马克·吐温，(Mark Twain 1835～1910)本名塞谬尔·朗赫恩·克莱门斯。马克·吐温是其笔名。他出生于密西西比河畔小城汉尼拔的一个乡村贫穷律师家庭，从小出外拜师学徒。当过排字工人，密西西比河水手、南军士兵，还经营过木材业、矿业和出版业，但有效的工作是当记者和写作幽默文学。

　　马克·吐温是美国批判现实主义文学的奠基人，世界著名的短篇小说大师。他经历了美国从“自由”资本主义到帝国主义的发展过程，其思想和创作也表现为从轻快调笑到辛辣讽刺再到悲观厌世的发展阶段。他的早期创作，如短篇小说《竞选州长》(1870)、《哥尔斯密的朋友再度出洋》(1870)等，以幽默、诙谐的笔法嘲笑美国“民主选举”的荒谬和“民主天堂”的本质。其后的作品，如长篇小说《镀金时代》(1874，与华纳合写)、代表作长篇小说《哈克贝里•费恩历险记》(1886)及《傻瓜威尔逊》(1893)等，则以深沉、辛辣的笔调讽刺和揭露像瘟疫般盛行于美国的投机、拜金狂热，及暗无天日的社会现实与惨无人道的种族歧视。马克·吐温被誉为“美国文学中的林肯”。马克•吐温病逝于1910年4月21日，他是美国文坛上的一位不朽的现实主义作家，他的优秀作品已成为美国文学和世界文学中的珍品。他的主要作品已大多有中文译本。

　　《汤姆·索耶历险记》是《哈克贝里·费恩历险记》的姊妹篇，故事发生在19世纪30-40年代美国密西西比河畔。主人公汤姆·索耶在母亲去世后，和弟弟西德随姨妈住在密苏里州的河畔小镇圣彼得堡。汤姆聪明伶俐，富于想象，顽皮淘气，乐于冒险；他不安于小镇那种刻板沉闷的生活环境，不喜欢听催眠似的牧师布道，也讨厌虚假的社交礼节；他厌恶读书，常常逃学，在课堂上捣乱，在教室里搞恶作剧……。，但他本性善良、勇敢，更有股天不怕、地不怕的冒险劲头儿。他和哈克在一个午夜去坟场游逛，意外撞见了一起强盗杀人的事情，他克服了巨大的恐惧，在法庭上指证罪犯，一夜之间成为英雄。而最后在一次冒着生命危险的探险中，他和哈利找到了强盗埋藏的宝藏，更是成为全村人的偶像。

　　主人公汤姆在很多方面带有作者童年的影子。汤姆和哈克都是伸张正义、善良勇敢、自尊要强的孩子，这些在当时社会中被人们看作是“调皮捣蛋”、“没有礼貌”。“不懂规矩”的毛孩子，在作者的笔下，却变得富有朝气、乐于助人、智勇双全、不畏艰险，成为了十分可爱的少年。主人公对一切与教会有关的清规戒律都感到无法忍受，反对读死书、死读书，反对刻板的戒律和规矩。他们追求自由自在、具有少年生活特点的娱乐和冒险，通过扮演海盗、强盗等来实现自己天真烂漫。自由轻松的生活理想。马克•吐温以丰富深厚的激情，把少年儿童的内心世界和一举一动描写得细致入微，活灵活现。此外，作者还运用幽默手法巧妙地讽刺了当时的社会陋俗、社会机构和社会上形形色色的人，鞭挞了社会上的一些丑恶现象。作者讽刺与幽默的语言特色在这部小说中表现得淋漓尽致。

　　这部小说独特的艺术魅力，在于贯穿和渗透全书的那种马克•吐温式的诙谐和幽默。“了不起的粉刷工”，“主日学校里出风头”，“猫和止疼药”，我们读着这些生活情趣浓郁、笔调轻松幽默的故事，一定会忍俊不禁，为小主人公的聪明机智拍案叫绝。马克•吐温的幽默是具有深刻社会意义的幽默，因而极具价值，发人深思；他的幽默是建立在真实生活基础上的幽默，紧紧抓住了像“公然的，也是常见的，平时是谁都不以为奇的”，但“却已经是不合理的，可笑、可鄙，甚而是可悲的现象”(鲁迅语)，加以概括、提炼，使之典型化，所以是真实的，给读者以人生警悟和启迪的幽默。

　　马克•吐温自己说，他的《汤姆•索耶历险记》是一首赞歌，是一首用散文写就的具有世俗风貌的赞美诗。这话一点不假。这部小说是一首赞歌，他歌颂了充满青春魅力的稚气童年以及生活中的美好事物。尽管也有暴力和凶杀，但是最终坏人遭到报应，死于非命，以美满结局收场。

