《都柏林人》〈死者〉佳句精選

《Dubliners都柏林人》
James Joyce 詹姆斯‧喬伊斯

-〈The Dead死者〉
Generous tears filled Gabriel's eyes. He had never felt like that himself towards any woman, but he knew that such a feeling must be love. The tears gathered more thickly in his eyes and in the partial darkness he imagined he saw the form of a young man standing under a dripping tree. Other forms were near. His soul had approached that region where dwell the vast hosts of the dead. He was conscious of, but could not apprehend, their wayward and flickering existence. His own identity was fading out into a grey impalpable world: the solid world itself, which these dead had one time reared and lived in, was dissolving and dwindling.
賈柏瑞兩眼淚水盈盈。他從來沒有對任何一個女人動過那樣的感情，但是他知道那一定是真正的愛。他的淚水越積越多。昏暗半明之界，想像著，他彷彿看見一句年輕的形體，站在雨中樹下。他身旁還有一些其他的形體。他的靈魂走進了那些陰魂盤據的領域。他意識到，但是卻無法掌握他們那捉摸不定、游移閃爍的存在。他自己的存在也逐漸淡入那灰色不可理喻的世界：這些死者曾經一度存在的世界，也逐漸消散湮滅。

A few light taps upon the pane made him turn to the window. It had begun to snow again. He watched sleepily the flakes, silver and dark, falling obliquely against the lamplight. The time had come for him to set out on his journey westward. Yes, the newspapers were right: snow was general all over Ireland. It was falling on every part of the dark central plain, on the treeless hills, falling softly upon the Bog of Allen and, farther westward, softly falling into the dark mutinous Shannon waves. It was falling, too, upon every part of the lonely churchyard on the hill where Michael Furey lay buried. It lay thickly drifted on the crooked crosses and headstones, on the spears of the little gate, on the barren thorns. His soul swooned slowly as he heard the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead.
窗櫺上幾許輕輕的滴落聲，引起了他的注意。窗外又開始下起雪來了。他帶著睡意，望著銀白灰濛的雪花，斜斜落在路邊的燈火下。該是他啟程西行的時候了。是的，報紙說的沒錯：大雪紛飛，鋪滿整座愛爾蘭島。大雪落在黑色中央草原的每一吋土地上、落在光凸凸不見一草一木的山丘上、輕輕地落在愛倫沼澤上、輕輕地落在更西邊的香儂河上，那黑色詭譎的河水之中。大雪也落在麥可‧費瑞安息的山丘上，那孤寂的墓園上。厚厚的飄雪堆積在歪歪斜斜的十字架和墓碑上，也落在墓園小門的欄杆尖上和光禿的荊棘之上。他的精神逐漸進入恍惚的昏睡狀態，他聽見雪花落在大地的微弱聲響；悄然落下，彷彿進入最後的旅程，落在所有的生者與死者身上。

中文譯本選自聯經出版社,《都柏林人》,莊坤良譯注。