拜登的童年家境不富裕，而且患有口吃。后来他凭借非凡的努力和毅力，克服了口吃并且成为中学里小有名气的演说者，进而开启了自己成就卓越的人生道路。

Joey Biden, He Could Really Talk

The mud in Delaware stinks. It’s clay, really, and you get used to it—it’s not bad unless you dig it up wet. But when you get a whole soggy swampful dug, it smells like someone died in there … and that was the smell, the day they got to the new place, the day they were going to start their new lives: Joe, Sr., Jean and Val and the boys, the Bidens, of Wilmington, Delaware.

特拉华州的泥巴臭气熏人。那实际上是黏土，你慢慢就会习惯了——只要不趁湿挖的话，还没那么糟糕。但如果在湿乎乎的泥地里挖上一阵的话，闻起来就像有人死在里面了一样......他们到了新地方的那天，将要开始新生活的那天，就是那个味道——他们是老乔、琴和薇儿、还有男孩子们，来自特拉华州威尔明顿的拜登一家。

Actually, it wasn’t even Wilmington, but Claymont, a steelworking suburb to the north, near the river, where in the fifties they were putting up ticky-tack houses, and garden apartments (except there were no gardens, just this malodorous mud), and when the Bidens drove in that day, to Brookview Apartments—they were among the first tenants—the place was a bulldozed moonscape, a stinking mess. Brookview would never be beautiful: strings of one-story yellow stucco boxes—efficiencies—appended to larger, two-story units at mid-horseshoe … so there were these horseshoes of stucco marching across the gray mud with the promise of eventual, unlovely overcrowding: an instant slum. You could see it at one glance, through the windshield, as you drove up. … And from the backseat, where he sat with his sister and brother, Joe Biden looked at his mother, and she was crying.

实际上，那里还不算是威尔明顿，而是克莱蒙特，在北边靠河的钢铁业郊区。上世纪五十年代人们在那里建起了简易房屋和花园式公寓（但却没有花园，只有臭烘烘的泥巴）。作为首批租客之一，拜登一家开车来到溪景公寓那天，这里被推土机推得坑坑洼洼的，臭烘烘又乱糟糟。溪景公寓永远不会美丽：单层的黄灰泥房缆绳连接于更大的马蹄形两层公寓上，很紧凑......原来这里的灰色泥巴地上满是灰泥房子，预示着以后必然令人厌恶的拥挤不堪：这里是简便的贫民窟。你开着车，透过挡风玻璃一眼就能看出这一点来。跟兄弟姐妹坐在后排的乔·拜登看着妈妈，而妈妈在哭泣。

“Mom, what’sa matter?”

“妈妈，怎么了？”

There was an instant’s pause, as Jean Biden tried to make her face a smile. “I’m just so happy,” she said.

哭泣立刻停了，琴·拜登试图露出笑脸，她说道：“我太高兴了。”

“Honey,” Joe, Sr., said from the driver’s seat, “it’s gonna be okay. It’s gonna … it’s just to start …”

老乔在驾驶室上说道：“亲爱的，会...会好起来的。这只是开始...”。

Now, from Joey in the back: “What’s wrong?”

此刻，坐在后排的乔说道：“出了什么事？”

Jean Biden turned quickly and said: “Nothing’s wrong, honey.” And then she turned back—must have taken all the will she had—turned back to Joe, Sr., and hugged him:

琴迅速转头说：“什么事也没有，宝贝。”接着她转回头——怕是用尽了全部毅力，转向老乔，拥抱了他：

“It’s wonderful—thanks …” Jean said. “I’m just so happy … I can’t stop crying.”

“这里很棒——谢谢...我太高兴了，哭得停不下来。”琴说道。

Joe, Sr., just couldn’t hack it anymore in Scranton—not with the old man, Jean’s father, silent in his armchair, and Gertie in the attic, and Boo-Boo all over the house (his house, the Finnegan house). When brother Frank Biden called from Wilmington and said he knew of a job there … well, it didn’t matter what the job was, it would be easier than swallowing another day in Scranton.

