经济学人245:《乔布斯传》疯狂的伟大

 　　Steve Jobs Insanely great《乔布斯传》疯狂的伟大

　　REMOVING the sleeve reveals a bookthat is entirely 1 white, except for the names of its author and subject inelegant black type on the spine 2. It is the perfect design for the biography ofa man who insisted that even the innards of his products be exquisitelycrafted, and that his factory walls gleam in the whitest white.
　　拆去封套，这本书完全是白色的，只有书脊上用黑色字体简洁的印有作者和书名。对于这样一个人物的自传，这是最完美的设计，他一直坚持他的产品哪怕是内部结构都要精雕细琢，也坚持工厂的墙壁要洁白得耀目。
　　The cover was the only part of thebook Steve Jobs wanted to control, writes Walter Isaacson in his introduction.The rest of his long-awaited tome bears this out. Though Mr Jobs pushed thebiographer of Albert Einstein and Benjamin Franklin to pen his own, granting him more than 40 interviews, this book offers a refreshing 3 counterbalance to theadulation that followed his death on October 5th at the age of 56.
　　沃尔特在序言里写到，尽管本书的封面是乔布斯唯一监督的部分，这部他期待已久的大部头的其他部分也延续了他的风格。虽然是乔布斯说服这位为爱因斯坦和富兰克林做传的传记作者来写他的传记，跟他做了40多次访谈，本书还是让人耳目一新——享年56岁于10月5日去世的乔布斯，世人对其逝世后的溢美之词，本书做到了很好的权衡。
　　The picture Mr Isaacson paints,particularly in the first half of this book, is not flattering. Mr Jobs emergesas a controlling and often unsympathetic character. A child of the 1960scounterculture, he abhorred 4 materialism 5 and lived in simply furnished houses(in part because he was too picky to decide on furniture). But when Apple wentpublic in 1980, he refused to give any stock options to Daniel Kottke, alongtime supporter and soul mate from college. “He has to abandon the people heis close to,” observes Andy Hertzfeld, an early Apple engineer. Mr Isaacsonfinds meaning in the fact that Mr Jobs was adopted, but this excuse feels thin.
　　作者描述的情境，尤其是本书前半部分的那些，并不讨好。他们表现出了乔布斯极有控制欲望且没有同情心的个性。做为二十世界60年代文化冲突中的孩子，他憎恶物质主义，住在装修及其简单的房子里——当然，对于家具过于挑剔也是部分原因。可是当苹果公司1980年上市的时候，他却没有给Daniel Kottke任何股票期权，这位Daniel Kottke可是从乔布斯大学时代起的支持者和知己。苹果早期的工程师Andy Hertzfeld觉得，“他似乎一定要疏远那些跟他关系密切的人”。作者把这归咎为当年乔布斯被弃养，可是这理由似乎没有什么说服力。
　　Mr Jobs was disarminglycharismatic, employing what has been dubbed 6 a “reality distortion field” toinspire cult-like loyalty 7. But also he could be cold and cruel. If hedisapproved of an employee’s work, he often humiliated 8 him. “This is who I am,”he once said after being challenged, “and you can’t expect me to be someone I’mnot.” This nasty edge wasn’t always helpful, but it served a purpose, writes MrIsaacson: many would “end their litany of horror stories by saying that he gotthem to do things they never dreamed possible.”
　　乔布斯的魅力无法抵挡，他有一种被人称为“扭转现实的气场”，从而激发一种类似邪教的忠诚度。但是他也很冷血和无情。如果他不赞成一个员工的工作，他往往会让人很难堪。他曾经对质疑他这一点的人说，“我这个人就是这样，你不能要求我做出不是我自己的样子”。这种让人厌恶的棱角不是时时有效，可是也会达到它的目的，作者这样写到，很多人在讲了一连串他们痛恨的故事之后，会说，因为乔布斯，他们做到了他们从来都想不到会成为可能的事情。
　　Often eccentric, Mr Jobs developedobsessive dietary habits in his early 20s, along with a taste for Bob Dylan,LSD and Zen. At Reed College in Portland before he dropped out, he ate onlyfruits and vegetables, if anything. When diagnosed with pancreatic cancer inlate 2003, he refused surgery for months, opting 9 for alternative treatment including a strict vegan diet.
