I tried to share this find with other students, but they'd always say, "You're foolish to take all those notes. Just sit back and listen." Although this sounded too easy to be good advice, I was struck by the great intelligence of my fellow students who could remember the main ideas of lecture after lecture, just by listening. I knew I couldn't; so to hide my inferior intelligence, I continued taking notes, completing them directly after class, categorizing the ideas, supplying the titles and subtitles, and reciting the lectures.

　　我试图让同学们和我一起分享这一发现，可他们总是说，“你真傻，记那些笔记干什么！坐那儿听听就行了。”尽管听起来未免太简单，算不上是个好建议，但我的诸位同学仅靠耳朵听就能把老师一堂又一堂课的主要内容记住，真是聪明绝顶，令我佩服。我知道自己可不行。为了掩饰相形见绌的智力，我继续做笔记，没有记上的课后立刻补全，分类记下内容，加注标题、小标题，并且复述老师讲课的内容。

　　Another incident finally convinced me of my intellectual inferiority when I found that the other students just "flipped the pages?of the textbook. But poor me, I had to work on each chapter for hours. It was only luck that I wasn't found out, because the professor never quizzed us on our reading; everything depended on the final exam. I was luckier still when, looking in the library stacks for a book on Egyptian religion, I ran across an entire shelf filled with books on Egypt. I spent the rest of the day until 10:00 P.M. (closing time) perusing this lucky find. I finally picked out three books which were written in a style easy enough for me to understand, and I took these back to my room. By first reading these extra books, I found I could come back to the assigned chapter in the textbook and understand it better. I noticed that the author of our textbook frequently referred by footnote to these library books. So with luck I solved the textbook problem.

　　还有一件事，使我最终彻底相信自己头脑愚钝、智力欠佳。我发现其他学生看课本时，都是一翻而过；而可怜的我，每章都得花上好几个小时。不过算我走运，教授并没有发现，因为他从来不检查我们的阅读情况，惟有期终考试决定乾坤。更幸运的是，有一天，我在

图书馆的书架上翻找一本关于埃及宗教的书时，偶然发现有整整一书架的书都是有关埃及的。那天其余的时间我就泡在那儿了，仔细翻阅着这喜从天降的收获，直到晚上10：00(闭馆时间)才离开。临走时，我还选了三本简单易懂的带回寝室。我发现先读一下这些课外书，回头再去读课本中老师布置阅读的相应章节，我就能更好地理解。我还注意到，从图书馆借来的这些书，恰是课本的著者经常在脚注中提到的。于是我的课本阅读难题又幸运地解决了。

　　Well, all of this simply led up to the final examination. There I was with a notebook, about two inches thick, filled with lecture notes. Now, was I to memorize all these notes for the exam? And the textbook? Realizing that I didn't have the brains to memorize everything in my notes, I decided (this time without Osiris's help) to read each lecture bearing one focusing thought in mind: "What is the really important idea here?" As I found the answer, I'd jot this central point on separate sheets which I called "Summary Sheets." When I finished, I had "boiled" down inches of lecture notes to just twelve pages of "main issues." I then did the same with my textbook.

　　这一切努力都是为了最后的期末考试。情况就是这样了，我已经有一本两英寸厚的笔记本了，里面全是课堂笔记。那么，我是不是该为了考试而将所有这些笔记全都背下来呢？课本的内容背不背？想想凭自己的脑子，根本不可能将笔记里所有的细节都记住，我决定(这次没有奥西里斯来帮忙)带着这一重点问题去读每一章：“这一讲最重要的观点是什么？”找到答案后，就把这个中心思想写在另外一些纸上，我称之为“内容提要”。最后完成时，几英寸厚的笔记已经浓缩成了只有12页的“主要议题”。随后，我又制作了类似的课本的“精华版”。

　　Thus armed, I aligned the "Summary Sheets" so that the main issues for both the lecture and textbook synchronized. I learned these main issues by first reading them over, thinking about them, reflecting on them, then without looking at my notes, by trying to recite them in my own words. I went through my summary sheets in the same way, issue by issue.

　　准备就绪，我又将“内容提要”作了调整，使讲座内容和教科书的要点相一致。我是这样记忆这些要点的：先通读一遍，认真思考、仔细琢磨，然后不看笔记，试着用自己的话将这些要点复述一遍。我用同样的方法，把“内容提要”部分一个要点、一个要点地过了一遍。

　　I guess that I had played the role of the professor too long, because after having mastered these main issues, I composed ten questions--questions that I'd ask if I were the professor. Still having some time left, I pretended that I was in the examination room, and I spent the next four hours rapidly answering my own ten questions. I then corrected my answers by referring to the lecture and textbook notes, and much to my delight, I had discussed all the facts and ideas accurately. For the first time I felt that I had achieved something. I felt almost adequate. But the warm glow was short-lived. What if the professor didn't ask what I had staked my life on? Well, I thought, "It is too late to change." With the feeling that my luck had really run out, I half-heartedly studied for six more hours. I went to bed at 10:00 for a good night's sleep, having refused to go to the second show of a "relaxing" movie with the rest of the boys.

　　我想我是扮教授扮得太投入了。在领会了这些主要问题后，我把自己假想为教授，站在他的角度出了十道题。这些做完后还剩下些时间，我就想象自己是在考场，花了四个小时，迅速答完了自己出的这十道题。然后根据讲座和课本笔记修改我的答卷，我高兴地发现，我准确地论述了所有史实和观点。我觉得应付考试应该没问题了。但没过多久，我的洋洋自得便消失得一干二净。我的生死存亡可都押在这十道题上了，要是教授他不考这些怎么办？当时我心一横，“反正现在再改也来不及了！”我觉得自己肯定要倒霉了，带着这种想法，我又心不在焉地看了六个小时书。十点，我就早早地上了床，没和其他人一起去看第二场“放松”电影，好好地睡了一觉。