关于《小妇人》 你不知道的10件事 10 things you might not know about little women

备受期待的《小妇人》最新改编电影于12月25日在北美上映，该片聚集了西尔莎·罗南、艾玛·沃森、“甜茶”提莫西·查拉梅、梅丽尔·斯特里普等众多明星大腕，堪称“神仙阵容”。

距离《小妇人》原著出版已经过去了150年，但它还是打动了一代又一代读者，这本书的影响力可见一斑。也许你已经读过路易莎·梅·奥尔科特的《小妇人》，但下面这些事实你可能从来没有听说过。

1. LOUISA MAY ALCOTT DIDN'T WANT TO WRITE LITTLE WOMEN.

路易莎·梅·奥尔科特本来不想写《小妇人》

Louisa May Alcott was writing both literature and pulp fiction when Thomas Niles, the editor at Roberts Brothers Publishing, approached her about writing a book for girls. Alcott said she would try, but she wasn’t all that interested, later calling such books “moral pap for the young.”

罗伯茨兄弟出版社的编辑托马斯·奈尔斯找上路易莎·梅·奥尔科特时，她正在写文学作品和通俗小说。奈尔斯请路易莎为女孩们写一本书。路易莎说她会写写看，但不是很感兴趣，她后来将这种书称为“给年轻人读的道德教化书”。

When it became clear Alcott was stalling, Niles offered a publishing contract to her father, Bronson Alcott. Although Bronson was a well-known thinker who was friends with Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau, his work never achieved much acclaim. When it became clear that Bronson would have an opportunity to publish a new book if Louisa started her girls' story, she caved into the pressure.

奈尔斯看出路易莎有意拖延，就给她父亲布朗森·奥尔科特发了一份出版合同。虽然布朗森是一位著名思想家，也是拉尔夫·沃尔多·爱默生和亨利·戴维·梭罗的朋友，但他的作品始终没有得到多少赞誉。当出版方明确表示如果路易莎开始写这个女孩故事，布朗森就有机会出版一本新书时，路易莎迫于压力才答应。

cave[keɪv]: v. 屈服

2. LITTLE WOMEN TOOK JUST 10 WEEKS TO WRITE.

《小妇人》只花了10个星期就写完了

Alcott began writing the book in May 1868. She worked on it day and night, becoming so consumed with it that she sometimes forgot to eat or sleep. On July 15, she sent all 402 pages to her editor. In September, a mere four months after starting the book, Little Women was published. It became an instant bestseller and turned Alcott into a rich and famous woman.

1868年5月，路易莎动笔写这本书。她夜以继日地写作，有时候甚至专注到废寝忘食的地步。7月15日，她将402页的原稿寄给编辑。同年9月，距离她开始写这本书才过了四个月，《小妇人》就出版了。它迅速成为了畅销书，也让路易莎变成了富有的女名人。

3. MEG, BETH, AND AMY WERE BASED ON ALCOTT'S SISTERS.

梅格、贝丝和艾米的原型是路易莎的姐妹

Meg was based on Louisa’s sister Anna, who fell in love with her husband John Bridge Pratt while performing opposite him in a play. The description of Meg’s wedding in the novel is supposedly based on Anna’s actual wedding.

梅格的原型是路易莎的姐姐安娜，她在一场戏剧中爱上和她演对手戏的约翰·布里奇·普拉特并与之结为夫妇。小说中对梅格婚礼的描写应该是基于安娜的真实婚礼。

Beth was based on Lizzie, who contracted scarlet fever in 1856. Though she recovered, the disease permanently weakened her; Lizzie passed away in her sleep from a “wasting condition” on March 14, 1858—just shy of her 23rd birthday. Like Beth, Lizzie caught the illness from a poor family her mother was helping.

贝丝的原型是丽兹，她于1856年感染了猩红热。尽管她康复了，但这场病让她从此以后身体一直很虚弱。1858年3月14日，丽兹因油尽灯枯在睡梦中去世，时年不足23周岁。和贝丝一样，丽兹是从母亲帮助的一个穷困家庭那里感染了猩红热。

Amy was based on May (Amy is an anagram of May), an artist who lived in Europe and whose paintings were displayed in the Paris Salon.

