My Interview at the Dictionary牛津词典面试记

约翰·辛普森

My interview at the dictionary was in June， at the beginning of the long hot summer of 1976， and Hilary and I took the train up3 from the earnest red brick of Reading to the medieval grandeur of Oxford to see if I could be settled into steady employment and the salary-earning classes. We arrived at the railway station and made our way to the Oxford University Press offices in Walton Street—to what I later came to regard as the epicentre of dictionary-making in the Western world. From here I was on my own. Hilary decided to look around the local shops， confidently but naively expecting me to reappear—elated or dejected—about thirty minutes later.

You and I would think epicentre was a good classical word， maybe arising in English around 1660， with the birth of the new， empirical sciences and the Renaissance affection for ancient words. But its not; we know it entered into the English language considerably later than that （1880）. Scientists typically reach4 for classical words—or just broken twigs of classical words—when creating a new term， in a tradition of pan-European scientific enquiry that reaches up to the present day. The immediate predecessor of epicentre in English was epicentrum （1874）， used in the same sense （“the point above the centre，” especially in seismology）. Maybe epicentrum looks barbaric to us， but thats the word the German scientist Karl von Seebach invented in 1873， in German but from Greek elements， for his new word in the new science of seismology （itself from Greek elements： the study of earthquakes）. We just made the new word look English， by changing epicentrum to epicentre. Try not to make assumptions about the origin and usage of words; there may be more of a story to it， especially when it is in the hands of white-coated scientists.

The front of the Oxford University Press was imposing5， especially to someone whose only experience of Oxford until then derived from regular trips over the county border from where I lived in Gloucestershire， as part of a school sports team. The massive black wrought-iron gates set between thick stone columns were designed to exclude and yet—by offering a passing glimpse on to a college-style lawn and quadrangle， with a towering copper beech tree leaning over an idle pond—to incite wonder and fascination. The building itself looked classically eighteenth century， as was intended when it was built in the early nineteenth century to house under one collective roof the University Presss editorial staff and print workers， who were previously scattered elsewhere in Oxford. I was， needless to say， suitably impressed.

The University Press porter6 let me into the grand quadrangle， or “quad.” Before I had a chance to reach the sumptuous lawn， I was directed off to one side—you didnt get to experience the full splendour of the place unless you deserved it—where I found the Personnel Department and my recent correspondent， the Colonel.

The Colonel was the human face of the Personnel Department at OUP in those days： he was a delightful military chap—“（retd）” of course—and something of a leftover from the days when old soldiers ruled Personnel. He was almost certainly modelled closely on7 the character actor Wilfrid Hyde-White， Colonel Pickering of My Fair Lady： quite short， dapper， balding， chatty， and charmingly military in tenor. We shook hands， and then he sank into his seat behind a substantial desk while I was directed towards an easy chair designed principally to make you feel that you werent the most important person in the room. We talked about the magnificent history of the University Press， as seen through the eyes of the Personnel Department， and we wondered jointly how easy I might find it moving from Reading to Oxford， should I be fortunate enough to be offered the opportunity. The distance between the two places is about twenty-five miles， but I discovered much later that there were people in Oxford who thought civilisation ended just a few hundred feet outside the old city walls， where the barbarian hordes were dug in for the foreseeable future. Others are said to believe that “the sun rises over Wadham [College] and sets over Worcester.” Worcester College， that is： there wouldnt be much point in referring to the City of Worcester here.

Once we had exhausted all possible areas of conversation， he took me on a little walk round to the dictionary department. In those days most of the University Press operated out of a single large block of buildings tucked away amongst the terraces of Jericho—an area of Oxford by the canal， made famous as Beersheba in Jude the Obscure. The dictionary occupied two small terraced houses， No. 40 and No. 41 Walton Crescent， on the edge of the main site. Its offices were very close to the centre of the University Presss publishing control rooms， and so the Colonel and I did not have far to walk. I was taken through the corridor-snaking interior of the University Press and debouched at No. 40 Walton Crescent.

According to its entry in the OED， the verb to debouch entered English in the mid-eighteenth century from French. Its not a particularly common word these days， but this again illustrates how we pluck out and make use of words from different layers of the contemporary language—archaic， historical， geographically distant， upper-class， or whatever. French words had been storming into English since at least the days of the Norman Conquest in 1066， but debouch apparently had seen no need to seek asylum here until quite late in the day， around the year 1740. It derives directly from the French word déboucher， “to unblock， uncork—let run out freely.” Its quite unrelated to the word debauch （which originally meant “to lead from the straight and narrow， or from the path of virtue”）， also borrowed from French， but several centuries earlier. A river can debouch into the sea， after having been pent up by its banks; a military force can debouch into open country after marching under cover of a forest; I was debouched unceremoniously by my guide in front of the dictionary department.

