（译文）《回忆爱因斯坦：他可真不是驾驶帆船那块料》

大部头的爱因斯坦传记读着嫌太严肃，偶然看见这篇小文，感觉有趣，翻成中文和大家共享。

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《回忆爱因斯坦：他可真不是驾驶帆船那块料》

Recalling Albert Einstein, who was not much of a genius when it came to sailing

------By Corey Kilgannon

纽约州卡特筹格村：当爱因斯坦于1939年7月间头一次走进罗斯曼百货店时，店主大卫.罗斯曼立刻认出了他，因为那时消息早已经传遍了这个位于长岛远端的僻静小村，说是那位头发蓬乱行为怪僻的天才自认是驾驶帆船的行家，且在卡特筹格码头旁租下了一栋渡夏小屋。 

CUTCHOGUE, New York: When Albert Einstein first came into Rothman's Department Store in July 1939, the owner, David Rothman, recognized him immediately.

Word had already spread across this sleepy bayside hamlet far out on Long Island that the strange, shaggy genius fancied himself a sailor and had rented a summer cottage overlooking Cutchogue Harbor.

科学家那艘长15英尺浑身吱嘎乱响的帆船取名“挺耐腐”，这词在意第绪语里意为 “寒碜”，或 “等外品”。  据小皮克尼克湾一带的传闻讲，这词拿来形容爱因斯坦的驾船技术也恰如其分。

The name of his clunky 15-foot sailboat was Tinef, Yiddish for "worthless" or "junk," and, according to tales across the Little Peconic Bay, it could have equally described Einstein's sailing skills.

“这地方总有不下30号人说是曾在爱因斯坦翻船时搭救过他，把他和他的船拖回码头，”大卫.罗斯曼的儿子罗伯特说。  罗伯特现在经营着他父亲那间百货店。

"You had 30 people around here who'd tell you they rescued Einstein when he capsized, and towed him and his boat in," said David Rothman's son Robert, who now runs the store.

那年夏天爱因斯坦走进百货店时，爱因斯坦60岁，罗伯特才12岁。 科学家要买一样东西，因为他的英文有很重的德国口音，听起来他好像在问店里是否卖日冕 （sundial）。   

Robert was 12 that summer when Einstein, then 60, first came in and, in his heavy German accent, seemed to be asking whether the store sold sundials.

"我父亲于是把他领到百货店后门外，指给他看一个日冕，”罗伯特上个星期在他的百货店里回忆说。 “爱因斯坦说，‘不是这个，是 sundial，’一面说，一面朝他脚上指。 原来他是想买双拖鞋 （sandals）。”

"So my father takes him out back and shows him a sundial," Robert Rothman recalled last week in the store. "Einstein says, 'No, no. Sundials,' and points at his feet. He's looking for sandals."

百货店里只有一种窄窄的女士拖鞋，可是给爱因斯坦穿上，却好像和他那副随意不羁的装扮十分般配。

The only sandals Rothman's stocked were a narrow feminine pair, but they seemed to fit right into Einstein's haphazard appearance.

“我至今还想得起他站在这个店里的情景，顶着那么一大蓬头发，”罗伯特说。  “那时候，男人很少有留那种发式的，他还用根白棉绳作腰带，可能就是从他那船上拆下来的。

"I can still see him standing here with that big head of hair," Rothman said. "The hair was very unusual at that time for a man, and he used a white cotton rope for a belt - probably something that came off his sailboat."

罗伯特.罗斯曼今年80岁。  他是少有的几个至今仍记得爱因斯坦当年在长岛渡夏的人，爱因斯坦在长岛渡夏时曾做过影响深远的大事，同时又有令人捧腹的时刻。

Rothman, 80, is one of a handful here who still remember Einstein's Long Island summer vacation, which had moments of both profound importance and profound hilarity.

他在那里写下了给罗斯福总统的信，有人认为那封信可能导致了对原子弹的研究开发。  然而有关大教授时常会因为船搁浅或翻船而需要人救助的故事也成了人们茶余饭后经久不衰的笑料。

There was the letter he wrote to President Franklin D. Roosevelt that some believe may have led to the development of the atomic bomb, and then there was the widespread delight among locals over the professor's needing constant rescue after stranding or capsizing his sailboat.

可是罗伯特.罗斯曼对那个夏天记得最清楚的就是，他要小心翼翼，不要因为打扰了他父亲和爱因斯坦的快乐时光而惹上麻烦。 他记得自己曾坐在爱因斯坦的门廊前，还记得他父亲开车带爱因斯坦到处转，而他则坐在后座上。

But Rothman remembers it simply as the summer he had to keep out of his father's - and Einstein's - hair. He recalls sitting on Einstein's porch and riding in the back seat as his father drove Einstein around.

"那年我才12岁，我自然不能帮他写物理理论，我的职责就是不乱跑，不贫嘴，我的职责基本上就是帮助照看爱因斯坦的孙子。  我曾带那孩子扬帆出海，” 罗伯特说。

"I was 12 then, so I wasn't helping him write physics theories," he said. "I was supposed to be seen and not heard, and basically had to keep his grandson occupied. I took the kid sailing."