艾米的原型是梅（艾米是梅的变位词），她是一个住在欧洲的艺术家，她的画作曾在巴黎艺术沙龙展出。

anagram[ˈænəɡræm]: n. 相同字母异序词，易位构词，变位词

Jo, of course, is based on Alcott herself.

乔的原型当然是路易莎自己。

4. THE BOOK AS WE KNOW IT WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN TWO PARTS.

我们现在所熟悉的《小妇人》原先是分成两部分出版的

The first half was published in 1868 as Little Women: Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy. The Story Of Their Lives. A Girl’s Book. It ended with John Brooke proposing marriage to Meg. In 1869, Alcott published Good Wives, the second half of the book. It, too, only took a few months to write.

第一部《小妇人：梅格、乔、贝丝和艾米的人生故事（女孩篇）》于1868年出版，以约翰·布鲁克向梅格求婚结尾。1869年，路易莎出版了第二部《好妻子》，这本书也是只花了几个月就写成了。

5. ALCOTT REFUSED TO HAVE JO MARRY LAURIE.

路易莎拒绝让乔嫁给劳里

Alcott, who never married herself, wanted Jo to remain unmarried, too. But while she was working on the second half of Little Women, fans were clamoring for Jo to marry the boy next door, Laurie. “Girls write to ask who the little women marry, as if that was the only aim and end of a woman’s life," Alcott wrote in her journal. "I won’t marry Jo to Laurie to please anyone.”

终身未婚的路易莎想让乔也不结婚。但是在她写第二部《小妇人》时，粉丝们强烈要求让乔嫁给邻居劳里。路易莎在她的日记中写道：“女孩们写信来问小妇人嫁给了谁，似乎这是一个女人一生的唯一目标和结局。我不会为了取悦任何人而把乔嫁给劳里。”

As a compromise—or to spite her fans—Alcott married Jo to the decidedly unromantic Professor Bhaer. Laurie ends up with Amy.

作为折衷方案——或许是为了让粉丝们气恼——路易莎让乔嫁给了一点也不浪漫的巴尔教授。劳里最后和艾米结了婚。

6. THERE ARE LOTS OF THEORIES ABOUT WHO LAURIE WAS BASED ON.

关于劳里的原型是谁有很多种理论

People have theorized Laurie was inspired by everyone from Henry David Thoreau to Nathaniel Hawthorne’s son Julian, but this doesn’t seem to be the case. In 1865, while in Europe, Alcott met a Polish musician named Ladislas Wisniewski, whom Alcott nicknamed Laddie. The flirtation between Laddie and Alcott culminated in them spending two weeks together in Paris, alone. According to biographer Harriet Reisen, Alcott later modeled Laurie after Laddie.

人们提出理论说，劳里的灵感来自很多人，从亨利·戴维·梭罗到纳撒尼尔·霍桑的儿子朱利安，但这似乎又说不通。1865年，路易莎在欧洲遇到了一位名为拉迪斯拉斯·维希涅夫斯基的波兰音乐家，路易莎对他的昵称是拉迪。拉迪和路易莎的调情最后发展成孤男寡女在巴黎共度两星期。据传记作者哈里特·雷森称，路易莎后来以拉迪为原型塑造了劳里的人物形象。

How far did the Alcott/Laddie affair go? It’s hard to say, as Alcott later crossed out the section of her diary referring to the romance. In the margin, she wrote, “couldn’t be.”

路易莎和拉迪的这段情后来发展到什么程度了呢？很难说，因为路易莎后来划掉了日记中提到这段浪漫史的部分。在日记的边缘处，她写道：“不能”。

7. YOU CAN STILL VISIT ORCHARD HOUSE, WHERE ALCOTT WROTE LITTLE WOMEN.

你仍然可以拜访路易莎写作《小妇人》的果园屋

Orchard House in Concord, Massachusetts was the Alcott family home. In 1868, Louisa reluctantly left her Boston apartment to write Little Women there. Today, you can tour this house and see May’s drawings on the walls, as well as the small writing desk that Bronson built for Louisa to use.

