For four decades, I have enjoyed a long and lucky literary life filled with many wonderful recognitions, but the Openbook Prize makes me especially happy to receive. My novel, Bewilderment, is about the elusive and essential quality of empathy. Indeed, it involves the story of an “empathy machine,” and the narrator of the story, the astrobiologist Theo Byrne, discovers that trying to understand any other person, even one’s own son, is like traveling in such a vehicle to another planet.
Translating a book from one language and culture into another very different language and culture is also a kind of interplanetary travel in an empathy machine. When a book can survive that journey and even thrive in an altogether different place, it is a kind of miracle.
That the Taiwanese version of Bewilderment has been recognized with this prize is testimony to my translator, Ching-chun Shih, the most conscientious of the many dozens of translators I have ever worked with over the decades. She has taken the view from one planet and transported it to another. If every successful novel is an empathy machine, a successful translation is something even rarer and more miraculous. Heartfelt thanks to Ching-chun Shih for doing this invaluable work of empathy and to the judges of the Openbook Prize for recognizing it.●
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▉評審推薦語
黃宗慧(決選評審,臺灣大學外文系教授)
記得前陣子在全球掀起話題的韓劇《異能》嗎?擁有超強五感的李美賢告誡同樣具有超能力的兒子:「超能力算什麼?同理心才是一個人真正的能力。能夠理解他人,才是最重要的能力。」
話說得很感人,但頂多只是一半的事實,另一半,理察・鮑爾斯(Richard Powers)透過《困惑的心》裡的父親之口說了出來:「面對這個基本上已經破碎的世界,你的同理心愈強,承受的痛苦也愈深。」
《困惑的心》就是這樣一本既凸顯同理的重要,也揭露同理之艱難的深沉作品。故事的第一人稱敘事者,是致力尋找外星生命的天文生物學家席歐・拜恩,他的兒子羅賓和不願負鼠遭到路殺以至於自己車禍身亡的妻子艾莉莎一樣,都深深在意地球上其他生物所面臨的危機。
雖然在拜恩教授眼中,「生命並不需要我們事事校正」,因此他視亞斯伯格的羅賓如同一個「想都不敢想要看透的袖珍宇宙」,而非需要使用精神藥物治療的患者,但在艾莉莎死後愈加敏感易怒的羅賓,不但在別人眼中是個異數,也成為教養上的難題。於是拜恩教授決定讓兒子透過尚在實驗階段的「神經反饋治療」控制情緒,只是,問題並未就此解決……
對生態環境的重視、對(兒童)心理的關切、對「正常」與「社會化」要求的質疑、對(腦神經科學)實驗倫理的反思,以及更普遍的,對於如何面對深愛之人死亡的探問,這一連串議題,在鮑爾斯高明的說故事功力下,隨敘事的推進,一一展開。
讀者跟著一起停佇在這些往往沉重得令人想逃避的問題上,想了又想,困惑再困惑,然後恍然明白,有惑,才不會將鳥的鳴唱、蝴蝶的飛旋、河流的清澈、親愛之人的存在……這些地球人所擁有的一切,視為理所當然。有惑,預設著在意問題的答案,也因此才有希望與救贖的可能。
可以想見,閱讀一本關懷議題如此之多的重量級小說,心情並不輕鬆,而故事的結局更可能讓人感覺唏噓。但就像拜恩常對羅賓說的,「一個呈現負面結果的實驗不見得是個失敗的實驗……你可以從負面結果中學到很多。」《困惑的心》所揭露的,人心的苦楚與生態的傷痕,看似都是「負面結果」,但在讓我們看見了承擔「同理心」的重要與代價之際,也成功地引領我們面對,從困惑中思索出路的必要。
▉獲獎作家感言
撰文:理察.鮑爾斯
40年來,我在漫長而幸運的文學生涯裡獲得許多精彩的認可,但我特別高興獲得Openbook好書獎。我的小說《困惑的心》是關於難以捕捉卻又不可或缺的同理心。書中有一部「同理心機器」,故事裡的敘述者,天文學家席歐.拜恩發現試圖去理解他人,甚至是自己的兒子,就像搭乘這樣的交通工具前往另一顆星球。
將一本書從一種語言和文化翻譯到另一種不同的語言與文化中,也是一種同理心機器的星際旅行。當一本書能夠在這趟旅程中存活,並且在另一個截然迥異的地方茁壯發展,簡直是奇蹟。臺灣版的《困惑的心》能夠獲得這個獎,足以證明譯者施清真是我數十年來合作譯者當中最盡責的一位,她把星球上看到的風景傳送到另一顆星球。
如果每部成功的小說都可以視為同理心機器,那麼成功的譯本更是稀有而不可思議。由衷感謝施清真為這項寶貴的同理心工作的付出,並感謝Openbook好書獎評審的肯定。
原文:
For four decades, I have enjoyed a long and lucky literary life filled with many wonderful recognitions, but the Openbook Prize makes me especially happy to receive. My novel, Bewilderment, is about the elusive and essential quality of empathy. Indeed, it involves the story of an “empathy machine,” and the narrator of the story, the astrobiologist Theo Byrne, discovers that trying to understand any other person, even one’s own son, is like traveling in such a vehicle to another planet.
Translating a book from one language and culture into another very different language and culture is also a kind of interplanetary travel in an empathy machine. When a book can survive that journey and even thrive in an altogether different place, it is a kind of miracle.
That the Taiwanese version of Bewilderment has been recognized with this prize is testimony to my translator, Ching-chun Shih, the most conscientious of the many dozens of translators I have ever worked with over the decades. She has taken the view from one planet and transported it to another. If every successful novel is an empathy machine, a successful translation is something even rarer and more miraculous. Heartfelt thanks to Ching-chun Shih for doing this invaluable work of empathy and to the judges of the Openbook Prize for recognizing it.●
困惑的心
Bewilderment
作者:理察.鮑爾斯(Richard Powers)
譯者:施清真
出版:時報文化公司
定價:480元
作者簡介:理察.鮑爾斯(Richard Powers)
出生於美國伊利諾州。青少年時期曾隨父親到曼谷短暫居住五年,高中回到美國,大學曾修讀物理,後專攻文學。自1980年來陸續出版13本小說,近作包括《The Echo Maker》、《Orfeo》。曾獲頒「麥克阿瑟天才獎」與「美國國家圖書獎」,亦曾四度提名「美國國家書評人獎」,2019年以《樹冠上》榮獲「普立茲文學獎」,現居大煙山山麓。
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