老乔再也受不了呆在斯克兰顿了——受不了老头子，琴的父亲，他总是一言不发坐在扶手椅里，还有在阁楼上的格蒂，以及在房子里跑来跑去的波波（他的房子，费尼根宅）。当他的兄弟弗兰克·拜登从威尔明顿打电话来说他知道那里有个活儿干......嗯，这个活儿是什么没关系，肯定比在斯克兰顿多忍受一天要容易。

So, Joe, Sr., started driving back and forth, each week, started cleaning out boilers—that was his work in Wilmington. And then he landed a job at Kyle Motors, in sales, and they liked the way he carried himself, the air of distinction he lent to the place, so right away they made him manager of sales … and that’s when he moved the family, to Claymont.

所以老乔开始每周开车往返两地，清理锅炉——那是他在威尔明顿的工作。后来他在凯尔汽车找到了一份销售工作，人们喜欢他的举止以及他为那里增添的不凡气氛，所以他们很快让他做了销售经理......接着他就把家搬到了克莱蒙特。

It was still a far cry from the big place outside Boston, the beautiful house in Garden City, Long Island—wasn’t half as nice as the place they left in Scranton. But at least they’d be on their own. And Joseph was going to get back, see: he never liked that used-car job, never—it was only a start. And the house, well … there’d be a better house. After a year, he moved Jean and the kids to a real house in Arden, a rental place, but better … and after another year, they moved to the house on Wilson Road. For nineteen years, they lived on Wilson, but to Joseph, it was always temporary. He was going to get back to a really good house, he was going to make it again, every day … he’d get up, and he’d say: Today, I’m going to turn that corner, get the big break, today. … That was the great thing about him: he would never, never quit.

这跟波士顿城外的长岛花园城的大房子还有很大差距——还不如他们所离开的斯克兰顿一半好。但至少他们独立生活了。老乔想要再过上那样的生活，他从来就不喜欢那份二手车工作，那只是个起点。还有房子.......会有更好的房子。一年以后，他把琴和孩子们搬到了雅顿的一处真正的房子里，尽管是租的，但要好一些......又过了一年，他们搬到了威尔逊路上的房子里。十九年里，他们都住在威尔逊，但对老乔来说，那只是临时的。他要再住到一个真正的好房子里，他每天都要去努力实现这个梦想......他起床会对自己说：今天我要转运，交上好运......那就是他了不起的地方：他永不放弃。

And to Joey, who watched this … every day … that was the difference between balls and courage. That was better than daring … that was guts. And Joey meant to have guts. He would never, never quit.

对小乔来说，每天看着这一切，那就是胆量和勇气的差别。那超过了大胆，那是决心。而小乔要拥有决心。他将永不放弃。

A stutter is a cruel affliction for a kid, because no one, not even he, can see anything wrong. It’s not like a club foot, or a missing finger—where there’s something physically, visibly wrong, and you have simply to shrug and do the best you can. No, a stutter is more insidious: it attacks directly a child’s ability to make himself known and felt in the world. But indirectly—because there’s nothing wrong—it attacks his own idea of himself, his self-esteem, his confidence: Why can’t he talk right?

对孩童来说，口吃是个残忍的折磨，因为没人能看出来有哪里不对，即便是他也不行。这不像畸形足或少了根手指——有外形可见的毛病，你只要耸耸肩尽力而为就好了。不，口吃更隐形：它直接打击孩子让自己被世界认知的能力。但间接上，因为没有实际问题，它打击孩子对自己的想法，他的自尊，他的自信：为什么我没法好好说话？

Joe did not stutter all the time. At home, he almost never stuttered. With his friends, seldom. But when he moved to Delaware, there were no friends. There were new kids, a new school, and new nuns to make him stand up and read in class: that’s when it always hit—always always always. When he stood up in front of everybody else, and he wanted, so much, to be right, to be smooth, to be smart, to be normal, j-j-ju-ju-ju-ju-jus’th-th-th-th-then!

