美国国家公共电台 NPR 'The Shortest Day': Susan Cooper And Carson Ellis Celebrate The Solstice

 

SUSAN COOPER: (Reading) So the shortest day came, and the year died, and everywhere down the centuries of the snow-white world came people singing, dancing to drive the dark away.

SCOTT SIMON, HOST:

Today, December 21 is the shortest day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere.

COOPER: (Reading) They lighted candles in the winter trees. They hung their homes with evergreen¹. They burned beseeching² fires all night long to keep the year alive.

SIMON: For more than 40 years, people have been reading and performing Susan Cooper's poem "The Shortest Day" to celebrate the winter solstice.

COOPER: (Reading) And when the New Year's sunshine blazed awake they shouted, reveling. Down all the frosty ages you can hear them echoing behind us. Listen.

SIMON: Now that poem is a children's book.

COOPER: It's a family celebration of the light coming back after the dark threatens to take over the world.

SIMON: We've been asking authors and illustrators how they work together or work separately to translate words into pictures. For "The Shortest Day," Susan Cooper collaborated³ with Carson Ellis, the illustrator, by mail.

COOPER: I said in a letter to Carson that there is no story in this poem. We have to put the story in the pictures. So it's up to you, kid. And she certainly did.

CARSON ELLIS: (Laughter) It was one long, beautiful, very forthright⁴ kind of daunting⁵ letter that Susan wrote to me kind of telling me what she wanted the book to be able to do, and it completely changed the direction I was going in. And it was really daunting. I read the letter and thought, oh, gosh, this is a much harder book.

COOPER: Oh, dear.

ELLIS: My initial response was that I wanted it to look sort of like a Bruegel painting. If you know who Bruegel is, he's, like, a 16th-century painter. He painted this really famous painting called Hunters in the Snow, I think. A lot of people would recognize it. And he painted a lot of medieval scenes and a lot of great winter scenes. So I had this idea that I could kind of set the poem against the backdrop of medieval life and sort of chock it full of medieval details, so there would be a lot to glean⁶ about a life in medieval northern Europe from the book. That was kind of my initial response to it. But I started to mock this book up in this way that had these kind of merry villagers reveling on their way to a solstice celebration.

And I sent it to Susan to ask her some questions. I had questions about the chronology of the poem, and I had questions about the history of the solstice. So we had this exchange. And when she saw these kind of cheerful, light-hearted illustrations, she kind of corrected me and said that's not really what this book is about. It's a book about deeper and more serious stuff, to paraphrase⁷ her. It just - basically, the sense that long ago, those shortening days - along with them came a lot of dread⁸ associated with the cold and starvation and - actually, I feel like Susan should be talking about what this book is about. So I'm going to stop here.

COOPER: The pictures show you not just the shortest day. They show you the way the light gradually gets less and less as the year diminishes towards the end. Carson does this beautifully by having three or four pictures before the poem even starts showing you the sun weakening as the year goes on and the dread that this used to bring in the minds of primitive⁹ peoples until the sun comes up again after the shortest day, which is the beginning of hope. And the pictures manage to take you through time so that you are seeing those peasants from the Bruegel painting, but you are also seeing the same feelings echoed right up to the present day.

ELLIS: And I would add also that that idea of starting with those wordless spreads was actually Susan's idea when we were initially¹⁰ talking about how to do the book. I think she said something like, you know, it's a pretty short poem, and we have 32 pages. Do we have to initially jump right in to the text? And it was such an obvious and brilliant way to start the book. I was sort of embarrassed that I hadn't thought of it myself as the illustrator.

COOPER: It's a great idea. I didn't think of it myself, either. I stole it from my daughter.

ELLIS: Oh.

(LAUGHTER)

COOPER: So we're both indebted.

ELLIS: Another thing I love about this book is that as a kid, I grew up in a really secular¹¹ Jewish household. We celebrated¹² Christmas and Hanukkah, but the general joy of the holidays associated with the birth of Christ was sort of lost on me. So this book helps me understand a little bit the joy of those winter holidays. It's more universal, and it really is just kind of light triumphing over darkness. And light is always a cause to celebrate.

COOPER: And I have an echo from my childhood, I think, because I was a kid during World War II in England. And the long dark nights were the nights that brought the Nazi¹³ bombers¹⁴ over, when we would be sitting in our air raid shelter underneath¹⁵ the back lawn with mum reading books to us by the light of a candle. And when the bombs came closer, the candle would shake. And it's the obviously subconscious¹⁶ echo of that, I think, has gone all through my writing life. And in this poem, particularly in this book, the line at the end of the book, people carol, feast, give thanks and dearly love their friends and hope for peace. Don't we all?

