第一篇：JK羅琳在哈佛畢業典禮的演講

JK羅琳在哈佛畢業典禮的演講

《哈利.波特》的作者羅琳于6月5日參加了哈佛大學2008年的畢業典禮，被授予榮譽學位，并作為特邀嘉賓做了標題為《The Fringe Benefits of Failure, and the Importance of Imagination》（失敗的額外收益與想象力的重要性）的演講。以下，是譯言的翻譯。

標題：《失敗的額外收益與想象力的重要性》（原文）

作者：J.K.羅琳

浮士德主席，哈佛公司和監察委員會的各位成員，大學的員工，自豪的父母，以及所有的畢業生們：

首先我想說的是“謝謝你們”。這不僅因為哈佛給了我非比尋常的榮譽，而且為了這幾個禮拜以來，由于想到這次畢業典禮演說而產生的恐懼與惡心讓我減肥成功。這真是一個雙贏的局面！現在我需要做的就是一次深呼吸，瞇著眼看著紅色的橫幅，然后欺騙自己，讓自己相信正在參加世界上受到最好教育群體的哈立波特大會。

做畢業典禮演說是一個重大的責任，我的思緒回到了自己的那次畢業典禮。那天的演講者是一位英國的杰出哲學家 Baroness Marry Warnock.對她演講的回憶對我寫這篇演講稿幫助巨大，因為我發現她說的話我居然一個字都沒有記住。這個發現讓我釋然，使我得以繼續寫完演講稿，我不用再擔心，那種想成為“gay wizard”（harry porter中的魔法大師）的眩暈的愉悅，可能會誤導你們放棄在商業、法律、政治領域的大好前途。

你們看，如果你們在若干年后能記住“gay wizard”這個笑話，我就比Barkoness Mary Warnock有進步了。所以，設定一個可以實現的目標是個人進步的第一步。

實際上，我已經絞盡腦汁、費勁心思去想今天我應該講什么好。我問自己：我希望在自己畢業那天已經知道的是什么，而又有哪些重要的教訓是我從那天開始到現在的21年間學會的。

我想到了兩個答案。在今天這個愉快的日子，我們聚在一起慶祝你們學習上的成功時，我決定和你們談談失敗的收益。另外，當你們如今處于“現實生活”的入口處時，我想向你們頌揚想象力的重要性。

我選擇的這兩個答案似乎如同歌德式幻想一樣不切實際，或者顯得荒謬，但是請容忍我講下去。

對于我這樣一個已經42歲的人來說，回頭看自己21歲畢業時的情景，并不是一件舒服的事情。我的前半生之前，我一直在自己內心的追求與最親近的人對我的要求之間進行不自在的抗爭。

我曾確信我自己唯一想做的事情是寫小說。但是我的父母都來自貧窮的家庭，都沒有上過大學，他們認為我的異常活躍的想象力只是滑稽的個人怪癖，并不能用來付抵押房產，或者確保得到退休金。

他們希望我再去讀個專業學位，而我想去攻讀英國文學。最后，達成了一個雙方都不甚滿意的妥協：我改學外語。可是等到父母一走開，我立刻報名學習古典文學。

我忘了自己是怎么把學古典文學的事情告訴父母的了，他們也可能是在我畢業那天才第一次發現。在這個星球上的所有科目中，我想他們很難再發現一門比希臘神學更沒用的課程了。

我想順帶著說明，我并沒有因為他們的觀點而抱怨他們。現在已經不是抱怨父母引導自己走錯方向的時候了，如今的你們已經足夠大來決定自己前進的路程，責任要靠自己承擔。而且，我也不能批評我的父母，他們是希望我能擺脫貧窮。他們以前遭受了貧窮，我也曾經貧窮過，對于他們認為貧窮并不高尚的觀點我也堅決同意。貧窮會引起恐懼、壓力，有時候甚至是沮喪。這意味著小心眼、卑微和很多艱難困苦。通過自己的努力擺脫貧窮確實是件很值得自豪的事情，但只有傻瓜才對貧窮本身夸夸其談。

我在你們這個年齡的時候，最害怕的不是貧窮，而是失敗。

在你們這個年齡，盡管我明顯缺少在大學學習的動力，我花了很多時間在咖啡吧寫故事，很少去聽課，但是我知道通過考試的技巧，當然，這也是好多年來評價我，以及我同齡人是否成功的標準。

我想說，并不是我太遲鈍，我覺得你們還不曾知道什么是艱難困苦，或者什么是心碎的感覺，因為你們還年輕，而且天資聰明，受到良好教育。但是天賦和智商還未能使任何人免于命運無常的折磨，我從來不認為這里的每個人已經享有平靜的恩典和滿足。

然而，你們能從哈佛畢業這個現實表明，你們對失敗還不是很熟悉，對于失敗的恐懼與對于成功的渴望可能對你們有相同的驅動力。確實，你們對于失敗的概念可能與普通人的成功差不了太多。你們在學習這方面已經站得相當高了！

當然，最終我們所有人不得不為自己決定什么是失敗的組成元素，但是如果你愿意的話，世界很愿意給你一堆的標準。基于任何一種傳統標準，我可以說，僅僅在我畢業7年后，我經歷了一次巨大的失敗。我突然間結束了一段短暫的婚姻，失去了工作。作為一個單身媽媽，而且在這個現代化的英國，除了不是無家可歸，你可以說我有多窮就有多窮。我父母對于我的擔心，以及我對自己的擔心都成了現實，從任何一個通常的標準來看，這是我知道的最大失敗。

現在，我不會站在這里和你們說失敗很好玩。我生命的那段時間非常的灰暗，那時我還不知道我的書會被新聞界認為是神話故事的革命，我也不知道這段灰暗的日子要持續多久。那時候的很長一段時間里，任何出現的光芒只是希望而不是現實。

那么我為什么還要談論失敗的收益呢？僅僅是因為失敗意味著和非我的脫離，失敗后我找到了自我，不再裝成另外的形象，我開始把我所有的精力僅僅放在我關心的工作上。如果我在其他方面成功過，我可能就不會具備要求在自己領域內獲得成功的決心。我變得自在，因為我已經經歷過最大的恐懼。而且我還活著，我有一個值得我自豪的女兒，我有一個陳舊的打字機和很不錯的寫作靈感。我在失敗堆積而成的硬石般的基礎上開始重筑我的人生。

你們可能不會經歷像我那么大的失敗，但生活中面臨失敗是不可避免的。永遠不失敗是不可能，除非你活得過于謹慎，這樣倒還不如根本就沒有在世上生活過，因為你從一開始就失敗了。

失敗給了我內心的安寧，這種安寧是順利通過測驗考試獲得不了的。失敗讓我認識自己，這些是沒法從其他地方學到的。我發現自己有堅強的意志，而且，自我控制能力比自己猜想的還要強，我也發現自己擁有比紅寶石更真的朋友。

從挫折中獲得的知識越充滿智慧、越有力，你在以后的生存中則越安全。除非遭受磨難，你們不會真正認識自己，也沒法知道你們之間關系有多鐵。這些知識才是真正的禮物，他們比我曾經獲得的任何資格證書更為珍貴，因為這些是我經歷過痛苦后才獲得的。

如果給我一個時間機器，我會告訴21歲的自己，個人的幸福建立在自己能夠認識到：生活不是擁有的物品與成就的清單。雖然你們會碰到很多和你們一樣大或年長的人分不清楚生活與清單的區別，但你們的資格證書、簡歷，都不能等價于你們的生活。生活是困難的，也是復雜的，它完全超出任何人的控制，謙虛的認識到這些能使你們在生命的沉浮中得以順利生存。

你們可能認為我選擇想象力作為第二個演講主題是因為它在重筑我人生的過程中起了作用，但這不是全部原因。雖然我會不遺余力地為床邊故事的價值做辯護，但我已學會從更廣泛的意義來評價想象力的價值。想象力不僅是一種能促使人類預想不存在事物的獨特能力，從而成為所有發明和創新的源泉；從想象力或許是最具改革性和啟示作用的能力這點講，它更是一種能使我們同沒有分享過他們經歷的人產生共鳴的力量。

我最偉大的生活經歷之一發生在寫《哈利波特》前，當然我在后來書中寫的很多東西與這個經歷有關。這個啟示來源于我最早期工作之一。我在倫敦的國際特赦組織總部的研究部門工作，雖然我在中飯的時間逃出來寫小說，但我需要這份工作來支付我20多歲時的房租。(注：國際特赦組織是一個全球性的志愿組織，致力于為釋放由于信仰而被監禁的人以及給他們的家庭發放救濟等方面的工作。)

在那兒我的狹小的工作室內，我匆忙得讀著從各地集權政權內傳出來的潦草信件，這些信件是那些冒著進監獄風險而向外傳播發生在他們身上慘劇的人偷運出來。我看到了無影無蹤就消失的人的相片，這些相片是家里人或朋友送來的。我讀著被酷刑折磨的受害者的證據和他們受傷的照片；我打開手寫的，目擊者對審訊和處決的摘要記錄，以及對綁架和強奸的敘述。

我的許多同事以前是政治犯人，他們因為勇于不附和政府而獨立思考，以致被趕出自己的家，或者被放逐。來拜訪我們辦公室的人包括那些傳遞消息的，或者嘗試弄清楚那些被迫離開的人身后的真相。

我永遠不會忘記那個非洲來的被酷刑折磨的受害者，他是一個和我那時候年齡相仿的年輕男子，但在他家鄉經受過的拷打后，他已經有了精神病。當他向錄像機講述強加在他身上的暴行時，他無法控制地發抖。他比我高一英尺，但像一個小孩一樣脆弱。后來我的工作是護送他去地下站，這個整個生活被野蠻摧毀的男子禮貌地握著我的手，祝福我一生幸福。

