2006年高考英语湖北卷 - 阅读理解E

Silence is unnatural to man. He begins life with a cry and ends it in stillness. In between he does all he can to make a noise in the world, and he fears silence more than anything else. Even his conversation is an attempt to prevent a fearful silence. If he is introduced to another person, and a number of pauses occur in the conversation, he regards himself as a failure, a worthless person, and is full of envy of the emptiest headed chatterbox. He knows that ninety-nine percent of human conversation means no more than the buzzing of a fly, but he is anxious to join in the buzz and to prove that he is a man and not a waxwork figure.
人不是天生沉默。生命以哭泣开始，以沉默结束。在这两者之间，人竭尽全力在世界上制造声音，他最害怕沉默，甚至谈话也是为了阻止可怕的沉默。如果他被介绍给另一个人，并且谈话中出现了一些停顿，他会认为自己是一个失败者，一个毫无价值的人，并且对头脑最空虚的喋喋不休的人充满嫉妒。他知道99%的人类对话不过是苍蝇的嗡嗡声，但他急于加入这一行列，证明自己是人，而不是一个蜡像。

The aim of conversation is not, for the most part, to communicate ideas; it is to keep up the buzzing sound. There are, it must be admitted, different qualities of buzz; there is even a buzz that is as annoying as the continuous noise made by a mosquito. But at a dinner party one would rather be a mosquito than a quiet person. Most buzzing, fortunately, is pleasant to the ear, and some of it is pleasant even to the mind. He would be a foolish man if he waited until he had a wise thought to take part in the buzzing with his neighbors.
谈话的目的大部分不是为了交流思想；必须承认，嗡嗡声有不同的品质；甚至还有一种嗡嗡声，就像蚊子不断发出的噪音一样烦人。但在晚宴上，人们宁愿做一只蚊子，也不愿做一个安静的人。幸运的是，大多数嗡嗡声都让人耳目一新，有些甚至让人心悦诚服。如果他等到有了明智的想法才与旁边的人一起嗡嗡，那他就是一个愚蠢的人。

Those who hate to pick up the weather as a conversational opening seem to me not to know the reason why human beings wish to talk. Very few human beings join in a conversation in the hope of learning anything new. Some of them are content if they are merely allowed to go on making a noise into other people's ears, though they have nothing to tell them except that they have seen two or three new, plays or that they had food in a Swiss hotel. At the end of an evening during which they have said nothing meaningful for a long time, they just prove themselves to be successful conversationists.
在我看来，那些不愿意把天气作为谈话的开场白的人似乎不知道人类为什么想说话。很少有人参加对话是为了学习新东西。有些人只是被允许继续在别人的耳朵里制造噪音就会很满意，尽管他们除了看过两三部新剧或在瑞士酒店吃的饭之外，没有什么可以告诉他们的。夜晚结束的时候，他们很长时间并没有说什么有意义的话，他们只是证明自己是成功的健谈者。