马萨诸塞州康科德的果园屋是奥尔科特一家住的房子。1868年，路易莎不情愿地离开了她在波斯顿的公寓，到果园屋来写作《小妇人》。今天，你可以到果园屋游览，看梅留在墙上的画，还有布朗森给路易莎做的小书桌。

8. LIKE THE MARCH FAMILY, THE ALCOTTS KNEW POVERTY.

和马奇家一样，奥尔科特一家尝过贫穷的滋味

Bronson Alcott’s philosophical ideals made it difficult for him to find employment—for example, as a socialist, he wouldn't work for wages—so the family survived on handouts from friends and neighbors. At times during Louisa’s childhood, there was nothing to eat but bread, water, and the occasional apple.

布朗森·奥尔科特的哲学理想让他很难找到工作——举例来说，作为社会主义者，他不愿为工资而工作——因此一家人只能靠朋友和邻居的接济过活。在路易莎的童年时期，有时候家里除了面包和水没有任何吃的东西，偶尔可以吃个苹果。

When she got older, Alcott worked as a paid companion and governess, like Jo does in the novel, and sold “sensation” stories to help pay the bills. She also took on menial jobs, working as a seamstress, a laundress, and a servant. Even as a child, Alcott wanted to help her family escape poverty, something Little Women made possible.

年纪大一点后，路易莎便去做有偿伴侣和女家庭教师，就像乔在小说里做的事一样，并为了贴补家用出售“耸人听闻的”故事。她还做过一些卑微的工作，比如针线活、洗衣、帮佣。路易莎从小就想帮助家庭摆脱贫困，而《小妇人》让她成功做到了。

menial[ˈmiːniəl]: adj. 卑微的；仆人的；适合仆人做的

9. LITTLE WOMEN HAS BEEN ADAPTED A NUMBER OF TIMES.

《小妇人》被改编过很多次

In addition to a 1958 TV series, multiple Broadway plays, a musical, a ballet, and an opera, Little Women has been made into more than a half-dozen movies. The most famous are the 1933 version starring Katharine Hepburn, the 1949 version starring June Allyson (with Elizabeth Taylor as Amy), and the 1994 version starring Winona Ryder. It's also been adapted for the small screen a number of times, most recently in 2018 for PBS's Masterpiece, by Call the Midwife creator Heidi Thomas. Oscar nominee Greta Gerwig’s version of the story, which will star Saoirse Ronan as Jo and Timothée Chalamet as Laurie, will arrive in theaters on Christmas Day 2019.

除了1958年版电视剧，《小妇人》还被改编成多部百老汇戏剧、一部音乐剧、一部芭蕾剧、一部歌剧，还有不止6部电影。最著名的改编作品是1933年凯瑟琳·赫本主演的电影、1949年琼·阿利森主演的电影（伊丽莎白·泰勒饰演艾米）和1994年薇诺娜·瑞德主演的电影。《小妇人》还被多次搬上小荧幕，最近的一次是2018年《呼叫助产士》制作人海蒂·托马斯为公共电视网Masterpiece栏目制作的剧集。获得奥斯卡奖提名的格蕾塔·葛韦格导演的新版《小妇人》电影将由西尔莎·罗南饰演乔，提莫西·查拉梅饰演劳里，2019年圣诞节登陆各大院线。

10. IN THE 1980S, A JAPANESE ANIME VERSION OF LITTLE WOMEN WAS RELEASED.

20世纪80年代曾播出过日本动画版《小妇人》

In 1987, Japan made an anime version of Little Women that ran for 48 half-hour episodes.

1987年，日本制作了动画版小妇人，一共48集，每集半小时。

英文来源：Mental Floss

翻译&编辑：丹妮