只要我活著，我就能記住我沿著一個空曠的走廊走，突然從后面關閉的一扇門傳來我從沒聽到過的充滿痛苦和恐怖的尖叫。門打開了，有個研究人員探出頭，讓我快點跑去弄點熱飲料給坐在她旁邊的那個年輕男子。原來，她剛告訴那個男子，為了報復他對他國家的政權做了公開的反對演講，他的媽媽被抓住、處決了。

在我20多歲時工作的每一天，我提醒我自己我是多么的幸運啊，能生活在一個民主選舉產生的政府的國家，在這里合法的陳述和公共審判是每一個人的權利。

每一天，我看到更多的證據，證明邪惡的人類為了獲得、維持權利而加害與他們同樣的人類。我開始為這些我看到的、聽到的、讀到的東西做惡夢，是文字惡夢。

然而，我也在國際特赦組織學到了比我以前知道的更多的人類善良的一面。

國際特赦組織動員了數千位沒有因為信仰問題而被拷問或入獄的人，讓他們來代表那些經歷過這些的人行動起來。人類的同理心具有能引導集體行動的力量，這種力量能拯救生命，讓囚徒獲得自由。在這種活動中，那些擁有受到保護的個人福址和安全的普通人聚在了一起，來拯救他們不認識、也永遠不會見面的人。我在這個過程中小小的參與是我生命中最卑微，也是最令人振奮的經歷之一。

人類和在這個星球上的其他生物不同，人類能夠在沒有自我經歷的情況下學習和理解。他們可以設身處地的思他人所思，想他人所想。

當然，這是一種力量，如同我虛構的魔法，這種力量是道德中立的。有人可能常運用這種能力去操作和控制，就像用于理解和同情一樣。

而且，許多人根本不喜歡訓練他們的想象力。他們寧愿在自己的經驗范圍內維持舒適的狀態，也不愿麻煩地去思考這樣的問題：如果他們不是現在的自己，那么應該是什么感覺呢？他們拒絕聽到尖叫，拒絕關注囚牢，他們可以對任何與他們自身無關的苦難關上思維與心靈的大門，他們可以拒絕知道這些。

我可能會羨慕那些以這種方式生活的人，但我不認為他們的噩夢比我少。選擇在狹小的空間生活會導致精神上的恐曠癥（對于陌生人、事物的恐懼），而且會帶來它自身形成的恐怖。我想那些任性固執的缺乏想象力的人會看到更多的怪物，他們常常更容易感到害怕。

甚至于，那些選擇不去想他人所想的人可能激活真正的惡魔。因為，雖然我們沒有親手犯下那些昭然若揭的惡行，我們卻以冷漠的方式和邪惡在串謀。

我在那個經典走廊(harry potter書內的一個地點？)的末端學到的，也是我18歲時在那冒險搜尋但不知道怎么定義的重要事情之一就是，如古希臘作家普盧塔克所寫的：“我們對內在修養的追求將會改變外在現實。”

這是一個令人驚訝的說法，然而它在我們生命中每一天會被證明一千多次。這句話部分地說明了我們和外部世界不可分離的聯系，我們只能通過生命存在來接觸別人生命的事實。

但是你們，2008哈佛大學的畢業生們，到底有多么得愿意來感受他人的生命呢？你們對付困難工作的智慧與能力，你們贏得和接受的教育，給了你們獨特的地位和責任。甚至你們的國籍也使你們與眾不同。你們中的很大一部分人屬于這個世界剩下的唯一超級大國（美國）。你們投票、生活、抗議的方式，你們給政府施加的壓力，會產生超越國界的影響。那是你們的特權，更是你們的負擔。

如果你們選擇用你們的地位和影響力來為沒法發出聲音的人說話；如果你們選擇不僅認同有權的強勢群體，也認同無權的弱勢群體；如果你們保留你們的能力，用來想象那些沒有你們這些優勢的人的現實生活，那么不僅是你們的家庭為你們的存在而感到自豪，為你們慶祝，而且那些因為你們的幫助而生活得更好的數以千萬計的人，會一起來為你們祝賀。我們不需要魔法來改變世界，我們已經在我們的內心擁有了足夠的力量：那就是把世界想象成更好的力量。

在我的演說快要結束的時候，我對大家還有最后一個希望，這是我在自己21歲時就明白的道理。畢業那天和我坐在一起的朋友后來成了我終生的朋友。他們是我孩子的教父母；他們是我碰到麻煩時能求助的人；他們是非常友善的，不會為了我在死亡復活節那天用他們名字而控告我的朋友。在我們畢業的時候，我們沉浸在巨大的情感沖擊中；我們沉浸于這段永不能重現的共同時光內；當然，如果我們中的某個人將來成為國家首相，我們也沉浸于能擁有極其有價值的相片作為證據的興奮中。

所以今天，我最希望你們能擁有同樣的友情。到了明天，我希望即使你們不記得我說過的任何一個字，但能記住塞內加，我在逃離那個走廊，回想進步的階梯，尋找古人智慧時碰到的另一個古羅馬哲學家，說過的一句話：“生活如同小說，要緊的不是它有多長，而在于它有多好。”

我祝愿你們都有幸福的生活。

謝謝大家。

第二篇：jk羅琳2008哈佛畢業典禮演講

JK羅琳JK羅琳2008哈佛大學畢業典禮上的演講

譯文_Juanz_新浪博客 如果您不僅去幫助強者，而且還會同情并幫扶弱者； 如果你會設身處地為不如你的人著想；

那么，您的存在將不僅是你家族的驕傲，也是無數因你幫助而過上幸福生活的人的驕傲。我們不需要魔法來改變世界，我們已經擁有了需要的所有的力量。我們有能力想象會更好。

我的演講也接近尾聲了。對你們，我有最后一個希望，也是我在21歲時就一直在思考的。畢業那天坐在我身邊的朋友將是我終身的朋友。他們是我的孩子的教父母，是我在遇到麻煩是可以求助的人，是當我用他們的姓名作為食死徒的名字而不會起訴我的朋友（譯者注：食死徒是哈利波特中人物在此指羅琳的朋友不會因為她用他們的名字而遭起訴）。

在我們畢業的時候，我們因無盡的愛而在此相聚。我們有共同的永不再有的經歷。當然，如果我們中的任何人競選首相，那么今天的照片將是極為寶貴的證明。所以，今天我可以給你們的，沒有比同伴的友誼更好的祝福了。

明天，我希望你們即使記不得我的名字，你還記得那些塞內加，他是我在羅馬文學著作中結識的另一位哲學家。在我退出職業生涯后，尋找古老的生活智慧： 生活就像故事一樣，不在乎長度，而在于質量。這才是問題的關鍵。我在此祝大家生活愉快！非常感謝Thank you!

來源：(http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_62b1cafa0100g5gn.html)-JK羅琳2008哈佛大學畢業典禮上的演講

譯文_Juanz_新浪博客

第三篇：JK羅琳2008哈佛畢業典禮演講

JK羅琳2008哈佛畢業典禮演講---不要害怕失敗中英文對照

members of the faculty, proud parents, and, above all, graduates, 福斯特主席，哈佛公司和監察委員會的各位成員，各位老師、家長、全體畢業生們：

The first thing I would like to say is “thank you.” Not only has Harvard given me an extraordinary honour, but the weeks of fear and nausea I’ve endured at the thought of giving this commencement address have made me lose weight.A win-win situation!Now all I have to do is take deep breaths, squint at the red banners and convince myself that I am at the world’s largest Gryffindors' reunion.首先請允許我說一聲謝謝。哈佛不僅給了我無上的榮譽，連日來為這個演講經受的恐懼和緊張，更令我減肥成功。這真是一個雙贏的局面。現在我要做的就是深呼吸幾下，瞇著眼睛看看前面的大紅橫幅，安慰自己正在世界上最大的格蘭芬多（滬江小編：以防有人沒看過《哈利波特》……格蘭芬多是小哈利所在的魔法學院的名字）聚會上。

Delivering a commencement address is a great responsibility;or so I thought until I cast my mind back to my own graduation.The commencement speaker that day was the distinguished British philosopher Baroness Mary Warnock.Reflecting on her speech has helped me enormously in writing this one, because it turns out that I can't remember a single word she said.This liberating discovery enables me to proceed without any fear that I might inadvertently influence you to abandon promising careers in business, law or politics for the giddy delights of becoming a gay wizard.發表畢業演說是一個巨大的責任，至少在我回憶自己當年的畢業典禮前是這么認為的。那天做演講的是英國著名的哲學家 Baroness Mary Warnock，對她演講的回憶，對我寫今天的演講稿，產生了極大的幫助，因為我不記得她說過的任何一句話了。這個發現讓我釋然，讓我不再擔心我可能會無意中影響你放棄在商業，法律或政治上的大好前途，轉而醉心于成為一個快樂的魔法師（gay有快樂和同性戀的意思）。

You see? If all you remember in years to come is the 'gay wizard' joke, I've still come out ahead of Baroness Mary Warnock.Achievable goals-the first step to self-improvement.你們看，如果在若干年后你們還記得“快樂的魔法師”這個笑話，那就證明我已經超越了Baroness Mary Warnock。建立可實現的目標——這是提高自我的第一步。

Actually, I have wracked my mind and heart for what I ought to say to you today.I have asked myself what I wish I had known at my own graduation, and what important lessons I have learned in the 21 years that has expired between that day and this.實際上，我為今天應該和大家談些什么絞盡了腦汁。我問自己什么是我希望早在畢業典禮上就該了解的，而從那時起到現在的 21年間，我又得到了什么重要的啟示。

I have come up with two answers.On this wonderful day when we are gathered together to celebrate your academic success, I have decided to talk to you about the benefits of failure.And as you stand on the threshold of what is sometimes called 'real life', I want to extol the crucial importance of imagination.我想到了兩個答案。在這美好的一天，當我們一起慶祝你們取得學業成就的時刻，我希望告訴你們失敗有什么樣的益處；在你們即將邁向“現實生活”的道路之際，我還要褒揚想象力的重要性。

