I had been extraordinarily3 shocked and concerned at the thought of Mary bearing children. It is a grotesque4 thing to confess but I had never let myself imagine the possibility of such a thing for her who had been so immensely mine....
We are the oddest creatures, little son, beasts and barbarians5 and brains, neither one nor the other but all confusedly, and here was I who had given up Mary and resigned her and freed myself from her as I thought altogether, cast back again into my old pit by the most obvious and necessary consequence of her surrender and mine. And it's just there and in that relation that we men and women are so elaborately insecure. We try to love as equals and behave as equals and concede a level freedom, and then comes a crisis,—our laboriously6 contrived7 edifice8 of liberty collapses9 and we perceive that so far as sex goes the woman remains10 to the man no more than a possession—capable of loyalty11 or treachery.
There, still at that barbaric stage, the situation stands. You see I had always wanted to own Mary, and always she had disputed that. That is our whole story, the story of an instinctive12 subjugation13 struggling against a passionate14 desire for fellowship. She had denied herself to me, taken herself away; that much I could endure; but now came this blazing fact that showed her as it seemed in the most material and conclusive15 way—overcome. I had storms of retrospective passion at the thoroughness of her surrender.... Yes, and that's in everyone of us,—in everyone. I wonder if in all decent law-abiding London there lives a single healthy adult man who has not at times longed to trample16 and kill....
For once I think the Fürstin miscalculated consequences. I think I should have engaged myself to Rachel before I went to America if it had not been for the Fürstin's revelation, but this so tore me that I could no longer go on falling in love again, naturally and sweetly. No man falls in love if he has just been flayed17.... I could no longer think of Rachel except as a foil to Mary. I was moved to marry her by a new set of motives18; to fling her so to speak in Mary's face, and from the fierce vulgarity of that at least I recoiled—and let her go as I have told you.
点击收听单词发音
1 industrious | |
adj.勤劳的,刻苦的,奋发的 | |
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2 glorified | |
美其名的,变荣耀的 | |
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3 extraordinarily | |
adv.格外地;极端地 | |
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4 grotesque | |
adj.怪诞的,丑陋的;n.怪诞的图案,怪人(物) | |
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5 barbarians | |
n.野蛮人( barbarian的名词复数 );外国人;粗野的人;无教养的人 | |
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6 laboriously | |
adv.艰苦地;费力地;辛勤地;(文体等)佶屈聱牙地 | |
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7 contrived | |
adj.不自然的,做作的;虚构的 | |
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8 edifice | |
n.宏伟的建筑物(如宫殿,教室) | |
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9 collapses | |
折叠( collapse的第三人称单数 ); 倒塌; 崩溃; (尤指工作劳累后)坐下 | |
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10 remains | |
n.剩余物,残留物;遗体,遗迹 | |
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11 loyalty | |
n.忠诚,忠心 | |
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12 instinctive | |
adj.(出于)本能的;直觉的;(出于)天性的 | |
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13 subjugation | |
n.镇压,平息,征服 | |
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14 passionate | |
adj.热情的,热烈的,激昂的,易动情的,易怒的,性情暴躁的 | |
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15 conclusive | |
adj.最后的,结论的;确凿的,消除怀疑的 | |
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16 trample | |
vt.踩,践踏;无视,伤害,侵犯 | |
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17 flayed | |
v.痛打( flay的过去式和过去分词 );把…打得皮开肉绽;剥(通常指动物)的皮;严厉批评 | |
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18 motives | |
n.动机,目的( motive的名词复数 ) | |
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