Call him Ishmael

叫他以實(shí)瑪利

Born 200 years ago, Herman Melville was globalisation’s first great bard

赫爾曼?梅爾維爾出生于200年前，是全球化的第一位偉大詩(shī)人

詞匯

Bard/ ?吟游詩(shī)人

The sailors hunting the White Whale with Captain Ahab are avatars of modernity

與亞哈船長(zhǎng)一起獵殺白鯨的水手們是現(xiàn)代社會(huì)的化身

詞匯

Avatar/（某種思想或品質(zhì)）化身

Jul 20th 2019?

STRIKING MATCHES on their rope-roughened palms, the burly whalers who chase Moby Dick seem unlikely avatars for modernity. But in an important, even prophetic way, that is what they are. The crew of the Pequod are a wondrous deputation “from all the isles of the sea, and all the ends of the earth”. Sailors of at least 13 nationalities are “federated along one keel” with Captain Ahab: Chinese and Tahitian, Icelandic and Portuguese. Their creator, Herman Melville—who was born 200 years ago, on August 1st 1819—was the first great writer of the age of globalisation.?

在繩索般粗糙的掌心上劃擦著火柴，魁梧的捕鯨者追逐著“莫比·迪克”；這幅畫(huà)面似乎看不出現(xiàn)代社會(huì)的影子。但從一個(gè)重要的，或者說(shuō)的預(yù)言性的角度看，這就是現(xiàn)代社會(huì)人們的縮影。"裴廓德號(hào)"上的船員是一個(gè)了不起的代表團(tuán)，"來(lái)自海洋的各個(gè)島嶼，來(lái)自地球的各個(gè)角落"。至少有13個(gè)國(guó)家的水手與亞哈船長(zhǎng)“同乘一條船”:中國(guó)人、塔希提人、冰島人和葡萄牙人。作品的創(chuàng)造者赫爾曼·梅爾維爾(Herman melville)生于200年前的1819年8月1日，是全球化時(shí)代的第一位偉大作家。

詞匯

Moby Dick/白鯨記（Moby Dick）是世上偉大的小說(shuō)之一。全書(shū)的焦點(diǎn)集中于南太平洋一條名叫莫比·迪克的白鯨，裴龐德號(hào)的船長(zhǎng)亞哈伯如何對(duì)它有不共戴天的仇恨

Burly/壯碩魁梧粗壯的

Prophetic/ ?預(yù)言的，預(yù)示的；先知的

Wondrous/奇妙的；令人驚奇的；非常的

Deputation/代表團(tuán)，代表

Keel/（船的）龍骨；平底船

The 19th century witnessed an unprecedented international circulation of people, goods and ideas. Sailors were at the forefront of this exchange, crossing and re-crossing oceans in a “devious zig-zag world-circle”, as Melville put it, constantly exposed to exotic lands and strange customs. A shortage of manpower and the dangers of the sea meant captains often cared little who shipped with them, provided they were able mariners. This was a cosmopolitanism of necessity rather than ideology, a grassroots phenomenon largely overlooked by contemporary authors.?

19世紀(jì)見(jiàn)證了前所未有的人員、商品和思想的國(guó)際流通。水手們處于這種交流的最前沿，在一個(gè)“曲折的之字形世界圈”中，一次又一次地穿越海洋，正如梅爾維爾所說(shuō)，他們不斷地接觸到異國(guó)的土地和奇怪的風(fēng)俗習(xí)慣。人力的短缺和海上的危險(xiǎn)意味著船長(zhǎng)們往往不關(guān)心與他們一起出海的人，只要他們是能干的水手。這是一種必然的世界主義，而非意識(shí)形態(tài)，一種被當(dāng)代作家普遍忽視的草根現(xiàn)象。

詞匯

Devious/偏僻的；彎曲的；不光明正大的

zig-zag /鋸齒狀的

exotic/異國(guó)的；外來(lái)的

mariner/水手；船員

cosmopolitanism/世界主義；世界大同主義

grassroots/基層的；草根的【不帶s就是單獨(dú)的“草根”這一名詞】

But not by Melville. As a Jack-Tar of 19, he sailed the New York-to-Liverpool circuit in 1839, an experience he recalled ten years later in his novel “Redburn”. He saw the awful conditions endured by Irish immigrants below decks and the hostility they encountered upon arrival in America. “If they can get here,” Melville thought, “they have God’s right to come.” The docking of an Indian vessel in Liverpool was an opportunity to swap stories with a Lascar sailor. “It is a God-send to fall in with a fellow like this,” Melville later wrote. “His experiences are like a man from the moon—wholly strange, a new revelation.”