These may seem quixotic or paradoxical choices, but bear with me.這些似乎是不切實際或自相矛盾的選擇，但請先容我講完。

Looking back at the 21-year-old that I was at graduation, is a slightly uncomfortable experience for the 42-year-old that she has become.Half my lifetime ago, I was striking an uneasy balance between the ambition I had for myself, and what those closest to me expected of me.回顧21歲剛剛畢業時的自己，對于今天42歲的我來說，是一個稍微不太舒服的經歷。可以說，我人生的前一部分，一直掙扎在自己的雄心和身邊的人對我的期望之間。

I was convinced that the only thing I wanted to do, ever, was to write novels.However, my parents, both of whom came from impoverished backgrounds and neither of whom had been to college, took the view that my overactive imagination was an amusing personal quirk that could never pay a mortgage, or secure a pension.我一直深信，自己唯一想做的事情，就是寫小說。不過，我的父母，他們都來自貧窮的背景，沒有任何一人上過大學，堅持認為我過度的想象力是一個令人驚訝的個人怪癖，根本不足以讓我支付按揭，或者取得足夠的養老金。

I know the irony strikes like with the force of a cartoon anvil now, but… 我現在明白反諷就像用卡通鐵砧去打擊你，但...They had hoped that I would take a vocational degree;I wanted to study English Literature.A compromise was reached that in retrospect satisfied nobody, and I went up to study Modern Languages.Hardly had my parents' car rounded the corner at the end of the road than I ditched German and scuttled off down the Classics corridor.他們希望我去拿個職業學位，而我想去攻讀英國文學。最后，達成了一個雙方都不甚滿意的妥協：我改學現代語言。可是等到父母一走開，我立刻放棄了德語而報名學習古典文學。

I cannot remember telling my parents that I was studying Classics;they might well have found out for the first time on graduation day.Of all the subjects on this planet, I think they would have been hard put to name one less useful than Greek mythology when it came to securing the keys to an executive bathroom.我不記得將這事告訴了父母，他們可能是在我畢業典禮那一天才發現的。我想，在全世界的所有專業中，他們也許認為，不會有比研究希臘神話更沒用的專業了，根本無法換來一間獨立寬敞的衛生間。

I would like to make it clear, in parenthesis, that I do not blame my parents for their point of view.There is an expiry date on blaming your parents for steering you in the wrong direction;the moment you are old enough to take the wheel, responsibility lies with you.What is more, I cannot criticise my parents for hoping that I would never experience poverty.They had been poor themselves, and I have since been poor, and I quite agree with them that it is not an ennobling experience.Poverty entails fear, and stress, and sometimes depression;it means a thousand petty humiliations and hardships.Climbing out of poverty by your own efforts, that is indeed something on which to pride yourself, but poverty itself is romanticised only by fools.我想澄清一下：我不會因為父母的觀點，而責怪他們。埋怨父母給你指錯方向是有一個時間段的。當你成長到可以控制自我方向的時候，你就要自己承擔責任了。尤其是，我不會因為父母希望我不要過窮日子，而責怪他們。他們一直很貧窮，我后來也一度很窮，所以我很理解他們。貧窮并不是一種高貴的經歷，它帶來恐懼、壓力、有時還有絕望，它意味著許許多多的羞辱和艱辛。靠自己的努力擺脫貧窮，確實可以引以自豪，但貧窮本身只有對傻瓜而言才是浪漫的。

What I feared most for myself at your age was not poverty, but failure.我在你們這個年齡，最害怕的不是貧窮，而是失敗。

At your age, in spite of a distinct lack of motivation at university, where I had spent far too long in the coffee bar writing stories, and far too little time at lectures, I had a knack for passing examinations, and that, for years, had been the measure of success in my life and that of my peers.我在您們這么大時，明顯缺乏在大學學習的動力，我花了太久時間在咖啡吧寫故事，而在課堂的時間卻很少。我有一個通過考試的訣竅，并且數年間一直讓我在大學生活和同齡人中不落人后。

I am not dull enough to suppose that because you are young, gifted and well-educated, you have never known hardship or heartache.Talent and intelligence never yet inoculated anyone against the caprice of the Fates, and I do not for a moment suppose that everyone here has enjoyed an existence of unruffled privilege and contentment.我不想愚蠢地假設，因為你們年輕、有天份，并且受過良好的教育，就從來沒有遇到困難或心碎的時刻。擁有才華和智慧，從來不會使人對命運的反復無常有所準備；我也不會假設大家坐在這里冷靜地滿足于自身的優越感。

However, the fact that you are graduating from Harvard suggests that you are not very well-acquainted with failure.You might be driven by a fear of failure quite as much as a desire for success.Indeed, your conception of failure might not be too far from the average person's idea of success, so high have you already flown academically.相反，你們是哈佛畢業生的這個事實，意味著你們并不很了解失敗。你們也許極其渴望成功，所以非常害怕失敗。說實話，你們眼中的失敗，很可能就是普通人眼中的成功，畢竟你們在學業上已經達到很高的高度了。

Ultimately, we all have to decide for ourselves what constitutes failure, but the world is quite eager to give you a set of criteria if you let it.So I think it fair to say that by any conventional measure, a mere seven years after my graduation day, I had failed on an epic scale.An exceptionally short-lived marriage had imploded, and I was jobless, a lone parent, and as poor as it is possible to be in modern Britain, without being homeless.The fears my parents had had for me, and that I had had for myself, had both come to pass, and by every usual standard, I was the biggest failure I knew.最終，我們所有人都必須自己決定什么算作失敗，但如果你愿意，世界是相當渴望給你一套標準的。所以我想很公平的講，從任何傳統的標準看，在我畢業僅僅七年后的日子里，我的失敗達到了史詩般空前的規模：短命的婚姻閃電般地破裂，我又失業成了一個艱難的單身母親。除了流浪漢，我是當代英國最窮的人之一，真的一無所有。當年父母和我自己對未來的擔憂，現在都變成了現實。按照慣常的標準來看，我也是我所知道的最失敗的人。

Now, I am not going to stand here and tell you that failure is fun.That period of my life was a dark one, and I had no idea that there was going to be what the press has since represented as a kind of fairy tale resolution.I had no idea how far the tunnel extended, and for a long time, any light at the end of it was a hope rather than a reality.現在，我不打算站在這里告訴你們，失敗是有趣的。那段日子是我生命中的黑暗歲月，我不知道它是否代表童話故事里需要歷經的磨難，更不知道自己還要在黑暗中走多久。很長一段時間里，前面留給我的只是希望，而不是現實。

So why do I talk about the benefits of failure? Simply because failure meant a stripping away of the inessential.I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was, and began to direct all my energy into finishing the only work that mattered to me.Had I really succeeded at anything else, I might never have found the determination to succeed in the one arena I believed I truly belonged.I was set free, because my greatest fear had been realised, and I was still alive, and I still had a daughter whom I adored, and I had an old typewriter and a big idea.And so rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.那么為什么我要談論失敗的好處呢？因為失敗意味著剝離掉那些不必要的東西。我因此不再偽裝自己、遠離自我，而重新開始把所有精力放在對我最重要的事情上。如果不是沒有在其他領域成功過，我可能就不會找到，在一個我確信真正屬于的舞臺上取得成功的決心。我獲得了自由，因為最害怕的雖然已經發生了，但我還活著，我仍然有一個我深愛的女兒，我還有一個舊打字機和一個很大的想法。所以困境的谷底，成為我重建生活的堅實基礎。

You might never fail on the scale I did, but some failure in life is inevitable.It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all – in which case, you fail by default.你們可能永遠沒有達到我經歷的那種失敗程度，但有些失敗，在生活中是不可避免的。生活不可能沒有一點失敗，除非你生活的萬般小心，而那也意味著你沒有真正在生活了。無論怎樣，有些失敗還是注定地要發生。

Failure gave me an inner security that I had never attained by passing examinations.Failure taught me things about myself that I could have learned no other way.I discovered that I had a strong will, and more discipline than I had suspected;I also found out that I had friends whose value was truly above the price of rubies.失敗使我的內心產生一種安全感，這是我從考試中沒有得到過的。失敗讓我看清自己，這也是我通過其他方式無法體會的。我發現，我比自己認為的，要有更強的意志和決心。我還發現，我擁有比寶石更加珍貴的朋友。

The knowledge that you have emerged wiser and stronger from setbacks means that you are, ever after, secure in your ability to survive.You will never truly know yourself, or the strength of your relationships, until both have been tested by adversity.Such knowledge is a true gift, for all that it is painfully won, and it has been worth more to me than any qualification I ever earned.從挫折中獲得智慧、變得堅強，意味著你比以往任何時候都更有能力生存。只有在逆境來臨的時候，你才會真正認識你自己，了解身邊的人。這種了解是真正的財富，雖然是用痛苦換來的，但比我以前得到的任何資格證書都有用。

So given a Time Turner, I would tell my 21-year-old self that personal happiness lies in knowing that life is not a check-list of acquisition or achievement.Your qualifications, your CV, are not your life, though you will meet many people of my age and older who confuse the two.Life is difficult, and complicated, and beyond anyone's total control, and the humility to know that will enable you to survive its vicissitudes.如果給我一部時間機器，我會告訴21歲的自己，人的幸福在于知道生活不是一份漂亮的成績單，你的資歷、簡歷，都不是你的生活，雖然你會碰到很多與我同齡或更老一點的人今天依然還在混淆兩者。生活是艱辛的，復雜的，超出任何人的控制能力，而謙恭地了解這一點，將使你歷經滄桑后能夠更好的生存。

