雪国[Snow Country]④：冠詞と代名詞の使い分け
「雪国」の第四弾、名著の冒頭部分の和英比較と注目ポイントのご紹介を通して、英語と日本語の仕組みの違いを学んでもらいます。
今回も、川端康成氏による原文とエドワード・G・サイデンステッカー氏（以下、EGS氏と略）による英訳を見比べて、英文での冠詞theとaの使い分け、冠詞と代名詞の使い分けと、和文と英文の細かいニュアンスの違いにご注目ください。
いわゆる学校英語や学術英語で整理しきれていない部分を面白いと思っていただけると幸いです（閲覧して面白いと思った方は、コメントしていただけると、教材や答え合わせを今後公開する励みになります）。
［タイトル］雪国 / Snow Country
［英文本文：最初から］（以前の｢雪国[Snow Country]｣①②③記事で紹介済）
① THE TRAIN came out of the long tunnel into the snow country. The earth lay white under the night sky. The train pulled up at a signal stop.
A girl who had been sitting on the other side of the car came over and opened the window in front of Shimamura. The snowy cold poured in. Leaning far out the window, the girl called to the station master as though he were a great distance away.
The station master walked slowly over the snow, a lantern in his hand. His face was buried to the nose in a muffler, and the flaps of his cap were turned down over his ears.
It’s that cold, is it, thought Shimamura. Low, barracklike buildings that might have been railway dormitories were scattered here and there up the frozen slope of the mountain. The white of the snow fell away into the darkness some distance before it reached them.
“How are you?” the girl called out. “It’s Yoko.”
“Yoko, is it. On your way back? It’s gotten cold again.”
“I understand my brother has come to work here. Thank you for all you’ve done.”
② “It will be lonely, though. This is no place for a young boy.”
“He’s really no more than a child. You’ll teach him what he needs to know, won’t you.”
“Oh, but he’s doing very well. We’ll be busier from now on, with the snow and all. Last year we had so much that the trains were always being stopped by avalanches, and the whole town was kept busy cooking for them.”
“But look at the warm clothes, would you. My brother said in his letter that he wasn’t even wearing a sweater yet.”
“I’m not warm unless I have on four layers, myself. The young ones start drinking when it gets cold, and the first thing you know they’re over there in bed with colds.” He waved his lantern toward the dormitories.
“Does my brother drink?”
“Not that I know of.”
“You’re on your way home now, are you?”
“I had a little accident. I’ve been going to the doctor.”
“You must be more careful.”
The station master, who had an overcoat on over his kimono, turned as if to cut the freezing conversation short. “Take care of yourself,” he called over his shoulder.
③ “Is my brother here now?” Yoko looked out over the snow-covered platform. “See that he behaves himself.” It was such a beautiful voice that it struck one as sad. In all its high resonance it seemed to come echoing back across the snowy night.
The girl was still leaning out the window when the train pulled away from the station. “Tell my brother to come home when he has a holiday,” she called out to the station master, who was walking along the tracks.
“I’ll tell him,” the man called back.
Yoko closed the window and pressed her hands to her red cheeks.
Three snowplows were waiting for the heavy snows here on the Border Range. There was an electric avalanche-warning system at the north and south entrances to the tunnel. Five thousand workers were ready to clear away the snow, and two thousand young men from the volunteer fire-departments could be mobilized if they were needed.
Yoko’s brother would be working at this signal stop, so soon to be buried under the snow—somehow that fact made the girl more interesting to Shimamura.
“The girl”—something in her manner suggested the unmarried girl. Shimamura of course had no way of being sure what her relationship was to the man with her. They acted rather like a married couple. The man was clearly ill, however, and illness shortens the distance between a man and a woman. The more earnest the ministrations, the more the two come to seem like husband and wife. A girl taking care of a man far older than she, for all the world like a young mother, can from a distance be taken for his wife.
But Shimamura in his mind had cut the girl off from the man with her and decided from her general appearance and manner that she was unmarried. And then, because he had been looking at her from a strange angle for so long, emotions peculiarly his own had perhaps colored his judgment.
