2018考研英語：長難句練習及解析（19）

① Ralph Waldo Emerson and other Transcendentalist philosophers thought schooling and rigorous book learning put unnatural restraints on children: “We are shut up in schools and college recitation rooms for 10 or 15 years and come out at last with a bellyful of words and do not know a thing.”

【核心詞彙】

restraint n.約束，抑制

recitation n.背誦，朗誦

a bellyful of 一肚子的

【結構分析】

主幹是Ralph Waldo Emerson and other Transcendentalist philosophers thought。schooling and rigorous book learning put unnatural restraints on children是that引導的賓語從句，但省略了引導詞that，冒號後面的部分起解釋說明作用。句中有些單詞和片語比較生僻，transcendentalist意為“先驗論者”或“先驗論的”，schooling等於education“教育”，rigorous book learning“拼命學習”或“死啃書本”，unnatural restraints“非自然的束縛”，college recitation rooms“大學的背誦教室”，a bellyful of words相當於漢語的“一肚子墨水”或“滿腹經綸”。

【參考譯文】

Ralph Waldo Emerson和其他一些先驗主義哲學家認為學校教育和死啃書本抑制了孩子們的天性：“我們被關在中小學和大學的背誦室十年或十五年，