If hard work were such a wonderful thing

2021年10月30日 

「假如努力工作是一件美妙的事，富人肯定會把一切工作都留給自己。」（If hard work were such a wonderful thing, surely the rich would have kept it all to themselves.）

立場新聞刊出一篇講辭職潮的特寫，一開頭引用美國已故工會領袖柯克蘭（Lane Kirkland）上面那句話，我一看覺得很不對勁，因為我直覺認為這句話中的hard work不是努力工作的意思。

To work hard是努力工作的意思，而hard work作為名詞，可以是努力工作的意思，例如：Your hard work has paid off.（你的努力得到了回報。）

但hard work當然也可以是艱苦的工作、苦活、苦工之意。例如在以下兩個片語中，hard work就是這意思（而絕不是努力工作）：

too much like hard work

If you say that an activity is too much like hard work, you do not want to do because it needs a lot of effort.

例：I don't like gardening - it's too much like hard work. （我不喜歡園藝，因為它太費工了。）

make hard work of something

To make something you are doing seem more difficult than it really is.

例：Juventus were making hard work of what should have been an easy game. （這場比賽應該是很輕鬆的，但Juventus卻踢得很辛苦。）

回到Lane Kirkland那句話：

If hard work were such a wonderful thing, surely the rich would have kept it all to themselves.

句中的hard work當然是指艱苦的工作而不是「努力工作」，而後面的it就是指hard work，而不是「一切工作」，所以立場新聞那篇特寫的翻譯可說是大錯。這句話可以這麼譯：

如果艱苦的工作真的那麼美妙，有錢人肯定會把它全都留給自己。