(单词翻译:单击)
听力文本
I'm Steve Ember. And I'm Shirley Griffith with People in America in VOA Special English. Today we tell about Kurt Vonnegut, a writer and thinker who shook up the country with his unusual writing style and subjects. He helped energize huge numbers of young people to protest the Vietnam War and to always question the powers that be. It took Kurt Vonnegut about twenty-five years to write his most famous book, "Slaughterhouse-Five." It was published in nineteen sixty-nine. The book remains required reading in high school and college English classes across the country. It includes this description of the fire-bombing of Dresden, Germany, by Allied forces during World War Two, as witnessed by a soldier named Billy Pilgrim:
"There was a fire-storm out there. Dresden was one big flame. The one flame ate everything organic, everything that would burn. It wasn't safe to come out of the shelter until noon the next day. When the Americans and their guards did come out, the sky was black with smoke. The sun was an angry little pinhead. Dresden was like the moon now, nothing but minerals. The stones were hot. Everybody else in the neighborhood was dead. So it goes." Kurt Vonnegut, a prisoner of war like Pilgrim, witnessed the bombing of Dresden. The waste of human life and other treasures greatly angered him. His novels contain some of that anger. But Vonnegut always balanced his work with humor and the use of wildly unlikely events presented as normal. For example, in "Slaughterhouse-Five," Billy Pilgrim visits the make-believe planet Tralfamadore. He and a beautiful movie star named Montana Wildhack fall in love there in a clear ball of a house. They are studied by the Tralfamadorians and find happiness.
Kurt Vonnegut compared the science fiction in "Slaughterhouse-Five" to the clowns in the plays of sixteenth century English writer William Shakespeare. Vonnegut believed such literary devices give the reader a rest before the story gets serious again. Kurt Vonnegut's own life was also filled with tragedy and laughter. He was born in nineteen twenty-two in Indianapolis, Indiana. His father was a building designer. His mother was from an extremely wealthy family. She suffered from mental illness and unhappiness as a failed writer. Vonnegut said his mother would have periods of madness where she would emotionally abuse his father. Vonnegut said his father was the gentlest man on the planet. Edith Vonnegut killed herself on Mother's Day, in nineteen forty-four. The act affected her son his whole life.
In nineteen fifty-eight, Kurt Vonnegut's sister and her husband died within two days of each other. Vonnegut and his wife at the time adopted the couple's three children. Kurt Vonnegut was interested in writing from at least his teenage years. He worked on his high school's newspaper. Later he studied at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York and became an editor of that school's newspaper. Vonnegut studied biochemistry. He followed in the footsteps of his older brother, Bernard, who was a scientist. However, Kurt Vonnegut was not a very good student. He left Cornell in nineteen forty-three and joined the army during World War Two. German forces captured him during the Battle of the Bulge in Western Europe. Vonnegut's experiences as a soldier and the bombing of Dresden were among the major influences in his life. He was a pacifist, someone who opposes war and violence for settling conflict. He once said: "You can teach people savagery. They may need savagery, but it's bad for the neighbors. I prefer to teach gentleness."
He was not always gentle on himself, however. He battled depression for most of his life. In nineteen eighty-four, he tried to kill himself by taking too much sleep medicine. He said later that children of a parent who committed suicide will naturally think of death as a sensible solution to any problem. After World War Two, Vonnegut married a childhood friend, Jane Cox. They moved to Chicago, Illinois in nineteen forty-five. They had three children. Vonnegut studied anthropology at the University of Chicago. He also worked as a reporter.
Kurt Vonnegut also began writing short stories. They were published in literary magazines. In nineteen fifty-two he wrote his first novel. "Player Piano" was influenced by Vonnegut's work at the power company, General Electric. Vonnegut said it was there that he got the idea of everything being controlled by computers. He told Playboy Magazine in nineteen seventy-three that it made perfect sense to have little clicking boxes, as he called them, make all the decisions for humans. But he said it was not good for human workers to be replaced by machines. Vonnegut said that he wrote science fiction because General Electric was science fiction to him. "Player Piano" describes a place called Ileum where the humans have surrendered to a computer.
Writers of science fiction are often considered less serious than writers of other kinds of fiction. As a result, Vonnegut's work was published in paperback and ignored by critics for several years. But people started listening more closely to Kurt Vonnegut's literary voice in the nineteen sixties. There was great public anger and protest over American military action in Vietnam. Distrust for the United States government was growing. Young people and minorities especially were speaking up against America's leaders and cultural restrictions. Vonnegut's statements about America, its people and its leaders mixed perfectly with that atmosphere. His novels became favorites of many people involved in the anti-establishment, politically progressive movement of that time.
