I. 節選自 James Boswell. An Account of Corsica, The Journal of a Tour to That
Island, and Memoirs of Pascal Paoli. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2006. 51-52.
I. 節選自詹姆士．博斯威爾著作的《科西嘉紀實－島嶼旅行日誌暨帕斯寇．帕歐里傳記》（牛津大學出版社，二ＯＯ六年出版，第五十一頁至五十二頁）
Although many distinguished authours have, in
conformity with the taste of the age, rejected every inquiry into the origin of
nations, and presented their readers with nothing but what can be clearly attested;
I confess, I am not for humouring an inordinate avidity for positive evidence.
By being accustomed to demonstration, or what approaches near to it, and at no
time giving any credit to what we do not fully comprehend, we are apt to form a
pride and insolence of understanding; the mind acquires a hardness and
obstinacy, inconsistent with the true intention of our faculties in this
imperfect state, and is rendered unfit for the reception of many important
truths.
雖然，許多順應時尚的卓越作家向來拒絕回答任何探詢國族起源的問題，而且，除非能夠清楚證實所言不虛，否則，不提供讀者絲毫資訊；不過，我坦承，我無意迎合一種企求精確證據的過度渴望。由於習慣了說明或類似表達方式以及不假思索讚許那些我們還沒有完全理解的事物，我們很容易形塑一種心領神會的驕傲與侮慢；不同於我們的官能沉溺在這種不完美狀態的真實意圖，心智學到的卻是強硬和頑固，而且沒有能力接納許多重要事實。
But not to deviate into metaphysical speculation, I have always thought, that even the dark and fabulous periods are worthy of some attention. The soundest heads among the ancients thought so; and their works are therefore more agreeable, than if they had confined themselves to strict authenticity. The origin of every nation is, as Livy says, "Poeticis decora fabulis, Adorned with poetical fables." These are always amusing to the imagination, when neither tedious, nor too extravagant. We love to be led on in a gradual progress, and to behold truth emerging from obscurity, like the sun breaking through the clouds. Such a progress makes a part of our own nature, which advances from the dawnings of being in our infancy, to greater and greater intelligence.
我常想，即使黑暗與神妙時期都值得特別注意，卻不是憑空玄想揣度。擁有最優秀腦袋的古人就是這樣想；如果他們始終自我羈絆於苛求確證，他們的實際作品就不會這麼討人喜歡。一如李維的說法，每個國族起源都「被詩情畫意的寓言故事裝飾（古典拉丁原文：Poeticis decora fabulis）」。只要不單調乏味也不過度誇張，這些裝飾總能讓創造力更趣味盎然。我們喜愛被引領到平緩的進程中，也喜愛看見事實像旭日劃開層雲般從朦朧中浮現。這樣的進程融合為我們自幼漸長的性格的一部分，讓才智越來越卓著。
They, whose genius is directed to the study of antiquities, besides the immediate delight which such traditions afford them, are often able, from hints seemingly detached and unimportant, to trace the fundamental truth, and extend the bounds of reality. Few indeed have that peculiar turn for inquiry, to deserve the name of antiquarians. But there is an universal principle of curiosity, with respect to times past, which makes even conjectures be received with a kind of pleasing veneration; and although the great end of history is instruction, I think it is also valuable, when it serves to gratify this curiosity.
他們運用天分研究古老事物，除了從古老傳統獲取快感外，通常也能夠從看來不相關和不重要的線索中勾勒精確事實，並拓展現實世界的疆域。他們當中的極少數人確實具有榮獲古文物學家名銜的探索真相特殊才能。只是，還有一款好奇心的普遍原則，以過去的年代來說，好奇心讓猜測也能接收到一種心悅誠服推崇的回應；而且，我認為，雖然歷史的終極目標是生聚教訓，不過，當歷史能滿足這類好奇心時，也值得。
I shall therefore, in treating of the
revolutions of Corsca, go as far back as books will serve me; though at the
same time, I intend to give no more than a concise recital, and am rather to
shew my readers what is to be seen, than to detain them till I exhibit a full
view of it.
因此，處理科西嘉革命議題時，我將根據書籍的輔助，儘可能深入原初時空；儘管如此，我仍打算極致簡述，而且，寧可為讀者描繪所見所聞，也不願勉強他們看完我羅列的全部觀點。
II. 節選自 Annie Dillard. The Writing Life. New York: Harper & Row, 1989. 3-7.
II. 節選自安妮．迪拉德著作的《寫作生涯》，紐約哈潑與羅於一九八九年出版，第三至七頁
When you write, you lay out a line of words.
The line of words is a miner's pick, a woodcarver's gouge, a surgeon's probe.
You wield it, and it digs a path you follow. Soon you find yourself deep in new
territory. Is it a dead end, or have you located the real subject? You will
know tomorrow, or this time next year.
