Unit 5B - The Man Who Wrote His Own Obituary
The Man Who Wrote His Own Obituary
Mark Waters
Cigarettes were the death of me. I became acquainted with my killer when I was 14 and began stealing several a day from my father's pack.
Smoking caused some nausea at first, but persistence conquered.
I was born in Davenport, Iowa, on June 2, 1909.
At 16, I moved with my family, including two sisters, to Baltimore, a city that I loved and adopted as my hometown.
It was still no problem getting cigarettes.
I got odd jobs after school to buy them, and tried all sorts of brands, such as Melachrinos, Omars and English Ovals. I felt quite sophisticated, but I can't recall now that I enjoyed smoking them.
In 1928, the coming depression cast its shadow. With money scarce, my father began counting his Camels, so a friend and I took to picking butts off the street. We toasted the tobacco in an oven and rolled it into rice-paper cigarettes. They were horrible.
Jobs for youth were hard to find, so I decided to join the Navy - a mouth removed from the table, and I could send money home.
Now cigarettes were no problem. If you were at sea, they were 4 cents a pack. I smoked two packs a day, drawing in most of the smoke.
When my 20-year Navy career ended, I went to the University of North Carolina. After I graduated I got a job in San Diego.
One night, while walking to my car, I had a slight stroke and staggered to the left. I had been smoking one cigarette after another that night, and I felt that that was what caused it.
My wife, Muriel, and I tried to quit. We lasted eight days.
It wasn't that I got any real pleasure out of smoking. Except for the first cigarette in the morning with my coffee, I never enjoyed it.
My mouth always tasted nasty. Smoking took away my appetite. It brought on emphysema that made it hard to breathe.
In 1956, smoking more than ever, I came to Honolulu to work for a local newspaper.
In June 1965 my stomach began hurting, and I would get up every hour or half hour during the night to drink milk and smoke a cigarette.
In September 1965 I came down with a horrible cough. I was hoarse, and there was a nasty soreness in my left lung.
I went to my doctor. He listened to my chest and ordered an X-ray.
"You have a lung tumor," he said.
Four days later, the lung surgeon took out a left lobe.
A month later, I was back at work. I hadn't smoked since the day before my operation. It wasn't hard to quit - for one simple reason. Motivation.
I came along fine, gained ten pounds and really felt good. Then, on January 3, I thought I had caught a cold.
I went to my surgeon, who tap a quart of fluid from my left chest cavity.
I went back several times, and my surgeon said, "The time is drawing closer."
Later, my wife told me he had told her after the operation that I had less than a year to live. But she wouldn't believe it, and she didn't tell me. I find no fault with that.
There are four cell types of lung cancer. The type seems to have a lot to do with its rate of growth. My doctor told me this; he also said that out of every 20 lung-cancer cases only one survives. The other 19 die.
That's the survival rate for lung cancer, taking into consideration all available forms of treatment. There is no 50-50 chance - the figure for other cancers - for this type of cancer.
My doctor is enthusiastic about getting people to quit cigarettes. He says that there's no question of the relationship between cigarette smoking and lung cancer. The statistics are overwhelming. It is estimated that one in every eight males who have been smoking heavily (20 cigarettes or more a day) for 20 years gets lung cancer.
The bad effect of cigarettes doesn't end with lung cancer. Smoking doubles the chances of death from heart disease, and the chances of dying from emphysema are 12 times greater.
I think doctors get to feeling pretty helpless at times. They warn people like me, but all their warnings go unheeded.
And there's all that cigarette advertising. As my doctor says, "Millions of dollars are spent in all forms of advertising to give the public the impression that cigarettes can make up for a number of short coming."
In Italy and Great Britain they have passed a ban against all cigarette advertisement on TV. I think that's a step in the right direction because, as the doctor says, the big effort should be to stop kids from getting started.
Whether this story will stop anyone from smoking, I don't know. I doubt it. Not a soul I've preached to has quit smoking - not a single soul.
You always think: "It will happen to the other guy; never to me." But when you get your lung cancer - God help you.