　　特立独行的乔布斯在他二十岁出头的年纪，就养成了近乎偏执的饮食习惯，他还喜欢Bob Dylan, LSD(一种强烈的半人工致幻剂)，禅学。他从波特兰州Reed大学退学前，如果吃东西，他只吃蔬菜和水果。当2003年他查出患有胰腺癌的时候，他曾经几个月拒绝手术，而选择其它的治疗方式，包括严格的vegan饮食（一种极为严格的素食主义）。
　　Whereas Mr Jobs might have thrownone of his tantrums after reading the first half of the book (which he neversaw), he would have enjoyed the second. It describes the period following hisreturn to Apple in 1996, more than 11 years after he was pushed out. He hadbecome a more mature manager, if not quite a mellow 10 one, after running, with mixedsuccess, Pixar, a film studio, and NeXT, a computer maker 11. He quickly turnedthe nearly bankrupt Apple around and made it into the world’s most valuabletechnology company.
　　虽然乔布斯有可能在读到一半的时候就已经勃然大怒（事实上他从来没有看到过这本书），但是他很有可能会喜欢本书后面的部分。后面讲述了他被苹果赶走11年后，于1996年重新回到苹果的那个时期。在经营过皮克斯（电影制作室），NeXT（计算机制造商）之后，他已经成为一个更加成熟的管理者，虽然，不是很慈祥的那种。他迅速使苹果摆脱了濒临破产的窘境，成为世界上最有价值的科技公司。
　　Much has been written about how hepulled this off. Mr Isaacson offers new perspectives. Mr Jobs was not simply abrilliant albeit 12 quasi-autistic innovator 13, nor was his firm a one-man show. Hereadily—sometimes too readily—took on ideas from others and recruited great talent, not least Tim Cook, Apple’s new boss, who made the firm’s operationsinto one of the industry’s most efficient.
　　很多人写过他是怎样成功的。可是作者提出了新的视角。乔布斯并不是一位出色却近乎自闭的创新者，他的公司也不是他一个人的成就。他很乐于接受其他人的创意，甚至有些时候有些过头，也请了很多顶尖的人才共事，苹果的新总裁Tim Cook就是其中之一，他使苹果的运作成为行业里最有效率的。
　　More interesting is Mr Isaacson’sdescription of how Mr Jobs engineered a different kind of technology company:one that could develop tightly integrated packages of hardware and software.This meant departments had to work together. At most companies engineeringdrives design; Apple does it the other way around. Together with Jonathan Ive,the firm’s chief designer, Mr Jobs would decide on how a product should lookand feel, and the engineers had to make it happen.
　　更有趣的是，作者这样描述乔布斯建立的这个与众不同的科技公司——这个公司致力于软件和硬件的完美整合。这意味着不同部门要分工合作。在大多数公司里面，科技推动设计，可是苹果却把它反了过来。乔布斯和设计部主管Jonathan Ive决定他们想要怎样外观和体验的产品，然后由技术工程师来实现它们。
　　The book’s flaws are a result ofits rush to print (publication was expedited when Mr Jobs’s health was failing).But despite being repetitive and long-winded, it is worth the read. Mr Isaacsonhas achieved what Mr Jobs wanted: an account for his four children of what their father did and why. “There are parts of his life and personality that areextremely messy,” observes Laurene Powell, his wife of 20 years, “but he alsohas a remarkable 14 story.”
　　这本书的美中不足是它的印刷质量。由于乔布斯的健康急转直下而仓促出版。尽管有些重复冗长，还是值得一读。Issacson达到了乔布斯的要求——告诉他的四个孩子们他们的父亲曾经做了什么，以及他的理由。LaurenePowell，他20年的妻子这样评价他，“在他的生活和个性方面有极度糟糕的地方，可是还是有不同寻常的故事。”