小乔并不是总口吃。在家里他几乎从不口吃，跟朋友在一起时偶尔口吃。但搬到特拉华州以后，周围没有朋友。有的是陌生的孩子、新的学校和新的老师让他站起来在班上朗读：那个场合总是口吃——一直一直一直口吃。当他站在其他人面前，他特别想显得正确，显得流畅，显得聪明，显得正常，就-就-就-那-啊-个-时-侯！

Of course, they laughed. Why wouldn’t they laugh? He was new, he was small, he was … ridiculous … even to him. There was nothing wrong. That’s what the doctors said.

当然，他们都笑了。干嘛不笑呢？他是新人，小个子......看着滑稽......自己也觉得如此。他什么毛病也没有，医生是这么说的。

So why couldn’t he talk right?

那他怎么不能正常说话呢？

He learned to dread. He’d be coming to school, running from the bus—flushed, healthy, full of juice—and then he’d remember: Oh, God, it’s my day to read in Latin class. God! … and the joy was gone from the morning.

他学会了恐惧。他上学的时候跑向校车——脸蛋红扑扑的，健康水灵——接着他想起来：哦，天啊，今天我要在拉丁课上朗读。天呐！......快乐一大早就烟消云散了。

He learned to scheme. In Catholic school, kids sit in rows. “A-a” takes the first seat, front of the row on the teacher’s far left. “A-b” will have the next seat back, and so on. Biden would usually sit in the middle of that far left row, maybe four or five seats from the front. And when the nun would start the readings, it was easy for a smart kid like Joey to count the paragraphs down the page … three, four … five—to find his paragraph, and memorize it. Somehow, it was easier, his mouth worked better, if he didn’t have to look at the page.

他学会了谋划。在天主教学校，孩子们排排坐。“A-a”坐第一座，第一排老师最左边的位置。“A-b”坐后面的位置，等等。拜登通常坐在左边的一排的中间，差不多从前到后数第四五个座位。修女开始阅读的时候，对于像小乔这样的聪明孩子来说，去数页面下方的图表很容易......三、四......五——找到他的图表并记住它。不知为何，如果他不需要看页面的时候，就容易一些，他的嘴也更好使一些。

He learned what cruelty, unfairness, was—a dozen ways, but all from the wrong end of the stick. There was a kid in class, Jimmy Lanahan, who used to give Joe fits. Every time he stood up to read, Lanahan would start on him:

他学会了残酷不公是怎么一回事——通过十几种方法，但都是糟糕的情况。班上有一个孩子，吉米·拉纳汉，总是让小乔发作。每次他站起来朗读，拉纳汉就开始了：

“B-b-b-b-b-b-BIDEN!”

“拜-拜-拜-拜-拜-拜登！”

Of course, that only turned the screws tighter, and Joey would stumble, have to look down at the page, and then it was over:

当然，那只会令他更紧张，小乔会结巴，要去低头看书，然后就没戏了：

“P-p-p-p-ar-r-r-ret omn-n-n-n-iamqu-qu-qu-qu-”

“柏-柏-柏拉图”

In a whisper, from behind: “B-b-b-b-b-BIDEN!”

后面小声说道：“拜-拜-拜-拜-拜-拜登！”

“… qu-que v-v-v-vi-v-vinc-c-c-c-it …”

“震-震-震-颤”

And from the sister at the head of the classroom: “All right, Mr. Biden. That will be enough.”

然后教室前面的修女就发话了：“好了，拜登先生。到此为止吧。”

Thing was, he knew they were wrong to mock him. There was a saying in Jean Biden’s house: “Never kid a fat person about being fat.” You could punch some kid in the nose—sure—but you did not, could not, attack his dignity.

问题是，他知道他们嘲笑他是不对的。琴在家里教他：“当着矬人不说短话。”你可以一拳打在一些孩子的鼻子上，那都没问题，但你不能去打击他的尊严。

One day, he stood to read, and from behind, Lanahan let him have it: “B-b-b-b-b-b-Biden!” And Joey turned around and got Jimmy—by the neck—and held on, shouted in his face:

有一天，他站着朗读，后面的拉纳汉在搞鬼：“拜-拜-拜登！”这时小乔转过头抓住吉米的脖子，掐住以后对着他的脸咆哮道：

“You sh-sh-shut up! I’m reading here!”

