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《爱情笔记》Essays|《爱情笔记》Essays in love - 2

2
Idealization
理想化
1. 'Seeing through people is so easy, and it gets you nowhere,' remarked Elias Canetti, suggesting how effortlessly and yet how uselessly we can find fault with others. Do we not fall in love partly out of a momentary will to suspend seeing through people, even at the cost of blinding ourselves a little in the process? If cynicism and love lie at opposite ends of a spectrum, do we not sometimes fall in love in order to escape the debilitating cynicism to which we are prone? Is there not in every _coup de foudre_ a certain wilful exaggeration of the qualities of the beloved, an exaggeration which distracts us from our habitual pessimism and focuses our energies on someone in whom we can believe in a way we have never believed in ourselves? 洞悉他人不难，但于己无益，”艾利亚斯·卡内蒂说，意指我们挑他人的过错再容易不过，但于己毫无意义。正是因为出于瞬间的念头，人们没有透视对方的心灵，甚至为此付出蒙蔽自己的代价才因此而相爱。如果玩世不恭和爱情位于对立的两端，那么有时候我们是用相爱来逃避自己耽于其中、从而遭其弱化的玩世不恭。每一例一见钟情中都有对爱人品质的故意夸张。这种夸张的赞美使我们只会把精力倾注在一张特定的脸上，这张脸承载着我们草率而神奇的信念，不致使理想破灭。
2. I lost Chloe amidst the throng at passport control, but found her again in the luggage-reclaim area. She was struggling to push a trolley cursed with an inclination to steer to the right, though the Paris carousel was to the far left of the hall. Because my trolley had no mind of its own, I walked over to offer it to her, but she refused, saying one should remain loyal to trolleys, however stubborn, and that strenuous physical exercise was no bad thing after a flight. Indirectly (via the Karachi arrival), we made it to the Paris carousel, already crowded with faces grown involuntarily familiar since boarding at Charles de Gaulle. The first pieces of luggage had begun to tumble down onto the jointed rubber matting, and faces peered anxiously at the moving display to locate their possessions.我和克洛艾在海关出口处的人群中走散了，后来又在行李提取处找到了她。她正使劲推着一辆总往右扭的手推车，但是从巴黎来的行李的传送带在大厅左边很远处。我的车灵活自如，所以我便推过去让给她用，但她拒绝了，说不管车多不听话，既然推到手上都应该对它忠实，还说飞行之后做点运动也有好处。我们推着这辆往右扭的车拐来拐去（经过卡拉奇航班的行李提取处），走到巴黎航班行李的传送带那儿。那儿已经挤满了人，自从在戴高乐机场登机后，这些面孔不由得都有些眼熟了。第一批行李开始滚落到有联结缝的橡胶垫子上。一张张面孔焦急地注视着传送带，寻找自己的行李。
3.'Have you ever been arrested at customs?' asked Chloe.
'Not yet. Have you?'
'Not really, I once made a confession. This Nazi asked me if I had anything to declare, and I said yes, even though I wasn't carrying anything illegal.'
'So why did you say you were?'
【《爱情笔记》Essays|《爱情笔记》Essays in love - 2】'I don't know, I felt guilty: I have this tendency to confess to things I haven't done. It somehow makes me feel better.'“你有没有被海关扣留过？”克洛艾问我。
“没有，你呢？”
“也没有，不过我曾假供认过一次。一个纳粹似的官员问我有没有东西要申报，我说有，其实我没带任何违反规定的物品。”
“那你为什么这样说呢？”
“不知道，我当时有一种罪恶感。我一直有这种可怕的倾向，想承认一些自己没做的事。我总有些怪念头，总想向警察坦白一些自己根本没有犯过的罪行。”
4.'By the way, don't judge me on my luggage,' said Chloe as we continued to watch and wait while others got lucky, 'I bought it at the last minute in this discount shop on the Rue de Rennes. It's a bit of a freak.'
'Wait till you see mine. Except that I don't even have an excuse. I've been carrying mine around for over five years.'
