人是很奇怪的动物，当你听到别人说“我很快乐”，你的脑袋中也许会闪出上百个带怀疑的问题，“你有没有想过就业压力？”，“你有没有试过做好一切出门的准备却被告知约会取消？”……当你为这个社会的诸多问题而烦闷，为他人或自己的愚笨而气恼时，停一停，给自己一个喘息的空间，承认你我和这世界的不完美，并学着融入这种不完美的生活中，创造奇迹。
作者简介：Star Over Broadway百老汇之星 
奥斯卡·汉默斯坦二世 (Oscar Hammerstein II, 1895–1960)，著名的音乐剧剧作家、歌词作家。在他那首扬名世界的作品《老人河》(Ol’ Man River)中，汉默斯坦把密西西比河比作一个老人，世间的不平与不幸，仿佛都已与他无关，他只顾缓缓地、头也不回地向着大海流去。被誉为音乐剧里程碑的《俄克拉荷马!》(Oklahoma!, 1943)和他之前的另一代表作《演出船》(Show Boat, 1927)，同样充分反映了美国本土生活和文化，对美国戏剧产生了不可估量的影响。汉默斯坦打破了传统音乐剧以喜剧或“美腿”开场的僵硬模式，主张不要受任何模式的限制去探讨最直接的，也是最佳的讲述戏剧故事的方式，是一位承前启后的音乐人。其后的《南太平洋》(South Pacific, 1949)，《国王与我》(The King and I, 1951)和《音乐之声》(The Sound of Music, 1959)，让汉默斯坦和他的最佳搭档作曲家理查德·罗杰斯(Richard Rodgers)享誉全球。
Read by Jason Boyd 美式发音 适合模仿
I have an unusual 1)statement to make. I am a man who believes he is happy. What makes it unusual is that a man who is happy seldom tells anyone. The unhappy man is more communicative. He is eager to recite what is wrong with the world and he seems to have a talent for gathering a large audience. It is a modern tragedy that despair has so many spokesmen, and hope so few. I believe, therefore, that it is important for a man to announce that he is happy, even though such an announcement is less dramatic and less entertaining than the cries of his 2)pessimistic opposite.
我有一句不寻常的话要说。我是一个相信自己很快乐的人。这话显得不寻常的原因在于快乐的人很少告诉别人。不快乐的人则更乐于交流。他渴望讲述世界的错误，并且他似乎拥有聚集大批听众的天赋。绝望有如此多代言人，而希望的却如此稀少，这是新时代的悲哀。所以我认为，快乐的人大声宣布自己是快乐的非常重要，即使这样的宣告不及他的悲观对手的哭诉那么激动人心和有趣吸引。
Why do I believe I am happy? Death has deprived me of many whom I loved, 3)dismal failure has followed many of my most earnest efforts, people have disappointed me, I’ve disappointed them, I’ve disappointed myself.
我为什么认为我是快乐的？死神夺去了很多我爱的人的生命，我多次付出最大的努力却只换来惨败，人们曾让我失望，我曾让他们失望，我曾让自己失望。
From all this evidence, could I not build up a strong case to prove why I am not happy at all? I could, but it would be a false picture; as false as if I were to describe a tree only as it looks in winter. I would be leaving out a list of people I love who have not died. I would be leaving out an acknowledgement of the many successes that have 4)sprouted among my many failures. I would be leaving out the blessing of good health, the joy of walking in the sunshine. ①All these things are as much a part of my world as the darker worries that shade them.
事实在眼前，难道我不能举例力证自己毫不快乐吗？我可以的，但那将会是一种错误的景象；就像我仅仅描述一棵树在冬天的样子。我将会忽略一批我关爱的生者。我将会忽略在我的诸多失败中诞生的诸多成功。我将会忽略拥有健康体魄的快乐和在阳光下漫步的喜悦。 ①所有这些都是我的世界的一部分，就像那些笼罩在其他人头上的阴霾与忧虑一样。
The conflict of good and bad merges in thick 5)entanglement. You cannot isolate virtue and beauty and success and laughter and keep them all from contact with wickedness and ugliness and failure and weeping. The man who strives for such isolated joy is riding for a fall; he will wind up in isolated 6)gloom. ②I don’t believe anyone can enjoy living in this world unless he can accept its imperfection. He must know and admit that he is imperfect, that all other 7)mortals are imperfect, that ③it is childish to allow these imperfections to destroy all his hope and all his desire to live.
善恶的矛盾冲突会纠缠不断。你不能将美德、美丽、成功和欢笑孤立起来，并断绝它们与邪恶、丑陋、失败和哭泣的所有联系。追求这种孤立的愉悦的人将会步向失败；其结果是陷入孤立的忧伤中。②我认为一个人除非接受了这个世界的不完美，否则他将无法享受生活在这个世界上的乐趣。他必须知道并承认自己是不完美的，所有其他人也是不完美的，而③任由这些不完美来毁灭他所有的希望和生存欲望是幼稚的。
Nature is older than man and she is still far from perfect. Her summers do not always start promptly on June 21st, her 8)bugs and beetles and other insects often go beyond her obvious intentions, devouring the leaves and buds with which she has 9)adorned her countryside. After the land has remained too dry for too long, she sends relieving rains, but frequently they come in torrents so violent that they do more harm than good.
自然比人类更年长，而它本身也远未达到完美的境地。夏天并不总是在6月21日迅时地到来，臭虫、甲虫和其它昆虫经常超出她的明确意愿，吞噬了她用来装饰乡村的绿叶和嫩芽。在土地经历了长期干旱之后，她会降下几场及时雨，但是它们往往会演变成迅猛的洪流，其结果往往弊大于利。
④Over the years, however, nature keeps going on in her imperfect way and the result, in spite of her many mistakes, is a continuing miracle. It will be 10)folly for an individual to seek to do better; to do better than go on in his own imperfect way, making his mistakes, 11)riding out the rough and 12)bewildering,exciting and beautiful storm of life until the day he dies.
④然而在过去的岁月中，自然依然在其不完美的方式中继续前进，结果是，尽管她有许多错误，却依然创下了持续的奇迹。个人力求完美是愚蠢的；不必力求完美，应当在自身的不完美中前行，容许犯错，经得起人生这场让人晕头转向、兴奋不已而又美妙绚丽的狂风暴雨，直至死亡的那一天。
翻译：晓淳