“你闭-闭嘴！我在朗读呢！”

Mostly, he got mad at himself: ashamed of his own helplessness. He always felt he was imposing on them. The class should not have to sit there, and l-l-l-li-lih-l-listen to him, t-t-t-t-trying to get out a p-p-p-p-pa-pa-paragraph th-tha-th-that everyone else w-w-w-w-wuh-wuh-would’ve f-f-f-f-f-ffinished!

大多数时候，他生自己的气：对自己的无助感到羞愧。他总是感到他在折磨别人。班上的同学不应该坐在那儿听他结巴，半天也憋不出来别人早就能读完的一段话了。

One of the nuns in Scranton had told him he’d do better if he got into a rhythm, a verbal march that would help him keep step while he read. So when Joe got to Wilmington, and schemed ahead to find his reading, he’d break each sentence into rhythmic bursts, till he could hear it, by memory, bouncing in his head. One day, that first school year in Wilmington, Joe skipped ahead to find his paragraph in the story of Sir Walter Raleigh:

斯克兰顿的一位修女告诉他如果他能押韵地读，就能保持节奏，就会读得好些。所以小乔来到威尔明顿的时候，提前计划好了阅读，把每句话分成押韵的语段，直到他能用记忆在脑子里复现。在威尔明顿首个学年里的一天，小乔在瓦尔特·罗利爵士的故事里找到了他的段落：

“Then, the gentleman put the cloak across the puddle, so the lady could step …”

“接着，那位绅士把斗篷铺在了水坑上，以便女士可以踩过去......”

And he broke it up in his head to hear the footfalls of its march:

他把这句话在脑子里分开以想象音节：

THEN the GEN-tle

接着那绅士

MAN put the CLOAK

把斗篷

a-CROSS the PUDdle

铺在水坑上

So the LA-dy could

这样那位女士

STEP…

就能踩过去

And that’s the way he spoke it—he was getting along great!

他就是用这种方法读的——读得很不错！

Then the nun broke in: “What is that word, Mr. Biden?”

然后修女插话道：“那个是什么词，拜登先生？”

“W-w-wh? …”

“哪-哪-个？”

“The third word, Mr. Biden! Read it!”

“第三个词，拜登先生！读出来！”

Joey froze. He could only say it as he’d heard it in his head: “GEN-tle MAN …”

小乔僵住了。他只能用脑子里想象的形式说出来“那位绅士......”

“Mr. Biden! Look at the page, and read it!”

“拜登先生！看着那页读出来！”

Joey could not look at the page and read it—he knew he’d lose it. What was the word? Did he have the wrong word?

小乔没法看着书读出来——他知道自己会搞砸。那是什么词？他读错了词吗？

“GEN-tle MAN …”

“绅士......”

“That will be all,” the teacher snapped, “Mr. B-b-Biden.”

老师大声说道：“好了，拜-拜-拜登先生。”

Joe put his book down, silent in his shame, and just walked out of the class.

小乔放下书，羞愧得一言不发，径直走出了教室。

Thing was, Joe, Sr., never could get out of selling those cars: there were four kids now—the youngest, Frankie, was born in Delaware—and Catholic schools for all of them, and the mortgage for the house on Wilson … so, it was the sales lot, every day, and evenings till nine, and Saturdays, too. He never could trade up to a house of distinction… no, it was a three-bedroom tract house, like its neighbors.

