Ah, this occurred before I was married, a long timeago, out in Manhattan, I was in Manhattan. I was atCity Center, this was ages ago, I was watching aballet at City Center, and I'm not a ballet fan at all, but they were doing the dying swan, andthere was a rumour, that some bookmakers had drifted into town from upstate New York, andthat they had fixed the ballet.

这事发生在我结婚之前，很久以前了，我那时在曼哈顿。我在“城市中心剧场”【1】，多年以前，我在“城市中心”看芭蕾演出。我根本不喜欢看芭蕾，但是他们演的是《天鹅之死》【2】，当时有谣传说打纽约北部晃过来一批赌客，他们对芭蕾做了点手脚。

Apparently there was a lot of money bet on the swan to live.

显然有很多钱打赌天鹅会活下来。

And I look at the box, and I see a girl, and my weak spot is women, so I always think somedaythey're gonna make me a birthday party, and wheel out a tremendous birthday cake, and agiant, naked woman is gonna leap out of the cake and hurt me and leap back in the cake.

我朝包厢望了一眼，看见一个女孩。我这人的弱点就是女人，所以我总是幻想有朝一日大家给我举办一个生日聚会，推出一个庞大无比的生日蛋糕，一个巨大的裸体女子从蛋糕里面跳出来，在打伤我之后又跳回去。

So I pick up this girl, I was very glib, and she was a brilliant girl, she was a Bennington girl,studying at Bennington to be a woman male nurse at a four-year program, working on a termpaper on the increasing incidents of heterosexuality amongst homosexuals.

于是我就和那个女孩搭讪，我口若悬河。她是个出色的女孩，来自于本宁顿学院【3】，她在本宁顿学的是“女性男护士”专业，学制四年，正在写一篇学期论文，论题有关“同性恋者中日益增多的异性恋事件”。

The girl was a swinger, however, I must....The girl was brought up in Darien, Conneticut, andwhen she was younger, she had a little brother about six years old, eight years...his parentssent the kid to military school.

那姑娘是个豪放女，我不得不……女孩在康涅狄格的达里安镇长大，在她年轻一点的时候，她有个六岁的小弟弟，是八岁??这孩子被他父母送进了军校。

And while he was there, he stole jam or something, and they caught him, and they wanted todo things right, 'cause it was military school, so they held a court martial there.

在军校期间他偷了果酱还是什么东西，他们抓住了他，他们决定好好立一下规矩，因为那是军校。于是他们将他送上了军事法庭。

They found the kid guilty. They shot him.

孩子被判有罪，他们枪毙了他。

They returned to his parents half the tuition.

他们把一半的学费还给了他父母。

Meanwhile, I was running amok with his sister, his sister was fabulous, she was a great, great,blonde, and she had tattooed on the inner surface of her thigh, the words 'Bird lives', which,unfortunately, I was never privileged to see in the relationship, but had it been printed inBraille, I would have had a great thing going with her.

同时，我正和他姐姐打得火热，他姐姐棒极了，她是个很漂亮、很漂亮的金发美女。她在大腿内侧纹了几个字：“鸟住于此”，不过不幸的是在我与她交往的这期间，我从未被允许看过那些字。要是那些字是用盲文纹上去的就好了，那样的话我就和她有好事可干了。

We used to go up to her apartment late at night, and all her beatnik friends would be sittingcrosslegged on each other there, and they would be trying to make opium out of the poppiesgiven out by veterans on street corners.

我们经常深夜去她住的地方，所有她那些“垮掉的一代”的朋友们互相翘着腿，坐在那儿，他们还试着用罂粟来做鸦片，那是从街角的老兵那里搞来的。

She used to plug in her twelve and a half dollar hi-fi set, y'know, with the teakwood needle,and put on the record albums on of Marcel Marceau, y'know, just....

她曾给她那台用十二块五美元买来的高保真唱机插上柚木针头，然后放上马塞尔·马尔索【4】的唱片，简直是??

She crushed me, I...Every time I tell the story, I'm reminded...I was what you would call, not aintellectual, up to her...she was...I was thrown out of college, and when I was thrown out ofcollege I got a job on Madison Avenue in New york, a real dyed-in-the-wool advertising agencyon Madison Avenue, wanted a man to come in, and they pay him ninetyfive dollars a week, andto sit in their office, and to look jewish.

她压得我喘不过气来，我……每次我提起这些事，我总是想起??跟她相比，我算不上你们所说的知识分子，她是……我被大学踢出校门，我被大学扫地出门后在纽约的麦迪逊大道找到份工作，那是一家地道的广告公司，在麦迪逊大道上，他们想招聘一个人，付给他每周95美元，就让他坐在他们的办公室里，看上去像犹太人。

They wanted to prove to the outside world, that they would hire minority groups, y'know.

他们想证明给外面世界的人看，他们愿意雇用少数族裔。

So I was the one they hired, y'know. I was the show jew at the agency.

所以我就成了他们雇用的人。我成了公司里的犹太摆设。

I tried to look jewish desperately, y'know. I used to read my memos from right to left all thetime.

我拼命地想表现得更像犹太人，我总是从右向左念我的文函。

They fired me finally, 'cause I took off too many jewish holidays.

他们最终还是解雇了我，因为我有太多的犹太节假日不去上班。

【1】即“纽约城市中心”，位于曼哈顿西55大街，介于第六和第七大道之间，是一家新摩尔建筑风格的剧院，以舞蹈和芭蕾演出闻名。

【2】俄罗斯芭蕾舞编导米哈伊尔·福金在1905年为安娜·巴甫洛娃创作的独舞，音乐取自于圣桑的《动物狂欢节》组曲中的大提琴独奏曲《天鹅》。

【3】位于佛蒙特州本宁顿镇的一所女子学院。

【4】马塞尔·马尔索，法国的滑稽剧(哑剧)演员。