英国首相特蕾莎·梅有一个梦：一个伤感、破旧的“英国梦” [英国媒体]

Theresa May has a dream. A mawkish, shabby ‘British dream’

英国首相特蕾莎·梅有一个梦：一个伤感、破旧的“英国梦”

Nesrine Malik, a Guardian columnist

Nesrine Malik （卫报专栏作家）

The PM’s jinxed idea is neither British nor dreamy. It is a great national crossing of fingers

英国首相特蕾莎·梅那倒霉的主张既不跟英国有关，也不跟梦想有关。它是一场全国性的伟大祈祷。



Theresa May is still trying to make “the British dream” happen. She tried to launch it in her excruciating, blighted speech last October at Tory conference, where she coughed her way through an address, was handed a P45 by a prankster and a letter fell off the Conservative party slogan behind her.

特蕾莎·梅仍在努力使“英国梦”成真。在去年十月的保守党会议上，她试图用一路咳嗽声、极度折磨人的演讲启动她的“英国梦”，但是有人恶作剧地递上了P45辞职退税申请表，还有一封掉在她身后保守党标语下的辞职信。

注释：P45表格是你在英国结束工作后你的雇主给你的退税申请表，代码是P45，表示该人员的最后一份工资发放状态。随后失业人员可持P45申请有关社会福利。

That should have been a sign or three that in this country we don’t do American-style nonsense. If you try it, nature will abhor it so much that it will give you a nice irritating British autumn cough, a nice British “I’m mad, me!” comedian with a poor and yet adequately disruptive joke, and nice British gone-off Blu-Tack.

这场闹剧本来应该有一些预兆的，因为在这个国家我们不搞什么美式的蠢事。如果你做了，就会受到自然规律的淘汰，它会给你带来一场“令人愉快”的英国秋季咳嗽，还有一个“友好”的英国喜剧演员做的一场糟糕但却极具破坏力的恶作剧。

It was a comforting corrective to the brand launch of British Dream. Even among all the new puffed-up nativism of Brexit, the phrase still jars. It’s just so embarrassing. So try-hard. So un-British both in overstatement and mawkishness. Its forced grandiosity reveals its threadbare shabbiness.

这是对“英国梦”的恶名令人欣慰的纠正。即使所有新支持英国脱欧的本土主义都趾高气扬，但是这仍然是个不和谐的乐章。这真是太尴尬了。所以英国脱欧过程中的努力、夸张和伤感都是不得已的宏伟表象，揭示其破旧本质罢了。

She had since seemingly quietly retired the jinxed phrase. But it has resurfaced. She rolled out the expression on Tuesday in a press conference with the Chinese premier, Li Keqiang, stressing that her key vision is that families “can achieve the British dream of ensuring that each generation has a better future than the last”.

之前她看起来似乎对这个不和谐的乐章充耳不闻。但现在她重新注意到了。星期二，她在与中国总理李克强举行的记者招待会上表达了她的观点，她强调她的目标是让每个家庭都可以“实现每一代人都比上一代有更好的未来这个英国梦”。

OK Theresa, I’ll bite. Having just achieved naturalisation I have a personal interest in integrating and becoming a citizen of somewhere. Why is that, British and why is it a dream? Surely everyone wants the next generation to have a better future, not just British people. And surely that should not be a “dream”, just a reasonable expectation.

好吧，特蕾莎，那我顺着你的意思来问吧。对于刚刚取得入籍的我来说，我个人有兴趣融入一个集体并成为某个国家的公民。但是为什么这个梦是英国的呢？为什么这算是一个梦呢？当然，每个人都希望下一代拥有一个更美好的未来，不仅仅是英国人会这么想。而且，这不应当是一个“梦想”，这只是一个合理的期望而已。

Or has Brexit left us reaching for even the basics, aspiring to just get through the day making life marginally better? Has May unwittingly revealed our new diminished horizons as a country? To dream big and hope for a less screwed future than the one we have now ... I feel slightly cheated having battled the Home Office for years (thanks again to Mrs May for that) to secure a British passport, only to realise that the timing is really bad. That what I have signed up to is a country whose prime minister is fantasising about hoping for the best. It’s less a dream and more a great British crossing of the fingers.

或者说英国退欧有满足我们的基本要求，让我们赖以度日并渴望生活稍微变好一些吗？梅是不是在不知不觉中揭露了我们这个国家的目光短浅呢？抱有远大的梦想，希望未来的前景比我们现在光明。。。。。。我有一点被骗了的感觉，我向内政部努力多年终于得到了属于我的英国护照（再次感谢梅夫人），但我只觉得这个时机是非常糟糕的，我入籍的这个国家有一个抱着最美好的幻想和希望的首相。这不是一个梦想，而是一场全国性的伟大祈祷。

注释：Home Office英国内政部，是负责移民控制、安全和秩序的英国政府部门。



But maybe it’s meant to be rousing. If so, then it is even more laughable. Does Theresa May even live here? Has she ever met the British? The notion of a soaring, expansive optimism is so alien it’s enough to make you think maybe the Tories are a little out of touch. It conjures up a nation of positive, go-getting extroverts.