情况是，老乔得一直卖车了：现在有了四个孩子——最小的弗兰奇是在特拉华出生的。四个孩子都要上天主教学校，威尔逊的房子要还按揭......所以，每天都得卖车，晚上要到九点，周六也得工作。他永远也没法换个好房子了......只能住在三室的批建房里，跟周围的邻居差不多。

And no room to spare—that was for sure. His daughter, Val, had to have her own room, so the boys, all three, slept in one small bedroom … and the dining table was spread with their homework, and the living room was an obstacle course of kids asprawl … and then Boo-Boo showed up. At first, he only came to drop off his father—Joey’s granddad—to stay with Jean for a few weeks, while Boo-Boo was on the road, selling Serta mattresses. But even after Pop Finnegan died, Boo-Boo would drop by for visits. And then one weekend, he came to visit, and stayed for eighteen years. Then, it was four in the boys’ room: two bunk beds, top and bottom. … And meanwhile, the Widow Sheen moved to Wilmington and lived with the Bidens for two years. Even after they found her a room in a private house nearby, she’d still put on her white gloves and come to lunch almost every day. … And then her son, Bill, Jr., moved into the Bidens’ rec room for a year or so … and then, too, Frank Biden’s wife died, and he was so lonely, he had to move in. Joseph and Jean took care of them all. That’s the way it was, with the Bidens.

肯定没有多余的房间了。他的女儿，薇儿，需要自己的房间，三个儿子要住在一件小卧室里......餐桌上铺满了孩子的作业，客厅成了孩子们匍匐的障碍训练场......接着波波出现了。最开始，他只是送父亲——小乔的外公来跟琴一家住上几星期，同时他也总是出门在外卖床垫。但就算后来外公芬尼根去世了，波波也会过来串门。后来有一个周末，波波又来串门，然后一住就是十八年。然后男孩子们的房间里就有了四个人：两张上下铺的双层床......同时，辛寡妇也搬来威尔明顿跟拜登一家住了两年。即便后来他们为她在附近找了一处私宅的房间来住，她几乎每天中午都会带上她的白手套过来吃午餐......她的儿子小比尔在拜登家的娱乐室住了一年左右......接着，弗兰克拜登的老婆也去世了，他太孤单了，也得搬过来住。老乔和琴照顾了所有这些人。拜登一家就是这样的。

But the big one was Boo-Boo, a presence in the house, and an object lesson for Joey: Boo-Boo stuttered. Edward Blewitt Finnegan was a smart man, a college man—had dreamed of becoming a doctor—but he stuttered. And the way Boo-Boo styled his life, it was a t-t-t-tuh-tuh-tragedy: he couldn’t go to med school when he talked like that! … It wasn’t that he didn’t try, was it? The stutter was his explanation, an alibi in constant evidence.

但大问题是波波，他呆在屋里令小乔有样学样：波波口吃。爱德华·布鲁维特·费尼根是个聪明人，上过大学，有过当医生的梦想——但他口吃。波波的生活是个悲-悲-悲剧：他这么说话是上不了医学院的。并不是他没尝试过，对吧？口吃是他的理由，时刻都显露出来的托辞。

But Jean Biden would have none of it. Blewitt was her brother, and she told it like it was. He could have gone to medical school, if he’d tried—if it took twenty years. There was no excuse, in Jean Biden’s book, for giving up. She would not let Boo-Boo mention his stutter and his failure in the same breath, without shaking her head, rolling her eyes … or calling him out, right in his face, in true Finnegan style: “Edward Blewitt Finnegan! That’s a goddam lie!”

但琴·拜登不接受这些。布鲁维特是他的弟弟，她有啥说啥。他如果努力了，早就上医学院了——哪怕要花上二十年。在琴的字典里，没有放弃的理由。她不允许波波把口吃和自己的失败放在一起说，她会摇头瞪眼，会以芬尼根家的风格当着他的面叫板：“爱德华·布鲁维特·芬尼根！那是该死的谎言！”

And she would not let Joey give up—not for one day, not for an hour: he would beat this … there was more to him than stutter. He had his Biden grace. He had talent. He had brains. She must have told him ten thousand times: “Joey, it’s just that you are so smart … your mind outruns your ability to say your thoughts.”

而她不会让小乔放弃，一天也不行，一小时也不行：他会战胜这个......他不仅仅会口吃。他有拜登家的优雅，他有天赋，有聪明的头脑。她已经跟他说过成千上万遍了：“小乔，你就是太聪明了......你的思维快过你能把想法说出来的能力。”

“Joey, you have such a high IQ …”

“小乔，你的智商如此之高......”

