女孩写了篇“穿内衣感想” 结果进了哈佛大学
2017-11-03 10:17
来源:沪江
作者:
名校真的是个神奇的地方,而且还在变得越来越神奇。前段时间爆出,有个女生写了篇文章讲自己怎么订外卖披萨,于是进了耶鲁大学。这回出了个更神奇的,一个女生写文章讲自己穿内衣的心得,结果就进了哈佛大学,而且还把招生官感动得不要不要的。
这件事情被爆出,都要归功于美国版的知乎 quora 网站,上面有一个问题:
What are some top Harvard admissions essays?
有哪些顶级的哈佛录取文书?
这位故事主角小姐姐叫 Ngoc,她说自己当时根本没把这次申请当一回事,因为她确定自己是进不了哈佛这种好学校的。不过她发现哈佛的申请流程实在太简单了,不申白不申,于是就把之前申请另一所大学的材料随便改了改,然后交给了哈佛。在这篇文章中,她讲了自己作为一个女生对内衣的看法,她从母亲第一次给自己胸衣的那一天讲起,一边讲故事一边说理,先是说内衣让她看破了人类的喜新厌旧,然后又说内衣的各种装饰演化展现了人类心灵本质上的空虚;
总之,就是各种上纲上线(moralistic),结果居然把招生官给感动了,后者在回信里面说非常喜欢这篇文章,然后告诉她学校已经决定录取她了。对,就这么简单。这个故事告诉我们,千万不要对作家和歌手的作品想太多,在你把自己感动得稀里哗啦的时候,他们可能在说:“真没想到有人喜欢这种东西。”
最后附上 Ngoc 那篇文书的全文,大家自己感受一下吧:
I remember the first time I wore a bra. I came home from school in the fifth grade, and my mom handed me a white cloth to put on beneath my shirt. “You’re a big girl now,” she said, “You need to wear this.” From that moment on, my life was forever changed.
That same year, I was taught that the sun would someday die, and I, feeling the pressure of the contraption beneath my shirt, realized that my childhood, too, would eventually dissipate just like the sun.
The first bra paved way for a second, and then a third, and then, by the fourth bra I had advanced to the Lady Type, the ones that my mom wore.
With every new bra, I cast away the former. Somewhere in the dark abyss of my closet, there is a heap of abandoned bras, tiny, worn-out filaments that had once shone so brightly in their days of use, but had faded away into old, neglected remnants of days long gone. They sit against a corner of the universe and gather dust like dead stars— without life, without luster, without vigor.
With every new bra, I felt the unmerciful hand of change push me further down a path with which I had no return. The bras no longer had the simplicity of the first; they came equipped with more folds and stitches and frills and patterns that were designed to counteract the growing complexity of my responsibilities.
Sometimes, when I found myself too big for the current one, I was either unable to or unwilling to get another because of the implications behind the transition—if every new bra meant the death of another star, then the adult world was nothing to me but a lifetime of darkness. I tried so hard not to kill any more stars, but my resistance was not enough, and I found myself adding layer after layer to the ever-increasing pile of bras. With this mindset, I prepared myself for the end, for the moment in which my entire universe would be engulfed by the black hole forming in my closet.
But I was saved.
I learned that life does not occur linearly, but in cycles: New stars can arise from the ashes of former ones, and the darkness of death is replenished by the light of birth. Thus, what is created is only a reinterpretation of the past in a form that is fitted for the present. In wearing a new bra, I was not casting away my old self but reorienting myself to accommodate to changing times.
Change, as overwhelming as it feels, is only natural—the pile of bras will only get bigger. Though it is hard to accept the existence of the bra in my life, I realize that I cannot live without it, for, as we grow older, things tend to droop more easily, and there is nothing more reliable than a bra to give us the inner support necessary to have a firm hold on life.
OK,来讲一讲今天的词 moralistic。这个词是由 moral(道德)变化而来的,不过它并不是一个褒义词,而是指那些“占据道德高地”的,并没有什么严密的逻辑,只是单纯的说教。换句话说,也就是中文里的“上纲上线”。
那么,我们来造个句子吧~
It's easy to be moralistic, because it does not require any skill or logic .
做道德评价是很容易的,因为它不需要任何技能和逻辑。