Lu Shi followed Natsume Soseki to the rented house on Braiya Road.
The house has one bedroom and a living room with quite old furnishings. On the east wall of the living room, two windows sealed with bricks are extremely eye-catching and are blocked tightly, causing the inside of the house to The air is extremely sluggish.
Natsume Soseki complained: "Don't dislike it, there are many like this in London."
Lu Shi nodded,
"Well, the hangover from the window tax."
Natsume Soseki looked at him in surprise and asked curiously: "What is window tax?"
Lu Shi did not answer the other party in a hurry. Instead, he walked to the window and fumbled on the wedge-shaped bricks for a while. He finally found the buckle and pulled hard.
Click, and a small hole opened in the lower right corner of the stone brick window.
Natsume Soseki was confused:? ? ?
"What are you doing?! We... hiss... broke the landlord's window."
Lu Shi waved his hand to signal the other party not to panic and explained: "Didn't we just talk about window tax? Before 1851, British law stipulated that any house with less than 10 windows would be taxed 2 shillings; if there were 10 to 20 windows, a tax of 2 shillings would be levied. Those with more than 20 windows are taxed 10 shillings. Since this tax is only levied on the number of windows, it does not take into account the area and value of the house, nor the taxpayer's ability to pay taxes. The burden is unusually light and heavy. It’s extremely unreasonable. In order to avoid paying taxes, taxpayers often change their bright windows into dark windows, just like this.”
He lay on the small hole, looked around, and said, "This thing can only be used to get some air, so don't worry about lighting it up. Phew~ Let me sober up first."
Natsume Soseki breathed a sigh of relief,
Just now, he was almost scared to death.
Unexpectedly, Lu Shi said again: "It's not an option to live like this. I'll smash the windows one day."
Natsume Soseki was depressed, wondering why he had invited an ancestor back to share the house with him.
He hesitated for a moment, and finally couldn't help but ask: "Lu, why do you rent with others?"
Lu Shi was speechless,
"Why else? I have no money~"
Natsume Soseki was a little surprised and asked: "Will you Chinese students have no money? I took a boat all the way to London and stopped in Shanghai, Fuzhou and other places. The ports are prosperous and there are magnificent buildings as far as I can see. My hometown is completely different than No. I remember when I was in Shanghai, I went to the customs to visit Tachibana Masaki, and I even got lost once because of those Western buildings."
Lu Shi clicked his tongue,
"You also said it's a Western-style building, in the concession area."
Natsume Soseki fell silent.
Before the Treaty of Commerce and Navigation was signed between Japan and Britain, foreigners had the right to live freely in certain treaty ports in Japan and enjoyed extraterritoriality.
In terms of external incompetence and humiliating the country, the Tokugawa shogunate was similar to the Qing court.
The atmosphere is a little weird.
Lu Shi moved several boxes and travel bags to his bedside, opened the bags and arranged the furnishings.
Natsume Soseki turned on the light, read and wrote.
After being relatively speechless for a while, Lu Shi walked behind the other party, glanced at the desk, and found that it was filled with various literary books, and even a few copies of "Seaside Magazine" (actually "Strand Magazine") before 1893. ), a picture of a detective smoking a pipe comes to life on the cover.
"Holmes?"
Lu Shi picked up one of the books and flipped through it.
Natsume Soseki was still writing something, without looking up, and said, "Do you like this? Then read it and return it to me after reading it. This kind of novel is useless to my studies."
He chose Chinese Literature at the University of London as his major, studying under the famous scholar William Alexander Smith, and at the same time conducted in-depth study of literature, philosophy, and sociology.
Lu Shi asked: "You are a government official, what are your academic requirements?"
Natsume Soseki smiled bitterly and replied: "Study English. However, I have only been here a few days and I discovered that the so-called British literature is very different from the English I knew before. Being proficient in English is not enough to strengthen the country."
As he spoke, he pointed to what he was writing and continued: "But no matter what, the homework assigned by the teacher must be completed."
Lu Shi leaned over and asked, "What homework?"
