摘要
作为麦克尤恩在继《床笫之间》后再度创作的唯一一部短篇小说,《我的紫色芳香小说》并未像读者所预计的那样重复其出道之初的乱伦、死亡、性虐等另类主题,而是以麦氏拿手的人物叙述、嵌入叙述、不可靠叙述等笔法,近乎炫技式地展现了两名作家跌宕起伏的文学生涯以及他们之间错综复杂的情感纠葛。小说中,人物叙述者帕克 斯帕罗用“跷跷板的两端”来比喻他与朋友乔斯林 塔拜特两人起起落落的创作与人生,试图遮蔽其一夜成名和乔斯林颓然堕落的真实原因,即自己涉嫌“偷窃”的“恶行”。从齐泽克、巴迪欧和阿特里奇的批评立场来看,帕克和乔斯林所卷入的文学剽窃案无疑是作品中最值得关注的“事件”,彻底改变了事件参与者的社会阶层、生活状态与人生轨迹。通过细审叙述者帕克在小说叙事进程中之于该起事件的不同叙事判断,我们会发现他刻意强调和倚重阐释判断与审美判断,而有意淡化和逃避伦理判断。什么原因导致了帕克对伦理话题的逃逸,顾左右而言他?带着这样的疑问,本文在事件理论基础上引入文学伦理学批评,试图逐一剥离帕克所精心编制的叙事圈套,捕捉被文本有意悬置的叙事信息,重构一个被叙述者试图掩盖的、颠倒是非、引发伦理混乱的故事世界:即清白无辜的受害者沦为名誉扫地的窃贼,人人喊打,而掩耳盗铃的偷窃者登堂入室,引人追捧。由是说来,叙述者对伦理话题的逃逸在很大程度上源自于其内心深处对破坏伦理秩序的恐惧和背叛友情的负疚。问题在于,承认“恶行”和明辨是非的叙述者对于自己偷来的人生既“不打算物归原主”,也没有像读者所期待的那样去纠正错误、澄清事实或恢复乔斯林的名誉,而是以“错就错了”的姿态将其叙述视为剖露心迹的“一份供词”。帕克之于文学剽窃案的矛盾态度反映
As Ian McEwan’s only short story in four decades since his In Between Sheets,"My Purple Scented Novel"does not revisit such themes as incest,death,and sadomasochism,but delves into a storyworld about two writers experiencing ups and downs through character narration,embedded narration,and unreliable narration instead.In the text,Parker Sparrow compares Jocelyn Target’s life and that of his own to "the two ends of a seesaw"to avoid mentioning the real factors leading to his sudden success and Jocelyn’s descent,which is largely involved with his wrong doing of"plagiarization."If viewed from the perspectives of Slavoj Zizek,Alain Badiou,and Derek Attridge,the scandal of plagiarization involved with Parker and Jocelyn is the most important event that drastically changes the states of lives of the two characters.A close examination of Parker’s narrative judgments of this event shows that he only makes interpretive and aesthetic judgment while deliberately avoiding making ethical judgment.At issue is what factors account for his avoidance?To address this question,the article couples event theory with ethical literary criticism in the aim of reconstructing and evaluating a storyworld of ethical chaos:the plagiarized is seemingly found guilty while the plagiarizer is seen as a hero.In this light,Parker’s avoidance of ethical issues can be attributed to his fear of breaking up the ethical order and his guilt of betraying his friend.Equally perplexing is Parker’s acknowledgement of his"wrong doing"and his denial of giving the stolen life back to Jocelyn,in which sense Parker’s confession reveals the discontinuity of his ethical consciousness and ethical action.
作者
尚必武
SHANG Bi-wu(School of Foreign Languages,Shanghai Jiao Tong University,Shanghai 200240,China)
出处
《东北师大学报（哲学社会科学版）》
CSSCI
北大核心
2020年第1期11-19,共9页
Journal of Northeast Normal University(Philosophy and Social Science Edition)
基金
国家社科基金重大项目(17ZDA281)
国家社科基金项目(14BWW039)