當你寫作時，你鋪陳一行文字。這行文字是礦工的披沙揀金、木雕師傅的精雕細琢、外科醫生的問診探究。你揮動它，鑿出一條讓你隨行的路徑。很快的，你發現自己深入新領域。這是沒有出路的絕境嗎？或者，你已經找到真正主題？明天或明年此時，你才會知道答案。
You make the path boldly and follow it fearfully. You go where the path leads. At the end of the path, you find a box canyon. You hammer out reports, dispatch bulletins.
你勇敢築徑，戰戰兢兢隨行。你往路徑指引的地方行走。在盡頭，你發現險峻峽谷。你推敲出傳聞，派送快報。
The writing has changed, in your hands, and in a twinkling, from an expression of your notions to an epistemological tool. The new place interests you because it is not clear. You attend. In your humility, you lay down the words carefully, watching all the angles. Now the earlier writing looks soft and careless. Process is nothing; erase your tracks. The path is not the work. I hope your tracks have grown over; I hope birds ate the crumbs; I hope you will toss it all and not look back.
在你的手中，這則創作已經改變，一眨眼，就把你想說的話變成認識論工具。新地方不清晰，所以，吸引你。你走入其中，虛懷若谷，小心翼翼臥躺在文字堆中，注視著所有角度。現在，早先的創作看來軟弱無力且思慮不周。過程無關緊要；清除你的足跡。路徑不是作品。我希望你的道路已經花木扶疏；我希望鳥群吃了麵包屑；我希望你拋掉一切，不要回首。
The line of words is a hammer. You hammer
against the walls of your house. You tap the walls, lightly, everywhere. After
giving many years' attention to these things, you know what to listen for. Some
of the walls are bearing walls; they have to stay, or everything will fall
down. Other walls can go with impunity; you can hear the difference.
Unfortunately, it is often a bearing wall that has to go. It cannot be helped.
There is only one solution, which appalls you, but there it is. Knock it out.
Duck.
那行文字是鎚子。你鎚擊你家的牆。你輕輕敲拍每一面牆。經過多年關注這些事情後，你知道為什麼要傾聽。有些牆是承重牆；他們必須保留，否則，房子會傾覆。其他的牆可以安心撤除；你可以聽出差異。不幸的是，有時候，必須撤除的是承重牆。愛莫能助！只有一個讓你膽戰心驚的解決方案，就這麼辦。敲掉它。乖乖。
Courage utterly opposes the bold hope that
this is such fine stuff the work needs it, or the world. Courage, exhausted,
stands on bare reality: this writing weakens the work. You must demolish the
work and start over. You can save some of the sentences, like bricks. It will
be a miracle if you can save some of the paragraphs, no matter how excellent in
themselves or hard-won. You can waste a year worrying about it, or you can get
it over with now. (Are you a woman, or a mouse?)
勇氣完全反對你魯莽期望這是作品或世界需要的精緻成分。筋疲力盡的勇氣堅持赤裸裸的現實：這次的寫作讓作品貧弱無力。你必須銷毀作品並重新開始。你可以保留一些如磚般用來砌造作品的句子。如果你能保留一些段落，將會是奇蹟；不管這些段落本身多麼優秀或多麼難產。你可以浪費一年去煩惱這個問題，也可以現在就終結煩惱。（你是女人或老鼠嗎？）
The part you must jettison is not only the
best-written part; it is also, oddly, that part which was to have been the very
point. It is the original key passage, the passage on which the rest was to
hang, and from which you yourself drew the courage to begin. Henry James knew
it well, and said it best. In his preface to The Spoils of Poynton, he pities
the writer, in a comical pair of sentences that rises to a howl: "Which is
the work in which he hasn't surrendered, under dire difficulty, the best thing
he meant to have kept? In which indeed, before the dreadful done, doesn't he
ask himself what has become of the thing all for the sweet sake of which it was
to proceed to that extremity?"
你棄置的部份不僅是最佳段落，出乎意料之外，也是必要精華。它是最初的關鍵段落，既是其他段落的寄託，也是你鼓舞自己提筆的起點。亨利．詹姆斯很了解這點，而且解說得最好。在《被凌辱的波頓》序言中，他藉由兩則嬉笑怒罵的詼諧句子悲憫作家：「什麼樣的工作會讓從事者在絕境下仍不捨棄他刻意保留的最美好東西？在非常拙劣作品完成前，他真得不問自己一廂情願持續到那麼極端的創作已經變成什麼東西？」
So it is that a writer writes many books. In
each book, he intended several urgent and vivid points, many of which he
sacrificed as the book's form hardened. "The youth gets together his
materials to build a bridge to the moon," Thoreau noted mournfully, "or
perchance a palace or temple on the earth, and at length the middle-aged man
concludes to build a wood-shed with them." The writer returns to these
materials, these passionate subjects, as to unfinished business, for they are
his life's work.
作家就是這樣寫出很多書。他想讓每本書各具重要鮮明觀點，其中有許多觀點是專為確立每本書形式而絞盡腦汁設想。「年輕人集結他的材料打算建構一道通往月球的橋樑，」梭羅哀怨地說：「或者，在地表上蓋一座宮殿或寺院，最後，中年男子將所有材料搭出一個柴棚。」作家繼續埋首在這些素材，這些熱情洋溢的主題，如同面對未決事務，只因全是他畢生心血結晶。
It is the beginning of a work that the writer
throws away.
