【英文原声版52】Reginald Jackson: The Tale of Genji

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英文文稿+中文翻译 

An outsider in the aristocratic world

贵族圈子中的局外人

Zachary Davis: When Japanese writer Murasaki Shikibu started writing The Tale of Genji in the 11th century, it was clear from the start that she was onto something. Those who read early versions in her small aristocratic circle couldn’t get enough. They loved it so much that they began reproducing it by hand so that they could have their own copies.

扎克里·戴维斯：十一世纪的时候，日本作家紫式部开始写《源氏物语》。从一开始她就知道，自己的这本书将大放光彩。身边贵族圈子里的人读完初稿后都感到意犹未尽。他们太喜欢这个故事了，甚至还用笔逐字逐句地抄写，好拥有一本属于自己的书稿副本。

Zachary Davis: The story became so popular and so powerful that Shikibu’s original manuscript is believed to have been stolen from her and never recovered. Although the author’s original copy is gone, the story remained intact in other sources and has been enormously influential in Japanese culture ever since it first appeared.

扎克里·戴维斯：这个故事变得如此受欢迎、如此富有魅力，以至于人们认为紫式部本人的手稿被偷走，再也找不回来了。虽然作者的原稿不见了，但这个故事在其他资料中仍然被原原本本地记载了下来，并且从问世之日起便对日本文化产生了巨大的影响。

Reginald Jackson: I think it's fair to say there is no other single piece of literature in Japanese culture that has been as influential as this text insofar as it's influenced every type of cultural production for, you know, a good thousand years. So, whether that’s stamps, whether that's money, whether that's, you know, anime and manga and pornographic, you know, woodblock prints or, you know, kind of dramas and, you know, motion pictures. All these things have, for better and for worse, it really has had this incredibly pervasive influence.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：可以说，在日本文化中没有哪部文学作品能比这本书更有影响力。它影响了一千多年来的各种文化作品，包括邮票、货币图案、动漫、漫画、情色作品、版画、戏剧和电影。不管怎样，《源氏物语》确实有着这样惊人的广泛影响力。

Reginald Jackson: My name is Reginald Jackson. I'm an associate professor of Pre-modern Japanese Literature and Performance at the University of Michigan.

雷金纳德・杰克逊：我叫雷金纳德・杰克逊，是密歇根大学前现代日本文学与表演艺术专业的副教授。

Zachary Davis: The Tale of Genji has remained relevant through the years because it can be read in so many different ways.

扎克里·戴维斯：时至今日，《源氏物语》仍然有着现实意义，因为它可以以多种不同的方式来解读。

Reginald Jackson: The text itself has been so obscured and has had so many, or so layered by all these different kind of interpretations and so forth, that one has the luxury or the pleasure of being able to make whatever they want of it, you know, to use it for whatever ends possible.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：这本书本身的面貌已经朦朦胧胧，种种解读层出不穷。人们甚至可以从中挖掘任何想要的东西，把它用于任何可能的目的，享受着这不常有的乐趣。

Zachary Davis: Welcome to Writ Large, a podcast about how books change the world. I’m Zachary Davis. In each episode, I talk with one of the world’s leading scholars about one book that changed the course of history. For this episode, I sat down with Professor Reginald Jackson to discuss Murasaki Shikibu’s The Tale of Genji.

扎卡里·戴维斯：欢迎收听：100本改变你和世界的书，在这里我们为大家讲述改变世界的书籍。我是扎卡里·戴维斯。每一集，我都会和一位世界顶尖学者探讨一本影响历史进程的书。在本集，我和雷金纳德·杰克逊教授一起紫式部的《源氏物语》。

Zachary Davis: What was that moment in which this text emerges, and what is the social environment that it is trying to describe?

扎克里·戴维斯：这本书写于什么时候？它想要展现怎样的社会环境呢？

Reginald Jackson: I mean, one thing to say, I think, overall, is that, you know, this text, as powerful as it is, is really fascinating to me in part because it's so ambiguous, which, by that I mean not in, like, this kind of orientalist, you know, mysterious “old Japanese thing” way. But just, you know, we don't know the author's real name, for instance. We don't have any original manuscript in her hand. It doesn't exist. We don't even know if she wrote the entire thing. There are kind of theories that say that she only wrote kind of parts of this.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：我想说，这本书总的来说很有影响力，不过我之所以觉得它这么有魅力，部分原因是它有种朦胧感。当然这并不是因为它是一本东方小说，有着神秘的日本古代气息，而是因为我们不知道作者的真实姓名，她手中的原稿也没有流传下来。我们也不知道整部作品是否都是她写的。有的理论认为，她只写了其中的某些部分。

Reginald Jackson: So, there's so much mystery surrounding this figure, to say nothing of production of the text itself—except that we do know that this is produced in the context of kind of aristocratic society in Japan.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：关于作者本人就有很多谜团了，更不用提关于这本书的创作过程了。我们唯一确定的是，这本书确实出现于日本贵族社会这一背景之下。

Zachary Davis: Scholars estimate the text was written in the early 11th century. This time in Japan is known as the Heian period. During this era, the Fujiwara family held much of the power in the country. The family’s strategy for staying in power was to marry their daughters to the existing emperor and then hope the daughter bears a son who would become the next emperor. Japanese emperors of this time typically had multiple wives.