但是也许英国梦注定让人心振奋。如果是这样，那就更可笑了。特蕾莎·梅有住在这里吗？她见过英国人吗？一种高涨的、膨胀的乐观主义的观念是如此的陌生，足以让你认为保守党有点不了解现实情况。英国梦让人联想到一个积极、外向又颇具野心的国家。

If “British Dream” were a theme park, there would be no rollercoasters or water rides. Just stalls. Stalls everywhere. Stalls where you can talk about the weather 24/7 with like-minded people, stalls where you can contest your latest parking fine, stalls where someone asks you: “Did you find us all right?” and you can launch into a detailed trip of your journey and how the M25 was a parking lot. Stalls to complain about the trains, and how you could have flown to the Canaries for less and got a seat. And then a final stall for a sit-down and a cup of tea and a soggy sandwich or a pint and some odd fusion-flavour crisps that are too expensive, but you forgot to have lunch.

如果“英国梦”是一个主题公园的话，那它不会有过山车和水上游乐设施。只有摊位。随处可见的摊位。在那里你可以随时和志趣相投的人寒暄谈论天气；在那里你可以对你被新贴的停车罚单提出异议；在那里有人问：“你找到我们了吗？”之后你可以开始一场规划详细的旅程，M25公路就像一个停车场；在那里你可以抱怨因为火车原因，不然你本可以乘飞机去大西洋的加那利群岛；在最后一个摊位，要是你忘了吃午饭，你可以坐下来喝杯茶，吃个松软多汁的三明治或者一大罐混合口味的薯片。

注释：
英国M25高速公路，或称伦敦外环高速公路，是一条环绕英国首都圈大伦敦（Greater London）的环状高速道路。
加那利群岛，位于非洲西北部大西洋上的火山群岛，是西班牙的十七个自治区之一，也是欧盟最外延的特别领域之一。

In my experience – and I could be very wrong, being a hitherto citizen of nowhere, and thus with no grasp of a national identity – the British dream is simply not to be lectured to about the British dream. It is to be left alone. It is to be free from being dictated to constantly about what British values and aspirations are.

就我个人经验而言，可能我大错特错了，到目前为止我不属于任何一个国家的公民，因此不能理解所谓的民族认同。英国梦不能仅仅通过演讲来完成。它是独立的，不能一直被英国的价值观和抱负所支配。

What May is trying to do is my ultimate British nightmare, an eager stranger talking to you about something obvious when you’re already on your third replacement bus service of the day. “Queueing are you? How British!” “Ah, I see you have given up your seat to an older lady. Typical British values!” “I notice you haven’t complained about your fellow passenger whose earphones are leaking. That’s the spirit of the blitz that defines us British!” Go. Away.

特蕾莎·梅试图做的事情是我最大的英国噩梦，这就像当你一天内已经转了三趟车的时候，一个热情的陌生人还与你谈论一些显而易见的事情。“你在排队是吗？多么有英国风范啊！”“啊，我知道你把座位让给了一位老太太。典型的英国价值观啊！”“我注意到你没有抱怨你旁边乘客的耳机太大声了。这就是英国精神啊！”你可以离我远点吗？

But it’s Brexit, isn’t it? It has us grasping for meaning and character to justify the adventurism that day by day is revealing itself to have no tangible benefit and only a growing list of downsides. It must all be worth it because there is something inherently, superhumanly British that means we can defy the laws of nature and still prevail. The British national identity, like any other, is merely a composite of unexceptional national traits and habits, comforting and galvanising in its detail but indefinable and fragile as a whole.

但这就是脱欧，不是吗？它让我们搜寻各种意义，来证明那一天天揭示其本身并无实际益处，只有越来越多缺点的冒险主义是合理的。它的一切必须都是值得的，因为这就是英国固有的、超人的一面，这意味着我们可以蔑视自然规律，仍处于不败之地。英国的民族认同，像任何其它国家一样，只是一个普通的民族特点和习惯的组合，这种民族认同可以在细节上安慰并激励人心，但是作为一个整体来说，是不可定义且脆弱的。

I might be way off with all of this, of course, in which case my apologies to British identity enforcer-in-chief Mrs May. Please don’t send round a Go Home van.

我可能会将自己置身事外，当然，在这种情况下，我要向英国精神的首席执行官特蕾莎·梅夫人道歉。请不要派一辆车来送我回老家。

注释：a Go Home van
2013年，英国内政部还针对非法移民开展“回家”运动，鼓励非法移民自愿离开。内政部要求广告车绕伦敦全城行驶，以示众人。车上的巨幅广告牌上写着：要么回家，要么被捕（Go home or face arrest）。
英国首相特蕾莎·梅对移民的态度素来强硬，她曾表示大量的移民涌入给英国带来的好处“近乎为零”，而她有责任将英国的净移民人数每年减少数万。