這是一件被作家丟棄的作品的濫觴。
A painting covers its tracks. Painters work from the ground up. The latest version of a painting overlays earlier versions, and obliterates them. Writers, on the other hand, work from left to right. The discardable chapters are on the left. The latest version of a literary work begins somewhere in the work's middle, and hardens toward the end. The earlier version remains lumpishly on the left; the work's beginning greets the reader with the wrong hand. In those early pages and chapters anyone may find bold leaps to nowhere, read the brave beginnings of dropped themes, hear a tone since abandoned, discover blind alleys, track red herrings, and laboriously learn a setting now false.
一幅畫覆蓋來時路。畫家的作品從起點入手。畫作的最新版本鋪疊並抹滅較早版本。從另一個角度來說，作家則從左到右著述。可丟棄的篇章在左邊。最新文學創作版本從作品中某處開始，朝著目標逐漸穩定發展。先前版本笨拙留置左邊；作品的開端以錯誤技法迎接讀者。在那些早期的書頁和章節裡，任何人都可以發現無拘無束馳騁到不知所在、閱讀掉落主題的大膽起點、傾聽來自放棄的音色、挖掘死胡同、追蹤轉移注意力的事物，以及費盡千辛萬苦認識到一個設定情節在現狀下是錯誤。
Several delusions weaken the writer's resolve
to throw away work. If he has read his pages too often, those pages will have a
necessary quality, the ring of the inevitable, like poetry known by heart; they
will perfectly answer their own familiar rhythms. He will retain them. He may
retain those pages if they possess some virtues, such as power in themselves,
though they lack the cardinal virtue, which is pertinence to, and unity with,
the book's thrust. Sometimes the writer leaves his early chapters in place from
gratitude; he cannot contemplate them or read them without feeling again the
blessed relief that exalted him when the words first appeared-relief that he
was writing anything at all. That beginning served to get him where he was
going, after all; surely the reader needs it, too, as groundwork. But no.
不少錯覺減弱作者丟棄作品的解決能力。如果他太常閱讀他寫的書頁，那些書頁將擁有無可避免的鈴聲般的必要品質，像詩被心靈認知一樣；他們會完美回應自身的熟悉節奏。他將保留他們。儘管那些書頁欠缺切題與統一書本要旨的基本要素，不過，只要能具備一些類似自發能量般的優點，他就可能保留他們。有時候，作家滿懷感激留下先前篇章；每當他審視或閱讀那些篇章時就會再次感受到振奮他的愉悅寬慰，這份慰藉來自某次寫作過程中第一次顯現幸福感的文字。那樣的開端終究會讓他來到現狀，當然，讀者也需要這個結果充當閱讀基礎。可是，不對啦。
Every year the aspiring photographer brought
a stack of his best prints to an old, honored photographer, seeking his
judgment. Every year the old man studied the prints and painstakingly ordered
them into two piles, bad and good. Every year the old man moved a certain
landscape print into the bad stack. At length he turned to the young man:
"You submit this same landscape every year, and every year I put it on the
bad stack. Why do you like it so much?" The young photographer said,
"Because I had to climb a mountain to get it."
每一年，雄心勃勃的攝影師帶著他最好的一疊照片去見一位年高德劭的攝影師，尋求他的評價。每一年，這位老先生仔細審核並費心將照片分成兩堆：優與劣。每一年，這位老先生挪移一張特定風景照片到不好的那一堆。過了幾年後，他對那位年輕人說：「你每年送來同樣的這張風景照片，我則每年把它放在不好的那一堆。究竟是什麼緣故，讓你那麼喜歡它？」年輕攝影師說：「因為我必須攀登高山才拍到它。」
A cabdriver sang his songs to me, in New
York. Some we sang together. He had turned the meter off; he drove around
midtown, singing. One long song he sang twice; it was the only dull one. I
said, You already sang that one; let's sing something else. And he said,
"You don't know how long it took me to get that one together.''
在紐約，一位計程車司機唱歌給我聽。有一些歌，我們一起唱。他關掉計費表；開車在市中心繞來繞去，一邊唱歌。有一首很長的歌，他唱了兩次；那是唯一枯燥乏味的一首歌。我告訴他，你已經唱過那首歌了；讓我們唱些別的吧！他說：「你不知道我苦練多久才學會唱完那首歌。」
How many books do we read from which the
writer lacked courage to tie off the umbilical cord? How many gifts do we open
from which the writer neglected to remove the price tag? Is it pertinent, is it
courteous, for us to learn what it cost the writer personally?
我們閱讀多少本作者欠缺勇氣結紮臍帶的書籍？我們打開多少件作者忘記拿掉價格標籤的禮物？如果我們探知作家本人付出什麼樣的代價，恰當嗎？有禮貌嗎？
＃＃＃