扎克里·戴维斯：学者们推测这本书写于十一世纪初。这个时期在日本被称为“平安时代”。当时藤原家族一揽国家大权。他们维持权力的方式是将女儿嫁给现任天皇，希望女儿生下的子嗣能继承皇位。在那个时代，日本天皇大多妻妾成群。

Reginald Jackson: The idea is that technically the most powerful position that you can inhabit in this context is to be the maternal grandfather of an emperor.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：这是因为理论上来说，在这种社会环境下，你能坐上的最高位置便是皇帝的外祖父。

Zachary Davis: If that daughter had a son, that son would be raised in the mother’s household. He would be loyal to his mother’s family, including his maternal grandfather. Because that boy is in line to become the next emperor, that grandfather would gain power and influence.

扎克里·戴维斯：如果女儿生了皇子，皇子会在母亲家里抚养长大，他便会听母亲家人的话，自然也会听外祖父的话。当他继承了皇位，外祖父也会权倾朝野。

Reginald Jackson: You know, imagine whatever your dream college is, plus Powerball, you know, is kind of what you're going for here. So, the competition in this context is incredibly fierce among different salons that are sponsored by these kind of wealthy patriarchal figures.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：不妨想想你的心仪的大学或是想中的彩票，这就是你梦寐以求的东西。在这种环境下，不同沙龙之间的竞争也异常激烈。这些沙龙都得到了有钱有势的男性的资助。

Zachary Davis: To be a desirable wife for an emperor, a woman had to be smart. Beauty didn’t matter as much; it was all about their intellect.

扎克里·戴维斯：女性若要得到天皇的宠爱，必须得聪明伶俐。美貌倒没那么重要，重要的是头脑。

Reginald Jackson: So, the smarter your daughters are, the more talented they are, the better reputation they have for being especially clever and charming and so forth. That's your kind of ticket. And indeed most of literature, I mean, at this time period is written by—that’s prose fiction in particular—but the best literature of the time is written by women at this point, because the salons are these kind of breeding grounds or training grounds for this type of literary exchange. And it's, and you have these really wealthy patrons who are pouring everything into this. So, you know, paper supplies, silk, everything to play this game in which their daughter might be noticed and then kind of be able to bear that son.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：你的女儿越聪明、越有才华，名声就越好，她们的聪慧和魅力便会广受称赞。这就是你的法宝。其实，当时最好的文学作品、尤其是虚构性散文都出自女性之手，因为文化沙龙为这类文学的交流提供了一席之地。那些富有的资助者把纸张、丝绸等各种资源都投入到这儿，好让沙龙开下去，让女儿们在沙龙中被天皇注意到，然后生下皇子。

Zachary Davis: In the early 11th century, the Fujiwara clan was at the height of its power, and at the top was a man named Fujiwara no Michinaga. He rose to power by eventually marrying off his first daughter, Shōshi, to the emperor. But before she could be married, she had to win the emperor’s approval.

扎卡里·戴维斯：十一世纪初，藤原家族的权势一时无二。家族的大家长是藤原道长，他后来将女儿藤原彰子嫁给了天皇，从而权倾朝野。不过联姻前，藤原彰子必须得到天皇的喜爱。

Reginald Jackson: And she enters this emperor's court. At the time she's around, I think, 11 years old. And Michinaga figures out that he needs to have ladies in waiting, right? So, in this kind of pretty gender-segregated world, basically train and serve as companions for his daughter. And he gets wind of this incredibly brilliant woman who we will call now Murasaki Shikibu and basically brings her in to tutor his daughter.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：藤原彰子入宫时大概十一岁。藤原道长发现需要招一些女官，好为深锁宫中的女儿寻得一些同伴。他招来了一个极其聪慧的女子，也就是我们如今熟悉的紫式部，让她教导女儿。

Zachary Davis: This is a huge deal for Murasaki Shikibu. She comes from a relatively unknown family with a father who isn’t especially powerful, and now, suddenly, she is thrust into the aristocratic inner circle to tutor the woman who might bear the next emperor.

