我是Simon，本公众号在每周一都会推送一段外文期刊的精读文章。学英语，懂文化，每周推送的内容够你一周内慢慢消化，在周三会重复推送一次提醒你温习。摈弃浮躁，回归本心，踏踏实实学习。
以政治经济评论为主体的《经济学人》在2月11日的杂志上很罕见地刊登了一位来自中国的娱乐明星——金星。标题是《China’s Transgender Oprah》，直译为「中国的变性版奥普拉」。奥普拉是美国非常有名的脱口秀女主持人，他主持的《奥普拉脱口秀》每周平均拥有3300万命观众，连续16年排在同类节目的第一位，虽然与2011年9月9日结束录制，但是奥普拉依然是美国极具影响力的人物。因此，将金星比为奥普拉，确实是一个非常高的评价。那么这篇文章以金星为人物是要表达什么呢？通读下来，作者其实想通过金星来讽刺一下人权状况。可惜，纵观全文，你能明显的感觉到作者绞尽脑汁也没能找到一个金星因为transgender的身份而受到歧视的具体例子，因此，未免有些缺乏说服力，为了黑而黑的感觉。不过，我们依然可以取其精华，提升英语。
难度指数 ★ ★
先将以下精选内容进行通读，本文行文非常简单，阅读的时候可以关注一下粗体部分。
CHINA’S favourite chat-show host has had an extraordinary career. Jin Xing was the country’s most successful dancer before becoming a colonel in an army entertainment troupe. He won fame in America, where the New York Times called him “a Chinese genius”. He trained dancers in Brussels and Rome, before returning to China for a sex-change operation. As a woman, she resumed her career as a ballerina, set up the country’s first private ballet company, ran a bar in Beijing and married a German businessman.
In a conservative society where even homosexuality is frowned upon, let alone sex-reassignment, her life would seem to place Ms Jin well outside the stodgy mainstream of Chinese broadcasting. Yet Ms Jin, who is 49, is the country’s most popular television judge. She began with a local version of “So You Think You Can Dance” and hit the jackpot with “The Jin Xing Show”, a variety and chat programme with an audience of around 100m. She has appeared with her husband on the Chinese version of “The Amazing Race”, in which couples race each other around the world. Her latest venture, “Chinese Dating”, is in its first season.
CHINA’S favourite chat-show host has had an extraordinary career. Jin Xing was the country’s most successful dancer before becoming a colonel in an army entertainment troupe. He won fame in America, where the New York Times called him “a Chinese genius”. He trained dancers in Brussels and Rome, before returning to China for a sex-change operation. As a woman, she resumed her career as a ballerina, set up the country’s first private ballet company, ran a bar in Beijing and married a German businessman.开篇盛赞金星。作者在两个地方给予了金星极高的评价，并用三个句子分别概括了金星的成名，转折，事业等情况。
精选词
chat-show；entertainment troupe
看第一句话：
CHINA’S favourite chat-show host has had an extraordinary career. Jin Xing was the country’s most successful dancer before becoming a colonel in an army entertainment troupe.
第一句话说她是中国最受欢迎的（favourite）脱口秀主持人；第二句话又盛赞她曾今是中国最成功的舞者。这两句话连「之一」的意思都没有，谦虚都没有一下，简直是人生赢家啊，作者极高的评价有没有。
chat-show 即为脱口秀，也叫talk-show，类似《鲁豫有约》那种。但并非所有说话类的节目都叫做 talk-show，例如最近流行的《吐槽大会》就叫做 roast，算是comedy的一种形式。
注意背景上的roast
来看roast的解释：
A roast is an event in which a specific individual, a guest of honor, is subjected to good-natured jokes at their expense intended to amuse the event's wider audience.
