万伊歌 比利时国立根特大学
Vanwalle, Iege, Ghent University
原文Original
On Zheng Min’s Affinities with Chinese and Western Poets and Poetry
Zheng Min’s true affinities regarding other poets and poetry (Chinese and Western), and does the existing literature do justice to these connections?
Zheng Min is amongst the most important and productive living poetesses in China. Her work covers more than half of the twentieth century and holds a distinct position in the development of almost one century of modern Chinese poetry. Although she has been recognized in the Chinese literary and academic world as one of the most renowned poetesses, and she has frequently been invited for the past ten years to international poetry festivals in America and Europe[1], in Western studies has only been given concise and descriptive commentary on work she produced prior to 1949.[2]
Zheng Min’s Poetry
Zheng Min’s poetical career is split into two main periods, separated by a literary silence of over 25 years. On the basis of her first collection Zheng Min shiji 1942-1947 (1949), Hsu Kai-yu described her in Twentieth Century Chinese Poetry (1963) as an independent poet of the 40s “…whose commentary on life shows a remarkable degree of sophistication, does not portray the intense moments of life as Zang Kejia does, nor does she record the ordinary moments of reality as He Qifang and Li Guangtian do. Her eyes scan the horizon of life, the urban and the rustic and she reflects on it…”.[3]Her poems deal with universal themes such as the quest for a better world and future, love, death and swiftness of time without her lapsing into a temporary context of personal experiences or real events. She transfers these themes toward an abstract world where swiftness and variability of everything is housing in a perpetual continuity, where all things are interrelated.
In The Literature of China in the 20th Century (1997) Bonnie S. McDougall and Kam Louie characterized Zheng Min as “…one of the very few Chinese poets like Guo Moruo before her and Yang Lian after, to attempt a panoramic vision of Chinese culture, although Zheng Min’s versions are more subdued…”.[4] The panoramic view presented by her poetry is most evident from the cosmopolitan and cosmic atmosphere created in it. Zheng’s broad knowledge of Chinese and Western culture is visible in the form as well as in the content of her poetry. Although not visible at first sight, poets, musicians, philosophers, literature, historical and mythic characters from the Chinese and Western world frequently appear in her poems. Examples of formal features in Zheng’s work are free verse, semi-sonnet and full sonnet (not always with full rhyme). As to Zheng’s use of a form such as the sonnet, Lloyd Haft stated that this “…probably reveal(s) the influence of Feng Zhi’s successful Chinese adaptation of the form.”[5] Later poems from Zheng Min’s second creative period starting at the beginning of the 80s, reveal, according to Lloyd Haft, a “…wider range of technical influences including American poetry after the Second World War. Thematically, however, there is much continuity between the earlier and later periods…”.[6]
Bei Dao, one of the most important of the obscure poets (menglong shiren) at the beginning of the 80s, points to the influence of the specific translation style (fanyi wenti) of, amongst others, the outstanding young poets of the 40s such as Mu Dan, Yuan Kejia, Chen Jingrong and Zheng Min on his own poems and those of his fellow poets.[7]Bonnie S. McDougall and Kam Louie underline this idea, stating that the works of the May 4th Movement poets of the 20s and 30s and the works of the Nine Leaves poets of the 40s were immediate sources of inspiration for the obscure poets of the 80s.[8]
Zheng Min’s poetry is situated in a field of tension between technical, formal and thematic aspects of Western (especially German and later Anglo-American poetry) and Chinese (particularly the work of Feng Zhi and Bian Zhilin) poetry and philosophy. It is my intention to study thoroughly, verify and specify these aspects of Zheng Min’s poetry.
Notes:
[1]For example, she has already been invited three times to Poetry International Festival in Rotterdam.
[2]Western studies describing Zheng’s work of the 40s are: Twentieth Century Chinese Poetry: An Anthology (1963) of Hsu Kai-yu (ed.); The Literature of China in the Twentieth Century.(1997) of Bonnie S.McDougall & Kam Louie (eds.); A Selective Guide to Chinese Literature 1900-1949. Modern Chinese Poetry Collections 1900-1949.(1989) of Lloyd Haft (ed.); Modern Chinese Poetry: Theory and Practice since 1917.(1991) and Anthology of Modern Chinese Poetry.(1992) of Michelle Yeh; Chinese Letterkunde (cop: 1996) van W.L.Idema & Lloyd Haft (eds.).
[3]Hsu Kai-yu (ed.), Twentieth Century Chinese Poetry (1963),p.34 (p. xxxiv: Introduction).
[4]B.S.McDougall & Kam Louie (eds.), The Literature of China in the Twentieth Century (1997), pp. 279-280.
[5]Lloyd Haft (ed.), A Selective Guide to Chinese Literature 1900-1949 (1989), vol.iii, p.268.
[6]Ibid note 12, p.267.
[7]Bei Dao, ‘Translation Style: A Quiet Revolution’, pp.60-64 in Inside Out: Modernism and Post-Modernism in Chinese Literary Culture, Wendy Larson & A. Wedell-Wedellborg (eds.), Aarhus Univ. Press, 1993.