“Joey Biden, you’re just smarter than anybody …”

“乔·拜登，你就是比别人都聪明......”

But she needn’t have worried. Joey was not short on will. And he had eyes to see what he didn’t want to be. He did not want to be Boo-Boo, arguing with schoolboys about their lessons, to show how smart he was. He did not want to have to alibi. He did not want to drive every week through five states, selling mattresses—no.

但她无需担忧。小乔不缺毅力。而且他亲眼看到了自己不想成为的样子。他不想成为波波，跟上学的孩子争论他们的课程，来显示他多聪明。他不想有托词。他不想每周开车穿过五个州去买床垫，绝不。

He knew it just as surely as he knew the other truth of his young life: he was not going to sell cars—no way. He didn’t know how his father could stand it. He would not be slave to a mortgage on a tract house; he would not end up trapped on that treadmill. No. He was a Biden and he could do … anything.

他清楚这一点，也清楚他年轻生活中的另一个事实：他不会去卖车——没门。他不知道父亲如何能忍受这一点。他不想成为批建房的房奴；他不想被困在那份单调的工作里。不。他是拜登家的人，干什么都能行。

It wasn’t quick, it took years. But he learned to game it out. He learned, always, to see himself in the situation to come, to think what he’d say, how he’d sound, what the other guy would say, and what the answer would be …

这可不快，要花上几年。但他学会了用游戏克服它。他学会了总是以即将出现的情况看待自己，想象他会说什么，听起来怎么样，另一个人会说什么，而答案会是什么......

He had a paper route, and a neighbor, an old chatty man, who was always around … and Joey knew (he could see it, like it already happened!) that if he wore his Yankee baseball cap, the old man would ask him about the Yankee game last night, and Joey would say:

他有条送报纸的路线，还有一位邻居，是个爱唠嗑的老人，总在附近......小乔知道（他能看到，好像已经发生了一样！）如果他戴上了他的洋基队棒球帽，老人就会问昨晚的洋基队比赛，而小乔会说：

“Mantle hit a home run …”

“曼托打出了一个本垒打......”

“Man-tle-hit-a-home-run …”

“曼-托-打-出-了-一-个-本-垒-打......”

“Mick-ey-Man-tle-hit-a-homer …”

“米奇-曼托-打-了-本-垒......”

He could see where he’d be standing on the walk, in front of the porch, and he’d hand the man his paper …

他能想到自己在人行道上站在那里，在门廊的前面，把报纸递给那个人......

“Yeah-Mick-ey-Man-tle-hit-a-homer …”

“是的-米奇-曼托-打-了-个-本-垒......”

“They-beat-Cleve-land-four-to-one …”

“他们-四比一-打赢了-克利夫兰......”

He’d play the thing over and over in his mind: everything the guy could ask him … everything Joey would have to say. And he’d make sure to wear his Yankee cap. That was the key.

他会在脑子里一遍遍回放：这个人会问他的所有事情......小乔要怎么回答。他会确保自己带着洋基队帽子。那是关键所在。

He lived so much of his life in his head, in the future, that he had more than a child’s understanding of how people were likely to react. Of course, every kid thinks that way about adults, to a certain extent, if only to stay out of trouble … but Joey had to know more. He had to know what they’d say, what he could say, how he’d be, how he’d sound, how he’d look. And then, if they said that … what would he say then?

他在头脑中经历了那么多的生活，后来他对人们可能会如何反应超过了一个孩子的理解。当然，每个小孩都那样去想大人，在某种程度上只是为了逃脱麻烦......但小乔需要懂得更多些。他需要知道他们会说什么，他自己会说什么，如何表现，听起来如何，看起来如何。然后，如果他们说这个的话，他要怎么说？

And so, he had more than a child’s understanding of what he wanted to do. That’s what his new friends in Wilmington saw. Joe always had an idea. … If their notion of a summer evening’s prank was to put a bag of dogshit on old man Schutz’s doorstep, Joey would say, “No, here’s what we’ll do. You know behind my house, where they got all those little trees? Get a shovel …” And they did: they went out with shovels and planted a forest of saplings on Mr. Schutz’s lawn. It was so much more elaborate—all thought out, the way Joey had it figured.

