As a historian who’s always searching for the text or the image that makes us re-evaluate the past, I’ve become preoccupied with looking for photographs that show our Victorian ancestors smiling (what better way to shatter the image of 19th-century prudery?). I’ve found quite a few, and- since I started posting them on Twitter-they have been causing quite stir. People have been surprised to see evidence that Victorians had fun and could, and did, laugh. They are noting that the Victorians suddenly seem to become more human as the hundred-or-so years that separate us fade away through our common experience of laughter.
作为一个历史学家，他总是在寻找能让我们重新评价过去的文字或图像，我已经开始全神贯注于寻找那些能展示我们维多利亚时代祖先微笑的照片（还有什么更好的方法可以打破19世纪的普鲁德里形象？）。我发现了不少，自从我开始在Twitter上发布它们以来，它们已经引起了相当大的轰动。人们惊讶地发现，维多利亚时代的人玩得很开心，而且能够笑。他们注意到，维多利亚时代似乎突然变得更加人性化，因为我们相隔的一百多年随着我们共同的欢笑经历逐渐消失。
Of course, I need to concede that my collection of ‘Smiling Victorians’ makes up only a tiny percentage of the vast catalogue of photographic portraiture created between 1840 and 1900, the majority of which show sitters posing miserably and stiffly in front of painted backdrops, or staring absently into the middle distance. How do we explain this trend?
当然，我需要承认的是，在1840年至1900年间创作的大量肖像摄影作品中，我收集的“微笑的维多利亚人”只占很小的比例，其中大多数是坐在画作背景前痛苦而僵硬地摆姿势，或是心不在焉地凝视着中间的距离。我们如何解释这种趋势？
During the 1840s and 1850s, in the early days of photography, exposure times were notoriously long: the daguerreotype photographic method (producing an image on a silvered copper plate) could take several minutes to complete, resulting in blurred images as sitters shifted position or adjusted their limbs. The thought of holding a fixed grin as the camera performed its magical duties was too much to contemplate, and so a non-committal blank stare became the norm.
在19世纪40年代和19世纪50年代，在摄影的早期，曝光时间是出了名的长：达盖尔照相法（在镀银的铜板上产生图像）可能需要几分钟才能完成，当坐着的人改变姿势或调整四肢时，图像会变得模糊。一想到相机在履行其神奇的职责时被拍照的人会咧着嘴咧嘴笑，这实在是太难想象了，于是，一个不负责任的茫然凝视就成了常态。
But exposure times were much quicker by the 1880s, and the introduction of the Box Brownie and other portable cameras meant that, though slow by today’s digital standards, the exposure was almost instantaneous. Spontaneous smiles were relatively easy to capture by the 1890s, so we must look elsewhere for an explanation of why Victorians still hesitated to smile.
但到了19世纪80年代，曝光时间要快得多，而Box Brownie和其他便携式相机的推出意味着，尽管以今天的数字标准来看，曝光速度很慢，但曝光并非即时的。到了19世纪90年代，人们相对容易捕捉到自发的微笑，所以我们必须从别处寻找一个解释，为什么维多利亚时代的人仍然对微笑犹豫不决。
One explanation might be the loss of dignity displayed through a cheesy grin. “Nature gave us lips to conceal our teeth,” ran one popular Victorian maxim, alluding to the fact that before the birth of proper dentistry, mouths were often in a shocking state of hygiene. A flashing set of healthy and clean, regular pearly whites’ rare sight in Victorian society, the preserve of the super-rich (and even then, dental hygiene was not guaranteed).
其中一个解释可能是由于一个低俗的笑容而失去了尊严。“大自然给了我们嘴唇来掩饰我们的牙齿，”维多利亚时代的一句流行格言暗指这样一个事实：在适当的牙科技术诞生之前，口腔常常处于令人震惊的卫生状态。一套闪亮的健康和干净的牙齿，普通的“珍珠白”在维多利亚社会是一种罕见的景象，是超级富豪的专利（即使在那时，牙齿卫生也没有保障）。
A toothy grin (especially when there were gaps or blackened teeth) lacked class: drunks, tramps, prostitutes and buffoonish music hall performers might gurn and grin with a smile as wide as Lewis Carroll’s gum-exposing Cheshire Cat, but it was not a becoming look for properly bred persons. Even Mark Twain, a man who enjoyed a hearty laugh, said that when it came to photographic portraits there could be “nothing more damning than a silly, foolish smile fixed forever”.
露齿而笑（尤其是在有缝隙或被熏黑的啃咬者的时候）缺乏阶级性：醉汉、流浪汉、妓女和滑稽的音乐厅表演者可能会咧嘴而笑，笑得像刘易斯·卡罗尔牙龈外露的咧着嘴笑，但这不是一个适合有教养的人的样子。就连喜欢开怀大笑的马克吐温也说，当谈到摄影肖像时，“没有什么比永远固定的愚蠢的微笑更可怕的了”。
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