我的生活海伦凯勒摘抄 海伦·凯勒自传《我的生活》第32期

海伦·凯勒自传《我的生活》第32期  

As I lay in my bed that night
I wept as I hope few children have wept. I felt so cold
I imagined I should die before morning
and the thought forted me. I think if this sorrow had e to me when I was older
it would have broken my spirit beyond repairing. But the angel of fetfulness has gathered up and carried away much of the misery and all the bitterness of those sad days.
Miss Sullivan had never heard of "The Frost Fairies" or of the book in which it was published. With the assistance of Dr. Alexander Graham Bell
she investigated the matter carefully
and at last it came out that Mrs. Sophia C. Hopkins had a copy of Miss Canby's "Birdie and His Friends" in 1888
the year that we spent the summer with her at Brewster. Mrs. Hopkins was unable to find her copy; but she has told me that at that time
while Miss Sullivan was away on a vacation
she tried to amuse me by reading from various books
and although she could not remember reading "The Frost Fairies" any more than I
yet she felt sure that "Birdie and His Friends" was one of them. She explained the disappearance of the book by the fact that she had a short time before sold her house and disposed of many juvenile books
such as old schoolbooks and fairy tales
and that "Birdie and His Friends" was probably among them.
The stories had little or no meaning for me then; but the mere spelling of the strange words was sufficient to amuse a little child who could do almost nothing to amuse herself; and although I do not recall a single circumstance connected with the reading of the stories
yet I cannot help thinking that I made a great effort to remember the words
with the intention of having my teacher explain them when she returned. One thing is certain
the language was ineffaceably stamped upon my brain
though for a long time no one knew it
least of all myself.
当时，这些故事并没有给我留下什么印象，不过，那些奇异的单词拼写足以让一个没有任何乐趣的小孩子开心一阵子了。虽然我连任何一个同故事有关的情节都记不起来了，但是我无法忘掉学习单词的艰苦过程。在老师休假归来后，我马上让老师给我解释那些陌生的词。因此，有一件事是肯定的——语言在我头脑中留下的烙印是无法抹煞的，只是很久以来，我并没有去特别留意这个问题。
When Miss Sullivan came back
I did not speak to her about "The Frost Fairies
" probably because she began at once to read "Little Lord Fauntleroy
" which filled my mind to the exclusion of everything else. But the fact remains that Miss Canby's story was read to me once
and that long after I had fotten it
it came back to me so naturally that I never suspected that it was the child of another mind.
In my trouble I received many messages of love and sympathy. All the friends I loved best
except one
have remained my own to the present time.