扎克里·戴维斯：这对紫式部来说是一件大事。她出身相对平凡，父亲不是达官显贵。突然间，她被推到了贵族圈子里，去教导一个可能生下下一任天皇的女子。

Reginald Jackson: So, I think it's fair to say that she was certainly a fish out of water on the one hand. At the same time, that there is a kind of sense of excitement, right? And a sense of wonder at what it means to be in this new place and to try to, you know, prove oneself and have to jockey for position while also, I mean, being very careful not to screw things up, all right? So, that anxiety that comes out, I think, about what it means to always follow the rules and always to be keenly aware of one’s self presentation.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：一方面，她肯定很不适应。但她肯定也很兴奋，甚至会好奇待在这个新地方意味着什么。在这儿你要证明自己，争得一席之地，但同时也要步步小心，避免把事情搞砸。我想，这种焦虑可能是因为，你必须时时刻刻守好规矩，敏锐地察觉自己的处境。

Reginald Jackson: And she didn't, they weren't second nature to her in the way that they would be for much higher ranking women. And I think, frankly, that's part of what makes her writing so much more interesting.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：但紫式部不是这样，她不像贵族女性一样将这些规矩刻在了骨子里。不过坦白地讲，这在一定程度上也让她的作品更有趣。

Monogatari, a literary genre in ancient Japan

日本古代的文学体裁——“物语”

Zachary Davis: While Murasaki Shikibu is tutoring this young woman, Shōshi, she is also writing The Tale of Genji. Could you tell listeners what is the story that it tries to tell? Broadly speaking, what is the story about?

扎克里·戴维斯：紫式部一边教导着年轻的藤原彰子，一边写着《源氏物语》。您可以跟我们讲讲这本书的情节吗？它大致讲了什么？

Reginald Jackson: It's called The Tale of Genji because it centered on this male character who’s called Hikaru Genji, “Shining Genji,” whose mother is of slightly lower status and enters the, is the favorite of an emperor and, you know, gives birth to this amazing, beautiful, perfect, you know, son, but is effectively bullied to death.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：这本书之所以叫《源氏物语》，是因为它围绕着光源氏这个男性角色展开。“光源氏”意为“光华公子源氏”。他的母亲出身低微，入宫后独得天皇宠爱，生下了源氏这个俊美的皇子，但不久便不堪欺凌，郁郁而终。

Zachary Davis: Genji’s mother is one of the emperor’s wives. The emperor’s other wives are jealous of Genji’s mother because, although she is of a lower status, she is the emperor’s favorite wife. Genji is only three years old when she dies.

扎克里·戴维斯：源氏的母亲是皇帝的妃子。其他妃子嫉妒他的母亲，因为她身份低微，却备受天皇宠爱。母亲死时，源氏只有三岁。

Reginald Jackson: And so Genji doesn't have the backing. And this emperor who is apparently, you know, would seem to be all powerful, actually can't really openly support him, you know, over his other wife's son. And so Genji gets this name, is the commoner, but has all of the trappings of an aristocrat and is trying to figure out what to do. And I mean, one way to understand the story… I mean, it's been called, I think, in really reductive ways, a romance. And there's lots of, courtship becomes, you know, a theme that kind of is circulated throughout.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：源氏在宫中没有靠山。天皇虽有权势，但在明面上却不能公然支持源氏、打压另一妃子所生的大皇子，于是便将他降为臣籍，赐姓源氏。不过源氏仍然享有贵族之尊，同时也寻找着出路。你可以这么解读——将整本书简单地看作一个爱情故事。小说中有很多关于爱情的情节，爱情这一主题甚至贯穿了全书。

Reginald Jackson: But I really think of it as a story of this deeply traumatized boy who is trying to figure out how to survive and how to make the best of a situation when he knows he deserves more than he can ever have and is constantly searching for some kind of stability.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：但我觉得，这本书其实讲了一个深受创伤的男孩的故事。他试图弄清楚要如何生存，他知道自己理应享有更多东西，但又只能在现有的局面下做到最好，同时又不断寻求某种平衡。

Zachary Davis: At one point in the story, Genji sleeps with his stepmother, one of the emperor’s other wives, because she reminds him of his own mother. They end up having a child together.

