Harmony with the Living Earth——《景观设计（风景园林）专业英语》翻译
2012-04-25 22:37阅读：
It is believed that the
lifetime goal and work of the landscape architect is to help bring
people, the things they build, their communities, their
cities——and
thus their lives——into harmony with the living earth.
By John Ormsbee Simonds
人们普遍认为，风景园林师的终身目标和工作是引领人类以及他们的作品、社区和城市——也就是他们的生活——与地球的和谐共处。
——约翰·O·西蒙兹
Harmony with
the Living Earth
与地球和谐共处
We are the victims of our own
building. We are trapped, body and soul, in the mechanistic
surroundings we have constructed about ourselves. Somewhere in the
complex process of evolving our living spaces, cities, and
roadways, we have become so absorbed in the power of machines, so
absorbed in the pursuit of new techniques of building, so absorbed
with new materials the we have neglected our human needs. Our own
deepest instincts are violated. Our basic human desires remain
unsatisfied. Divorced from our natural habitat, we have almost
forgotten the glow and exuberance of being healthy animals and
feeling fully alive.
我们是自身建设的受害者。我们的身与灵都被困在了自己建造的机械环境中。在生活空间、城市和道路逐步发展的复杂进程中，我们太过于依赖机械的力量，太过于追求新的建造技术和新的材料，以至于反而忽视了人的需求。这种最深处的本能被违反了。最基本的人类欲望也得不到满足。远离了自然生境的我们几乎忘却了作为一种健康的动物感受生命意义时的那种活力与激情。
Many contemporary
ailments——our hypertensions and neuroses
——are no more than
the physical evidence of rebellion against our physical
surroundings and frustration at the widening gap between the
environment we yearn for and the stifling, artificial one we
planners have so far contrived.
这一时代的许多疾病，譬如高血压和神经衰弱，正是我们的身体反抗外界环境的表现，而我们所渴望的的环境与我们作为规划师规划的那种沉闷的人工环境之间不断增大的裂痕也令人沮丧。
Life itself is dictated
by our moment-by-moment adjustment to our environment. Just as the
bacterial culture in the petri dish must have its scientifically
compounded medium for optimum development and the potted geranium
cutting its proper and controlled conditions of growth to produce a
thriving plant, so we——as complicated, hypersensitive human
organisms——must have for our optimum development a highly specialized
milieu. It is baffling that the nature of this ecological framework
has been so little explored. Volumes have been written on the
conditions under which rare types of orchids may best be grown;
numerous manuals can be found on the proper raising and care of
guinea pigs, white rats, goldfish, and parakeets, but little has
been written about the nature of the physical environment best
suited to human culture. Here is a challenging field of
research.
生活取决于我们每时每刻对环境的适应。就像培养皿中培养的细菌，必须具备科学的复合介质才能促进其繁殖；亦或是盆栽的天竺葵扦插条，也必须在适合的、可控的条件下才能生长茂盛。我们作为复杂且高度敏感的人类有机体，也必须有适合我们发展的高度专业化环境。令人费解的是，这种生态框架的本质却很少被人探寻。有关于稀有兰花在什么环境下生长最好的研究写了一卷又一卷，介绍如何正确的饲养几内亚的猪、白老鼠、金鱼以及长尾小鹦鹉的手册更是数不胜数。然而却几乎没有一本书来介绍什么样的物质环境最适合人类发展。这是一块非常具有挑战性的研究领域。
The naturalist tells us
that if a fox or a rabbit is snared in a field and then kept in a
cage, the animal’s clear eyes will soon become dull, its coat will
lose its luster, and its spirit will flag. So it is with humans too
long or too far removed from nature. For we are, first of all,
animals. We are creatures of the meadow, the forest ,the sea, and
the plain. We are born with a love of fresh air in our lungs, dry
paths under our feet, and the penetrating heat of the sun on our
skin. We are born with a love for the feel and smell of rich, warm
earth, the taste and sparkle of clear water, the refreshing
coolness of foliage overhead, and the spacious blue dome of the
sky. Deep down inside we have for these
things——a
longing, a desire sometimes compelling, sometimes quiescent but
always it is there.
自然博物学家告诉我们，如果狐狸或兔子被捕以后关在笼子里，他们清澈的眼睛很快会变得灰暗，皮毛会失去光泽，精神也会萎靡不振。人类远离大自然也会如此，因为人类首先是一种动物。我们是草地、森林、海洋还有平原的动物。我们在出生之时，肺里就充满了爱的新鲜空气，脚下踏着干燥的小路，阳光普照于我们的肌肤之上。我们天性有爱，那是一种感受大地的富饶温暖的爱，那是一种品味清澈水源的爱，那是一种对头顶的枝叶带来的丝丝凉爽的爱，那是一种对广阔的蓝色苍穹的爱。我们内心深处的这这些渴望，有时是明显的，有时又是含蓄的，但是它总是一直在那里。
It has been proposed by many
sages that, other things being equal, the happiest person is one
who lives in closest, fullest harmony with nature. It might then be
reasoned: why not restore humans to the woods? Let them have their
water and earth and sky, and plenty of it. But is the primeval
forest-preserved, untouched, or
simulated——our ideal environment? Hardly. For the story of the human
race is the story of an unending struggle to ameliorate the forces
of nature. Gradually, laboriously, we have improved our shelters,
secured a more sustained and varied supply of food, and extended
control over the elements to improve our way of
living.