Natsume Soseki replied: "Not long after I came here, the teacher wanted to test my understanding and grasp of English literature. Since it is English literature, popular books like "Seaside Magazine" naturally don't matter."
This matter happened to be within Lu Shi's professional shooting range.
He said: "Not necessarily. For example..."
As he talked, he rummaged through the stacks of books and finally found Sherlock Holmes's first case, and asked: "Looking at this title, how would you translate it?"
Natsume Soseki sighed helplessly,
"You don't understand Japanese, so it's useless for me to talk to you."
Lu Shi urged: "Just say it."
Natsume Soseki rubbed a corner of his moustache and replied while pondering: "'A Study in Scarlet' should be 'A Study in Scarlet' or 'A Study in Scarlet'. What's so difficult about this? It's completely literal." "
Lu Shi shook his head,
"wrong."
This is the first time Natsume Soseki has been criticized professionally. He was a little dissatisfied and said: "Then what do you think it is?"
Lu Shi chuckled and said in Japanese: "It should be "Scarlet Study"."
After Natsume Soseki heard this translation, he immediately felt that Riku Toki was not good enough and lost interest.
He said lazily: "There are three difficulties in translation: trustworthiness, expressiveness and elegance. It is already very difficult to seek trustworthiness! If you are concerned about trustworthiness, you will not reach it. Even if you translate it, if you don't translate it, you will not reach it." Daya and Ya were proposed by Mr. Yan Fu of your country, but you are so good at it, you are so reckless in order to express yourself..."
As he said that, he finally discovered something, his eyes widened,
"You know Japanese!?"
Lu Shi did not continue, but changed the subject, pointed to the magazine and said: "Look at what the original text of this paragraph says, 'How about we call it "A Study in Scarlet"? Using a little artistic terminology , I don’t think it’s harmful.’ It is clearly stated here that “A Study in Scarlet” uses artistic terms, and in the field of art, what does study mean?”
Natsume Soseki's thoughts were drawn back again.
After a long while, he gave the answer: "In painting, it refers to practice, trial painting, and trial painting; in music, it refers to etudes."
Lu Shi nodded,
"Furthermore, the Sherlock Holmes series is created with Dr. Watson as the first point of view, and the author Conan Doyle happens to be a doctor. Considering that this is the first article in the series, it is most appropriate to say that it is a practice work if the author is put into it."
Even if you only look for evidence in the original text, it is convincing enough.
Natsume Soseki showed a sincere expression,
"Lu Jun, what on earth are you..."
Lu Shi interrupted: "Let's try to use English as much as possible."
Natsume Soseki coughed, stood up, took a step forward, put his legs on the ground, placed his hips on his ankles, kept his upper body straight, and placed his hands on his knees regularly.
after,
Boom——
He leaned over suddenly,
"Sensational Mud Private Marseille!"
Lu Shi:? ? ?
He didn't want Natsume Soseki to really knock him, so he quickly avoided the opponent's front and said, "Don't...brother, don't mess with me."
Natsume Soseki seemed to feel that the time to apologize was enough, so he stood up and
"Lu, I was wrong. I underestimated you in my heart just now."
He glanced at "Seaside Magazine" again, and continued what he had just said: "I also underestimated the hidden literature and artistry in popular books. To make up for it, I decided to treat the study of the Sherlock Holmes series as a homework and thoroughly study it. Read it, read it thoroughly.”
Lu Shi had one head and two heads.
"You don't have to be like this. There are still many unscientific things about Sherlock Holmes."
Natsume Soseki was stunned and asked curiously: "Isn't it true that Dr. Doyle's writing style is very professional? After reading it, I felt that the plots are very consistent and the reasoning is very rigorous."
Lu Shi shook his head,
"There are really a lot of unscientific things. For example, in "The Case of the Spotted Belt", a snake will suffocate to death in an airtight safe; in "The Yellow Face Man", a black man and a white man gave birth to a father who was older than the black man. Children with darker skin are also outrageous; there are many descriptions in "Silver Horse" that do not comply with official horse racing rules..."
Natsume Soseki swallowed, picked up a pen and recorded silently,
He was quite sure that the homework would be due tomorrow.