"Cat's Cradle," published in nineteen sixty-three, is one example. It tells the story of a fictional scientist who helped invent the atomic bomb and something even more dangerous – a substance called ice-nine. "Cat's Cradle" is an extremely funny condemnation of many things. These include the arms race at the time -- efforts by countries to increase their nuclear weapons. It also makes jokes about organized religion and the United States government. In nineteen sixty-four, "Cat's Cradle" won a Hugo Award for science fiction. Also that year, Kurt Vonnegut began teaching at the Writers Workshop at the University of Iowa. He was a professor for many years and taught English at several universities and colleges. He wrote at least fifteen more books, including non-fiction. One of those books was "Breakfast of Champions," published in nineteen seventy-three. Vonnegut tells the story of a wealthy and crazy car salesman named Dwayne Hoover. Hoover reads science fiction books written by a man named Kilgore Trout. Hoover becomes more and more sure that the books are not fiction but reality.
Here Kurt Vonnegut reads from an early version of "Breakfast of Champions." The reading took place in New York City in nineteen seventy. "My name is Dwayne Hoover and I am an experiment by the creator of the universe. I am the only creature in the entire universe who has free will. I am the only creature who has to figure out what to do next and why. Everybody else is a robot. I am pooped. I wish I were a robot too. It is perfectly exhausting having to reason all the time in a universe I never made." Kurt Vonnegut and his wife Jane separated in nineteen seventy. Vonnegut married photographer Jill Krementz nine years later. They adopted a daughter.
Vonnegut continued to be politically outspoken. He used the American political crime called the Watergate scandal in his novel "Jailbird." He was also an early environmental activist. He spoke often and loudly about the long-term dangers of fossil fuel use, pollution and waste of natural resources. Vonnegut also condemned the Bush administration and the war in Iraq that began in two thousand three. Kurt Vonnegut published his last book in two thousand five. "A Man Without A Country" is a collection of his opinions of many subjects, including issues in modern American society. He died in two thousand seven after suffering brain injuries from a fall in his home. He was eighty-four. Kurt Vonnegut's children placed notes of thanks to his fans on the Vonnegut Web site. His daughter Nanny wrote: "I am so sorry for your loss as well as mine."
重点解析
1.witness 目击
Anyone who witnessed the attack should call the police.
任何目睹了那场攻击的人都应该报警。
2.contain 包含
Watermelon contains vitamins and also potassium.
西瓜含有维生素也有钾。
3.make-believe 假装的；虚假的
The violence in those films was too unreal, it was make-believe.
