Illustrator and children’s book author Dick Bruna, the creator of the popular image Miffy, died at the age of 89 on Feb 16. On Twitter, many people posted the weeping white bunny in memory of this beloved Dutch man.
2月16日，插画家、童书作者迪克·布鲁纳逝世，享年89岁。他是广受欢迎的米菲兔形象的创作者。在推特上，很多人发表了哭泣的米菲兔来纪念这位深受爱戴的荷兰人。
Miffy, in Dutch, was originally called Nijntje (little rabbit), which Bruna created in 1955 by shortening the Dutch word for rabbit, Konijntje.
米菲兔起先在荷兰语版本中叫Nijntje（小兔子的意思）。1955年，布鲁纳把荷兰语中的兔子Konijntje简化创造了Nijntje这个词。
English translator Olive Jones gave the little rabbit the name Miffy in the 1960s.
直到上个世纪60年代英国的译者Olive Jones翻译的时候给小白兔取名米菲兔。
Over six decades, Bruna wrote and illustrated more than 100 books about Miffy, which are considered globally to be suitable for kids aged between eight months and two years old.
六十年间，布鲁纳创作并绘制了100多本米菲兔书，他的书在世界范围内广泛被认为适于8个月和2岁之间的儿童阅读。
So far, the Miffy stories have been translated into more than 50 languages, with more than 85 million copies of Miffy books having been sold in 85 countries so far.
迄今为止，米菲兔的故事已经被翻译成50多种语言，在85个国家售出8500万册以上。
Miffy is very popular in Japan. The Japan Times even has a section on its web page especially devoted to her. Besides this, a café in Tokyo serves food dedicated to her name.
米菲兔在日本很受欢迎。《日本时报》的网页上还有一个专门留给米菲兔的板块。东京有一家咖啡店卖的食物用米菲兔命名。
Bruna disliked Hello Kitty, a Japanese kitten image with two black-dot eyes and no mouth that was launched in 1974. He thought it was a copy of Miffy.
但是布鲁纳不喜欢Hello Kitty。1974年，Hello Kitty在日本发布，它眼睛是两个黑点，没有嘴巴。布鲁纳觉得那是翻版米菲兔。
In an interview with Telegraph, he said:
布鲁纳在接受《电讯报》采访的时候说：
“I don’t like that at all. Try to make something that you think of yourself. After all… there’re so many nice things.”
“我一点也不喜欢（Hello Kitty）。画点自己的东西吧。毕竟，有那么多好东西。”
In 2004, Miffy was appointed the official “family tourist ambassador to New York City”.
2004年，米菲兔被指定为纽约旅游官方大使。
Miffy was first introduced to China in 2002 by Children’s Fun Publishing Co., which later published the second Chinese edition of the books in 2009. More than three million copies of the second Chinese edition have been sold so far.
中国的童趣公司于2002年引入米菲兔图书，后又在2009年出版了第二个版本。迄今，第二版本已经售出300多万册了。
In 2015, to celebrate Miffy’s 60th birthday, train carriages in Guangzhou were decorated with her image.
2015年，为了庆祝米菲的60岁生日，广州地铁装饰了米菲兔形象。
Many European countries like Germany also have websites dedicated to Miffy.
德国等欧洲国家也都有专门的米菲兔网站。
Bruna was born in August 1928 in Utrecht of the Netherlands. His father owned the country’s largest publishing company, A W Bruna and Zoon.
布鲁纳于1928年8月出生于荷兰乌特勒支市，父亲是荷兰最大的出版公司A W Bruna and Zoon的老板。
Against his father’s will, Bruna wanted to become an artist, rather than inherit the family business.
布鲁纳并没有如他父亲所愿继承家族产业，而想成为一名艺术家。
He lived in Paris for a while and studied at the State Academy of Fine Arts in Amsterdam but unable to paint or master perspective, he became frustrated and did not finish.
他在巴黎住过一段时间，并在阿姆斯特丹的国家美术学院学习，但是由于学不会透视法无法绘画，很抑郁，没有完成学业。
When he got married, in order to earn a steady income, he worked as a designer at his father’s publishing company, designing posters, book covers and promotional materials for detective novels.
结婚以后，为了有稳定的收入，他去父亲的出版公司当美编，为侦探小说画海报、书封以及其他的宣传资料。
But besides work, Bruna painted side products. In 1953, he published his first book for children The Apple, which tells the story of life from an apple’s perspective.
除了工作，布鲁纳做一点副业。1953年，他出版了第一本童书《苹果》，从苹果的角度讲述生命的故事。
In 1955, when Bruna was spending vacation with his one-year-old son at the beach, they encountered a playful white rabbit. The rabbit inspired Bruna and every night he told his son a story about the rabbit. Later he drew the story and created the first Miffy book.
