Youth is not a time of life; it is a state of mind; it is not a matter of rosy cheeks, red lips and supple knees; it is a matter

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问题   Youth is not a time of life; it is a state of mind; it is not a matter of rosy cheeks, red lips and supple knees; it is a matter of the will, a quality of the imagination, a vigor of the emotions; it is the freshness of the deep springs of life. Youth means a temperamental predominance of courage over timidity, of the appetite for adventure over the love of ease. This often exists in a man of 60 more than a boy of 20. Nobody grows old merely by a number of years. We grow old by deserting our ideals. Years may wrinkle, the skin but to give up enthusiasm wrinkles the soul. Worry, fear, self-distrust bows the heart and turns the spring back to dust. Whether 60 or 16 years old, there is the lure of wonder, the unfailing childlike appetite and the joy of the game of living in every human being’s heart. In the center of your heart and my heart there is a wireless station: so long as it receives messages of beauty, hope, char, courage and power from men and from the Infinite, so long are you young. When the aerials are down, and your spirit is covered with snows of cynicism and the ice of pessimism, then you are grown old, even at 20, but as long as your serials are up, to catch waves of optimism, there is hope you may die young at 80.

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答案年岁有加,并非垂老;理想丢弃,方堕暮年。岁月悠悠,衰微只及肌肤;热忱抛却,颓唐必致灵魂。忧烦,惶恐、丧失自信,定使心灵扭曲,意气如灰。无论年届花甲,押或二八芳龄,心中皆有生命之欢乐,奇迹之诱惑,孩童般天真久盛不衰。人人心中皆有一台天线,只要你从天上人间接受美好、希望、欢乐、勇气和力量的信号,你就青春永驻、风华常存。一旦天线倒下,锐气便被冰雪覆盖,玩世不恭、自暴自弃油然而生,即便年方二十,实以垂垂老矣;然则只要竖起天线,捕捉乐观信号,你就有望在八十高龄告别尘寰时仍觉年轻。

解析 原文行文流畅,句式简洁,语言生动,翻译时需保持这一语体特征。
“Nobody grows old…We grow old…”在结构(subject+v.+complement+adv.)和语义(nobody对we;grows old merely by a number of years对grow old by deserting our ideals)上均有逻辑关联,对仗的结构形式突出了对比的思想内容。翻译时要突出这种对比,译为“年岁有加,井非垂老;理想丢弃,方堕暮年”,内容与形式相得益彰。
turns the spring back to dust与上文的it is the freshness of the deep springs of life(青春是生命的深泉在涌流)相呼应,指生命的深泉干涸,最终化作尘埃,这里引申意译为“意气如灰”。
in the center of your heart and my heart译为“人人心中”,是考虑到译文风格上的总体设计(多用四字结构)。
以“天上人间”译“from men and from the Infinite",这需要对两种语言的文化有较高的认识。
so long are you young为倒装,其中的long为状语,前移的目的是为了强调;译文“你就青春永驻、风华常存”采用同义重复的方法,使抽象(long,young)变具体(永驻、常存;青春、风华)。
  介词词组with snows of cynicism and the ice of pessimism译为动词短语“玩世不恭、自暴自弃油然而生”,这是汉语中多用动词词组的特性决定的;英译汉中遇到with引导的短语,如with sth. done,with sb./sth.doing等等,常常译作独立的分句。
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