No. 40 Walton Crescent was the nerve centre of the OED in those days. The Colonel chattered away as he led me up to a room on the first floor， where he introduced me to the departmental secretary， and then left me to await my interview with the OEDs chief. I was told that my waiting room was the departmental library. There was a central table around which editors would sit while consulting the weighty books arrayed on shelves throughout the room; and right in the centre of the table was a book-rest displaying the latest texts that had been voraciously consumed （it was carefully explained to me by my guide） by the dictionarys stable of “readers”—that is， the people who volunteered to make their way steadily through countless works of literature， hunting down words and expressions which they wrote out on index cards and sent to Oxford for possible inclusion in the dictionary. The Collected Letters of George Bernard Shaw had made its appearance there that week， along with several other books and magazines whose titles I forget.

The possibility of a group of OED readers scattered around the world， whose sole objective in life was to collect extracts from books such as Shaws Letters， exclusively for the files of the dictionary， was an entrancing prospect. I envisaged these troops of readers being asked to read the latest prize-winning novels， or a run of racy tabloid newspapers， just looking out for new words. Who were these people？ How did they land a job like that？ Did anyone ever meet them？ But this was just something to mull over. I didnt need to think out all the implications just yet.

Though I did not realise it at the time， I was at that very moment the object of all-consuming attention to numerous dictionary editors， keen to spot what their potential new colleague might look like. I affected8 nonchalance9 as I investigated the contents of the library， but I was left to await my fate.

詞典部约我面试是在6月，1976年那个漫长炎热的夏季刚刚开始，希拉丽和我乘坐火车，从雷丁庄重的红砖楼来到牛津堂皇的中世纪建筑，看看我能否谋取一份稳定的工作，跻身工薪阶层。我们顺利抵达牛津火车站，一路找到坐落于沃尔顿大街的牛津大学出版社办事处——我后来开始将这里视为西方世界词典编纂的中枢（epicentre）。到了这儿，我得一个人行动了。希拉丽决定在当地的商店转一转，充满信心却也是过于天真地预计，大约30分钟后我就会重新出现：无论是录用，还是被拒。

你我往往都会认为，epicentre（震中;中枢）是古典词语的一个极佳个例，或许于1660年前后在英语中出现，伴随新的实验科学和文艺复兴引发的喜好古词之风而产生。实际却并非如此。我们知道它进入英语相当晚（1880）。造新词时，科学家典型的做法是借助于古典词语——或者从这些词上折取一些小枝杈。这是泛欧洲科学研究的一个传统，一直延续至今。在英语中，epicentre的最直接前身是epicentrum（1874），意思相同（“中心之上的那个点”，尤用于地震学，指“震中”）。epicentrum这个词看上去或许有些“荒蛮”，但它是德国科学家卡尔·冯希巴赫1873年创造的，是德语，却源自希腊语，专为地震学（seismology本身也源自希腊语，意思是研究地震的学问）这门新科学而造。把epicentrum变成epicentre，只是为了让这个新词看上去更像英语。不要试图凭空去猜测单词的词源和用法：单词背后的故事可能更多，尤其是出自身穿白大褂的科学家之手时。

牛津大学出版社的门面很壮观，尤其对我这样的人而言——此前，我对牛津的体验只存在于跟随学校运动队从格洛斯特郡出发的定期跨郡之旅中。两个粗大的石柱间，安装着两扇厚实的黑铸铁大栅栏门，此种设计原本为了隔绝，却也引发了人们的好奇和迷恋——透过栅栏向内匆匆一瞥，能够看到大学风格的草坪和四方院建筑，还有一棵高耸入云的紫叶山毛榉，侧身掩映着一塘闲水。出版社大楼本身看上去就是典型的18世纪建筑，建于19世纪初，意在将出版社全体编辑人员和印刷工人汇集在同一个屋檐下，此前他们在牛津各处办公。不用说，大楼给我留下了深刻印象。

大学出版社的门卫放我进入了宏大的四方院。还没来得及走到奢华的草坪，我就被领着转向一侧——要想充分领略这里的富丽堂皇，得有资格才行——我被带到人事部，见到了近期与我通信的“上校”。