这样，他对自己想要做什么也超过了一个孩子的理解。这是他在威尔明顿的新朋友们所见到的。小乔总是有想法......如果他们在夏天傍晚恶作剧的打算是在老人舒尔茨家门口台阶上放一包狗屎的话，小乔会说，“不，我们要这么做。你们知道在我家后面，有那些小树吧？拿支铁锹......”然后他们这样做了：他们带上铁锹在舒尔茨先生的草坪上栽了一堆小树苗。这周密多了，全部按小乔的想法经过了深思熟虑。

The other thing was, the moms loved Joey: as long as young Biden was along, the thing was okay. … Part of it had to be, he was so nice to them—he seemed to know how they would feel about things. They might have seen, too, how he was about his own mom—so sentimental. (The way to get a punch in the nose was to say anything about Joey’s mom. BANGO! Right in the face.) But what those ladies saw most clearly: here was a boy unswayed by peer pressure, who always seemed to have his own idea—such a sense of himself…

还有一件事，妈妈们喜欢小乔：只要小拜登在身边，就什么都好......部分肯定是由于他对她们那么友善——他似乎知道她们对事情的感受如何。她们可能也看到了他对自己妈妈怎么样——如此的有感情。（想在鼻子上挨一拳就说小乔妈妈的坏话吧。砰！对着脸上就是一下。）但这些女士们看得最清楚的是，这个男孩不被同龄人左右，他总是有自己的想法——自我感十足......

Yes, and that’s why it mattered so much to Joey to get into Archmere—Wilmington’s smallest, most serious, preppiest Catholic high school. It was crucial to the picture he had of himself—in the future, which was so real, so present, in Joe.

是的，那就是为何对小乔来说，进入阿奇米尔为何如此重要——那是威尔明顿最小，最严谨，最具私立风格的天主教高中。这于他对自己的期许至关重要——期许本是在未来，而在小乔身上又如此真实，如同当下。

He was so happy when he got to go—so grateful. (He knew it was a strain. He’d heard his parents talk at night about the bills … he knew.) But Archmere held its terrors, too. There was speech class—required for all ninth- and tenth-graders—and weekly Tuesday assemblies, where four underclassmen would each have to make a speech, in front of the whole student body, and all the teachers, and Father Diny, the head man.

当他能去的时候，他如此高兴，又十分感恩（他知道压力很大，他听到父母在晚上讨论费用......他清楚）。但阿奇米尔也有自己的恐怖之处。九年级和十年级的学生要上演讲课，周四还有活动，一二年级学生要在全校学生和老师以及校长迪尼神父面前演讲。

What could he do but scheme ahead, and dread the day, and practice? He went into training. If memorizing helped, then he would train to memorize: he used to time himself, committing to rote stock pieces, like the Declaration of Independence. He’d grab the text and peer at it, like he wanted to bore holes through the page, and then he’d put it down and try to say it, whole. … How fast could he get the thing in his head?

他能干什么呢？无非是提早计划，整天担心，不断练习。他进行了训练。如果记忆有帮助，他就训练记忆：他曾给自己计时，决心死记硬背老套文章，比如《独立宣言》。他会拿起文本盯着看，好像要在纸上看出洞来，然后他会把它放下并试图整篇说出来......他能够多快把这些记到脑子里呢？

Someone said a stutter was caused by facial muscles seizing up in nervous convulsion. So Joey stood for hours in front of a mirror, reading aloud or simply talking to his own image, while he tried to relax the muscles in his face, to attain that droopy, logy, sloooow eeeease that he thought would solve his problem.

