第一章（第4/6页）

Both sisters lived in their father's, really their mother's, Kensington housemixed with the young Cambridge group, the group that stood for 'freedom' and flannel trousers, and flannel shirts open at the neck, and a well-bred sort of emotional anarchy, and a whispering, murmuring sort of voice, and an ultra-sensitive sort of manner. Hilda, however, suddenly married a man ten years older than herself, an elder member of the same Cambridge group, a man with a fair amount of money, and a comfortable family job in the government: he also wrote philosophical essays. She lived with him in a smallish house in Westminster, and moved in that good sort of society of people in the government who are not tip-toppers, but who are, or would be, the real intelligent power in the nation: people who know what they're talking about, or talk as if they did.

姐妹俩住进肯辛顿（注：位于伦敦西部的行政区划）父亲家里，确切地讲，那里本来属于母亲，与剑桥大学学生团体的年轻成员们混居一处。这些家伙都标榜“自由”，穿法兰绒开领衫，配法兰绒长裤，满腹教养，笃信情感无政府主义，嗓音低沉含混，仪态反应异常灵敏。没料想，希尔达突然成婚，丈夫比她年长十岁，是该学生团体的资深成员，家财殷实，在政府中充当僚属，也常写点哲学文章。她跟随丈夫，住进威斯敏斯特一处不大的寓所，交往的都是政府阶层，虽说算不得头面人物，但也都是或者将会成为英国的真正智囊。他们知道自己在谈论些什么，或者装作自己无所不知。

Connie did a mild form of war-work, and consorted with the flannel-trousers Cambridge intransigents, who gently mocked at everything, so far. Her "friend" was a Clifford Chatterley, a young man of twenty-two, who had hurried home from Bonn, where he was studying the technicalities of coal-mining. He had previously spent two years at Cambridge. Now he had become a first lieutenant in a smart regiment, so he could mock at everything more becomingly in uniform.

康妮得到份清闲的战时工作，常与那些穿法兰绒长裤的剑桥学生为伴，他们有着独立的政治见解，总会措辞文雅地揶揄时事。她的“男友”名叫克利福德·查泰莱，时年22岁，当时正在德国波恩学习煤矿开采技术，刚刚匆忙赶回英伦。此前，他在剑桥修习过两年。如今则是一个厉害的军团里的陆军中尉，身着军装，更可以随意睥睨一切了。

Clifford Chatterley was more upper-class than Connie. Connie was well-to-do intelligentsia, but he was aristocracy. Not the big sort, but still it. His father was a baronet, and his mother had been a viscount's daughter.

克利福德·查泰莱的出身高过康妮。康妮出自富裕的知识分子家庭，而他却属于贵族阶层。虽说不是名门显族，但仍然沾得上边。其父为准男爵，其母未出阁时，也是子爵家的千金。

But Clifford, while he was better bred than Connie, and more "society", was in his own way more provincial and more timid. He was at his ease in the narrow "great world", that is, landed aristocracy society, but he was shy and nervous of all that other big world which consists of the vast hordes of the middle and lower classes, and foreigners. If the truth must be told, he was just a little bit frightened of middle-and lower-class humanity, and of foreigners not of his own class. He was, in some paralysing way, conscious of his own defencelessness, though he had all the defence of privilege. Which is curious, but a phenomenon of our day.

虽说克利福德的教养及身份都优于康妮，但却更加狭隘羞怯。置身狭小的“上流社会”——地主贵族阶层，他尚且感觉自在，但一旦与其他阶层——包括人数众多的中产阶级、下层民众、甚至外国人相处，他便羞怯不前，紧张兮兮。说白了，他对中低阶层的人们有些心怀畏惧，对并非贵族的外国人也有些抵触。虽然享有的特权都得到极力捍卫，但他仍然会觉得自己有些麻木但又惶惑无助。这种现象的确怪异，但却真实存在于我们这个时代。

Therefore the peculiar soft assurance of a girl like Constance Reid fascinated him. She was so much more mistress of herself in that outer world of chaos than he was master of himself.

也难怪康斯坦斯·里德那份与众不同的温婉自得，让他深深着迷。身处纷乱复杂的外部世界中，康妮显得更加镇定自若，这点远非他所能比。

Nevertheless he too was a rebel: rebelling even against his class. Or perhaps rebel is too strong a word; far too strong. He was only caught in the general, popular recoil of the young against convention and against any sort of real authority. Fathers were ridiculous: his own obstinate one supremely so. And governments were ridiculous: our own wait-and-see sort especially so. And armies were ridiculous, and old buffers of generals altogether, the red-faced Kitchener supremely. Even the war was ridiculous, though it did kill rather a lot of people.

然而，他同样是个离经叛道者，甚至公然对抗自己的阶级。或许离经叛道这个词过于强烈，太过激烈。他不过是跟普通青年大众一样愤世嫉俗，反对传统，挑战任何形式的权威。父辈们都是愚蠢可笑的，他那位冥顽不灵的父亲尤是如此。政府当局都是极端荒谬的，总是抱有投机心理的英国政府尤是如此。军队都是荒唐透顶的，那些垂垂老矣的将军们，面色酡红的基奇纳（注：1850-1916，英国陆军元帅，在一战前期起到过举足轻重的作用。）尤是如此。甚至战争本身都是毫无意义的，虽然成千上万的人们因它而丢掉性命。

In fact everything was a little ridiculous, or very ridiculous: certainly everything connected with authority, whether it were in the army or the government or the universities, was ridiculous to a degree.

事实上，世间万物都有些荒诞的色彩，或者说是非常荒诞，尤其是所有与权威相关的东西，无论是军队、政府或者高等院校，无一例外地荒诞至极。

And as far as the governing class made any pretensions to govern, they were ridiculous too. Sir Geoffrey, Clifford's father, was intensely ridiculous, chopping down his trees, and weeding men out of his colliery to shove them into the war; and himself being so safe and patriotic; but, also, spending more money on his country than he'd got.

至于那些自命不凡的统治阶层，同样是值得奚落的对象。克利福德的父亲，杰弗里爵士，更是荒唐到极点。他伐尽园中的树木，将自家矿场里的工人一股脑地赶上前线，而自己则在后方高枕无忧，高喊救国口号，不过，他也确实为国家慷慨解囊，甚至到了入不敷出的地步。

When Miss Chatterley—Emma—came down to London from the Midlands to do some nursing work, she was very witty in a quiet way about Sir Geoffrey and his determined patriotism. Herbert, the elder brother and heir, laughed outright, though it was his trees that were falling for trench props. But Clifford only smiled a little uneasily. Everything was ridiculous, quite true. But when it came too close and oneself became ridiculous too...? At least people of a different class, like Connie, were earnest about something. They believed in something.