很多小夥伴都想讀英文原著學英語，可每次看兩頁就放棄。為了幫助大家從閱讀中找到樂趣，曉梅老師就帶大家一起讀英文原著，看看有意思的故事，學學地道表達，分析長難句。先從A Short History of Nearly Everything《萬物簡史》開始。這本書從宇宙大爆炸開始講現代科學史，穿插了很多科學家的生平故事，妙趣橫生。本書作者Bill Bryson喜歡用口語化的語言敘述，因而裡面的英語要比一般的原著通俗易懂。今天讀第4章關於牛頓的片段。
牛頓的怪癖
Newton was a decidedly odd figure - brilliant beyond the measure, but solitary, joyless, prickly to the point of paranoia, famously distracted (upon swinging his feet out of bed in the morning he would reportedly sometimes sit for hours, immobilized by the sudden rush of thoughts to his head), and capable of the most riveting strangeness.
牛頓絕對是個怪人——聰明過人，但孤獨、無趣、易怒、多疑，注意力很不集中（據說，早上他把腳從被子裡伸出來之後，有時突然之間思如泉湧，會一動不動坐上幾個小時），而且能做出最令人著迷的怪事。
He built his own laboratary, the first at Cambridge, but then engaged in the most bizarre experiments. Once he inserted a bodkin - a long needle of the sort used for sewing leather - into his eye socket and rubbed it around 'betwixt my eye and the bone as near to [the] backside of my eye as I could' just to see what would happen. What happened, miraculously, was nothing - at least, nothing lasting.
他建立了自己的實驗室，也是劍橋大學的第一個實驗室，但接著就進行異乎尋常的實驗。有一次，他把一根錐子（一種縫皮革用的長針）插進了眼窩，然後在「眼睛和儘可能接近眼睛後部的骨頭之間」揉來揉去，只是為了看看會發生什麼。奇蹟般地，什麼也沒發生——至少沒造成什麼持久的影響。
On another occasion, he stared at the sun for as long as he could bear, to determine what effect it would have upon his vision. Again he escaped lasting damage, though he had to spend some days in a darkened room before his eyes forgave him.
還有一次，他一直盯著太陽看，能看多久看多久，想知道太陽會對他的視力產生怎樣的影響。他又一次逃脫了持久的傷害，不過他不得不在暗室裡待了幾天，等著眼睛恢復過來。
Set atop these old beliefs and quirky traits, however, was the mind of a supreme genius - though even when working in conventional channels, he often showed a tendency to peculiarity. As a student, frustrated by the limitations of conventional mathematics, he invented an entirely new form, the calculus, but then told no one about it for 27 years. In like manner, he did work in optics that transformed our understanding of light and laid the foundation for the science of spectroscopy, and again, chose not to share the results for three decades.
然而，除了這些古老的信念和古怪的特質，牛頓還有超級天才的頭腦——即使做常規工作，他也往往顯得很特別。在學生時代，他對傳統數學的局限性感到沮喪，於是發明了一種全新的形式——微積分，但之後的27年裡，他沒有告訴任何人。以同樣的方式，他在光學方面的工作改變了我們對光的理解，為光譜學奠定了基礎，但還是過了30年才與別人分享成果。
For all his brilliance, real science accounted foronly a part of his interests. At least half his working life was given over to alchemy and wayward religious pursuits. These were not mere dabblings, but wholehearted devotions. He was a secret adherent of a dangerously a heretical sect called Arianism, whose principal tenet was the belief that there had been no Holy Trinity (Slightly ironic, since Newton's college at Cambridge was Trinity).
儘管他才華橫溢，真正的科學只佔他興趣的一部分。他至少有一半工作時間用於鍊金術和任性的宗教追求。他在這些領域不僅僅是涉獵，而是全心全意的奉獻。他是危險的異端教派阿里烏派的秘密信徒，阿里烏派的主要信條是不存在聖靈三位一體（這有點諷刺，因為牛頓曾在劍橋大學的三一學院上學）。
He spent endless hours studying the floor planof the lost Temple of King Solomon in Jerusalem (teaching himself Hebrew in the process, the better to scan original texts) in the belief that it held mathematical clues to the dates of the second coming of Christ and the end of the world.
他花了無數個小時研究耶路撒冷失落的所羅門王神廟的平面圖（在這個過程中他自學了希伯來語，以便更好地閱讀原始文本），相信裡面包含關於基督第二次降臨日和世界末日的數學線索。
所羅門王神廟平面圖
His attachment to alchemy was no less ardent. In 1936, the economist John Maynard Keynes bought a trunk of Newton's papers at auction and discovered with astonishmentthat they were overwhelmingly preoccupied not with optics or planetary motions, but with a single minded quest to turn base metals into precious ones.
他對鍊金術同樣無比熱愛。1936年，經濟學家約翰·梅納德·凱恩斯(John Maynard Keynes)在拍賣會上買了一箱牛頓的論文，驚訝地發現這些論文絕大多數都不是專注於光學或行星運動，而是一心一意尋求把賤金屬變成貴金屬。
An analysis of a strand of Newton's hairin the 1970s found it contained mercury - an element of interest to alchemist, hatters and thermometer-makers, but almost no-one else - at a concentration some 40 times the natural level. It is perhaps little wonder that he had trouble remembering to get up in the morning.
除了鍊金術士、制帽商和溫度計製造商，幾乎沒人對汞這種元素感興趣。20世紀70年代對牛頓一縷頭髮的分析發現，其中的汞含量約為正常水平的40倍。他早上有時忘記起床也許就不足為怪了（譯註：汞會影響神經系統）。
詞彙與短語
1. eye socket [skt]，眼眶，眼窩
2. account [kant] for，佔……比例；解釋
Afro-Americans account for 12% of the US population. 非洲裔美國人佔美國人口的12%。
Recent pressure at work may account for his behavior. 最近工作上的壓力也許可以解釋他的行為。
3. floor plan，n. 建築的平面圖
4. astonishment，[stnmnt]，n. 驚訝
She stared at him in astonishment. 她驚訝地盯著他。
To my astonishment, the car was gone. 令我驚訝的是，車不見了。
5. a strand of hair，一縷頭髮
He reached out and brushed astrand of hairaway from her face. 他伸手拂去她臉上的一縷頭髮。
長難句分析
He [主語] spent [謂語] endless hours [賓語] studying the floor planof the lost Temple of King Solomon in Jerusalem (teaching himself Hebrew in the process, the better to scan original texts) in the belief [賓語補足語] that [that引導的同位語從句] it held mathematical clues to the dates of the second coming of Christ and the end of the world.
他花了無數個小時研究耶路撒冷失落的所羅門王神廟的平面圖（在這個過程中他自學了希伯來語，以便更好地閱讀原始文本），相信它包含了關於基督第二次降臨日和世界末日的數學線索。
詞彙與短語發音：