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骑士公共汽车
骑士公共汽车（Knight Bus）
【Pottermore的内容】
（翻译参考了pottermore吧帖子《【翻译】波特磨《囚徒》第二章玛姬姑妈/第三章骑士公共汽车》）
对于那些对飞路粉过敏、幻影移形能力欠佳、恐高、或是在使用门钥匙时会头晕害怕的巫师，骑士公共汽车总会在那里等着为你服务。迫切需要交通工具时，只要在路边伸出拿魔杖的手，它就会出现。
它是一辆紫色的三层公共汽车，车里白天有座位，晚上有床铺。它坐起来不是很舒服，即使车上提供热饮，我也建议你别点，因为汽车总是刚一通知就从一个地方跳到另一个地方，饮料被打翻的例子笔笔皆是。
骑士公共汽车是巫师社会中相对较为现代的发明，并且（虽然很少被承认）从麻瓜社会中获取了一些灵感。魔法世界对于能够让未成年人或体弱者安全谨慎使用交通工具的需求已经存在了一段时间，而人们也曾经提供过不少建议（比如在出租车式的飞天扫帚旁加上跨斗、夜骐下面悬挂篮子），但全部被魔法部否决。最后，时任魔法部部长的杜格德·迈克菲尔（Dugald McPhail）想出了模仿麻瓜当时还比较新的“公共汽车服务”的主意。于是，骑士公共汽车于1865年上路运营。
虽然一些巫师（主要是纯血统狂热分子）给《预言家日报》的读者来信栏投稿，宣布抵制这种“麻瓜式侮辱”，但骑士公共汽车仍然受到了大多数巫师的热烈欢迎，并且至今仍繁忙地运行着。
罗琳的想法：
骑士公共汽车被叫这个名字首先是因为，骑士（knight）和夜晚（night）同音，而在英国各地，日间正常的交通停运后，会有夜间班车开始运营。其次，“骑士”暗含救援、保护的意思，比较适合一种人们实在没办法才会选择的交通工具。
《哈利·波特与阿兹卡班囚徒》里，骑士公共汽车的司机和售票员是以我祖父和外祖父的名字命名的，他们分别叫厄恩（Ernest）和斯坦（Stanley）。
【原著里的骑士公共汽车】
汽车挡风玻璃上的金色字母组成了“骑士公共汽车”几个词。只要伸出你的魔杖并且走上车来，它就可将你带到陆地上你想去的任何地方（水底去不了）。20世纪90年代时，售票员是斯坦·桑帕克，司机则是厄恩·普兰。
哈利在木兰花新月街上车到伦敦对角巷下车，需要11银西可。支付14西可能得到巧克力，15西可能拿到一个热水瓶和一把牙刷。
在白天，车厢里则胡乱摆放着各式各样的椅子，样子十分不统一。晚上的时候，汽车里没有座位，在拉上了窗帘的窗子后面，放有六张带黄铜柱的床。每张床旁边的托架上都点着蜡烛，照亮了有护壁板的墙。它的行进速度非常快，而它行驶方向上的所有障碍物都会自动跳到一边避开。
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【Pottermore原文】
For witches and wizards who are Floo-sick, whose Apparition is unreliable, who hate heights or who feel frightened or queasy taking Portkeys, there is always the Knight Bus, which appears whenever a witch or wizard in urgent need of transportation sticks out their wand arm at the kerb.
A purple, triple-decker bus, it has seats during the day and beds at night. It is not particularly comfortable, and I would advise against ordering hot drinks even if offered, because the bus’s habit of leaping from one destination to another at a moment’s notice can result in a lot of spillage.
The Knight Bus is a relatively modern invention in wizarding society, which sometimes (though it will rarely admit it) takes ideas from the Muggle world. The need for some form of transportation that could be used safely and discreetly by the underage or the infirm had been felt for a while and many suggestions had been made (sidecars on taxi-style broomsticks, carrying baskets slung under Thestrals) all of them vetoed by the Ministry. Finally, Minister for Magic Dugald McPhail hit upon the idea of imitating the Muggles’ relatively new ‘bus service’ and in 1865, the Knight Bus hit the streets.
While some wizards (mainly pureblood fanatics) announced their intention of boycotting what was dubbed ‘this Muggle-esque outrage’ in the letters page of the Daily Prophet, the Knight Bus proved hugely popular with most of the community and remains busy to this day.
J.K. Rowling's thoughts
The Knight Bus was so-named because, firstly, knight is a homonym of night, and there are night buses running all over Britain after normal transport stops. Secondly, ‘knight’ has the connotation of coming to the rescue, of protection, and this seemed appropriate for a vehicle that is often the conveyance of last resort.
The driver and conductor of the Knight Bus in ‘Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban’ are named after my two grandfathers, Ernest and Stanley.
作者有话说
第14章 骑士公共汽车
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作者有话说
