当代英雄匹诺曹

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Back Story: Pinocchio, hero of our time

前传:当代英雄匹诺曹


He cannot hide his lies. He wants to be a celebrity. But is he a “real boy”?

他无法掩盖谎言。他想成名。但他是一个“真正的男孩”吗?

He lies (but is found out).

他撒谎了(但被人发现了)。

He quits school to become a celebrity.

为了成为名人,他退学了。

A high-spec automaton powered by artificial intelligence (AI), he isn’t quite human though it is hard to say why.

他是一个由人工智能(AI)驱动的高规格机器人,虽然很难说出原因,但他并不完全是人类。

Truly, Pinocchio is the hero of our time.

但皮诺曹确确实实是我们这个时代的英雄。

Imagine it: a leader denies going to a lockdown party, or that he lost an election when he did, or that he is about to invade Ukraine, and the fib is as plain as his lengthening nose.

想象一下:一位领导人否认在疫情封锁期间参加了派对,或者否认自己在大选中失败,或者否认他即将入侵乌克兰,而谎言就像他变长的鼻子一样明显。

The fantasy of visible mendacity may help explain why “Pinocchio” is in vogue.

这种对于谎言一目了然的幻想,可能有助于我们明白《匹诺曹》为什么如此流行。

Disney recently released a remake of its cartoon of 1940, which stars Tom Hanks alongside a CGI puppet and assorted cutesy animals (including the weirdly flirtatious goldfish from the original).

迪士尼最近翻拍了1940年的动画版《匹诺曹》,由汤姆·汉克斯主演,其它“演员”则是一个电脑生成的木偶影像和各种矫揉造作的动物(包括原版中奇怪的调情金鱼)。

Guillermo del Toro’s stop-motion animated version had its premiere at the London Film Festival and is out on Netflix soon.

吉列尔莫·德尔·托罗的定格动画版本在伦敦电影节上进行了首映,很快就会在Netflix上线。

But it isn’t only the climate of impunity for lies that makes “Pinocchio” a fable for today.

但是,让《匹诺曹》具有现实意义的,不仅仅是当前说谎也能不受惩罚的形势。

So does the eerie central conceit of the talking, walking puppet, lively yet not wholly alive, and the attendant issue of what makes a “real boy”.

还在于它通过这个会说话、会走路、活泼但并不完全活着的木偶所形成的怪异中心构想,以及随之而来的问题:如何才能成为一个“真正的男孩”。

That question has never been more pressing, or more provocative.

这个问题从未像现在这样不容忽视,也从未像现在这样引人深思。

Advances in AI are blurring the distinction between real people and latter-day puppets.

随着人工智能的发展,真人和现代木偶之间的区别日益模糊。

Meanwhile a revolt against crude notions of masculinity—and against the orthodox binary of male and female—has complicated the “boy” part of the equation, too.

与此同时,对原始的男子气概观念以及正统的男女二元论的反抗,也让“男孩”的概念变得复杂起来。

“The Making of Pinocchio”, a stage show currently on tour in Britain, imagines a trans Pinocchio in flight from rigid categories of gender and sexuality.

目前正在英国巡回演出的舞台剧《匹诺曹的制作》,构造出了一个逃离性别和性取向刻板印象的跨性别匹诺曹。

It revels in the phallic symbolism of his tumescent appendage, which adaptations for children tend to skirt.

该剧陶醉于匹诺曹的肿胀附属器官所具有的阳具象征意义,供儿童观看的改编版往往会对此避而不谈。

And the character is a case study in another syndrome that can seem ever-more acute—the lure of fame and easy money.

这个角色还可以用作对另一种综合症的案例研究,这种综合症似乎比以往任何时候都更加严重,那就是会被名气和轻松赚钱诱惑的病。

Temporarily, Pinocchio is seduced by the bright lights of the puppet theatre.

皮诺曹被木偶剧院的明亮灯光诱惑住了一段时间。

“To be famous is to be real,” declares a villain in the new Disney film, diverting him from the straight and narrow with the prospect of being “an influencer”.

这部迪士尼新片中的一位反派宣称:“成名就是真实。”匹诺曹相信了这句话,认为自己将来能成为网红,因此偏离了正道。


Fun versus duty, autonomy and submission, innocence and experience: Carlo Collodi’s tale, first published in Italian in serial form in 1881, suggests many enduring themes and interpretations.

寻欢作乐还是担起责任、独立自主还是俯首听命、天真无邪还是久经考验:卡洛·科洛迪的故事于1881年首次以意大利语连载出版,呈现了许多经久不衰的主题和理解。

In the schmaltzy Disney take, when Pinocchio goes to Pleasure Island, supposedly a carefree paradise, it looks a lot like Disney World—an odd sort of marketing, given all the visitors are turned into donkeys.

