经济学人35:节食的历史 A history of dieting

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　　文艺；书评；节食的历史；狂欢和清理；

　　Calories and Corsets: A History of Dieting Over 2000 Years. By Louise Foxcroft.

　　《卡路里和束身衣：2000年来的节食历史》 Lousise Foxcroft 著。

　　After the binge of the holidays, many stumble into January with a hangover, some fragile resolutions and a desire to shed a few pounds. Alas², few will benefit from rigid³ calorie-counting or cabbage-soup slurping⁴. In a recent study of 31 long-term diet plans, the American Psychological Association found that up to two-thirds of participants ended up heavier than before they started. Some diets are more sensible than others, but any regimen that promises swift and dramatic results will doom⁵ most followers⁶ to failure. Weight-loss pills and surgery are similarly ineffective—and sometimes dangerous—over time. Yet girth-management is big business, full of charismatic hucksters and fake science (fat-burning lip balm?), earning $40 billion a year in America alone.

　　在假日的狂欢之后，许多人宿醉，下着不坚定的决心，立志要减去数磅体重，在跌跌撞撞中进入了一月。哎呀，少有人会得益于严格计算卡路里饮食或是食用卷心菜汤所带来的好处。最近有一项关于31个长期节食计划的研究，美国心理协会发现有超过三分之二的参与者在结束计划时比他们开始时还要重。一些饮食计划明显比其他的要有效果，但是任何承诺快速有效的养生方法都注定让它的实践者们失败。减肥药片和手术经过时间的验证，同样效果不佳——有时甚至很危险。然而，腰围管理仍然是一件大事，这里充满着有推销能力的商家和伪科学（燃烧脂肪的唇膏？），每年就仅仅在美国就可以挣得400亿美元。

　　“The diet industry is all about exploitation and profit,” writes Louise Foxcroft in “Calories and Corsets”, her slim new book about the history of dieting. Less a banquet than a tasting menu (the tone is breezy, opinionated and occasionally rushed), she chronicles more than 2,000 years of movers, shakers and tummy-tuckers, highlighting both the wise and the wacky.

　　“节食产业几乎只有开发和盈利” Louise Foxcroft在《卡路里和束束身衣》一书中写道，她薄薄的新书描述了节食的历史。她的书与其说是一场盛宴，不如说是一本激起人食欲的菜单（整本书语调轻松，观点明确，有时有些咄咄逼人），Foxcroft按时间顺序，编写了2000多年来的行动者, 有影响的人物和减肥人士, 既写聪明人，也记叙古怪的人。

　　The word diet comes from the Greek diaita, an approach to health that linked the mental with the physical. Classical physicians saw being too fat or thin as a sign of an imbalance. Man “cannot live healthily on food without a certain amount of exercise”, observed Hippocrates, who believed in breakfast, long walks and prudent⁷ vomiting⁸. Philosophers such as Socrates saw a relationship between food and ethics⁹, as a taste for luxury often leads to greed and unjust behaviour.

　　“diet”节食这个单词来源于希腊语“diata”,意思是使身体和心灵都健康的方法。传统的医师认为太胖或者太瘦都是不平衡的标志。人类“依靠食物健康地生存必须要有定量的运动” 希波克拉底得出这个结论，他崇尚早餐，长距离的行走和适当呕吐。哲学家如苏格拉底发现了食物和道德之间的关系，吃大餐通常会导致人的贪婪和不公平行为。

　　Unlike the other deadly sins, gluttony is visible and so is often judged harshly, as if heft were always evidence of wanton indulgence or laziness. (The link between genetics and metabolism¹⁰ was not discovered until the 20th century.) In particularly hard times such as the two world wars, fat people were seen as traitors¹¹. Greater access to food and a rising stigma¹² against podge helped inspire the fashion for corsets in the 17th century, which caused overlapping¹³ ribs¹⁴, bad breath and the occasional death. When it comes to diets, women occupy a perversely¹⁵ central place, argues Ms Foxcroft. They are condemned¹⁶ for their gluttony, criticised for their vanity, manipulated for their insecurity心神不定 and also blamed for the flab on their husbands and children.

　　不同于其他致命的罪恶，暴饮暴食是显而易见的，因此常招致严厉的批评，似乎重量就是放肆纵容和懒惰的证据（直到20世纪，遗传学和新陈代谢之间的联系才被发现）尤其是在艰难时期如两次世界大战，肥胖的人往往被视为是叛徒。17世纪，人们可以吃到更多的食物，对于矮胖之人的羞辱也与日俱增，这一切引发了束身衣的流行。束身衣可以致使人肋骨重叠，口臭，甚至是死亡。Foxcroft 女士指出，当谈到节食时，女性通常占据着主导地位。她们常因暴食受到谴责，因虚荣招致批评，因心神不定而被人利用，因丈夫和孩子身上的肥肉受到指责。

　　Until the 18th century, ideas on diet were mostly about healthy eating, morality and control. Laxatives and emetics¹⁷ were common, but many philosophers and physicians had sensible ideas about restraint and nutrition. By the early 19th century complaints about fat became rife¹⁸, as even the working class had moved from the fields to the calorie-rich cities. This created a larger market for dieting solutions, particularly fads¹⁹ such as cold-rain douches, chest beatings, electrode zappings and massages²⁰ that promised to crush subcutaneous fat globules.

　　直到18世纪，人们关于节食的想法大都关于健康饮食，道德和控制。排泄和催吐非常普遍，但是许多哲学家和医师对于抑制和营养有着明智的看法。到19世纪早期，当工人阶级从农村搬到充满卡路里的城市，人们对于肥胖的抱怨开始流行起来。这为节食计划创造了更大的市场，尤其是冷水灌洗，击打胸部，电极刺激和按摩这些承诺可以减少皮下脂肪的方法。

　　The 19th century saw a chap named William Banting bring the first low-carbohydrate diet to a mass audience. A study in the Lancet later confirmed the value of favouring protein and fat over carbs well before a once overweight cardiologist named Robert Atkins figured this out for himself. Horace Fletcher, otherwise known as “The Great Masticator”, was emphatic²¹ about chewing each mouthful of food until it was liquid, and counted John D. Rockefeller and Franz Kafka among his disciples²².

　　在19世纪，有个叫做William Banting的人，他第一次将低碳水化合物食谱推荐给大众。后来在《柳叶刀》中刊登的一项研究证实了多摄入蛋白质和脂肪，少摄入碳水化合物的好处，在此之后，有一个曾经超重的心脏病专家Robert Atkins也为自己指出了这一点。Horace Fletcher，以“伟大的咀嚼者”广为所知，曾强调咀嚼每一口食物直到它们成了液体，他的拥趸包括洛克菲勒和卡夫卡。

　　There have been other gurus, plans, drugs and devices, but most offer short-lived results and long-term angst. Lasting²³ changes need slow but steady modifications²⁴ to lifestyle. Inspired by those early Greeks, who wished to achieve personal balance, not an ideal body type, Ms Foxcroft offers a suggestion that sounds enough like a resolution: “make sensible choices and stick to them.”

　　还有些权威，节食计划，药品和设备，但是大多数方法都缩短了人的寿命，引起了人们长期的愤怒。持久的变化需要对生活方式进行缓慢但稳定的调整。Foxcroft女士受到了早期希腊人的启发，要想获得个人的平衡，而不是理想的身材。她出了一个建议，但听起来更像一个决心：做理智的选择，并且持之以恒。

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