1．If all the sky were parchment and all the sea were ink
按“青天做纸张”之语，西方各国诗人皆有之，常以“碧海化墨水”为对。P.19
2．New forms are simply canonization of inferior genres.
百凡新体，只是向来卑不足道之体忽然列品入流。P.35
3．behind its attributes
须在未具性德以前，推其本质。P.37
4．“Not of the letter, but of the spirit; for the letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life.”
意在言外，得意忘言，不以词害意。P.43
5．To hold, as’t were, the mirror up to nature.
持镜照自然。P.60
6．selective imitation
取舍之工。P.60
7．This is an art / Which does mend nature, change it rather, but/ That art itself is Nature (The Winter’s Tale, IV, iv. Polixenes)
莎士比亚尝曰：“人艺足补天工，然而人艺即天工也。”p.61
8．In shape the perfection of the berry, in light the radiance of the dewdrop. (Lord Tennyson; A Memoir, by his son, Vol. I, P.211)
体完如樱桃，光灿若露珠。P.114
9．“A poem round and perfect as a star. ”（Alexander Smith: A Life Drama） “诗好比星圆。”P.114
10．“It used to be said of a famous cricketeer that he bowled or batted with his head. ”（S. Alexander: Beauty and Other Forms of Value, p.25）
画以心而不以手。P.211
11．A direct sensuous apprehension of thought.
能以官感领会义理。P.232
12．Be thou thine own home, and in thy selfe dwell;/Inn any where,
continuance maketh hell./ And seeing the snaile, which every where doth rome, /Carrying his owne house still, still is at home.(Complete Poetry and Selected Prose, ed. J. Hayward, pp.153-4)
万物皆备于身，方之蜗牛戴壳，随遇自足，著处为家。—— 约翰唐（John Donne）名篇: （To Sir Henry Wotton）P.232
13．“Poetry should strike the Reader as a working of his own highest thoughts and appear almost a Remembrance. ”（Letter to Taytor, 27 Feb. 1818, H. E. Rollins, ed., Letters I, 238）
“好诗当道人心中事，一若忆旧而得者。” ——济慈 (Keats) 论诗第一要义（axiom）P.255
14．ear pleasure
悦耳 P.269
15．mind pleasure
餍心 P.269
16．unreasonable or magical element
不落理路、神幻无方。P.269
17．natural magic
魔力 P.269
18．inspiration
落笔神来之际 P.269
19．catharsis
情欲宣泄 P.270
20．purification
斋心洁己 P.270
21．All Arts aspire to the condition of music.
佩特谓诸艺造妙皆向往于音乐之空灵澹荡。 P.271
22． Most imitative of arts（S. H. Butcher: Aristotle’s Theory of Poetry and Fine Art, P.122）
“乐在诸艺中最近自然。”P.271
23．committed fornication
意淫 P.273
24．mental fictions
乱真 P.273
25．“All emotion, Of thorough enough, would take one to heaven.” “一切情感，充极至尽，皆可引人入天。” P.288
26．“This creative reason thinks eternally. Of this unceasing work of thought,
however, we retain no memory, because this reason is unaffected by its
objects. ”（Aristotle’s Psychology, with Introduction and Notes, by E. Wallace, ” P.161, P.272）
“无时间性，变易不居，勿滞于物，不可记忆。” P.289
27．“None can care for literature in itself who do not take a special pleasure in the sound of names. ”
“凡不知人名地名声音之谐美者，不足以言文。”——史梯芬生《游美杂记》（Stevenson: Across the Plains Tuesday） P.295
28．“Silence and speech acting together”
