重讀〈普魯斯特的形象〉— Excerpt: The Image of Proust


經典作品是那些你經常聽人家說 “我正在重讀……” 而不是 “我正在讀……” 的書。
——伊塔羅‧卡爾維諾,《為什麼要讀經典作品?》(Why Read the Classics?)

從邏輯上來說，經典作品必然是不斷重讀的作品，但不斷重讀的作品卻未必是經典作品。
而班雅明的這一篇〈普魯斯特的形象〉，不管是否”已經”或”將來”會成為一篇經典的評論之作，對我來說，一讀再讀的興味始終是絲毫未減，更重要的是那前次閱讀不曾領略過的滋味，經由這次閱讀更讓人迷醉了。

又如波赫士所說：「閱讀，是為了找出書可以重讀。」
我理應慶幸自己在三年前發現了本雅明的《啟迪》這一本文選。
在之前的舊文 (http://blog.udn.com/le14nov/2709063) 裡，我簡短摘要了〈普魯斯特的形象〉的幾個片段，而這一次，我找到了英譯本並且做了一番對照之後摘要了更多的片段，希望有興趣的格友對於這篇評論會有更深層的認識。


【Excerpt】

中譯：張旭東
英譯：HARRY ZOHN

馬塞爾·普魯斯特的十三卷《追憶逝水年華》來自一種不可思議的綜合，它把神秘主義者的凝聚力、散文大師的技巧、諷刺家的鋒芒、學者的博聞強記和偏執狂的自我意識在一部自傳性作品中熔於一爐。誠如常言所說，一切偉大的文學作品都建立或瓦解了某種文體，也就是說，它們都是特例。但在那些特例中，這一部作品屬於最深不可測的一類。它的一切都超越了常規。從結構上看，它既是小說又是自傳又是評論。在句法上，它的句子綿延不絕，好似一條語言的尼羅河，它氾濫著，灌溉著真理的國土，更令人驚異的是，這個特例同時也標誌著過去幾十年裡的文學最高成就。這部作品的創作條件是極不健康的：非同一般的疾病，極度的富有，古怪的脾性。在任何一方面這都不是可資效仿的生活，然而它卻整個變成了典範。我們時代無與倫比的文學成就注定要降生在不可能性的心臟。它既坐落在一切危險的中心，也處於一個無關痛癢的位置。這標誌著這部花費了畢生心血的作品乃是一個時代的斷後之作。普魯斯特的形象則是文學與生活之間無可抗拒地擴大著的鴻溝的超一流面相。這是我們為什麼要乞靈於這個形象的理由。

The thirteen volumes of Marcel Prousts A la Recherche du temps perdu are the result of an unconstruable synthesis in which the absorption of a mystic, the art of a prose writer, the verve of a satirist, the erudition of a scholar, and the self-consciousness of a monomaniac have combined in an autobiographical work. It has rightly been said that all great works of literature found a genre or dissolve one-that they are, in other words, special cases. Among these cases this is one of the most unfathomable. From its structure, which is fiction, autobiography, and commentary in one, to the syntax of endless sentences (the Nile of language, which here overflows and fructifies the regions of truth), everything transcends the norm. The first revealing observation that strikes one is that this great special case of literature at the same rime constitutes its greatest achievement of recent decades. The conditions under which it was created were extremely unhealthy: an unusual malady, extraordinary wealth, and an abnormal disposition. This is not a model life in every respect, but everything about it is exemplary. The outstanding literary achievement of our time is assigned a place in the heart of the impossible, at the center-and also at the point of indifference-of all dangers, and it marks this great realization of a "lifework" as the last for a long time. The image of Proust is the highest physiognomic expression which the irresistibly growing discrepancy between literature and life was able to assume. This is the lesson which justifies the attempt to evoke this image.


拉丁文「文本」的原義是「編織」。誰的文本也沒有馬塞爾·普魯斯特的編織得那樣緊密。在他看來，任何事物都不夠緊湊，不夠耐久。從他的出版商伽里瑪那兒我們得知，普魯斯特的校閱習慣要了排字工的命。送還的清樣上寫滿了邊角注，所有的空白處都被新的文句填滿，可錯字卻一個沒改。這樣一來，記憶的法則甚至在作品修改過程中也大行其道。因為一件經歷是有限的，無論怎麼樣，它都局限在某個經驗的領域；然而回憶中的事件是無限的，因為它不過是開啟發生於此前此後的一切的一把鑰匙。記憶還在另一層面上頒布編織的法則。構成文本機體的既不是作者也不是情節，而是回憶的過程本身。我們甚至可以說作者和情節是記憶連續體中的間斷，它構成了那張掛毯的背面圖案。

