演讲原文

You might be driven by a fear of failure quite as much as a desire for success. Indeed, your conception of failure might not be too far from the average person's idea of success, so high have you already flown.

你们对失败的恐惧很可能与你们对成功的渴望一样强烈。实际上，你们眼中的失败可能在常人看来就是成功，毕竟你们在学业上已经相当成功了。

Ultimately, we all have to decide for ourselves what constitutes failure, but the world is quite eager to give you a set of criteria if you let it. So I think it fair to say that by any conventional measure, a mere seven years after my graduation day, I had failed on an epic scale. An exceptionally short-lived marriage had imploded, and I was jobless, a lone parent, and as poor as it is possible to be in modern Britain, without being homeless. The fears that my parents had had for me, and that I had had for myself, had both come to pass, and by every usual standard, I was the biggest failure I knew.
最终，我们所有人都必须自己判断什么事失败，但是如果你乐意的话，这个世界是非常渴望给你一套标准的。因此根据任何传统的标准都可以说，我在毕业后短短七年里经历了惨痛的失败：短暂的婚姻闪电般破裂，失业，成为单身母亲。在现代化的英国，我变得极度贫困，只是还没有到无家可归的地步。父母和我自己对未来的担忧，当年都变成了现实。无论按什么标准，当时我都是我所知道是最失败的人。

Now, I am not going to stand here and tell you that failure is fun. That period of my life was a dark one, and I had no idea that there was going to be what the press has since represented as a kind of fairy tale resolution. I had no idea then how far the tunnel extended, and for a long time, any light at the end of it was a hope rather than a reality.
现在，我不打算站在这里告诉你们失败是有趣的。那段日子是我生命中的黑暗岁月，我不知道我会写出被新闻界成为“童话故事的革命”的作品。我也不知道自己还要在黑暗中走多久，不知道还要过多久才能看到希望的光芒而不是现实的黑暗。

热词空间

conception
n. 概念
eg. This conception has been rigidified.
这种观念已被僵化。

constitute
vt. 构成
eg. Listening, speaking, reading, then writing constitute the fundamental order in language learning.
听、说、读、写是学习语言的根本顺序。

criteria
n. 标准（criterion 的复数）
eg. The criteria will be different from those that pertain elsewhere. 这里的标准将不同于其他地方适用的标准。

conventional
adj. 传统的
eg. The conventional practice flourishes in the United States.
这种常规做法在美国很盛行。

epic
adj. 规模的大的，有重大历史意义的
eg. Having created this bond with the audience and taken them on an epic journey, he turned in on himself.
此前他与观众互动，并将他们领进了一段史诗般的旅程，而现在他开始转入自己的内心。

implode
vi. 内爆
eg. As the traditional journalism business continues to implode, the almost-journalists will come to play an increasingly important role in the media ecosystem.
随着传统的新闻业务不断地内爆，这些准新闻记者将会在媒体生态环境中扮演越来越重要的角色。

resolution
n. 决心；决定
eg. We subscribe to the resolution.
我们赞同这项决议。

tunnel
n. 隧道
eg. A tunnel was to be blasted through the mountains.
一条隧道要被炸开，穿山而过。