哲理散文《远和近》

Thomas Wolfe (1900-1938) was an American novelist. Born in the small mountain town of Asheville, North Carolina, She began writing during her college years. His main works include the novels "Angel Looks home", "Time and River", "Why Can't I Go Home Again", and the novel "The Net and the Rock".

Far and near

A small town, on high ground, rising from the railway line. On its outskirts was a neat little house with green Windows. On one side of the hut was a garden, neatly partitioned, with vegetables. There is also a grape shed, and by the end of August the grapes will be ripe. Three large oak trees stood in front of the house, and in the summer the house was shaded by neat patches of shade. On the other side is a bed of flowers in full bloom. All these, full of neat, prosperous, simple comfortable atmosphere.

Every day a few minutes after two o 'clock, the express train between the two cities passes through here. In those days the long train paused near the town and picked up again at a steady pace, but its speed was not so startling as at full speed. With the powerful pull of the engine, he watched it move along at a deliberate pace, the heavy carriage rumbling on the tracks in a low, harmonious sound, and disappearing into the curve. For a while, at regular intervals, the train's tracks could be felt along the edge of the prairie, as the whistle roared and puffed thick rings of smoke. At last nothing was heard but the firm creaking of the wheels, which died away in the silence of the afternoon.

Every day for more than twenty years, the driver blew his whistle as the train approached the hut. Every day, at the sound of the whistle, a woman came out of the back door of the hut and waved to him. She had a child who had clung to her skirts, and now the child was a grown girl who came out every day with her mother to wave.

After years of hard work, the driver is grey-haired and getting old. He has carried passengers across the land thousands of times on long trains. His own children are grown and married. Four times he had seen on the track before him the speck of terrible tragedy, the horrible shadow that shot like a cannonball before the engine -- a carriage full of children, and a dense row of frightened little faces; A cheap car parked on the tracks with people sitting in their mouths aghast; A gaunt tramp, old and deaf, walking along the railway without hearing the whistle; A startled figure passed by his window -- all this the driver remembered and remembered. He knew as much sorrow, joy, danger, and toil as any man could know. His respectable work, like wind and frost, had carved lines into his face. Now, in his old age, he had been loyal, brave and humble during his long service, and had acquired the nobleness and wisdom expected of drivers.

But no matter how many dangers and tragedies he had seen, the sight of that little house, of those two women waving at him with a bold and easy movement, remained in his mind as a symbol of beauty, of immortality, of immutability, of constancy, even though disaster, sorrow, and evil might break the iron rules of his life.

The sight of the cottage and the two women filled him with the greatest happiness he had ever known. A thousand times cloudy and sunny, a hundred times stormy and snowy, he always saw them. He saw them through the grim, monotonous grey light of winter, through the brown, icy stubble; He saw them again in the seductive green April.

He felt them and their cottage as dear to him as parents to their children. At last he felt that the picture of their lives was so imprinted on his mind that he knew every moment of their day. He resolved that when he retired, he would go to them, and finally talk to them about his life, for their lives were so deeply intertwined with his own.

The day finally came. Finally, the driver got off at the station in the small town where they lived and walked onto the platform. He had reached the end of his career on the railway. He is currently a company pensioner and has no work to do. The driver walked slowly out of the station into the street of the town. But everything was new to him, as if he had never seen the town before. As he walked, he began to feel confused and confused. Was this the town he had passed through a thousand times? Were these the houses he always saw from the high carriage Windows? Everything was so strange and disturbing to him, like a city in a dream. The further he went, the more doubts filled his mind.

Now the houses are turning into scattered cottages outside the town, and the street is turning into a country lane -- one of which is where the two women live. The driver plodded slowly through the heat and dust, and at last stood in front of the house he was looking for. He knew at once that he had found the right one. He saw the tall oaks in front of the house, the flower-beds, the garden and the vine-shed, and beyond, the gleam of the railroad tracks.

Yes, it was the house he was looking for, the place he had passed so many times, the destination of his dream of happiness. Now he had found it, he was here, but why was his hand shaking at the door? Why had the town, the lane, the field, the door of the cottage he loved seemed so strange, like something out of a nightmare? Why does he feel melancholy, doubt and disappointment?

At last he entered the gate and walked slowly along the path. Presently he ascended the three steps that led to the porch and knocked at the door. A moment later, he heard footsteps in the drawing-room, the door opened, and a woman stood before him.

At that moment, he felt very disappointed and frustrated, and deeply regretted coming to this trip. At once he recognized the woman who stood before him, looking at him suspiciously, as the same person who had waved to him a thousand times. But her face was stern, withered, and wasted; Her skin was gaunt and sallow and loosely wrinkled; Her little eyes stared at him in wonder. All the courage, candour, affection that he had imagined in her waving vanished in a moment when he saw her and heard her cold voice.

And now, as he explained to her who he was and why he had come, his own voice sounded false and forced. But he stammered on, struggling to stifle the regrets, the perplexity, the doubts that were welling up in him, to forget all his past joys, and to regard all his acts of hope and love as a disgrace.

Finally, with great reluctance, the woman invited him into the house, calling out in a shrill voice for her daughter. For a miserable short time the driver sat in an ugly little drawing-room, intending to engage in conversation, while the two women stared at him with confused hostility and dark, timid, depressed, dull eyes.

At last he stammered a stiff farewell. He emerged from the path and walked along the road toward the town. He suddenly realized that he was an old man. How boldly and confidently his heart had gazed upon the familiar vista of the railroad. Now, as he looked at this strange, unexpected land, always so close, never seen, never known, his heart sank with fear. He knew that all the myths of lost access to the light, the prospect of the shining railway, the land of illusion in the good little world of hope, were gone, never to return.

(Wan Zi)

Far and Near is an essay full of philosophy. The article tells a legendary story of a train driver by contrast. Every day as his train passed through a small town, a woman and a little girl would come out of the back door of a cottage on the outskirts and wave to him, an image that has remained pictorial throughout his 20-plus years of driving. As the years passed, the women grew older and the children grew into big girls, but they still went out and waved to him every day. This impression gradually becomes a pillar of the protagonist's life, a "symbol of beauty, immortality, immutability and constancy" that brings him great happiness and power.

First of all, the article tries its best to describe the prosperous and comfortable town and the scene of women and children waving their hands. They together build a peaceful and beautiful picture, and render the shock and association that this beauty brings to the hero's heart, so that he finally has a strong desire to meet them.

Then, the article turns to the old train driver after retirement with sacred feelings set foot on the road to visit the town. But as he got closer and closer, his feelings became more and more strange, he became more and more discouraged, he felt his own ideas were strange. When he finally stood timidly at the door of the little house he had seen so many times on the train, he was so disappointed and sad.

Finally, the hero finally met he imagined countless times to his matchless beauty of the old woman and a young girl, but the old lady that aging, haggard, severe image and rude attitude towards the protagonist, and from her previous imagined between the wave form bright contrast, brave, honest, affectionate, he finally regret to this line. So far, the two completely different emotions of the hero form a strong contrast with almost exaggerated description, resulting in a bright artistic effect.

Through the distance between far and near, through the different understanding of the object before and after, the article writes the characters' perception of reality. When the object is only an ideal, it is beautiful. Once we approach the ideal, it is no longer the ideal, but the mediocre reality. Ideal is beautiful and illusory, it is exciting; The reality is real, grim and often thought-provoking.

The outstanding feature of this article is to use the stream of consciousness technique to structure the whole text with the psychological activities of the characters as clues, emphasize the inner feelings of the characters, and touch the readers with the strong emotional experience of the characters.