評論
打印
In refusing to be obsolete, you challenged and defied the evolutionist historians. I had great respect for Spengler in my youth, but even then I couldn’t accept his conclusions, and (with respect and admiration) I mentally told him to get lost.
你拒絕被淘汰，就是對進化論史學家的挑戰(zhàn)和蔑視。年輕時我非常尊重斯賓格勒，但即使那個時候，也無法接受他的結(jié)論，而（懷著敬慕之情）在心里對他說：你走遠點吧。
Sixty years later, in a recent issue of The Wall Street Journal, I come upon the old Spenglerian argument in a contemporary form. Terry Teachout, unlike Spengler, does not dump paralyzing mountains of historical theory upon us, but there are signs that he has weighed, sifted and pondered the evidence.
時隔60年，在最近一期《華爾街日報》上，偶見斯賓格勒式老調(diào)新彈。跟斯賓格勒不同，特里?蒂奇奧特并沒有將一座座令人窒息的史論大山壓在我們身上，但跡象表明，他權(quán)衡、篩選、思索過相關(guān)證據(jù)。
He speaks of our “atomized culture,” and his is a responsible, up-to-date and carefully considered opinion. He speaks of “art forms as technologies.” He tells us that movies will soon be “downloadable”—that is, transferable from one computer to the memory of another device—and predicts that films will soon be marketed like books. He predicts that the near-magical powers of technology are bringing us to the threshold of a new age and concludes, “Once this happens, my guess is that the independent movie will replace the novel as the principal vehicle for serious storytelling in the 21st century.”
他談到了我們的"原子化文化"，觀點新穎可靠，并經(jīng)過深思熟慮，談到了 "作為技術(shù)的藝術(shù)形式"，告訴我們，電影很快就"可以下載"，即從一臺電腦轉(zhuǎn)入另一存儲設(shè)備。他還預測，電影不久會如書籍般銷售。他預言近乎魔法的技術(shù)之 力將把我們引入一個新時代，并得出結(jié)論："一旦這成為現(xiàn)實，我猜想，獨立電影會替代小說，成為21世紀嚴肅故事敘述的主要載體。"
In support of this argument, Mr. Teachout cites the ominous drop in the volume of book sales and the great increase in movie attendance: “For Americans under the age of 30, film has replaced the novel as the dominant mode of artistic expression.” To this Mr. Teachout adds that popular novelists like Tom Clancy and Stephen King “top out at around a million copies per book,” and notes, “The final episode of NBC’s ‘Cheers,’ by contrast, was seen by 42 million people.”
為了支持這一觀點，蒂奇奧特先生指出，圖書銷量不幸下降，而電影觀眾卻大幅上升。"對30歲以下的美國人來說，電影已經(jīng)取代小說，成為藝術(shù)表達的首要模 式。"蒂奇奧特先生補充道，湯姆?克蘭西和斯蒂芬?金@等暢銷小說家"每本書最多也就賣到一百萬冊左右，"還說，"相比之下，全國廣播公司的《歡樂酒 店》*的最后一集，觀眾達4200萬之多。"
On majoritarian grounds, the movies win. “The power of novels to shape the national conversation has declined,” says Mr. Teachout. But I am not at all certain that in their day “Moby-Dick” or “The Scarlet Letter” had any considerable influence on “the national conversation.” In the mid-19th century it was “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” that impressed the great public. “Moby-Dick” was a small-public novel.
就數(shù)量多寡而言，電影贏了。"小說左右國民言談的力量巳經(jīng)削弱，"蒂奇奧特先生說。但我絲毫不敢肯定，當初《白鯨》或《紅字》對"國民言談"有過什么重大影響。19世紀中期，打動大眾的是《湯姆叔叔的小屋》。《白鯨》是一部小眾小說。