扎克里·戴维斯：书中一处提到了，源氏与他的继母、也就是皇帝的另一个妻子私通，因为她让自己想到了母亲。他们后来生下了一个孩子。

Reginald Jackson: Eventually he ends up being the most powerful character because he secretly produces an heir who becomes an emperor. And so in that sense, he's made it. He's attained that really elusive position that someone like Michinaga had, right? So that, you know, art imitates life in that regard.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：后来，两人私通后生下的儿子成为了天皇，而源氏也成了权倾朝野的人物。从这个意义上讲，源氏成功了，成了藤原道长这样的外戚。在这方面，艺术可谓源于生活。

Zachary Davis: Murasaki Shikibu had a unique position as an outsider in this close knit aristocratic world. This perspective allowed her to write about this world in a way that few were able to.

扎克里·戴维斯：在这个盘根错节的贵族圈子里，紫式部作为一个局外人，身份自然很独特。这种身份与视角让她以一种少有人能做到的方式讲述这个圈子的生活。

Reginald Jackson: The text itself, it's deeply ambivalent. And I think that part of the thing that makes it so fascinating and why I keep, I can't get away from it is that it seems to me to be a deep critique of all of this kind of very notion of an idealized style of romance, of the notion of, you know, hierarchy as an end unto itself, you know, of this notion of “the good life” that everybody is clawing their way and backstabbing their way towards, you know.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：这本书本身非常矛盾。我觉得它之所以让我这么着迷，一部分原因是它深刻地批判了一种理想化的浪漫理念，批判了以攫取权力为目的的观念，为了所谓的“美好生活”而拼命攀爬、互相倾轧。

Reginald Jackson: This woman who comes from outside of that system and now has to operate within it and is also, benefits from it, but is also brutalized by it, I think, has a lot of really critical… I mean, this has a really strong critical subtext. What it means when she depicts scenes of sexual violence or, you know, all the ways in which courtship goes awry. And when this thing that you want actually ends up being a hindrance to your flourishing, but you gotta, you know, kind of keeping on.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：这个女子从贵族圈子外而来，如今不得不生活在这个圈子中，从中受益，也从中受伤。我觉得书中隐藏着很强烈的批判态度。当她写下那些性暴力行为和渐行渐错的求爱之举时，其意味不言而喻。你想要的东西最终阻碍着你发展，但你还是一直继续下去。

Zachary Davis: Why did she write this text?

扎克里·戴维斯：紫式部为什么要写这本书？

Reginald Jackson: I think one motivation certainly is that she's expected, she's hired effectively to be this tutor-companion to an empress. And part of what that entails is having to entertain. The women of these salons were, you know, the smartest, most interesting folks that can be found, right? And their job was to make this particular person as, I mean, to edify them on the one hand, but also to keep them company and to help shape them, help groom them—literally.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：我觉得一个原因是她被选为中宫的女官，而为中宫提供消遣也是她的职责之一。后宫沙龙里的女子都极为聪慧、极为有趣。她们一方面要教导妃嫔，另一方面也要陪伴她们、为她们梳妆打扮。

Reginald Jackson: So, there's lots of women who are combing each other's hair to make them beautiful and all these other things, but also to, you know, as this collective team, to be able to build something that's going to be more durable than the next lady over.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：所以书里，很多女子会互相梳理鬓发，打扮得漂漂亮亮。但除此之外，这些女官作为一个团队，需要为她们所侍奉的人创造出能够胜过其他后宫女子的作品。

Zachary Davis: Shikibu did not write this book to make a classic work—that’s clear from the title. The book’s Japanese title is Genji Monogatari. “Monogatari” can mean anything from “gossip” to “gibberish,” but it’s certainly not respectable literature. Respectable literature of this time was typically written by men and was about history and facts.

扎克里·戴维斯：紫式部写这本书并不是为了创造什么文学经典——这从书名中便能看出来。书名叫“源氏物语”，而“物语”在日文中指故事或杂谈，并非什么严肃文学。当时的严肃文学大多出自男人之手，讲述的多半是史实。

Reginald Jackson: By contrast, monogatari are kind of trashy, are about “women's stuff,” are not to be taken seriously because they're fictional, are much more, you know, unlike diaries and these documents, they aren't dated, right? So, there's a way in which all these things are meant to impugn the value of this, on the one hand. But men were obsessed with these too, right?