那些电影里的暴力太不真实了，是假的。
4.science fiction 科幻小说
The idea of cloning extinct life forms still belongs to science fiction.
克隆已经灭绝的生物的想法仍旧只限于科幻小说中。
5.literary device 文学手法
Symbolism is not merely a literary device, but occurs in all art forms.
象征主义不仅仅是一种文学手法，而且作为艺术表现手法出现在所有艺术形式之中。
6.surrender 使投降；放弃
General Martin Bonnet called on the rebels to surrender.
马丁·邦尼特将军要求反叛分子们投降。
参考译文
我是史蒂夫·恩贝尔。我是雪莉·格里菲斯。这里是VOA慢速英语栏目《美国人物志》。今天我们要讲述库尔特·冯内古特，他是一名作家兼思想家，用他不同寻常的写作方式和写作主题震撼这个国家。他帮助激励大批年轻人反对越南战争，质疑掌权力量。
库尔特·冯内古特花了约25年的时间创作了他最著名的书籍《五号屠宰场》。该书于1969年出版。该书仍是美国高中大学英语课上的必读材料。书中讲到了二战期间盟军在德国德累斯顿的大轰炸，名为比利·皮尔格里姆的士兵是目击者：“原子爆炸引起了风暴性大火。德累斯顿就是一团巨大的火焰。这团火焰吞噬了一切有机事物，一切都被烧毁了。直到第二天中午，才可以安全走出避难所。当美国人和他们的守卫出来的时候，天空满是浓浓的黑烟。太阳像是一只愤怒的针头。德累斯顿就像月亮一样，除了矿物什么都没有。石头是热的。邻区其他人都死了。就这么回事。”库尔特·冯内古特作为和皮尔格里姆一样的战犯目睹了德累斯顿的爆炸。对人类生命和其他财产的漠视让他极为愤怒。
他的小说中包含愤怒。但是冯内古特总是用幽默感和不可能发生的事件平衡愤怒。例如，在《五号屠宰场》中，比利·皮尔格里姆参观虚构星球特拉法马铎。他和一位名叫梦坦妮·怀尔德哈克漂亮女明星坠入爱河，他们被关在一个房子的透明球里，被特拉法马铎星人研究取乐。库尔特·冯内古特将《五号屠宰场》中的科幻比作16世纪英国作家威廉·莎士比亚戏剧中的小丑。冯内古特认为这种文学手法在故事陷入悲伤之前能让读者轻松一下。
库尔特·冯内古特自己的一生也充满悲剧和笑声。1922年他在印第安纳州印第安纳波利斯出生。他的父亲是一名建筑设计师。她的母亲来自于一个非常富裕的家族。她是一名失败的作家，患有精神疾病，郁郁寡欢冯内古特说他的母亲有时会发疯，发疯时会在虐待他的父亲。冯内古特说他的父亲是这个世界最温和的人。1944年母亲节那一天，伊迪丝·冯内古特自杀了。这一事件影响了她儿子的一生。1958年，库尔特·冯内古特的妹妹和妹夫在两天内相继去世。那时冯内古特和他的妻子收养了他们的三个孩子。
至少从青少年时期起，库尔特·冯内古特就对写作感兴趣。高中时期，他在学校的报社工作。后来他在纽约伊萨卡岛康乃尔大学读书并成为了校报的一名编辑。冯内古特学习生物化学。他跟随着哥哥伯纳德的脚步，伯纳德是一名科学家。但库尔特·冯内古特并不是一名好学生。1943年，他辍学并在二战期间参军。德国军队在西欧的坦克大决战抓捕了他。冯内古特当兵和德累斯顿轰炸的经历对他产生重要影响。他是和平主义者，反对战争和暴力。他曾说：“你可以教会一个人野蛮。他们可能需要野蛮，但是这对别人不是一件好事。我更愿意教人和蔼。”但他自己并非一直温雅。一生大部分时间，他都在与抑郁斗争。1984年，他试图服安眠药自杀。他之后说那些自杀的单亲孩子自然而然地认为死亡是解决任何问题的明智方法。
二战后，冯内古特和童年伙伴简·考克斯结婚。1945年，他们搬到伊利诺斯州芝加哥，有三个孩子。冯内古特在芝加哥大学研究人类学，他还是一名记者。库尔特·冯内古特还开始写短故事，刊登在文艺杂志上。1952年，他写了自己的第一部小说。《自动钢琴》是受到了冯内古特在通用电气工作的经历影响。冯内古特说正是在那里他有了一切都被电脑控制的想法。1973年，他告诉《花花公子》，让那些滴滴答答小盒子替人类做决定是非常合理的。但是他说用机器替代人类工人，对他们而言不是一件好事。冯内古特说他写科幻小说是因为通用电气对他而言就是一部科幻小说。《自动钢琴》描述了一个叫做Ileum的地方，这里的人类向一台电脑投降。
科幻小说的作者常被认为没有其他小说作者严肃。因此，冯内古特的作品出版在平装书中，受到了评论家的忽视。但20世纪60年代，人们开始更多的听库尔特·冯内古特的文学作品。美国参加越战引起公众愤怒和反抗。对美国政府的不信任加剧。尤其是年轻的一代和少数群体公开反对美国领导层和文化限制。冯内古特关于美国、美国人民以及领导层的表述和当时的氛围完美混合。他的小说成为当时反对权威当局要求进步人士的最爱。1963年出版的《猫的摇篮》就是其中之一。该书讲述了一名帮助发明原子弹和一些更危险物质—冰-9的虚构科学家。《猫的摇篮》对很多事情进行了有趣的谴责。其中就包括那时的军备竞赛—国家借此增加他们的核武器。书中还拿组织宗教和美国政府开玩笑。1964年，《猫的摇篮》获得雨果科幻小说奖。
同年，库尔特·冯内古特开始在爱荷华大学作家工作室教书。他当了多年教授，在几所大学教英文。他的书籍作品不少于15本，其中包括非小说类。其中一本是《冠军的早餐》，出版于1973年。冯内古特讲述了一名名为德韦恩·胡佛的富有又疯狂的汽车推销员的故事。胡佛阅读基尔戈·屈鲁特写的科幻小说。胡佛越来越确信这些小说并非虚幻而是真实的。以下是库尔特·冯内古特朗读《冠军的早餐》早期版本的片段，于1970年纽约。
“我叫德韦恩·胡佛，是这个宇宙创造者的试验品。我是整个宇宙中唯一有自由意识的生物。我是唯一一个需要思考的生物。其他的都是机器人。我精疲力竭。我希望我也是机器人。要在宇宙中一直保持理智让人深感疲惫。”
库尔特·冯内古特和他的妻子简在1970年分开了。9年后，冯内古特和摄影师吉尔结婚。他们收养了一个女儿。冯内古特继续在政治上直言不讳。他的小说《囚鸟》谈及了美国政治犯罪—水门丑闻。他还是一名早期的环保主义者。他经常公开谈论使用化石燃料、污染以及自然资源浪费的长期危害。冯内古特还谴责布什政府和2003年开始的伊拉克战争。2005年，库尔特·冯内古特最后一部作品出版。《没有国家的人》是他关于现代美国社会问题等观点的集合。2007年，在他家中摔倒脑部受伤后去世，享年84岁。库尔特·冯内古特的孩子在冯内古特网站上发言感谢他的粉丝。他的女儿南妮写到：“我为大家和自己深感遗憾。”
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