Zhang Xianliang

Half of a Man is a Woman "is a semi autobiographical novel by Zhang Xianliang, which mainly tells the life experiences and psychological changes of Zhang Yonglin in a labor camp. 张贤亮·《男人的一半是女人》（节选）英译 Half Man is Woman  (Excerpt) 张贤亮 Zhang Xianliang “‘八年啦，别提啦！’”她笑着，学了一句革命样板戏《智取威虎山》里的唱词。随后，两脚倒着把我埋下的土踩瓷实，眼睛看着地面说，“这八年，结了两次婚，离了两次婚，就这些。幸亏没生娃娃。” ‘Me? Don’t even ask.’ She laughed, as she reeled off a line from a model revolutionary play. Then she stamped down the earth that I had shoveled in. ‘Eight years: I married twice and divorced twice. That was about it. Luckily there weren’t any children.’ 我不停地干着活，一点也不惊奇。我看见、听见的出乎意料的事太多了，到后来，竟没有一件事能出乎我的意料。她不那样生活还能怎样生活？幸福是一种奇迹，不幸才是常规。她对我的坎坷也没有感到惊奇。这样，我们倒是真正地相互理解了。她不说那些安慰的话语也好，这些年，我最怕那种老太婆式的絮絮叨叨的同情。 I kept on working, not at all surprised. I had seen too much, and heard too much. In the end, there was very little that I could not imagine. If she didn’t get along that way, how was she to live? Good fortune was a kind of miracle, misfortune was the norm. She, in turn, felt no surprise at my own experience. In that respect we both totally understood each other. Her lack of any commiseration was fine—through the years, I had come to dislike the simpering sympathy of other people. “你别笑话，”她接着说，“你蹲了两次监狱，我结了两次婚，其实结婚跟蹲监狱一样，有的时候比蹲监狱还要难受。前一次，我没告诉他我劳改过，成天提心吊胆的，怕他知道了。可他还是知道了，跟我打了离婚。后一次，在白银滩农场，我一开始就跟他说清楚了，可他老把这事拿捏我，我受不了，跟他打了离婚。前一次是人家不要我，后一次是我不要人家，一比一，平了！唉，人一辈子就是这么回事。我以后再不结婚了！” ‘You’ve been in jail twice over these years, well, don’t laugh, I’ve been married twice. Comes to the same thing. At…