例3：

       二是向前看，不爭論，少宣揚，多實干。改革之初，有些同志曾提出，要改革，首先就要批判過去高等教育體制的弊端。對此我堅決不同意，并說服這些同志要用歷史唯物主義的觀點看問題，否則我們就永遠沒有正確的是非標準。中國共產黨之所以是個成熟的政黨，其中重要的一條就是我們善于用辯證唯物主義和歷史唯物主義來正確地處理“繼承與發展”的關系問題。不管你的成就多大，都有歷史的局限，不能當事后諸葛亮。我們今天的改革，大家認為是正確的，甚至是很有前瞻性的。但過多少年以后，用那時的標準來看今天的改革，也許會被后人認為是難以理解的“古董”。但你能否認今天的改革成果嗎？所以，不必要的爭論不但對推進改革無益，反而會影響改革進程。我們只有從實際出發，針對現存的問題進行改革，盡量做好在當前時代條件下能做到的事。

       Second, we must look forward, waste absolutely no time on unnecessary arguing and hype, and work more in a down-to-earth way. (11) In the beginning, some people had suggested criticizing the drawbacks in higher education prior to reform. (12) I said no and persuaded them to look at things from the perspective of historical materialism, otherwise we could never find the criteria for telling right from wrong. (13) A major reason why the Communist Party of China is a mature party is because we are good at applying dialectical materialism and historical materialism when handling the relationship between inheriting and developing. All achievements, no matter how big, have historical limits, and the "I told you so" attitude gets us nowhere. (14) Today, everyone is saying the reform is correct and rather farsighted. However, many years in the future, if people use their contemporary standards to judge the reform of today, they may see it as some sort of unfathomable "antique". But can you negate the reform and its results today because of that? Therefore, unnecessary arguments can do nothing for the progress of reform but hinder it. (15) We can only proceed from reality, carry out reform to redress existing problems, and do what we can under the circumstances. (16)

       注11. 此處與注3所談情況一樣，加we作主語。此外，arguing前面加了unnecessary 一詞，這也不是譯者隨意加的。本段倒數第二句提到unnecessary arguments，前后呼應。

       注12. 此句原文兩次提到“改革”，譯文都沒有用reform，而把它與prior to 連用，修飾the drawbacks in higher education，真可以說用在了該用的地方。

       注13. “對此我堅決不同意”譯作 I said no，這是一個非常簡潔有力的譯法。此外，“正確的是非標準”譯作the criteria for telling right from wrong，表面上“正確的”沒有譯，實際上已經意在其中了。這是翻譯中常見的一種現象，許多形容詞和副詞的含義已經包含在它所修飾的詞里了，就不必單獨用一個詞來表示。這種現象值得注意。

       注14. 此處原文用了一個典故“事后諸葛亮”，若照字面譯，不能使外國讀者產生同樣的聯想，因此譯文用了英語里一個相應的說法。

       注15. 譯文用it，避免重復“改革”。

       注16. 原文是一個主語帶三個并列謂語動詞，譯文也是一樣，但原文沒有用連詞，譯文里這個and卻是必需的。

       例4：

       與此同時，這十年來，我一直要求大家少宣揚，多實干。這是因為改革是一個不斷探索的進程，孰是孰非，還要經過一段實踐的檢驗，不宜作不必要的宣傳，更不應事情還沒有做好就先吹一通。何況宣傳不適當還會引發不必要的爭論或簡單的“刮風”，影響改革的進程，甚至把好事變壞。

       Over this decade I always asked my colleagues to cut the hype and do more solid work. This is because reform is a process of progressive exploration. Whether we are doing things right or wrong, only time and practice can tell. Hype is unnecessary; we should not brag before our accomplishments are in place. (17) Untimely publicity can trigger avoidable controversy or simplistic "campaigning," thus affecting the progress of reform or even damaging the good results we have achieved. (18)

       注17. 這一句說明提出上述要求的原因，內容比較多，因此譯文分了三句，這樣譯比較清楚。

       注18. simplistic 有貶義，意思是“過于簡單化的”，用在這里正合適。后半句譯文用了兩個分詞短語，說明上述做法可能產生的后果。

       例5：

       三是“借東風”，抓機遇。要推動改革，每一個重大的機遇都要抓住不放。例如上面我提到的，1998年國務院進行機構改革，撤銷了9個部門，“皮之不存，毛將焉附？”部門沒有了，部門所屬的那些高校怎么辦？我們就抓住這一機遇，整體推進了部門所屬高校以地方管理為主共建的改革，受到地方和這些高校的普遍歡迎。改革后，我去這些學校考察，有些校領導對我說，改由地方為主管理后，他們受到地方政府的重視和種種優待，發展比過去快多了，早該這樣改革了！

       Third, don't let a good opportunity slip through your fingers. (19) To promote reform you've got to act every time a good opportunity presents itself. One such opportunity appeared during the 1998 State Council organizational reshuffle, in which nine ministries were abolished. (20) Now that these ministries were gone, what was to be done with the universities under their charge. (21) We acted immediately and launched a wholesale reform by delegating reconstruction responsibilities for these universities to the local authorities, a decision well received by the localities and the universities themselves. When I visited these universities toward the end of the reform, some leaders told me that they won much attention and preferential treatment from local governments, and that their development was much faster than before. This reform was long overdue, they said. (22)

       注19. 在這里“借東風”和“抓機遇”是同樣的意思。這就是為什么本節的題目中“借東風”只譯作seizing the opportunities。“借東風”本是漢語里的一個典故，來自《三國演義》，但翻譯起來，很難對外國讀者說清楚，只好把它要表達的意思譯出來算了。但這個典故用在這里確實很生動，于是譯者在英文里找了一個與之相對應的習語。根據《Oxford Advanced Learner's English-Chinese Dictionary》（《牛津高階英漢雙解詞典》）第6版，let sth slip (through your fingers)意思是to miss or fail to use an opportunity，因此用在這里是非常恰當的。

       注20. reshuffle一詞很有用，談到政府的重大人事或機構變動，最常用的就是這個詞。

       注21. 這句譯文具體說明了前面引語“皮之不存，毛將焉附?”在這里的含義，因此這句引語就沒有譯，若譯出來就顯得重復了。此外，請注意后半句what was to be done...。此處不能用what to do，因為它只是一個短語，不能獨立構成一個問句。

       注22. 最后一句譯文加了they said。若不加，讀者就可能認為最后一句是作者的話了。