1993年1月英语四级 - 阅读理解D

Like fine food, good writing is something we approach with pleasure and enjoy from the first taste to the last. And good writers, good cooks, do not suddenly appear full-blown. Quite the contrary, just as the cook has to undergo an intensive training, mastering the skills of his trade, the writer must sit at his desk and devote long hours to achieving a style in his writing, whatever its purpose-schoolwork, matters of business, or purely social communication. You may be sure that the more painstaking the effort, the more effective the writing, and the more rewarding.
好的写作就像美食，从开始品尝到最后吃完都是一次愉快的享受。好的作家，好的厨师，不会突然显得成熟起来。恰恰相反，正如厨师必须接受密集的培训，掌握自己的职业技能一样，作家必须坐在办公桌前，花很长时间来实现自己的写作风格，无论其目的是学校作业、商业事务还是纯粹的社交交流。你可以肯定，付出的努力越多，写作就越有效，收获也就越多。

There are still some remote places in the world where you might find a public scribe to do your business or social writing for you, for a fee. There are a few managers who are lucky enough to have the service of that rate kind of secretary who can take care of all sorts of letter writing with no more than a quick note to work from. But for most of us, if there is any writing to be done, we have to do it ourselves.
世界上仍有一些偏远的地方，你可能会找到一位公共抄写员为你做生意或社交写作，但需要付费。有一些经理足够幸运，能够得到这种级别的秘书的服务，他们只需要一张快速的便条就可以处理各种信件。但对我们大多数人来说，如果有什么要写的，我们必须自己写。

We have to write school papers, business papers or home papers. We are constantly called on to put words to paper. It would be difficult to count the number of such words, messages, letters, and reports put into the mails or delivered by hand, but the daily figure must be enormous. What is more, everyone who writes expects, or at least hopes. We want whatever we write to be read, from first word to last, not just thrown into some “letters-to-be-read” file or into a wastepaper basket. This is the reason we bend our efforts toward learning and practicing the skill of interesting, effective writing.
我们必须写学校、商业或家庭方面的文章。我们经常需要把文字写在纸上，很难统计这些单词、信息、信件和报告的数量，但每天的数字肯定是巨大的。更重要的是，每个写作的人都在期待，或者至少是希望。我们希望我们写的任何文字都能被读到，从开头到结尾，而不仅仅是被扔进一些“待阅读的信件”档案或者放入废纸篓中。这就是我们努力学习和练习有趣、有效的写作技巧的原因。