SIMON: Susan Cooper and Carson Ellis. A Newbury and Caldecott-award-winning author and illustrator talking about their book "The Shortest Day."

(SOUNDBITE OF LIGHTS AND MOTION'S "FIREFLIES")

1 evergreen   

n.常青树；adj.四季常青的

参考例句：

• Some trees are evergreen;they are called evergreen.有的树是常青的，被叫做常青树。
• There is a small evergreen shrub on the hillside.山腰上有一小块常绿灌木丛。

2 beseeching   

adj.恳求似的v.恳求，乞求（某事物）( beseech的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• She clung to her father, beseeching him for consent. 她紧紧挨着父亲，恳求他答应。 来自辞典例句
• He casts a beseeching glance at his son. 他用恳求的眼光望着儿子。 来自辞典例句

3 collaborated   

合作( collaborate的过去式和过去分词 )； 勾结叛国

参考例句：

• We have collaborated on many projects over the years. 这些年来我们合作搞了许多项目。
• We have collaborated closely with the university on this project. 我们与大学在这个专案上紧密合作。

4 forthright   

adj.直率的，直截了当的 [同]frank

参考例句：

• It's sometimes difficult to be forthright and not give offence.又直率又不得罪人，这有时很难办到。
• He told me forthright just why he refused to take my side.他直率地告诉我他不肯站在我这一边的原因。

5 daunting   

adj.使人畏缩的

参考例句：

• They were faced with the daunting task of restoring the house.他们面临着修复房子的艰巨任务。
• Starting a new job can be a daunting prospect.开始一项新工作有时会让人望而却步。

6 glean   

v.收集(消息、资料、情报等)

参考例句：

• The little information that we could glean about them was largely contradictory.我们能够收集到的有关它们的少量信息大部分是自相矛盾的。
• From what I was able to glean,it appears they don't intend to take any action yet.根据我所收集到的资料分析，他们看来还不打算采取任何行动。

7 paraphrase   

vt.将…释义，改写；n.释义，意义

参考例句：

• You may read the prose paraphrase of this poem.你可以看一下这首诗的散文释义。
• Paraphrase the following sentences or parts of sentences using your own words.用你自己的话解释下面的句子或句子的一部分。

8 dread   

vt.担忧，忧虑；惧怕，不敢；n.担忧，畏惧

参考例句：

• We all dread to think what will happen if the company closes.我们都不敢去想一旦公司关门我们该怎么办。
• Her heart was relieved of its blankest dread.她极度恐惧的心理消除了。

9 primitive   

adj.原始的；简单的；n.原(始)人，原始事物

参考例句：

• It is a primitive instinct to flee a place of danger.逃离危险的地方是一种原始本能。
• His book describes the march of the civilization of a primitive society.他的著作描述了一个原始社会的开化过程。

10 initially   

adv.最初，开始

参考例句：

• The ban was initially opposed by the US.这一禁令首先遭到美国的反对。
• Feathers initially developed from insect scales.羽毛最初由昆虫的翅瓣演化而来。

11 secular   

n.牧师，凡人；adj.世俗的，现世的，不朽的

参考例句：

• We live in an increasingly secular society.我们生活在一个日益非宗教的社会。
• Britain is a plural society in which the secular predominates.英国是个世俗主导的多元社会。

12 celebrated   

adj.有名的，声誉卓著的

参考例句：

• He was soon one of the most celebrated young painters in England.不久他就成了英格兰最负盛名的年轻画家之一。
• The celebrated violinist was mobbed by the audience.观众团团围住了这位著名的小提琴演奏家。

13 Nazi   

n.纳粹分子，adj.纳粹党的，纳粹的

参考例句：

• They declare the Nazi regime overthrown and sue for peace.他们宣布纳粹政权已被推翻，并出面求和。
• Nazi closes those war criminals inside their concentration camp.纳粹把那些战犯关在他们的集中营里。

14 bombers   

n.轰炸机( bomber的名词复数 )；投弹手；安非他明胶囊；大麻叶香烟

参考例句：

• Enemy bombers carried out a blitz on the city. 敌军轰炸机对这座城市进行了突袭。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The Royal Airforce sill remained dangerously short of bombers. 英国皇家空军仍未脱离极为缺乏轰炸机的危境。 来自《简明英汉词典》

15 underneath   

adj.在...下面，在...底下；adv.在下面

参考例句：

• Working underneath the car is always a messy job.在汽车底下工作是件脏活。
• She wore a coat with a dress underneath.她穿着一件大衣，里面套着一条连衣裙。

16 subconscious   

n./adj.潜意识(的)，下意识(的)

参考例句：

• Nail biting is often a subconscious reaction to tension.咬指甲通常是紧张时的下意识反映。
• My answer seemed to come from the subconscious.我的回答似乎出自下意识。