Wang Yipei
When I translated "A Happy Fate", I was translating "The Troubadour"; when she translated "There is no need to overcome nothingness, not even to cure nothingness, just to withstand its test", I am writing in the "afterword": "On the night of the end of the 'Middle Ages', I saw a comet falling on a barren mountain in North America, as if the 'bard' was dragging a long sword and galloping on his horse; the evening wind was cold, blowing away their black cloaks; the stars were careful and fastened their clothes for them..." I thought, This is not only a coincidence of time, but also "a happy fate", nor is it known; just as the "Red Chamber" mentions the production of "cold incense pills", the word "keqiao" is used.
Yes, "do not overcome nothingness", because "nothingness" cannot be defeated at all - to say that those who have overcome nothingness, fluttering lightly, live only in dreams; "there is no need to cure nothingness", because "nothingness" is not a disease, it is the background of life; as Baudelaire repeatedly used the metaphor of "canvas": "And darkness itself is the canvas, and the countless / disappeared lives in the painting still live, / and emerge from my eyes, casting a kind gaze!" Therefore, "just have to stand the test of it" -
And how to withstand the test of "nothingness"? Author Philip Forrest almost provides the answer in "nothingness": it turns out that poetry creation itself is a paradox of giving answers and not giving answers? The answer is "create in nothingness" or "create nothingness," nor is it known.
"A Happy Destiny", Philip Forrest/ by Huang Xun/ Translation, CITIC Publishing Group Chuchen Culture, April 2021 edition
Yet, to me, a potential reader of this "little book," the chapters in the book are like tents in the wilderness, under the stars, ready for the "psychics" who "will go far, far away, like bohemians"; the long nights will be shortened and folded in the tents like a jigsaw puzzle; but what a solemn game! For example, this night, the "psychic" with dewdrops on his head came in and out of the tent, only to find that unconsciously, the small universe around him actually gathered a "psychic tribe"——
It turns out that the "psychics" of the past and the present, le voyant, or translated as "discerning people", can see each other and must meet on a certain occasion - necessary; time and space, kingdoms, dynasties, races, languages, cultures, are the layers of tents waiting for them to open, or simply pierced by a sword - "one night tent" (a leaf obstacle), without seeing Tarzan. Thanks to this tent under the stars, I just lived until the middle of the night and then got up from insomnia, went to the next door to visit the door, talked about one topic after another about life and soul, and did not know that next door lived Rimbaud, Philip, Lin Sister or Brother Bao... Or Bob Dylan, or not —
I saw in a biopic called "The Seven Faces of Bob Dylan" that Bob Dylan's heart lives with Picasso, and Rimbaud... It turns out that the troubadours of the past have you and I have you; in the film, the protagonist Bob Dylan, played by a handsome lady, coldly comes up with a sentence: I am someone eles. - Je est un autre. - "I am the other". This is Rimbaud's signature quote and the code of contact between the "psychics". And this "I," after "experiencing a long, widespread, conscious misdeed of sensations, all forms of love, pain, and madness," "becomes a psychic," who is in a trance, scattered, or, in the words of the author, "dispensable." I think it could be this one, or "the other." I went on to say "digressions": Later, I had the privilege of meeting Bob Dylan's real body and watching his live concert, which was at the Shanghai Ten Thousand People Stadium, which was conceivable, crowded, dazzling spotlights, mountain-like tsunami-like applause, however, when the troubadour appeared, everything changed, and the beautiful harmonica sound and the hoarse voice instantly turned the stadium into an empty valley, and the applause immediately turned into the noise and commotion of the leaves in the forest..." In this green valley, the singing river / Hang the broken silver light on the tip of the grass; / The flickering sun crosses the high mountains, / The points of light in the valley are like bubbles floating.". The sacrificial young warrior in Rimbaud's poem, clearly lying in the valley, I saw, like a confession — fortunately, the wilderness under the stars, and such a tent, which can take in lonely travelers, "psychics" from ancient times to the present...
