美国印象：爱迪生（2015）

Edison was fairly bursting with ideas.
新实验室“在做和要做事情”的目录整整五页
His catalogue of "Things doing and to be done"in the new laboratory ran to five full pages
包括从人造丝到雪压缩机
and included everything from artificial silk
到盲人油墨等所有东西
to a snow compressor to ink for the blind.
你不可能像他干得那么多
You can't work as much as he did,
跨越那么多领域 像他那么激♥情♥
in as many different spheres,with as much zeal as he did,
如果你内心没有真正的火焰
if you don't have some real fire burning inside there.
而这种火焰 就是他的激♥情♥
And that fire has to be a passion for what he was doing
和基本行为表现
and literally the act of doing it.
他喜欢用他的头脑
He loves his mind.
他喜欢深深思考
He loves slipping into it.
对他而言 这正是活着的意义
For him,it was exactly what made him come alive,
给了他使命
what gave him his mission.
我只能想象他在实验室后面的小憩
And I can only imagine him lying on his cot,right,at the back of the lab,having one of his catnaps,
然后醒来说
and then waking up and going,
“这是我过去的想法
"Oh,this is what I was thinking about,
这是现在我为什么有不同思路“
and here's how I'm thinking about it differently now."
他的思维非常有趣
And,you know,being in his element
非常活跃和深邃
by being in the kind of very,very interesting,
使他专注
very,very active black hole of his thinking.
爱迪生希望新实验室有新开端
Edison had hoped to make a fresh start in his new laboratory.
相反发现他对新发明的追求
Instead,he would find his pursuit of new inventions
在过去发明衬托下黯淡
eclipsed by old ones,
他不断努力到达顶端的步伐
and his perpetual reach for the top rung
这次直接把他带到底部
this time would carry him straight to the bottom.
这是我见过的最美妙的事情
It is the most wonderful thing that I have ever experienced.
十年的大部分时间
For the better part of a decade,
爱迪生的留声机处于寂静
Edison's phonograph had lain dormant,
“暂时昏迷”
"comatose for the time being,"
问及时他告诉记者
he'd told reporters when queried about it.
到1880年代末
But by the late 1880s,
老对手亚历山大·格雷厄姆·贝尔
his old rival,Alexander Graham Bell,
和他的化学家表弟奇切斯特
and his cousin Chichester,a chemist,
已经在爱迪生留下的地方继续
had picked up where Edison left off.
贝尔的表弟来找他并说
Alexander Graham Bell's cousin comes to him and says,
“汤姆 这不是很棒么?
"Tom,isn't this cool?
“你看我做的
"Look what I did.
我对你的留声机做了修改“
I've done a mod to your phonograph."
他在留声机上
And he had taken the phonograph
铺了层蜡面而不是锡纸
and put a sort of wax surface on it
爱迪生的回答基本就是:
instead of tin foil,and Edison's basic response was,
“呵呵 伙计 别在我活着的时候”
"Uh-uh,not while I'm around,fella."
爱迪生没有大方的天性
Edison did not have a generous nature,
他最不愿意向对手说“干得好”
and he was most unwilling to say to a rival,"Well done."
我想他有种焦虑
I think he,you know,got kind of anxious.
“这方面我有些知识产权
"I have this little bit of intellectual property here,
“我知道这点 现在其他人
"I'm known for this,and now other people
围绕我的发明而发明
"are sort of inventing around my invention.
我最好回头看看“
I better get back to it."
谴责贝尔的朋友是“海盗”
Denouncing the Bell associates as "pirates,"
爱迪生发誓要比他们的做得更好
Edison had vowed to best their machine
并立即着手他号♥称的
and immediately set to work on what he called
“完美化的留声机”
"the perfected phonograph."
为得到协助
To assist in the effort,
他让他的朋友易斯拉·吉利兰
he'd made his friend Ezra Gilliland
成为正式合伙人
an official partner,
让他负责改进装置的营销和制♥造♥
giving him charge of the marketing and manufacturing of the improved device.
但当吉利兰注意到原型的一个设计缺陷
But when Gilliland expressed concerns over design flaws in one prototype
并为潜在改进向爱迪生提出自己想法时
and offered Edison his own ideas for potential improvements,
他冷淡地回绝了
he was coldly rebuffed.
爱迪生告诉他
It was impossible,Edison told him,
一个人是不可能同时做生意和发明的
for a man to do business and invent simultaneously.
我认为吉利兰感到
I think Gilliland did feel
爱迪生没有把他当平等合作人
that he was more of an equal partner in this operation than Edison perceived him as being.
问题是对于爱迪生 没人能和他平起平坐
The problem is that for Edison,nobody is quite his equal.
如果有自己的想法并想实施
If you had your own ideas and you really wanted to go off,
你来错了地方
you were kind of in the wrong place
因为这是爱迪生的地盘
because it was really Edison's party.
在1888年春天
Then,in the spring of 1888,
有人接触吉利兰
Gilliland was approached by an entrepreneur,
愿意购买♥♥爱迪生新留声机的销♥售♥权
who offered to buy the marketing rights to Edison's new phonograph.
