学习临终前的冷静与幽默

                              ______美国教授“最后一课”感动千万人（续一）

张放

这位刚刚于2008年7月底离开人世的美国教授，在其“最后一课”中的表现实在在太可爱了，见我7月30日的博文《美国教授“最后一课”感动千万人》（视频）。面对的是即将到来的死亡，却那么乐观，带着一种人生的喜悦。我非常敬佩他。才于7月30日把他的视频中的头一部分给翻译出来，也从一些网站上读到有网友看过视频的感想，基本上是感动，感动，再感动。然后就是期待我继续把后面的给翻译出来。也真的是太长了的东西。他一共讲了76分钟的讲座。但要用文字表述，而且是中英文的，则字数多得有些不太像博文，而更像一本小书了。

但我还是尽力吧，于是，就抽出业余时间，再继续弄下去。希望大家能从他的演讲中，获取人生中的最大题目：死，带给我们的深刻提示，并深深地爱世界，爱人们，爱梦想，爱自然而然，爱临终前的冷静与幽默吧。 

（续前《美国教授“最后一课”感动千万人 第一部分》）

After Coach Graham, I had another coach, Coach Setliff, and he taught me a lot about the power of enthusiasm. He did this one thing where only for one play at a time he would put people in at like the most horrifically wrong position for them. Like all the short guys would become receivers, right? It was just laughable. But we only went in for one play, right? And boy, the other team just never knew what hit ‘em them. Because when you’re only doing it for one play and you’re just not where you’re supposed to be, and freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose, boy are you going to clean somebody’s clock for that one play.

格雷厄姆教练走了以后，又来了位教练，叫赛特利夫，正是他教会我懂得了什么叫激情的力量。他偶尔会这样做：把场上所有选手都安排在最不恰当的位置。比如，让所有矮个儿都充任接球手什么的，对吧？那效果太搞笑了。不过，我们就这么着打了一场比赛，对吧？天哪，给对手真来个措手不及。因为，你只这么着打一场比赛，你又根本不打平时的位置，那就意味着，你已经无所顾忌了，因为你没有什么损失的了。哎呀，这样的比赛中，就只剩下痛扁对手了。

And that kind of enthusiasm was great. And to this day, I am most comfortable on a football field. I mean, it’s just one of those things where, you know, if I’m working a hard problem, people will see me wandering the halls with one of these things, and that’s just because, you know, when you do something young enough and you train for it, it just becomes a part of it. And I’m very glad that football was a part of my life. And if I didn’t get the dream of playing in the NFL, that’s OK. I’ve probably got stuff more valuable. Because looking at what’s going on in the NFL, I’m not sure those guys are doing so great right now.

由此带出的那种激情太棒了。直到今天此时，我仍然会感到，只要身在橄榄球场地，就十分惬意。我意思是说，橄榄球已经成了我的一个东西，我是说，如果我遇到什么难题要冥思苦索时，你就会发现我在很多走廊里，拿个橄榄球，走来走去。就是因为，你知道，人在年轻时做过什么很有趣的事情，再为此受过什么训练的话，那这个事情就会成为生活中的一个自然组成部分。我很高兴的是，橄榄球成了我生命中的一部分。假如我当时没有梦想要到全国橄榄球联盟打球的话，那橄榄球也就不算什么了。可能我会弄点更有价值的事情做吧。因为只要看看现在橄榄球联盟里发生的一切，我也不觉得那些伙计们玩得有多好。

OK, and so one of the expressions I learned at Electronic Arts, which I love, which pertains to this, is experience is what you get when you didn’t get what you wanted. And I think that’s absolutely lovely. And the other thing about football is we send our kids out to play football or soccer or swimming or whatever it is, and it’s the first example of what I’m going to call a head fake, or indirect learning. We actually don’t want our kids to learn football. I mean, yeah, it’s really nice that I have a wonderful three-point stance and that I know how to do a chop block and all this kind of stuff. But we send our kids out to learn much more important things. Teamwork, sportsmanship, perseverance, etcetera, etcetera. And these kinds of head fake learning are absolutely important. And you should keep your eye out for them because they’re everywhere.

