爱思英语编者按：有人说，世界上总会有个人是为你而存在的。于是，我们就一直在寻找这个为自己而生的人，慢慢变成了剩女，最后变成了大龄剩女。你怎么看待婚姻呢？你是非爱不嫁还是找个差不多的就行了呢？

Women looking for a Mr Right should give up after 30 and settle for a Mr ­Second Best or a Mr Right Now.

女人一旦年过三十，就不要再苦苦寻找Mr. Right了，如果能找到差不多的或者处于现在进行时的，就该定下来了。

Lori Gottlieb, author of Marry Him: The Case for Settling for Mr Good Enough, which is published in the UK next week, believes women who refuse to commit unless they find a man with whom they feel a deep, romantic love are consigning themselves to a lonely future.

Lori Gottlieb写了一本书，名叫《嫁给他：找个够好的就行了》。这本书下周即将在英国发售，她认为一个女人如果一定要找到一个能让自己陷入一段深深的浪漫的爱情才结婚，通常都落得孤独终身的下场。

"The theme of holding out for true love (whatever that is – look at the divorce rate) permeates our collective mentality," writes Gottlieb, a 40-year-old single mother who now admits she wishes she had "settled" for any of the "perfectly acceptable but uninspiring" men she rejected during her search for the perfect man.

Gottlieb本人是一个四十岁的单身妈妈，她写道，“坚持寻找真爱的想法已经渗透到了我们的灵魂（谁知道真爱是啥——看看现在的离婚率），”她在寻找完美男人期间拒绝了很多“完全可以接受但是不感兴趣”的人，她现在承认很希望自己早就和这样的人定下来。

"My dream, like that of my mother and her mother, was to fall in love, get married and live happily ever after. Of course, women are loth to admit it in this day and age, but ask any soul-baring 40-year-old single heterosexual woman what she most longs for in life, and she probably won't tell you it's a better career or a smaller waistline or a bigger apartment. Most likely, she'll say that what she really wants is a husband (and, by extension, a child)," she writes.

她写道，“我的梦想，像我妈妈和她妈妈一样，曾经是坠入爱河、结婚、然后从此过上幸福快乐的日子。当然，女人到了现在这种时代和年龄不喜欢承认这一点，但是，你问问任何愿意吐露心声的四十岁的异性恋女人，她们一生中最想要什么，通常她不会说想要更好的事业、更细的小蛮腰或者更大的房子。最有可能的是，她会说她非常想要个老公（再说开一点，一个孩子）”。

Gottlieb's book is based on an article she wrote in 2008 for the Atlantic magazine. The piece created such a sensation that it was picked up by Oprah Winfrey's O magazine and polarised readers. The debate caught the attention of Warner Independent and Tobey Maguire's Maguire Entertainment, which bought the book and film rights. Maguire intends to produce the film himself.

Gottlieb的书是在她2008年写给《亚特兰大》杂志的一篇文章的基础上写成的。这篇文章造成了轰动，奥普拉把这篇文章收入到自己的杂志《O》里面，在读者中也造成了两极分化的讨论。这场讨论引起了华纳独立影业和托比·马圭尔的马圭尔娱乐的注意，他们买下了这本书的版权和拍成电影的权利。马圭尔想自己制作这部电影。

Gottlieb blames feminism for the number of women who find themselves alone after spending years holding out for their white knight. To the outside world, says Gottlieb, these women still insist they are self-sufficient. "But in reality, we aren't fish who can do without a bicycle; we're women who want a traditional family," she writes. "Every woman I know – no matter how successful and ambitious, how financially and emotionally secure – feels panic, occasionally coupled with desperation, if she hits 30 and finds herself unmarried."

现在有很多女人经年累月寻找白马王子最后只能独身一人，Gottlieb 为此责备女权主义者。Gottlieb说，这些女人对外界仍然坚称她们是自我满足的，“但是事实上，我们不是不需要自行车的鱼，我们是需要一个传统家庭的女人，”她写道，“我认识的每个女人——不管多成功多有野心，经济上和心理上多么安全——如果到了30岁还没结婚，都会觉得恐慌，偶尔还会伴随着绝望。”

It is not just feminism that has betrayed women by telling them they could have it all, said Gottlieb: every book, film and television show that perpetuates the myth of combining romantic love with a happy-ever-after ending – from Jane Austen to Friends – has done women a great and dangerous disservice.

Gottlieb说，告诉女人她们可以拥有一切，这么背叛她们的不只是女权主义者，每一本书、每部电影和电视剧——从简·奥斯汀到老友记都表现了浪漫爱情和永远幸福的结尾组合在一起的神话，而这个神话的永垂不久给女人帮了一个巨大又危险的倒忙。

"We're conditioned to crave that Big Love. It's painful how pervasive the fantasy is that The One is out there," she said. "We grew up idealising marriage, but if we'd had a more realistic understanding of its cold, hard benefits, we might have done things differently. So we walked away from uninspiring relationships that might have made us happy."

“我们被决定去追求伟大的爱情。人生中的唯一就在某个地方，这种神话如此普遍，这令人非常痛苦，”她说，“我们长大了把婚姻理想化了，但是如果我们事先拥有的是对婚姻那种冷冰冰的、艰难的东西有更现实的理解的话，我们会走上完全不同的道路。结果我们放弃了哪些让人不太感兴趣的关系，那本来会让我们幸福的。”

She even claims that settling for Mr Second Best could make women happier in the long run. "When we're holding out for romantic love, we have the fantasy that this level of passionate intensity will make us happier," she writes. "But marry­ing Mr Good Enough might be equally viable, especially if you're looking for a reliable life companion.

她甚至说，找个第二选择结婚从长久来看会让女人更幸福。“当我们坚持寻找浪漫爱情的时候，我们会有幻觉这种热情和激情会让我们更幸福，”她写道。“但是嫁给一个足够好的人也是可行的，尤其是你在寻找一生的伴侣的时候。”

"What makes for a good marriage isn't necessarily what makes for a good romantic relationship. Marriage isn't a passion-fest; it's a partnership formed to run a very small, mundane and often boring non-profit business. And I mean this in a good way."

“一段好的婚姻并不需要一段浪漫的关系，婚姻并不是激情的聚会，婚姻是合伙运营一个非常小的、世俗的、通常很乏味又不盈利的公司。我这么说是好意。”

But fellow author Elizabeth Gilbert believes that women are wrong to believe marriage will make them happy. In her new book, Committed: A Sceptic Makes Peace with Marriage, she writes: "We marry most often because we are in love and we think it will make us happy. Yet married women are more likely to suffer from depression than are single women.

但是作家Elizabeth Gilbert认为女人觉得婚姻会让她们幸福就是错的。在她的新书中，她写道“我们结婚通常都是因为我们恋爱了，我们觉得结婚会让我们幸福。然而结了婚的女人比起单身女人来说更容易陷入绝望。”

"Married women are not as successful in their careers as single women."

“已婚女性在职场上没有单身女性那么成功。”更多信息请访问：http://www.engbus.cn/

She adds: "The fact is women generally lose in the exchange of vows."

她说：“事实是，在交换誓言的时候女性通常就是输的一方。”