但梅爾維爾沒(méi)有。19歲時(shí)，他就開(kāi)始了從紐約到利物浦的海上巡回，10年后，他在自己的小說(shuō)《雷伯恩》中回憶了這段經(jīng)歷。他看到了愛(ài)爾蘭移民在甲板下忍受的惡劣條件，以及他們抵達(dá)美國(guó)時(shí)所遭遇的敵意。“如果他們能到這兒來(lái)，”梅爾維爾想，“他們就有上帝來(lái)的權(quán)利?！耙恢в《却辉诶锲滞？?，這是與印度水手交流故事的好機(jī)會(huì)。梅爾維爾后來(lái)寫(xiě)道:“能遇到這樣一個(gè)家伙，真是天賜良機(jī)。”“他的經(jīng)歷就像一個(gè)來(lái)自月球的人——完全陌生，一個(gè)全新的視界?！?/p>

詞匯

Deck/甲板；行李倉(cāng)；露天平臺(tái)

Lascar/印度水手（在歐洲船上工作）

He took his education on the ground—and on the water—having been withdrawn from formal schooling at 12 on the death of his bankrupt father. In January 1841 he shipped from New Bedford as a whaler; over the next four years he was briefly imprisoned in Tahiti for taking part in a mutiny and hitched across the Pacific. He worked as a farmhand and as a pin-setter in a Hawaiian bowling alley. This journey, too, became material for his stories.

他的父親破產(chǎn)后，12歲時(shí)就輟學(xué)了；他開(kāi)始了他在陸上和海上的學(xué)習(xí)。1841年1月，他從新貝德福德出海當(dāng)成為一名捕鯨人。在接下來(lái)的四年里，他因?yàn)閰⑴c了一場(chǎng)叛變而被短暫地囚禁在塔希提島，并搭順風(fēng)車(chē)橫跨太平洋。他在夏威夷的保齡球館當(dāng)過(guò)農(nóng)場(chǎng)工人和釘針工。這段旅程也成了他寫(xiě)故事的素材。

詞匯

Hitch/搭便車(chē)

In them, rigid land-based axioms give way to social and moral fluidity. In the “watery part of the world”, categories of class, nation and race dissolve; the company includes “renegades, and castaways, and cannibals”. In “Moby Dick”, the masterpiece Melville published in 1851, Queequeg, an expert harpooner (and reputed man-eater) from the South Seas, earns more than Ishmael, the inexperienced white narrator. In his early book “Omoo” (1847), a workhouse foundling becomes a Pacific warlord. The late novella “Billy Budd” mentions African-Americans fighting under the British flag at the Battle of Trafalgar.?

其中，僵硬的基于土地的公理讓位于社會(huì)和道德的流動(dòng)性。在“世界的水鄉(xiāng)”，階級(jí)、民族和種族的類(lèi)別逐漸消失;這家公司包括“叛徒、漂流者和食人族”。在梅爾維爾1851年出版的杰作《白鯨記》中，來(lái)自南海的魚(yú)叉手魁魁格(同時(shí)也是有名的食人者)賺的錢(qián)比沒(méi)有經(jīng)驗(yàn)的白人解說(shuō)者以實(shí)瑪利還多。在他早期的著作《歐穆》（Omoo）(1847)中，一個(gè)濟(jì)貧院的棄兒成為了太平洋的軍閥。晚期的中篇小說(shuō)《比利·巴德》(Billy Budd)提到，在特拉法加戰(zhàn)役(Battle of Trafalgar)中，非裔美國(guó)人在英國(guó)國(guó)旗下作戰(zhàn)。

詞匯

Axiom/公理；格言

Renegade/叛徒；變節(jié)者

Castaway/被拋棄的人；坐船遇難者；漂流者

Cannibal/食人者

Harpooner/ 魚(yú)叉手

Warlord/軍閥

Novella/中篇小說(shuō)

Or, The Whale

或者,鯨魚(yú)

Travel led Melville to question the concepts of “savagery” and “civilisation”. “I call a savage a something highly desirable to be civilised off the face of the earth,” said his more parochial contemporary, Charles Dickens. For his part, Melville jumped ship at Nuku Hiva, in the Marquesas Islands, and spent a month with a tribe untouched by Western influence. That led to the radical defence of cannibalism in “Typee” (1846), his first book, as a form of justice no more barbaric than Britain’s erstwhile habit of displaying hung, drawn and quartered bodies.