和爱因斯坦那栋小屋隔几个房子住着玛萨.保罗。  今年82岁的玛萨过去在这里渡夏，如今则在此常年居住。 玛萨从她房子的阳台上朝伸出浅湾的一块独立礁石一指，她说大科学家会不时坐在那礁石上，向着大海凝视出神。

Several doors down from Einstein's cottage, Martha Paul, 82, would spend summers in the house where she now lives full time. She pointed down from her deck to a solitary rock jutting out of the shallow water, where she said the scientist used to sit and stare out to sea.

“我的婶婶和他的发式一模一样。  有一次我看见他们俩在海滩上相遇时都不约而同停了下来，”玛萨说，“他们都情不自禁地盯着对方头发看，好像都对居然会看到和自己一样的发式而吃惊。”

"My Aunt Martha had his same hairstyle, and once I saw them pass each other while walking on the beach," Paul recalled. "They looked up and stared at each other like they were amazed to see the same hairdo."

“对我们来说，他就是个发式滑稽，说话怪腔怪调，驾船技术很差的水手”，玛萨补充道。“那时大家会一面朝港口外瞧着，一面笑话那个在船上不知所措的怪人。”

"To us, he was just a bad sailor with funny hair and a funny accent," she added. "People used to look out there and laugh at this strange guy in his sailboat going nowhere."

1939年，正是爱因斯坦试图提出一种把几个科学原则和并在一起的统一场理论的时候，也许他觉得驾船出海可以让他的思绪随着他的船遨游。

In 1939, Einstein was seeking a unified field theory to unite several scientific principles, and perhaps sailing allowed his mind to drift along with his boat.

正是在爱因斯坦在罗斯曼的百货店里欣赏了莫扎特的“朱庇特”交响乐录音以后，爱因斯坦和百货店老板发现对方会拉小提琴。不久，他们两人就开始每周一次聚会在百货店里，一起拉室内乐。

After Einstein admired the recording of Mozart's "Jupiter" Symphony playing in Rothman's, the scientist and the store owner discovered they were both violinists, and soon they were meeting weekly at the Rothman house to play chamber music.

后来爱因斯坦在给大卫.罗斯曼的信里说，那是他 “一生最幸福的夏天”，说那个海湾是 “我所见过的最美丽的可以航船的所在。” 

Einstein later wrote to David Rothman that it was his "happiest summer ever," calling the bay "the most beautiful sailing ground I ever experienced."

在另一封信里，爱因斯坦先是记述了自己看到小罗伯特给自己的小划艇巧妙地安装上桅杆和船帆时的喜悦，接着就提到自己是如何烧掉了对相对论的书面阐述的第一稿。

Another letter recalls Einstein's delight at young Robert's clever rigging of his own rowboat with a mast and sail, and then in the next sentence describes how Einstein burned his first written attempt to explain relativity.

“有一次他从他的小屋驾船来百货店，居然半路上迷路了”，罗伯特回忆说， “警察来电话，说海滩上有一个一脑袋长头发的人在东奔西跑，到处问怎么去罗斯曼百货店。”

"Once, he sailed to the store from his cabin and got lost," Rothman said. "The police found him and called, saying there was this hairy guy wandering the beach asking for my father."

百货店至今变化无几。收银台旁摆一个粗笨的煤油暖炉，店里仍旧出售园林工具，家用器具，五金工具，船上用品和玩具。

The department store has hardly changed. Next to the checkout counter is a bulky kerosene heater, and the inventory still includes gardening tools, housewares, hardware, appliances, nautical equipment and toys.

“城里犹太人不多，我父亲是一个，”罗斯曼说。据他讲，虽然其父全靠自学，但能和爱因斯坦讨论政治，艺术，驾船术，音乐和哲学。

"My dad was one of the few Jews in town, and he had educated himself," said Rothman, who said his father nonetheless could discuss politics, art, boating, music and philosophy with Einstein.

曾有一次爱因斯坦试着在一张废纸片上用草图来解释他的相对论和其他定律。前不久罗斯曼的家人才把这草图出售给一位收藏家。

Once, Einstein tried to explain his theory of relativity and other principles by sketching them on a scrap of paper. The Rothman family recently sold the scrap to a collector.

罗斯曼家仍然藏有很多爱因斯坦的来信，信中谈到他的船，他的家庭和健康状况，还谈及他对第二次世界大战的忧心。 所有这些信都是用打字机在爱因斯坦的个人信笺上打出，结尾都署有规整紧凑的签名：“阿.爱因斯坦。”

The family still has numerous Einstein letters, which included news about his boat, his family and his health, and his concerns about World War II. They are all typewritten on Einstein's personal stationery and signed with a neat, tight script: "A. Einstein."

第二年夏天爱因斯坦没有再来，而是在纽约州北部的萨兰娜克湖畔渡过的。 但是他保持了和大卫.罗斯曼的通信联系， 而大卫.罗斯曼从那以后也每年给爱因斯坦送一双 “日冕”去。

Einstein spent the next summer at Saranac Lake in upstate New York, but he continued to correspond with David Rothman, who sent him a new pair of "sundials" year after year.