'Can I ask you a favour? Could you look after my trolley while I look for the loo? I'll just be a minute. Oh, and if you see a pink carrier bag with a luminous green handle, that'll be mine.'“顺便提一句，不要根据我的行李箱来判断我这个人。”我们在张望着等行李的时候，克洛艾对我说。其他的人已经幸运地拿到了。“我是上飞机前的最后一刻在雷恩街的一家破店里买的，丑得很。”
“待会看过我的你再说吧，我可连个借口都没有。这包我用了五年多了。”
“帮个忙好吗？我去一趟盥洗室，帮忙留意一下我的手推车，我一会儿就回来。哦，如果你看到一个粉红色的手提箱，有鲜绿色手柄，那就是我的。”
5. A little later, I watched Chloe walk back towards me across the hall, wearing what I later learnt was her usual pained and slightly anxious expression. She had a face that looked permanently near tears, her eyes carried the fear of a person about to be told a piece of very bad news. Something about her made one want to comfort her, offer her reassurance ?or a hand to hold.过了一会儿，我看见克洛艾穿过大厅，朝我走回来。她脸上现出难受的表情，略有些焦虑不安。后来我才知道，这是她的常态。她的脸上看去永远凄楚欲泪，眼神中有一种担忧，似乎有人要告诉她一个不幸的消息。她的这种气质令人忍不住想要抚慰她，给她安全感（或只是伸手让她握住）。
“行李还没过来？”她问道。
“没有，我的也没有，不过还有很多人在等呢。至少还要五分钟，不要那么急嘛。”
“还真难等，”克洛艾露出微笑，低下头看着脚。
6. Love was something I sensed very suddenly, shortly after she had embarked on what promised to be a very long and very boring story (indirectly sparked by the arrival of the Athens flight in the carousel next to us) about a holiday she had taken one summer with her brother in Rhodes. While Chloe talked, I watched her hands fiddling with the belt of her beige woollen coat (a pair of freckles were collected below the index finger) and realized (as if this had been the most self-evident of truths) that I loved her. However awkward it was that she rarely finished her sentences, or was somewhat anxious, and had not perhaps the best taste in earrings, she was adorable. I fell prey to a moment of unrestrained idealization, dependent as much on my emotional immaturity as on the elegance of her coat, the after-effects of flying, and the depressing interior of the Terminal Four baggage area, against which her beauty showed up so starkly.我骤然觉察到爱的降临，就在她开始讲起一个她自认为会是漫长而乏味的故事（间接因为雅典航班的行李传送带就在我们旁边）后降临了。故事说的是她和她哥哥夏天在罗得岛度假的事。克洛艾讲述时，我看着她的手摆弄着米色羊毛外套的腰带（食指上有些斑点），意识到（好像这是最不证自明的事实）自己爱上她了。我情不自禁地认为，无论她如何拙于言辞、语句不全，或者总有些焦虑不安，对于耳环的品位可能也不够高，她都是那样的令人倾慕。这是完全理想化的一刻，产生于一种无可理喻的幼稚的感情，就如同产生于她外套的优雅、我的飞行时差综合征、我早餐所吃的东西，以及在第四航站楼行李区与她彻底展露的美丽截然不同的压抑气氛一样。
7. 'The island was packed with tourists, but we rented motorcycles and...' Chloe's holiday story was dull, but its dullness no longer counted against it. I had ceased to consider it according to the secular logic of ordinary conversations. I was no longer concerned to locate within it either insight or humour, what mattered was not so much what she was saying, as the fact that she was saying it - and that I had decided to find perfection in everything she could utter. I felt ready to follow her into every anecdote (there was this shop that served fresh olives...), I was ready to love every one of her jokes that had missed its punchline, every reflection that had lost its thread. I felt ready to abandon self-absorption for the sake of consummate empathy, to catalogue every one of Chloe's memories, to become a historian of her childhood, to learn all of her loves and fears. Everything that could possibly have played itself out within her mind and body had promptly grown fascinating.