　　它还是一部现实主义与浪漫主义水乳交融的作品。小说一方面描述了镀金的现实社会，另一方面描述了汤姆和他的伙伴们度过许多快乐时光的荒岛上幸福、快乐而美好的诗景般的世界。甚至有一阵子，马克•吐温也想找到杰克逊岛，去那里隐居，避开尘世间的喧嚣。

　　全书共35章，这里选的是第二章“了不起的粉刷工”。周末到了，别的孩子都在尽情的玩耍，而汤姆却因逃学而被姨妈罚干活——粉刷栅栏。汤姆出现在人行道上，一只手拎着一桶灰浆，另一只手拿着一把长柄刷子。他环顾栅栏，所有的快乐，立刻烟消云散，心中充满了惆怅。栅栏可是三十码长，九英尺高啊。生活对他来说太乏味空洞了，活着仅是一种负担。正在这灰心绝望的时刻，他忽然灵机一动，计上心来。这主意实在是聪明绝伦，妙不可言。他装出一副专心致志的样子，“一丝不苟”地刷着栅栏，又不时地后退一步，好像一位艺术大师在欣赏自己的艺术杰作。孩子们被他吸引住了，争着要替他干活。汤姆显得很“勉强”，孩子们就自己的心爱的小玩意换取粉刷栅栏的“特权”，结果栏杆被粉刷了三遍，小伙伴们的“家当”也都装进了汤姆的口袋！他还不知不觉地发现了人类行为的一大法则——那就是为了让一个大人或一个小孩渴望干什么事，只需设法把这事变得难以到手就行了。

　　【小说原文】

　　Adventures of Tom Sawyer

　　By Mark Twain

　　CHAPTER II

　　SATURDAY morning was come, and all the summer world was bright and fresh, and brimming with life. There was a song in every heart; and if the heart was young the music issued at the lips. There was cheer in every face and a spring in every step. The locust-trees were in bloom and the fragrance of the blossoms filled the air. Cardiff Hill, beyond the village and above it, was green with vegetation and it lay just far enough away to seem a Delectable Land, dreamy, reposeful, and inviting.

　　Tom appeared on the sidewalk with a bucket of whitewash and a long-handled brush. He surveyed the fence, and all gladness left him and a deep melancholy 1 settled down upon his spirit. Thirty yards of board fence nine feet high. Life to him seemed hollow, and existence but a burden. Sighing, he dipped his brush and passed it along the topmost plank; repeated the operation; did it again; compared the insignificant whitewashed streak with the far-reaching continent of unwhitewashed fence, and sat down on a tree-box discouraged. Jim came skipping out at the gate with a tin pail, and singing Buffalo Gals2 . Bringing water from the town pump had always been hateful work in Tom's eyes, before, but now it did not strike him so. He remembered that there was company at the pump. White, mulatto3, and negro boys and girls were always there waiting their turns, resting, trading playthings, quarrelling, fighting, skylarking. And he remembered that although the pump was only a hundred and fifty yards off, Jim never got back with a bucket of water under an hour -- and even then somebody generally had to go after him. Tom said:

　　"Say, Jim, I'll fetch the water if you'll whitewash some."

　　Jim shook his head and said:

　　"Can't, Mars Tom. Ole missis, she tole me I got to go an' git dis water an' not stop foolin' roun' wid anybody. She say she spec' Mars Tom gwine to ax me to whitewash, an' so she tole me go 'long an' 'tend to my own business -- she 'lowed SHE'D 'tend to de whitewashin'." 4

　　"Oh, never you mind what she said, Jim. That's the way she always talks. Gimme5 the bucket

　　-- I won't be gone only a a minute. SHE won't ever know."

　　"Oh, I dasn't, Mars Tom. Ole missis she'd take an' tar de head off'n me. 'Deed she would." 6

　　"SHE! She never licks anybody -- whacks 'em over the head with her thimble -- and who cares for that, I'd like to know. She talks awful, but talk don't hurt -- anyways it don't if she don't cry. Jim, I'll give you a marvel. I'll give you a white alley!"

　　Jim began to waver.

　　"White alley, Jim! And it's a bully taw."

　　"My! Dat's a mighty gay marvel, I tell you! But Mars Tom I's powerful 'fraid ole missis --" 7

　　"And besides, if you will I'll show you my sore toe."

　　Jim was only human -- this attraction was too much for him. He put down his pail, took the white alley, and bent over the toe with absorbing interest while the bandage was being unwound. In another moment he was flying down the street with his pail and a tingling rear, Tom was whitewashing with vigor, and Aunt Polly was retiring from the field with a slipper in her hand and triumph in her eye.

