原文：苏小姐理想的自己是：“艳如桃李，冷若冰霜，”让方鸿渐卑逊地仰慕而后屈伏地求爱。谁知道气候虽然每天华氏一百度左右，这种又甜又冷的冰淇淋作风全行不通。（钱钟书 - 《围城》 ）

 

译文：Miss Su, who pictured herself in the words of the familiar saying, "as delectable¹ as peach and plum and as cold as frost and ice," decided² she would allow Fang³ to humbly⁴ gaze at her in admiration⁵ and then prostrate⁶ himself to beg for her love. Who would have thought that while the temperature hovered⁷ around 100 degrees every day, this sweet, cool ice cream manner of hers was completely ineffective. (美 Jeanne Kelly, Nathan K.Mao <译> –Fortress Besieged)

 

 

这句话出自于《苍鹰击 割爱》。一般用来形容女子，容貌艳丽而态度严肃。

 

文中译为as delectable as peach and plum and as cold as frost and ice

 

delectable是一个GRE的词汇，常用在来说食物美味的，或者某件事或人是令人愉快的。

 

例如：What delectable dinner it is！这顿晚餐真是美味极了！

 

还有什么词语可以来形容女子美貌的呢？是不是想到了“沉鱼落雁，闭月羞花”？

 

沉鱼落雁 make the fish sink and wild geese fall

 

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

 

 

这里特别指出左右，是不是有点奇怪？左右无非就是left and right？哈哈，我们来看，文中是怎么翻译的。

 

文中译为hovered around，是盘旋的意思，这里的翻译很巧妙，例如：

 

These days Shanghai's temperature hovered around 0 degrees.

这些天上海的气温在0度左右。

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