雷金纳德·杰克逊：相比之下，物语似乎难登大雅之堂，不被认真看待。它们讲的都是女人家的事情，多半是虚构的，而且不像日记和文件那样有确切的日期。从某些方面讲，所有这些方面都与严肃文学的取向相悖。不过男人们其实也很喜欢物语。

Reginald Jackson: You know, so on the one hand, there's this kind of official discourse about, you know, about the problems with this, we’d call it a genre, but it's also something that is sustaining for people's lives, you know, pre-Netflix and pre-, you know, all these other kind of, or PlayStation or whatever. Like what do you have, really? You have, you know, literature and you have kickball and you have these kind of, music and so forth. But this becomes really important.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：因此，一方面，当时的正统话语或许不怎么看得上这种体裁，但另一方面，它充实了人们的生活，像是古代版的奈飞视频网站和索尼游戏机一样。你可以看看物语、踢踢蹴鞠、听听音乐。不过物语这种娱乐形式慢慢变得重要起来。

Reginald Jackson: And so Murasaki Shikibu is writing this kind of almost on demand, you know, as a kind of, as a way to pass the time, it would seem. And, you know, she writes this and shares it with these women in her immediate circle, and they love it. And what they do, if you like something, is that you copy your own, you know, in your own hand, you copy, they copy it down. And that's how things circulate. And then you start to make these different kind of changes in some cases and then pass it along and kind of have it circulate.

雷金纳德・杰克逊：紫式部几乎是为了满足他人的需求而写了这本书，来为他人提供消遣。她一边写，一边在周围女性的小圈子里分享，大家都很喜欢。而如果你喜欢什么书，便会自行传抄。于是这本书就被传开了。然后你就会根据不同情况来做一些修改，再把它传下去，让它流传开来。

Reginald Jackson: And so one of the things that means is that then people start to say, “Well, what happens next?” Or, “What about this character?” Or, you know, “How does that turn out?” And so this is how the text starts to grow and grow is that but she's getting feedback and these kind of conversations, and people are reading these aloud for entertainment and so forth. And that then feeds into the creation process. And so it becomes this kind of feedback loop, in some ways, where she then goes back and starts to elaborate this or that and sort of shape the story in different ways in order to, you know, sort of satisfy herself, but also to respond to these folks who are interested in her story. And it kind of grows and grows from there.

雷金纳德・杰克逊：然后人们会问，接下来发生了什么，或是这个角色怎么了，或是结果如何。书的内容就这么渐渐充实了。紫式部收到了反馈，和大家交流，大家读着她的书聊作消遣。这些都反哺了她的创作。这一流程不断循环着。从某方面讲，她回过头换个方式来搭建故事，一来是为了让自己满意，二来也是为了让那些对她的故事感兴趣的人满意。于是内容便慢慢丰富起来。

The missing copy, like the missing baby

痛失手稿，仿佛痛失爱子

Zachary Davis: It eventually catches the attention of Michinaga, Shōshi’s father. He realizes the power of this text and wants to claim some of the recognition for this work because he is Murasaki Shikibu’s patron.

扎卡里·戴维斯：它最终引起了藤原彰子的父亲藤原道长的注意。他意识到了这本书的影响力。身为紫式部的资助人，他想为这个作品争得一些认可。

Reginald Jackson: And she returns to her room one day and finds that her copy, her kind of very carefully curated manuscript is gone. It's been taken. And it's akin to, you know, I think it's fair to say it's akin to a kind of a rape. And what's happened is that Michinaga, realizing how valuable this literature is in that time, has stolen it.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：一天，紫式部回到房间后，发现自己精心写成的手稿不见了。有人把它拿走了。这简直和强暴无异。而事情的真相是，藤原道长意识到它的价值之后，便把它偷走了。

Reginald Jackson: And she's devastated. You know? And this is a woman who has lost her husband, lost children, mainly due to these kind of pandemics, you know, and, you know, death and destruction that's happening in the capital. And so, you know, it’s akin, I think it's fair to say, you know, to losing a child, losing another child, to lose that manuscript because everything that she has rides on the success of this thing. This is her livelihood, right?

雷金纳德・杰克逊：这对紫式部来说是个沉重的打击。当时京城爆发了大规模的流行病。病毒夺去了许多生命，带来了无数破坏。紫式部的丈夫和孩子也因病去世。所以对她来说，失去了这份手稿无异于痛失了另一个孩子，因为她所拥有的一切全都寄托在了手稿的成功上。这就是她的命根子。

Reginald Jackson: Because this is not, you know, there's no royalties. There's no copyright. There's no, you know, 403B or 401K plan to retire on. You are only as good as the next line of calligraphy or poetry that you write. And so that's why it's so good, right? Because there is no... And it's not like, you know, paper was incredibly valuable, too. So, it's not like you're doing drafts, right? This is the kind of, I think it's really hard for us in this moment of dictation software and emojis and all these other things, you know, and really terrible handwriting to really understand that you're pouring your heart and soul into being able to make this thing so, in order to make it kind of resonate for other people.

