A city child’s summer is spent in the street in front of his home, and all through the long summer vacations I sat on the edge of the street and watched enviously the other boys on the block play baseball. I was never asked to take part even when one team had a member missing—not out of special cruelty, but because they took it for granted I would be no good at it. They were right, of course.
一个城市孩子的夏天是在他家门前的街道上度过的，整个漫长的暑假，我都坐在街边，羡慕地看着街区里的其他男孩打棒球。即使团队有一名成员缺席，也从没让我参加，不是因为特别残忍，而是因为他们认为我不擅长，所以理所当然。当然，他们是对的。
I would never forget the wonderful evening when something changed. The baseball ended about eight or eight thirty when it grew dark. Then it was the custom of the boys to retire to a little stoop that stuck out from the candy store on the corner and that somehow had become theirs. No grownup ever sat there or attempted to. There the boys would sit, mostly talking about the games played during the day and of the game to be played tomorrow. Then long silences would fall and the boys would wander off one by one. It was just after one of those long silences that my life as an outsider changed. I can no longer remember which boy it was that summer evening who broke the silence with a question: but whoever he was, I nod to him gratefully now. “What’s in those books you’re always reading?” he asked casually. “Stories,” I answered. “What kind?” asked somebody else without much interest.
我永远不会忘记那个美妙的夜晚，当时有些事情发生了变化。棒球比赛大约在八点或八点半左右结束，这时天黑了。然后，男孩们的习惯是退到一个从街角的糖果店伸出的门廊，不知怎么就变成了他们的，成年人不会坐在那里或想坐在那里。男孩们坐在那里，主要谈论白天的比赛和明天的比赛。然后，长时间沉默，男孩们一个接一个地走开。就在一次漫长的沉默之后，我作为一个局外人的生活发生了改变。我已经记不清是哪个男孩在那个夏天的晚上打破了沉默，提出了一个问题：但无论他是谁，我现在都很感激他。“你一直在读的是些什么书？”他漫不经心地问道。“故事书，”我回答。“什么类型的？”另一个人毫无兴趣地问道。
Nor do I know what drove me to behave as I did,for usually I just sat there in silence, glad enough to be allowed to reain among them; but instead of answering his question, I told them for two hours the story I was reading at the moment. The book was Sister Carrie. They listened bug-eyed and breathless. I must have told it well, but I think there was another and deeper reason that made them to keep an audience. Listening to a tale being told in the dark is one of the most ancient of man’s entertainments, but I was offering them as well, without being aware of doing it, a new and exciting experience.
我也不知道是什么驱使我做出这样的行为，因为通常我只是静静地坐在那里，很高兴能被允许和他们在一起；但我没有回答他的问题，而是把我当时正在读的故事给他们讲了两个小时。这本书是《嘉莉妹妹》。他们睁大眼睛听着，我一定讲得很好，但我认为还有另一个更深层次的原因使他们成为听众。在黑暗中听别人讲故事是人类最古老的娱乐方式之一，我也在不知不觉中提供了一种新的、令人兴奋的体验。
The books they themselves read were the Rover Boys or Tom Swift or G.A.Henty. I had read them too, but at thirteen I had long since left them behind. Since I was much alone I had become an enthusiastic reader and I had gone through the books-for-boys series. In those days there was no reading material between children’s and grownups’ books or I could find none. I had gone right from Tome Swift and His Flying Machine to Theodore Dreiser and Sister Carrie. Dreiser had hit my young mind, and they listened to me tell the story with some of the wonder that I had had in reading it.
他们自己看的书是《流浪汉男孩》、《汤姆·斯威夫特》或《G.A.Henty》。我也看过，但在十三岁的时候，我早就把它们抛在脑后。由于我很孤独，我成了一个热情的读者，我已经读完了男孩系列的书。在那些日子里，儿童读物和成人读物之间没有任何读物，或者我一本也找不到。我从《汤姆·斯威夫特》和《他的飞行机器》到《西奥多·德莱塞》和《嘉莉妹妹》。德莱塞打动了我年轻的心灵，他们听我讲述这个故事时带着我看时的一些惊奇。
The next night and many nights thereafter, a kind of unspoken ritual took place. As it grew dark, I would take my place in the center of the stoop and begin the evening’s tale. Some nights, in order to taste my victory more completely, I cheated. I would stop at the most exciting part of a story by Jack London or Bret Harte, and without warning tell them that that was as far as I had gone in the book and it would have to be continued the following evening. It was not true, of course; but I had to make certain of my new-found power and position. I enjoyed the long summer evenings until school began in the fall. Other words of mine have been listened to by larger and more fashionable audiences, but for that tough and athletic one that sat close on the stoop outside the candy store, I have an unreasoning love that will last forever.
第二天晚上和之后的许多夜晚，一种默契的仪式发生了。天一黑，我就在门廊中央就位，开始讲述今晚的故事。有些晚上，为了更彻底地品尝我的胜利，我作弊了。我会在杰克·伦敦或布雷特·哈特的故事中最激动人心的部分停下来，毫无征兆地告诉他们，我书中看过的都讲完了，只能第二天晚上继续。当然，这不是真的；但我必须确保我新获得的权力和地位。我享受着漫长的夏夜，直到秋天开学。我的其他话已经被越来越多、更时尚的听众听到了，但对于那个坐在糖果店外门廊上的坚韧而运动的人来说，我有一种无法实现的爱，这种爱将永远持续下去。
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