All you need to see is that shadow on your chest X-ray. It's a real shocker. You can't do a thing.
At this point, I'm comfortable. The nurse give me something whenever there's pain.
I'm very short of breath. I can't take five steps without having to sit. The cancer has gone into my liver and I don't know where else.
I don't have a ghost of a chance.
It's too late for me.
It may not be for you.
参考译文——自撰讣告的人
自撰讣告的人
马克·沃特斯
我的命是香烟给断送的。我14岁时便与我的这位杀手相识，开始每天从我父亲的烟盒中偷几支烟抽。
刚开始抽时觉得有些恶心，可坚持下去就没事了。
1909年6月2日我生于衣阿华州的达文波特。
16岁那年，我和两个姐妹一起，随全家搬到巴尔的摩。我喜欢这个城市，把它当作我的故乡。
弄几支烟抽仍然不成问题。
我放学后干些零活来挣钱买烟，试过各种各样的牌子，如麦拉克日诺斯牌，奥马尔斯牌，还有英国的椭圆牌。我觉得自己挺在行的，但现在我记不起来当初是不是喜欢抽这些烟。
1928年，大萧条的阴影逼近。钱少了，我父亲开始每天数着抽他的骆驼牌烟，于是我和一个朋友就开始在街上捡烟蒂。我们把烟丝放在烤箱里烤，再用卷烟纸卷好。那烟真够呛。
年轻人很难找到活干，于是我决定加入海军——饭桌上少一张嘴，而我又能往家里寄钱。
这样烟就不成问题了。要是你出海的话，一包才4分钱。我一天抽两包，把烟差不多都吸进肺去。
20年的海军生涯结束后，我进了北卡罗来纳大学，毕业后在圣地亚哥找了个工作。
一天夜晚，我朝我的车走去时，发生了一次小中风，身子踉踉跄跄地往左歪。那天晚上我曾一支接一支地抽烟，我感到那便是致病的原因。
我和妻子缪蕾尔试着戒烟。我们坚持了 8天。
其实我并没有从抽烟当中真正得到多少乐趣。除了早上就着咖啡抽的第一支烟外，我从来没有觉得抽烟是件快乐的事。
我嘴里老是苦涩涩的。抽烟使我饭菜吃起来不香。还引起肺气肿，令我呼吸不畅。
1956年那年，我抽烟抽得特别厉害，那时我来到火奴鲁鲁，在当地一家报社工作。
1965年6月，我的胃开始犯病，夜里每隔一小时或半小时我就得起床，喝些牛奶抽支烟。
到了 1965年9月，我开始不停地咳嗽。我嗓子沙哑，左肺部疼痛不堪。
我去看医生，他作了胸部听诊后，让我做X光透视。
“你长了个肺瘤，”他说。
4天后，外科医生取出了我的一个左肺叶。
一个月后，我回去上班。我从手术前一天起就没抽过烟。戒烟不难——原因只有一个：动力。
我恢复得不错，体重增加了10镑，自我感觉很好。后来，到了 1月3日，我觉得自己感冒了。
我去找为我治疗的外科医生，他从我的左胸腔里抽出了一夸特积液。
我又去看了好几次，医生说:“活不长了。”
后来我妻子告诉我，他在手术后跟她说，我活不到一年了。可她怎么也不相信，就没告诉我。她那样做，我不怪她。
肺癌细胞有四种。这种分类似乎主要依据其生长的速度。我的医生是这么跟我说的，他还说20例肺癌病人当中，只有一人能存活，其他19人死亡。
即使考虑到现有的各种可能的治疗方法，肺癌的存活率也只能如此了。别的癌症可以有一半的存活可能，可这类癌症却不行。
我的医生热衷于鼓励人们戒烟。他说毫无疑问，肺癌和吸烟有关。统计数字非常令人信服。据估算，有20年重烟瘾（每天抽20支以上）的男子，8个中有一个会得肺癌。
抽烟的严重后果还不止于肺癌。抽烟使死于心脏病的可能性增加一倍，使死于肺气肿的可能性增加12倍。
我觉得当医生的有时会感到毫无办法。他们警告像我这样的人，可所有的警告都成了耳边风。