雷金纳德・杰克逊：当时没有版税和版权，也没有什么养老金计划。生活是好是坏，全都看你写的下一行书法或诗歌如何。所以这本小说才这么精彩，因为没有其他什么余地了。而且当时纸张也很贵。所以你不会抱着打草稿的心态去写。如今我们可以对着手机电脑进行口述，经常用表情包，笔迹也很糟糕，所以我们很难想象把整颗心都倾注到手稿上来唤起别人的共鸣，是怎样的感觉。

Zachary Davis: What a knife-edge! What high stakes! And for Murasaki Shikibu to have that power over people's attention. I mean, both the pressure and the anxiety, but also just the thrill.

扎克里·戴维斯：这真的是放手一搏，把所有赌注都押在这个手稿上了。对紫式部来说，得到大家的关注既让她焦虑、感到有压力，又让她非常兴奋。

Reginald Jackson: I think that she certainly felt that kind of importance, but also, you know, was deeply anxious about that, I think, partially because she knew it could all evaporate in an instant. So, I think there was that thrill and there was that... You know, she was feeling herself at a certain point. She knew that she was doing, you know, the dopiest thing that existed at the time. And she knew that other women hated her guts for that, and there was, you know, she and, there's you know, I think this points, you can point to where she is. I think it's clear that she enjoys that.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：她肯定感觉到了手稿有多重要，也为此而深深焦虑，但我觉得焦虑的原因可能是她觉得所有这些会转瞬即逝。所以她既觉得兴奋，也会觉得自己在做一件有史以来最不讨巧的事情。她也深知其他女子会讨厌她的大胆举动。我觉得这是你可以在她身上看到的。显然她很乐意这样。

Reginald Jackson: But there's also, then, that other part where she also knows that if she writes too well that she's going to lose this thing, that she's, you know, again, that she's spent all this time, and she's going to lose that investment, and she never really owns this thing, right? I mean, the fact that her first name, Murasaki, is actually, comes from a character in the thing that she wrote. So, we don't even know her real name because she was so famous, in some ways, that her own identity was obscured by this product that she made.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：但另一方面，她也清楚，如果自己写得太好了，反而会失去这部作品。她一门心思地扑在这上面，到头来手稿却没了。其实这部作品从来就没有真正属于过她。她的姓“紫”源于她笔下的人物“紫姬”。我们甚至不知道她的真实姓名，因为她的作品太有名了，以至于她本人的身份都被作品的光辉所掩盖了。

Zachary Davis: This precarity is shown throughout The Tale of Genji.

扎克里·戴维斯：这种朝不保夕的感觉在整部《源氏物语》中都有体现。

Reginald Jackson: Murasaki Shikibu really wants to show how unideal, how deeply flawed, the system is, whether that's in terms of, at the same time that we have beautiful poetry, at the same time that you have these incredibly touching, tender moments where friends kind of meet and part and Genji mourns folks and is trying to do right by certain folks, even as he's really terrible to others and so forth. And I think that the female protagonists that come throughout the tale are also, I think, become, I think, symbolize a lot of that deep anxiety around how cruel the system is. You know, so there's I don't think that there's any character, arguably, that doesn't become a testament to, you know, this really completely depleting way of going through the world.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：紫式部很想展现这个体制是多么不尽如人意、有着多么深的缺陷。书中有很多优美的诗句，也记叙了朋友们相聚相别的时刻，记叙了源氏如何哀悼故人、在冷落故人之后如何试图改正。我认为，在故事中的主要女性角色身上，我们也能看到一种对残酷体制的深深焦虑。可以说，我觉得所有角色都证明了，他们在以这种筋疲力尽的方式走完此世。

Reginald Jackson: And I think that's one of the things that's really interesting about the reception of this, is that there's lots of commentators who traditionally have focused on the pretty things and the flowers and the evanescence of cherry blossoms and all these things that become these really hackneyed tropes about Japanese culture and aesthetic beauty. And of course, there's all kinds of eulogies to that and all kinds of ways in which the text supports that. At the same time that there's also, you know, women who kill other women and, you know, sexual violence, and all of this really just terrible violence that pervades the entire narrative.

雷金纳德・杰克逊：我觉得这也是对这本书一个非常有意思的解读。很多评论家习惯于将关注点放在美丽的事物和花卉上，谈论樱花凋零等和日本文化与审美相关的老套话题。当然，书中有许多与此相关的文字，全书也以各种方式佐证了这种文化。但与此同时，书中还有女性互相倾轧、性暴力等情节。这些可怕的暴力情节贯穿了整个故事。

What’re the influences of the book?

这本书有哪些影响？

Zachary Davis: Are there elements of enduring Japanese, either cultural expression or self-understandings that you do see some story about how it continues to be alive among Japanese people, and, like, in what ways?

