第四十五章
I have said already that but for the hazard of a journey to Tahiti I should doubtless never have written this book. It is thither that after many wanderings Charles Strickland came, and it is there that he painted the pictures on which his fame most securely rests. I suppose no artist achieves completely the realisation of the dream that obsesses him, and Strickland, harassed incessantly by his struggle with technique, managed, perhaps, less than others to express the vision that he saw with his mind's eye; but in Tahiti the circumstances were favourable to him; he found in his surroundings the accidents necessary for his inspiration to become effective, and his later pictures give at least a suggestion of what he sought. They offer the imagination something new and strange. It is as though in this far country his spirit, that had wandered disembodied, seeking a tenement, at last was able to clothe itself in flesh. To use the hackneyed phrase, here he found himself.
我在前面已經(jīng)說(shuō)過(guò)，如果不是由于偶然的機(jī)緣到了塔希提，我是肯定不會(huì)寫(xiě)這本書(shū)的。查理斯·思特里克蘭德經(jīng)過(guò)多年浪跡最后流落到的地方正是塔希提；也正是在這里他創(chuàng)作出使他永遠(yuǎn)名垂畫(huà)史的畫(huà)幅。我認(rèn)為哪個(gè)藝術(shù)家也不可能把晝夜縈繞在他心頭的夢(mèng)境全部付諸實(shí)現(xiàn)，思特里克蘭德為掌握繪畫(huà)的技巧，艱苦奮斗、日夜處于痛苦的煎熬里，但同其他畫(huà)家比較起來(lái)，他表現(xiàn)自己幻想中圖景的能力可能更差，只有到了塔希提以后，思特里克蘭德才找到順利的環(huán)境。在這里，他在自己周?chē)幪幙梢钥吹綖槭棺约旱撵`感開(kāi)花結(jié)果不可或缺的事物，他晚年的圖畫(huà)至少告訴了我們他終生追尋的是什么，讓我們的幻想走入一個(gè)新鮮的、奇異的境界。仿佛是，思特里克蘭德的精神一直脫離了他的軀體到處漫游，到處尋找寄宿，最后，在這個(gè)遙遠(yuǎn)的土地上，終于進(jìn)入了一個(gè)軀殼。用一句陳腐的話說(shuō)，他在這里可謂“得其所哉”。
It would seem that my visit to this remote island should immediately revive my interest in Strickland, but the work I was engaged in occupied my attention to the exclusion of something that was irrelevant, and it was not till I had been there some days that I even remembered his connection with it. After all, I had not seen him for fifteen years, and it was nine since he died. But I think my arrival at Tahiti would have driven out of my head matters of much more immediate importance to me, and even after a week I found it not easy to order myself soberly. I remember that on my first morning I awoke early, and when I came on to the terrace of the hotel no one was stirring. I wandered round to the kitchen, but it was locked, and on a bench outside it a native boy was sleeping. There seemed no chance of breakfast for some time, so I sauntered down to the water-front. The Chinamen were already busy in their shops. The sky had still the pallor of dawn, and there was a ghostly silence on the lagoon. Ten miles away the island of Murea, like some high fastness of the Holy Grail, guarded its mystery.
我一踏上這個(gè)偏遠(yuǎn)的島嶼，就應(yīng)該立刻恢復(fù)對(duì)思特里克蘭德的興趣，這似乎是一件很自然的事；但事實(shí)是，我手頭的工作卻占據(jù)了我的全部精神，根本無(wú)暇顧及與此無(wú)關(guān)的事；直到在塔希提住了幾天以后，我才想到這個(gè)地方同思特里克蘭德的關(guān)系。我畢竟同他分手已經(jīng)十五年了，他逝世也已有九年之久了。現(xiàn)在回想當(dāng)時(shí)的情況，在我到塔希提之后，不論手頭的事多么重要，我本來(lái)應(yīng)該立刻把它拋諸腦后的；但事實(shí)卻不是這樣，甚至一周以后我仍然無(wú)法從冗雜的事務(wù)中脫身出來(lái)。我還記得頭一天早上，我醒得很早。當(dāng)我走到旅館的露臺(tái)上時(shí)，周?chē)稽c(diǎn)動(dòng)靜也沒(méi)有。我圍著廚房轉(zhuǎn)了一圈，廚房的門(mén)還上著鎖，門(mén)外一條長(zhǎng)凳上，一個(gè)本地人，旅館的一個(gè)侍者，睡得正酣，看來(lái)一時(shí)我還吃不上早飯。于是我漫步到濱海的街道上。僑居在這里的中國(guó)人已經(jīng)在他們開(kāi)的店鋪里忙碌起來(lái)了。天空仍然呈現(xiàn)出黎明時(shí)分的蒼白，環(huán)礁湖上籠罩著死一樣的沉寂。十英里之外，莫里阿島佇立在海面上，象是一座圣杯形狀的巍峨要塞，深鎖著自己的全部秘密。
評(píng)論
打印
