"The Raft of the Medusa."

VOA: special.2010.06.23

Standing in the Lethe of Milton's hell is none other than the classical figure, the figure from classical mythology, Medusa.

站在弥尔顿笔下的忘川河畔正是,那个源自神话的经典人物美杜莎。

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Such is her power. But we have every right to ask what Medusa - this is a figure from Greek mythology - what Medusa is doing in a Christian hell.

她有那样的力量，但我们有权问问美杜莎,这一希腊神话里的人物,在基督教的地狱里做什么。

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They've been clearly been hurled into hell by a Judeo-Christian deity. So this little moment, this Medusa moment, we can call it, is really quite strange.

他们被犹太教和基督教共同的上帝扔进地狱,所以在这一时刻，我们可以说美杜莎的出现是十分奇怪的。

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You could think of Medusa as Milton's counter-muse.

你可以把美杜莎看作是弥尔顿最重要的缪斯女神。

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Now it goes without saying that Milton has not been up to this point writing an allegorical poem. The creatures moving and speaking have been actual creations of the deity, with the strange exception of Medusa.

不用说，弥尔顿从未,写过寓言诗，这些移动着的说着话的生灵,是由神创造的，除了美杜莎这个奇怪的例外。

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Medusa can turn men into stone.

美杜莎可以把人变成石头。

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You know Medusa.

我们知道美杜莎。

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Milton has dug up a gem from the pages of The Iliad, and this gem has something like a Medusa effect on the poem or perhaps on us as readers. Time almost seems to stop when we begin appreciating this image solely on aesthetic grounds.

弥尔顿从《伊利亚特》中挖出了一块瑰宝，这块瑰宝对于诗或我们读者起得作用,如同美杜莎一样，在我们只欣赏着,精美绝伦的地面上的场景时，时间仿佛停止。

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