評論
打印
The news has become a matter of opinion.
新聞成了對觀點的闡述。
And this puts a newspaper editor in a position not at all dissimilar from that of a novelist. It is for the novelist to create, communicate and sustain over time a personal and coherent vision of the world that entertains, interests, stimulates, provokes and nourishes his readers. It is for the newspaper editor to do very much the same thing with the pages at his disposal. In that specialized sense, we are all in the fiction business now.
這也就使報紙的編輯與小說家置身于相同的境地。小說家就是要創造、傳達并在一段時間內對世界保有一貫的個人看法，使讀者從中享受樂趣、獲取益處、受到激勵、有所感觸、得到滋養。對于報紙編輯而言，他們就是要對任憑自己支配的版面做完全相同的事情。就這一特定的含義而言，我們現在都是在搞小說創作這一行。
One of the more extraordinary truths about the soap opera that is the British royal family is that to a large extent the leading figures have had their characters invented for them by the British press. And such is the power of the fiction that the flesh and blood royals have become more and more like their print personae, unable to escape the fiction of their imaginary lives.
一個更為非凡的事實是對于英國皇室成員那猶如肥皂劇一般的報道，在很大程度上其中的主角不過是英國媒體杜撰出來的。而虛構的力量是如此之大，就連活生生的皇室成員們也與報道中的面貌越來越相像，而無法逃脫那富于想象力的對其生活的虛構。
The creation of "characters" is, in fact, rapidly becoming an essential part of print journalism's stock in trade. Never have personality profiles and people columns—never has gossip—occupied as much of a newspaper as they now do. The word "profile" is apt. In a profile, the subject is never confronted head-on but receives a sidelong glance. A profile is flat and two-dimensional. It is an outline. Yet the images created in these curious texts (often with their subjects' collusion) are extraordinarily potent —it can be next to impossible for the actual person to alter, through his own words and deeds, the impressions they create—and thanks to the mighty clippings file, they are aiso self-perpetuating.
對“人物”的創造實際上正迅速成為新聞出版業看家本領的要素。人物特寫和人物專欄，還有那些流言蜚語，從未像今天這樣占據報紙如此大的篇幅。用“特寫”一詞恰如其分。對于人物特寫中的人物從不進行直接地描繪而是從側面刻畫。人物特寫是扁平而又膚淺的，不過是人物的輪廓。但是這些煽情的刻畫所創造出來的形象(被描繪的人物對此也往往心照不宣)具有非凡的影響力一即便是通過這個人物自己的言行也幾乎不可能改變所刻畫出的形象給人們留下的印象——也正是多虧了這些循環往復而又威力無比的剪報才使得這些被創造出來的形象得以長久流傳。