［以下、④続き］
※読み仮名は原文ではルビ、記事ではカッコで表示（太字や※部分は私が入力、段落が長いので、注にナンバリング）
もう三時間も前のこと、島村は退屈まぎれに左手*1の人差指*1をいろいろに動かして眺めては、結局この指*1だけ*2が、これから会いに行く女をなまなましく覚えている、はっきり思い出そうとあせればあせるほど、つかみどろこなくぼやけてゆく記憶の頼りなさのうちに、この指*1だけ*2は女の触感で今も濡(ぬ)れていて、自分を遠くの女へ引き寄せるかのようだと、不思議に思いながら、鼻につけて匂いを嗅(か)いでみたりしていたが、ふとその指*1で窓ガラスに線を引くと、そこに女の片眼がはっきり浮き出たのだった。彼は驚いて声をあげそうになった。しかしそれは彼が心を遠くへやっていたからのことで、気がついてみればなんでもない、向側の座席の女が写ったのだった。外は夕闇がおりているし、汽車のなかは明かりがついている。それで窓ガラスが鏡になる。けれども、スチイムの温(ぬく)みでガラスがすっかり水蒸気に濡れているから、指*1で拭(ふ)くまではその鏡はなかったのだった。
It had been three hours earlier. In his boredom, Shimamura stared at his left*1 hand as the forefinger*1 bent and unbent. Only*2 this hand*1 seemed to have a vital and immediate memory of the woman he was going to see. The more he tried to call up a clear picture of her, the more his memory failed him, the farther she faded away, leaving him nothing to catch and hold. In the midst of this uncertainty only*2 the one hand*3, and in particular*2 the forefinger*1, even now seemed damp from her touch, seemed to be pulling him back to her from afar. Taken with the strangeness of it, he brought the hand*1 to his face, then quickly drew a line across the misted-over window. A woman’s eye floated up before him. He almost called out in his astonishment. But he had been dreaming, and when he came to himself he saw that it was only the reflection in the window of the girl opposite. Outside it was growing dark, and the lights had been turned on in the train, transforming the window into a mirror. The mirror had been clouded over with steam until he drew that line across it.
※あちこちで指摘されていることですが、文章の区切り箇所が川端氏の原文とEGS氏の英文では全然違います。おそらくは情報の順序（語順ではなく）を優先するための工夫、EGS氏の苦労ぶりが伝わってくるようです（区切りを守ることで情報の順序を変えるよりも、情報の順序を変えないことを最優先するために文章を細かく区切って意訳）。
※1："the forefinger"は、英文法的には｢体の一部を表すthe｣。所有格"his left hand"との違いに注意。次の文、日本語では｢この指｣なのを英訳では"this finger"ではなく"this hand"。EGS氏は、和文からは不必要なほどにhandとfingerを区別してhandを好んで使用。段落最後の｢指｣は英訳せず無視。理由は何となく推測できるような気もします。
※"the woman he was going to see"は、葉子とは違う女性（葉子なら、"he was going to see"ではないから）。初出でも｢特定のthe｣。
※2：｢だけ｣の英訳が３通り：まずonlyとin particular
※3："his one hand"や"this one hand"ではなく"the one hand"。
※"he brought the hand to his face"の冠詞theと代名詞hisの使い分けに注意。
※"drew a line across the misted-over window"は｢初出のa｣と｢既出のthe｣という定番説明で整理可能。
※"A woman’s eye"は葉子だという認識が島村にないから不定冠詞（このaがwomanにかかるのか、eyeにかかるのか、きちんと整理はできますか？）。また、次の段落の"The one eye"との比較も面白い思います。
※"He almost called out in his astonishment."は、日本語に慣れた身としてはhisが余計だと感じてしまいます。英文法的には単に"in astonishment"でも良いところですが、hisを入れた理由を考えてみるのも興味深いかも。
※"the lights"は初出でも定番解説｢状況で分かる｣で整理可能。
※"the line"ではなく"that line"、これは日本語で考えれば分かるはず。日本語と比べると大胆な意訳。
娘の片眼だけ*2はかえって異様に美しかったものの、島村は顔を窓に寄せると、夕景色(ゆうげしき)見たさという風な旅愁顔を俄(にわか)づくりして、掌(てのひら)でガラスをこすった。
The one eye by itself*2 was strangely beautiful, but, feigning a traveler’s weariness and putting his face to the window as if to look at the scenery outside, he cleared the steam from the rest of the glass.
※"The one eye by itself"は、既出なこともあって英語ではoneなしの"The eye by itself"でも単数であることが伝わるはずですが、oneを入れた方がいいという判断か。
※2：｢だけ｣の英訳が３通り、only, in particular, by itself
娘は胸をこころもち傾けて、前に横たわった男を一心に見下(おろ)していた。肩に力が入っているところから、少しいかつい眼も瞬(まばた)きさえしないほどの真剣さのしるしだと知れた。男は窓の方を枕(まくら)にして、娘の横へ折り曲げた足をあげていた。三等車である。島村の真横ではなく、一つ前の向側の座席だったから、横寝している男の顔は耳のあたりまでしか鏡に写らなかった。
The girl leaned attentively forward, looking down at the man before her. Shimamura could see from the way her strength was gathered in her shoulders that the suggestion of fierceness in her eyes was but a sign of an intentness that did not permit her to blink. The man lay with his head pillowed at the window and his legs bent so that his feet were on the seat facing, beside the girl. It was a third-class coach. The pair were not directly opposite Shimamura but rather one seat forward, and the man’s head showed in the window-mirror only as far as the ear.
※"her shoulders", "her eyes", his head", his legs", his feet", the man’s head", the ear"：最後のearだけ、所有格ではなくthe。
※２文目でShimamuraを主語にするかどうか、日本語からは微妙な判断かも。
今回のご紹介は以上です。
川端康成氏による原文とエドワード・G・サイデンステッカー氏による英訳の比較から見えてくる和英の違い（今回は英文での冠詞と代名詞の使い分けに加えて、様々なレベルでの和文と英文の細かい表現の違い）、いかがでしたか？
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