肯尼迪夫人尘封的带血裙装

A Smart Pink Suit, Preserved In Memory, Kept Out of View

肯尼迪夫人尘封的带血裙装

On the plane back to Washington, in her pink Chanel suit, caked with her husband’s blood, Jackie Kennedy resisted all suggestions from aides that she clean herself up. Instead, she just said, “Let them see what they’ve done.”

在返回华盛顿的飞机上，杰奎琳·肯尼迪(Jackie Kennedy)穿着的香奈儿(Chanel)套装上，她丈夫的鲜血已经结成了块。助手们多次建议她清理一下，但她只是说，“让他们看看，他们都干了什么。”

But for the half century since John F. Kennedy’s assassination in Dallas on Nov. 22, 1963, the most famous artifact from that day, one of the most recognizable articles of clothing ever worn, has been seen by almost no one. Now preserved by the National Archives in a climate-controlled vault outside of Washington, it is subject to Kennedy family restrictions that it not be seen for almost a century more.

然而在1963年11月22日，约翰·F·肯尼迪(John F. Kennedy)在达拉斯遇刺身亡以来的半个世纪里，几乎没有人见到过那一天留下的最著名物品，它也是曾被穿过的最为人熟知的衣物之一。现在，它被国家档案馆(National Archives)保存在华盛顿郊外一座控制温湿的保险库里，按照肯尼迪家族的要求，还要再过将近一个世纪的时间，才能将其公开展出。

If there is a single item that captures both the shame and the violence that erupted that day, and the glamour and artifice that preceded it, it is Jackie Kennedy’s bloodstained pink suit, a tantalizing window on fame and fashion, her allure and her steely resolve, the things we know about her and the things we never quite will.

如果说有一件物品，既能表现那一天迸发的耻辱和暴力，又能够表现在那之前的瑰丽和精巧，那就是杰奎琳·肯尼迪血迹斑斑的粉色套装。它是一扇诱人的窗口，透过它能窥视名望和时尚，了解她的魅力和坚定的决心，感受我们已知的她，揣度我们永远也不会了解的她。

That Mrs. Kennedy is so closely linked to an item of clothing is fitting. In nearly three years as first lady, she had gained universal celebrity for her youthful style. Politically, it meant huge crowds whenever she accompanied the president. But for Mrs. Kennedy, who felt vulnerable, fashion gave her a sense of separation from the public’s gaze. It was armor.

肯尼迪夫人和一件衣物的联系如此紧密，这一点恰如其分。在身为第一夫人的近三年时间里，她因为自己青春的风采而名动天下。在政治上，这意味着无论她何时陪伴在总统身边，都会引来大批人的追随。然而，对于感到脆弱的肯尼迪夫人而言，时尚给了她一种与公众的目光相隔离的感觉。它是一副盔甲。

So even on that day, before the horror of what ensued, to look at Mrs. Kennedy was to be drawn inevitably to the pink suit, a line-for-line copy of a classic cardigan-style Chanel with navy lapels. The suit came from Chez Ninon, a Park Avenue salon that created many of her clothes, following her taste for simple lines. She wore it at least six other times, including on a 1962 visit to London and that same year to greet the president of Algeria.

所以，即使是在那天，在惨剧发生之前，看到肯尼迪夫人之时，人们的目光还是会不可避免被吸引到那件粉色套装上，这件带深蓝色翻领的套装，一丝不苟地模仿了香奈儿一款经典的开襟套装。衣服来自公园大道(Park Avenue)上的Chez Ninon，这家店根据杰奎琳喜好简洁线条的品味，为她制作了许多服装。除了这天之外，她至少还穿过这件衣服六次，她在1962年访问伦敦时穿过，同年会见阿尔及利亚总理时也穿过。

Fifty years ago, at noon in Dallas, Clint Hill, who was the Secret Service agent assigned to Mrs. Kennedy, thought the pink suit looked fluorescent against the dark blue of the car carrying the president and the first lady.

指派给肯尼迪夫人的特勤局特工克林特·希尔(Clint Hill)感觉，50年前那个中午的达拉斯，在载有总统及第一夫人的深蓝色轿车的映衬下，粉色套装显得闪闪发亮。

“She stood out so much in the car because of the color of that suit,” said Mr. Hill, who has released a new account of the killing, “Five Days in November,” in time for the anniversary. “It was like the sun just illuminated it.”