“语言与静默协力”——卡莱尔论象征 P.309
29．“Leave something to the willing intelligence of the reader. ”
须留与读者思量。——佩特论文 P.309
30．thinking intently of his own name
英诗人丁尼生常言自思其名字，系念不散。P.312
31．“and the earth looked black behind them, /as though turned up by plows. But it was gold,/All gold—a wonder of the artist’s craft. ”—Iliad, XVIII 630-32 “犁田发土，泥色俨如黑。然此盾固纯金铸也，盖艺妙入神矣。”P.318
32．“O! One glimpse of the human face, and shake of the human hand, is
better than whole reams of this cold, thin correspondence, etc. ”—Works, ed. E. V. Lucas, VI, 175
“得与其人一瞥面、一握手，胜于此等枯寒笔墨百函千牍也。噫！” P.320
33．habitualization, automatization
落套刻板 P.320
34．defamiliarization
使熟者生 P.320
35．rebarbarization
使文者野 P.320
36．“Grace of style comes from arrangement. ”
“词意位置得当，文章遂饶姿致。”P.325
37．repose, perfect fitness
一字之稳当 P.328
38．“I have such a sensitive ear that the repetition of a word irritates me three
pages away. ”—A. Rhodes, The Poet as Superman, 46
“至谓一字在三页后重出，便刺渠耳。”—— 邓南遮P.329
39．“We have had the brow and the eye of the moon before; but what have we reserved for human beings, if their features and organs are to be lavished on objects without feeling and intelligence? ”—Letters: Later Years, ed. E. de Selincourt, I, 436
“语已有月眉、月眼矣。复欲以五官百体尽予此等无知无情之物，吾人独不为己身地耶。”—— 华兹华斯 P.344
40．“The first is physical. The second is intellectual and is much higher. The third signifies a nobler power of the soul which is so high and so noble that it apprehends God in His own naked being. ”—Sermon XIX, in James M. Clark, Meister Eckhart, 220, cf. 62
“学为有上中下三等：下学以身；中学以心知；上学以神，绝伦造极，对越上帝。” ——十四世纪德国神秘宗师爱克哈特（Meister Eckhart）P.366
41．Meister Eckhart, Sermon, XII:“I take a basin full of water, place in it a mirror and put it below the sun’s disc. The reflection of the sun is the sun within the sun, and yet the mirror remains what it is.”
“以一镜照形，以余镜照影，镜镜相照，影影相传；是形也、与影无殊，是影也、与形无异。”P.371
42．“If Galileo had said in verse that the world moved, the Inquisition might have left him alone. —quoted in R. Gittings, The Older Hardy, Penguin, 1980, 120
“苟伽俐略只作诗述其地球转动说，则宗教法庭或且任纵之而不问。”——哈代 P.388
43．To count chicken before they are hatched.
“卵未抱而早计雏数。”P.392
44． Edward Young, Conjectures on Original Composition: “A genius differs from a good understanding, as a magician from an architect; that raises his structure by means invisible, this by the skilful use of common tools.”—E. D. Jones, ed., English Critical Essays;16th, 17th and 18th Centuries, “The World’s Classics”, 279
“天才与聪慧之别，犹神通之幻师迥异乎构建之巧匠；一则不见施为，而楼台忽现，一则善用板筑常器，经之营之。”——爱德华·杨 P.411
45．E. H. Gombrich, Art and Illusion, 5th ed., 1977, 174-5,“screen”, “the power of expressing through absence of brush and ink.”