be subjected to good-natured jokes 遭受善意的玩笑
to subjected to 是一个非常常见的短语，是遭受的意思，往往是指自己无力控制的事情。
People seeking care should not be subjected to abuse。
寻求护理的人不应该遭受虐待。
good-natured 是善意的，反义词当然是bad-natured。其实，恶意的还有一个词malicious，malicious jokes是指恶毒的笑话。
wider audience 广大的观众群。这里需要提醒一下，audience是一个collective noun，是指观众群，不能用来指某一个观众，所以这里没有用复数形式。类似的有飞机上的crew，是对飞机上所有机务的统称，所以不能用crew来特指某个空姐，如要特指可以说crew member。
army entertainment troupe 是军队文工团，文工团是很有中国特有的一个组织，所以不妨将army去掉，将entertainment troupe记为文工团。
精选词
won fame；sex-change；resume；ballerina
He won fame in America, where the New York Times called him “a Chinese genius”. He trained dancers in Brussels and Rome, before returning to China for a sex-change operation. As a woman, she resumed her career as a ballerina, set up the country’s first private ballet company, ran a bar in Beijing and married a German businessman.
won fame是指获得了成功，也就是成名。有个短语叫做 claim to fame，即成名的原因，比如金星靠跳舞成名，那么dancing就是她的claim to fame，也就是支撑她成功的那个最重要的才华。这里不妨想一下，你自己的claim to fame是什么呢？：）
sex-change operation 即变性手术。sex-change是一个偏口语的说法，如果更加学术一点的话，叫做sex reassignment surgery（SRS）。一个人经过SRS之后，就成为了一个transgender，即变性人。
ballerina是芭蕾舞女演员。
resume her career 里的resume隐含有之前中断了的意思，暗示金星之前为了手术，中断了跳舞。
这段话里最容易忽视的就是作者对于代词的变化。仔细看，在sex-change operation之前，作者指代金星的时候用的都是 He，之后就变成了 She。这里引出一个知识点，即gender和sex有什么区别？两者一般都被我们粗暴的翻译为「性别」，但是其实它们是有区别的。Gender是指一个人的自我认同性别，sex指生理性别。对于变性前的金星，他的sex是He，但是她的idenfitifed gender确是女性。也就是说，gender和sex可以不同。
CHINA’S favourite chat-show host has had an extraordinary career. Jin Xing was the country’s most successful dancer before becoming a colonel in an army entertainment troupe. He won fame in America, where the New York Times called him “a Chinese genius”. He trained dancers in Brussels and Rome, before returning to China for a sex-change operation. As a woman, she resumed her career as a ballerina, set up the country’s first private ballet company, ran a bar in Beijing and married a German businessman.
这位中国最受欢迎的脱口秀主持人有一个非凡的职业生涯。金星在成为这个国家最成功的舞者之前是军队文工团的上校。他在美国成名，纽约时报称他为“中国天才”。在他回到中国做了变性手术前，他在布鲁塞尔和罗马培训舞蹈演员。作为一个女人，她重新开始了她的职业生涯，当芭蕾舞演员，成立了中国第一家私人芭蕾舞公司，在北京开了一家酒吧，和一个德国商人结了婚。
In a conservative society where even homosexuality is frowned upon, let alone sex-reassignment, her life would seem to place Ms Jin well outside the stodgy mainstream of Chinese broadcasting. Yet Ms Jin, who is 49, is the country’s most popular television judge. She began with a local version of “So You Think You Can Dance” and hit the jackpot with “The Jin Xing Show”, a variety and chat programme with an audience of around 100m. She has appeared with her husband on the Chinese version of “The Amazing Race”, in which couples race each other around the world. Her latest venture, “Chinese Dating”, is in its first season.
这一段主要以反差的方式继续表扬金星。在一个思想观念非常保守的社会，她不但被主流接受了，还在不同的节目中大放异彩，获得了不凡的成就。
精选词
conservative society；homosexuality；frown upon；let alone；stodgy；mainstream
In a conservative society where even homosexuality is frowned upon, let alone sex-reassignment, her life would seem to place Ms Jin well outside the stodgy mainstream of Chinese broadcasting.
let alone 是更不用说，更别提的意思，主要用于进一步强调和延伸之前的论述（in a conservative society）。从意思上也很容易理解，let alone不能放在句首，应该放在一句话之后，或者如本例的两句话中间。
There isn’t enough room for us, let alone the guests.
