萬圣節為何說“不給糖就搗蛋”?

譯/劉清清 審訂/沛軒

Each Halloween, hordes of costumed kids trudge1trudge費力地走，跋涉。from door to door exclaiming the same phrase at each stop:“Trick or treat!” It’s really a treat-only affair, since adults always shell out2shell out分發（給孩子們的萬圣節禮物）。candy and children rarely have tricks up their sleeves3have sth up one’s sleeve暗中留有一招；藏有錦囊妙計。(except perhaps for those dressed as magicians).In other words,they may as well save half a breath and simply shout “Treat!” So, where did the term come from?

Halloween hijinks4hijinks = high jinks狂歡作樂，嬉鬧。

每到萬圣節，成群結隊的孩子們穿著節日服裝，挨家挨戶地敲門，每到一家他們都喊著同一句話:“不給糖就搗蛋!”。其實只是給糖的事，因為大人總是會買好糖果，而孩子們則很少偷偷準備要搗蛋（那些裝扮成魔術師的小孩或許除外）。換句話說，孩子們還不如省口氣，直接喊一聲“給糖!”那么，“不給糖就搗蛋!”這個說法是怎么來的呢?

2Halloween wasn’t always about cosplay and chocolate bars.During the 19th century, Irish and Scottish children celebrated the holiday by wreaking (mostly harmless) havoc on their neighbors—jamming hot cabbage into a keyhole to stink up someone’s house,frightening passersby with turnips carved to look ghoulish5ghoulish可怕的。, etc.

萬圣節狂歡

2在過去，萬圣節的活動并不總是裝扮角色和討要巧克力棒。19世紀，為了慶祝萬圣節，愛爾蘭和蘇格蘭的孩子們會對鄰居們使壞（大多無實質性傷害），比如把熱乎乎的卷心菜塞進鑰匙孔里讓房子發臭，用蕪菁雕刻成的鬼臉嚇唬路人，等等。

3Kids didn’t give up that annual mischief when they immigrated to the U.S.,and Americans happily co-opted6co-opt借鑒，借用（別人的觀點）。the tradition.Toppled outhouses7outhouse戶外廁所。and trampled vegetable gardens soon gave way to more violent hijinks—like the time a Kansas woman almost died in a car crash after kids rubbed candle wax on streetcar tracks, for example—and these pranks escalated during the Great Depression.

4In short, tricks were a huge part of Halloween throughout the early 20th century.So, too, were treats.For All Souls’ Day in the Middle Ages, people went door-to-door offering prayers for the dead in exchange for food or money, a tradition known as souling.A similar custom from 19th-century Scotland, called guising8guising化妝游戲（把自己裝扮成一個神話人物或可怕的形象，或是萬圣節故事中的人物，到人們家里要糖果或錢）。, entailed9entail使必要；牽涉。exchanging jokes or songs for goodies.While it’s not proven that modern treatbegging is directly derived from either souling or guising, the practice of visiting your neighbors for an edible handout10handout施舍物。around Halloween has existed in some form or another for centuries.

3蘇格蘭和愛爾蘭人移民到美國后，他們的后代沒有丟掉每年一次搞惡作劇的傳統，而美國人也欣然借鑒了這一傳統。最初是弄倒屋外廁所和踩踏菜園子，很快升級為更激烈的狂歡。例如，在堪薩斯州，孩子們在有軌電車的軌道上抹蠟，釀成車禍，差點導致一位當地婦女喪命。而在大蕭條期間，這些惡作劇更是變本加厲。

Canada coins a catchphrase

4簡而言之，在20世紀早期，搗蛋和款待都是萬圣節的重要組成部分。中世紀時期，人們會在萬靈節這一天挨家挨戶為逝者禱告以換取食物或錢，這便是“索靈”風俗的由來。19世紀的蘇格蘭也有類似的習俗，稱之為“化妝游戲”，即人們通過講笑話或唱歌來換取美食。雖然目前沒有證據表明現代的“討糖”行為直接源自“索靈”或“化妝游戲”，但在萬圣節拜訪鄰居、討要吃食的做法已經以各種形式存在了好幾個世紀。

5With tricks and treats on everyone’s minds come October11come October =when October comes這是一種特殊形式的倒裝結構，將come的原形形式置于日期、時間之前，意思是“（提及的時間）到來”。, it was only a matter of time before someone combined them into a single catchphrase.Based on the earliest known written references to “trick or treat”, this may have happened in Canada during the 1920s.As Merriam-Webster reports,a Saskatchewan newspaper first mentioned the words together in an article from 1923.“Hallowe’en passed off very quietly here,” it read.“‘Treats’ not‘tricks’ were the order of the evening.”By 1927, young trick-or-treaters had adopted the phrase themselves.

