|
尽管与上世纪相比，英国在权力和影响力上长期处于衰落状态，很多英国人仍不愿接受这一新的现实，尤其是在老一辈英国人中。支持英国脱欧的民众梦想回到过去，回到那个幻想的大英帝国。但这只是一个谬论。 By Greg Fountain Twenty years ago this month, Hong Kong was returned to China - an event that is often considered to mark the formal end of the British Empire. 20年前的7月，香港回归中国。人们通常将这一事件视为大英帝国正式结束的标志。 Yet there seems to be some reluctance, back home in the UK, to admit that the British hegemony of the 19th and early 20th centuries is now a thing of the past. 然而，很多英国民众似乎不愿承认英国19世纪和20世纪初建立的霸权现在已经成为历史。 Last year's European Union membership referendum provided ample evidence of this, with the so-called Brexit vote won, at least in part, because of a certain xenophobic nostalgia for the "good old days". 去年，关于欧盟成员国身份的公投为此提供了充足的证据，所谓的退欧公投取得胜利，至少有一部分是因为一些排外的英国民众还怀念“过去的美好时光”。 Despite the country's extended period of decline in power and influence over the past century, many Britons still refuse to accept this new reality. Fervent nationalism, embodied in such anachronistic "anthems" as Rule Britannia and expounded by certain elements of England's right-wing press, is rife - especially among the older generation. | 
