have been the smartest in their class, only smart enough.

　　他或她不必成为班里最聪明的孩子，足够聪明就好。

　　In fact, we can be even more precise.

　　实际上，我们可以描述的更精确。

　　Just as there is a perfect birth date for a nineteenth-century Robert Barren and a perfect birth date for a software tycoon,

　　那时刚好是个适合19世纪商业大亨出生的年代，也是适合软件天才出生的年代，

　　there is a perfect birth date for a New York Jewish lawyer as well.

　　同样也是适合纽约的犹太裔律师出生的年代。

　　It's 1930 or thereabouts, because that would give the lawyer the benefit of a blessedly small generation.

　　在1930年，也正因为如此，才使得律师有机会得到这一代幸运儿的眷顾，获得很多利润。

　　It would also make him forty years of age in 1970, when the revolution in the legal world first began,

　　这个阶段持续了40年，直到1970年，法律格局发生重大的变革，

　　which translates to a healthy fifteen-year Hamburg period in the takeover business while the white-shoe lawyers lingered, obliviously, over their two-martini lunches at the Princeton Club.

　　律师进入了十五年富裕的汉堡时期，律师们在外面忙个不停，几乎一个午餐时间要见两个客户，

　　If you want to be a great New York lawyer, it is an advantage to be an outsider,

　　如果你想成为纽约最出色的律师，你就要在外跑个不停，这是你的优势；

　　and it is an advantage to have parents who did meaningful work, and, better still, to have been born in the early 1930s.

　　如果你的父母曾教导你工作的意义何在，你就又多了一个优势；如果你是出生在30年代，那么就更具优势了。

　　But if you have all three advantages, on top of a good dose of ingenuity and drive, then that's an unstoppable combination.

　　如果这三个优势，你都具备了，那么再加上出色的独创性与动机。这将会是一个绝妙的组合。

　　That's like being a hocky player being born on January 1.

　　这就好像是出生在1月1日的冰球手。