扎克里·戴维斯：有没有什么元素是经久不衰的？如今在日本人的生活中，您有没有看到什么尚存的和《源氏物语》有关的故事呢？无论是文化表达还是自我理解方面的都可以。它们又是以什么形式存在的呢？

Reginald Jackson: So, I think in terms of the long legacy, I mean, lots of folks who have written about this, and then the work of particularly folks like Melissa McCormick just recently staged an amazing exhibition at the Met on Genji and had all kinds of things, really amazing things there. So, from sculpture and statuary to, you know, manga adaptations from Yamato Waki, which is incredible. So, there's a whole range, you know, there’s certainly card games and all these other things as well.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：说起长期的文化遗产，我觉得很多人都写过关于《源氏物语》的文章。特别值得一提的是梅丽莎·麦克科米克最近在纽约大都会博物馆举办的、介绍《源氏物语》的精彩展览。从雕塑到大和和纪改编的精彩同名漫画，再到花牌等各类艺术——所有这些都受到了《源氏物语》的影响。

Reginald Jackson: You know, I think that in terms of the appeal of those things, you know, some of those things are really sincere, and some of them aren't, you know? So, I think that the manga adaptation by Yamato Waki, I think, is very deeply, I think, reverential towards the text. There are folks, too, I would say, you know, among the intellectuals who I think resist seeing Genji as this exemplar or this paragon of premodern culture, but deeply feudal and, you know, not worldly and apolitical and therefore really resist it because it's been so co-opted, in some ways, by these folks, you know, previous right wing folks, you know, current right wing folks, as Japanese culture incarnate.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：我觉得就吸引力来说，这些艺术中有的很有诚意，有的则并不。大和和纪改编的漫画就高度致敬了原著。但也有些知识分子拒绝把《源氏物语》看作日本前现代文化的典范。相反，他们觉得它有着很深的封建烙印，不贴合现实生活，有着很强的政治性，还被从前的右翼以及现在的右翼分子看做是日本文化的化身。因此，这些知识分子对这部作品有所拒斥。

Reginald Jackson: One of the things that’s really interesting to think about in terms of reception history is that depending on the decade, Genji might be this, you know, the most amazing thing ever or people are like, “This is, you know, really effeminate, and, you know, we are a modern nation now, and we're trying to compete with the West,” and all this.

雷金纳德・杰克逊：因此，涉及到人们对《源氏物语》的接受情况，一件很有意思的事情就是，根据时代的不同，人们对这本书的印象也大不相同。某些年代，《源氏物语》很可能是最伟大的著作，但在另一些年代，人们会说，“这书太女里女气了。我们日本可是现代国家了，要和西方竞争呢。”

Reginald Jackson: And so on the one hand, so, like, deeply homophobic readings of this text because of these cultural norms that they want the status of Genji, right? To say like, “We were more civilized than you,” when civilization as a discourse is also very much about, you know, the social Darwinist kind of notion of who deserves to conquer whom. Genji is really serviceable, right, in that discourse, and on the one hand, but not the parts where there's all this homoeroticism and so forth. And so, again, picking and choosing with this text because it is such an accomplishment, I think, is one of the legacies of it.

雷金纳德・杰克逊：因此，一方面讲，对《源氏物语》的恐同式解读源于一种文化惯例，那就是想要确立《源氏物语》的地位。假如有人说，我们比你们更文明，这时候“文明”这个词就很有社会达尔文主义的感觉，像是在说谁有资格压过谁。在这种语境下，《源氏物语》便很有价值，除了那些关于同性情愫的部分以外。鉴于这本书如此无所不包，不同的人便可以对书中的内容进行不同的取舍，而这也是它带给我们的一大遗产。

Zachary Davis: Like most influential ancient texts, The Tale of Genji also has an academic legacy.

扎克里·戴维斯：就像很多富有影响力的古代书籍一样，《源氏物语》也带给了我们丰厚的学术遗产。

Reginald Jackson: One of the things that I've been really heartened by and really love seeing and in teaching classes is having students do, you know, do visual art. So, having them make hand scrolls and compete with one another and try to, in a very low-rent, you know, deeply inefficient kind of way, kind of try to approximate some of the social context and materials even, you know, of, like not letting people erase these kinds of things and seeing how that really seems to have activated the text for students and got them to understand and appreciate just craft.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：有件事情我很喜欢看到，也很喜欢运用到课堂上，那就是让学生们进行视觉艺术创作。比如，我会让他们动手做卷轴，互相比赛，用非常原始低效的方式还原当时的社会背景和物质条件，让大家不要忘记这些差别，看看这样能不能让学生切身体会到书中的世界，让他们好好理解并欣赏这些手艺。

