雙語暢銷書《艾倫圖靈傳》第2章:下一個星期(29)

His utter loneliness was pierced at last.

艾倫內心的孤獨，終於被打破了。

It was difficult to make friends with an older boy from another house. Nor was Alan good at conversation. But he found an entrée in mathematics. 'During the term Chris and I began setting one another our pet problems and discussing our pet methods.' It would be impossible to separate the different aspects of thought and feeling. This was first love, which Alan would himself come to regard as the first of many for others of his own sex. It had that sense of surrender ('worshipped the ground he trod on'), and a heightened awareness, as of brilliant colour bursting upon a black and white world. ('He made everyone else seem so ordinary.') At the same time, it was most important that Christopher Morcom was someone who took scientific ideas seriously. And gradually, though always with considerable reserve, he took Alan seriously. ('My most vivid recollections of Chris are almost entirely of the kind things he said to me sometimes.') So these elements were all present, and had the effect of giving Alan reason to communicate.

要和比自己大的男孩交朋友，不是件容易的事，艾倫並不擅長交談，但他在數學上找到了突破口。“這學期，克里斯和我列出了我們喜歡的問題，還一起討論我們喜歡的方法。”他是艾倫的初戀，艾倫自己認爲，這是他諸多同性愛人中的第一個。他有被征服感（“崇拜他踩過的泥土”），還有仰視感，他就像一抹鮮豔的色彩，在黑白世界裏噴薄（“他讓別人看起來如此單調”）。最重要的是，克里斯朵夫是一個很嚴肅地對待科學的人。漸漸地，他對艾倫也認真起來了，雖然還是有點拘謹。（“克里斯給我留下的最清楚的回憶，就是他對我說的那些親熱的話。”）所有這些因素湊到一起，讓艾倫有了溝通的理由。

Before and after Eperson's classes Alan might talk to Christopher about relativity, or might show him other pieces of work. He had, for example, calculated π to thirty-six decimal places at about this time, perhaps making use of his own series for the inverse tangent function, and being much annoyed to find an error in the last decimal place. After a time, Alan found another opportunity to see Christopher. By accident he discovered that during a certain period on Wednesday afternoons set for private study, Chris went to the library and not to his house. (Ross did not allow boys to work unsupervised, fearing the sexual potential in unregulated associations.) 'I so enjoyed Chris' company there, ' wrote Alan, 'that ever since I always used to go to the library instead of my study.'

在愛普森的課間，艾倫有時會和克里斯朵夫討論相對論，有時會給他看自己的其它成果。比如，他用自己的反正切級數，計算圓周率到小數第36位，然後生氣地發現，最後一位算錯了。過了一陣，艾倫又找到另外一個與克里斯同處的機會，他偶然發現，在每週三下午有段時間，克里斯會去圖書館，而不是回宿舍。（本來羅斯不允許男孩們在無人監督的情況下學習，他擔心無約束的交往可能會導致性行爲）艾倫寫道：“那裏有克里斯的陪伴，我十分享受，從此我總是去圖書館，而不是回到自己的書房。”