2016年高考英语全国Ⅲ卷 – 阅读理解B

On one of her trips to New York several years ago, Eudora Welty decided to take a couple of' New York friends out to dinner. They settled in at a comfortable East Side cafe and within minutes, another customer was approaching their table.
几年前，在一次去纽约的旅行中，尤多拉·韦尔蒂决定带几个纽约朋友出去吃饭。他们在东区一家舒适的咖啡馆安顿下来，几分钟后，另一位顾客走近他们的桌子。

“Hey, aren'’t you from Mississippi?" the elegant, white-haired writer remembered being asked by the stranger. “I'm from Mississippi too.”
“嘿，你来自密西西比州吗？”这位优雅的白发作家记得陌生人问他。“我来自密西西比州。”

Without a second thought, the woman joined the Welty party. When her dinner partner showed up, she also pulled up a chair.
这位女士毫不犹豫地加入了韦尔蒂一伙。当她的晚餐搭档出现时，她也搬来一把椅子。

“They began telling me all the news of Mississippi," Welty said. “l didn't know what my New York friends were thinking.”
“他们开始告诉我密西西比州的所有消息，”韦尔蒂说，“我不知道我的纽约朋友在想什么。”

Taxis on a rainy New York night are rarer than sunshine. By the time the group got up to leave, it was pouring outside. Welty's new friends immediately sent a waiter to find a cab. Heading back downtown toward her hotel, her big city friends were amazed at the turn of events that had changed their Big Apple dinner into a Mississippi state reunion.
纽约雨夜的出租车比阳光还少。当这群人起身准备离开时，外面正下着倾盆大雨。韦尔蒂的新朋友立刻派服务员去叫出租车。回到市中心的酒店，她的大城市朋友们对事件的转变感到惊讶，这些事件将他们的纽约聚餐变成了密西西比州的聚会。

“My friend said: 'Now we believe your stories,"" Welty added. “And I said: 'Now you know. These are the people that make me write them.’”
韦尔蒂补充道：“我的朋友说：‘现在我们相信你的故事了。’我说：‘你知道了，是这些人让我写的。’”

Sitting on a sofa in her room, Welty, a slim figure in a simple gray dress, looked pleased with this explanation.
韦尔蒂坐在房间里的沙发上，身材苗条，穿着简单的灰色连衣裙，看起来对这个解释很满意。

"I don't make them up," she said. Of the characters in her fiction these last 50 or so years. “I don't have to."
“我不会编造，”她说。在过去50年左右的时间里，她小说中的人物，“没必要。”

Beauticians, bartenders, piano players and people with purple hats, Welty's people come from afternoons spent visiting with old friends, from walks through the streets of her native Jackson, Miss., from conversations overheard on a bus. It annoys Welty that, at 78, her left ear has now given out. Sometimes, sitting on a bus or a train, she hears only a fragment of a particularly interesting story.
美容师、调酒师、钢琴手和戴着紫色帽子的人，韦尔蒂的人物来自于下午与老朋友的拜访，来自她家乡密西西比州杰克逊的街道散步，来自在公共汽车上无意中听到的对话。78岁的韦尔蒂左耳失聪了，这让她很恼火。有时，坐在公共汽车或火车上，她只能听到一个特别有趣的故事片段。