希尔说，“因为套装的颜色，她在车里如此夺目，就像阳光让它发亮。”希尔刚出版了记述肯尼迪遇刺事件的新书《11月的5天》(Five Days in November)，以配合又一个周年纪念日。

Now preserved in its vault, the pink suit and its accessories, still stained, the stockings blood-powdered and folded in a white towel, remain essentially unchanged from the day of the assassination. Only the outfit’s matching pillbox hat and white kid gloves are missing, lost in the chaos of that day.

目前保存在保险库的粉色套装和与它配套的长筒袜(卷放在一块白毛巾中，上面沾着凝结的血滴)基本上和遇刺当日一模一样。只是和套装相配的小圆帽和白色羊皮手套已在当日的混乱中遗失了。

Although the National Archives has kept the suit and accessories, including navy shoes, bag and navy blouse, since 1964, when they arrived in a dress box, the items legally belonged after her death to Caroline Kennedy as her mother’s surviving heir. So a deed of gift was made in 2003 with the provision that the suit would not be seen by the public until 2103. Through her office, Ms. Kennedy declined to comment.

1964年，套装和配饰(包括深蓝色的皮鞋、手袋和深蓝色上衣)被装在服装盒里运抵国家档案馆，自那以后一直保存在这里。肯尼迪夫人去世后，作为母亲的在世继承人，卡罗琳·肯尼迪(Caroline Kennedy)在法律上拥有这些物品。于是，在2003年，肯尼迪家族立下了赠送契约，其中有条款规定，要到2103年才能将套装公之于众。卡罗琳通过办公室表示，她拒绝置评。

Over the years, the Kennedy family has sought to avoid the sensational treatment of assassination artifacts, and that is the explicit intent of the 100-year restriction. Nonetheless, Martha Murphy, chief of special access at the archives, said Mrs. Kennedy’s clothes are the only items in the assassination collection with this specific restriction.

多年来，肯尼迪家族一直力图避免对遇刺时留下的物品进行煽情的处理，这也是100年限制明确的用意所在。尽管如此，档案馆特别访问权主管玛莎·墨菲(Martha Murphy)说，肯尼迪夫人的衣物是遇刺藏品中唯一受到这种特殊限制的物品。

By comparison, scholars and researchers who meet special criteria of the archives may view President Kennedy’s clothing and the rifle used by Lee Harvey Oswald. To the best of anyone’s knowledge, access to Mrs. Kennedy’s suit for research purposes has never been granted.

相比之下，符合国家档案馆特别标准的学者和研究人员可以查看肯尼迪总统的衣物和李·哈维·奥斯瓦尔德(Lee Harvey Oswald)用的步枪。就各方所知，为了研究目的而查看肯尼迪夫人套装的申请从未被批准过。

After Mrs. Kennedy returned to the White House, early on Nov. 23, her clothing was put in a bag, presumably by her personal maid, Providencia Paredes, and soon after placed in a dress box. Records show that it arrived at the archives sometime before July 1964, accompanied by an unsigned note on the stationery of Mrs. Kennedy’s mother, Janet Auchincloss.

肯尼迪夫人在11月23日一早回到白宫后，她的衣物被放进一个袋子，想必是由她的贴身女佣普洛韦登西亚·帕雷德斯(Providencia Paredes)做的，不久后这些衣物又被放进一个服装盒。记录显示，盒子大约在1964年7月前的某一日抵达国家档案馆，并附有一张用肯尼迪夫人的母亲珍妮特·奥金克洛斯(Janet Auchincloss)的信笺所写的字条，上面没有签名。

The note simply said: “Jackie’s suite and bag — worn November 22, 1963.” It is unknown whether Mrs. Auchincloss made the decision to send the clothes to the archives or, as many believe, was following her daughter’s wishes. Ms. Paredes, in an interview, said the suit was at first sent to Mrs. Auchincloss’s home in Georgetown, but she is confident Mrs. Kennedy would have made the decision on where to send it. “Nobody would have made that decision for her,” she said.

