重返故里
课文学习台
Back in the old country
把人物、线索、转折和结果组织成连贯叙述，理解句子里的修饰层次。
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本课原文与译文
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第1段
I stopped to let the car cool off and to study the map. I had expected to be near my objective by now, but everything still seemed alien to me. I was only five when my father had taken me abroad, and that was eighteen years ago. When my mother had died after a tragic accident, he did not quickly recover from the shock and loneliness. Everything around him was full of her presence, continually reopening the wound. So he decided to emigrate. In the new country he became absorbed in making a new life for the two of us, so that he gradually ceased to grieve. He did not marry again and I was brought up without a woman's care; but I lacked for nothing, for he was both father and mother to me. He always meant to go back one day, but not to stay. His roots and mine had become too firmly embedded in the new land. But he wanted to see the old folk again and to visit my mother's grave. He became mortally ill a few months before we had planned to go and, when he knew that he was dying, he made me promise to go on my own.
我停下车，让车冷却一下，同时看一下地图。我本以为离目的地不远了，但周围的一切对我来说仍很陌生。我5岁那年，父亲就带我出国，那是18年前的事了。当时我母亲在一次事故中惨死，父亲未能很快从打击与孤独中恢复过来。他身边的一切都是母亲的影子，不断揭开他的伤口。于是他决定移居他国。在这个新的国家里，父亲专心致志地为我们俩开创一种新的生活，慢慢地不伤心了。父亲没有再娶，因此，我在没有母亲的环境里长大成人。但我什么都不缺，他既当父亲又当母亲。他总想将来回国看看，但却不愿长期住下去，因为他与我一样已经把根深深地扎在异国的土地上。但是，他想看一看父老乡亲，扫扫母亲的墓。就在计划回国的前几个月，父亲突然罹患绝症。他知道自己时日不多，于是他要我答应一定单独回故乡一趟。
第2段
I hired a car the day after landing and bought a comprehensive book of maps, which I found most helpful on the cross-country journey, but which I did not think I should need on the last stage. It was not that I actually remembered anything at all. But my father had described over and over again what we should see at every milestone, after leaving the nearest town, so that I was positive I should recognize it as familiar territory. Well, I had been wrong, for I was now lost.
抵达后的第二天，我租了一辆车，并买了一本详尽的地图册。在乡间行车途中，我觉得它非常有用，但我原以为最后一段路不需要它。这并不是因为我真还记得故乡的什么景物，而是父亲曾详细给我讲了，在过了离故乡最近的那个小镇后，在每一个路标处可以见到些什么。因此，我确定这段路对我来说会是很熟悉的。唉，结果我错了，我现在迷路了。
第3段
I looked at the map and then at the milometer. I had come ten miles since leaving the town, and at this point, according to my father, I should be looking at farms and cottages in a valley, with the spire of the church of our village showing in the far distance. I could see no valley, no farms, no cottages and no church spire—only a lake. I decided that I must have taken a wrong turning somewhere. So I drove back to the town and began to retrace the route, taking frequent glances at the map. I landed up at the same corner. The curious thing was that the lake was not marked on the map. I felt as if I had stumbled into a nightmare country, as you sometimes do in dreams. And, as in a nightmare, there was nobody in sight to help me. Fortunately for me, as I was wondering what to do next, there appeared on the horizon a man on horseback, riding in my direction. I waited till he came near, then I asked him the way to our old village. He said that there was now no village. I thought he must have misunderstood me, so I repeated its name. This time he pointed to the lake. The village no longer existed because it had been submerged, and all the valley too. The lake was not a natural one, but a man-made reservoir.
我看了看地图，又查了一下里程表。从小镇出来，我走了10英里。照父亲的说法，我面前应是一个山谷，有农场与村舍，还可远远望见老家村子里教堂的尖顶。可现在我连山谷、农场、村舍，还有教堂尖顶的影子都找不着。看见的只有一片湖泊。我想一定是什么地方拐错了弯。于是我驾车返回小镇，重新按路线行驶。结果又来到刚才那个拐弯处。奇怪的是那个湖没有在地图上标出。我感到自己就像平时作梦那样迷迷糊糊地闯进了恶梦境地。就像在恶梦里一样，见不到一个人可以帮助我。不过，我是幸运的，正当我走投无路之时，从地平线上出现一个骑马的人向我走来。等他走近了，问他去老家的路。他说那村子已经没有了。我想他一定误解了我的意思，于是又说了一遍村庄的名字。这次他用手指了一下那个湖。村庄已不复存在，因为已经被水所淹，山谷也被水淹没了。这不是一个天然湖泊，是一座人工修建的水库。
学完这一课
保留原段的推进关系，换成自己的经历，写或说一段四五句的话。
译文与解析据吴应时、何景霖整理资料及本站首轮审校稿；词伙与练习提示为本站学习设计。原PDF第205—208页，2022年2月第3版。