You might think that I chose my second theme, the importance of imagination, because of the part it played in rebuilding my life, but that is not wholly so.Though I will defend the value of bedtime stories to my last gasp, I have learned to value imagination in a much broader sense.Imagination is not only the uniquely human capacity to envision that which is not, and therefore the fount of all invention and innovation.In its arguably most transformative and revelatory capacity, it is the power that enables us to empathise with humans whose experiences we have never shared.對于第二個主題的選擇——想象力的重要性——你們可能會認為是因為它對我重建生活起到了幫助，但事實并非完全如此。雖然我愿誓死捍衛睡前要給孩子講故事的價值觀，我對想象力的理解已經有了更廣泛的含義。想象力不僅僅是人類設想還不存在的事物這種獨特的能力，為所有發明和創新提供源泉，它還是人類改造和揭露現實的能力，使我們同情自己不曾經受的他人苦難。

One of the greatest formative experiences of my life preceded Harry Potter, though it informed much of what I subsequently wrote in those books.This revelation came in the form of one of my earliest day jobs.Though I was sloping off to write stories during my lunch hours, I paid the rent in my early 20s by working at the African research department at Amnesty International's headquarters in London.其中一個影響最大的經歷發生在我寫哈利波特之前，為我隨后寫書提供了很多想法。這些想法成形于我早期的工作經歷，在20 多歲時，盡管我可以在午餐時間里悄悄寫故事，可為了付房租，我做的主要工作是在倫敦總部的大赦國際研究部門。

There in my little office I read hastily scribbled letters smuggled out of totalitarian regimes by men and women who were risking imprisonment to inform the outside world of what was happening to them.I saw photographs of those who had disappeared without trace, sent to Amnesty by their desperate families and friends.I read the testimony of torture victims and saw pictures of their injuries.I opened handwritten, eye-witness accounts of summary trials and executions, of kidnappings and rapes.在我的小辦公室，我看到了人們匆匆寫的信件，它們是從極權主義政權被偷送出來的。那些人冒著被監禁的危險，告知外面的世界他們那里正在發生的事情。我看到了那些無跡可尋的人的照片，它們是被那些絕望的家人和朋友送來的。我看過拷問受害者的證詞和被害的照片。我打開過手寫的目擊證詞，描述綁架和強奸犯的審判和處決。

Many of my co-workers were ex-political prisoners, people who had been displaced from their homes, or fled into exile, because they had the temerity to think independently of their government.Visitors to our office included those who had come to give information, or to try and find out what had happened to those who they had left behind.我有很多的同事是前政治犯，他們已離開家園流離失所，或逃亡流放，因為他們敢于懷疑政府、獨立思考。來我們辦公室的訪客，包括那些前來提供信息，或想設法知道那些被迫留下的同志發生了什么事的人。

I shall never forget the African torture victim, a young man no older than I was at the time, who had become mentally ill after all he had endured in his homeland.He trembled uncontrollably as he spoke into a video camera about the brutality inflicted upon him.He was a foot taller than I was, and seemed as fragile as a child.I was given the job of escorting him to the Underground Station afterwards, and this man whose life had been shattered by cruelty took my hand with exquisite courtesy, and wished me future happiness.我將永遠不會忘記一個非洲酷刑的受害者，一名當時還沒有我大的年輕男子，他因在故鄉的經歷而精神錯亂。在攝像機前講述被殘暴地摧殘的時候，他顫抖失控。他比我高一英尺，卻看上去像一個脆弱的兒童。我被安排隨后護送他到地鐵站，這名生活已被殘酷地打亂的男子，小心翼翼地握著我的手，祝我未來生活幸福。

And as long as I live I shall remember walking along an empty corridor and suddenly hearing, from behind a closed door, a scream of pain and horror such as I have never heard since.The door opened, and the researcher poked out her head and told me to run and make a hot drink for the young man sitting with her.She had just given him the news that in retaliation for his own outspokenness against his country's regime, his mother had been seized and executed.只要我活著，我還會記得，在一個空蕩蕩的的走廊，突然從背后的門里，傳來我從未聽過的痛苦和恐懼的尖叫。門打開了，調查員探出頭請求我，為坐在她旁邊的青年男子，調一杯熱飲料。她剛剛給他的消息是，為了報復他對國家政權的批評，他的母親已經被捕并執行了槍決。

Every day of my working week in my early 20s I was reminded how incredibly fortunate I was, to live in a country with a democratically elected government, where legal representation and a public trial were the rights of everyone.在我20多歲的那段日子，每一天的工作，都在提醒我自己是多么幸運。生活在一個民選政府的國家，依法申述與公開審理，是所有人的權利。

Every day, I saw more evidence about the evils humankind will inflict on their fellow humans, to gain or maintain power.I began to have nightmares, literal nightmares, about some of the things I saw, heard and read.每一天，我都能看到更多有關惡人的證據，他們為了獲得或維持權力，對自己的同胞犯下暴行。我開始做噩夢，真正意義上的噩夢，全都和我所見所聞有關。

And yet I also learned more about human goodness at Amnesty International than I had ever known before.同時在這里我也了解到更多關于人類的善良，比我以前想象的要多很多。

Amnesty mobilises thousands of people who have never been tortured or imprisoned for their beliefs to act on behalf of those who have.The power of human empathy, leading to collective action, saves lives, and frees prisoners.Ordinary people, whose personal well-being and security are assured, join together in huge numbers to save people they do not know, and will never meet.My small participation in that process was one of the most humbling and inspiring experiences of my life.大赦動員成千上萬沒有因為個人信仰而受到折磨或監禁的人，去為那些遭受這種不幸的人奔走。人類同理心的力量，引發集體行動，拯救生命，解放囚犯。個人的福祉和安全有保證的普通百姓，攜手合作，大量挽救那些他們素不相識，也許永遠不會見面的人。我用自己微薄的力量參與了這一過程，也獲得了更大的啟發。

Unlike any other creature on this planet, human beings can learn and understand, without having experienced.They can think themselves into other people's places.不同于在這個星球上任何其他的動物，人類可以學習和理解未曾經歷過的東西。他們可以將心比心、設身處地的理解他人。

Of course, this is a power, like my brand of fictional magic, that is morally neutral.One might use such an ability to manipulate, or control, just as much as to understand or sympathise.當然，這種能力，就像在我虛構的魔法世界里一樣，在道德上是中立的。一個人可能會利用這種能力去操縱控制，也有人選擇去了解同情。

And many prefer not to exercise their imaginations at all.They choose to remain comfortably within the bounds of their own experience, never troubling to wonder how it would feel to have been born other than they are.They can refuse to hear screams or to peer inside cages;they can close their minds and hearts to any suffering that does not touch them personally;they can refuse to know.而很多人選擇不去使用他們的想象力。他們選擇留在自己舒適的世界里，從來不愿花力氣去想想如果生在別處會怎樣。他們可以拒絕去聽別人的尖叫，看一眼囚禁的籠子；他們可以封閉自己的內心，只要痛苦不觸及個人，他們可以拒絕去了解。

I might be tempted to envy people who can live that way, except that I do not think they have any fewer nightmares than I do.Choosing to live in narrow spaces can lead to a form of mental agoraphobia, and that brings its own terrors.I think the wilfully unimaginative see more monsters.They are often more afraid.我可能會受到誘惑，去嫉妒那樣生活的人。但我不認為他們做的噩夢會比我更少。選擇生活在狹窄的空間，可以導致不敢面對開闊的視野，給自己帶來恐懼感。我認為不愿展開想像的人會看到更多的怪獸，他們往往更感到更害怕。

What is more, those who choose not to empathise may enable real monsters.For without ever committing an act of outright evil ourselves, we collude with it, through our own apathy.更甚的是，那些選擇不去同情的人，可能會激活真正的怪獸。因為盡管自己沒有犯下罪惡，我們卻通過冷漠與之勾結。

One of the many things I learned at the end of that Classics corridor down which I ventured at the age of 18, in search of something I could not then define, was this, written by the Greek author Plutarch: What we achieve inwardly will change outer reality.我18歲開始從古典文學中汲取許多知識，其中之一當時并不完全理解，那就是希臘作家普魯塔克所說：我們內心獲得的，將改變外在的現實。

That is an astonishing statement and yet proven a thousand times every day of our lives.It expresses, in part, our inescapable connection with the outside world, the fact that we touch other people's lives simply by existing.那是一個驚人的論斷，在我們生活的每一天里被無數次證實。它指明我們與外部世界有無法脫離的聯系，我們以自身的存在接觸著他人的生命。

But how much more are you, Harvard graduates of 2008, likely to touch other people's lives? Your intelligence, your capacity for hard work, the education you have earned and received, give you unique status, and unique responsibilities.Even your nationality sets you apart.The great majority of you belong to the world's only remaining superpower.The way you vote, the way you live, the way you protest, the pressure you bring to bear on your government, has an impact way beyond your borders.That is your privilege, and your burden.但是，哈佛大學的2008屆畢業生們，你們多少人有可能去觸及他人的生命？你們的智慧，你們努力工作的能力，以及你們所受到的教育，給予你們獨特的地位和責任。甚至你們的國籍也讓你們與眾不同，你們絕大部份人屬于這個世界上唯一的超級大國。你們表決的方式，你們生活的方式，你們抗議的方式，你們給政府帶來的壓力，具有超乎尋常的影響力。這是你們的特權，也是你們的責任。

If you choose to use your status and influence to raise your voice on behalf of those who have no voice;if you choose to identify not only with the powerful, but with the powerless;if you retain the ability to imagine yourself into the lives of those who do not have your advantages, then it will not only be your proud families who celebrate your existence, but thousands and millions of people whose reality you have helped to change.We do not need magic to transform the world, we carry all the power we need inside ourselves already: we have the power to imagine better.如果你選擇利用自己的地位和影響，去為那些沒有發言權的人發出聲音；如果你選擇不僅與強者為伍，還會同情幫扶弱者；如果你會設身處地為不如你的人著想，那么你的存在，將不僅是你家人的驕傲，更是無數因為你的幫助而改變命運的成千上萬人的驕傲。我們不需要改變世界的魔法，我們自己的內心就有這種力量：那就是我們一直在夢想，讓這個世界變得更美好。