字条上简单地写着：“杰奎琳1963年11月22日所穿套装和所携手袋。”究竟是奥金克洛斯做出了把衣物送交国家档案馆的决定，抑或如许多人所信，她是按照女儿的愿望这么做的，外界已无从得知。帕雷德斯在一次采访中说，那件套装最初被送到奥金克洛斯位于乔治敦的家，不过她确信，肯尼迪夫人对它的去向做出了决定。她说，“没人能替她做这个决定。”

The Kennedy family never advised the archives about cleaning the suit, Ms. Murphy said, although leaving blood and other residue on garments is a standard conservation practice. “It’s part of the history of the object,” said Phyllis Magidson, curator of costume and textiles at the Museum of the City of New York. Ms. Murphy, who has seen the suit, said it essentially looks brand-new.

墨菲说，肯尼迪家族从未建议国家档案馆清洗套装，尽管把血迹和其他残留物留在衣物上是一种标准的保护做法。纽约市博物馆(Museum of the City of New York)服装和纺织品负责人菲莉丝·马吉德松(Phyllis Magidson)说，“它们是这件物品历史的一部分。”曾见过套装的墨菲说，它看上去基本上依然是崭新的。

For all Mrs. Kennedy’s visibility, it seems fitting that her pink suit should be hidden from view.

尽管肯尼迪夫人引人注目，但她的粉色套装隐藏于公众视线外似乎是合适的。

“She certainly understood invisibility and disappearance very deeply, as well as staged appearance,” said the cultural critic Wayne Koestenbaum, author of “Jackie Under My Skin: Interpreting an Icon.” “So the unseen suit is a very poignant and accurate emblem of her contradiction.”

文化评论员、《面具下的杰奎琳：偶像演绎》(Jackie Under My Skin: Interpreting an Icon)的作者韦恩·科斯腾鲍姆(Wayne Koestenbaum)说，“她无疑对不露面和消失有着极深的理解、对事先精心编排的亮相也是如此。所以，看不见的套装是一件令人沉痛的纪念品，准确象征着她生活中的矛盾”。

And noting that Mrs. Kennedy’s interest in historic preservation adds another facet to the suit’s status, Ms. Magidson said, “It has everything encapsulated within it.”

墨菲指出，肯尼迪夫人对文物保护的兴趣给套装的地位添加了另一个层面，她说，“这件套装浓缩了一切。”

Curators cannot think of another historical garment imbued with more meaning, and also deemed too sensitive to be shown. Among items of apparel with similar resonance are garments worn in concentration camps and the tatters that remained after the atomic blasts in Japan. But these objects, while deeply affecting, are displayed in museums. Other examples mentioned by curators include Napoleon’s death coat, a shoe dropped by Marie Antoinette on the way to the guillotine and the suit and cloak Abraham Lincoln was wearing when he was assassinated.

博物馆馆长们想不出还有哪件历史性服装的内涵能超过这件套装，同时又因被认定过于敏感而无法公开。能形成类似震撼的衣物包括集中营里穿过的衣物，还有原子弹在日本爆炸后留下的破衣烂衫。然而这些感人至深的物品是在博物馆里展出的。馆长们提到的其他例子包括拿破仑死时穿的外套、玛丽·安托瓦内特 (Marie Antoinette)被押往断头台途中掉下的一只鞋，以及阿伯拉罕·林肯(Abraham Lincoln)遇刺时穿的衣服和斗篷。

But when Lincoln was alive, relatively few Americans knew what he looked like. Besides, his image, even if it had been familiar, would hardly have compared to Mrs. Kennedy’s riveting beauty and pop culture celebrity. She was, as Norman Mailer said in a 1962 essay critical of her televised tour of the White House, “an institution being put together before our eyes.”

可是，林肯在世时，知道他模样的美国人相对较少。而且，即使他的相貌为人熟知，也难以和肯尼迪夫人令人着迷的美貌和流行文化名人的身份相媲美。正如诺曼·梅勒(Norman Mailer)在1962年的一篇随笔中，批评她电视直播的白宫之行时所说，她是“我们眼睁睁看着被制造出来的时尚。”

For that reason, combined with the fixation on President Kennedy’s assassination and a charged media culture, most experts believe that displaying her suit would be problematic. “It would produce hysteria if it were placed on view,” Ms. Magidson said.