无笔墨处与点染处互相发挥烘托。P.415
46． “The most beautiful figure is the sphere among solids and the circle among plane figures.”—Diogenes Laertes, VIII. 35, “Loeb”, II, 351
立体中最美者为球，平面中最美者为圈。——毕达哥拉斯 P.430
47． “Let it (the mind) once become a sphere, and spherical it
abides.”—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations VIII§41, tr. J. Jackson, 152
心不为外物所著，当如圆球。——古罗马哲人马可·奥勒留 P.430
48．“On a Drop of Dew”
So the Soul, that Drop, that Ray,
Of the clear Fountain of Eternal Day,
…
Does, in its pure and circling thoughts express
The greater Heaven in an Heaven less
—Helen Gardner, ed., The Metaphysical Poets, Penguin, 1972, 241
露珠圆澄，能映白日，正如灵魂之圆转环行，显示天运也。——英国诗人马委尔（Andrew Marvell）《露珠》诗 P.431
49．“Till rolling time is lost in round eternity.”—Dryden, The Hind and Panther, Pt III, 1.19
圆永恒 P.431
50．Why, at the height of desire and human pleasure—worldly, social, amorous, ambitious, or even avaricious—does there mingle a certain sense of doubt and sorrow?—L. A. Marchand, Byron, 1957, II, 900
入世务俗，交游酬应，男女爱悦，图营势位，乃至贪婪财货，人生百为，于兴最高、人最欢时，辄微觉乐趣中杂以疑虑与忧伤，其故何耶。P.438
51． I have thought some of nature’s journeymen had made men, and not made them well, they imitated humanity so abominably.— Hamlet, III. Ii
“其人似为大自然之学徒所造，手艺甚拙，像人之形而狞恶可憎。”——哈姆雷特 P.464
52．One may remember the lion of medieval bestiaries who, at every step forward, wiped out his footprints with his tail, in order to elude his pursuers.—L. Spitzer:“Linguistics and Literary History”, in D. C. Freeman, ed., Linguistics and Literary Style, 1970, 31
有如中世纪相传，狮子每行一步，辄掉尾扫去沙土中足印，俾追者无可踪迹。P.466
53． Why does a painting seem better in a mirror than outside it? —Leonardo da Vinci, Notebooks, tr. E. Maecurdy, II, 272
“镜中所映画图，似较镜外所见为佳，何以故？”P.483
54．Of making many books there is no end; and much study is a weariness of
flesh. —Ecclesiastes, xii. 12
“书籍无穷，多读徒疲精弊体。”——旧约全书P. 502
55． Wit, you know is the unexpected copulation of ideas, the discovery of some occult relation between images in appearance remote from each other.—Rambler, No. 194, Everyman’s Lib., 284;cf. R. Wellek, A History of Modern Criticism, I, 3
“使观念之配偶出人意表，于貌若漠不相关之物象察见其灵犀暗通。”——约翰生 P.522
56． Foregrounding, the intentional violation of the norm of the standard, distortion
刻意破常示异。 P.532
57． Normally every datum of sense is at once devoured by a hungry intellect and digested for the sake of its vital juices. Knowledge is not eating. —G. Santayana, The Life of Reason, I, 75, 77
当世论师以唯心论与为实论均常拟致知于饮食，遂嘲为“口腹哲学。” P.535
58．Everything is the same, but you are not here, and I still am. In separation the one who goes away suffers less than the one who stays behind. —Leslie A. Marchand, Byron, II 783
“此间百凡如故，我仍留而君已去耳。行行生别离，去者不如留者神伤之甚也。”P.541
59．Poetry, like schoolboys, by too frequent and severe corrections, may be cowed into Dullness.—The Notebooks of S. T. Coleridge, ed. K. Coburn, I 35 诗苟多改痛改，犹学童常遭塾师扑责，积威之下，易成钝儿。——柯尔律治 P.557
60．that particular kind of borrowing which thinks to disguise itself by inserting or extracting “notes”—G. Saintsbury, History of Criticism, III, 591
“取古人成说，是其所非，非其所是，颠倒衣裳，改换头面，乃假借之一法耳。”P.562
61．They are to me original: I have never seen the notions in any other place; yet be that reads them here persuades himself that he has always felt them. —Lives of the Poets, ed., B. Hill, III, 442
“创辟崭新，未见有人道过，然读之只觉心中向来宿有此意。”——葛雷（Thomas Gray）凭吊墟墓诗 P.573
62．Now I never wrote a “good” line, in my life, but the moment after it was written it seemed a hundred years old. Very commonly I had a sudden
conviction that I had seen it somewhere.—O. W. Holmes, The Autocrat of the Breakfast, Table, ii
“吾生平每得一佳句，乍书于纸，忽觉其为百年陈语，确信曾在不忆何处见
过。”——霍姆士 P.574
63．History is philosophy teaching by or learned from examples.
