双语·《刀锋》 第一章 一

CHAPTER ONE 1
第一章 一

I have never begun a novel with more misgiving. If I call it a novel it is only because I don't know what else to call it.I have little story to tell and I end neither with a death nor a marriage.Death ends all things and so is the comprehensive conclusion of a story, but marriage finishes it very properly too and the sophisticated are ill-advised to sneer at what is by convention termed a happy ending.It is a sound instinct of the common people which persuades them that with this all that needs to be said is said.When male and female, after whatever vicissitudes you like, are at last brought together they have fulfilled their biological function and interest passes to the generation that is to come.But I leave my reader in the air.This book consists of my recollections of a man with whom I was thrown into close contact only at long intervals, and I have little knowledge of what happened to him in between.I suppose that by the exercise of invention I could fill the gaps plausibly enough and so make my narrative more coherent；but I have no wish to do that.I only want to set down what I know of my own knowledge.
以前动笔写小说从未像今日这般顾虑重重。称之为“小说”，只是因为再也想不出别的名称。我所叙述的事情故事性不强，结局并非是“一命呜呼”或者“喜结连理”。死亡可以一了百了，通常讲故事都是以此作为收场，但“喜结连理”也是一种十分恰当的结局。遇见世俗的所谓幸福美满的大结局，奉劝那些老于世故者也不必嗤之以鼻。饮食男女嘛，本性使然，一切都尽在不言中。一男一女，不管经历怎样的水深火热，最终喜相逢，在生物功能完成之后，兴趣也就转移到未来一代的身上去了。至于事情的原委，我要给读者留一些悬念。这本书记录的是我跟一个人的陈年往事——此人和我关系亲密，但要隔很长时间才相会一次。在这段间隔期他有着什么样的经历我一无所知。如果叫我编出一些情节来加以弥补，我也可以写得天衣无缝，让故事一气贯通，可我不愿意这样做。我只打算将自己所了解的实情付诸笔端。

Many years ago I wrote a novel called The Moon and Sixpence. In that I took a famous painter, Paul Gauguin, and, using the novelist's privilege, devised a number of incidents to illustrate the character I had created on the suggestions afforded me by the scanty facts I knew about the French artist.In the present book I have attempted to do nothing of the kind.I have invented nothing.To save embarrassment to people still living I have given to the persons who play a part in this story names of my own contriving, and I have in other ways taken pains to make sure that no one should recognize them.The man I am writing about is not famous.It may be that he never will be.It may be that when his life at last comes to an end he will leave no more trace of his sojourn on earth than a stone thrown into a river leaves on the surface of the water.Then my book, if it is read at all, will be read only for what intrinsic interest it may possess.But it may be that the way of life that he has chosen for himself and the peculiar strength and sweetness of his character may have an ever-growing influence over his fellow men so that, long after his death perhaps, it may be realized that there lived in this age a very remarkable creature.Then it will be quite clear of whom I write in this book and those who want to know at least a little about his early life may find in it something to their purpose.I think my book, within its acknowledged limitations, will be a useful source of information to my friend's biographers.
多年前，我写过一本小说叫《月亮与六便士》。在那本书里，我塑造的主人公的原型是个名叫保罗·高更的名画家。关于这位法国艺术家的生平我知之甚少，只是依据一星半点的事实，使用小说家的特权添枝加叶编造出一些情节加以渲染。在本书里，我无意如法炮制。此处无任何虚构。书中角色的姓氏全都改过，并且采取了一些别的处理手法使之难以辨认，免得那些还活在世上的人看了尴尬。我写的这人并不出名，也许永远不会出名。也许，他的生命一旦结束，这一生留在世界上的痕迹并不比石子投入河中留在水面上的涟漪多。如此，如有读者青睐本书，完全是书中的内涵激发了读者的兴趣。不过，也许会出现另外一种情况——他选择的人生道路以及他那坚毅和温良的人格对同胞们产生了越来越强烈的影响。这样，可能在他久别人世之后，人们会醒悟到：原来在这个时代产生过一个如此出类拔萃的人物。至于我写的是何人，谜底将会昭然若揭。有些人对他早年的身世想略作了解，定会如愿以偿。我在本书中追溯那如烟的往事。书中所述可能有种种不足，但对有意为我友著书立传者尚可资用，不失为好的参考。

