在挪威的森林寻找村上春树

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  他的难懂之处在于其超现实。
  他的美妙之处也在于其超现实。
  他的《挪威的森林》与《麦田里的守望者》平行并进,守护着一代又一代的年轻心灵—
  他是村上春树,游走于另类与大众、幻象与现实之间的村上春树。
  
  学习小提示:很难得找到这么棒的原声材料—语音清晰,节奏分明,尤其是旁白和小说选段的抑扬顿挫极富感情,而且背景音乐非常好听。文章本身也写得很有味道,除了适合精听精读,两个小说选段更是优秀的诵读素材哦。另外,本文为典型英式发音,喜欢英音的同学要注意跟读,喜欢美音的同学则可以从中学习两种口音的区别。
  
  I’m on the trail of Haruki Murakami – the 1)illusive
  Haruki Murakami. He’s Japan’s most successful novelist. He writes 2)off-beat books, where dream, memory and reality
  often 3)swap places with one another. His stories are fueled by his great passion, music, especially jazz, and his fame has spread far beyond Japan. He’s been translated into over 40 different languages. Murakami turned Japanese literature on its head, writing novels and short stories, heavily influenced by western literature that were 4)contemporary, humorous and that often slipped into the 5)surreal.
  Something tells me that looking for Murakami isn’t
  going to be, well, straightforward. For a start, he doesn’t
  do TV or radio. But, for the first time ever, he did agree to meet up with the producer and answer some of our questions off camera, and on condition that his own voice wasn’t heard. We asked him, first, if the inspiration to write came easily.
  Murakami: Sometimes it comes and sometimes it stops coming – I don’t know why. But, you know, writing fiction…
  writing novels is just like searching for something in the dark places. So you need every help, every help you can get. Sometimes it’s cats, sometimes it’s wells, and in the dark places there are small things waiting to help you.
  
  Book of the Youth, Book for the Youth
  
  Kobe High School, where Murakami spent his
  6)adolescence – not the greatest student. He says he passed his time playing Majong, fooling around with girls, skipping class, smoking and reading novels.
  Murakami: I’m a kind of rebel. It was the 1960s, the age of the rebel. We felt we were free. We could do anything. Back then I just wanted to find a window that faced the outside world, and it happened to be foreign culture. I was interested in reading books in English, mostly
  American literature, so I was addicted to those things. I could escape from Japanese society and its culture, so it was just great.
  When Murakami left school, he half-heartedly took exams to study law at university and failed to get a place. After a year of hanging out in the library, he passed the exam to study in Tokyo, in the Department of Literature at the 7)prestigious Waseda University. Newly arrived in the capital, his parents arranged for him to stay in a private 8)dormitory close to Waseda, Wakei Juku. Little changed since Murakami was there 40 years ago, Wakei features 9)prominently in Murakami’s most popular novel,
  Norwegian Wood.
  
  “Once upon a time, many years ago – just 20 years ago in fact – I was living in a dormitory. I was 18 and a first-year student. I was new to Tokyo, and new to living alone. And so my anxious parents found a private dorm for me to live in rather than the kind of single room that most students took. There were two 3-story concrete dorm buildings facing each other. They were large with lots of windows and gave the impression of being either flats that had been 10)converted into jails or jails that had been converted into flats. For my part, I would have preferred to rent a flat and live in comfortable 11)solitude.
  But, knowing what my parents had to spend on
  12)enrollment fees and 13)tuition, I was in no position to insist. And besides, I didn’t really care where I lived.”
  (from Norwegian Wood)
  
  Adolescents, students, young people at transitional moments in their lives are often the central characters in Murakami’s novels. He seems endlessly fascinated with this period of life and with his own memories of being that age. Norwegian Wood is a story about a 19-year-old boy, Toru, and his relationship with two different girls.
  
