《了不起的盖茨比·Chapter VIII》第7节
“I don’t think she ever loved him.” Gatsby turned around from a window and looked at me challengingly. “You must remember, old sport, she was very excited this afternoon. He told her those things in a way that frightened her—that made it look as if I was some kind of cheap sharper. And the result was she hardly knew what she was saying.” He sat down gloomily. “Of course she might have loved him just for a minute, when they were first married—and loved me more even then, do you see?” Suddenly he came out with a curious remark. “In any case,” he said, “it was just personal.” What could you make of that, except to suspect some intensity in his conception of the affair that couldn’t be measured? He came back from France when Tom and Daisy were still on their wedding trip, and made a miserable but irresistible journey to Louisville on the last of his army pay. He stayed there a week, walking the streets where their footsteps had clicked together through the November night and revisiting the out-of-the-way places to which they had driven in her white car. Just as Daisy’s house had always seemed to him more mysterious and gay than other houses, so his idea of the city itself, even though she was gone from it, was pervaded with a melancholy beauty.
注释摘要
这一段话发生在漫漫长夜之后。窗口透进曙光，盖茨比转身用一句否定式的自白打破了宁静。“我不认为她爱过他”——这话不是在陈述事实，更像是在执拗地说服自己。他用的“challengingly”（挑衅地）这个词极为关键，尼克的视角告诉我们，盖茨比不是平静地追忆，而是绷紧全身等着反驳。他旋即给出一个看似合理的解释：那个下午汤姆说了些话，把他说得像一个“廉价的骗子”（…