華爾街時報頭版文章:致畢業生們

Dear Class of 2012

致2012年畢業的你

Allow me to be the first one not to congratulate you. Through exertions that—let's be honest—were probably less than heroic, most of you have spent the last few years getting inflated grades in useless subjects in order to obtain a debased degree. Now you're entering a lousy economy, courtesy of the very president whom you, as freshmen, voted for with such enthusiasm. Please spare us the self-pity about how tough it is to look for a job while living with your parents. They're the ones who spent a fortune on your education only to get you back— return-to-sender, forwarding address unknown.

請允許我成爲第一個不對你說“恭喜”的人。在過去幾年中，你們中的大多數努力地在各種並不實用的課程中爲了一個看得過去的成績而徘徊奮鬥。老實說，這並不是什麼值得誇耀的事情。現在在這糟糕的，拜你們大一時投票選出的總統所賜的經濟環境下，你們要離開學校了。重回父母家住下，還要同時開始尋找並不好找的工作，這不是一件容易的事兒。畢竟你的父母是曾經在你身上給予厚望，而他們現在更像是拿着沒能寄出去的郵包的發件人，且無從得知這個郵包接下來該往哪兒發去。

No doubt some of you have overcome real hardships or taken real degrees.A couple of years ago I hired a summer intern from West Point. She came to the office directly from weeks of field exercises in which she kept a bulletproof vest on at all times, even while sleeping. She writes brilliantly and is as self-effacing as she is accomplished. Now she's in Afghanistan fighting the Taliban.

你們中的某些當然還是經歷了嚴峻的考驗獲得了真才實學的。幾年前我曾經招了一個來自西點軍校的實習生。她開始工作前剛完成了一個長達數週的訓練項目，在這個項目裏她甚至連睡覺的時候都得穿着防彈背心。她的文筆十分的好，而且格外謙虛。現在的她正在阿富汗對抗恐怖分子。

If you're like that intern, please feel free to feel sorry for yourself. Just remember she doesn't.

　　

如果你也像那個實習生一樣，你有權利對你的生活覺得不滿。但請記住，她從來沒有那麼想過。

Unfortunately, dear graduates, chances are you're nothing like her. And since you're no longer children, at least officially, it's time someone tells you the facts of life. The other facts.

但是親愛的畢業生們，也許你們遠沒有達到她的成就。你們已然不是小孩兒了，至少現在有人該告訴你一些關於人生的實情了。一些其他的實情。

Fact One is that, in our "knowledge-based" economy, knowledge counts. Yet here you are, probably the least knowledgeable graduating class in history.

首先要說的是，在這個知識決定命運的經濟環境中，知識依然是很受重視的。但可惜你們也許是這麼多年來最缺乏知識的一屆畢業生。

A few months ago, I interviewed a young man with an astonishingly high GPA from an Ivy League university and aspirations to write about Middle East politics. We got on the subject of the Suez Crisis of 1956. He was vaguely familiar with it. But he didn't know who was president of the United States in 1956. And he didn't know who succeeded that president.

幾個月前，我面試了一個從常春藤盟校畢業，有一個高得令人髮指的GPA的男生。他想寫作關於中東政治方面的文章，於是我們開始談論1956年的蘇伊士運河危機（注：第二次中東戰爭）。他只是大概知道這樁歷史事件，但完全不瞭解誰是當時的美國總統（注：美國與蘇聯的介入是戰爭最終結束的主因），以及他的繼任者是誰。

Pop quiz, Class of'12: Do you?

突擊檢查一下，12屆畢業生們，你們知道嗎？

Many of you have been reared on the cliché that the purpose of education isn't to stuff your head with facts but to teach you how to think. Wrong. I routinely interview college students, mostly from top schools, and I notice that their brains are like old maps, with lots of blank spaces for the uncharted terrain. It's not that they lack for motivation or IQ. It's that they can't connect the dots when they don't know where the dots are in the first place.

人們一直說教育的目的不是灌輸式地記憶，而是學習如何思考。亂扯。在我長期面試在校生的印象中，我發覺許多面試者的思維就像古舊的地圖一般，有許多區域是因爲沒有認知而空白着的。很多情況下我覺得他們並不是缺乏動機或是智力不足，而是當他們根本不知道知識從何而來的時候，無法建立知識點間的聯繫。

Now to Fact Two: Your competition is global. Shape up. Don't end your days like a man I met a few weeks ago in Florida, complaining that Richard Nixon had caused his New York City business to fail by opening up China.