I do not pretend that the conversations I have recorded can be regarded as verbatim reports. I never kept notes of what was said on this or the other occasion, but I have a good memory for what concerns me, and though I have put these conversations in my own words they faithfully represent, I believe, what was said.I remarked a little while back that I have invented nothing；I want now to modify that statement.I have taken the liberty that historians have taken from the time of Herodotus to put into the mouths of the persons of my narrative speeches that I did not myself hear and could not possibly have heard.I have done this for the same reasons as the historians have, to give liveliness and verisimilitude to scenes that would have been ineffective if they had been merely recounted.I want to be read and I think I am justified in doing what I can to make my book readable.The intelligent reader will easily see for himself where I have used this artifice, and he is at perfect liberty to reject it.
我并无意硬说书中对原谈话内容的记载一句不漏。在此类境况中，对于说话人的话语我从不做笔录，而只是将与我有关的事情谨记心间。虽说记载他们谈话的内容我用的是自己的词语，但我敢保证自己所言不虚。刚才我说书中无任何虚构，现在我想做一更正。就像希罗多德希罗多德，公元前5世纪的古希腊作家，他把旅行中的所闻所见，以及第一波斯帝国的历史记录下来，著成《历史》一书，成为西方文学史上第一部完整流传下来的散文作品。

Another reason that has caused me to embark upon this work with apprehension is that the persons I have chiefly to deal with are American. It is very difficult to know people and I don't think one can ever really know any but one's own countrymen.For men and women are not only themselves；they are also the region in which they were born, the city apartment or the farm in which they learnt to walk, the games they played as children, the old wives'tales they overheard, the food they ate, the schools they attended, the sports they followed, the poets they read, and the God they believed in.It is all these things that have made them what they are, and these are the things that you can't come to know by hearsay, you can only know them if you have lived them.You can only know them if you are them.And because you cannot know persons of a nation foreign to you except from observation, it is difficult to give them credibility in the pages of a book.Even so subtle and careful an observer as Henry James, though he lived in England for forty years, never managed to create an Englishman who was through and through English.For my part, except in a few short stories, I have never attempted to deal with any but my own countrymen, and if I have ventured to do otherwise in short stories it is because in them you can treat your characters more summarily.You give the reader broad indications and leave him to fill in the details.It may be asked why, if I turned Paul Gauguin into an Englishman, I could not do the same with the persons of this book.The answer is simple：I couldn't.They would not then have been the people they are.I do not pretend that they are American as Americans see themselves；they are American seen through an English eye.I have not attempted to reproduce the peculiarities of their speech.The mess English writers make when they try to do this is only equalled by the mess American writers make when they try to reproduce English as spoken in England.Slang is the great pitfall.Henry James in his English stories made constant use of it, but never quite as the English do, so that instead of getting the colloquial effect he was after, it too often gives the English reader an uncomfortable jolt.
写这本书还有一点也叫我顾虑重重——书中的主人公基本上都是美国人。了解一个人是非常困难的事情。对于本国之人尚可以知根知底，对于其他国家的人恐怕就难以做到这一点了。了解一个人，不论男女，不但要了解其本身，也得了解其出生的环境、居住的城市公寓、学步的场所、儿时的游戏、外婆讲的故事、吃的饭菜、求学之处、从事的运动、吟咏的诗篇以及宗教信仰。这些因素深入他们的骨髓。你不可能听别人说说就算了解了他们，而非得跟他们同吃同住才能够知根知底。要做到真正了解，就得成为他们当中的一员。对于异国他乡的人，你只是一个旁观者，不可能真正了解，写书时就难取信于人了。即便亨利·詹姆斯①那般观察细致入微的人，在英国住了四十年，也没能在作品中创造出一个有着地道英国味的英国人来。至于我本人，除了在几个短篇里涉及外国人，我只专注于刻画本国人。敢于在短篇里写外国人，仅仅因为短篇里的人物不必精细描写，而只需泛泛一谈。你给读者一点粗浅的启示，细节由读者自己推想。也许有人要问，既然我能把保罗·高更塑造成一个英国人，这本书里的人物为什么不可以照做。回答是：恕难从命。照葫芦画瓢，那样的主人公就不伦不类了。我敢说，那样的主人公绝非美国人眼中的美国人，而成了英国人眼里的美国人。连他们的语言特点我都没有打算仿效。英国作家在这方面闯的乱子和美国作家打算模仿英国人说的英语时闯的乱子一样多。俚语简直就是个陷阱。亨利·詹姆斯在他的英国故事里经常要用俚语，可是总不像一个英国人说的那样地道，因此非但未能取得他所追求的俚语效果，反而弄巧成拙，时常使英国人读来感到别扭和不舒服。