People are always talking about 'the problem of youth'. If there is one -- which I take leave to doubt -- then it is older people who create it, not the young themselves. Let us get down to fundamentals and agree that the young are after all human beings -- people just like their elders. There is only one difference between an old man and a young one: the young man has a glorious future before him and the old one has a splendid future behind him: and maybe that is where the rub is.

 

When I was a teenager, I felt that I was just young and uncertain -- that I was a new boy in a huge school, and I would have been very pleased to be regarded as something so interesting as a problem. For one thing, being a problem gives you a certain identity, and that is one of the things the young are busily engaged in seeking.

 

I find young people exciting. They have an air of freedom, and they not a dreary commitment to mean ambitions or love of comfort. They are not anxious social climbers, and they have no devotion to material things. All this seems to me to link them with life, and the origins of things. It's as if they were, in some sense, cosmic beings in violent and lovely contrast with us suburban creatures. All that is in my mind when I meet a young person. He may be conceited, ill-mannered, presumptuous or fatuous, but I do not turn for protection to dreary cliches about respect of elders -- as if mere age were a reason for respect. I accept that we are equals, and I will argue with him, as an equal, if I think he is wrong.

 

人們總是在談?wù)?ldquo;青年問(wèn)題”。如果這個(gè)問(wèn)題存在的話(huà) -- 請(qǐng)?jiān)试S我對(duì)此持懷疑態(tài)度 -- 那么，這個(gè)問(wèn)題是由老年人而不是青年人造成的。讓我們來(lái)認(rèn)真研究一些基本事實(shí)：承認(rèn)青年人和他們的長(zhǎng)輩一樣也是人。老年人和青年人只有一個(gè)區(qū)別：青年人有光輝燦爛的前景，而老年人的輝煌已成為過(guò)去。 問(wèn)題的癥結(jié)恐怕就在這里。

 

我十幾歲時(shí)，總感到自己年輕，有些事拿不準(zhǔn) -- 我是一所大學(xué)里的一名新生，如果我當(dāng)時(shí)真的被看成像一個(gè)問(wèn)題那樣有趣，我會(huì)感到很得意的。因?yàn)檫@至少使我得到了某種承認(rèn)，這正是年輕人所熱衷追求的。

 

我覺(jué)得年輕人令人振奮，無(wú)拘無(wú)束。他們既不追逐卑鄙的名利，也不貪圖生活的舒適。他們不熱衷于向上爬，也不一味追求物質(zhì)享受。在我看來(lái)，所有這些使他們與生命和萬(wàn)物之源聯(lián)系在了一起。從某種意義上講，他們似乎是宇宙人，同我們這些凡夫俗子形成了強(qiáng)烈而鮮明的對(duì)照。每逢我遇到年輕人，腦子里就想到這些年輕人也許狂妄自負(fù)，舉止無(wú)理，傲慢放肆，愚昧無(wú)知，但我不會(huì)用應(yīng)當(dāng)尊重長(zhǎng)者這一套陳詞濫調(diào)來(lái)為我自己辨護(hù)，似乎年長(zhǎng)就是受人尊敬的理由。我認(rèn)為我和他們是平等的。如果我認(rèn)為他們錯(cuò)了，我就以平等的身份和他們爭(zhēng)個(gè)明白。