Reginald Jackson: Showing them some of these 12th century hand scrolls and having them really kind of pay attention to these things and, you know, to drop, you know, an 1100-page translation on a desk and hear the weight of that and then have them write out in their best handwriting just a paragraph and you know, and not mess up and watch them sweat and the feel that, all of those things. I think that's something that we've lost, I think, really that sense of craft and sense of devotion to a single thing. And I think that Genji can be a really great vehicle for being able to, if not instill, at least to give a taste of that.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：我还会给他们看一些十二世纪的卷轴，让他们细细观察；或是把一千一百多页的译本扔在桌子上，叫他们听听这么重的书发出的声音；或是让他们用最漂亮的字写一段话，叫他们不要写砸，看着他们满头大汗。这种匠心和对一件事情全神贯注的态度是我们如今非常缺乏的。而我觉得，可以借助《源氏物语》向他们灌输这种态度，或者至少让他们体味一番。

Reginald Jackson: You know, I always tell students, you know, this is remarkable in some ways because the stakes are so high, but also because people again, this was their lives. And if you ever care about anything enough to feel as though a child was stolen, you know, when it's taken from you, you know, that's, I hope that someone can have that, you know, particularly with some kind of creative endeavor. And so I think the Genji as a way to underscore that to a degree that a lot of other texts I don't think we really are able to do.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：我总是告诉学生，这本书在某些方面非常了不起，因为作者把很多东西都倾注在了这上面，这就是她的心血。如果你非常在乎某个东西，失去它的时候你甚至觉得像是丢了孩子一样。我希望有人能有这样的感觉，最好还能努力加以创新。我觉得《源氏物语》在某种程度上强调了这一点，而这恰恰是其他许多书做不到的。

Zachary Davis: This ability to continually inspire new generations of readers and artists is why Genji remains so influential.

扎克里·戴维斯：《源氏物语》不断启发着新一代读者和艺术家，这也是为什么它还能这么有影响力。

Reginald Jackson: It made a whole slew of artists and cultural producers across all kinds of genres and media, it forced them to reckon with the very notion of aristocratic culture, you know, in a way that nothing else ever did or could. And that's for both better and for worse. You know, I think that's effectively what it did, is that it gave such a deep and fine-grained account of all that contingency that you mentioned that, you know, there's no way to exhaust it. And then, like most of the great literature that you can go back to and again and again and again, but from so many different facets. There's no text that I've ever read that does that to that degree.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：它以前所未有的方式，让许多各个领域的艺术家和文化创作者认真思考贵族文化这个概念。这既有好处，也有坏处。我觉得其实它做的，便是穷尽笔墨、深刻且细致地描绘了你说的所有无常之事，就像大多数伟大的、值得一遍遍反复阅读的文学作品所做的那样，《源氏物语》也不例外，然而它对这种无常和偶然性的刻画包含了那么多丰富的层面，这在我读过的书里面是绝无仅有的。

Reginald Jackson: And I think that's what Genji did, is that it gave enough to be specific enough to really have people delve into all of that minutia on the one hand, but then also spoke to all of these really common themes at the same time. At that moment, there was nothing in the world that was able to do both of those things. And really, since, arguably, particularly in the context of Japanese kind of literary culture.

雷金纳德·杰克逊：我觉得《源氏物语》极其细致地描绘了许多东西，让人们可以深入研究所有这些细节。但同时它也谈到了一切普世性的主题。在那个时代，世界上还没有哪部作品可以同时做到这两点，在日本文学中更是如此。

Zachary Davis: When Murasaki Shikibu wrote The Tale of Genji, she revealed a darker side of aristocratic culture to the aristocracy. Her unique position as an outsider in Japan’s inner circle gave her the perspective to reveal certain truths about Japan’s elite. Because of Shikibu’s unique perspective and artistic mastery, this text has remained a cornerstone of Japanese literature and culture.

扎克里·戴维斯：紫式部的《源氏物语》向贵族阶层展现了贵族文化的黑暗面。紫式部是日本贵族圈子中的局外人。这种独特的身份让她能够从自己的角度揭露日本贵族生活的真相。而她的独特视角和非凡的艺术造诣让《源氏物语》成为了日本文学与文化的基石。

Zachary Davis: Writ Large is a production of Ximalaya. Writ Large is produced by Jack Pombriant, Liza French, and me, Zachary Davis. Script editing is by Galen Beebe. We get help from Feiran Du, Ariel Liu and Monica Zhang. Our theme song is by Ian Coss. Don’t miss an episode. Subscribe today in the Ximalaya app. Thanks for listening. See you next time.

扎卡里·戴维斯：本节目由喜马拉雅独家制作播出。感谢您的收听，我们下期再见!