有人说口吃是由面部肌肉在神经性痉挛时的紧张引起的。因此小乔在镜子前面站上数个小时，大声阅读或者就对自己的影像说话，同时努力放松面部的肌肉，达到无松弛，呆滞，迟缓的安逸，而他认为这能解决他的问题。

And in class, he read about Demosthenes, who made himself the greatest orator of his day by putting pebbles in his mouth and declaiming to the sea, above the roar of the waves. So Joey Biden, of Wilson Road, would stand outside at the wall of his house, the blank wall that looked out toward the fence and Mom-Mom’s roses, and with stones in his mouth, he’d try to read aloud, until he could read that page without a miss, and then he’d go to the next page, and the next … until it was the book in one hand and a flashlight in the other.

上课时，他读到德摩斯梯尼通过把鹅卵石放到嘴里对着大海慷慨陈词，盖过海浪的咆哮而成为其同时代最伟大的演说家。因此住在威尔逊路的乔·拜登，会站在家里的墙外——那面光墙对着篱笆和妈妈的玫瑰丛，他嘴里含着石头，努力大声朗读，直到他把整页毫无错误的读下来，接着他会读下一页，然后再下一页......直到一只手里拿着书，另一只手里要打着手电的时候。

And he got through: ninth grade, he had to stand up at assembly and give a talk, like the rest … but the rest could not have known such triumph. His speech was not perfect, no … but it was a great day. And like a kid who beats his big brother at a footrace, and devotes himself to running ever after, Joe Biden decided he would be a speaker. He would be the best goddam speaker at Archmere.

他做到了：九年级的时候，他要在集会上起立发言，与其他人一样......但其他人无法知道那样的狂喜。他的演讲并非完美，但那真是很棒的一天。如同长跑中打败了哥哥的孩子接着会致力于跑步，乔·拜登决定要做个演说家。他会成为阿奇米尔最好的演说家。

So he trained. That summer, after his job on the school grounds crew, in the hours till dinner, after which his friends would show up, he’d practice. He’d read aloud. He’d speak aloud. … And that was the same summer he grew so much, came of age and of size … and still good-looking—a wonderful smile—and plenty smart, and less wary now when he came back to school, which wasn’t a new school anymore, but a small place, really, where everybody knew him … or thought they did (He’s changed somehow, hasn’t he?) … and that was the same time that girls got important, and Joey was always sweet and serious with girls—they loved him—and his sister knew plenty of them … and that size made a difference on the football field, and Joey could run, and he could catch, and most important, he believed he could catch anything … and that was the difference, really: he believed he could master … anything. It seemed he could: he was in just the right circle, with the athletes, and the cool guys, and when the question came up—what’re we gonna do?—well, still, it was Joe who had an answer. He was a leader—that’s what his teachers said. And a player—that was from his coach. And the other guys, his classmates, they remember those things, too … but what they all say about Biden at Archmere:

他就这么训练的。那个夏天，在操场维护小组干完活后到晚饭前的时间里，他会练习，之后他的朋友们会来玩。他会大声朗读。他会大声演说......就在那个夏天他成长了太多，年龄增长，体格也增长了......还是那么帅气——灿烂的笑容，满是灵气，如今返回学校少了一些小心翼翼，因为这里不再是新学校了，而实际上是一个人人认识他或者自以为认识他的小地方了（他变得不一样了，不是吗？）......那也是女孩子变得重要的时期，小乔总是对女孩温柔又认真——她们喜欢他，他姐姐就认识一大堆这样的女孩......他的体格在足球场上也很管用，小乔能跑位能接球，最重要的是，他相信自己什么都能接住.......那才是不凡之处：他相信自己什么都能掌握。看起来他能行：他的圈子很不错，跟运动员和那些很酷的家伙们一起，然后问题来了——我们要做什么？仍然是小乔拥有答案。他是个领导者——那是他的老师说的；还是个斗士——那是他的教练说的。还有其他人，他的同学，他们也记得这些事情。但他们都这么说在阿奇米尔的拜登：

Joey Biden, he could really talk.

乔·拜登，他可真能侃。

出处：头条号 @HeadlineAhead