綜合教程之ThejeaningofAmerica的翻譯

1、This is the story of a sturdy American symbol which has now spread throughout most of the world. The symbol is not the dollar. It is not even Coca-Cola. It is a simple pair of pants called blue jeans, and what the pants symbolize is what Alexis deTocqueville called “a manly and legitimate passion fo

2、r equality .Blue jeans are favored equally by bureaucrats and cowboys; bankers and deadbeats; fashion designers and beer drinkers They draw no distinctions and recognize no classes; they are merely American 1 . Yet they are sought after almost everywhere in the world including Russia, where authorit

3、ies recently broke up a teen-aged gangthat was selling them on the black market for two hundred dollars a pair. They have been around for a long time, and it seems likely that they will outlive even the necktie.2 This ubiquitous American symbol was the invention of a Bavarian-born Jew. Hisn a m e w

4、a sL e v iS t r a u s s .3 He was born in Bad Ocheim, Germany, in 1829, and during the European political turmoil of 1848 decided to take his chances in NewYork , to which his two brothers already had emigrated. Upon arrival, Levi soon found that his two brothers had exaggerated their tales of an ea

5、sy life in the land of the main chance. They were landowners, they had told him; instead, he found them pushing needles, thread, pots, pans ribbons, yarn, scissors and buttons to housewives. For two years he was a lowly peddler, hauling some 180 pounds of sundries door-to-door to eke out a marginall

6、iving. Whena married sister in San Francisco offered to pay his way West in1850, t e n t i n g .he jumped at the opportunity, taking withhim bolts of canvas he hoped to sell for4 It was the wrong kind of canvas for that purpose, but while talking with a miner down from the mother lode, he l earned t

7、hat pants sturdy pants that would stand up to the rigors of the digging were almost impossible to find. Opportunity beckoned. On the spot, Strauss measured the man's girth and inseam with a piece of string and, for six dollars in gold dust 2 , had the canvas tailored into a pair of stiff but rug

8、ged pants. The miner was delighted with the result, word got around about “those pants of Levi's ” and Strauss was in business. The company h a s b e e n i n b u s i n e s s e v e r s i n c e .5 When Strauss ran out of canvas, he wrote his two brothers to send more. He received instead a tough,

9、brown cotton cloth madein Nimes, France called serge de Nimes and swiftly shortened to“denim”(the word “jeans ” derives from G e and hired Davis as anes, the French word for Genoa, where a similar cloth was produced). Almost from the first, Strauss had his cloth dyed the distinctive indigo that gave

10、 blue jeans their name3 , but it was not until the 1870s that he added the copper rivets which have long since become a companytrademark. The rivets were the idea of a Virginia City, Nevada , tailor, Jacob W. Dacis, who added them to pacify a mean-tempered miner called Alkali Ike. Alkali, the story

11、goes, complained that the pockets of his jeans always tore when he stuffed them with ore samples and demandedthat Davis do something about it. As a kind of joke, Davis took the pants to a blacksmith and had the packets riveted; once again, the idea worked so well that word got around;in 1873 Strauss

12、 appropriated 4 and patented the gimmick regional manager.6 By this time, Strauss had taken both his brothers and two brothers-in-law into the companyand was ready for his third San Francisco store. Over the ensuing years the company prospered locally, and by the time of his death in 1902, Strauss h

13、as becomea manof prominence in California . For three decades thereafter the business remained profitable though small, with sales largely confined to the working people of the West cowboys, lumberjacks, railroad workers, and the like. Levi's j eans were first introduced to the East, apparently,

14、 during the dude-ranch craze of the 1930s, when vacationing Easters returned and spread the word about the wonderful pants with rivets. Another boost came in World Warn , when blue jeans weredeclared and essential commodity and were sold only to people engaged in defense work 5 . From a companywith

15、fifteen salespeople, two plants, and almost no business east of the Mississippi in 1946, the organization grew in thirty years to include a sales force of more than twenty-two thousand, with fifty plants and offices in thirty-five countries. Each year, more than 250,000,000 items of Levi's cloth

16、ing are sold including more than 83,000,000 pairs of riveted blue jeans. They have become, through marketing, word of mouth, and demonstrable reliability, the common pants of America . They can be purchased pre-washed, pre-faded, and pre-shrunk for the suitably proletarian look.They adapt themselves