The Latin word textum means "web." No ones text is more tightly woven than Marcel Prousts; to him nothing was tight or durable enough. From his publisher Gallimard we know that Prousts proofreading habits were the despair of the typesetters. The galleys always went back covered with marginal notes, but not a single misprint had been corrected; all available space had been used for fresh text. Thus the laws of remembrance were operative even within the confines of the work. For an experienced event is finite-at any rate, confined to one sphere of experience; a remembered event is infinite, because it is only a key to everything that happened before it and after it. There is yet another sense in which memory issues strict weaving regulations. Only the actus purus of recollection itself, not the author or the plot, constitutes the unity of the text. One may even say that the intermittence of author and plot is only the reverse of the continuum of memory, the pattern on the back side of the tapestry.


普魯斯特從未向睡眠屈服。然而，或不如說正由於此，讓·谷克多在一篇優美的文章裡說普魯斯特的聲音抑揚頓挫，遵循著夜與蜜的法則。委身於這樣的法則竟使他征服了一直伴隨著他的無望的遺憾。他曾把這種遺憾稱為”現實存在物本質上不可救藥的不完美” (L’imperfection incurable dans L’essence meme du present)。在記憶的蜂巢裡他為自己營造了容納思想幼蟲的房屋。谷克多所認識到的正是所有普魯斯特的讀者都關心的問題。但誰也沒意識到這正是他思想和效果的樞紐。谷克多看出來普魯斯特對幸福的追尋是那樣盲目、狂熱、不能自制。這一切閃爍在他的眼裡；儘管這不是一雙幸福的眼睛，但人們卻可以在裡面看到好運，就好像它們潛伏在賭博或戀愛之中。

Proust did not give in to sleep. And yet-or, rather, precisely for this reason-Jean Cocteau was able to say in a beautiful essay that the intonation of Prousts voice obeyed the laws of night and honey. By submitting to these laws he conquered the hopeless sadness within him (what he once called "limperfection incurable dans lessence meme du present".), and from the honeycombs of memory he built a house far the swarm of his thoughts. Cocteau recognized what really should have been the major concern of all readers of Proust and yet has served no one as the pivotal point of his reflections or his .affection. He recognized Prousts blind, senseless, frenzied quest for happiness. It shone from his eyes; they were not happy, but in them there lay fortune as it lies in gambling or in love.


但的確有一種二元的幸福意志，一種幸福的辯證法：一是讚歌形式，一是輓歌形式。一是前所未有的極樂的高峰；一是永恆的輪迴，無盡的回歸太初，回歸最初的幸福。在普魯斯特看來，正是幸福的輓歌觀念----我們亦可稱之為伊利亞式的----將生活轉化為回憶的寶藏。為此他在生活中犧牲了朋友和伴侶，在作品中割捨了情人、人物、敘事的流動和想像的遊戲。

There is a dual will to happiness, a dialectics of happiness: a hymnic and an elegiac form. The one is the unheard-of, the unprecedented, the height of bliss~ the other, the eternal repetition, the eternal restoration of the original, the first happiness. It is this elegiac idea of happiness-it could also be caned Eleatic-which for Proust transforms existence into a preserve of memory. To it he sacrificed in his life friends and companionship, in his works plot, unity of characters, the flow of the narration, the play of the imagination.


顯然，普魯斯特的人物屬於飽食終日者的圈子，但那裡面沒有一個人同作者的顛覆者形象相同。把這一切歸納為一個公式，我們可以說普魯斯特的用心在於把整個社會的內部結構設計為閒談的觀相術。在它的偏見與準則的寶庫裡，每一樣東西都被一種危險的喜劇成分徹底瓦解了。
……
當然，這種比較尚不足以充分說明普魯斯特社會批判的爆炸力量。他的風格是喜劇而不是幽默。他的笑聲不是把世界捧起來，倒是將它摔到了地上。這樣做的危險在於這個世界會四分五裂，而這又會讓普魯斯特流下眼淚。不過，家庭與人格的整體性道德和職業榮譽的確早已支離破碎了，於是布爾喬亞的矯揉造作在笑聲中土崩瓦解。它們的回歸和被貴族再吸收則是普魯斯特作品的社會學主題。