另外，let alone后面如果跟动词，一般和前面并列关系的动词保持同样的形式。
We hadn’t got the money to have a meal, let alone stay in a hotel. (stay 和 have 并列)
conservative 保守的，这里主要指思想上的保守。
homosexuality 指同性恋。这个词指的是同性恋这件事，不用来指人。
frown upon 为不赞成，这个词字面的意思是「皱眉头」，非常形象。这里为被动语态，是说同性恋都会招致反感。如下图
也可以用主动式：
I frown upon smoking in public restaurants.
我不赞成在公共餐厅中抽烟。
would seem to place Ms Jin well outside the stodgy mainstream of Chinese broadcasting （她的生活）似乎本应该将她置于中国电视业古板主流之外
would seem to 是一个典型的虚拟语气，其中隐含了实际情况于此相反。其实有would，could，should等这类情态动词的出现，常常就已经带有了某种虚拟的口气。
Yet Ms Jin, who is 49, is the country’s most popular television judge. She began with a local version of “So You Think You Can Dance” and hit the jackpot with “The Jin Xing Show”, a variety and chat programme with an audience of around 100m.
第一句话Yet Ms Jin, who is 49, is the country’s most popular television judge.中的 who is 49 是一个非限定性定语从句，两边的逗号不能省略，否则意思完全不同了。对于这一点，我在之前帖子90%人都会错用的定语从句！中有详细解释。
jackpot 是累积奖池。是赌场中机台所累积的奖金，它是所有玩家每一笔的下注中特别提取出来，并且不断累积，当金额够高的时候，就有可能开出来。如果你运气足够好，一旦触发就可以得到奖池所有的钱。在赌场里，jackpot是赌客最最期待的大奖，如果想要赢得巨额奖金，非要jackpot。
如下图某赌场hit the jackpot赌客，一夜暴富
所以 hit the jackpot 就是撞了大运的意思。在这里就是说金星凭借《金星秀》走红，有走了好运的意思。
I think we hit the jackpot with our ad campaign because our sales have nearly doubled.
我觉得凭借着广告活动我们获得了成功，因为销售涨了两倍。
She has appeared with her husband on the Chinese version of “The Amazing Race”, in which couples race each other around the world. Her latest venture, “Chinese Dating”, is in its first season.
venture 一般指有一些风险的事情，比如风险投资，或者去野外探险等。她的新节目Chinese Dating才是第一季，所以还不知道能不能成功，所以这里用了venture这个词。
Venture是一个非常常见的词，例如创业公司需要找风投，即VC，就是Venture Capital的缩写，这里就隐含了风险的含义。
venture也可以做动词，同样有冒险的意思。
When darkness fell, he would venture out.
天黑以后，他就会状着胆子出去。
I ventured to ask him what he was writing.
我小心翼翼地问他在写什么。
In a conservative society where even homosexuality is frowned upon, let alone sex-reassignment, her life would seem to place Ms Jin well outside the stodgy mainstream of Chinese broadcasting. Yet Ms Jin, who is 49, is the country’s most popular television judge. She began with a local version of “So You Think You Can Dance” and hit the jackpot with “The Jin Xing Show”, a variety and chat programme with an audience of around 100m. She has appeared with her husband on the Chinese version of “The Amazing Race”, in which couples race each other around the world. Her latest venture, “Chinese Dating”, is in its first season.
在一个连同性恋（更不用说变性）都不被许可的保守社会，金女士的生活似乎本应将她置于中国广播电视古板的主流之外。然而，49岁的金女士是该国最受欢迎的电视评委。她先是出现在一个本土版本的“舞林争霸”节目中并在“金星秀”中大获成功，“金星秀”是一个有1亿观众的综艺和谈话节目。她与她的丈夫一起出现在中国版的《极速前进》，在节目中夫妇们在世界各地相互竞赛。她最新的节目“中国式相亲”正在进行第一季。
