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In the winter of 1789, around the time George Washington was elected as the first United States president, a printer quietly published what would become the first American novel.
1789年冬天，大约在乔治·华盛顿当选为美国第一任总统的时候，一位印刷商悄悄地出版了后来成为美国第一部小说的作品。
William Hill Brown wrote the book, called The Power of Sympathy.
威廉·希尔·布朗写了一本书，名为《同情的力量》。
Isaiah Thomas & Company in Boston, Massachusetts published it anonymously.
以赛亚·托马斯公司在马萨诸塞州的波士顿匿名出版了该书。
Around 100 pages long, The Power of Sympathy is a love story of two young New Englanders.
《同情的力量》大约有100页长，是一个关于两个年轻的新英格兰人的爱情故事。
Their relationship ends suddenly and tragically when they learn of a shocking secret.
当他们得知一个令人震惊的秘密时，他们的关系突然悲惨地结束了。
The book is dedicated to the “Young Ladies of United Columbia” (the United States).
这本书是献给“联合哥伦比亚的年轻女士们”（美国）的。
Outside of Boston, though, few Americans would have known or cared about The Power of Sympathy as a historical marker.
在波士顿之外，很少有美国人会知道或关心《同情的力量》作为一个历史标志。
David Lawrimore, who teaches at the University of Idaho, has written about early U.S. literature.
大卫·劳里莫尔在爱达荷大学任教，他写过关于美国早期文学的文章。
He said, “If you picked ten random citizens, I doubt it would have mattered to any of them.”
他说：“如果你随机挑选十个公民，我怀疑任何一个人都觉得这不重要。”
“Most people weren’t thinking about the first American novel,” he added.
“大多数人都没有想过第一本美国小说，”他补充道。
The Power of Sympathy is in many ways a sign of its time with its use of letters, religious messages and formal language.
《同情的力量》在很多方面都是其时代的标志，它使用了信件、宗教信息和正式语言。
But the story also includes themes of the worries and hopes of a young country.
但这个故事也包含了一个年轻国家的担忧和希望的主题。
Dana McClain is an assistant professor of English at Holy Family University.
达纳·麦克莱恩是圣家大学的英语助理教授。
McClain noted that Brown was an outspoken Federalist who believed in a strong national government and stable society.
麦克莱恩指出，布朗是一位直言不讳的联邦主义者，他相信强大的国家政府和稳定的社会。
The letters in The Power of Sympathy include the subjects of class, public outlook and the differences between North and South, as if expecting the Civil War that followed in the 1860s.
《同情的力量》中的信件涉及阶级、公众舆论以及南北差异等主题，仿佛预示了随后在19世纪60年代爆发的内战。
Like many other early American writers, Brown tied the behavior of women to the fate of the larger society.
像许多其他早期的美国作家一样，布朗将女性的行为与更大社会的命运联系在一起。
The novel’s letters concern the “power of pleasure” and how female envy could bring “a flood of scandal.”
这部小说的信件涉及到“快乐的力量”以及女性的嫉妒如何带来“丑闻的洪流”。
The book compares high moral standards to a “mighty river” that “fertilizes the country through which it passes….”
这本书将高道德标准比作一条“强大的河流”，它“流经之处肥沃了国家……”。
A character in the book warns, “Most of the novels with which our female libraries are overrun are built upon a foundation not always placed on strict morality and in the pursuit of objects not always probable or praiseworthy.”
书中的一个角色警告说：“我们女性图书馆里泛滥的大多数小说，其基础并不总是建立在严格的道德之上，追求的目标也不总是可能或值得称赞的。”
The character adds, “(they) appear to me totally unfit to form the minds of women, of friends, or of wives.”
这位人物还说："（她们）在我看来完全不适合塑造女性、朋友或妻子的思想。”
The Power of Sympathy was commonly cited as the first American novel in the 1800s without much debate.
《同情的力量》在19世纪通常被认为是第一部美国小说，这一点没有太多争议。
Experts then agreed that the honor should belong to the first book written and published in the United States by a writer born and still living in the country.
专家们随后一致认为，这一荣誉应该更改为在美国出生并仍居住在美国的作家所写并出版的第一本书。
These guidelines disqualified several earlier works such as Charlotte Ramsay Lennox’s The Life of Harriot Stuart and Thomas Atwood Digges’ Adventures of Alonso.
这些准则使夏洛特·拉姆齐·伦诺克斯的《哈里奥特·斯图亚特的生活》和托马斯·阿特伍德·迪格斯的《阿隆索历险记》等早期作品失去了资格。
Another contender was Father Bombo’s Pilgrimage to Mecca which was written around 1770 but was not published until 1975. Author Brown was likely born in 1765 in Boston.
另一位竞争者是《邦博神父的麦加之行》，该书写于1770年左右，但直到1975年才出版。作者布朗可能于1765年出生在波士顿。
One of his early published works was a poem about Daniel Shays.
他早期发表的作品之一是一首关于丹尼尔·谢斯的诗。
Shays led a rebellion of former Revolutionary War soldiers in Massachusetts.
谢斯领导了马萨诸塞州前革命战争士兵的叛乱。
Brown was not yet 30 when he died in North Carolina, in 1793, from what experts believe was malaria. He never married or had children.
布朗于1793年在北卡罗来纳州去世，享年不到30岁，专家认为他死于疟疾。他从未结婚，也没有孩子。
After his death, publishers released his play The Treason of Arnold and another novel Ira and Isabella. Brown did not gain much fame in his short life.
他去世后，出版商出版了他的戏剧《阿诺德的叛国罪》和另一部小说《艾拉与伊莎贝拉》。布朗在短暂的一生中并没有获得太多的声誉。
No memorials, historical places, or literary societies have been named after Brown. Even the site of his burial place is a mystery.
没有任何纪念碑、历史遗迹或文学社团是以布朗的名字命名的。甚至他的埋葬地点也是一个谜。
I'm Caty Weaver.
我是凯蒂·韦弗。