　　But Tom's energy did not last. He began to think of the fun he had planned for this day, and his sorrows multiplied. Soon the free boys would come tripping along on all sorts of delicious expeditions, and they would make a world of fun8 of him for having to work -- the very thought of it burnt him like fire. He got out his worldly wealth and examined it -- bits of toys, marbles, and trash; enough to buy an exchange of WORK, maybe, but not half enough to buy so much as half an hour of pure freedom. So he returned his straitened means to his pocket, and gave up the idea of trying to buy the boys. At this dark and hopeless moment an inspiration burst upon him! Nothing less than a great, magnificent inspiration.

　　He took up his brush and went tranquilly to work. Ben Rogers hove in sight presently -- the very boy, of all boys, whose ridicule he had been dreading. Ben's gait was the hop-skip-and-jump9

　　-- proof enough that his heart was light and his anticipations high. He was eating an apple, and giving a long, melodious whoop, at intervals, followed by a deep-toned ding-dong-dong, ding-dong-dong, for he was personating a steamboat. As he drew near, he slackened speed, took the middle of the street, leaned far over to star-board and rounded to ponderously and with laborious pomp and circumstance -- for he was personating the Big Missouri, and considered himself to be drawing nine feet of water. He was boat and captain and engine-bells combined, so he had to imagine himself standing on his own hurricane-deck giving the orders and executing them:

　　"Stop her, sir! Ting-a-ling-ling!" The headway ran almost out, and he drew up slowly toward the sidewalk.

　　"Ship up to back! Ting-a-ling-ling!" His arms straightened and stiffened down his sides.

　　"Set her back on the stabboard! Ting-a-ling-ling! Chow! ch-chow-wow! Chow!" His right hand, meantime, describing stately circles -- for it was representing a forty-foot wheel.

　　"Let her go back on the labboard! Ting-a-ling- ling! Chow-ch-chow-chow!" The left hand began to describe circles.

　　"Stop the stabboard! Ting-a-ling-ling! Stop the labboard! Come ahead on the stabboard! Stop her! Let your outside turn over slow! Ting-a-ling-ling! Chow-ow-ow! Get out that head-line! LIVELY now! Come -- out with your spring-line -- what're you about there! Take a turn round that stump with the bight of it! Stand by that stage, now -- let her go! Done with the engines, sir! Ting-a-ling-ling! SH'T! S'H'T! SH'T!" (trying the gauge-cocks).

　　Tom went on whitewashing -- paid no attention to the steamboat. Ben stared a moment and then said: "Hi-YI! YOU'RE up a stump, ain't10 you!"

　　No answer. Tom surveyed his last touch with the eye of an artist, then he gave his brush another gentle sweep and surveyed the result, as before. Ben ranged up alongside of him. Tom's mouth watered for the apple, but he stuck to his work. Ben said:

　　"Hello, old chap, you got to work, hey?"

　　Tom wheeled suddenly and said:

　　"Why, it's you, Ben! I warn't noticing."

　　"Say -- I'm going in a-swimming, I am. Don't you wish you could? But of course you'd druther11. WORK -- wouldn't you? Course you would!"

　　Tom contemplated the boy a bit, and said:

　　"What do you call work?"

　　"Why, ain't THAT work?"

　　Tom resumed his whitewashing, and answered carelessly:

　　"Well, maybe it is, and maybe it ain't. All I know, is, it suits Tom Sawyer."

　　"Oh come, now, you don't mean to let on that you LIKE it?"

　　The brush continued to move.

　　"Like it? Well, I don't see why I oughtn't to like it. Does a boy get a chance to whitewash a fence every day?"

　　That put the thing in a new light12 . Ben stopped nibbling his apple. Tom swept his brush daintily back and forth -- stepped back to note the effect -- added a touch here and there -- criticised the effect again -- Ben watching every move and getting more and more interested, more and more absorbed. Presently he said:

　　"Say, Tom, let ME whitewash a little."

　　Tom considered, was about to consent; but he altered his mind:

　　"No -- no -- I reckon it wouldn't hardly do, Ben. You see, Aunt Polly's awful particular about this fence -- right here on the street, you know -- but if it was the back fence I wouldn't mind and SHE wouldn't. Yes, she's awful particular about this fence; it's got to be done very careful; I reckon there ain't one boy in a thousand, maybe two thousand, that can do it the way it's got to be done."

　　"No -- is that so? Oh come, now – lemme13 just try. Only just a little -- I'd let YOU, if you was me, Tom."