“历史乃哲学用以教人之实例。”P.586
64．Use of the description instead of the name of a thing—Rhetoric, VI. i, Loeb, 375
不道事物之名而写事物之状 P.567
65．in peace—which is as much above joy as joy is above pleasure, and which can scarcely be called emotion, since it rests, as it were, in final good, the premium mobile, which is without motion—we find ourselves in the region of “great art”—C. Patmore,Principle in Art 1889, 29
艺之至者，终和且平，使人情欲止息，造宁静之境；此境高于悦愉，犹悦愉高于痛快也。P.589
66．I never can catch myself.
自我不可把捉。——休谟 P.597
67．The passage is remarkably like a central tenet of Buddhism, a cult of which Hume could hardly have heard.—O. Elton, A Survey of English Literature: 1730—1780, 1928, II, 163
酷似佛教主旨，然休谟未必闻有释氏也。P.597
68． Shakespeare in composing had no I, but the I representative.
—Biographia Literaria, ed. J. Shawcross, I, 213 note
无我而有综盖之我。——柯尔律治 P.597
69．When I am assailed with heavy tribulations, I rush out among my pigs, rather than remain alone by myself. The human heart is like a millstone in a mill: when you put wheat under it, it turns and grinds and bruises the wheat to flour; if you put no wheat, it still grinds on, but then’ tis itself it grinds and wears away. So the human heart, unless it be occupied with some employment, leaves space for the devil, who wriggles himself in, and brings with him a whole host of evil thoughts, temptations and
tribulations, which grind our the heart. — Martin Luther, Table Talk, tr. W. Hazlitt, “Bohn’s Library”, 275
“吾遭逢大不如意事，急往饲牧吾猪，不欲闲居独处。人心犹磨坊石硙，苟中实以麦，则碾而成面；中虚无物，石仍辘转无已，徒自研损耳。人心倘无专务，魔鬼乘虚潜入，挟恶念邪思及诸烦恼以俱来，此心遂为所耗蚀矣。”——马丁·路德 P.599
70． Peer Gynt, IV. Xiii, Begriffenfeldt:“Long live the Emperor of self; V. v, Peer:“There’s a surprising lot of layers (in the wild onion).
Are we never coming to the kernel?
There isn’t one!
To the innermost bit
It’s nothing but layers, smaller and smaller…”
—Everyman’s Library 171, 201-2
易卜生一名剧中主角号：“自我之皇帝”而欲觅处世应物之“自我”，则犹剥玉葱求其核心然，层层揭净，至境无可得。P.600
71．For one can only“interpret”a poem by reducing it to an allegory—Which is like eating an apple for its pips.—G. Orwell, Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters, 1968, I, 72
“此举何异食苹婆者，不嗜其果脯而咀嚼其果中核乎。”P.610
72．The movement of love is circular, at one and the same impulse projecting creatures into independency and drawing them into harmony.—Collected Papers, ed. C. Hartshorne and P. Weiss, VI, 191
情爱运行，做团圆相，此机一动，独立与偶合遂同时并作，相反相成。——美国哲学家皮尔斯 P.615
钱钟书先生的这篇散文说的是窗子，但是其用意绝不仅仅是说说窗子而已，而是要以窗子来比喻生活、比喻人生。从语言上看，《窗》延续了一贯的钱派手法，用词平实、普通，没有长句，没有什么复杂结构，非常从容地叙述、说理，却又紧紧地扣住了主题。这样的特点对翻译构成的难度不言而喻，翻译中应当时时充分考虑上述特点，尽量在译文中体现出来。 一逐句分析：
窗
Random Thoughts on the Window
（题目中的这个窗字，包含的意思较为丰富，使人有多种联想，因此译成Random Thoughts
on the Window.）
又是春天
It is spring again
中文是无主句，英文没有这样的句子结构，因此用It is……句型。原文里“又”用在句首，但是英文如果也把again放在句首，这个词就太突出，分量太重了。所以again一词在译文中放在句末和原文“又”放在句首分量相当。
窗子可以常开了
and the window can be left open as often as one would like
用定冠词the 加单数名词window来代表所有的窗子。英语里表示“全部”可以有几种方法：1）复数名词，2）不定冠词a/an+名词，3）定冠词+名词。这里就是用的第三种，更侧重其一致性。“常开”不能译成can open often或can be opened often.因为原文是从人的角度说的，人们什么时候想开窗都行，所以用了one would like这样的说法。
春天从窗外进来
As spring comes in through the windows
这句把春天拟人化了，英文也用同样的结构就行。窗外：out of the window.但是，如果把“从窗外进来”理解成一个过程，用through表示就比较好。
人在屋子里坐不住，就从门里出去
so people——unable to bear staying inside any longer——go outdoors
破折号之间的形容词短语说明人们在屋里坐不住的原因。bear：忍受，后面既可跟-ing动词，也可跟不定式动词。
不过屋子外的春天太贱了
The spring outside, however, is much too cheap
这里的“贱”，是说春天多阳光，以多为贱，中外同理，用cheap也就顺理成章了。 到处是阳光
for the sun shines on everything
这里和上一句是连接在一起的，所以用了连接词for来说明原因。最好不要译成the sunshine is everywhere.因为阳光并不是一种存在，而是说照耀在所有的一切上面，因此说shines.
