SAT阅读精讲(4)-英文第一人称记述文实例解析

李嘉玉 主讲

这是一篇优美的典型的SAT记述文。它采用了规范的记述文写作技术；真实地描绘了作者的“眼耳鼻舌身意”与画家、一幅画、及围绕对这幅画的情感变化。这篇文章不仅文笔流畅，而且逻辑严谨，认识递进引人入胜，高潮震撼，结论升华睿智。

在读这一讲之前，读者必须反复学习SAT阅读精讲（3）；掌握记述文写作的基本理论。

Setting:

{在setting，作者给出了两个名词：The first painting 和画家Sheila Fell. 这是setting部分最重要的外部事物。}

The first painting I ever bought was by Sheila Fell.

{然后，作者引出第一个故事发展的时间和空间及内容：（意）thinking awful empathetically to be an artist to deal with buyers face to face, feeling embarrassed. I imagined she must be feeling the same. 既是第一段作者臆念的一个结尾，也预示（anticipate）了下面的转折。这里，作者采用了一个英文写作常用技术：Contrast。用强烈对比的办法是为了突出即将引出的画家的人物特征。}

I went to her studio in Redcliffe Square feeling uncomfortable and even embarrassed, thinking how awful to be an artist, having to pop up with prospective buyers coming to gape, whereas writers never need to see anyone read their books. I kept wishing, all the way up to the steep flights of stairs, that I could go and look without Sheila being there. I imagined she must be feeling the same. 

{与but和however一样，I was wrong是个转折，但语气更强烈。使读者anticipate Sheila是一个不计较别人是否要买她的画，大方地甚至享受展示自己作品的人。这就会对作者的“意”从最初的“画家展示自己的画”（色）与（受），到“感到窘迫”（想），再到“希望她不在”（行），最后，实现“我错了，她完全是享受与可能的买主沟通(识)”。第一个事件完成，实现了一个“意”的“色受想行识”的螺旋上升过程。

另外其中，还隐含有一个“眼”的“色受想行识”过程：“画家与画室的存在（色）”；Sheila didn’t care…She was perfectly at ease（识）”；“She was perfectly at ease. There was a confidence about how she propped up canvas after canvas（受）”“She enjoy showing her work.(想)”；“made me in turn relax(行)”。

在写作中，为了逻辑流畅，作者可以把“色受想行识”过程的顺序打破。例如在此，由于读者和作者都通过“I was wrong”这句假定故事发生的地点是画室，并且看到画家的一些列行为来说明画家的个性和特征，所以作者没有再一次提及画家与画室这一外部世界。但是，作者用了倒叙，为了逻辑上顺畅，呼应“I was wrong”，先说画家的特征“识”：“她根本不在乎谁看她的画，和看画者怎么想。”把看在眼里的“受”：“She was perfectly at ease. There was a confidence about how she propped up canvas after canvas”和“想”：“She enjoy showing her work.”作为“识”的原因，这就使得行文逻辑更流畅。最后，把“行”：“made me in turn relax”作为“受”和“想”的结果来陈述。这不仅使本段逻辑严谨，更重要的是也很好地接续了上下段落。}

I was wrong. Sheila didn't care who looked at her paintings or what they thought of them or whether she sold them. She was perfectly at ease, seemed to me to enjoy showing her work. There was a confidence about how she propped up canvas after canvas that made me in turn relax.

{下面一段，在某种意义上是故事发展下去的进一步Setting。所以，如果我们认为整篇文章的setting在这段完成才结束，我也没有意见。作者说：“我真不该在来的路上那么的担心（embarrassing）。毕竟，我们有太多的相同。我们是老乡；“北漂”在伦敦，都深深地怀念着青山陪衬，烈日温暖着的田野”。到此，可以说完整地介绍了画家的个性、出身、与自己的感情纽带。对画家的这些描述使读者对本文的另外一个主要事物-画产生强烈的期盼和预感。}

I don't know why I'd been so apprehensive- after all, we had Cumberland in common, there was no need for me to explain why I was drawn to her work. What I missed, exiled in London, she missed: the landscape of where we had both been born and brought up.

{剧幕打开，新的主题-画呈现在读者面前。画是一个田野里的新建的干草垛。金色的午后阳光洒满大地。空气中充满芳香和温馨。这段描写是一个视觉盛宴。为作者的“想行识”提供充分的“受”。}

The painting was of a haystack in a field. The haystack had clearly just been made, it was golden and the field flooded with red-gold light, the whole atmosphere mellow and rich.