17、 to any sort of idiosyncraticuse; women slit them at the inseams and convert them into long skirts, men chop them off above the knees and turn them into something to be worn while challenging the surf. Decorations and ornamentations abound.7 The pants have become a tradition, and along the way have

18、acquired a historyof th eir own so much so that the company has opened a museum in San Francisco.There was, for example 6 , the turn-of-the-century trainman who replaced a faultycoupling with a pair of jeans; the Wyoming man who used his jeans as a towrope tohaulhis car out of a ditch; the Californi

19、an who found several pairs in an abandonedmine, wore them, then discovered they were sixty-three years old and still as good as new and turned them over to the Smithsonian as a tribute to their toughness.And then there is the particularly terrifying story of the careless construction worker who dang

20、led fifty-two stories above the street until rescued, his sole support the Levi's belt loop through which his rope was hooked.美國(guó)牛仔褲史話卡琳奎因1 本文講述的是美國(guó)的一個(gè)堅(jiān)實(shí)的象征物，如今已經(jīng)遍及世界大部分地區(qū)。此物不是美 元，甚至也不是可口可樂(lè)，而只是一條稱作藍(lán)色牛仔褲的普通褲子。這條褲子所象征的， 如亞歷克西德托克維爾所言，是“對(duì)平等的果敢而正當(dāng)?shù)目是蟆睙o(wú)論是官員還是牛 仔，銀行家還是賴帳徒，時(shí)裝設(shè)計(jì)師還是嗜酒成性者，都同樣青睞藍(lán)色牛仔褲。這種褲子 對(duì)人

21、不分高低貴賤， 只要是美國(guó)人都可以穿。 不過(guò)，牛仔褲幾乎在世界各地都廣受歡迎 其中包括俄羅斯，其當(dāng)局最近破獲了一個(gè)在黑市上倒賣(mài)牛仔褲的青少年團(tuán)伙，他們的牛仔 褲賣(mài)到 200 美元一條。牛仔褲已經(jīng)流行了很長(zhǎng)時(shí)間，看來(lái)其生命力甚至可能超過(guò)領(lǐng)帶。2 這個(gè)無(wú)所不在的美國(guó)象征是一個(gè)出生于巴伐利亞的猶太人發(fā)明的，它的名字叫李 維施特勞斯3 他于 1829 年出生于德國(guó)的巴德奧切姆， 1848 年歐洲政治動(dòng)蕩期間，決定去紐約碰 碰運(yùn)氣，他的兩個(gè)哥哥已經(jīng)移民去了那里。到了紐約，李維很快就發(fā)現(xiàn)，兩個(gè)哥哥關(guān)于在 這片充滿機(jī)遇的土地上生活比較安逸的說(shuō)法實(shí)在有些言過(guò)其實(shí)。他們說(shuō)自己擁有土地，可 他發(fā)現(xiàn)他們?cè)谙蚣彝ブ鲖D

22、推銷針線、鍋罐、緞帶、剪刀和鈕扣。李維做了兩年寒酸的小販， 拉著 180 來(lái)磅的雜貨挨門(mén)挨戶地叫賣(mài)，勉強(qiáng)維持生計(jì)。 1850 年，他的一個(gè)嫁到舊金山的 姐姐愿意為他提供西行的路費(fèi)，他急忙抓住這一機(jī)會(huì)，帶著幾卷帆布走了，打算賣(mài)給人家 做帳篷用。4 豈料這種帆布不適于做帳篷。不過(guò)，李維跟一個(gè)來(lái)自主礦脈的礦工交談時(shí)了解到，人 們簡(jiǎn)直買(mǎi)不到能經(jīng)得起采礦磨損的結(jié)實(shí)耐穿的褲子。機(jī)會(huì)向他招手了。施特勞斯當(dāng)場(chǎng)用一 根帶子量了那人的腰圍和褲長(zhǎng)，請(qǐng)人用帆布做成一條粗硬而耐磨的褲子， 賣(mài)得了 6 美元的 砂金。礦工感到很滿意，于是有關(guān)“李維的那些褲子”的消息不脛而走，施特勞斯從此做 起了生意。自那以后，他的公司一直

