读书评译（５０）：绝境
破不了这法，脚就是迈不出这一步，就不断走回头路。于是，到天亮才发现不过在原地转圈。这还算好的，更糟的还能把人引向绝境，那就是死亡。（第二章）
If the spell isn’t broken the person’s feet don’t move forward and even if he keeps walking, he stays exactly where he started off. Only at daybreak does he discover that he has been going around in circles. That’s not so bad, the worst is when a person is led into a blind-alley: that means death.
评：译为 led to a blind-alley (blind alley) 会使读者以为是走进真的死胡同。可改为 led to a hopeless situation。这里，并不是提倡死扣字眼。实际上，除了小说开头有关汽车的那段话以外，译者几乎都是逐字翻译的。翻译有“故意误译”和“无意误译”（见谢天振《译介学》，１９５页），后者或出于对原文的误解，或出于译文的不当，属于比较低级的错误，应该避免。