旅行使梅爾維爾對(duì)“野蠻”和“文明”的概念提出了質(zhì)疑。“我稱(chēng)野蠻人是居于地球表面，非?？释玫浇袒囊蝗何锓N，”與他同時(shí)代的、更狹隘的查爾斯?狄更斯(Charles Dickens)說(shuō)。而梅爾維爾則在馬克薩斯群島的努庫(kù)希瓦(Nuku Hiva)下船，與一個(gè)未受西方影響的部落生活了一個(gè)月。在他的第一本書(shū)《泰比》(Typee, 1846)中，這導(dǎo)致了對(duì)同類(lèi)相食行為的激進(jìn)辯護(hù)，認(rèn)為這是一種正義的形式，并不比英國(guó)人過(guò)去習(xí)慣的展示被絞死、拖出和切成四等分的尸體更野蠻。

詞匯

Savage/未開(kāi)化的人

Parochial/狹隘的

Since everyone saw the world through the prism of their own culture, Melville believed, no society could claim moral superiority over another. In “White-Jacket” (1850), a Polynesian aboard an American frigate bound for New England has never before ventured beyond his home. “His tastes were our abominations: ours his,” the narrator observes. “Our creed he rejected: his we.” The upshot is that “neither was wrong, but both right.” In lectures the author gave about his experiences, he advocated travel as a way to dispel bigotry. The racist, he said, “finds several hundred millions of people of all shades of colour…And learns to give up his foolish prejudice.”

梅爾維爾認(rèn)為，由于每個(gè)人都是通過(guò)自己文化的棱鏡來(lái)看待這個(gè)世界的，因此沒(méi)有哪個(gè)社會(huì)能夠宣稱(chēng)自己比另一個(gè)社會(huì)具有道德上的優(yōu)越性。在《白夾克》(1850)中，一名波利尼西亞人登上一艘開(kāi)往新英格蘭的美國(guó)護(hù)衛(wèi)艦，此前從未出過(guò)家門(mén)。“他的品味是我們所厭惡的:我們的品味是他他所厭惡的，”敘述者說(shuō)。他拒絕了我們的信條:我們也是如此。結(jié)果是“兩種說(shuō)法都不對(duì)，但也都是合理的?！痹谧髡咧v述自己經(jīng)歷的講座中，他提倡旅行是消除偏見(jiàn)的一種方式。他說(shuō)，這位種族主義者“發(fā)現(xiàn)了數(shù)億不同膚色的人……并學(xué)會(huì)了放棄自己愚蠢的偏見(jiàn)?！?/p>

詞匯

Abomination/厭惡；憎恨；令人厭惡的事物

Upshot/結(jié)果，結(jié)局；要點(diǎn)

Bigotry/偏執(zhí)；頑固；盲從

If differences are respected in Melville’s globalised world, commonalities emerge, too. Sailors learn each other’s languages and develop hybrid dialects. In moments of leisure, the crew of the Pequod lie in the forecastle swapping tales of women and wandering, singing shanties and dancing jigs. Prejudice and nationalism are too ingrained to vanish entirely; but, through mutual dependence on the high seas, interracial bonds are forged. “You sink your clan; down goes your nation; you speak a world’s language, jovially jabbering in the Lingua-Franca of the forecastle.”

如果在梅爾維爾全球化的世界中尊重差異，那么共同點(diǎn)也會(huì)出現(xiàn)。水手們學(xué)習(xí)彼此的語(yǔ)言，并發(fā)展混合方言。閑暇時(shí)，"裴廓德號(hào)"的船員們就躺在水手艙里，講著女人的故事，唱著歌，跳著舞，四處游蕩。偏見(jiàn)和民族主義根深蒂固，無(wú)法完全消除;但是，通過(guò)對(duì)公海的相互依賴(lài)，建立了不同種族之間的聯(lián)系。“你毀了你的部落;你們的民族滅亡了;你說(shuō)的是一種世界語(yǔ)言，在水手艙里愉快地用通用語(yǔ)嘰嘰喳喳地說(shuō)個(gè)不停?！?/p>

