通常我們?cè)谠u(píng)價(jià)一篇漢語(yǔ)文章“有文采”時(shí)，指的是其遣詞造句出色。那么，英文的文采如何體現(xiàn)呢？與中文類(lèi)似，英文的文采可以通過(guò)兩個(gè)方面體現(xiàn)，一個(gè)是用詞，另一個(gè)是修辭。下面小編會(huì)通過(guò)一些具體的例子來(lái)做說(shuō)明。

1.用詞

唐朝詩(shī)人賈島因?yàn)檎遄谩傍B(niǎo)宿池邊樹(shù)，僧敲月下門(mén)”究竟應(yīng)該用“推”還是用“敲”而碰巧遇到韓愈，于是有“推敲”的典故。這說(shuō)明好作品是一個(gè)字斟句酌的過(guò)程，有時(shí)候用好一個(gè)詞就能起到畫(huà)龍點(diǎn)睛的效果，英文中也有很多這樣的例子，比如：

In nature, though, diamonds are unremarkable. They are simplycrystals of carbon, albeit crystals of a type that needs a fair amount ofpressure to form. And carbon is the fourth-most abundant element in theuniverse. For that reason, diamonds are thought to be the commonest gemstoneson Earth. Elsewhere in the cosmos, as demonstrated in a paper just published inNature Astronomy, they are probably available in embarrassing abundance.

上面這段文字的背景是：鉆石因?yàn)橄∪倍鴥r(jià)格高昂，但在宇宙中組成鉆石的物質(zhì)其實(shí)并不稀缺。《自然天文學(xué)》雜志上面最新發(fā)表的論文顯示，鉆石這種物質(zhì)在宇宙其他地方很常見(jiàn)，有多常見(jiàn)呢？原文的說(shuō)法是：they areprobably available in embarrassing abundance 翻遍世界上所有詞典，恐怕沒(méi)有任何一本會(huì)告訴你abundance可以用embarrassing來(lái)修飾，但embarrassing在這里如神來(lái)之筆，它很好地說(shuō)明了鉆石的數(shù)量之多：已經(jīng)多到令人尷尬的程度了。

還有另外一個(gè)例子：

After passing Titan, Cassini will dive back towards Saturn, butthis time, it will not return. On September 15th, at about 1pm London time, itwill kiss the outer edges ofSaturn’s atmosphere and begin to tumble, losing contact with Earth.

卡西尼探測(cè)器在通過(guò)土星的衛(wèi)星泰坦之后將會(huì)墜入土星，對(duì)于重返土星這一過(guò)程，作者用了一個(gè)詞：kiss，kiss在這里并不是“親吻”的意思，而是指“輕觸，輕拂”。這一詞很形象地說(shuō)明了卡西尼輕輕掠過(guò)土星外層大氣的場(chǎng)景。

2.修辭

英文中用到的修辭手法主要有這幾種：排比、對(duì)仗、重復(fù)、押韻、比喻、引用等。

（1）排比

排比將結(jié)構(gòu)相同或相似的語(yǔ)言單位平行并列，達(dá)到對(duì)稱(chēng)的形式美。這種手法在演講中很常見(jiàn)，比如著名的GettysburgAddress:

But, in a larger sense, wecannot dedicate-- we cannotconsecrate-- we cannot hallow--this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, haveconsecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract.

上面的句子連用三個(gè)we cannot來(lái)增強(qiáng)語(yǔ)氣，讀起來(lái)很有感染力。

又比如馬丁路德金的演講I have a dream:

I have a dreamthat one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaningof its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men arecreated equal."

I have a dreamthat one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slavesand the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at thetable of brotherhood.

I have a dreamthat one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering withthe heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will betransformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

馬丁路德金在演講中用了一系列I have a dream來(lái)說(shuō)明自己對(duì)種族平等的希望，表達(dá)效果很震撼，類(lèi)似的例子還有奧巴馬在2008年獲勝演講時(shí)用的六個(gè) ”Yes we can.”

