WHAT IT'S LIKE TO BECOME A GAMING CELEBRITY AT 79 YEARS OLD“游戏奶奶”与她的“网红”人生

⊙ By Steven Messner ⊙ 翻译：思苇

WHAT IT'S LIKE TO BECOME A GAMING CELEBRITY AT 79 YEARS OLD“游戏奶奶”与她的“网红”人生

⊙ By Steven Messner ⊙ 翻译：思苇

无论是玩游戏还是当视频主播，听上去都是年轻人的事——但是在YouTube上，偏偏就有那么一位老奶奶打破了大家的成见，两年来用独特的个人魅力征服了成千上万的粉丝。一起来认识一下这位可爱的“游戏奶奶”！

One morning in September,2015,Shirley Curry woke up to a surprise.Her email inbox had been flooded with 11,000 emails from strangers commenting on her firstSkyrim注video.For the then 79-yearold Shirley,the sudden wave of attention wasoverwhelming[压倒性的],“I hadn’t even thought of anything like that happening so I didn’t know what to do.”

So Shirley did the only thing that seemed natural to her: She began opening each email,one after the other,and writing back.Slowly,Shirley’s dread turned to joy.“When I realized the kind of comments I was getting,it got really fun.Some of them were really touching,and I started getting attached to these people.They were all so very sweet.”

ThatSkyrimvideo was her first step into thepantheon[万神殿]of YouTube celebrities.

Theformula[公式]for becoming a popular YouTube gamer is about as mysterious as the meaning of life.But Shirley is just Shirley,a twicewidowed[成为寡妇]mother of four and grandmother of nine who lives in Virginia.

“I have my own picture on there and I talk about my age,because I wanted my viewers to know me and I wanted to know them.I’m not going to hide behind some cartoonish-lookingavatar[化身]and never mention the fact that I’m an older woman.”

Shirley’s success on YouTube isn’t because she’s a skilled gamer or haswitty[诙谐的]commentary[解说].It’s because she’scompassionate[有同情心的]andaccepting[易接受的].She creates a warm space where no matter who you are,you are still her sweet grandkid.

“I’m Grandma to all of them,” she says matter-of-factly.“That’s the young ones,to those in their 30s and 40s,and even the olderones—all of them call me Grandma.They’re all so sweet.You can’t help but care about them.There’s children who make comments in such a sad way that makes me feel like they don’t have anyone.And then I get people who say that they are put down or told that they can’t do this or they can’t do that,and that I inspire them to go ahead and do whatever they want to do.”

词组：put down

这个动词词组有着极其丰富的含义，我们平时经常接触到的包括“放下，压下；记下，写下；镇压，取缔；降级”等等，而它在口语中还可以表示“贬低，奚落，使窘迫，使沉默”，如：Don’t put yourself down.You are just a bit older.（别小看自己，你不过是年纪稍大一点罢了。）

参考译文

2015年9月的一天清早，雪莉·柯里从睡梦中醒来，被吓了一大跳——她的收件箱里有11000封陌生人发来的电子邮件，都是关于她的第一个《天际》游戏视频的评论。对当时已经79岁高龄的雪莉来说，这种突如其来的关注度让她有点喘不过气来：“我从没想过会发生这样的事情，根本不知道该怎么做。”

于是，雪莉采取了对她来说唯一合理的行动：她打开每一封邮件，认真看完，然后一封封地写回信。渐渐地，她的惊恐变成了快乐。“当我意识到自己所收到的都是些怎样的评论，这种交流便成了一件乐事。其中有些邮件特别感人，我与这些人逐渐产生共鸣，他们实在太可爱了。”

那一段《天际》视频正是雪莉踏入YouTube红人殿堂的第一步。

要成为一名人气游戏主播，其中窍门几乎就和人生意义一样神秘难测。不过雪莉永远是雪莉，两度丧夫，养大了四个儿女，膝下有九个孙辈，她如今在美国弗吉尼亚州生活。

“我会贴上自己的照片，毫不忌讳地谈论年龄问题，因为我希望观众们能了解我，我也想多了解他们。我可不会躲在一个卡通形象后面，绝口不提自己是个老妇人。”

雪莉之所以能在YouTube上走红，并不是因为她是个技巧娴熟的老玩家，也不是因为她的讲解机智诙谐，而是因为她很有同情心，乐于接纳他人。她创造了一个特殊的温暖空间——无论怎样的人，都是她可爱的孙儿孙女。

“我就是粉丝们的奶奶，”她实事求是地说道。“无论是年轻人，还是三四十岁的观众，甚至还有年纪更大的人——他们都喊我奶奶。他们都太可爱了，让你不得不牵肠挂肚。有些孩子留下的评论让人特别揪心，感觉就像他们没有人可以依靠。我还遇到另外一些粉丝，他们说自己遭人奚落，有人对他们指手画脚，这也不能做，那也不能做；他们还说，我的视频可以激励他们不断前行，勇敢做自己想做的事。”

注：全称为《上古卷轴5：天际》（The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim），发行于2011年，是著名角色扮演游戏《上古卷轴》的系列最新作。