[转载]海明威：A Day's Wait 《等待的一天》
2012-03-18 16:09阅读：
作者:
nzw99
He came into the room to shut the windows while we were still in
bed and I saw he looked ill. He was shivering, his face was white,
and he walked slowly as though it ached to move.
'What's the matter, Schatz?'
'I've got a headache.'
'You better go back to bed.'
'No, I'm all right.'
'You go to bed. I'll see you when I'm dressed.'
But when I came downstairs he was dressed, sitting by the fire,
looking a very sick and miserable boy of nine years. When I put my
hand on his forehead I knew he had a fever.
'You go up to bed,' I said, 'You're sick.'
'I'm all right,' he said.
When the doctor cam
e he took the boy's temperature.
'What is it?' I asked him.
'One hundred and two.'
Downstairs, the doctor left three different medicines in
different colored capsules with instructions for giving them. One
was to bring down the fever, another a purgative, the third to
overcome an acid condition. The germs of influenza can only exist
in an acid condition, he explained. He seemed to know all about
influenza and said there was nothing to worry about if the fever
did not go above one hundred and four degrees. This was a light
epidemic of flu and there was no danger if you avoided
pneumonia.
Back in the room I wrote the boy's temperature down and made a
note of the time to give the various capsules.
'Do you want me to read to you?'
'All right. If you want to,' said the boy. His face was very
white and there were dark areas under his eyes. He lay still in the
bed and seemed very detached from what was going on.
I read aloud from Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates; but I could see
he was not following what I was reading.
'How do you feel, Schatz?' I asked him.
'Just the same, so far,' he said.
I sat at the foot of the bed and read to myself while I waited
for it to be time to give another capsule. It would have been
natural for him to got sleep, but when I looked up he was looking
at the foot of the bed, looking very strangely.
'Why don't you try to sleep? I'll wake you up for the
medicine.'
'I'd rather stay awake.'
After a while he said to me, 'You don't have to stay in here with
me, Papa, if it bothers you.'
'It doesn't bother me.'
'No, I mean you don't have to stay if it's going to bother
you.'
I thought perhaps he was a little lightheaded and after giving
him the prescribed capsules at eleven o'clock I went out for a
while. It was a bright, cold day, the ground covered with a sleet
that had frozen so that it seemed as if all the bare trees, the
bushes, the cut brush and all the grass and the bare ground had
been varnished with ice. I took the young Irish setter for a walk
up the road and along the frozen creek, but it was difficult to
stand or walk on the glassy surface and the red dog slipped and
slithered and I fell twice, hard, once dropping my gun and having
it slide away over the ice.
We flushed a covey of quail under a high clay bank with
overhanging brush and I killed two as they went out of sight over
the top of the bank. Some of the covey lit in trees, but most of
them scattered into brush piles and it was necessary to jump on the
ice-coated mounds of brush several times before they would flush.
Coming out while you were poised unsteadily on the icy, springy
brush they made difficult shooting and I killed two, missed five,
and started backed pleased to have found a covey close to the house
and happy there were so many left to find on another day.
At the house they said the boy had refused to let anyone come
into the room.
'You can't come in,' he said, 'You mustn't get what I
have.'
I went up to him and found him in exactly the position I had left
him, white-faced, but with the tops of the cheeks flushed by the
fever, staring still, as he had stared, at the foot of the
bed.
I took his temperature.
'What is it?'
'Something like a hundred,' I said. It was one hundred and two
and four tenths.
'Who said so?'
'The doctor.'
'Your temperature is all right,' I said. ' It's nothing to worry
about.'
'I don't worry, 'he said, ' but I can't keep from
thinking.'
'Don't think, ' I said. ' Just take it easy.'
'I'm taking it easy,' he said and looked straight ahead. He was
evidently holding tight onto himself about something.
'Take this with water.'
'Do you think it will do any good?'
'Of course it will.'
I sat down an opened the Pirate book and commenced to read, but I
could see he was not following, so I stopped.
'About what time do you think I枕 going to die?' he asked.
'What?'
'About how long will it be before I die?'
'You aren't going to die. What's the matter with you? '
'Oh, yes, I am. I heard him say a hundred and two.'
'People don't die with a fever of one hundred and two. That's a
silly way to talk.'
'I know they do. At school in France the boys told me you can't
live with forty-four degrees. I've got a hundred and two.'
He had been waiting to die all day, ever since nine o'clock in
the morning.
'You poor Schatz,' I said. 'Poor old Schatz. It's like miles and
kilometers. You aren't going to die. That's a different
thermometer. On that thermometer thirty-seven is normal. On this
kind it's ninety-eight.'
'Are you sure?'
'Absolutely,' I said. 'It's like miles and kilometers. You know,
like how many kilometers we make when we do seventy miles in the
car?'
'Oh,' he said.
But his gaze at the foot of the bed relaxed slowly. The hold over
himself relaxed too, finally, and the next day it was very slack
and he cried very easily at little things that were of no
importance.