1955年，布鲁纳带着一岁的儿子在海边度假，他们偶遇一只活蹦乱跳的小白兔。小白兔给了布鲁纳灵感，每天晚上他都会给儿子讲一个小白兔的故事。后来他把故事画出来，成了第一本米菲书。
Bruna himself was not sure whether Miffy was a boy or a girl until 1970 when he worked on the sixth book, Miffy’s Birthday. He put her in a dress because he liked to draw dresses more than trousers.
布鲁纳自己也不知道米菲是男孩还是女孩，直到1970年，他画第六本书《米菲的生日》的时候，给她穿上了裙子，因为他更想画裙子，不太喜欢画裤子。
Miffy was always a cheerful little white rabbit enjoying moments of happiness while taking small adventures: a trip with her family to the zoo, visiting a museum or playing in snow.
米菲兔总是一只欢乐的小白兔，日常有一些小冒险，有些幸福的时刻：跟家人一起去动物园，参观美术馆，或是在雪里玩耍。
Bruna’s painting style was influenced by the bold lines and two-dimensionality of Henri Matisee and Fernand Leger. He loved using primary colors and clear lines, trying to eliminate unnecessary elements in his drawing, and reduce the little rabbit to the absolute minimum.
布鲁纳的绘画风格受到野兽派创始人亨利·马蒂斯和喜欢简化的法国画家费尔南德·莱热的影响。他喜欢使用原色和清晰的线条，试图去除不必要的元素，将小兔子极简化。
For example, in order to draw a crying Miffy, Bruna gave her three teardrops at first, but later reduced it to only one, but added another drop to express heartbreak.
例如，起先画哭泣的米菲的时候，布鲁纳画了三滴泪，但是后来减少到一滴，而后为了表现心碎的伤心，又加了一滴泪。
Bruna once said: “I spend a long time making my drawings as simple as possible, throwing lots away, before I reach that moment of recognition… I leave plenty of space for children’s imagination.”
布鲁纳曾说过，“我花很长时间将我的画尽可能简化，在达到理想时刻之前去除很多累赘……这样留给儿童很多想象的空间。”
Besides books, there are many other Miffy products such as stationery and videos.
除了书之外，米菲兔还有很多周边产品，比如文具，录像和其他。
Bruna became very rich, but he maintained a simple life until he had a stroke at 84 - worked six days a week, woke up at six every morning, then rode a bike to his studio before eight and ate lunch with his wife every day. It is said that every person in Utrecht knew him.
布鲁纳非常富有，但他一直过着简单的生活，直到84岁中风：一周工作六天，每天六点醒来，骑自行车八点前到达工作室，每天都与妻子吃午餐。据说乌特勒支市的所有人都认识他。
“In the Netherlands, everyone has always liked Dick Bruna as a person as well,” Agnes Vogt, a children’s book specialist at the Dutch Foundation for Literature, told New York Times. “He was such a modest and kind man who lived a very simple life, although he was very rich.”
“在荷兰，大家都喜欢迪克·布鲁纳这个人，”荷兰文学基金会童书专家艾格尼丝·沃格特在接受《纽约时报》采访的时候说。“他是个非常谦逊善良的人，尽管很富有，但是生活很简单。”
Miffy was introduced to China in 2002. At that time, compared with other children's books, Miffy books looked smaller, thinner and more expensive. As a result, Miffy was not widely accepted by Chinese parents until 2009.
2002年，米菲兔被引入中国，但是在那个时候，跟其他童书比，米菲兔的书看起来又小又薄又贵。因此直到2009年，米菲兔才被中国的父母广泛接受。
At the suggestion of A Jia, a children's book specialist, Children's Fun Publishing Co. re-translated the books. A Jia, one of the translators, spent eight months translating the first ten books, trying to make it understandable for children between eight months and two years old.
在童书专家阿甲的建议下，童趣公司重新翻译了这本书。阿甲是翻译之一。他花八个月才翻完第一辑的十本书。翻译的过程中，他一直试图翻出能让八个月到两岁之间的孩子听得懂的译文。
童书专家阿甲
"Bruna first spent an average of one month finishing painting 12 pictures for one book, and then wrote the story in strict poetic style," says 46-year-old A Jia.
“布鲁纳首先花1个月的时间把12幅画画出来，然后再用严格的诗歌体把故事写出来，” 46岁的阿甲说。
Bruna said that when he was working on the books, he imagined there was a child sitting across from him.
布鲁纳说在他创作的时候，他想象有个小孩坐在他对面。
"It's really not an easy job to create a text that is easy to be understood by small babies. It's even harder to imagine how Bruna can continue on for decades," he says.
“要想创作一个文本让婴幼儿容易理解是一件挺难的事。更难得的是，布鲁纳数十年来一直在做这样的工作，”他说。
"I fell in love with Miffy at first sight in 2002. It's so simple but so expressive with so few lines," he says.
“2002年的时候我一看到米菲兔就喜欢上了。她的线条如此简单，但是内涵却如此丰富，” 他说。
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