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对狄金森“离别”的理解:从1988年到现在
武夷山
1988年11月初,我读到美国女诗人Emily Dickinson的两句诗:
Parting is all we know of heaven,
And all we need of hell.
字面意思是:
我们所知道的与天堂有关的事只是离别;
我们所需要的与地狱有关的事也是离别。
一直想翻译这两句,但20多年了也翻译不出来。一看到这两句,脑子里便跳出“生离死别”四个字,再也没有别的。即使在英语国家,对这两句诗也有多种多样的理解。这正是诗歌的迷人之处,也正是狄金森的迷人之处。
全诗如下:
Parting
My life closed twice before its close;
It yet remains to see
If Immortality unveil
A third event to me,
So huge, so hopeless to conceive,
As these that twice befell.
Parting is all we know of heaven,
And all we need of hell.
20多年后,我试图了解一下人家是怎么理解这两句的,发现美国纽约布鲁克林学院英语系女教授Lilia Melani对最后两句的理解比较靠谱 (http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/cs6/closed.html),她说:
最后两句呈现出巨大的悖论:离别既是天堂,也是地狱。我们与逝者离别,希望他们升入了天堂。对于他们,天堂是永久幸福之地,可是,我们这些被抛下的却因为他们的死亡(离别)而忍受苦痛(地狱)。这首诗有任何慰藉人心的内涵吗?关于天堂,我们“确知“的那一项事物到底是什么?对所有活着的人来说,天堂是与地狱密不可分的吗?我每次读这首诗都不寒而栗,而且这种感觉绵延不去。
The last two lines of this poem present a powerful paradox; parting is both heaven and hell. We part with those who die and--hopefully--go to heaven, which is, ironically, an eternal happiness for them; however, we who are left behind suffer the pain (hell) of their deaths (parting). Is there any comfort in this poem? What is the one thing we "know" about heaven? Is heaven, for living human beings, connected to hell? A personal note: these lines chill me every time I read them, and they stay with me afterward.
我以前翻译过狄金森的几首诗,列在下面:
1. 我是无名之辈http://blog.sciencenet.cn/home.php?mod=space&uid=1557&do=blog&id=409486;
2. 有人死了,http://blog.sciencenet.cn/home.php?mod=space&uid=1557&do=blog&id=42227;
3. 今天我脑海中闪过一个念头,http://blog.sciencenet.cn/home.php?mod=space&uid=1557&do=blog&id=19149。
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