　　"Ben, I'd like to, honest injun14; but Aunt Polly -- well, Jim wanted to do it, but she wouldn't let him; Sid wanted to do it, and she wouldn't let Sid. Now don't you see how I'm fixed? If you was to tackle this fence and anything was to happen to it --"

　　"Oh, shucks, I'll be just as careful. Now lemme try. Say -- I'll give you the core of my apple."

　　"Well, here -- No, Ben, now don't. I'm afeard --"

　　"I'll give you ALL of it!"

　　Tom gave up the brush with reluctance in his face, but alacrity in his heart. And while the late steamer Big Missouri worked and sweated in the sun, the retired artist sat on a barrel in the shade close by, dangled his legs, munched his apple, and planned the slaughter of more innocents. There was no lack of material; boys happened along every little while; they came to jeer, but remained to whitewash. By the time Ben was fagged out15, Tom had traded the next chance to Billy Fisher for a kite, in good repair; and when he played out, Johnny Miller bought in for a dead rat and a string to swing it with -- and so on, and so on, hour after hour. And when the middle of the afternoon came, from being a poor poverty-stricken boy in the morning, Tom was literally rolling in wealth. He had besides the things before mentioned, twelve marbles, part of a jews-harp, a piece of blue bottle-glass to look through, a spool cannon, a key that wouldn't unlock anything, a fragment of chalk, a glass stopper of a decanter, a tin soldier, a couple of tadpoles, six fire-crackers, a kitten with only one eye, a brass door-knob, a dog-collar -- but no dog -- the handle of a knife, four pieces of orange-peel, and a dilapidated old window sash.

　　He had had a nice, good, idle time all the while -- plenty of company -- and the fence had three coats of whitewash on it! If he hadn't run out of whitewash he would have bankrupted every boy in the village.

　　Tom said to himself that it was not such a hollow world, after all. He had discovered a great law of human action, without knowing it -- namely, that in order to make a man or a boy covet a thing, it is only necessary to make the thing difficult to attain. If he had been a great and wise philosopher, like the writer of this book, he would now have comprehended that Work consists of whatever a body is OBLIGED to do, and that Play consists of whatever a body is not obliged to do. And this would help him to understand why constructing artificial flowers or performing on a tread-mill is work, while rolling ten-pins or climbing Mont Blanc is only amusement. There are wealthy gentlemen in England who drive four-horse passenger- coaches twenty or thirty miles on a daily line, in the summer, because the privilege costs them considerable money; but if they were offered wages for the service, that would turn it into work and then they would resign.

　　The boy mused awhile over the substantial change which had taken place in his worldly circumstances, and then wended toward headquarters to report.

　　Notes:

　　1.melancholy 忧郁; 悲哀或情绪低落；郁闷( sadness or depression of the spirits; gloom)

　　2.gal 少女，女孩(=girl)

　　3.mulatto 黑白混血儿，父母分别为黑人和白人的人(A person having one white and one black parent)

　　4.Can't, Mars Tom. Ole missis, she tole me I got to go an' git dis water an' not stop foolin' roun' wid anybody. She say she spec' Mars Tom gwine to ax me to whitewash, an' so she tole me go 'long an' 'tend to my own business -- she 'lowed SHE'D 'tend to de whitewashin'.

　　这是不符合语法规则，发音也不规范的儿童语言。相当于：I can’t, Master Tom. Old mistress, she told me I have got to go and get this water and not stop fooling round with anybody. She says she expects Master Tom is going to ask me to whitewash, and so she told me to go along and attend to my own business—— she allowed she would attend to do whitewashing.

　　5.Gimme = Give me

　　6.Oh, I dasn't, Mars Tom. Ole missis she'd take an' tar de head off'n me. 'Deed she would.

　　= Oh, I dare not, Master Tom. Old mistress she’d take the head off in me. Indeed she would.

　　7.My! Dat's a mighty gay marvel, I tell you! But Mars Tom I's powerful 'fraid ole missis --

　　= My! That’s a mighty say marvel, I tell you1 But Master Tom I am powerfully afraid of old mistress---

　　8.a world of fun 极大的，级多的

　　9.hop-skip-and-jump 这3个词都表示跳的意思，但有细微的区别：hop常指“单脚跳(To jump on one foot.)”；skip常指“两只脚轮流跳(To move by hopping on one foot and then the other)”；jump通常指“跳离地面或其它基底(To spring off the ground or other base by a muscular effort of the legs and feet)。

　　10.ain't (1) = am not, is not；(2) = are not, has not, have not

　　11.druther (副词) 宁可,宁愿

　　12.That put the thing in a new light. = That makes the thing take on a new look; that makes the thing fairly new. 这倒是个新鲜事。

　　13.lemme = let me

　　14.honest injun = honestly enjoy

　　15.fag out 筋疲力尽 (= exhausted, rather tired) (廊坊：李树德)