岛上挤满了游客，但我们租了摩托车和……克洛艾的假日故事沉闷无趣，但沉闷无趣不再是一个评判标准。我不再依据日常谈话约定俗成的逻辑看待它；我也不再从话语中找出智性的感悟或诗化的真谛。她说了什么无关紧要，紧要的是她正在说——我想从中发现她所说的一切都是那么完美无缺。我乐意倾听她说的每一个趣闻（有一个卖鲜橄榄的店子……）；喜爱她讲的每一个笑话，即使讲丢了其中的妙语；欣赏她发表的每一点见解，即使头绪纷乱。因为这彻底的寄情克洛艾，我乐意不再自我专注，而是用心体会她的每一点脾性，分享她的每一段记忆，探索她童年时代的生活历程，了解她喜欢的所有事物，知晓她害怕和痛恨的东西——所有这些也许早已存在于她身心之中，却在瞬息之间变得那么神奇迷人。
8. Then the luggage arrived, hers only a few cases behind mine; we loaded it onto the trolleys and walked out through the green channel.行李终于来了，在我的行李后面只隔着几个箱子，就是她的。我们把行李搬上手推车，从绿色通道走出去。
9. What is so frightening is the extent to which we may idealize others when we have such trouble tolerating ourselves ?because we have such trouble... I must have realized that Chloe was only human, with all the implications carried by the word, but could I not be forgiven for my desire to suspend such a thought? Every fall into love involves the triumph of hope over self-knowledge. We fall in love hoping we won't find in another what we know is in ourselves, all the cowardice, weakness, laziness, dishonesty, compromise, and stupidity. We throw a cordon of love around the chosen one and decide that everything within it will somehow be free of our faults. We locate inside another a perfection that eludes us within ourselves, and through our union with the beloved, hope to maintain (against the evidence of all self-knowledge) a precarious faith in our species.一个人对他人的美化可以达到可怕的程度，甚至连自己都无法忍受——因为自己都无法忍受……我必定已经意识到，其实克洛艾不过是一个平常人（包含这个词所有的字面意义），但是我不愿正视，因为旅行和生活的所有压力，我理应得到谅解。每一例相爱都是（借用奥斯卡·王尔德的一句话）“希望”压倒“自知之明”的伟大胜利。我们跌入爱河，祈望不要在心上人身上发现我们自己的劣根——胆怯、脆弱、懒惰、无信、妥协忍让、粗鲁愚蠢。我们给心上人戴上爱的饰环，认为心上人能够超越我们自己犯下的一切错误，从而可亲可爱。我们从心上人的内心找到自己并不曾有的完美，盼望通过与心爱之人的结合，即可保有（不顾心知肚明的所有反面证据）对人类的一种岌岌可危的信念。
10.Why did this awareness not prevent my fall into love? Because the illogicality and childishness of my desire did not outweigh my need to believe. I knew the void that romantic intoxication could fill, I knew the exhilaration that comes from identifying someone, anyone, as admirable. Long before I had even laid eyes on Chloe, I must have needed to find in the face of another an integrity I had never caught sight of within myself.为何心知肚明却不能阻止我跌入爱河？因为我的欲望毫无逻辑、天真幼稚，无法阻止我对她的信念。我知道有一种空虚，浪漫的幻想可以填补；我知道有一种喜悦，来自于发现他人值得倾慕。早在遇见克洛艾之前，我肯定早有必要去从另一张脸上找到一种完美，一种我在自己身上从未发现过的完美。
11. 'May I check your bags sir?' asked the customs man. 'Do you have anything to declare, any alcohol, cigarettes, firearms...?'
Like Oscar Wilde with his genius, I wanted to say, 'Only my love,' but my love was not a crime, not yet at least.
'Shall I wait with you?' asked Chloe.
'Are you together with madam?' enquired the customs officer.