  “Naoko called me the following Saturday. And that Sunday we had a date. I suppose I could call it a date. I can’t think of a better word for it. As before, we walked the streets. Memory is a funny thing. When I was in the scene, I hardly paid it any attention. I never stopped to think of it as something that would make a lasting impression – certainly never imagined that 18 years later I would recall it in such detail. I was thinking
  about myself. I was thinking about the beautiful girl walking next to me. I was thinking about the two of us together and then about myself again. I was at that age, that time of life when every sight, every feeling, every thought came back like a 14)boomerang to me. And worse, I was in love, love with complications.”
  (from Norwegian Wood)
  
  Murakami’s ability to 15)authentically 16)evoke the smell of adolescence in this 17)melancholy 18)rites-of-passage love story has led the book to be dubbed “the Japanese Catcher in the Rye.”
  
  More Than Being Japanese
  
  Murakami: What I want to do is write what I want to write. I like to express the things which arise in my mind deeply. People ask me, for example, what does “the cat” mean? I have no answer. I just wanted to write it. I have no reason to write it, but I knew I should [have] written it. So I’m very confident about it, and my readers can feel my confidence.
  Interviewer: He’s never really 19)fitted in, has he? I mean, how much is he a…a Japanese writer?
  Jay Rubin (Murakami translator): One thing that I don’t
  think is central to Murakami is that search for Japanese identity. I don’t think there’s any likelihood that Murakami would have had the worldwide impact he’s had, if all he were doing was 20)preaching to the world or teaching the world about what it…what it means to be Japanese. That…
  that’s there, but it…it’s finally…it’s what it means to be human. And that’s why so many different cultures are able to relate to him. I think he manages to do that. He manages to 21)burrow into these things that are so much part of the brain and part of the…the
  individual 22)psyche that he doesn’t encounter cultural
  resistance. He’s obviously dealing with the things that so many people do feel as the most important things in their lives. I think that’s one of the things that[’s] made him so moving to so many different people from so many different countries.
  Murakami: Sometimes, I don’t know what I’m looking
  for. But I know something is there, and I want to find out what it is. But I don’t know what it is until
  I’ve found it. So that is the reason why I write stories. Stories are a 23)maze, a 24)labyrinth. So, if I can’t find a way through that maze, if I can’t tell stories, then I can’t find anything at all.
  I came to Japan, searching for some answers about Haruki Murakami and his books. Turns out, with Murakami, there’s always going to be more questions than answers. But then, as I’ve discovered, so far as he’s concerned, it’s not the answers, it’s the journey, the hunt, the soul-searching for the answers that really matters.
  
  我在追寻村上春树的踪迹—迷离飘忽的村上春树。他是日本最成功的小说家。他的著作不落俗套,幻梦、回忆与现实在其中交织相替。他的故事里充满了巨大的热情,以及音乐尤其是爵士乐的魅力。如今他的名声远播海外,其作品被翻译成四十多种语言。村上彻底颠覆了日本文学的传统,其小说和短篇故事深受西方文学的影响,极富现代感,文笔幽默,时常落入超现实世界。
  我有预感,寻找村上的道路不会那么简单直接。一来,他从不接受电视或电台访问,而这次,他却首度同意与我们的节目监制见面,在镜头外回答我们的问题,前提条件是他本人的声音不能被播出。我们首先问道,写作灵感会否涌泉而至。
  村上:灵感时有时无—我也不知道为什么。但是,你知道,编故事……写小说就如同在黑暗中寻寻觅觅。所以你需要各种各样的辅助,能想到的都得派上用场。有时是猫,有时是水井;在暗处,总有些小东西等着助你一臂之力。
  
  少年书,书少年
  
  村上在兵库县立神户高等学校度过其少年岁月—他并不是最优秀的学生。他说自己当时在混日子,整天打麻将,泡妞,逃课,抽烟,看小说。
  村上:我是个叛逆分子。那是(上世纪)六十年代,反叛旗帜高扬的时代。我们觉得无拘无束,想做什么都可以。那时我只想找一扇通往外面世界的窗口,外国文化碰巧成了这扇窗口。我喜欢读英文著作,主要是美国文学,于是就迷上那些作品了。我可以由此逃离日本社会和文化,那感觉真是太棒了。
  高中毕业后,村上不太认真地报考大学法律专业,结果落榜了。在图书馆晃荡了一年,他最终通过了考试,来到东京,在久负盛名的早稻田大学文学系学习。刚到首都,村上的父母安排他入住早稻田附近的私人宿舍—和敬塾。四十年过去了,这里与他入住时相比也没有什么变化。在他最受欢迎的小说《挪威的森林》里,有不少关于和敬塾的特写。
  