而在迪士尼的矫情版本中,当皮诺曹去欢乐岛时,这个设定为如天堂一般无忧无虑的地方看起来和迪士尼世界没什么两样。这种营销方式真的很怪,因为所有的游客都变成了驴。

As Geppetto, the puppet’s old man, Mr Hanks sets sail in a small boat, a sequence that could be an out-take from “Cast Away”, a desert-island movie he made with the same director, Robert Zemeckis.

汉克斯饰演的老木匠杰佩托驾着一艘小船启航时,不知道的还以为这一幕是从他与该片导演罗伯特·泽米吉斯合作的荒岛电影《荒岛余生》中剪下来的。

Geppetto brings the goldfish along in a bowl.

杰佩托是把金鱼装在碗里带着的。

You half-fear he might eat it.

让人有点担心他会把这条鱼吃掉。

Mr del Toro’s spin is deeper and darker.

德尔·托罗的诠释更加深刻,也更黑暗。

Strange as it is to say of an animated film narrated by a cricket (voiced by Ewan McGregor), there is little magic here.

说来奇怪,在他这版由蟋蟀(伊万·麦格雷戈配音)进行讲述的动画电影中,几乎没有提到魔法。

In a revamp set in Mussolini’s Italy, Geppetto fashions the puppet in a drunken fit of grief for a child he lost in the first world war.

该片将故事背景改为墨索里尼统治下的意大利,杰佩托在第一次世界大战中失去了一个孩子,之后于借酒浇愁之际造出了匹诺曹。

Instead of cavorting on Pleasure Island, Pinocchio is conscripted into a Fascist boot-camp; in his mistreated purity he is likened to Jesus Christ.

匹诺曹没有像以往的版本一样在欢乐岛上尽情玩乐,而是被征召到了法西斯新兵营;他就好比耶稣基督,他的纯洁受到了折磨。

The distinguishing feature of a real boy, in this telling, is that he can die.

在这个版本中,“真正的男孩”的显著特征就是他会死。

If that sounds bleak, try Collodi’s original text.

如果这听起来很悲观,不妨试试科洛迪的原著。

Even by the standards of children’s classics, it is macabre.

即使以儿童经典作品的标准来看,它也令人毛骨悚然。

Almost the first thing Pinocchio does is kill the annoying cricket.

可以说,匹诺曹做的第一件事就是杀死那只讨厌的蟋蟀。

He is stabbed, hanged, burned and enlisted as a farmer’s guard-dog; bandit weasels offer him a kickback to let them steal chickens.

匹诺曹经历过刺伤、吊死、焚烧,还被征召为农民的看门狗;土匪黄鼠狼还给过他回扣,好让他们偷鸡。

His is a world of violence, random death, corruption, hunger and penury.

他的世界充斥着暴力、随机死亡、腐败、饥饿和贫穷。

“When poverty is truly poverty, everyone—even kids—understands it,” says a zingy new translation by Anna Kraczyna and John Hooper (who also writes for The Economist).

安娜·克拉齐纳和约翰·胡珀(后者也是《经济学人》的撰稿人)在一篇有吸引力的新译本中写道:“当贫困是真正的贫困时,每个人--甚至是孩子--都能理解。”

This delinquent Pinocchio is “a lazy bum”.

这版的不良匹诺曹是个“懒汉”。

Like many nagging offspring, he is both famished and a fussy eater.

他就像许多使人不得安宁的孩子一样,又饿又挑食。

Selfish and rude, he makes Geppetto miserable.

他既自私又粗鲁,让杰佩托痛苦不堪。

In a suitably modern revision, Mr del Toro’s moral lies less in what children do to parents than what parents’ strictures and expectations do to children.

在符合现代标准的修订版本中,德尔·托罗想传达的寓意与其说是孩子对父母的影响,不如说是父母的约束和期望对孩子的影响。

Defiance, as much as devotion, becomes the goal of Pinocchio’s odyssey.

反抗和忠诚一样,成为了匹诺曹艰险旅程的目标。

Always, though, the crux of the drama is found in the belly of the beast—the sea monster which, after all their rows and misadventures, swallows both Pinocchio and Geppetto.

然而,这部戏剧的关键部分总是在海怪的肚子那里——在匹诺曹和杰佩托经历了所有的争吵和不幸之后,海怪把他们二人吞入了腹中。

Their reunion in its entrails blends biblical imagery with Freudian fever dream.

他们在海怪内脏中的重逢,融合了圣经的意象和弗洛伊德式的狂热梦境。

It captures an eternal truth about troubled souls and their dearest, hardest relationships: sometimes you have to sink to the bottom before you can grasp your way back up.

它体现了一个永恒的真理,这个真理关乎陷入困境的灵魂和他们最宝贵、最坚固的关系:有时你必须沉沦到谷底,才能重新找到出路。

来源:VOA

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