I am nearly finished.I have one last hope for you, which is something that I already had at 21.The friends with whom I sat on graduation day have been my friends for life.They are my children's godparents, the people to whom I've been able to turn in times of real trouble, people who have been kind enough not to sue me when I've used their names for Death Eaters.At our graduation we were bound by enormous affection, by our shared experience of a time that could never come again, and, of course, by the knowledge that we held certain photographic evidence that would be exceptionally valuable if any of us ran for Prime Minister.我的演講要接近尾聲了。對你們，我有最后一個希望，也是我21歲時就有的。畢業那天坐在我身邊的朋友現在是我終身的摯交，他們是我孩子的教父母，是在我遇到麻煩時愿意伸出援手，在我用他們的名字給哈利波特中的 “食死徒”起名而不會起訴我的朋友。我們在畢業典禮時坐在了一起，因為我們關系親密，擁有共同的永遠無法再來的經歷，當然，也因為假想要是我們中的任何人競選首相，那照片將是極為寶貴的關系證明。

So today, I can wish you nothing better than similar friendships.And tomorrow, I hope that even if you remember not a single word of mine, you remember those of Seneca, another of those old Romans I met when I fled down the Classics corridor, in retreat from career ladders, in search of ancient wisdom: 所以今天我可以給你們的，沒有比擁有知己更好的祝福了。明天，我希望即使你們不記得我說的任何一個字，你們還能記得哲學家塞內加的一句至理明言。我當年沒有順著事業的階梯向上攀爬，轉而與他在古典文學的殿堂相遇，他的古老智慧給了我人生的啟迪：

As is a tale, so is life: not how long it is, but how good it is, is what matters.生活就像故事一樣：不在乎長短，而在于質量，這才是最重要的。

I wish you all very good lives.我祝愿你們都有美好的生活。

Thank you very much.非常感謝大家。

第四篇：JK羅琳2008哈佛畢業典禮演講

President Faust, members of the Harvard Corporation and the Board of Overseers, members of the faculty, proud parents, and, above all, graduates.The first thing I would like to say is ??thank you.?ˉ Not only has Harvard given me an extraordinary honour, but the weeks of fear and nausea I have endured at the thought of giving this commencement address have made me lose weight.A win-win situation!Now all I have to do is take deep breaths, squint at the red banners and convince myself that I am at the world?ˉs largest Gryffindor reunion.Delivering a commencement address is a great responsibility;or so I thought until I cast my mind back to my own graduation.The commencement speaker that day was the distinguished British philosopher Baroness Mary Warnock.Reflecting on her speech has helped me enormously in writing this one, because it turns out that I can?ˉt remember a single word she said.This liberating discovery enables me to proceed without any fear that I might inadvertently influence you to abandon promising careers in business, the law or politics for the giddy delights of becoming a gay wizard.You see? If all you remember in years to come is the ??gay wizard?ˉ joke, I?ˉve come out ahead of Baroness Mary Warnock.Achievable goals: the first step to self improvement.Actually, I have wracked my mind and heart for what I ought to say to you today.I have asked myself what I wish I had known at my own graduation, and what important lessons I have learned in the 21 years that have expired between that day and this.I have come up with two answers.On this wonderful day when we are gathered together to celebrate your academic success, I have decided to talk to you about the benefits of failure.And as you stand on the threshold of what is sometimes called ??real life?ˉ, I want to extol the crucial importance of imagination.These may seem quixotic or paradoxical choices, but please bear with me.Looking back at the 21-year-old that I was at graduation, is a slightly uncomfortable experience for the 42-year-old that she has become.Half my lifetime ago, I was striking an uneasy balance between the ambition I had for myself, and what those closest to me expected of me.I was convinced that the only thing I wanted to do, ever, was to write novels.However, my parents, both of whom came from impoverished backgrounds and neither of whom had been to college, took the view that my overactive imagination was an amusing personal quirk that would never pay a mortgage, or secure a pension.I know that the irony strikes with the force of a cartoon anvil, now.So they hoped that I would take a vocational degree;I wanted to study English Literature.A compromise was reached that in retrospect satisfied nobody, and I went up to study Modern Languages.Hardly had my parents?ˉ car rounded the corner at the end of the road than I ditched German and scuttled off down the Classics corridor.I cannot remember telling my parents that I was studying Classics;they might well have found out for the first time on graduation day.Of all the subjects on this planet, I think they would have been hard put to name one less useful than Greek mythology when it came to securing the keys to an executive bathroom.I would like to make it clear, in parenthesis, that I do not blame my parents for their point of view.There is an expiry date on blaming your parents for steering you in the wrong direction;the moment you are old enough to take the wheel, responsibility lies with you.What is more, I cannot criticise my parents for hoping that I would never experience poverty.They had been poor themselves, and I have since been poor, and I quite agree with them that it is not an ennobling experience.Poverty entails fear, and stress, and sometimes depression;it means a thousand petty humiliations and hardships.Climbing out of poverty by your own efforts, that is indeed something on which to pride yourself, but poverty itself is romanticised only by fools.What I feared most for myself at your age was not poverty, but failure.At your age, in spite of a distinct lack of motivation at university, where I had spent far too long in the coffee bar writing stories, and far too little time at lectures, I had a knack for passing examinations, and that, for years, had been the measure of success in my life and that of my peers.I am not dull enough to suppose that because you are young, gifted and well-educated, you have never known hardship or heartbreak.Talent and intelligence never yet inoculated anyone against the caprice of the Fates, and I do not for a moment suppose that everyone here has enjoyed an existence of unruffled privilege and contentment.However, the fact that you are graduating from Harvard suggests that you are not very well-acquainted with failure.You might be driven by a fear of failure quite as much as a desire for success.Indeed, your conception of failure might not be too far from the average person?ˉs idea of success, so high have you already flown.Ultimately, we all have to decide for ourselves what constitutes failure, but the world is quite eager to give you a set of criteria if you let it.So I think it fair to say that by any conventional measure, a mere seven years after my graduation day, I had failed on an epic scale.An exceptionally short-lived marriage had imploded, and I was jobless, a lone parent, and as poor as it is possible to be in modern Britain, without being homeless.The fears that my parents had had for me, and that I had had for myself, had both come to pass, and by every usual standard, I was the biggest failure I knew.Now, I am not going to stand here and tell you that failure is fun.That period of my life was a dark one, and I had no idea that there was going to be what the press has since represented as a kind of fairy tale resolution.I had no idea then how far the tunnel extended, and for a long time, any light at the end of it was a hope rather than a reality.So why do I talk about the benefits of failure? Simply because failure meant a stripping away of the inessential.I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was, and began to direct all my energy into finishing the only work that mattered to me.Had I really succeeded at anything else, I might never have found the determination to succeed in the one arena I believed I truly belonged.I was set free, because my greatest fear had been realised, and I was still alive, and I still had a daughter whom I adored, and I had an old typewriter and a big idea.And so rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.You might never fail on the scale I did, but some failure in life is inevitable.It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all ¨C in which case, you fail by default.Failure gave me an inner security that I had never attained by passing examinations.Failure taught me things about myself that I could have learned no other way.I discovered that I had a strong will, and more discipline than I had suspected;I also found out that I had friends whose value was truly above the price of rubies.The knowledge that you have emerged wiser and stronger from setbacks means that you are, ever after, secure in your ability to survive.You will never truly know yourself, or the strength of your relationships, until both have been tested by adversity.Such knowledge is a true gift, for all that it is painfully won, and it has been worth more than any qualification I ever earned.So given a Time Turner, I would tell my 21-year-old self that personal happiness lies in knowing that life is not a check-list of acquisition or achievement.Your qualifications, your CV, are not your life, though you will meet many people of my age and older who confuse the two.Life is difficult, and complicated, and beyond anyone?ˉs total control, and the humility to know that will enable you to survive its vicissitudes.Now you might think that I chose my second theme, the importance of imagination, because of the part it played in rebuilding my life, but that is not wholly so.Though I personally will defend the value of bedtime stories to my last gasp, I have learned to value imagination in a much broader sense.Imagination is not only the uniquely human capacity to envision that which is not, and therefore the fount of all invention and innovation.In its arguably most transformative and revelatory capacity, it is the power that enables us to empathise with humans whose experiences we have never shared.One of the greatest formative experiences of my life preceded Harry Potter, though it informed much of what I subsequently wrote in those books.This revelation came in the form of one of my earliest day jobs.Though I was sloping off to write stories during my lunch hours, I paid the rent in my early 20s by working at the African research department at Amnesty International?ˉs headquarters in London.There in my little office I read hastily scribbled letters smuggled out of totalitarian regimes by men and women who were risking imprisonment to inform the outside world of what was happening to them.I saw photographs of those who had disappeared without trace, sent to Amnesty by their desperate families and friends.I read the testimony of torture victims and saw pictures of their injuries.I opened handwritten, eye-witness accounts of summary trials and executions, of kidnappings and rapes.Many of my co-workers were ex-political prisoners, people who had been displaced from their homes, or fled into exile, because they had the temerity to speak against their governments.Visitors to our offices included those who had come to give information, or to try and find out what had happened to those they had left behind.I shall never forget the African torture victim, a young man no older than I was at the time, who had become mentally ill after all he had endured in his homeland.He trembled uncontrollably as he spoke into a video camera about the brutality inflicted upon him.He was a foot taller than I was, and seemed as fragile as a child.I was given the job of escorting him back to the Underground Station afterwards, and this man whose life had been shattered by cruelty took my hand with exquisite courtesy, and wished me future happiness.And as long as I live I shall remember walking along an empty corridor and suddenly hearing, from behind a closed door, a scream of pain and horror such as I have never heard since.The door opened, and the researcher poked out her head and told me to run and make a hot drink for the young man sitting with her.She had just had to give him the news that in retaliation for his own outspokenness against his country?ˉs regime, his mother had been seized and executed.Every day of my working week in my early 20s I was reminded how incredibly fortunate I was, to live in a country with a democratically elected government, where legal representation and a public trial were the rights of everyone.Every day, I saw more evidence about the evils humankind will inflict on their fellow humans, to gain or maintain power.I began to have nightmares, literal nightmares, about some of the things I saw, heard, and read.And yet I also learned more about human goodness at Amnesty International than I had ever known before.Amnesty mobilises thousands of people who have never been tortured or imprisoned for their beliefs to act on behalf of those who have.The power of human empathy, leading to collective action, saves lives, and frees prisoners.Ordinary people, whose personal well-being and security are assured, join together in huge numbers to save people they do not know, and will never meet.My small participation in that process was one of the most humbling and inspiring experiences of my life.Unlike any other creature on this planet, humans can learn and understand, without having experienced.They can think themselves into other people?ˉs places.Of course, this is a power, like my brand of fictional magic, that is morally neutral.One might use such an ability to manipulate, or control, just as much as to understand or sympathise.And many prefer not to exercise their imaginations at all.They choose to remain comfortably within the bounds of their own experience, never troubling to wonder how it would feel to have been born other than they are.They can refuse to hear screams or to peer inside cages;they can close their minds and hearts to any suffering that does not touch them personally;they can refuse to know.I might be tempted to envy people who can live that way, except that I do not think they have any fewer nightmares than I do.Choosing to live in narrow spaces leads to a form of mental agoraphobia, and that brings its own terrors.I think the wilfully unimaginative see more monsters.They are often more afraid.What is more, those who choose not to empathise enable real monsters.For without ever committing an act of outright evil ourselves, we collude with it, through our own apathy.One of the many things I learned at the end of that Classics corridor down which I ventured at the age of 18, in search of something I could not then define, was this, written by the Greek author Plutarch: What we achieve inwardly will change outer reality.That is an astonishing statement and yet proven a thousand times every day of our lives.It expresses, in part, our inescapable connection with the outside world, the fact that we touch other people?ˉs lives simply by existing.But how much more are you, Harvard graduates of 2008, likely to touch other people?ˉs lives? Your intelligence, your capacity for hard work, the education you have earned and received, give you unique status, and unique responsibilities.Even your nationality sets you apart.The great majority of you belong to the world?ˉs only remaining superpower.The way you vote, the way you live, the way you protest, the pressure you bring to bear on your government, has an impact way beyond your borders.That is your privilege, and your burden.If you choose to use your status and influence to raise your voice on behalf of those who have no voice;if you choose to identify not only with the powerful, but with the powerless;if you retain the ability to imagine yourself into the lives of those who do not have your advantages, then it will not only be your proud families who celebrate your existence, but thousands and millions of people whose reality you have helped change.We do not need magic to change the world, we carry all the power we need inside ourselves already: we have the power to imagine better.I am nearly finished.I have one last hope for you, which is something that I already had at 21.The friends with whom I sat on graduation day have been my friends for life.They are my children?ˉs godparents, the people to whom I?ˉve been able to turn in times of trouble, people who have been kind enough not to sue me when I took their names for Death Eaters.At our graduation we were bound by enormous affection, by our shared experience of a time that could never come again, and, of course, by the knowledge that we held certain photographic evidence that would be exceptionally valuable if any of us ran for Prime Minister.So today, I wish you nothing better than similar friendships.And tomorrow, I hope that even if you remember not a single word of mine, you remember those of Seneca, another of those old Romans I met when I fled down the Classics corridor, in retreat from career ladders, in search of ancient wisdom:

As is a tale, so is life: not how long it is, but how good it is, is what matters.I wish you all very good lives.Thank you very much.

第五篇：jk羅琳在哈佛畢業典禮演講(中英文)

jk羅琳在哈佛畢業典禮演講（中英文）

resident Faust, members of the Harvard Corporation and the Board of Overseers, members of the faculty, proud parents, and, above all, graduates，致Faust校長，哈佛集團以及哈佛監事委員會的各位成員，各位教職員工，眾多自豪的家長，以及最為重要的——各位畢業生們：

The first thing I would like to say is 'thank you.' Not only has Harvard given me an extraordinary honour, but the weeks of fear and nausea I've experienced at the thought of giving this commencement address have made me lose weight.A win-win situation!Now all I have to do is take deep breaths, squint at the red banners and fool myself into believing I am at the world's best-educated Harry Potter convention.我想要說的第一句話是“謝謝你們”。這份感謝不僅來自于哈佛賦予我如此非同尋常的榮譽，更是由于幾個星期以來每當我想到今天的致詞就會覺得頭暈惡心，因而終于成功的減肥了。這就是“雙贏”啊!現在，我只需要深呼吸幾次，瞄幾眼紅色的橫幅，然后裝模作樣的讓自己相信，我正身處世界上受過最好教育的哈里波特迷的盛大集會之中。

Delivering a commencement address is a great responsibility;or so I thought until I cast my mind back to my own graduation.The commencement speaker that day was the distinguished British philosopher Baroness Mary Warnock.Reflecting on her speech has helped me enormously in writing this one, because it turns out that I can't remember a single word she said.This liberating discovery enables me to proceed without any fear that I might inadvertently influence you to abandon promising careers in business, law or politics for the giddy delights of becoming a gay wizard.畢業典禮上致詞意味著極大的責任——我這樣想著，直到我開始回想我自己的畢業典禮。那天致詞的是著名的英國哲學家 Baroness Mary Warnock。對于她的演講的回憶也極大地幫助了我完成現在這份，因為，我完全想不起來她說了什么。這個具有解放意義的重大發現讓我無所畏懼的寫下自己的致詞，因為我再也不必擔心會在不經意間對你們造成影響，以至于讓你們為了成為一個快樂巫師的虛幻憧憬，就放棄自己在商業、法律界或政界的遠大前程。

You see? If all you remember in years to come is the 'gay wizard' joke, I've still come out ahead of Baroness Mary Warnock.Achievable goals: the first step towards personal improvement.Actually, I have wracked my mind and heart for what I ought to say to you today.I have asked myself what I wish I had known at my own graduation, and what important lessons I have learned in the 21 years that has expired between that day and this.I have come up with two answers.On this wonderful day when we are gathered together to celebrate your academic success, I have decided to talk to you about the benefits of failure.And as you stand on the threshold of what is sometimes called 'real life', I want to extol the crucial importance of imagination.These might seem quixotic or paradoxical choices, but please bear with me.事實上，為了確定今天應該對你們說些什么，我真是絞盡了腦汁。我問自己，在我自己的畢業典禮上，我曾期待知道什么?而自那天開始到現在的21年間，我又學到了那些教訓?

我想到了兩個答案。在今天這個美妙的時刻，當我們齊聚一堂慶祝你們取得學業成功的時候，我決定跟你們談談失敗帶來的好處。另外，在你們正要一腳踏入所謂“真實的生活”的時候，我還要高聲贊頌想象力的重大意義。

這些決定看起來頗為荒誕而矛盾，但是啊，請聽我慢慢道來。

Looking back at the 21-year-old that I was at graduation, is a slightly uncomfortable experience for the 42-year-old that she has become.Half my lifetime ago, I was striking an uneasy balance between the ambition I had for myself, and what those closest to me expected of me.I was convinced that the only thing I wanted to do, ever, was to write novels.However, my parents, both of whom came from impoverished backgrounds and neither of whom had been to college, took the view that my overactive imagination was an amusing personal quirk that could never pay a mortgage, or secure a pension.They had hoped that I would take a vocational degree;I wanted to study English Literature.A compromise was reached that in retrospect satisfied nobody, and I went up to study Modern Languages.Hardly had my parents' car rounded the corner at the end of the road than I ditched German and scuttled off down the Classics corridor.I cannot remember telling my parents that I was studying Classics;they might well have found out for the first time on graduation day.Of all subjects on this planet, I think they would have been hard put to name one less useful than Greek mythology when it came to securing the keys to an executive bathroom.對于一個已經42歲的婦人來說，回顧21歲畢業典禮的時刻并不是一件十分舒服的事情。在前半生中我一直奮力掙扎，為了在自己的雄心壯志與親人對我的期盼之間取得一個平衡。

我自己認定今生唯一想做的事情就是寫小說。然而，我的出身貧寒、從未受過大學教育的父母卻認為，我那過于活躍的想象力只不過是個人的怪癖而已，永遠也不能幫我償還貸款，也不能幫我弄到養老金。

他們希望我取得一個職業技能學位;而我卻向往在英國文學方面深造。最后我們互有妥協并達成一致，讓我去學習現代語言;而事后想來，這份妥協其實沒有讓任何一方滿意。于是，沒等父母的車繞過路盡頭的拐角從視野里消失，我就丟下了德語，轉而沿著古典文學的道路快步走下去。

我記不得是否有告訴父母我其實在學習古典文學;他們也可能在出席畢業典禮的時候終于覺察了事實真相。在地球上所有的學科當中，當涉及到“獲得使用正式員工專用洗手間的權利”的時候，我估計他們很難想到比希臘神話更沒用的學科了。

I would like to make it clear, in parenthesis, that I do not blame my parents for their point of view.There is an expiry date on blaming your parents for steering you in the wrong direction;the moment you are old enough to take the wheel, responsibility lies with you.What is more, I cannot criticise my parents for hoping that I would never experience poverty.They had been poor themselves, and I have since been poor, and I quite agree with them that it is not an ennobling experience.Poverty entails fear, and stress, and sometimes depression;it means a thousand petty humiliations and hardships.Climbing out of poverty by your own efforts, that is indeed something on which to pride yourself, but poverty itself is romanticised only by fools.順便提一句，我必須聲明自己并沒有為父母的觀點而責怪他們的意思。你不能總是責怪父母指錯了方向;當你長大成人、可以獨立掌舵的時候，這份責任就應該由你獨立承擔了。況且，父母希望我永遠都不要經受貧窮，而我不能譴責這一期望。他們自己飽受貧寒之苦，而我也曾經是個窮人，我十分贊同他們的想法——貧窮決不是什么高貴的經歷。伴隨貧窮而來的是恐懼和緊張，有時還會陷入憂傷沮喪之中;這些都意味著無盡的卑微和艱難。憑借自己的力量掙脫貧困境地，這的確是值得自豪的事情，但是只有愚蠢的人才會一廂情愿的為貧窮本身涂抹浪漫的色彩