  “从前,许久以前,其实就是二十年前,我曾住在一栋宿舍里。当时我十八岁,才刚上大学而已。爸妈担心我一来在东京人生地不熟,二来又是头一次离家独自生活,于是给我找了个私人宿舍,而不是大部分学生住的那种单间。这儿有两栋三层楼高的水泥建筑,平行并排,有很多窗户,看上去总给人一种像是由公寓改造而成的监狱,或是由监狱改造而成的公寓的感觉。我自己倒宁愿在外面租个房子,一个人舒舒服服地住。不过,一想到我的入学金、学费花了父母不少钱,我也不好意思再说些什么。何况,其实住哪里,我并不在乎。”
  (摘自《挪威的森林》)
  
  青少年、学生、面临人生转折点的年轻人,这些常常是村上小说中的中心人物。他似乎总是对这一人生阶段充满向往,沉溺于自己青春年少时那些回忆。《挪威的森林》讲述的是19岁小伙子阿彻和两个女孩子的感情故事。
  
  “接下来的那个周六,直子打电话给我。周日我们约会去了。那可以叫做约会吧,我想不出比这更贴切的词了。像往常一样,我们一起逛街。记忆这玩意儿真是不可思议。当我身历其境时,我根本没多留意周围的风景,不会停下来想到这一切将深深烙印在我心里—也绝不会料到十八年后,我能将那一草一木记得这么清楚。那时,我在想着自己的事情,想着走在身旁的这个漂亮女孩,想到俩人的关系,又回过头来想着自己的事情。不管见到什么,感受到什么,想到什么,结果总会像飞镖一样又联想到自己身上,我当时正处于那个年纪。更糟糕的是,我正在谈恋爱,那是一段困难重重的感情。”
  (摘自《挪威的森林》)
  
  在这个讲述人生重要时期的忧伤爱情故事中,村上真实地重现出那份年少青涩的味道,使该书被冠以“日本的《麦田里的守望者》”之称。
  
  突破“日本”的界限
  
  村上:我想做的就是写自己想写的东西。我要把心中所想深刻地表达出来。人们问我,譬如,“猫”有什么寓意?我也回答不上来。我只是想这么写,没有什么特别原因,但我就知道应该这么写。所以我写得很有信心,读者也能感受到我的自信。
  主持人:他向来不从众,对吧?我的意思是,他在多大程度上……像是个日本作家?
  杰伊·鲁宾(村上作品译者):我觉得,探寻日本的文化身份对村上来说并不重要。我想,要是他一味向世界宣讲,教会全世界何谓……何谓日本人,他根本不可能有今天的全球影响力。何谓日本人……他会有所触及,但是……最终他在探讨的是作为“人”的意义何在,这就是为什么那么多文化都能对他的作品产生共鸣。我认为他成功了。他能深入触及我们的大脑以及个人心灵的一部分,因此不会遇到任何文化代沟。他探讨的显然是大家都视作我们生命中最重要的那些事情。我想那正是他能打动来自这么多不同国家的这么多不同读者的原因之一。
  村上:有时,我不知道自己在寻找些什么。但我知道那些东西确实存在,我要把它找出来,看看到底是什么。而只有真正找到了,我才会知道那是什么。所以这就是我要写小说的原因。一个个故事就是曲径深幽的重重迷宫。所以,如果找不到走出迷宫的正确道路,如果不写小说,我(的人生)就一无所获。
  我来到日本,寻找村上春树和他那些著作的谜底。到头来发现,遇上他,问题总是多于答案。后来我发现,对他来说,答案并不重要,那段未解的旅程、那种苦苦的追寻、那个扪心自问探求答案的过程才是最重要的。
  


  


  

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