{“It was a large painting and I had no wall and no room to do it justice.”是“色受想行识”中的“识”。又是先说最后的认识。再倒述认识过程，讲述放在哪儿都配不上“她”。自然地，作者又“想”将来把“她”带回家乡，买个大房子试试。文章读到这儿，读者知道，按照该作者的写作风格，这又是一个Contrast. 是的，作者说：“三十年后，他买了这样一个大房子（“行”），画还是不happy（“识”）。”这样一个“色受想行识”循环，导致下一波的“想”和“行”：“卖掉了这幅画，买个另外一幅Sheila Fell“小”的作品。”这里，有意留下了“卖画”行为的“识”；给读者留下预示，让读者产生期待。}

 It was a large painting and I realized as soon as it arrived at my home that however much I loved it I had no wall and no room to do it justice. I put it on the largest wall we had in the biggest room and still I felt I was insulting it-the power of the picture was too huge to be contained in our ordinary house. And the light was wrong. The painting couldn't glow, as it wanted to-it needed a vast, empty room and a great distance in front of it. One day, I hoped, I'd take it back to Cumberland and find a house there where it could settle happily. But when, after thirty years, we found that house, the painting was failed again. The walls were no bigger and neither were the rooms. So I sold the painting and bought another, smaller Sheila Fell. 

{本文写作风格一致，在次用语句而不是转折连词来强调感情：“It was a terrible mistake.”既是上一段的“识”，又引出一系列的“受想行识”去填补上段产生的留白。最后认识到：“I grieved for it and wished I could buy it back, marry it again after the folly of a divorce”。读者自然认为，这有点难。}

It was a terrible mistake. The moment the painting had been taken away I realized how stupid I'd been. So it had been overwhelming, too large, too dramatic to contain in either house but I shouldn't have let that matter, I should have found a way to keep it. I grieved for it and wished I could buy it back, marry it again after the folly of a divorce.

Climax：

{是的，作者也说：“太晚了。”故事发展到这里，读者有期待，某种暴风骤雨般的高潮到来，否则，故事有点平淡。对的，他再次在英国皇家美术馆富丽堂皇的展厅见到这副画（“受”）。Its beauty was stunning（“想”）. People stopped and stared and admired （“受”）and I wanted（“想”）to shout （“行”）that what they were looking at was mine. （“识”）I am not at all possessive by nature but suddenly I felt fiercely possessive. This glorious painting had been part of my life for so very long and I didn't seem to be able to grasp that I had willfully let it go. 这段是文章的高潮：“我再次看到美艳绝伦的‘她’；人们停住、注视、惊叹。我想喊出你们看到的是我的。”这如同交响乐章的高潮，让人心血澎湃。接下来，是轻松低沉的述说：“是的，我已经把她买了，可是，我还是情不自禁；我就是不能释怀。”}

But it was too late. And then, in 1990, I went to the Sheila Fell Exhibition at the Royal Academy and there, in pride of place, at the end of the longest room, the room it had always needed, was my painting. Its beauty was stunning. People stopped and stared and admired and I wanted to shout that what they were looking at was mine. I am not at all possessive by nature but suddenly I felt fiercely possessive. This glorious painting had been part of my life for so very long and I didn't seem to be able to grasp that I had willfully let it go.

Resolution：

{叽里咕噜，辗转反侧，撕心裂肺，磨磨唧唧。无论如何，这个倒霉蛋是无法再拥有这幅画了。那么，这么，结束故事呢？结尾是这篇记述文画龙点睛之笔。我们来学学：“In a way, that's better than being able to go and look at it hanging in a public gallery-I'd only go on torturing myself with wanting it back. I can see every detail of it in my mind's eye anyway. It lives in my head. I can recite it like a poem, and so in a sense I can never lose it”。大意：“展览要结束了。她的私人收藏者要把她带走。某种意义上说，与其天天看到她在公共展厅折磨自己，还不如不知道是谁拥有她。毕竟，在我的脑海里，如同一首诗歌一样，我知道她的一切。这种意义上说，我从没有失去过她！”}

I went back to the exhibition day after day and on the last one became almost maudlin at saying my good-byes. I don't know who owns the painting now-it merely said "Private Collection" in the catalog-but I doubt if I'll ever see it again. In a way, that's better than being able to go and look at it hanging in a public gallery-I'd only go on torturing myself with wanting it back. I can see every detail of it in my mind's eye anyway. It lives in my head. I can recite it like a poem, and so in a sense I can never lose it.

{最后认识上的升华不仅化解了作者的痛苦，而且也完成了全文的“色受想行识”，形成了一个大的螺旋。这让我想起一句描绘北京的话：一个大圈圈，里面有个小圈圈，小圈圈中有个。。。}

阅读一篇优秀的记述文，如果能够感同身受就说明读者读明白了作品。记住：记述文都离不开“眼耳鼻舌身意”对外部的感知与认知过程“色受想行识”的演变。为了掌握记述文的写作技术，多读绝对是个好办法。但是，能够按照我们这里讲述的技术写几篇记述文效果会更好。

作业：模仿这篇文章，仿写一篇卖名牌鞋、包、或衣服的记述文。