由于这个原因，再加上公众对肯尼迪总统遇刺的沉迷和情绪激烈的媒体文化，大多数专家认为，展出她的衣物会引发问题。马吉德松说，“如果让它公开展出，会导致人们情绪失控。”

Those who knew her say it is almost certain that Mrs. Kennedy played a role in nearly every step of the suit’s journey from Manhattan dress shop to Dallas, and eventually to the vault.

认识肯尼迪夫人的人说，几乎可以肯定，这件套装从曼哈顿的服装店到达拉斯，最终抵达保险库，肯尼迪夫人几乎在每一个环节都扮演了一个角色。

She was a woman of meticulous organizational skills, who dictated to her White House secretary, Mary Barelli Gallagher, from her bed, and who dogged people with her morning memos. (Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. once likened them to Churchill’s “Action This Day” memos during World War II.)

她是一个有着周密组织技能的女人。她会在床上向自己的白宫秘书玛丽·巴雷利·加拉格尔(Mary Barelli Gallagher)下达指令，她的早间备忘录也让人应付不暇。(小阿瑟·M·施莱辛格[Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr.]曾把它们比作丘吉尔[Churchill]在二战期间的《今日行动》[Action This Day]备忘录。)

Ms. Gallagher’s 1969 memoir, “My Life with Jacqueline Kennedy” makes a good companion to “The Death of a President,” by William Manchester, the one book on the assassination commissioned by the Kennedys. Loaded with details about Mrs. Kennedy’s work and personal habits, Ms. Gallagher’s memoir is sort of a backstairs view of the noble purposes that Mr. Manchester ascribes to her.

加拉格尔1969年出版的回忆录《我和杰奎琳·肯尼迪在一起的生活》(My Life with Jacqueline Kennedy)堪称威廉·曼彻斯特(William Manchester)《总统之死》(The Death of a President) 的姐妹篇。《总统之死》是由肯尼迪家族委托撰写的唯一记述遇刺事件的书。加拉格尔的回忆录里满是有关肯尼迪夫人的工作和生活习惯的细节。曼彻斯特称肯尼迪夫人有着崇高的目标，而加拉格尔的回忆录则像是对这些崇高目标的幕后介绍。

For instance, he referred to Mrs. Kennedy as a “retiring” socialite who was transformed by loss, “a new Jackie.” But he did not consider that maybe the skills and determination that she used to hunt down clothes and furniture were the same qualities she magisterially deployed after the assassination.

比如，他称肯尼迪夫人是“喜欢独处”的社会名流，因失去丈夫而发生了重大变化，成了“新杰奎琳”。但他没有考虑到，也许她在搜寻服饰和家具时所用的那些技巧和决心，与她在丈夫遇刺后展现的沉毅是相同的特质。

And what about her stony refusal to change her clothes? Though describing White House duties, Ms. Gallagher offered many instances where Mrs. Kennedy had no compunction about saying no. She wrote, “If she didn’t want to participate in some activity, nothing could drive her to it.”

她坚决拒绝换衣服的行为该怎么解读?尽管加拉格尔主要记载白宫的职责，但她也叙述了肯尼迪夫人毫无犹豫说不的许多事例。她写道，“如果她不想参加某个活动，谁都别想勉强她去。”

The Manchester book described President Kennedy taking an unusual interest in what his wife planned to wear on the Texas trip, something he had never done in their marriage. He said to her, Mr. Manchester reported, “Be simple — show these Texans what good taste really is.”

根据曼彻斯特在书中的记载，肯尼迪总统对去德州时妻子计划穿什么异常感兴趣。在他们的婚后生活中，这是此前从未有过的事。曼彻斯特写道，总统对妻子说，“穿简单点儿，让这些德州人知道什么是真正的好品味。”

Ms. Paredes, though not disputing the account, gives less significance to it: “Maybe the president told her to wear the suit. I don’t think she gave it a thought. It was a practical suit to travel in.”

尽管没有质疑这段记述，但帕雷德斯认为它没那么重要：“或许总统让她穿那件套装。我觉得她没有多想。那是一套在旅行时非常实用的套装 。”

She added, “I did pack a lot of clothes for her, because you never know about the weather. The president called me on the phone. It was the last time I spoke to him. He said, ‘You know, it’s going to be hot in Texas.’ ”

她还补充说，“我的确给她打包了很多衣服，因为你永远不知道天气如何。总统给我打过电话。那是我最后一次和他说话。他说，‘你也知道，德州会很热。’”