23、在經(jīng)營(yíng)。5 施特勞斯用完了帆布，便寫(xiě)信叫哥哥在發(fā)一些過(guò)來(lái)，不想收到的卻是法國(guó)尼姆產(chǎn)的一 種堅(jiān)韌的棕色棉布稱作“尼姆嗶嘰” （ serge de Nimes ）, 很快就簡(jiǎn)稱為“勞動(dòng)布” 英語(yǔ)詞 jeans（ 牛仔褲 ） 源自于法語(yǔ)的 Genes ，即英語(yǔ)的 Genoa （熱那亞），此地生 產(chǎn)一種類似的棉布 。幾乎從一開(kāi)始，施特勞斯就把他的布料染成別具一格的靛藍(lán)色，因 此便有了藍(lán)色牛仔褲之稱。不過(guò)，直到 19 世紀(jì) 70 年代，他才往褲子上加了銅鉚釘；長(zhǎng) 期以來(lái)，這銅鉚釘也就成了公司的標(biāo)志。給褲子加上鉚釘是內(nèi)華達(dá)州弗吉尼亞市的裁縫雅 各布 w戴維斯想出的主意，他這樣做是為了撫慰為一個(gè)名叫阿爾卡利

24、艾克的脾氣暴 躁的礦工。據(jù)說(shuō)他抱怨他往口袋里裝礦石標(biāo)本時(shí)，口袋總是被撐破，要求戴維斯想想辦法。戴維斯開(kāi)了個(gè)玩笑，把褲子拿到鐵匠鋪，給口袋上了鉚釘。這一招果然奏效，消息再一次不脛而走。1873年，施特勞斯采納了這一小發(fā)明，出資為之申請(qǐng)了專利一一并雇用戴維 斯做地區(qū)經(jīng)理。這時(shí)候，施特勞斯已把他的兩個(gè)哥哥和兩個(gè)姐夫招進(jìn)了公 司，并準(zhǔn)備在舊金山開(kāi)辦他的第三個(gè)分店。此后的幾十年間，公 司在當(dāng)?shù)厣馀d隆。1902年施特勞斯去世時(shí)，他已成為加利福 尼亞的知名人士。在以后的30年中，生意雖然不大，但一直在 盈利，主要的銷售對(duì)象是西部的勞工階層一一諸如牛仔、伐木工、 鐵路工之類的人。李維的牛仔褲最初引進(jìn)到東部，

25、顯然是在20世 紀(jì)30年代的農(nóng)場(chǎng)度假熱潮中，西去度假的東部人回家后，便到處宣揚(yáng)這種帶銅鉚釘?shù)钠婷钛澴?。二次大?zhàn)期間，藍(lán)色牛仔褲又 一次走俏，被宣布為緊要商品，只賣(mài)給從事防務(wù)工作的人。該公 司在1946年時(shí)還只有15名銷售員，兩個(gè)加工廠，密西西比河 以東幾乎沒(méi)有什么業(yè)務(wù)，而30年后則發(fā)展成擁有2萬(wàn)2千多 人的銷售隊(duì)伍，并在35個(gè)國(guó)家設(shè)有50家加工廠和辦事處。每 年，李維服裝的銷售量超過(guò)2億5千多萬(wàn)件一一其中包括8千 3百多萬(wàn)條釘有銅鉚釘?shù)乃{(lán)色牛仔褲。 通過(guò)市場(chǎng)營(yíng)銷，口口相傳， 以及顯而易見(jiàn)的可靠性，牛仔褲已成為美國(guó)的尋常褲裝。人們還 可以賣(mài)到進(jìn)行過(guò)水洗、褪色和縮水處理的牛仔褲，以符合無(wú)產(chǎn)者 的形象。牛仔褲經(jīng)過(guò)改造還可以供各種癖好的人使用。婦女們將 褲管內(nèi)縫拆開(kāi)，將褲子改制成長(zhǎng)裙；男人們將其從膝蓋上方截下， 變成沖浪時(shí)穿的短褲。人們還給牛仔褲綴上各式各樣的裝飾物。7牛仔褲已成為一種傳統(tǒng)，在其發(fā)展過(guò)程中譜寫(xiě)了自己的歷史這歷