It is obvious that the problems of Proust’s characters are those of a satiated society. But there is not one which would be identical with those of the author, which are subversive. To reduce this to a formula, it was to be Prousts aim to design the entire inner structure of society as a physiology of chatter. In the treasury of its prejudices and maxims there is not one that is not annihilated by a dangerous comic element.
……
These comparisons, of course, do not do full justice to the explosive power of Prousts critique of society. His style is comedy, not humor; his laughter does not toss the world up but flings it down-at the risk that it will be smashed to pieces, which will then make him burst into tears. And unity of family and personality, of sexual morality and professional honor, are indeed smashed to bits. The pretensions of the bourgeoisie are shattered by laughter. Their return and reassimilation by the aristocracy is the sociological theme of the work.


普魯斯特對那些進入貴族圈子所必需具備的訓練從不厭倦。他調節自己的人格，把它弄得既捉摸不透又妙趣橫生，既謙恭柔順又難以對付。他做起這些來勤勉有加，不以為累，彷彿是其使命讓他不得不如此。隨後，這種神秘化和儀式化簡直變成他人格的一部分。有時他的書信整個是一個插入語和附言的系統，而這絕不僅限於語法。撇開那些才華橫溢、靈活多變的語句，他的書信有時像是書信寫作手冊裡的一件格式樣本：”親愛的太太，我剛剛注意到我將手杖忘在了您府上；請您費心將它交給持信人。多有打擾，敬請原諒；我剛剛找到了手杖，又及。”

Proust did not tire of the training which moving in aristocratic circles required. Assiduously and without much constraint, he conditioned his personality, making it as impenetrable and resourceful, as submissive and difficult, as it had to be for the sake of his mission. Later on this mystification and ceremoniousness became so much part of him that his letters sometimes constitute whole systems of parentheses, and not just in the grammatical sense-letters which despite their infinitely ingenious, flexible composition occasionally call to mind the specimen of a letter writers handbook: "My dear Madam, I just noticed that I forgot my cane at your house yesterday; please be good enough to give it to the bearer of this letter. P.S. Kindly pardon me for disturbing you; I just found my cane."


普魯斯特最精確、最令人信服的觀察總是像昆蟲吸附著枝葉和花瓣那樣緊緊地貼著它的對象。它在接近對像時從不暴露自己的存在。突然間，它振翅撲向前去，同時向受驚的旁觀者表明，某種非計算所能把握的生命業已不知不覺地潛伏進一個異類的世界。真正的普魯斯特的讀者無時無刻不陷入小小的震驚。

Prousts most accurate, most convincing insights fasten on their objects as insects fasten on leaves, blossoms, branches, betraying nothing of their existence until a leap, a beating of wings, a vault, show the startled observer that some incalculable individual life has imperceptibly crept into an alien world. The true reader of Proust is constantly jarred by small shocks.


普魯斯特對勢利眼的分析是他的社會批評的頂峰，其重要性遠在他對藝術的頂禮膜拜之上。因為勢利眼的態度無非是從純粹消費者角度出發的，對生活前後一致、井井有條，而又鐵一般堅硬、冷酷的看法。在這個撒旦的魔幻世界裡，有關大自然生產力的哪怕是最遙遠、最原始的記憶也被刪除了，因此普魯斯特發現變態的關係比常態的關係更有用，甚至在愛情上也是如此。無論從邏輯上講還是從理論上講，純粹的消費者也就是純粹的剝削者；在普魯斯特的世界裡，這個形象達到了其真實歷史存在的全部具體性。這個形象之所以具體，是因為它既深不可測又游移不定。普魯斯特描繪的是這樣一個階級，它在任何場合都把自己的物質基礎偽裝起來，並由此同某種早已沒有任何內在的經濟上的重要性，但卻足夠充當上流中產階級面具的封建主義文化結合在一起。普魯斯特知道自己是個幻滅者，他無情地去除了”自我”和”愛”的光彩，同時把自己無止境的藝術變成了他的階級的最活躍的秘密，即其經濟活動的一層面紗。這樣做當然不是為這個階級效力。因為普魯斯特作品中表現出來的是一種鐵石心腸，是一個走在其階級前面的人的桀傲不馴。他是他創造出來的世界的主人。在這個階級尚沒有在其最後掙扎中最充分地展露其特徵之前，普魯斯特作品的偉大之處是難於為人所充分領悟的。

