英语原文

Only two memories brought tears to Sun Yaoting's eyes in old age -- the day his father cut off his genitals, and the day his family threw away the pickled remains that should have made him a whole man again at death.

China's last eunuch was tormented and impoverished in youth, punished in revolutionary China for his role as the "Emperor's slave" but finally feted and valued, largely for outlasting his peers to become a unique relic, a piece of "living history."

He had stories of the tortuous rituals of the Forbidden City, Emperor Pu Yi's last moments there and the troubled puppet court run by the Japanese during the 1930s. He escaped back to the heart of a civil war, became a Communist official and then a target of radical leftists before being finally left in peace.

This turbulent life has been recorded in the "The Last Eunuch of China" by amateur historian Jia Yinghua, who over years of friendship drew out of Sun the secrets that were too painful or intimate to spill to prying journalists or state archivists.

He died in 1996, in an old temple that had become his home, and his biography was finally published in English this year.

It unveils formerly taboo subjects like the sex life of eunuchs and the emperor they served, the agonizing castrations often done at home and also often lethal, and the incontinence and shame that came with the promise of great power.

"He was conflicted over whether to tell the secrets of the emperor," said Jia, adding that Sun preserved a loyalty to the old system because he had dedicated so much of his life to it.

"I was the only person he trusted. He did not even confide in his family, after they threw away his 'treasure,'" Jia added, using traditional eunuchs' slang for their preserved genitals.

They were discarded during the chaotic 1966-76 Cultural Revolution, when having anything from the "old society" could put lives at risk.

"He only cried about two things; when telling me about the castration and about the loss of his 'treasure'," said Jia, who works as an energy bureaucrat, but devotes all his spare time to chronicling the dying days of Imperial China after a childhood enthralled by the eunuchs and princes who were his neighbors.

STERILITY AND POWER

Over years of painstaking research, he has gleaned arcane details about every aspect of palace life, along with secrets about the emperor's sexuality and cruelty that would look at home on the front page of tabloid newspapers.

For centuries in China, the only men from outside the imperial family who were allowed into the Forbidden City's private quarters were castrated ones. They effectively swapped their reproductive organs for a hope of exclusive access to the emperor that made some into rich and influential politicians.

Sun's impoverished family set him on this painful, risky path in hopes that he might one day be able to crush a bullying village landlord who stole their fields and burned their house.

His desperate father performed the castration on the bed of their mud-walled home, with no anesthetic and only oil-soaked paper as a bandage. A goose quill was inserted in Sun's urethra to prevent it getting blocked as the wound healed.

He was unconscious for three days and could barely move for two months. When he finally rose from his bed, history played the first of a series of cruel tricks on him -- he discovered the emperor he hoped to serve had abdicated several weeks earlier.

"He had a very tragic life. He had thought it was worthwhile for his father, but the sacrifice was in vain," Jia said, in a house stacked with old books, newspapers and photos.

"He was very smart and shrewd. If the empire had not fallen there is a high chance he would have become powerful," Jia added.

The young ex-emperor was eventually allowed to stay in the palace and Sun had risen to become an attendant to the empress when the imperial family were unceremoniously booted out of the Forbidden City, ending centuries of tradition and Sun's dreams.

"He was castrated, then the emperor abdicated. He made it into the Forbidden City then Pu Yi was evicted. He followed him north and then the puppet regime collapsed. He felt life had played a joke at his expense," Jia said.

Many eunuchs fled with palace treasures, but Sun took a crop of memories and a nose for political survival that turned out to be better tools for surviving years of civil war and ideological turbulence that followed.

"He never became rich, he never became powerful, but he became very rich in experience and secrets," Jia said.

中文翻译

父亲替他净身那天，他的家人把他的“宝贝”（待死后和尸体一起下葬以保证作为一个身体发肤未缺损的人）扔了那天——唯有这两次记忆使孙耀庭（音）老泪纵横。

中国最后的太监早年间穷困潦倒，在革命的中国中又因充当“主子的奴才”这一角色而受罚，但最后也“人以稀为贵”了，因为活的主子们长，成为唯一的遗物，一种“活历史”。

他讲述了紫禁城的繁文缛节，溥仪在那里的最后时光以及1930年代日本人扶植拼凑的傀儡朝廷。他从内战中逃离，成为共产党干部，在和平年代又被打成激进左倾分子。

这动荡的一生已被收入业余历史学者贾英华（音）写的《中国最后一个太监》书中，作为孙的好友，得以披露出痛苦而隐私的秘闻，而这些是不足道于八卦记者和官方档案的。

1996年他死在一个寄居的旧庙中，今年他的英文传记出版。

太监和他们的主子的性生活这些从前的禁忌话题如今公诸于众，极端痛苦的阉割通常就在家做，容易致死，失禁和难堪也伴随在对巨大权力的追求过程中。

“他以前不愿意透露皇帝的秘密，”贾说，孙对那倾注一生的古老体制忠心耿耿。

“我是他唯一信任的人，他连家里人都不说，何况他们扔掉了他的‘宝贝’，”贾补充道，用的词是旧时太监们对收藏的命根子的叫法。

文革动荡中，它们都被扔了，那时私藏“旧社会”来的任何事物都是危险的。

“他只为两个事哭过；跟我讲净身和‘宝贝’没了的时候，”贾说，这位把所有业余时间都投入编纂中国帝制垂死时期历史的人也是一位精力充沛的主管能源的干部，童年时代，邻居中的太监和王族吸引了他。

经过多年潜心研究，他已收集了宫廷生活的各种细节，包括那种刊载于小报头版上的关于皇帝性事和残忍的传说。

在中国，数个世纪以来，唯一能进入紫禁城内城的皇室以外的人就是太监。他们交出传宗接代的器官，希翼通过这道窄门在皇帝那里换取飞黄腾达。

孙家贫困，让他走这条痛苦危险的道路是希望有朝一日他能发达了，好找抢地烧房导致他家败落的恶霸地主报仇。

在他家筑泥为墙的屋子里，他躺在床上，孤注一掷的父亲下了阉刀，没有麻药，完了只用油纸包住。一根鹅毛管子插进孙的尿道防止伤口愈合时赌塞。

他昏迷三天，接下来两个月没动。等他从床上起来时，历史跟他玩了一个把戏，这只是他残酷命运的开局——他希望伺候的皇帝几个星期前退位了。

“他一生悲惨。他曾想为了父亲有所作为，却发现一场空，”贾说，屋子里堆满了书、报纸、图片。

“他人很精明。如果皇帝没有下台，他有很大机会发达，”贾补充道。

年轻的废皇后来被允许留在宫里，孙升格为皇后服务的时候皇室被赶出了紫禁城，数世纪的体制结束了，孙的梦想也被击碎了。

“他被阉，紧接着皇帝退位。他进入紫禁城然后溥仪被驱逐。他追随溥仪到北方直到傀儡政府垮台。他觉得命运在戏弄他，”贾说

许多太监跑的时候带着宫里的财宝，而孙带着丰富的记忆力和政治敏感性，在日后的内战和意识形态中它们发挥了作用。

“他没有发达过，但他在阅历和秘闻方面也算发达了。”贾说。