1. From a very early age, perhaps the age of five or six, I knew that when I grew up I should be a writer. Between the ages of about seventeen and twenty-four I tried to abandon this idea, but I did so with the consciousness that I was outraging my true nature and that sooner or later I should have to settle down and write books.
    1)很小的时候，大概五六岁，我就意识到长大以后将成为一个作家。从15至24岁这段时间里，我力求打消当作家的念头，可每每觉得这样做是在戕害我的天性，认为或迟或早我会坐下来伏案著书。

    2. I was the middle child of three, but there was a gap of five years on either side, and I barely saw my father before I was eight. For this and other reasons I was somewhat lonely, and I soon developed disagreeable mannerisms which made me unpopular throughout my schooldays. I had the lonely child's habit of making up stories and holding conversations with imaginary persons, and I think from the very start my literary ambitions were mixed up with the feeling of being isolated and undervalued. I knew that I had a facility with words and a power of facing unpleasant facts, and I felt that this created a sort of private world in which I could get my own back for my failure in everyday life. Nevertheless the volume of serious -- i.e. seriously intended -- writing which I produced all through my childhood and boyhood would not amount to half a dozen pages. I wrote my first poem at the age of four or five, my mother taking it down to dictation. I cannot remember anything about it except that it was about a tiger and the tiger had "chair-like teeth" -- a good enough phrase, but I fancy the poem was a plagiarism of Blake's "Tiger, Tiger." At eleven, when the war of 1914 -- 18 broke out, I wrote a patriotic poem which was printed in the local newspaper, as was another, two years later, on the death of Kitchener. From time to time, when I was a bit older, I wrote bad and usually unfinished "nature poems" in the Georgian style. I also, about twice, attempted a short story which was a ghastly failure. That was the total of the would-be serious work that I actually set down on paper during all those years.
    2)三个孩子中，我是老二。老大和老三与我相隔五岁。八岁以前，我很少见到我爸爸。由于这个以及其他一些缘故，我生性有些孤僻。我的举止言谈逐渐变得很不讨人喜欢，这使我在上学期间几乎没有什么朋友。像一般孤僻的孩子一样，我喜欢窃自凭空编造各种故事，和想像的人物谈天。我觉得，从一开始，我的文学志向就与一种孤独寂寞，被人冷落的感觉相联系。我知道我有驾驭语言的才能，并敢于直面令人不快的现实。这一切似乎造就了一个幽独的天地。在此天地中我能补偿我在日常生活中的不得意。但是，在我整个童年和少年时代，我创作的严肃的东西，即有严肃的意向要创作的东西，也不过五六页。我四五岁时创作了第一首诗，母亲听着我念诵把它记下来。这诗在我的印象中已很淡薄，只知道它是讲一只老虎。这虎有“椅背似的牙齿”——这似乎不失为好句。但我想这诗是拾了布莱克《老虎》一诗的牙慧。11岁时，第一次世界大战爆发了。我写了首富有爱国热情的诗，登在当地报纸上。两年后，另一首悼基茨奈之死的诗也登载于报。随着年岁的增长，我又时不时用乔治时代的风格写一些蹩脚的“山水诗”，而且通常是半途而废。大概有两次，我还试着写短篇小说，但都一败涂地。这几篇东西，便是我在那些年里为将来当作家而确确实实付诸笔墨的作品。