What I feared most for myself at your age was not poverty, but failure.At your age, in spite of a distinct lack of motivation at university, where I had spent far too long in the coffee bar writing stories, and far too little time at lectures, I had a knack for passing examinations, and that, for years, had been the measure of success in my life and that of my peers.I am not dull enough to suppose that because you are young, gifted and well-educated, you have never known hardship or heartbreak.Talent and intelligence never yet inoculated anyone against the caprice of the Fates, and I do not for a moment suppose that everyone here has enjoyed an existence of unruffled privilege and contentment.當我像你們這么大的時候，我最害怕的甚至還不是貧窮，而是失敗。

當我像你們這么大的時候，我對大學里的課程沒什么動力，總是在咖啡館里花上大把的時間寫小說，而用于聽課的時間則寥寥無幾。盡管如此，我卻有些讓自己能通過考試的竅門;而考試，在若干年中，就成了衡量我和我同齡人的成敗的標準。

我不會笨到認為你們這些年輕、有天賦、受過良好教育的孩子就從來不知道困難和心碎的滋味。天賦和智力并不能讓人免受命運的捉弄;我也從不認為在這里的所有人都享有不可破壞的特權與滿足。

However, the fact that you are graduating from Harvard suggests that you are not very well-acquainted with failure.You might be driven by a fear of failure quite as much as a desire for success.Indeed, your conception of failure might not be too far from the average person's idea of success, so high have you already flown academically

Ultimately, we all have to decide for ourselves what constitutes failure, but the world is quite eager to give you a set of criteria if you let it.So I think it fair to say that by any conventional measure, a mere seven years after my graduation day, I had failed on an epic scale.An exceptionally short-lived marriage had imploded, and I was jobless, a lone parent, and as poor as it is possible to be in modern Britain, without being homeless.The fears my parents had had for me, and that I had had for myself, had both come to pass, and by every usual standard, I was the biggest failure I knew.Now, I am not going to stand here and tell you that failure is fun.That period of my life was a dark one, and I had no idea that there was going to be what the press has since represented as a kind of fairy tale resolution.I had no idea how far the tunnel extended, and for a long time, any light at the end of it was a hope rather than a reality.然而，畢業于哈佛大學這一事實暗示著你們并不十分熟悉失敗。驅動你們前行的對于失敗的恐懼可能更為接近對于成功的渴望。事實上，你們心目中的失敗很可能與普通人設想的成功相差無幾，畢竟你們在學業上的成功已經高到遙不可及。

最終，我們都要按自己的想法給失敗下一個定義;但是如果你允許的話，這個世界會迫不及待的為你設定一套標準。因此我覺得，不管按照什么慣行標準，僅僅在畢業七年之后，我都確確實實的失敗了，而且敗得徹徹底底。我那罕見的短暫婚姻走到了盡頭，自己又失業了。一個單身母親，淪落到當代英國最為貧困的境地，只不過還沒到無家可歸的程度而已。我父母害怕發生在我身上的事情，我害怕發生在自己身上的事情，都降臨了。無論按照什么標準來看，我都是我所知道的最大的失敗。

現在，我站在這里，告訴你們失敗可是件一點也不好玩的事情。那個時候我的人生被黑暗籠罩，根本想不到在未來的時光里這段經歷竟會被報道為神話般的堅定意志。那時候我不知道黑暗的隧道何時才是盡頭，而盡頭的任何光亮都像是渺茫的希望而非穩固的現實。

So why do I talk about the benefits of failure? Simply because failure meant a stripping away of the inessential.I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was, and began to direct all my energy into finishing the only work that mattered to me.Had I really succeeded at anything else, I might never have found the determination to succeed in the one arena I believed I truly belonged.I was set free, because my greatest fear had already been realised, and I was still alive, and I still had a daughter whom I adored, and I had an old typewriter and a big idea.And so rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.You might never fail on the scale I did, but some failure in life is inevitable.It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all – in which case, you fail by default.Failure gave me an inner security that I had never attained by passing examinations.Failure taught me things about myself that I could have learned no other way.I discovered that I had a strong will, and more discipline than I had suspected;I also found out that I had friends whose value was truly above rubies.The knowledge that you have emerged wiser and stronger from setbacks means that you are, ever after, secure in your ability to survive.You will never truly know yourself, or the strength of your relationships, until both have been tested by adversity.Such knowledge is a true gift, for all that it is painfully won, and it has been worth more to me than any qualification I ever earned.什么我還要談起失敗的好處呢?簡單的說，是因為失敗會為我們揭去表面那些無關緊要的東西。我不再裝模作樣，終于重新做回自己，開始將所有的精力投入到自己在意的唯一作品。如果我此前在其它的任何什么方面有所成功，我恐怕都會失去在自己真正歸屬的舞臺上獲得成功的決心。我最大的恐懼終于成為現實，而我卻因此獲得了自由，我還活著，還有我深愛的女兒，我還有一架老式打字機和一個宏大的夢想。這片頑固的低谷成為我腳下堅定的基石，在此之上，我重筑了自己的人生。

你們也許不會像我摔得這樣慘，但是人生路上總會有些失敗。你也許可以毫無失敗的度過一生，但你將活得如此小心翼翼，就好像你幾乎沒有活過——不管從什么意義上講，你都注定要失敗的。

失敗賦予我內心的安全感，而這是考試及格也不能讓我感受到的。失敗讓我明白關于自己的一些東西，這是除了失敗以外我決不可能獲得的認知。我意識到自己擁有堅強的意志，而且比我以前設想的還要自律;我還發現我擁有的朋友們是如此寶貴，其價值連寶石也不能媲美。

你在挫折中成長，更聰明，更強壯，這意味著從此以后你已擁有了牢不可催的生存能力。直到通過逆境的考驗，你才會真正了解自己，以及你周圍的人賦予你的力量。這些認知都是寶貴的財富，我歷經艱辛才獲得的財富，這比我得到的任何資格證書都更有價值。

Given a time machine or a Time Turner, I would tell my 21-year-old self that personal happiness lies in knowing that life is not a check-list of acquisition or achievement.Your qualifications, your CV, are not your life, though you will meet many people of my age and older who confuse the two.Life is difficult, and complicated, and beyond anyone's total control, and the humility to know that will enable you to survive its vicissitudes.You might think that I chose my second theme, the importance of imagination, because of the part it played in rebuilding my life, but that is not wholly so.Though I will defend the value of bedtime stories to my last gasp, I have learned to value imagination in a much broader sense.Imagination is not only the uniquely human capacity to envision that which is not, and therefore the fount of all invention and innovation.In its arguably most transformative and revelatory capacity, it is the power that enables us to empathise with humans whose experiences we have never shared.One of the greatest formative experiences of my life preceded Harry Potter, though it informed much of what I subsequently wrote in those books.This revelation came in the form of one of my earliest day jobs.Though I was sloping off to write stories during my lunch hours, I paid the rent in my early 20s by working in the research department at Amnesty International's headquarters in London.There in my little office I read hastily scribbled letters smuggled out of totalitarian regimes by men and women who were risking imprisonment to inform the outside world of what was happening to them.I saw photographs of those who had disappeared without trace, sent to Amnesty by their desperate families and friends.I read the testimony of torture victims and saw pictures of their injuries.I opened handwritten, eye-witness accounts of summary trials and executions, of kidnappings and rapes.如果能夠讓時光倒流，我會告訴21歲的自己，幸福在于懂得人生不是收獲和成就的清單。你的資格證書或你的簡歷，并不是你的生活;盡管你將遇到很多我這樣年紀、甚至比我更老的人，他們卻還分不清楚兩者間的區別。生活是嚴酷的，也是復雜的，更不處于任何人的掌控;謙遜的懂得并接受這一點，會幫助安然你度過生活中的風浪。

也許你們會以為，我之所以選擇第二個主題——想象力的重要性，是因為想象力在我重筑人生時發揮了巨大作用。但這并不是全部的原因。我固然到死也會捍衛睡前故事的價值，但我還認識到要在更為廣闊的范圍內珍視想象力。想象力是人類獨有的預見未知的能力，它還是所有發明創造的源泉。它具有已被證實的最富變革性和啟示性的力量，而正是想象力讓我們能夠切身體會他人的經驗——雖然我們自己并未身臨其境。

對我影響最為深遠的經歷發生在哈里波特之前，而這一經歷為我后來完成著作提供了很多信息。我在最早的全日制工作中獲得了啟示。在二十幾歲的時候，我在位于倫敦的國際特赦組織總部的研究部門工作，以獲得付房租的錢，而午餐的時候我就溜掉去寫小說。

在那里，我坐在小小的辦公室里閱讀來自集權統治下的地區的信件。男人和女人們急切的寫下潦草的文字，將信偷偷寄出來，冒著坐牢的風險告訴外界自己遭受了怎樣的對待。我看到那些無聲無息地失蹤了的人的照片，是由他們的絕望的親人和朋友寄到特赦組織來的。我讀著被嚴刑拷打的受害人的證詞，看著記錄他們的慘狀的照片。我打開手寫的親眼見證的記錄，記載著對于綁架和強奸案件的簡單審訊和執行。

