【英文原文】

On Nov.18,1995, Itzhak Perlman, the violinist, came on stage to give a concert. If you have ever been to a Perlman concert, you know that getting on stage is no small achievement for him. He was stricken with polio as a child, and so he walks with the aid of two crutches.

The audience sit quietly while he makes his way across the stage to his chair and begins his play. But this time, something went wrong. Just as he finished the first few bars, one of the strings on his violin broke. We thought that he would have to stop the concert. But he didn't. Instead, he waited a moment, closed his eyes and then signaled the conductor to begin again.

The orchestra began and he played with such passion and such power and such purity as they had never heard before.

Of course, anyone knows that it is impossible to play a harmonious work with just three strings. I know that, and you know that, but that night Itzhak Perlman refused to know that.

When he finished, there was an awesome silence in the room. And then people rose and cheered. There was an extraordinary outburst of applause from every corner of the auditorium.

He smiled, wiped the sweat from this brow and then he said---not boastfully, but in a quiet, sacred tone---"You know, sometimes it is the artist's task to find out how much music you can still make with what you have left."

This powerful line has stayed in my mind ever since I heard it. And who knows? Perhaps that is the definition of life---not just for artists but for all of us.

He has prepared all his life to make music on a violin of your strings, but all of a sudden, in the middle of a concert, he finds himself with only three strings; so he makes music with three strings, and the music he made that night with just three strings was more beautiful, more sacred, more memorable, than any that he had ever made before, when he had four strings.

So, perhaps our task in this shaky, fast-changing, bewildering world in which we live is to make music, at first with all that we have, and then, when that is no longer possible, to make music with what we have left.

【中文譯文】

1995年11月18日，小提琴家伊扎克?帕爾曼將要舉辦一場音樂會。如果你曾經聽過帕爾曼的音樂會，你就知道對他來說走上舞臺可不是一件容易的事情。他小的時候患過小兒麻痹癥，所以他需要靠雙拐走路。

觀眾在靜靜地等待著他穿過舞臺坐在椅子上開始表演。但是這一次出了點兒問題。當他剛剛演奏完前面幾小節的時候，一根琴弦斷了。我們以為他不得不結束這場演奏會，然而他沒有。他停了一下，閉上眼睛，然后向指揮示意重新開始。

樂隊再一次開始演奏，他用前所未有的激情、力量和內心的純凈演奏著。

當然，我們每個人都知道僅用三根琴弦是無法演奏出和諧的樂曲的。你我都明白這一事實，但是那一晚伊扎克?帕爾曼就是拒絕承認。

當演奏結束的時候，大廳里一陣可怕的沉寂。接著，人們從座位上站起并歡呼起來，從觀眾席的每一個角落都爆發出熱烈的掌聲。

他微笑著，檫去額頭的汗珠，沒有一點驕傲，他用平靜的、虔誠的語氣說道：“有些時候音樂家要明白用不完整的樂器，你還能演奏出怎樣的音樂。”

從那天起，這句有力的話一直留在我的心里。要知道，也許這就是對生命的解釋----不僅是對音樂家，而是對所有的人。

伊扎克?帕爾曼一生都在做著用四弦的小提琴演奏音樂的準備，然而，突然間，就在音樂會上，他發現他只剩下三根琴弦，于是他用三根琴弦演奏。那一晚他用三根琴弦演奏的音樂比他以往用四根琴弦演奏的音樂更美妙，更神圣，更難忘。

我們要學會在這個動蕩多變充滿迷惑的世界里演奏音樂，也許開始的時候傾盡所有來演奏，當有些東西不再擁有的時候，就用我們所剩下的來演奏音樂。