加拿大創造的流行語

5十月來了，每個人心里都想著tricks（搗蛋）與treats（款待），人們將二者組合成一句順口溜只是時間問題。根據已知關于“不給糖就搗蛋”的最早書面記載，該詞可能出現在20世紀20年代的加拿大。據《梅里亞姆-韋伯斯特詞典》，加拿大薩斯喀徹溫省的一家報紙在1923年的一篇文章中首次將這兩個詞相提并論，“非常平靜地度過了萬圣節”“今晚的主題是‘款待’不是‘搗蛋’”。1927年之前，小搗蛋鬼們便用上了“不給糖就搗蛋”這個短語。

6“Halloween provided an opportunity for real strenuous fun,” Alberta’s Lethbridge Herald reported in 1927.“No real damage was done except to the temper of some who had to hunt for wagon wheels, gates, wagons, barrels,etc., much of which decorated the front street.The youthful tormentors were at back door and front demanding edible plunder by the word ‘trick or treat,’ to which the inmates gladly responded and sent the robbers away rejoicing.”

6“萬圣節提供了一個讓人們狠狠玩一把的機會。”阿爾伯塔省《萊斯布里奇先驅報》1927年的報道稱：“沒有造成實際的損失，除了一些人被搞得氣急敗壞，不得不到處找馬車輪子、大門、馬車、桶等，這些大多用來裝飾正門所臨的街道了。小搗蛋鬼們敲開鄰居家的前后門，嚷嚷著‘不給糖就搗蛋’，屋里的人高高興興地交出吃的，小強盜們就這樣被打發了，一個個興高采烈地。”

7The phrase appeared in Michigan’s Bay City Times the following year, describing how children uttered“the fatal ultimatum ‘Tricks or treats!’”to blackmail their neighbors into handing out sweets.

Donald Duck’s endorsement

8Sugar rationing brought trick-ortreating to a temporary halt during

7等到下一年，該短語便出現在了美國密歇根州《灣城時報》上，該報描述了孩子們如何說出“致命通牒‘不給糖就搗蛋’”，威脅鄰居們分發糖果。World War II, but the tradition (and the phrase itself) had gained popularity once again by the early 1950s—with some help from candy companies and a few beloved pop culture characters.Charles Schulz depicted the Peanuts12《花生漫畫》簡稱《花生》，是一部長篇連載的美國漫畫。漫畫的主人公為查理·布朗（Charlie Brown），以及飼養的米格魯獵兔犬史努比（Snoopy）。漫畫還有乒乓（Pig-Pen）、施洛德（Schroeder）、露西·范佩爾特（Lucy Van Pelt）、萊納斯·范佩爾特（Linus Van Pelt）、莎莉·布朗（Sally Brown）等知名的個性角色，是世界漫畫史上首部以多角色演繹故事的日常系漫畫。gang cavorting13cavort嬉戲玩鬧。around town in costume for a Halloween comic strip14comic strip（通常刊登在報紙上的）連環漫畫。in 1951; and Huey, Dewey, and Louie15迪士尼公司“米老鼠”系列中的三胞胎小鴨子，是唐老鴨調皮的外甥、“少年軍校”的成員。 三只小鴨分別叫作Huey Duck（輝兒，紅色衣帽）、Dewey Duck（杜兒，藍色衣帽）、Louie Duck（路兒，綠色衣帽）。got to go trick-or-treating in a 1952 Donald Duck cartoon titled Trick or Treat.

唐老鴨的支持

8二戰期間，由于糖限量供應，“不給糖就搗蛋”的活動暫時停止。但到了20世紀50年代早期，在糖果公司和幾位流行文化偶像的推動下，這一傳統（以及這一短語本身）再次風靡起來。1951年，查爾斯·舒爾茨在《花生》的一組萬圣節主題連環畫中描繪了幾個小伙伴穿著節日服裝在鎮上玩鬧的場景；而輝兒、杜兒和路兒在1952年的唐老鴨卡通片《不給糖就搗蛋》中也玩起了“不給糖就搗蛋”的游戲。

9Fortunately, the treat part of the phrase has thoroughly overtaken the trick part.But if you stuff rank cabbage in your neighbor’s keyhole this Halloween, we won’t tell.■

9幸運的是，短語中的“款待”已經完全取代了“搗蛋”。但如果在今年萬圣節你也想把發臭的卷心菜塞進鄰居的鑰匙孔，我們會保密的。 □