詞匯

hybrid dialect/混合方言

After “Moby Dick”, a succession of Melville’s novels failed. Many contemporaries were surprised to learn he had died in 1891: they assumed he was dead already. But since its rediscovery in the early 20th century, the tale of Ahab’s hubristic vendetta against the whale has become an all-purpose political fable. In the 1950s C.L.R. James, a Trinidadian writer, described the book as “the biography of the last days of Adolf Hitler.” It has been deployed to decry the Vietnam war, George W. Bush’s crusade against the “axis of evil”, Osama bin Laden’s jihad against the West, Vladimir Putin’s hatred of NATO, Donald Trump’s pursuit of a border wall and Theresa May’s quest for a Brexit withdrawal agreement.?

在《白鯨記》之后，梅爾維爾的一系列小說(shuō)都以失敗告終。許多同時(shí)代的人得知他已于1891年去世時(shí)都很驚訝:他們以為他已經(jīng)死了。但自從20世紀(jì)初它被重新發(fā)現(xiàn)以來(lái)，亞哈對(duì)鯨魚(yú)的傲慢的仇殺已經(jīng)成為一個(gè)通用的政治寓言。20世紀(jì)50年代，特立尼達(dá)作家C.L.R.詹姆斯(C.L.R. James)把這本書(shū)描述為“阿道夫·希特勒(Adolf Hitler)最后日子的傳記”。它被用來(lái)譴責(zé)越南戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)、喬治·w·布什(George W. Bush)對(duì)“邪惡軸心”(axis of evil)的討伐、奧薩馬·本·拉登(Osama bin Laden)對(duì)西方的圣戰(zhàn)、弗拉基米爾·普京(Vladimir Putin)對(duì)北約(NATO)的仇恨、唐納德·特朗普(Donald Trump)對(duì)邊境墻的追求，以及特蕾莎·梅(Theresa May)尋求英國(guó)退歐協(xié)議。

詞匯

Hubristic/傲慢的

Vendetta/（尤指族間或血親間的）仇殺；深仇

Crusade/改革運(yùn)動(dòng)；十字軍東侵

Jihad/（個(gè)人基于宗教或道德原因的）內(nèi)心掙扎，心靈斗爭(zhēng)

Today the white whale spouts across the globe. In Arabic the famous first line is “Call me Isma’il”; in Japanese it is “Call me Ishumeeru”. Melville’s leviathan has become a mirror for preoccupations everywhere. Iranian scholars debate the book’s Zoroastrian and Islamic elements; Melville, some argue, believed fate trumped morality as the ancient Sasanians did. During the Cultural Revolution Chinese pedagogues claimed Melville was a rare anti-capitalist American author. Germans note the influence of Goethe; Japanese academics think Ahab’s harpooner, the mysterious Fedallah, is one of their own. On the Antarctic Peninsula, meanwhile, huddle Mount Ahab, Tashtego Point and a glacier named Pequod. Two centuries after his birth, Melville continues to federate the world along one keel.?

今天，白鯨向全球噴水。在阿拉伯語(yǔ)中，著名的第一句話是“叫我Isma’il”;在日語(yǔ)中，它是“叫我Ishumeeru”。梅爾維爾筆下的海中巨獸已成為世界各地人們關(guān)注的一面鏡子。伊朗學(xué)者爭(zhēng)論這本書(shū)的瑣羅亞斯德教和伊斯蘭元素;一些人認(rèn)為，梅爾維爾相信命運(yùn)戰(zhàn)勝了道德，就像古代薩珊人一樣。在————期間，中國(guó)的教育學(xué)家聲稱(chēng)梅爾維爾是一個(gè)罕見(jiàn)的————的美國(guó)作家。德國(guó)人注意到了歌德的影響;日本學(xué)者認(rèn)為，亞哈的魚(yú)叉手神秘的費(fèi)達(dá)拉是他們自己的。與此同時(shí)，在南極半島上，亞哈山、塔斯蒂哥角和一個(gè)名叫裴廓德的冰川擠在一起。在他出生兩個(gè)世紀(jì)后，梅爾維爾繼續(xù)乘著平底船整合著世界。

詞匯

Leviathan/海中怪獸；龐然大物；巨輪

Pedagogues/教師，教員