许多圣人都谈到：在其他条件都相同的情况下，最开心的人是那些最能与自然和谐共处之人。按照这种说法，为何不使人类回归自然？让他们拥有充沛的水源、土地和天空呢。但是这种原始的、未经开发的森林保护地会是我们理想的生存环境吗？很难这么说。因为人类的历史就是一部通过无休止的斗争来改善自然的历史。在经历了一个逐步的、充满艰辛的过程之后，我们改善了我们的住所，获得了源源不断的、各式各样的食物供给，也通过增强对其他事物的控制力改进了我们生活的方式。
What alternatives, then,
are left? Is it possible that we can devise a wholly artificial
environment in which to better fulfill our potential and more
happily work out our destiny? This prospect seems extremely
doubtful. A perceptive analysis of our most successful ventures in
planning would reveal that we have effected the greatest
improvements not by striving to subjugate nature wholly, not by
ignoring the natural conditioning or by the thoughtless replacement
of the natural features, contours, and covers with our
constructions, but rather by consciously seeking a harmonious
integration. This can be achieved by modulating ground and
structural forms with those of nature, by bringing hills, ravines,
sunlight, water, plants, and air into our areas of planning
concentration, and by thoughtfully and sympathetically spacing our
structures among the hills, along the rivers and valleys, and out
into the landscape.
还有其他的选择吗？我们有可能通过创造一个完全人工的环境来更好的满足我们的潜在需求和掌控我们的命运吗?这种前景令人质疑。通过深入分析那些最成功的规划，可以看出：我们的成功之处在于有意识的寻求一种和谐的整体而不是粗暴的征服自然，不是忽略自然条件，也不是武断的用人工建筑掩盖自然特征和外观。而这种和谐是通过调整土地和结构形式以适应自然，是通过将丘陵，沟壑，阳光，水，植物，空气引入集中规划区域，是通过将构筑物间筑于群山之间，河流和山谷沿线以及风景之中来完成的。
We are perhaps unique
among the animal in our yearning for order and beauty.
It is doubtful whether any other animal enjoys a “view”,
contemplates the magnificence of a venerable oak, or delights in
tracing the undulations of a shoreline. We instinctively seek
harmony; we are repelled by disorder, friction, ugliness, and the
illogical. Can we be content while our towns and cities are still
oriented
to crowded streets rather than to open parks? While
highways slice through our communities? While freight trucks rumble
past our churches and our homes? Can we be satisfied while our
children on their way to school must cross and recross murderous
traffic ways? While traffic itself must jam in and out
of the city, morning and evening, through clogged and
noisy valley floors, although these valley routes should, by all
rights, be green free-flowing parkways leading into spacious
settlements and the open countryside
beyond.
就我们对秩序和美丽的渴望来看，我们可能是动物中独一无二的。是否有其他动物能够欣赏风光，对古老橡树带来的壮观景致产生思考，或者喜欢追逐海水的潮起潮落，这是令人怀疑的。我们本能的寻求和谐，并对混乱、丑陋和毫无逻辑避之不及。当我们的乡村与城市被拥挤的街道而非开放性的公园占据，我们会感到满意吗？当高速公路穿越我们的社区，我们会感到满意吗？当我们的孩子在上学时需要来回穿过危险的交通道路，我们会感到满意吗？从早到晚，来往的车辆在这个堵塞且嘈杂的、高楼林立的城市山谷中川流不息，虽然这条山谷的路线本应是绿意怅然、畅行无阻的景观道路，而周边尽是宽敞的社区和开阔的乡间景色的。
We of contemporary times must
face this disturbing fact: our urban, suburban, and rural diagrams
are for the most part ill-conceived. Our community and highway
patterns bear little logical relationship to one another and to our
topographical, climatological, physiological, and ecological base.
We have grown, and often continue to grow, piecemeal, haphazardly,
without reason. We are dissatisfied and puzzled. We are frustrated.
Somewhere in the planning process we have failed.
我们这一时代的人必须直面这个令人不安的事实，即：我们的城市、城郊甚至于农村地区的规划在很大程度上都是考虑欠周的。我们的社区与高速公路二者之间几乎没有任何逻辑关系，并且这二者的规划与相关的地形学、气象学、生理学、生态学基础亦无联系。我们已经长大，并将继续成长，逐步的、无规则的，无任何理由。我们并不满足，而且迷惑。我们感到沮丧。规划过程中的某些部分，我们确实失败了。
Sound planning, we can
learn from observation, is not achieved problem by problem or site
by site. Masterful planning examines each project in the light of
an inspired and inspiring vision, solves each problem as a part of
a total and compelling concept which, upon consideration, should be
self-evident. Stated simply, a central objective of all physical
planning is to create a more salubrious living
environment——a more secure, effective, pleasant, rewarding way of life.
Clearly, if we are the products of environment as well as of
heredity, the nature of this environment must be a vital concern.
Ideally it will be one in which tensions and frictions have been in
the main eliminated, where we can achieve our full potential, and
where, as the planners of old Peking envisioned, man can live and
grow and develop“in harmony with nature, God,
