TEXT B

A Violin with Three Strings

On Nov. 18, 1995, Itzhak Perlman, the violinist, came on stage to give a concert at Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center in New York City.

If you have ever been to a Perlman concert, you know that getting on stage is no small achievement for him. He was stricken with polio as a child, and so he has braces on both legs and walks with the aid of two crutches. To see him walk across the stage one step at a time, painfully and slowly, is an awesome sight.

He walks painfully, yet majestically, until he reaches his chair. Then he sits down, slowly, puts his crutches on the floor, undoes the clasps on his legs, tucks one foot back and extends the other foot forward. Then he bends down and picks up the violin, puts it under his chin, nods to the conductor and proceeds to play.

By now, the audience is used to this ritual. They sit quietly while he makes his way across the stage to his chair. They remain reverently silent while he undoes the clasps on his legs. They wait until he is ready to play.

But this time, something went wrong. Just as he finished the first few bars, one of the strings on his violin broke. You could hear it snap - it went off like gunfire across the room. There was no mistaking what that sound meant. There was no mistaking what he had to do.

We figured that he would have to get up, put on the clasps again, pick up the crutches and limp his way off stage - to either find another violin or else find another string for this one. But he didn't. Instead, he waited a moment, closed his eyes and then signaled the conductor to begin again.

The orchestra began, and he played from where he had left off. And he played with such passion and such power and such purity as they had never heard before.

Of course, anyone knows that it is impossible to play a symphonic work with just three strings. I know that, and you know that, but that night Itzhak Perlman refused to know that. You could see him modulating, changing, re-composing the piece in his head. At one point, it sounded like he was de-tuning the strings to get new sounds from them that they had never made before.

When he finished, there was an awesome silence in the room. And then people rose and cheered. There was an extraordinary outburst of applause from every corner of the auditorium. We were all on our feet, screaming and cheering, doing everything we could to show how much we appreciated what he had done. He smiled, wiped the sweat from his brow, raised his bow to quiet us, and then he said - not boastfully, but in a quiet, pensive, reverent tone - "You know, sometimes it is the artist's task to find out how much music you can still make with what you have left."

What a powerful line that is! It has stayed in my mind ever since I heard it. And who knows? Perhaps that is the definition of life - not just for artists, but for all of us.

Here is a man who has prepared all his life to make music on a violin with four strings, who, all of a sudden, in the middle of a concert, finds himself with only three strings; so he makes music with three strings, and the music he made that night with just three strings was more beautiful, more sacred, more memorable, than any that he had ever made before, when he had four strings.

So, perhaps our task in this shaky, fast-changing, bewildering world in which we live is to make music, at first with all that we have, and then, when that is no longer possible, to make music with what we have left.

参考翻译：

三根弦的小提琴

1995年11月18日,小提琴家伊萨克帕尔曼在纽约林肯中心的艾弗里费舍大厅举办音乐会。

如果你听过波曼的演奏会，你就会知道能走上舞台为大家演奏对他来说并不是一件容易的事。他因患小儿麻痹症,双腿都绑着支架,只能依靠两根拐杖走路。每当看到他痛苦缓慢地,一步步走上舞台时,会令人感到敬畏。

他缓慢但是庄严地走到椅子前,坐下,慢慢把双拐放到地板上。他打开腿上的夹板,一只脚向后拉，另一只向前伸。然后，他弯下腰拿起小提琴放到颌下,向指挥点头示意并开始演奏。

听众对他的这一套动作习以为常。从他上台到坐到椅子上,观众始终静静地坐着。当他打开夹板时，每个人都保持肃静，等待他开始演奏。

但这一次出了点差错。他刚拉完头几个小节，小提琴上的一根弦断了。每个人都能听到它崩断的声音一就像屋里传来一声枪响。人们都知道这声响意味着什么,都知道他会做什么。

大家想象着他会站起身,扣紧夹板,捡起双拐,走下舞台——或换一把琴或找根新弦。但他没有这样做。

他停顿片刻，闭,上眼睛,然后示意指挥再次开始。

伴奏响起，他从刚才中断之处重新拉起，用从未有过的激情、力量和虔诚演奏着。

当然,每个人都明白，用三根弦演奏交响乐是不可能的。我知道你们都晓得这一点,但是那晚伊萨克.帕尔曼不想知道。你可以看出他在脑海里调整、变化、重谱着作品。一个时刻,听起来似乎他在把琴弦变调以获得它们从未发出过的声音。

演奏完毕,厅里一阵骇人的寂静。然后人们起立欢呼，从大厅的每一个角落都响起极其热烈的掌声。人们跺脚,尖叫着,欢呼着，用尽一切方式来表达他们是多么欣赏帕尔曼所做的一切。他微笑,拭去额头上的汗水，用一种平静、深沉、虔诚的语调说:“你们知道,有时，艺术家的任务就是要弄清楚用自己所剩的还能创造出多少音乐。”

多么铿锵有力的话语,从听到那一刻起就印刻在我的心里。谁知道呢?这大约也就是人生的定义一不仅对于艺术家，而且对于我们所有的人。

他是个要把自己一生奉献给用四根弦的小提琴演奏的人。突然有一天，在演奏中,他发现自己的琴只剩三根弦;而那一晚他用仅剩的三根弦演奏出了比他以前用四根弦演奏的更美妙、更神圣、更难忘的音乐。

所以,我们有时在这个动荡不安、变数不定、眼花缭乱的世界.上的任务就如同演奏音乐，开始时我们倾其所有而为之,然后在不可能时，用我们现有的一切去创造。