不像射破屋里阴深的那样明亮
and so does not seem as bright as that which shoots into the darkness of the house
用seem是指屋里屋外阳光是一样的，只是环境的反差使阳光显得不同罢了。as……as是表示屋里屋外阳光的比较。that指the sun.
到处是给太阳晒得懒洋洋的风
Outside the sun-slothed breeze blows everywhere
这里加了一个词outside，因为后面马上要说到的“屋里”并不包括在“到处”一词里：“晒”字英文里与之相当的词就是shine，但是shine并没有带复合宾语的用法，所以换了一个角度来说这句话。sun-slothed是一个复合词。
不像搅动屋里沉闷的那样有生气
but it is not so lively as that which stirs the gloominess inside the house
沉闷这个词在这里不是形容词，而是名词，所以用gloomy加上词尾-ness构成了表示状态的名词。
就是鸟语，也似乎琐碎而单薄，需要屋里的寂静来做衬托
Even the chirping of the birds sounds so thin and broken that the quietness of the house is needed to set it off
说thin and broken而不说broken and thin只是因为语音的关系，音节少的词放在前面，多的放在后面，结构上显得平稳，不至于头重脚轻。只要把这几个词连在一起朗读一下就可体会出来。
我们因此明白，春天是该镶嵌在窗子里看的，好比画配了框子
It seems that spring was always meant to be put behind a windowpane for show, just like a
picture in a frame
“我们因此明白”译成It seems……，因为这是一种比喻的说法，直译成英文会给人以突兀的感觉，所以用“似乎如此”的说法。be meant to be的意思是“原本为……”，加了always等于从语气上与原文更相符合，并没有特别具体的含义。中文说“窗子里”，而英文却不能说in a windowpane，windowpane指的是窗子上的玻璃，这就是用behind的原因。
同时，我们悟到，门和窗有不同的意义
At the same time it also becomes clear that the door has a different significance from the window
悟到和上一句中的“明白”是相同的意思，it become clear that 这一说法比it seems that 要肯定一些。
当然，门是造了让人出进的
Of course, doors were made for people to pass through
出进可以译成to come out and go in，但译成to pass through就显得句子紧凑、精炼一些。 但是，窗子有时也可作为进出口用
but a window can also sometimes serve as an entrance or as an exit
entrance和exit这两个词比door和window抽象化了，充分表明了“进出口”的字面意思和含义。
譬如小偷或小说里私约的情人就喜欢爬窗子
and is used as such by thieves and by lovers in novels
译文用了by thieves and by lovers，而不说by thieves and lovers，因为这本来就是两类人，不能放在一起混为一谈。
所以窗子和门的根本分别，决不仅是有没有人进来出去
In fact the fundamental difference between a door and a window has nothing to do with them being either entrances or exits
比较一下different between和前文的different （from）：说两者之间的区别，用different between A and B；而说A怎样不同于B则说A is different from B.
