例3：经济体制改革成不成功，成功大小，要看三年到五年。见效了才能说服人，证明第二个三中全会决议是正确的。

It will be three to five years before we can tell whether the reform of the economic structure is successful and to what extent. Only when it has shown positive results will we be able to convince people that the resolution of the Third Plenary Session was correct.

例4：改革的意义，是为下一个十年和下个世纪的前五十年奠定良好的持续发展的基础。没有改革就没有今后的持续发展。所以，改革不只是看三年五年，而是要看二十年，要看下世纪的前五十年。这件事必须坚决干下去。

The purpose of the reform is to lay a solid foundation for sustained development over the next decade and throughout the first half of the next century. Without the reform, there could be no sustained development. So, we should think not in terms of just three to five years, but in terms of the last 20 years of this century and the first 50 of the next. We must persist in the reform.

例5：比如说，现在我们国内人们议论雇工问题，我和好多同志谈过，犯不着在这个问题上表现我们在“动”，可以再看几年。开始我说看两年，两年到了，我说再看看。

For example, right now people are talking about the problem of privately hired labour. I have said to many comrades that it is not worth showing that we are taking action on this question and that we can wait a couple of years. At first I said we could wait two years; now two years have passed, and I'd say we should still wait.

分析：例3到例5这三个例子，“看”字依然包括观察、思考、判断等含但强调一定长度的时间，因此，译文用了It will be …years, think in terms of和wait等词语。

取自《译海一粟-汉英翻译九百例》，庄绎传编著，如有侵权，联系删除