Afraid of presumption, I answered no, but asked Chloe if she'd wait for me on the other side of the border.可以检查你的包吗，先生？”海关官员询问我，“你有什么东西需要申报吗，比如酒类，香烟，枪支……？”
就如天才王尔德一样，我想要说的是“只有我的爱需要申报”。但是我的爱不是罪过，至少眼下还不是。
“要我等你吗？”克洛艾问我。
“你是和那位女士一起的？”那个海关官员问道。
我担心有些冒昧，就说不是，但又问克洛艾是不是可以在另一边等我。
12. Love reinvents our needs with unique speed. My impatience with the customs ritual indicated that Chloe, who I had not known existed a few hours ago, had already acquired the status of a craving. I felt I would die if I missed her outside ?die for the sake of someone who had only entered my life at eleven thirty that morning.爱情以无与伦比的速度和独特性改造着我们的需求。我对海关例行公事的不耐烦，暗示着克洛艾已经成为我欲望之所在，而几小时前我还不知道世界上有这么一个人儿。这不同于饥饿感，饥饿是逐渐出现的，是根据时间的推移产生的需要，在开饭时周期性到来。我感到如果在大厅另一边找不到她，我就活不下去了——为那天上午十一点半时才踏进我生命的人而死。
如果爱情生发得过于迅速，也许是因为对爱的向往催生了爱人的生成，需要促成了结果。先是想要爱某一个人（大体来看是无意识的），心上人的出现只是第二步——我们对爱情的渴望铸就了心上人的特征，我们对爱情的期盼唤来心上人的出现。（但是我们诚实的一面不会让欺骗永远继续。总会有这样的时刻，我们怀疑心中构想的爱人是否真实存在——或他们是否只是我们创造出来的一个幻影，用以防止爱的缺失必然带来的崩溃。）
13. Chloe had waited, but we could spend only a moment together. She had parked her car nearby. I had to take a taxi to my office. Both parties hesitated whether or not to continue with the story.
'I'll give you a call some time,' I said casually, 'we could go and buy some luggage together.'
'That's a good idea,' said Chloe, 'have you got my number?'
'I'm afraid I already memorized it, it was written on your baggage tag.'
'You'd make a good detective, I hope your memory is up to it. Well, it was nice meeting you,' said Chloe extending a hand.
'Good luck with the cacti,' I called after her as I watched her head for the lifts, her trolley still veering insanely to the right.克洛艾在那边等我，但我们只在一起待了一会儿，就又分别了。她当初从伦敦出发时把车泊在停车场，我则必须乘出租车去办公室拿文件——这是一个双方都倍感为难的时刻，不知是否要把故事继续下去。
“我会打电话给你，”我随口说道，“我们可以一起去买一些箱包。”
“这主意不错，”克洛艾说，“你知道我的电话号码吗？”
“我想我已经记住了，写在你的行李标签上呢。”
“你倒挺会打探，希望你没记错，很高兴认识你，”克洛艾说着，朝我伸出一只手。
“祝你的仙人掌好运，”我看着她走向电梯，在她身后喊道。那辆手推车还是一直往右扭。
14.In the taxi on the way into town, I felt a curious sense of loss. Could this really be love? To speak of love after we had barely spent a morning together was to encounter charges of romantic delusion and semantic folly. Yet we can perhaps only ever fall in love without knowing quite who we have fallen in love with. The initial convulsion is necessarily founded on ignorance. Love or simple obsession? Who, if not time (which lies in its own way), could possibly begin to tell? 坐在回市区的出租车上，我感到莫名的失落和忧伤。这真的就是爱情吗？仅共度了一个上午就说是爱，会被认为是浪漫的幻想和语义的错误。然而只有在不了解所爱之人时，我们才会跌入爱河，最初的行动必然建立在茫无所知的基础上。所以，面对如此多的忧虑，既有心理学的，也有认识论的，如果我仍然将其称之为爱，这也许来自这样一种认知，即这个词永远都无法精确地使用。既然爱不是地点，不是颜色，也不是化学品，而是所有这三者甚至更多，或并非这三者甚至更少，那么当谈到爱的时候，人们为什么不可以如己所愿地畅所欲言，各行其是？难道这个问题还局限在学术领域的对与错？是真爱？抑或是一时的沉迷？如果不是时间（时间也是自欺的），谁又能断定？

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