In the movie "I'm Not There," actress Kate Blanchett reverses the role of Bob Dylan
"Off-topic," I went on to say: That night, when Bob Dylan sang "Like a Rolling Stones" in one voice and looked into the air along the way of the "Rolling Stones", I saw the boulder left by Nüwa on the cliffs of the Great Desolation Mountain, "homeless, directionless, self-contained"; "Red stripes come and go without concern", yes, that day I found the source of the "Rolling Stones" and was convinced that there were "psychics" and "psychics" in this world, so if anyone says: I literally saw a mosque appear in the factory position, a drumming team of angels, a four-wheeled carriage driving on the sky road, a living room at the bottom of the lake..." It is not surprising that this is not what "I" said, this is what Rimbaud said.
Living in this tent of "a kind of happy fate", I heard an echo from the next door: "Reading history and knowing other things, stroking the scrolls is desolate." Why don't I be born, and the other world suddenly looks at each other. This is the voice of the Southern Song Dynasty poet Wen Tianxiang. It can be seen that poets all over the world lament that they were not born at the right time, and they are eager to know each other with the "psychics" of the other world.
This kind of "desolation" may be another form of "nothingness", in which the surprise and hope lies in the "other world overlooking each other"; and making this "looking at each other" possible may be the meaning of creation. Only such a psychic work can withstand the test of "nothingness", so that we can finally "feel that we are still alive" in this "night shrouded world".
And the only way to realize this "otherworldly and suddenly looking at each other" is through the "simple and obscure" "universal language" that the author Philip, and the poet Rimbaud has been searching for all along- "The poet (Rimbaud) announces the arrival of the lingua franca, which, if I am not mistaken, will abolish the diversity of the world's existing dialects - "This language will come from the soul and for the soul, summarize everything, aroma, sound and color, the collision of ideas and ideas and stimulate thoughts'" - No wonder the author, in this "little tent" with folding at will, has invited such non-material, ancient and modern, race- and national travelers such as Aragon, Baudelaire, Benjamin, Borges, Dante, Desnos, Mishima, Kierkegaard, etc. The lingua franca "talks all night long, just like Rimbaud sitting on the side of the road late at night, listening to the whispers of the stars, "like dewdrops dripping wet forehead, thick as wine" ...
Sure enough, this language is like the stars, unimpeded, and like the Garci River accompanied by hundreds of crows, gushing and coexisting with the human world, this "ranger knight's enthusiasm for dying", only preserved between the lines, that strange "dizzy". As in the discussion of "Vowels", the author lamented that more than "vowels" are like this - "Since the earth can be blue like an orange, then the letter U also has every reason to be green, just like the clear waves of the blue sea, the waves come and go, the waves hit, the sound of the waves seems to be printed in the words, you can hear its ups and downs and the cosmic divine breath corresponding to the harmony" -
Here, allow me to provide another example: when I finished translating the Complete Works of Rimbaud, I turned to Rimbaud's eyes to look at the vowel alphabet, re-examined my native Chinese, and was as clueless as a foreign language, but there was an astonishing discovery; the ancient hieroglyphs thus rejuvenated, restored their original vitality, and radiated the three paths of the sun, moon, and stars, so I thought like a fountain and created "The Language in the Temple" - it seems to be inspired by "Explanation of Words", but it is actually inspired by Rimba's "Vowels".