若据赏春一事来看，我们不妨这样说
When it comes to the admiration of spring, it could be put this way
When it comes to是比较中庸的说法，不那么正式，但也不那么随意，意思是“说起赏春……”，让人们对下文有一个期待。
有了门，我们可以出去
a door makes it possible for one to go out
“有了门”不能译成with a/the door，因为这里不是说有还是没有，而是有门存在，人们就可以进出房屋。
有了窗，我们可以不必出去
whereas a window makes it possible for one not to have to
Whereas而……。这是一个连接词，表示一种前后的比较或对照。这里的句型和上面是一样的，但是后面的not to have to 是不定式的否定形式，后面省略了go out.
窗子打通了大自然和人的隔膜
A window helps to pull down the partition between man and nature
“由于有了窗子，人和大自然之间的隔膜才得以打破”，窗子起的是一种促进作用，其本身并不能去“打破”什么，因此用了helps to pull down.partition隔离墙。“隔膜”是解剖学词汇，这里用的是其引申意义，不能按字面译成diaphragm，那样意思就不对了。man and nature：man是指整个人类，所以不用任何冠词；nature则是不可数名词。
把风和太阳逗引进来，使屋子里也关着一部分春天
It leads breezes and sunlight in, and keeps part of the spring in the house
Lead：引导，引领。keep……inthe house：使停留在屋里不能外出。
让我们安坐了享受，无需再到外面去找
It allows one to sit and enjoy the spring in peace, and makes it unnecessary to go looking for it outside
原文是说“安坐”，而实际上“安”的意思也应当能涵盖“享受”，只是从词的节奏上感觉“安坐”和“享受”都是两个字的词，似乎是并列的。译文里译成了sit……in peace，等于将状语移了一个位。注意这句中几个it的含义，第一个it指代window，第二个it是形式宾语，引出后面的to go……，第三个it是指代the spring.
二全篇通览：
窗
Random Thoughts on the Window
又是春天，窗子可以常开了。春天从窗外进来，人在屋子里坐不住，就从门里出去。不过屋子外的春天太贱了！到处是阳光，不像射破屋里阴深的那样明亮；到处是给太阳晒得懒洋洋的风，不像搅动屋里沉闷的那样有生气。就是鸟语，也似乎琐碎而单薄，需要屋里的寂静来做衬托。我们因此明白，春天是该镶嵌在窗子里看的，好比画配了框子。
It is spring again and the window can be left open as often as one would like. As spring comes in through the windows, so people——unable to bear staying inside any longer——go outdoors. The spring outside, however, is much too cheap, for the sun shines on everything, and so does not seem as bright as that which shoots into the darkness of the house. Outside the
sun-slothed breeze blows everywhere, but it is not so lively as that which stirs the gloominess inside the house. Even the chirping of the birds sounds so thin and broken that the quietness of the house is needed to set it off. It seems that spring was always meant to be put behind a windowpane for show, just like a picture in a frame.
同时，我们悟到，门和窗有不同的意义。当然，门是造了让人出进的。但是，窗子有时也可作为进出口用，譬如小偷或小说里私约的情人就喜欢爬窗子。所以窗子和门的根本分别，决不仅是有没有人进来出去。若据赏春一事来看，我们不妨这样说：有了门，我们可以出去；有了窗，我们可以不必出去。窗子打通了大自然和人的隔膜，把风和太阳逗引进来，使屋子里也关着一部分春天，让我们安坐了享受，无需再到外面去找。
At the same time it also becomes clear that the door has a different significance from the window. Of course, doors were made for people to pass through; but a window can also sometimes serve as an entrance or as an exit, and is used as such by thieves and by lovers in novels. In fact the fundamental difference between a door and a window has nothing to do with them being either entrances or exits. When it comes to the admiration of spring, it could be put this way: a door makes it possible for one to go out, whereas a window makes it possible for one not to have to. A window helps to pull down the partition between man and nature. It leads
breezes and sunlight in, and keeps part of the spring in the house. It allows one to sit and enjoy the spring in peace, and makes it unnecessary to go looking for it outside.