跟著「經濟學人」一起聊聊月餅

來自專欄 LearnAndRecord

一年一度的中秋佳節到了，LR在這裡祝大家中秋快樂，闔家團圓！大家應該都吃了月餅吧？今天就和大家一起學習經濟學人是怎麼聊月餅的~

MOONCAKES are among the most divisive treats. For some the chewy pastries are delicacies on which to gorge for the Mid-Autumn Festival, a Chinese holiday that falls this year on September 24th. For others they are dry, dense and full of calories. But for economists they are something else entirely: an indicator of important trends in consumption, innovation, corruption and grey-market trading.

treat

treat一詞在前幾天網紅"故宮黃酒雪糕" 你心動了嗎？提到過，不過沒有明顯標註出來，今天再來回顧一次：表示「〔尤指不經常吃的〕美味食物」，英文解釋為：a special food that tastes good, especially one that you do not eat very often.

舉個??：

The cafe serves an assortment of gourmet treats.

這家小餐館供應各種美味佳肴。

這裡用divisive（造成不和的；引起紛爭的）一詞來形容月餅很貼切，因為下文緊接著提到爭論的雙方（For some...For others...）

月餅

the chewy pastry 耐嚼的油酥糕點

gorge on

表示「狼吞虎咽」，英文解釋為：If you gorge on something or gorge yourself on it, you eat lots of it in a very greedy way.

舉個??：

I could spend each day gorging on chocolate.

我可以將每一天都花在狂吃巧克力上。

中秋節

文中寫到the Mid-Autumn Festival後，還補充了一句 a Chinese holiday that falls this year on September 24th.

grey-market

字面意思就是「灰市」 ，指經非正式渠道購賣商品再以低於市價的價格售出，英文解釋為：Grey-market goods are bought unofficially and then sold to customers at lower prices than usual.

舉個??：

Grey-market perfumes and toiletries are now commonly sold by mail.

灰市的香水和化妝品現在常以郵購方式售出。

寫作

經濟學人是很好的學習英文寫作的素材，比如這裡的經典開頭。首句提出論點... are among the most divisive ...，然後用For some...For others...結構引出雙方論據，最後再用一個But引出新的觀點——經濟學家的觀點，也就是文章主旨。

Mooncakes play this role because of their status as gifts. Ahead of the mid-autumn holiday, companies give them to employees; business contacts exchange them. Consumption of mooncakes is thus less a reflection of whether people enjoy the pastries, likened by some to edible hockey pucks, and more a measure of the health of the economy.

edible hockey pucks

hockey pucks指「冰球」，這裡是說因為月餅和冰球很像，人們把它比作「可食用的冰球」。

OF ALL the dread-provoking Christmas gifts—all the reindeer sweaters and buzzing children』s toys—perhaps none is as feared as the fruitcake: a football-sized dessert, wrapped in lurid red foil. It will often lurk reprovingly on sideboards and in refrigerators for months before being finally, furtively, chucked out.

dread-provoking

合成詞，dread表示「畏懼，害怕」，provoke表示「激怒，惹起，煽動」，所以dread-provoking表示「令人害怕的」。從這個詞可以看出來作者對fruitcake作為「聖誕禮物「的態度是消極的，而破折後的」as feared as「進一步體現了這種態度。

lurid

表示「艷麗的」，英文解釋為「If you describe something as lurid, you do not like it because it is very brightly coloured. 」

舉個??：

She took care to paint her toe nails a lurid red or orange.

她小心翼翼地把腳趾甲塗成艷麗的紅色或桔色。

fruitcake

fruitcake意思是「水果[果脯，果子]蛋糕，摻有乾果的糕餅」，它還有另一個意思表示「瘋子，怪人」，文中對前者的解釋：a football-sized dessert, wrapped in lurid red foil

圖片來源維基百科

It will often lurk reprovingly on sideboards and in refrigerators for months before being finally, furtively, chucked out.

這個句子用了大量的介詞，而且是採用it這種無靈主語，將fruitcake擬人化，所以直譯的話個人覺得怪怪的，試著採用了意譯（歡迎指正哦）：

人們經常刻意把水果蛋糕放在餐具柜上或冰箱里不顯眼的地方，數月之後又偷偷扔掉。

reprovingly 挑剔地

lurk on 潛伏

sideboard 餐具櫃

furtively 偷偷地

chuck out 扔掉

For the Chinese and Vietnamese, the equivalent is the mooncake: a dense, round pastry that—based on your correspondent』s highly informal survey—people seem much fonder of giving than eating. The cakes are stuffed with a variety of high-calorie fillings, often based on lotus seeds, nuts or sweet bean-paste. As with much of Chinese cuisine, mooncakes vary by region: in Shanghai and eastern China the filling often includes pork and tends to be savoury; Henan mooncakes are crisp and almost biscuit; Teochew mooncakes are often yam.

stuff

表示「把...裝滿」，常與with搭配，英文解釋為「If you stuff a container or space with something, you fill it with something or with a quantity of things until it is full. 」

舉個??：

He grabbed my purse, opened it and stuffed it full, then gave it back to me.

他搶走我的錢包，打開並把它裝得滿滿的，然後還給了我。

月餅

上文出現的：the chewy pastry 耐嚼的油酥糕點

此處用了：a dense, round pastry

The cakes are stuffed with a variety of high-calorie fillings 餡, often based on lotus seeds, nuts or sweet bean-paste 豆沙

In Shanghai and eastern China the filling often includes pork and tends to be savoury 鹹的; Henan mooncakes are crisp 脆的 and almost biscuit 淡褐色的; Teochew mooncakes are often yam 山藥 or 紅薯？餡.

來來來，上海、河南、潮汕以及

五湖四海的朋友們，

說說自己家鄉月餅的味道