Prousts analysis of snobbery, which is far more important than his apotheosis of art, constitutes the apogee of his criticism of society. For the attitude of the snob is nothing but the consistent, organized, steely view of life from the chemically pure standpoint of the consumer. And because even the remotest as well as the most primitive memory of natures productive forces was to be banished from this satanic magic world, Proust found a perverted relationship more serviceable than a normal one even in love. But the pure consumer is the pure exploiter-logically and theoretically-and in Proust he is that in the full concreteness of his actual historical existence. He is concrete because he is impenetrable and elusive. Proust describes a class which is everywhere pledged to camouflage its material basis and for this very reason is attached to a feudalism which has no intrinsic economic significance but is all the more serviceable as a mask of the upper middle class. This disillusioned, merciless deglamorizer of the ego, of love, of morals-for this is how Proust liked to view himself-turns his whole limitless art into a veil for this one most vital mystery of his class: the economic aspect. He did not mean to do it a service. Here speaks Marcel Proust, the hardness of his work, the intransigence of a man who is ahead of his class. That he accomplishes he accomplishes as its master. And much of the greatness of this work will remain inaccessible or undiscovered until this class has revealed its most pronounced features in the final struggle.


普魯斯特呈現給我們的不是無邊的時間，而是繁複交錯的時間。他真正的興趣在於時間流逝的最真實的形式，即空間化形式。這種時間流逝內在地表現為回憶，外在地表現為生命的衰老。觀察回憶與生命衰老之間的相互作用意味著突入普魯斯特世界的核心，突入一個繁複交錯的宇宙。這是一個處於相似性狀態的世界，它是通感 (correspondances) 的領域。浪漫主義者們第一個懂得了通感，波德萊爾最為狂熱地擁抱了它，但普魯斯特則是唯一能在我們體驗過的生活中將它揭示出來的人。這便是 memoire involontaire (非意願記憶)的作品。這種讓人重返青春的力量正與不可抵禦的衰老對稱。當過去在鮮嫩欲滴的”此刻”中映現出來時，是一種重返青春的痛苦的震驚把它又一次聚合在一起。

The eternity which Proust opens to view is convoluted time, not boundless time. His true interest is in the passage of time in its most real-that is, space-bound-form, and this passage nowhere holds sway more openly than in remembrance within and aging without. To observe the interaction of aging and remembering means to penetrate to the heart of Prousts world, to the universe of convolution. It is the world in a state of resemblances, the domain of the correspondances; the Romanticists were the first to comprehend them and Baudelaire embraced them most fervently, but Proust was the only one who managed to reveal them in our lived life. This is the work of the memoire involontaire, the rejuvenating force which is a match for the inexorable process of aging. When the past is reflected in the dewy fresh "instant," a painful shock of rejuvenation pulls it together once more.


許多創造的天才用他們傲視一切的英雄主義突破了自身的弱點。但這在普魯斯特身上卻聞所未聞。這再清楚不過地表明了普魯斯特特殊的創造性同他疾病間緊密的共生狀態。因此，從另一個角度著眼，我們也可以說，要不是他的痛苦是如此巨大而持續不斷，普魯斯特同生活和世事進程之間親密的同謀關係本來是會不可避免地將他引向平庸、懶惰、沾沾自喜的生活。然而，他的疾病卻注定要由一種沒有慾望和悔恨的激情來把它安置在偉大作品的創造過程中。當米開朗基羅在西斯廷大教堂的天穹上畫《創世紀》時，人們看見藝術家站在腳手架上，頭仰在身後作畫。在馬塞爾·普魯斯特那裡，我們看到同樣的腳手架(鷹架)又一次升了起來：它就是他的病床，在這張病床上，普魯斯特詭秘地將他的筆跡佈滿了不計其數的稿紙；他將它們舉向空中，彷彿是在慶祝他那小小宇宙的誕生。

For the rest, the closeness of the symbiosis between this particular creativity and this particular malady is demonstrated most clearly by the fact that in Proust there never was a breakthrough of that heroic defiance with which other creative people have risen up against their infirmities. And therefore one can say, from another point of view, that so close a complicity with life and the course of the world as Prousts would inevitably have led to ordinary, indolent contentment on any basis but that of such great and constant suffering. As it was, however, this malady was destined to have its place in the great work process assigned to it by a furor devoid of desires or regrets. For the second time there rose a scaffold like Michelangelos on which the artist, his head thrown back, painted the Creation on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel: the sickbed on which Marcel Proust consecrates the countless pages which he covered with his handwriting, holding them up in the air, to the creation of his microcosm.