那时，“上校”是出版社人事部的宣传代言人：他是一位快乐的军人，当然是“退伍的”，是那个老兵统治人事的年代所遗留下来的。他几乎与性格演员威尔弗里德·海德-怀特——就是电影《窈窕淑女》中的那位皮克林上校——别无二致：身材矮小、衣冠楚楚、谢顶、健谈，外加迷人的军人风范。我们握过手，他就坐到了办公桌后面的座椅里，办公桌宽大厚实，而我则按照指示坐上一张轻便椅——这椅子主要就是为了让你体会到，在这个房间里你不是那个最重要的人。我们谈到出版社的辉煌历史，当然是透过人事部的眼睛来回顾的;还一起想弄明白，如果我有幸得到这份工作，从雷丁搬到牛津大概是多简单的事。两地之间大约相距25英里，然而很久之后我发现，在牛津有一些人认为，走出牛津老城城墙几百英尺，文明就止步了：在可预见的未来，那里还一直会由蛮族把守。据说，还有些人认为，“太阳在瓦德汉[学院]升起，在伍斯特沉落”。这里的伍斯特指伍斯特学院，不是指伍斯特市，否则没什么意义。

我们谈完了各种可能的话题后，他便领我去词典部转转。那时候，大学出版社的绝大部分机构都在一大片独立的建筑群内，隐身于耶利哥的排房之中。耶利哥是牛津靠运河的一个区域，以《无名的裘德》中的比尔谢巴闻名。词典部占据了两栋小排屋——沃尔顿新月街40号和41号，在出版社主址最靠边的位置。词典部的办公室离大学出版社出版控制办公室的中心很近，所以我和“上校”用不着走多远。我被带着穿过大学出版社内部的蜿蜒走廊，沃尔顿新月街40号豁然出现（debouch）。

依据《牛津英语词典》中的词条，动词to debouch在18世纪中从法语进入英语。如今，它不是个特别通用的单词，但它再一次向我们展示，我们如何从当代语言的不同层面挑拣词语来使用——废弃的、历史的、遥远的、上流階层的，等等。至少从1066年诺曼征服的年代开始，法语词就一直汹涌而入，但是很显然debouch不需要在这里寻求避难，直到更晚些时候，大约是1740年。它直接派生于法语词déboucher，意思是“解除障碍、拔去塞子——让自由跑出”。有一个词跟它长相相近却毫不相干，debauch（最初意指“使品行不端或道德沦丧”），也借自法语，但要早好几个世纪。受堤岸约束的河流可以在摆脱堤岸后流入（debouch）大海;在树林掩护下行进的部队可以在穿过树林后进入（debouch）开阔地;我被向导唐突地带到了（debouch）词典部。

沃尔顿新月街40号是当时《牛津英语词典》的神经中枢。“上校”一边喋喋不休地说着，一边带我来到二楼的一个房间，把我介绍给词典部的秘书，然后就转身走了，剩下我一个人等待词典主编面试。我被告知，等候室是词典部的图书馆。整间屋子排满了书架，上面搁着厚重的图书，屋子正中摆放着一张大桌子，供编辑们查阅资料时围坐。桌子中央是一个看书架，展示最近的阅读文本，这些文本已经由词典招募的固定“阅读者”狼吞虎咽般地完成通读（我的向导为我详细解释了）。“阅读者”指的是那些志愿者，他们持续不断地通篇阅读数不清的文学作品，捕捉那些单词和表达式，将它们誊抄到索引卡片上，发送给牛津备用，有些可能会被收录。那个星期，看书架上摆放的是萧伯纳的《书信集》，另外还有几本书和杂志，名字我记不得了。

《牛津英语词典》的“阅读者”群体可能散布世界各地，他们此生的唯一目标就是从萧伯纳《书信集》之类的书籍中收集摘录，作为资料专供词典编纂，这一境况令人着迷。我想象着一群群“阅读者”受命阅读最新获奖的小说或一系列生动有趣的特色小报，目的就是找出新词。这都是些什么人？他们怎么找到这样一份工作的？有谁跟他们见过面吗？但这是要好好研究的事。我还大可不必去思考那种种结果。

当时我没有意识到，但就在那一刻，我是众多词典编辑关注的对象，他们急切地想要瞧瞧可能入职的新同事长什么样。我装作若无其事的样子，翻看着图书馆的资料，但实际却只能忐忑地等候命运的发落。                                           □