当然还有所有那些烟草广告。正如我的医生所说:“数百万美元花在各种形式的广告上，就为了给公众这样一个印象：抽烟可以弥补种种欠缺。”
意大利和英国已通过了一项禁令，不允许在电视上做烟草广告。我认为这是朝正确的方向迈出的一步，因为，正如医生所说，应花大力气制止孩子们学会抽烟。
会不会有人因为我这篇文章而不再抽烟，我不知道。恐怕没人会这样做，因为还没有谁听了我的大道理就戒烟的——一个也没有过。
你总是想:“这种事只会发生在别人身上，决不会发生在我身上的。”可等你得了肺癌——到那时只有上帝能帮助你了。
你只要看看胸部X光透视片上的那团阴影就明白了。那真够触目惊心的。你一点办法也没有。
如今到这份儿上，我不再忧虑什么了。只要一痛，那些护士就会给我些药。
我的呼吸十分困难。走上五步就非得坐下歇歇不可。癌细胞已经扩散到我的肝脏，还有别的我说不上来的部位。
我是没有一点儿生还的希望了。
真是悔之晚矣。
可你还来得及啊。
Key Words:
acquainted [ə'kweintid]
adj. 有知识的，熟悉的，了解的 动词acquaint
shadow ['ʃædəu]
n. 阴影，影子，荫，阴暗，暗处
vt. 投阴
cast [kɑ:st]
v. 投，掷，抛，铸造，丢弃，指定演员，加起来，投射(目
depression [di'preʃən]
n. 沮丧，萧条
scarce [skɛəs]
adj. 缺乏的，不足的，稀少的，罕见的
sophisticated [sə'fistikeitid]
adj. 诡辩的，久经世故的，精密的，老练的，尖端的
persistence [pə'sistəns]
n. 坚持，毅力
slight [slait]
adj. 轻微的，微小的，纤细的，脆弱的
surgeon ['sə:dʒən]
n. 外科医生
appetite ['æpitait]
n. 嗜好，食欲，欲望
stroke [strəuk]
n. 笔画，击打，一笔（画）连续的动作，中风，
except [ik'sept]
vt. 除，除外
enthusiastic [in.θju:zi'æstik]
adj. 热情的，热心的
fault [fɔ:lt]
n. 缺点，过失，故障，毛病，过错，[地]断层
survival [sə'vaivəl]
n. 生存，幸存者
figure ['figə]
n. 图形，数字，形状; 人物，外形，体型
cell [sel]
n. 细胞，电池，小组，小房间，单人牢房，(蜂房的)巢室
surgeon ['sə:dʒən]
n. 外科医生
consideration [kənsidə'reiʃən]
n. 考虑，体贴，考虑因素，敬重，意见
overwhelming ['əuvə'welmiŋ]
adj. 势不可挡的，压倒的
available [ə'veiləbl]
adj. 可用的，可得到的，有用的，有效的
shortcoming [ʃɔ:t.kʌmiŋ]
n. 短处，缺点
impression [im'preʃən]
n. 印象，效果
shadow ['ʃædəu]
n. 阴影，影子，荫，阴暗，暗处
vt. 投阴
helpless ['helplis]
adj. 无助的，无依靠的
参考资料：
- 大学英语精读(第三版) 第四册:Unit5B The Man Who Wrote His Own Obituary(1)_大学教材听力 - 可可英语
- 大学英语精读(第三版) 第四册:Unit5B The Man Who Wrote His Own Obituary(2)_大学教材听力 - 可可英语
- 大学英语精读(第三版) 第四册:Unit5B The Man Who Wrote His Own Obituary(3)_大学教材听力 - 可可英语
大学英语精读(第三版) 第四册:Unit5B The Man Who Wrote His Own Obituary(4)_大学教材听力 - 可可英语
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