爱迪生要价50万美元
Edison stood to make $500,000 from the sale.
吉利兰私下另外谈了笔交易
Gilliland,in a secret side deal,
自己拿了25万美元
negotiated a payout for himself of $250,000.
吉利兰对他施加很大压力
Basically,Gilliland put a lot of pressure on him
号♥称这可能是最好的条件
that this was probably the best deal he was going to get.
爱迪生屈服了压力
So Edison gave in to the pressure.
几个月后 爱迪生才知道
It was several months before Edison became aware
吉利兰拿到的总额 他被激怒了
of the sum paid to Gilliland,and then he was enraged.
“我刚了解 你做了次我不知道的交易"
"I just learn you have made a certain trade of a nature unknown to me,"
他给当时在欧洲的吉利兰打电报
he cabled Gilliland,then in Europe.
“从今天起 我废除你的合约”
"I have this day abrogated your contract."
爱迪生认为 这是完全的背叛
Edison felt it was an utter betrayal,
我认为深深刺痛了他
and I think that stung him deeply
某种程度上 是从未有过的伤害
in a way that he hn't been hurt before.
爱迪生从出名那一刻
Edison,from the moment he became famous,
就觉得大家都想从他身上得到些东西
felt that people wanted things from him,
而吉利兰是他以前就熟悉的人
and Gilliland was someone he knew from way back,
所以他信任他
so he trusted him.
爱迪生不会让自己处于再受打击的地位
Edison would not allow himself to be in a vulnerable position again.
在迈尔斯堡
In Fort Myers,
老朋友计划共用的土地上
on the land the longtime friends had planned to share,
两座新建的房♥屋并肩而立
two newly constructed houses stood side by side.
爱迪生指示看护人“切断”
Edison now instructed the caretaker to "cut the pipes"
给吉利兰家供水的管道
that supplied Gilliland's house with water.
托马斯·爱迪生对背叛培养出高度敏感
Thomas Edison had a highly cultivated sense of betrayal,
和他要么在一起 要么不在
and either you were with him or you weren't.
就像黑白两面
It was quite black and white in that regard.
到1888年 美国的电气化进展顺利
By 1888,the electrification of the United States was well under way.
距爱迪生打开珍珠街第一个电网电闸 已过去六年
In the six years since Edison had thrown the switch on the first electrical power grid at Pearl Street,
他的帝国已发展到全国各地城镇的121个中心站
his empire had grown to include 121 central stations in cities and towns across the country,
从阿♥拉♥巴马州伯明翰 到密歇根的大急流城
from Birmingham,Alabama,to Grand Rapids,Michigan,
欧洲和拉丁美洲还有几个
as well as numerous others in Europe and Latin America.
但这个他创立的行业 现在充满竞争
But already,the industry he'd founded was bristling with competition.
1884年 匹兹堡企业家乔治·西屋
In 1884,Pittsburgh entrepreneur George Westinghouse
加入游戏 从国内外电气发明家手上购买♥♥专利
had gotten into the game,buying up patents from electrical inventors in America and abroad
迅速发展自己的公♥司♥参加竞争
and quickly developing his own rival system.
近期 弧光的长♥期♥供应商
More recently,the Thomson-Houston Company,
汤姆森-休斯顿公♥司♥
a longtime supplier of arc light,
采用来自西屋许可的技术
had begun installing its own central stations,
开始安装自己的中心站
using technology licensed from Westinghouse.
现在照亮世界漆黑角落的竞赛在进行
Now the race was on to light the dark corners of the world.
如果俄亥俄州某个地方
If you are the town council
一个5000人小镇的镇议会
in a town of 5,000 people in Ohio someplace
讨论 “我们是否要通电?”
and you're debating,"Do we want to electrify?"
西屋 汤姆森-休斯顿 爱迪生
you know that there's Westinghouse,there's Thomson-Houston,and there's Edison.
都声称能给你提供完整系统
All of them claim to be able to deliver a whole package to you.
西屋电气公♥司♥和汤姆森-休斯顿
Both Westinghouse and Thomson-Houston
兜售一种在欧洲开♥发♥的新传输系统
were peddling a new delivery system,developed in Europe
称为交流电或AC
and known as alternating current,or AC,
它采用高压电线
which employed high-voltage wires
可以长距离传输电力 -
to transmit electricity over long distances--
远到离发电站几百英里
as much as several hundred miles from the generating station.
相比之下
By contrast,
爱迪生的低压直流系统或DC
Edison's low-voltage direct current system,or DC,
最大传送范围只有一两英里
with its maximum delivery range of only a mile or two,
似乎全然过时
seemed downright antiquated.
你可以想像对一个城市有多大吸引力
You can imagine how much more attractive it was to a city
如果西屋推销员来会说
if you came as a Westinghouse salesman and said,
“当你城市发展时 我们不必
"We don't have to build power houses every one mile.
“每英里都建电站