People are always talking about 'the problem of youth'. If there is one -- which I take leave to doubt -- then it is older people who create it, not the young themselves. Let us get down to fundamentals and agree that the young are after all human beings -- people just like their elders. There is only one difference between an old man and a young one: the young man has a glorious future before him and the old one has a splendid future behind him: and maybe that is where the rub is. 人们总是在谈论“青年问题”。如果这个问题存在的话 -- 请允许我对此持怀疑态度 -- 那么,这个问题是由老年人而不是青年人造成的。让我们来认真研究一些基本事实:承认青年人和他们的长辈一样也是人。老年人和青年人只有一个区别:青年人有光辉灿烂的前景,而老年人的辉煌已成为过去。 问题的症结恐怕就在这里。 When I was a teenager, I felt that I was just young and uncertain -- that I was a new boy in a huge school, and I would have been very pleased to be regarded as something so interesting as a problem. For one thing, being a problem gives you a certain identity, and that is one of the things the young are busily engaged in seeking. 我十几岁时,总感到自己年轻,有些事拿不准 -- 我是一所大学里的一名新生,如果我当时真的被看成像一个问题那样有趣,我会感到很得意的。因为这至少使我得到了某种承认,这正是年轻人所热衷追求的。
New words and expression 生词和短语
leave n. 允许 fundamentals n. 基本原则 glorious adj. 光辉灿烂的 splendid adj. 灿烂的 rub n. 难题 identity n. 身份