I have always disliked being a man. 1.The whole idea of manhood in America is pitiful, in my opinion. Even the expression “Be a man!” strikes me as insulting and abusive. It means: Be stupid, be unfeeling, obedient, soldierly and stop thinking. Man means “manly”—how can one think about men without considering the terrible ambition of manliness? And yet it is part of every man’s life. It is a hideous and crippling lie; it not only insists on difference and connives at superiority, it is also by its very nature destructive—emotionally damaging and socially harmful.
It is very hard to imagine any concept of manliness that does not belittle women, and it begins very early. At an age when I wanted to meet girls—let’s say the treacherous years of thirteen to sixteen—I was told to take up a sport, get more fresh air, and I was urged not to read so much. If you asked too many questions about sex you were sent to camp—a boy’s camp, of course: the nightmare. Nothing is more unnatural or prison-like than a boy’s camp.
2.It ought to be clear by now that I have something of an objection to the way we turn boys into men. It does not surprise me that when the President of the United States has his customary weekend off he dresses like a cowboy—it is both a measure of his insecurity and his willingness to please. In many ways, American culture does little more for a man than prepare him for modeling clothes in the L. L. Bean catalogue.
There was a fear that writing was not a manly profession- indeed, not a profession at all. The paradox in American letters is that it has always been easier for a woman to write and for a man to be published. 3. Writing is only manly when it produces wealth—money is masculinity. So is drinking, particularly the ability to drink another man under the table. A man in America has to kill lions, hunt ducks, and carry enough knives and guns on his shoulders, to prove that he is just as much a monster as the next man. Everything in stereotyped manliness goes against the life of the mind.
4. There would be no point in saying any of this if it were not generally accepted that to be a man is somehow—even now in feminist-influenced America—a privilege. It is on the contrary an unmerciful and punishing burden. Being a man is bad enough; being manly is appalling. It is the sinister silliness of men’s fashions, and a clubby attitude in the arts. It is the subversion of good students. It is the so-called “Dress Code” of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Boston, and it is the institutionalized cheating in college sports. It is the most primitive insecurity.
Directions:Read the following passage, and then translate the underlined parts numbered from (1) to(4) , from English into Chinese. Please write your answer on the ANSWER SHEET.