好，那么我从电子艺术公司里学了个词儿，我很喜欢，也跟今天的讲座相关，就是：“所谓经验，就是你渴望求得而不成的收获”。我想，这个表述太有可爱了。另外还是橄榄球的事儿，我们把孩子送去打橄榄球，或踢足球，或练游泳，或干什么运动项目，这其实就是我称为“障眼法”，或叫“间接学习”的第一个例子。事实上，我们本身并不是想让孩子们打橄榄球。我是说，是啊，我的获三分的触地姿式很带劲儿，我也很会玩膝下阻挡，还会玩很多这种小技巧。但是，我们让孩子去学橄榄球，其实是要他们学更重要的东西：团队合作，体育精神，毅力，等等，等等。当然，橄榄球的那些技法学习还是绝对重要的。注意留意就是了，那些技法在哪儿都能发现。

All right. A simple one, being an author in the World Book Encyclopedia. When I was a kid, we had the World Book Encyclopedia on the shelf. For the freshman, this is paper. We used to have these things called books. And after I had become somewhat of an authority on virtual reality, but not like a really important one, so I was at the level of people the World Book would badger. They called me up and I wrote an article, and this is Caitlin Kelleher [shows slide of Caitlin wearing VR headset manipulating a 3D world], and there’s an article if you go to your local library where they still have copies of the World Book. Look under V for Virtual Reality, and there it is. And all I have to say is that having been selected to be an author in the World Book Encyclopedia, I now believe that Wikipedia is a perfectly fine source for your information because I know what the quality control is for real encyclopedias. They let me in. 

好，说下一个梦想。很简单，想当《世界百科全书》作者。我还小时，书架上就摆着《世界百科全书》了。对大一学生来说，它们只是纸。（笑声）我们以前把这些东西叫做书。只是当我成了虚拟现实的某种权威时，其实根本不是什么真正权威，我就一下了成了《世界百科图书》要打扰的人了。他们给我打电话，然后，我就写了篇文章，画面上这位叫凯特琳.凯乐荷。你要是到当地图书馆查，找到有的图书馆还收藏这百科全书的话，那你就可以看到这篇文章，看V 字母下面的“虚拟现实”词条，它就在那里。我要说的是，我居然给选为《世界百科全书》作者，那我现在相信，“维基百科”对诸位来说，绝对是个优质的资讯来源，因为，我知道，现实版的《百科全书》的质量控制水平是什么样的。他们让我去写的。

All right, next one. At a certain point you just realize there are some things you are not going to do, so maybe you just want to stand close to the people. And I mean, my god, what a role model for young people. I mean, this is everything you want to be, and what I learned that carried me forward in leadership later is that, you know, he wasn’t the smartest guy on the ship. I mean, Spock was pretty smart and McCoy was the doctor and Scotty was the engineer. And you sort of go, and what skill set did he have to get on this damn thing and run it?

好，下一个梦想。（笑）人有时侯会意识到，有些事情是不能去做的，所以，你可能就是想跟那些做了那些事的人站在一起而已。我是说，天哪，我真成了年轻人的楷模。（笑）我是说，这就是你要成为的一切。我学到的，后来又因此使我成为领袖的是，其实，他不是船

上最聪明的家伙。我是说，有个斯波克相当聪明，有个麦科伊是个医生，还有斯科特是个工程师。我就会想，他到底有什么能耐，就当了船长还指挥着一切呢？

And, you know, clearly there is this skill set called leadership, and, you know, whether or not you like the series, there’s no doubt that there was a lot to be learned about how to lead people by watching this guy in action. And he just had the coolest damn toys! I mean, my god, I just thought it was fascinating as a kid that he had this thing and he could talk to the ship with it. I just thought that was just spectacular, and of course now I own one and it’s smaller. [takes out cell phone] So that’s kind of cool.

你知道吗，显然，他有种能耐，那叫“领袖特质”，而且，不管你喜不喜欢这电视系列剧，毫无疑问，看他的所作所为，就能学到很多如何领导别人的能耐。而且，他居然手上有最酷的玩具！（笑）我是说，天哪，我小时候就想过，要是有他手上那玩艺儿，得多神奇。他拿着它跟船上所有人说话。我那时就想，那也太奇妙了，当然，现在我自己就有一个，比船长的那个还小呢。所以，挺酷。

（未完，敬请期待……）

（前面的译文见《美国教授“最后一课”感动千万人》）