[8]B.S.McDougall & Kam Louie (eds.), The Literature of China in the 20th Century (1997), pp.426-428.
译文Translation
论郑敏与中西方诗人和诗歌之渊源
郑敏与其他中西方诗人和诗歌之间的真正渊源何在？目前的文学界是否对此关联做出了公正的评价？
郑敏可以说是中国最重要、最多产的在世女诗人。她的作品跨越了大半个二十世纪，在近百年的中国现代诗歌发展史上占据了一个显著的地位。虽然郑敏是中国文学界和学术界所认可的最负盛名女诗人之一，虽然她在过去的十年中也经常受邀参加美国和欧洲的国际诗歌节，[1]但是，西方学界只是对她1949年之前创作的作品做过一些简要的和描述性的评论。[2]
郑敏的诗歌
郑敏的诗歌创作生涯可以分为两个主要阶段，中间有一段超过25年的创作沉寂期。根据诗人的第一部诗集《郑敏诗集1942-1947》（1949年），许芥昱(Hsu Kai-yu)在《二十世纪中国诗选》（1963年）中将郑敏描述为四十年代的独立诗人，“……她对生命的评价异常玄妙，她没有像臧克家一样展示生活的激烈时刻，也没有如同何其芳和李广田那般记录现实中的平凡时刻。她审视生命的界域、城市和乡村，并思索这些……”[3]。她的诗歌与个人经历或真实事件无关，所涉及的主题通常较为宏大，比如对一个美好世界和未来的追寻、爱情、死亡和时间的易逝。她把这些主题转化成一个抽象的世界，这个世界里，每一事物的稍纵即逝和变化无常都寓于永久不绝的连续状态中，一切事物也在其中相互关联。
在《二十世纪中国文学》（1997年）一书中，杜博妮(Bonnie S. McDougall)和雷金庆(Kam Louie)这样描述郑敏：“……和在其之前的郭沫若和在其之后的杨炼一样，她是不都数几位尝试以全景方式展现中华文化的诗人之一，尽管她不那么激烈……”[4]。在郑敏的诗歌中，这种全景式景观最清楚地呈现为一种世界性或宇宙性氛围。郑敏广博的中西方文化知识同时见之于其诗歌的内容和形式中。虽然初看并不明显，但是中西方诗人、音乐家、哲学家、以及文学、历史和神话中的人物频繁出现在她作品中。郑敏的诗歌形式有自由诗、半韵十四行诗和全韵十四行诗（不总是全韵）。在谈及郑敏对于十四行诗等诗歌形式的使用时，汉乐逸(Lloyd Haft)指出：“……这可能反映了冯至在中文诗歌中成功吸纳这种形式所产生的影响。”[5]对于郑敏始于八十年代的第二阶段创作，汉乐逸是这样评价的：这些后期诗歌“……在技法上受到了更为多样的影响，包括二战后的美国诗歌。但就主题而言，其早期创作与晚期创作之间并没有明显的断裂……”。[6]
作为八十年代初中国最重要的朦胧诗人之一，北岛明确表示，包括穆旦、袁可嘉、陈敬容和郑敏在内的40年代一批杰出的年轻诗人的独特翻译文体对他自己和同时代诗人的诗歌创作影响很大。[7]杜博妮和雷金庆持有同样看法，他们认为五四运动时期的诗歌、二十年代和三十年代的诗歌，以及四十年代九叶诗人的诗歌作品，均是八十年代朦胧诗人的直接灵感来源。[8]
概括而言，郑敏的诗歌处在西方诗歌（尤其是德国，以及后来的英美诗歌）的技法、形式和主题与中国诗歌（特别是冯至和卞之琳的作品）和哲学的张力之中。笔者的目的是深入研究，说明和指出郑敏诗歌的相关特点。
注释：
[1]比如，郑敏三次应邀参加鹿特丹的国际诗歌节。
[2]西方研究述及郑敏四十年代创作的著作有：《二十世纪中国诗选》（许芥昱编，1963）；《二十世纪中国文学》（杜博妮、雷金庆编，1997）；《中国文学导读 1900-1949》中《中国现代诗歌合集》（汉乐逸编，1989）；《中国现代诗歌：自1917年以来的理论及实践》（叶奚密，1991）、《中国现代诗歌选集》（叶奚密编，1992）；《中国诗歌集》（伊维德、汉乐逸编，1996）。
[3]许芥昱编：《二十世纪中国诗选》，1963年，“导言”第34页。
[4]杜博妮、雷金庆编：《二十世纪中国文学》，1997年，第279-280页。
[5]汉乐逸编：《中国文学导读1900-1949》，第三卷，1989年，第268页。
[6]同上，注释12，第267页。
[7]北岛：《翻译文体：寂静的革命》，收录于《由内而外：中国文学文化的现代性和后现代性》（蓝温迪、魏安娜编，奥胡斯大学出版社，1993年），60-64页。（Inside Out: Modernism and Post-Modernism in Chinese Literary Culture, Wendy Larson & A. Wedell-Wedellborg (eds.), Aarhus Univ. Press, 1993）
[8]杜博妮、雷金庆编：《二十世纪中国文学》，1997年版，第426-428页。