"铁娘子"不幸中风辞世, 绝代风华戛然而止

Margaret Thatcher, Britain’s longest-serving and only woman prime minister, has died aged 87 after suffering a stroke, prompting a flood of tributes from across the globe.
玛格丽特•撒切尔(Margaret Thatcher)因中风去世，享年87岁，在世界各地引发了一阵哀悼浪潮。撒切尔是英国任职最长的首相，也是唯一的女首相。

Leaders lined up to pay their respects to the former prime minister, who revolutionised the UK economy during an 11-year tenure, as she rolled back the state and put in place some of the country’s most radical and controversial reforms.
各国领导人纷纷向这位英国前首相表达敬意。在其长达11年的任期中，撒切尔领导了英国经济的革命，缩减了政府职能，并实施了该国最为激进、最有争议的一些改革。

David Cameron, UK prime minister, described the former Conservative prime minister as the “greatest peacetime prime minister”.
英国现首相戴维•卡梅伦(David Cameron)把这位前保守党首相称为“英国和平时期最伟大的首相”。

“[She] took a country that was on its knees and made Britain stand tall again. We can’t deny that Lady Thatcher divided opinion. For many of us, she was and is an inspiration. For others she was a force to be defined against.
卡梅伦表示：“（她）临危受命，让英国重新站起来，再度屹立。不可否认，人们对她的评价各异。在我们许多人看来，她过去和现在都是一位鼓舞人心的人物。在其他人看来，她是一种特色鲜明的力量。

“But if there is one thing that cuts through all of this – one thing that runs through everything she did – it was her lion-hearted love for this country,” he said.
“但如果说有一个中心贯穿着她的一生——在她所做的每一件事中都体现出来，那就是她对这个国家的无比热爱。”

President Barack Obama said: “The world has lost one of the great champions of freedom and liberty, and America has lost a true friend.”
美国总统巴拉克•奥巴马(Barack Obama)表示：“世界失去了一位积极倡导自由的领袖，美国失去了一位真正的朋友。”

The prime minister’s office announced that parliament would be recalled for a special session on Wednesday to pay tribute to Thatcher. Her funeral will be held at the end of next week at St Paul’s Cathedral.
英国首相办公室宣布，周三议会将召开一次特别会议，向撒切尔致哀。她的葬礼将于下周末在伦敦圣保罗大教堂(St Paul's Cathedral)举行。

She will have a “full ceremonial funeral” with military honours as was afforded to the Queen Mother and Lady Diana. The British flag flew at half mast over Parliament to honour Thatcher as all UK political parties suspended campaigning for the local elections on May 2.
撒切尔将享有带有军事礼仪的“礼仪葬礼”，礼遇同王太后和戴安娜一样。英国国会降半旗向撒切尔致哀，各政党暂停针对5月2日地方选举的竞选活动。

Thatcher, who transformed Britain with her free-market revolution, had been in poor health since suffering minor strokes in 2002.
自从2002年患上中风以来，撒切尔的健康状况一直很差。她曾以自己的自由市场革命改变了英国的面貌。

Statesmen past and present shared their memories of the woman dubbed the “Iron Lady”. Tony Blair, the second longest-serving postwar prime minister, called her “a towering political figure”. “Very few leaders get to change not only the political landscape of their country but of the world. Margaret was such a leader. Her global impact was vast.”
已卸任和在任的政治家们共同悼念有“铁娘子”绰号的撒切尔。英国战后任期第二长的首相托尼•布莱尔(Tony Blair)称撒切尔为“一位伟大的政治人物。”“不但改变本国政治版图、还改变世界政治版图的领袖人物非常少，撒切尔就是其中的一位。她在全球播下了深远的影响。”

George W. Bush, former US president, described her as a “great ally” who “strengthened the special relationship”.
美国前总统小布什(George W. Bush)称撒切尔为一位“强化了美英特殊关系的伟大盟友”。

Thatcher had a particularly close relationship with Ronald Reagan, the former US president.
撒切尔与美国前总统罗纳德•里根(Ronald Reagan)之间保持了一种极为密切的关系。

With Reagan, she helped bring about the end of the Soviet Union and the fall of the Berlin Wall. The British prime minister saw herself as the perfect intermediary between the two countries, having struck up constructive relationships with both Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev, the Soviet president, and a man with whom she told Reagan “we can do business”.
她和里根一道促成了苏联的解体和柏林墙的倒塌。这位英国前首相把自己视为美苏两国间的完美中间人，与里根和苏联总统米哈伊尔•戈尔巴乔夫(Mikhail Gorbachev)都建立了富有建设意义的关系。她告诉里根，戈尔巴乔夫是一个“我们能和他打交道”的人。

Mr Gorbachev said Thatcher helped end the Cold War: “Thatcher was a politician whose word carried great weight,” he said in a statement on his website. “Our first meeting in 1984 marked the beginning of a relationship that was at times difficult, not always smooth, but was treated seriously and responsibly by both sides.”
戈尔巴乔夫在自己网站上发布的声明中表示，撒切尔帮助结束了冷战：“撒切尔是一位一言九鼎的政治家。我们在1984年第一次会面，随后便开启了一段时而棘手、并非一帆风顺但双方都认真负责予以对待的关系。”

Lech Walesa, Poland’s former president and anti-communist freedom figure, said Thatcher was key in hastening the fall of the Iron Curtain: “She was a great person. She did a great deal for the world, along with Ronald Reagan, Pope John Paul II and Solidarity, she contributed to the demise of communism in Poland and central Europe.”
波兰前总统、反对共产主义的自由派人士列赫•瓦文萨(Lech Walesa)表示，撒切尔在加速“铁幕”(Iron Curtain)倒塌的过程中发挥了关键的作用：“她是一位伟人。她为世界做出了巨大的贡献，她与罗纳德•里根、教皇约翰•保罗二世(Pope John Paul II)和波兰团结工会(Solidarity)一起，推动了波兰与中欧共产主义政权的终结。”

Her other great success abroad was in the Falklands War against Argentina, which invaded the islands in 1982. Thatcher defied resistance in her own cabinet to send a 25,000-strong task force to the tiny archipelago, which troops eventually recaptured after two months.
撒切尔在海外的其他巨大胜利，还包括1982年的英阿福克兰群岛战争（Falklands war，又称马岛战争）。她不顾自己内阁的反对，向面积微小的福克兰群岛派出了2.5万人的特遣部队，最终于两个月后夺回了该群岛。

Her legacy was just as long-lasting at home. A succession of prime ministers, Labour and Conservative alike, have felt unable or unwilling to depart from the blueprint she established of a state serviced by privatised utilities and free of the stranglehold of organised unions.
撒切尔在国内留下的遗产同样意义深远。历任首相，无论出自工党还是保守党，都感到不能或不愿背离她为英国设定的蓝图——公用事业私有化，企业不受有组织工会的钳制。