In both these roles it ratifies more than it creates.
在这两个方面，它所起的审批作用大于其创造作用。
Wall Street will advance the millions to make a Hollywood movie only if convinced that a bestselling title or a star name will ensure its success.
华尔街只有在确信某种畅销书或是某位影星的大名准保一部影片的成功时才会为制作一部好莱坞影片投放百万巨资。
The networks’ news centers are here, and the largest book publishers, and the biggest magazines – and therefore the largest body of critics to appraise the films, the plays, the music, the books that others have created.
美国广播电视网的新闻中心、最大的图书出版商和最大的期刊杂志都在这里，因而最庞大的一支评论家队伍也在这里，他们可以对别人创作出的电影、戏剧、音乐、图书和其他作品评头论足。
New York is a judging town, and often invokes standards that the rest of the country deplores or ignores.
纽约是一个裁判城市，经常炮制出一些全国其他地方的人不是为之感到遗憾就是完全不予理睬的规范标准。
A market for knowingness exists in New York that doesn’t exist for knowledge.
在纽约这地方真正的知识学问没有市场，狡黠伶俐却颇有市场。
The ad agencies are all here too, testing the markets and devising the catchy jingles that will move millions from McDonald’s to Burger king,
商业广告公司也全集中在这里。这些广告公司窥测着市场动向，挖空心思地炮制出一些琅琅上口、易于记诵的广告词，把千千万万的顾客从"麦克唐纳"拉到"伯格?金"，
so that the ad agency’s “creative director” can lunch instead in Manhattan’s expense-account French restaurants.
因而广告公司的"创作主任"便可以坐在曼哈顿那些记帐报销的高级法国餐馆里吃午餐了。
The bankers and the admen. The marketing specialists and a thousand well-paid ancillary service people, really set the city’s brittle tone— catering to a wide American public whose numbers must be respected but whose tastes do not have to shared.
实际上，就是那些银行家、广告商、市场营销专家以及那数以千计的为他们工作的高薪雇员们为纽约这个城市定下了尖锐生硬的调子--对广大的美国公众要投其所好，对他们人数的多寡必须予以重视，但对他们的兴趣爱好却不必加以认同。
The condescending view from the fiftieth floor of the city’s crowds below cuts these people off from humanity.
从摩天大楼的五十层楼上屈尊俯就地光顾楼下的芸芸众生。
So does an attitude which sees the public only in terms of large, malleable numbers— as impersonally as does the clattering subway turnstile beneath the office towers.
这些富人们就会感觉到他们与这些芸芸众生仿佛不是同类;还有他们那种就像他们的办公高楼下面地铁入口处卡嗒作响的转门一样，丝毫不带任何感情地视广大人民群众如一大堆可以任意排列组合的数字的态度，也同样使他们产生不属于人类的感觉。