《圍城》英譯選句 － 艷如桃李，冷若冰霜

原文：

蘇小姐理想的自己是：“艷如桃李，冷若冰霜，”讓方鴻漸卑遜地仰慕而后屈伏地求愛。誰知道氣候雖然每天華氏一百度左右，這種又甜又冷的冰淇淋作風全行不通。（錢鐘書 - 《圍城》 ）

翻譯關鍵詞：艷如桃李，冷若冰霜，華氏一百度“左右”

譯文：

Miss Su, who pictured herself in the words of the familiar saying, "as delectable as peach and plum and as cold as frost and ice," decided she would allow Fang to humbly gaze at her in admiration and then prostrate himself to beg for her love. Who would have thought that while the temperature hovered around 100 degrees every day, this sweet, cool ice cream manner of hers was completely ineffective. (美 Jeanne Kelly, Nathan K.Mao <譯> –Fortress Besieged)

翻譯筆記：

艷如桃李，冷若冰霜

這句話出自于《蒼鷹擊 割愛》。一般用來形容女子，容貌艷麗而態度嚴肅。

文中譯為as delectable as peach and plum and as cold as frost and ice

delectable是一個GRE的詞匯，常用在來說食物美味的，或者某件事或人是令人愉快的。

例如：What delectable dinner it is！這頓晚餐真是美味極了！

還有什么詞語可以來形容女子美貌的呢？是不是想到了“沉魚落雁，閉月羞花”？

沉魚落雁 make the fish sink and wild geese fall

閉月羞花 a beauty which obscure the moon and make flowers blush

華氏一百度“左右”

這里特別指出左右，是不是有點奇怪？左右無非就是left and right？哈哈，我們來看，文中是怎么翻譯的。

文中譯為hovered around，是盤旋的意思，這里的翻譯很巧妙，例如：

These days Shanghai's temperature hovered around 0 degrees.

這些天上海的氣溫在0度左右。

相關閱讀

《圍城》英譯選句 - “想到你”還是“想你”？

《圍城》英譯選句 - “體無完膚”

《圍城》英譯選句 - “算命”

《圍城》英譯選句 - “教子以義方”

（來源：滬江英語 編輯：Rosy）