情书 杰拉德·杜瑞尔

四月拖更,按既定的更新规则,将存稿按四月第1期发布。


Gerald Durrell,英国著名作家、物种拯救家,创立了泽西动物园,在保护野生动物上取得了巨大成就。这封他于1978年写给妻子的情书,充满了含蓄的浪漫。


我原以为借物言志是一种中国人才独有的自古流传至今的含蓄。以为只有我们的文人才能让家国情怀在广厦千万间里郁结,让思念在妻死之年手植的枇杷树下炽盛,让爱在”我从此不敢看观音“里静默生长。

后来我读到了夏目漱石。读到了他不敢直视双眼的羞怯,读到了他只敢大胆地对着日本的月亮说月色真美。我以为这是东亚儒家文化圈才特有的浪漫情怀。

再后来我偶然读到了英国作家杰拉德写给妻子的情书。

他说,我看过千次日出月落。我跨过无数山和海洋。我听过见过世间万千。

杰拉德热爱自然,花了大半生的精力拯救濒危动物。他爱着世间美好的一切,但是情书末尾他说:

这一切经历无你陪伴,使我深感遗憾。

这一切经历若是有你,是我最大期盼。

我情愿将这一切放弃,换与你一刻相伴。

整篇文章的绝大部分都在叙述他一生经历和所见所闻。山川大海,冰川热带;细蝶猛虎,飞鸟鲸鱼;矿洞幽暗,明月高悬,自然之波澜壮阔,生命之千姿百态,若不是真实体验过,绝不会写得这样饱含深情。这部分内容丰富,文笔翔实,形象斐然,功底深厚。临近结尾短短两段才款款告白,用通篇的自然热爱,去反衬他对妻子的爱之深,决心放弃之坚定。

世间美好千般万种,生命诚可贵,自由价更高。若为爱情故,二者皆可抛。

春风十里,不如你。

盈盈一水间,脉脉不得语。

是的,一切尽在不言中。斯人若彩虹,遇上方知有。有句话说:一个人想要在爱里获得幸福,这个人必须既懂人性,又懂爱情。

我不懂人性,也不懂爱情。但倘若爱情的本质是一种自我满足,那么我想,每一个在爱中做出过牺牲,在爱里“我将无我”的人,看到这里,都会被这封情书深深打动吧。


情书原文附上:

I have seen a thousand sunsets and sunrises,

on land where it floods forest and mountains

with honey-colored light,

at sea where it rises and sets

like a blood orange in a multi-colored nest of cloud,

slipping in and out of the vast ocean.


I have seen a thousand moons:

harvest moons like gold coins,

winter moons as white as ice chips,

new moons like baby swans' feathers.


I have seen seas as smooth as if painted, colored like shot silk:

or blue as a kingfisher,

or transparent as glass,

or black and crumpled with foam,

moving ponderously and murderously.


I have felt winds straight from the South Pole,

bleak and wailing like a lost child;

winds as tender and warm as a lover's breath;

winds that carried the astringent smell of salt and the death of seaweeds;

winds that carried the moist rich smell of a forest floor,

the smell of a million flowers;

fierce winds that churned and moved the sea like yeast,

or winds that made the waters lap at the shore like a kitten.


I have known silence:

the cold, earthy silence at the bottom of a newly dug well;

the implacable stony silence of a deep cave;

the hot, drugged midday silence

when everything is hypnotised and stilled into silence by the eye of the sun;

the silence when great music ends.


I have heard summer cicadas cry

so that the sound seems stitched into your bones.

I have heard tree frogs in an orchestration

as complicated as Bach,

singing in a forest lit by a million emerald fireflies.

I have heard the Keas calling over the grey glaciers

that groaned to themselves like old people,

as they inched their way to the sea.


I have heard the hoarse street vendor cries of the mating Fur seals

as they sang to their sleek golden wives,

the crisp staccato admonishment of the Rattlesnake,

the cobweb squeak of the Bat,

the belling roar of the Red deer knee-deep in purple heather.


I have heard Wolves baying at a winter's moon,

Red Howlers making the forest vibrate with their roaring cries.

I have heard the squeak, purr and grunt

of a hundred multi-colored reef fishes.

I have seen humming birds flashing like opals round a tree of scarlet blooms,

humming like a top.


I have seen flying fish,

skittering like quicksilver across the blue waves,

drawing silver lines on the surface with their tails.

I have seen Spoonbills flying home to roost

like a scarlet banner across the sky.

I have seen Whales black as tar,

cushioned on a cornflower blue sea,

creating a Versalles of fountain with their breath.


I have watched butterflies emerge and sit,

trembling while the sun irons their wings smooth.

I have watched Tigers like flames,

mating in the long grass.


I have been dive-bombed by an angry Raven,

black and glassy as the Devil's hoof.

I have lain in water warm as milk, soft as silk

while around me played a host of Dolphins.



I have met a thousand animals

and seen a thousand wonderful things.

All this I did without you.

This was my loss.

All this I want to do with you.

This will be my gain.


All this I would gladly have forgone

for the sake of one minute of your company,

for your laugh, your voice;

your eyes, hair, lips, body;

and above all, for your sweet, ever surprising mind,

which is an enchanting quarry,

in which it is my privilege to delve.

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