（2）對(duì)仗

對(duì)仗的手法與對(duì)比類(lèi)似，只不過(guò)它是用意義相反的語(yǔ)言單位來(lái)形成強(qiáng)烈的對(duì)比感。比如阿姆斯特朗在登月時(shí)說(shuō)的一句話：That’s one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind. 其中就用到了對(duì)仗的手法。

最近我在《衛(wèi)報(bào)》上讀到一篇文章：How technologydisrupted the truth，作者在文中表達(dá)了對(duì)互聯(lián)網(wǎng)技術(shù)加劇人們認(rèn)知差距的擔(dān)憂，其中出現(xiàn)一組句子在對(duì)仗的運(yùn)用上爐火純青：

Now, we are caught in a series of confusing battles betweenopposing forces: between truth and falsehood, fact and rumour, kindness andcruelty; between the few and the many, the connected and the alienated; betweenthe open platform of the web as its architects envisioned it and the gatedenclosures of Facebook and other social networks; between an informed publicand a misguided mob.

這一系列對(duì)比句寫(xiě)得如行云流水，讀起來(lái)本身就是一種享受。作者也通過(guò)這一組句子很好地說(shuō)明目前互聯(lián)網(wǎng)上這兩股勢(shì)力的隔閡之深。

（3）重復(fù)

重復(fù)手法則是通過(guò)對(duì)某個(gè)單詞或短語(yǔ)的重復(fù)來(lái)起到強(qiáng)調(diào)的作用，比如《經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)人》的前主編JohnMicklethwait在他的離任告別文章The case forliberal optimism里面寫(xiě)過(guò)一個(gè)句子：

But for the things this newspaper cares about, the past nineyears have been a battle, one that has left me in a state of paranoid optimism. Paranoia because so much remains underthreat; optimism because, for themost part, the creed this newspaper lives by is strong enough to survive.

作者提到自己處于一種“既恐懼又樂(lè)觀”的狀態(tài)：恐懼是因?yàn)殡s志的很多理念都遭到攻擊，樂(lè)觀是因?yàn)殡s志賴(lài)以為生的信條足夠強(qiáng)大，能夠繼續(xù)生存下去。如果你試著把這個(gè)句子讀上幾遍，你會(huì)發(fā)現(xiàn)paranoid和optimism這兩個(gè)單詞重復(fù)得恰到好處。如果我們把句子改寫(xiě)成：

But for the things this newspaper cares about, the past nineyears have been a battle, one that has left me in a state of paranoid optimism.On the one hand, so much remains under threat; on the other hand, for the mostpart, the creed this newspaper lives by is strong enough to survive.

句子分分鐘變成四六級(jí)作文水平，徹底失去了靈氣。

再舉個(gè)例子，寫(xiě)作社群練習(xí)中有這樣一句話：

The vast majority of people would be willing to sacrifice a fewrats in order to gain medical progress,progress that might one day savetheir life or that of a loved-one.

有學(xué)生問(wèn)為什么不直接把句子寫(xiě)成：

The vast majority of people would be willing to sacrifice a fewrats in order to gain medical progress, which might one day save their life orthat of a loved-one.

這里也跟重復(fù)的手法有關(guān)：原句連用兩個(gè)progress來(lái)強(qiáng)調(diào)這種醫(yī)學(xué)進(jìn)步的重要性，將progress改為which雖然在語(yǔ)法上沒(méi)問(wèn)題，但表達(dá)效果會(huì)大打折扣。

William Zinsser 在 On WritingWell 的序言中也寫(xiě)過(guò)這樣一段話：

So On Writing Wellwas born, in 1976, and it's now in its thirdgeneration of readers, its sales well above a million. Today I often meet young newspaper reporters whowere given the book by the editor whohired them, just as those editors werefirst given the book by the editor who hired them.I also often meet gray-hairedmatrons who remember being assigned the book in college and not finding it thehorrible medicine they expected. Sometimes they bring that early edition for meto sign, its sentences high-lighted in yellow. They apologize for the mess. I love the mess.

這里作者使用了不少重復(fù)單詞和句式，比如 I often meet... were given the book by the editor who hired them... the mess 這些重復(fù)使句子讀起來(lái)非常有感情且富有節(jié)奏感。

（4）押韻

押韻主要有兩種，頭韻和尾韻，這種手法主要通過(guò)讓兩個(gè)或兩個(gè)以上單詞的首字母（或最后的字母）相同，以賦予語(yǔ)言的節(jié)奏感。舉個(gè)例子，奧巴馬在2009年就職演講的第一句就運(yùn)用了尾韻（同時(shí)還使用了排比的手法）：

I stand here today humbledby the task before us, grateful forthe trust you have bestowed, mindfulof the sacrifices borne by our ancestors.