現在讓我們來談談第二樁事實：你們所面對的競爭是國際化的。努力吧，別像我前兩天在佛羅里達所遇到的那個商人一樣，在你的餘生中抱怨是尼克松總統對中國開放的政策悔了他曾經在紐約的業務。

In places like Ireland, France, India and Spain, your most talented and ambitious peers are graduating into economies even more depressed than America's. Unlike you, they probably speak several languages. They may also have a degree in a hard science or engineering—skills that transfer easily to the more remunerative jobs in investment banks or global consultancies.

在像愛爾蘭、法國、印度和西班牙這樣的地方，你們不乏天賦與目標的同齡人正在一個更糟糕的經濟環境中畢業。與你們不同的是，他們也許會說許多種語言，並擁有一個科學或工程方面的學位。他們的能力或許更容易幫助他們找到一份薪酬豐厚的類似於投行或諮詢業的工作。

I know a lot of people like this from my neighborhood in New York City, and it's a good thing they're so well-mannered because otherwise they'd be eating our lunch. But if things continue as they are, they might soon be eating yours.

在我在紐約工作的地方附近，有許多這樣的人。萬幸他們仍然保持着應有的禮節，所以我們並沒有感受到來自他們的壓力。然而如果經濟環境繼續這麼發展下去，也許他們馬上就會開始搶你們的飯碗了。

Which reminds me of Fact Three: Your prospective employers can smell BS from miles away. And most of you don't even know how badly you stink.

這讓我聯想起了我想說的第三樁事情：你未來的老闆對於誇誇其談的想法早有察覺。但你們中的許多甚至不知道你們的想法有多糟。

When did puffery become the American way? Probably around the time Norman Mailer came out with "Advertisements for Myself." But at least that was in the service of provoking an establishment that liked to cultivate an ideal of emotional restraint and public reserve.

從什麼時候起連美國人也開始靠吹牛而活了？也許是始於諾曼?梅勒的《給自己的廣告》。但至少那本書是爲了動員人們培養個人節操以及參與社會公益活動。

To read through your CVs, dear graduates, is to be assaulted by endless Advertisements for Myself. Here you are, 21 or 22 years old, claiming to have accomplished feats in past summer internships or at your school newspaper that would be hard to credit in a biography of Walter Lippmann or Ernie Pyle.

畢業生們，當我閱讀你們的簡歷時，我所看見的只是無窮無盡的“給自己的廣告”。你們在21、22歲時所完成的一切，不管來自你上個夏天的實習或是在學校校報的工作，甚至已經超出沃爾特?李普曼和厄尼?派爾（注：均爲非常有名的作家，普利策獎得主）在他們自傳中對他們自己的描述了。

If you're not too bright, you may think this kind of nonsense goes undetected; if you're a little brighter, you probably figure everyone does it so you must as well.

也許你愚蠢地認爲這種吹噓並不會爲人們所發覺，或者你自作聰明地認爲既然大家都在這麼做你也必須從衆一下。

But the best of you don't do this kind of thing at all. You have an innate sense of modesty. You're confident that your résumé needs no embellishment. You understand that less is more.

但是你最好的那一面絕不會做這樣的事情。最初你內心是很謙遜的。你無需在簡歷中標榜自己，並對此有足夠的信心。你懂什麼是“少即是多”。

In other words, you're probably capable of thinking for yourself. And here's Fact Four: There will always be a market for people who can do that.

從另一個角度說，你也許有自我思考的能力。這是我想說的第四件事情：對於能自我思考的人而言，市場的需求永遠存在。

In every generation there's a strong tendency for everyone to think like everyone else. But your generation has an especially bad case, because your mass conformism is masked by the appearance of mass nonconformism. It's a point I learned from my West Point intern, when I asked her what it was like to lead such a uniformed existence.

對於每一代人而言，人云亦云的問題是很普遍的。但對於你們這代人來說，這個問題尤其嚴重，因爲你們的大量的從衆行爲大多帶上了不走尋常路的僞裝。這是我與我西點軍校的實習生聊到她帶領規定練習的經驗時所學到的。

Her answer stayed with me. Wearing a uniform, she said, helped her figure out what it was that really distinguished her as an individual.

她的回答讓我印象深刻。她說，穿着統一的制服，反而讓她理解到自己與其他人的不同之處。”

Now she's a second lieutenant, leading a life of meaning and honor, figuring out how to Think Different for the sake of a cause that counts. Not many of you will be able to follow in her precise footsteps, nor do you need to do so. But if you can just manage to tone down your egos, shape up your minds, and think unfashionable thoughts, you just might be able to do something worthy with your lives. And even get a job. Good luck!

現在她已經是一個有着對生活的理想和榮耀的少尉了，而且她有對自己生活意義的獨到見解。你們中也許沒多少人能完全像她一樣，當然也沒有必要像她一樣。但是如果你能夠放下自我中心的想法，多獨立思考，也許在你的生命中你能夠做出些不枉此生的事情。甚至找到一份工作。加油吧！