Many of my co-workers were ex-political prisoners, people who had been displaced from their homes, or fled into exile, because they had the temerity to think independently of their government.Visitors to our office included those who had come to give information, or to try and find out what had happened to those they had been forced to leave behind.I shall never forget the African torture victim, a young man no older than I was at the time, who had become mentally ill after all he had endured in his homeland.He trembled uncontrollably as he spoke into a video camera about the brutality inflicted upon him.He was a foot taller than I was, and seemed as fragile as a child.I was given the job of escorting him to the Underground Station afterwards, and this man whose life had been shattered by cruelty took my hand with exquisite courtesy, and wished me future happiness.And as long as I live I shall remember walking along an empty corridor and suddenly hearing, from behind a closed door, a scream of pain and horror such as I have never heard since.The door opened, and the researcher poked out her head and told me to run and make a hot drink for the young man sitting with her.She had just given him the news that in retaliation for his own outspokenness against his country's regime, his mother had been seized and executed.Every day of my working week in my early 20s I was reminded how incredibly fortunate I was, to live in a country with a democratically elected government, where legal representation and a public trial were the rights of everyone.Every day, I saw more evidence about the evils humankind will inflict on their fellow humans, to gain or maintain power.I began to have nightmares, literal nightmares, about some of the things I saw, heard and read.Amnesty mobilises thousands of people who have never been tortured or imprisoned for their beliefs to act on behalf of those who have.The power of human empathy, leading to collective action, saves lives, and frees prisoners.Ordinary people, whose personal well-being and security are assured, join together in huge numbers to save people they do not know, and will never meet.My small participation in that process was one of the most humbling and inspiring experiences of my life.我的很多同事以前都是政治犯。他們被迫離開家庭或流亡國外，因為他們有勇氣以獨立意志評判他們的政府。我們的辦公室的訪客有些是來提供信息的，也有人前來了解他們被迫放棄的同伴的情況。

我永遠也無法忘記一個來自非洲的經受嚴刑拷打的受害者。他是個年輕人，不會比那時的我年紀更大，在自己的祖國遭受的一切已經使他有些精神失常。對著攝影機講述自己遭受的痛苦的時候，他無法抑制的戰栗著。他比我高一英尺，看上去卻像孩子一樣脆弱無助。隨后，在我按照吩咐護送他去地鐵的路上，這個人生已被殘暴摧毀的男人卻優雅有禮的拉著我的手，祝我未來幸福快樂。

在我有生之年，我都會記得自己走過一條空曠的走廊的時候，從身后一扇緊閉的門內傳出的尖叫。其中包含的痛苦和恐懼是如此強烈，我以后再沒聽過那樣的聲音。門打開了，一個工作人員探出頭，告訴我趕快跑去，給坐在她身邊的青年男子拿一杯熱飲。她剛剛告訴那位年青人，由于他本人公開反對自己國家的專制，他的母親已被抓走并處決了。

在我二十幾歲的時候，工作中的每一天，我都不斷被提醒著自己是多么的幸運，能夠生活在一個民選政府管理的國家，人人都享有法律代理和公開審判的權利。

每天我都看見更多的人類的邪惡加諸于同胞的證據，這樣的罪惡僅僅是為了獲得或者維持權力。我開始做惡夢，徹頭徹尾的惡夢，夢到那些我看到、聽到和讀到的事情。

然而，在國際特赦組織里我還了解了很多關于人類的好的一面，有些是我從不知道的。

Unlike any other creature on this planet, humans can learn and understand, without having experienced.They can think themselves into other people's minds, imagine themselves into other people's places.Of course, this is a power, like my brand of fictional magic, that is morally neutral.One might use such an ability to manipulate, or control, just as much as to understand or sympathise.And many prefer not to exercise their imaginations at all.They choose to remain comfortably within the bounds of their own experience, never troubling to wonder how it would feel to have been born other than they are.They can refuse to hear screams or to peer inside cages;they can close their minds and hearts to any suffering that does not touch them personally;they can refuse to know.I might be tempted to envy people who can live that way, except that I do not think they have any fewer nightmares than I do.Choosing to live in narrow spaces can lead to a form of mental agoraphobia, and that brings its own terrors.I think the wilfully unimaginative see more monsters.They are often more afraid.What is more, those who choose not to empathise may enable real monsters.For without ever committing an act of outright evil ourselves, we collude with it, through our own apathy.際特赦組織調動了幾千人，他們從未因自己的信念而被折磨或監禁，他們代表那些飽受折磨的人并為之行事。人類的同情心的力量引導了集體行動，拯救生命，釋放被關押的人們。那些個人幸福和安全已經得到保證的普通人，為了拯救他們并不認識、甚至再也不會見面的陌生人而集結起來，匯聚成強大的群體。我個人在其中的參與，是我今生最為卑微、卻最為振奮的經歷。

人類與地球上的其它生物不同。就算沒有親身經歷，人類也可以學習和理解。人類可以將自己代入別人的思想之中，設想自己處于他人的境地。

當然，這也是力量，就好像我的小說中的魔法。這是在道德上中立的力量，可以被用于操縱和控制，也可以被用于理解和同情。

還有很多人寧愿不去使用他們的想象力。他們選擇舒舒服服的呆在自己的經歷之內，從不費事去想象如果他們生下來是別的人，那一切將會怎樣。他們可以拒絕傾聽叫喊聲，也不會窺視籠子內的情況;對于任何沒有降臨到自身的痛苦，他們都可以關閉自己的頭腦和心靈;他們可以拒絕知道。

也許我禁不住會想要嫉妒這樣生活的人，只可惜我不相信他們做的惡夢會比我少。選擇生活在狹窄的范圍里，會導致某種精神上的對于陌生環境的恐懼癥，并由此產生相應的害怕心理。我認為那些自己決定不去想象的人會看到更多的怪物。他們通常會更害怕。

One of the many things I learned at the end of that Classics corridor down which I ventured at the age of 18, in search of something I could not then define, was this, written by the Greek author Plutarch: What we achieve inwardly will change outer reality.That is an astonishing statement and yet proven a thousand times every day of our lives.It expresses, in part, our inescapable connection with the outside world, the fact that we touch other people's lives simply by existing.But how much more are you, Harvard graduates of XX, likely to touch other people's lives? Your intelligence, your capacity for hard work, the education you have earned and received, give you unique status, and unique responsibilities.Even your nationality sets you apart.The great majority of you belong to the world's only remaining superpower.The way you vote, the way you live, the way you protest, the pressure you bring to bear on your government, has an impact way beyond your borders.That is your privilege, and your burden.外，選擇不去同情的人會養育現實中的怪物。就算我們自己沒有親自作出邪惡的事情，我們對于邪惡的無動于衷就等同于和它同謀。

十八歲時，為了尋找那時我無法描述的目的，我踏上了古典文學的探險道路;當走到盡頭的時候，我學到了很多東西，其中之一就是希臘作家Plutarch的這句話：我們在內心的所得，將改變外界的現實。

這句驚人的宣言卻每天都被我們的生活證實無數次。在某種程度上，它表達了我們與外面世界的無法逃避的聯系;它道出這樣一個事實，僅僅是我們自身的存在，就已經觸碰到了他人的生活。

但是，哈佛大學XX屆的畢業生們，你們又將對他人的生活深入多少呢?你們的智慧、你們應對高難度工作的才能、你們謀求并接受到的教育，都賦予你們

獨一無二的身份，以及獨一無二的責任。即使你們的國籍將你們區隔開來。你們中的大多數，屬于這個世界目前僅存的超級大國。你們投票的方式，你們生活的方式，你們抗議的方式，你們對于政府施加的壓力，其影響都會遠遠超出你們自身的界限。那就是你們的特權，也是你們背負的重任

If you choose to use your status and influence to raise your voice on behalf of those who have no voice;if you choose to identify not only with the powerful, but with the powerless;if you retain the ability to imagine yourself into the lives of those who do not have your advantages, then it will not only be your proud families who celebrate your existence, but thousands and millions of people whose reality you have helped transform for the better.We do not need magic to change the world, we carry all the power we need inside ourselves already: we have the power to imagine better.如果你選擇了，用你的身份和影響力來提高你的聲音，為那些沒有聲音的人吶喊;如果你選擇了，不僅認同權勢群體，更要與弱勢群體為伍;如果你保留了想象的能力，能夠與不具備你的優勢的那些人感同身受。那么，不僅僅是你的家人會為你自豪，更有成千上萬的、因為你而生活得更好的人會為你歡呼。我們并不需要魔法來改造世界。我們在內心深處已經擁有了所需的所有力量：我們擁有想象更好的世界的力量。

I am nearly finished.I have one last hope for you, which is something that I already had at 21.The friends with whom I sat on graduation day have been my friends for life.They are my children's godparents, the people to whom I've been able to turn in times of trouble, friends who have been kind enough not to sue me when I've used their names for Death Eaters.At our graduation we were bound by enormous affection, by our shared experience of a time that could never come again, and, of course, by the knowledge that we held certain photographic evidence that would be exceptionally valuable if any of us ran for Prime Minister.So today, I can wish you nothing better than similar friendships.And tomorrow, I hope that even if you remember not a single word of mine, you remember those of Seneca, another of those old Romans I met when I fled down the Classics corridor, in retreat from career ladders, in search of ancient wisdom:

As is a tale, so is life: not how long it is, but how good it is, is what matters.I wish you all very good lives.Thank you very much.我的話快要說完了。最后，我對你們還有一個期望，在我21歲的時候我就懷有這個期望。在畢業典禮上與我坐在一起的朋友們，后來成了我一生的朋友。他們是我的孩子們的教父和教母。他們是我陷入困境時可以尋求幫助的人。他們是如此寬容的朋友，就連名字被我用來命名食死徒的時候也沒有起訴我。在畢業典禮上，我們被心中澎湃的激情緊密聯結，被共同分享的寶貴時光緊密聯結，當然，也被某個共識緊密聯結——如果我們中的某人有朝一日當選為英國首相，那我們持有的合影照片肯定會價值不菲。

因此，今天，我能夠送給你們的最好的祝福，就是這樣的友誼。明天，我希望就算你記不起我說過的任何一個字，你還是能夠想起Seneca說過的話。那時我已遠離職業生涯的階梯，轉而尋找古代的智慧。我在沿著古典文學的走廊飛奔時遇到了這個古羅馬的家伙。

他說：

人生就像故事，不在于漫長，而在于精彩。

我祝你們所有人一生幸福。

非常感謝