下面這個(gè)例子則是壓頭韻和尾韻：

Public resources allocated to the arts create jobs for artistsand others whose livelihood depends on a vibrant, rich culture – just the sortof culture that breeds charitable concern for the hungry, the helpless,and the hapless.

（5）比喻

比喻有明喻、暗喻、提喻和轉(zhuǎn)喻，其中用到比較多的是暗喻。J.K.羅琳在2008年哈佛畢業(yè)演講上就用了很多精彩的暗喻，比如：

I was set free, because my greatest fear had been realised, andI was still alive, and I still had a daughter whom I adored, and I had an oldtypewriter and a big idea. And so rockbottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.

將人生的低谷比喻為重建新生活的基石。

Now, I am not going to stand here and tell you that failure isfun. That period of my life was a dark one, and I had no idea that there wasgoing to be what the press has since represented as a kind of fairy taleresolution. I had no idea then how farthe tunnel extended, and for a long time, any lightat the end of it was a hope rather than a reality.

將她在人生低谷時(shí)的努力比喻為在黑暗隧道中的摸索。light at theend of the tunnel也是英語(yǔ)中的一個(gè)習(xí)語(yǔ)，含義是“黑暗盡頭的光明”。

（6）引用

引用這種手法則經(jīng)常出現(xiàn)在文章開(kāi)頭或結(jié)尾，通過(guò)引用名人名言來(lái)強(qiáng)化自己的論據(jù)。例如下面這個(gè)例子：

“Judge a man byhis questions, rather than his answers,” Voltaire advised. Google has becomeone of the most successful firms in history by heeding that advice. Itevaluates the intention of web-surfers’ queries and returns relevantadvertising alongside search results.

作者在文章開(kāi)頭引用了伏爾泰的名言，“從一個(gè)人提的問(wèn)題判斷他是一個(gè)什么樣的人，而不是從他的回答”，并將這句名言巧妙套用到谷歌上，以此來(lái)說(shuō)明谷歌的搜索業(yè)務(wù)之成功。

還有一個(gè)例子：

Britain, Napoleon once supposedly scoffed, was “a nation ofshopkeepers”. Nowadays it is a nation of online shoppers. The British do agreater share of their retail spending online than almost anyone.

拿破侖據(jù)說(shuō)曾嘲諷英國(guó)是一個(gè)“由小商店店主構(gòu)成的國(guó)家”（在拿破侖時(shí)代的法國(guó)，小商店店主并不是一個(gè)受人尊敬的職業(yè)），作者在這里引用了拿破侖的名言，但話鋒一轉(zhuǎn)，指出英國(guó)現(xiàn)在其實(shí)是一個(gè)由網(wǎng)購(gòu)者組成的國(guó)家，以此來(lái)說(shuō)明英國(guó)網(wǎng)購(gòu)行業(yè)的發(fā)展。

上面總結(jié)的這幾種用詞和修辭手法是提升英文文采的常見(jiàn)方式。實(shí)際上，這些手法大量出現(xiàn)在外刊和原版書(shū)上，平時(shí)有大量閱讀習(xí)慣的同學(xué)應(yīng)該深有體會(huì)。這些用詞和修辭手法也值得我們?cè)趯?xiě)作中借鑒——我們不應(yīng)該僅僅滿足于寫(xiě)出沒(méi)有錯(cuò)誤的英文，還應(yīng)該去試著寫(xiě)出漂亮的英文。這是任何一名有追求的英語(yǔ)學(xué)習(xí)者的基本素養(yǎng)。

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

必克英語(yǔ)在線課程，在線英語(yǔ)培訓(xùn)，
一對(duì)一固定老師，系統(tǒng)培訓(xùn)，循序漸進(jìn)！
點(diǎn)擊  “必克英語(yǔ)一對(duì)一在線課程” 
注冊(cè)即可領(lǐng)取必克英語(yǔ)試聽(tīng)課程

<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<