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As a black boy growing up in America in the early 1900s, Richard Wright knew well the meaning of racial prejudice. He was not allowed to play in a park or borrow books from a library. While working as an office boy in a bank, though, he found a way into the library and discovered the power of the written word. In the following story, Richard Wright tells us how his thirst for books grew with each passing day and what changes took place in himas he did more and more reading.
作为20世纪初期在美国长大的黑人男孩，理查德·赖特非常清楚种族偏见的含义。他不得在公园里玩耍，不得向图书馆借书。不过，在一家银行做勤杂员时，他找到了进入图书馆的方法，并且发现了文字的力量。在下面的故事中，理查德·赖特向我们讲了他对书的渴望是如何与日俱增的，讲了书越读越多后身上发生了什么变化。
The Library Card
借书证
Richard Wright
理查德·赖特
One morning I arrived early at work and went into the bank lobby where the Negro porter was mopping. I stood at a counter and picked up the Memphis Commercial Appeal and began my free reading of the press. I came finally to the editorial page and saw an article dealing with one H. L. Mencken. I knew by hearsay that he was the editor of the American Mercury, but aside from that I knew nothing about him. The article was a furious denunciation of Mencken, concluding with one, hot, short sentence: Mencken is a fool.
一天早晨，我上班早了，就走进了银行的门厅，门厅里黑人清洁工正在拖地板。我站在一个柜台前，随手拿起孟菲斯《商业呼声报》，不花钱看起了报纸。最后，我翻到社论版，看到一篇写一个叫做H·L·门肯的人的文章。我听说过，他是《美国信使》的主编，但除此之外，对他一无所知。文章猛烈抨击门肯，结尾是火辣辣的一个短句：门肯是个傻瓜。
I wondered what on earth this Mencken had done to call down upon him the scorn of the South. The only people I had ever heard enounced in the South were Negroes, and this man was not a Negro. Then what ideas did Mencken hold that made a newspaper like the Commercial Appeal castigate him publicly? Undoubtedly he must be advocating ideas that the South did not like.
我不知道门肯究竟干了些什么，惹得南方这般奚落他。我所听到过的在南方遭谴责的只有黑人，可此人并非黑人。那么，门肯有什么思想使得像《商业呼声报》这样的报纸公开对他大加斥责呢？毫无疑问，他所宣扬的思想肯定是南方各州不喜欢的。