《等待的一天》的写作风格
二十世纪美国文坛上一颗璀璨的明星，对那个时代产生深远影响的作家欧内斯特·海明威（1899驯961），出生于伊利诺斯州的奥克帕克。他的父亲是个医生，母亲为音乐教师。海明威于1917年中学毕业后任堪萨斯市《星报》的见习记者。他的早期长篇小说《太阳照样升起》（The
Sun Also Rises）（1926）、《永别了，武器》（A Farewell to
Arms）（1927）成为表现美国'迷惘的一代'的主要代表作。他的代表作《老人与海》（The Old Man and the
Sea）完成于1952年，由于小说体现了人在'充满暴力与死亡的现实世界中'表现出来的勇气而获得1954年的诺贝尔文学奖。海明威晚年患多种疾病，精神抑郁，最终开枪自杀。海明威一生的创作在现代文学史上留下了光辉的一页，他留下的大量小说也成为美国文学宝库中的珍贵遗产。
1954年海明威被授予诺贝尔文学奖时，瑞典皇家学院对他的风格作了如下评述：海明威是我们时代的伟大作家之一，他忠实地、不屈地再现了这个严酷时代的真实面貌，在这个充满暴力和死亡的世界中，他看到了勇气和同情，这是他最突出的标志之一。
同样，海明威的这篇短篇小说A Day's Wait
也鲜明地反映了他的以'简洁'著称的写作风格。海明威一直尊奉美国建筑师罗德维希的名言'越少，就越多'，使自己的作品趋于精炼，缩短了作品与读者之间的距离。海明威在作品《午后之死》（Death
in the Afternoon)（1932》中总结了他的创作经验，提出了
'冰山原则'：'冰山在海面上移动很是庄严雄伟，这正是因为它只有八分之一露出水面。'他常常托不尽之意于言外，给读者留下极大的想像空间，让读者去体味他的'弦外之音'，这正是海明威作品的妙处，正如唐代诗人贾岛的五言诗所云：'松下问童子，言师采药去。只在此山中，云深不知处。'
'生命'、'死亡'和'勇气'这几个黑白分明的主题在海明威作品中常常出现，正如同'痛苦'、'欢乐'、'光明'、'黑暗'等主题常常出现在贝多芬的乐曲中一样。这篇小说只有两个人物：'我'，即父亲，还有儿子。故事情节也极其简单，儿子发烧了，可是他并不知道摄氏温度与华氏温度的区别，误以为自己即将死去。最后在爸爸的解释下，儿子才明白自己的担心纯系多余。
医生来给孩子看病，留下几副药。医生走后，儿子的注意力似乎从现实世界中游离出去了。他误认为大去之期不远，就躺在床上静静地等待死神的来临，还让父亲到外面转转。父亲到户外转转时，看见大雪后放晴的景象洋溢着生机：It
was a bright, cold day, the ground covered with a sleet that had
frozen so that it seemed as if all the bare trees, the bushes, the
cut brush and all the grass and the bare ground had been varnished
with ice: ... Some of the covey lit in trees, but most of them
scattered into piles...
这一整段的描写真可谓是生命的礼赞：茫茫大雪覆盖树木和大地，这象征了严酷的现实。而在这样的背景下，鹌鹑仍在雪里嬉戏，它们象征着顽强的生命。尽管天寒地冻，路滑难行，但仍有太阳普照，它象征了人生的希望与光。小说中的'我'有如闲庭信步，对寒冷毫不畏惧，从中我们可以窥见作者坚强的意志和乐观的人生态度，其境界可以用中国宋代词人张孝祥的名句'世路如今已惯，此心到处悠然'来形容。海明威说过：'A
man may be destroyed, but not
defeated.'诚然，人类是'万物的灵长，宇宙的精英'（莎士比亚言），千百年来，人类不断征服自然，改造自然。
'我'回到家后，儿子仍一动不动地躺在床上，这里引入正题--'A Day's Wait'。Wait for what? For
death. 一个九岁的男孩认真严肃地等待着死亡，这真让人啼笑皆非。且读父子间简洁的对话：
'About what time do you think I'm going to die? ' he asked.
'What?'
'About how long will it be before I die?'
' You aren't going to die. What's the matter with you? '
' Oh, yes, I am. I heard him say a hundred and two.'
' People don't die with a fever of one hundred and two. That's a
silly way to talk.'
如果'我'与儿子都被作者赋予了象征意义的话，那么，父亲象征了知识和力量，儿子则象征了天真和无知。从字面上看，儿子对体温的误解既让做父亲的'我'啼笑皆非，又令'我'心疼儿子这一天'痛苦'的等待。最终儿子弄清了摄氏与华氏的区别，也克服了对死亡的顾虑，这象征着知识就是力量，知识给人战胜死亡的力量。
小说结尾描写了这之后的情形，言简意赅：But his gaze at the foot of the bed relaxed
slowly. The hold over himself relaxed too, finally, and the next
day it was very slack and he cried very easily at little things
that were of no importance.
其实，人是复杂的多面体，有坚强的一面，也有软弱的一面。原本大家以为，这个男孩体验了死亡的恐惧之后会变得更加坚强。可是海明威在小说最后一句却写到这个男孩变得脆弱起来，这才是一个九岁小男孩真实的一面。其实，许多人都曾经历过生死轮回。然后又走向新生，作者的描写真可谓力透纸背，这种面对严峻现实的复杂感情也是人类性格的真实写照。