However, living in a "small tent" often feels a kind of "vertigo". In the author's quote from Aragon, "My only request for the works I read is to give me a vertigo"; and if so, this little book brings me "vertigo" from the first page, reminding me of the feeling of crossing the Tanggula Mountains by coach for the first time many years ago, which was an alpine reaction. In the author's own words: "The truth itself is dizzying. But when I think about it, the "folding tent" set up by this little book makes me dizzy because it is full of paradoxes. For example, when talking about the meaning of symbols, the author said: "The poet has thrown himself into an empty space, and what he embraces in his arms is always only the illusion of the world." Falling makes the two lovers miss each other, and waking up makes the previous stories look like a spring dream. This refers to Rimbaud's Dawn: "Dawn falls under a tree with the child"; "Wake up at noon". Here I have to say: the paradox is a complete paradox – if the poet pounces on the void, who pounces on it? Du Fu Shiyun: "Listen to the three tears of the ape, and make the false follow the August Maple." This "virtual" is a journey to the Heavenly River with the immortals in a boat; but what is real is the tears that fall from the clouds. Looking back, Rimbaud was indeed "empty", but looking at the void life and the vast universe, those who lived with Rimbaud's contemporaries, where did their original night and dawn go? In addition to being in the empty arms of Rimbaud, where else will future generations go to embrace this summer dawn? Yes, "the poet pounced on an emptiness", but I think that the focus is not on emptiness, in "fluttering", only one swoop can subvert the illusion of the world; only a flutter can embrace the summer dawn, the eternal lover. No wonder Picasso said, "Art is subversion." And Rimbaud said, "Finally found it?" What eternity. It was the sea, blending into the sun. ”
Philippe Forrest is a French writer and scholar. Due to the death of his youngest daughter, he wrote the book "However", which won the French "December Literature Prize". The book completes the writer's self-redemption by tracing the stories of three Japanese artists who also lost their young daughters— Kazucha Kobayashi, Natsume Soseki, and Eisuke Yamabata. In addition, Philip Forrest has published works such as The Eternal Child and Schrödinger's Cat.
Due to space limitations, I will say one last word here, ready to pass through like the author, understating, afraid of being overwhelmed: in short, psychic tents, built on the earth, in the midst of severe life and suffering.
When translating Rimbaud's letters to his mother and sister on Friday, May 23, 1891, I noticed that the last metaphor used by the "psychic poet" after abandoning writing and leaving literature was "the disease has made me skinny, and my right leg is now swollen like a big pumpkin." I translated here, I almost fell, and now, in Mr. Philip's little book, I see the author inadvertently writing: "Rimbaud died at the age of thirty-seven." Before he was amputated, his knee was swollen like a pumpkin. Before that, the author said calmly: "When my daughter died, the world suddenly lost its meaning." What is even more heartbreaking is that the author's daughter and Rimbaud have the same rare disease: bone cancer.
Couldn't say anything more. Thanks to the author, in today's world, for the displaced, helpless people, built this folding tent; live in it to know that there are "psychics" from all over the world and all ages, and they constitute a "psychic tribe". At this point, I would like to say from the bottom of my heart: the best work is an affirmation of a desolate life. The suffering soul may find a confidant here, a deep calamity, a bottomless abyss, essentially "a happy destiny." And this is again a paradox, as the author puts it: "His escape returned to him the world he had left, and let him discover its naked, primitive, unobstructed, splendid beauty." ”
Finally, allow me to pay tribute to this translator, whom I have never met and never met. First of all, for the translation of Rimbaud's poetry quoted in the book, I have a revelation: Rimbaud's poetry is a multi-prism, which can be cut from multiple angles and discover multiple meanings. Before that, however, we must polish the mirror to see it as it is. To this end, I also looked at some translated fragments against the original text, and found that the translators kept their loyalty to the original text as much as possible, and did not dare to "play freely", at the same time, they tried their best to control their emotions, keep calm, and leave their enthusiasm and imagination to the reader. The translator's demeanor is also manifested in: hiding himself. By hiding yourself, better presenting... What is presented? It is not the author, the author, who does not exist in the Chinese, but the unity of the translator and the author after the encounter and collision, the other "I" that exists in the two languages, which can only be understood by substituting into oneself. And all of this is just my first impression of reading this book, and it is also a small prophecy and a deep blessing.
March 11, 2021
(The author of this article, Wang Yipei, is the translator of the Complete Works of Rambo, a writer and poet, and has published poetry collections "What Happened This Night", "Language in the Temple", the novel "Big Bell Pavilion", the Three Gorges series "Three Gorges Memory", "White Emperor City" and so on.) ）
Editor-in-Charge: Gu Ming
Proofreader: Shi Gong