真的有所谓的“经典”吗? | 经济学人文化

财富   2024-08-30 08:03   浙江  

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Culture | Picture perfect
经济学人文化|完美无瑕

英文部分选自经济学人20240824期文化板块

Culture | Picture perfect

经济学人文化|完美无瑕

Is there such a thing as a classic?

真的有所谓的经典吗?

A new book argues that the “timeless classic” is a critical creation

某新著认为,经典永流传是评论家创造的概念
After Taylor Swift, the “Mona Lisa” is probably the most recognisable female face in the world. Every day around 20,000 people gape at Leonardo da Vinci’s painting in the Louvre. Yet it became famous not because of a beguiling semi-smile, but a thief. Until a worker stole the masterpiece in 1911, it was still mostly unknown; viewers flooded in to see what a French newspaper called “an enormous, horrific, gaping void”.

或许蒙娜丽莎是除泰勒·斯威夫特之外全球最具辨识度的女性面孔了。每天约有2万人前往卢浮宫,一睹达芬奇画作《蒙娜丽莎》的真容。但这幅画作闻名于世,并非是由于蒙娜丽莎迷人的似笑非笑,而是由于一起盗窃案。这幅作品一直默默无闻,直到1911年被一名工人偷走才名声大噪。参观者们蜂拥而至,前来观赏这幅被法国媒体称作巨大、恐怖、令人瞠目结舌的空白的杰作。

Classics of art, literature and music are supposed to carry some mysterious appeal that endures across the ages. But as Rochelle Gurstein, a historian, writes in a new book, the “timeless classic” is anything but. “What I believed was written in stone was actually written in water,” she argues. Classics come and go.

人们认为美术、文学和音乐领域的经典一定有着某种神奇的吸引力,经久不衰。但正如历史学家罗谢尔·古尔斯坦(Rochelle Gurstein)在新书中写道,绝无永恒的经典。她说,我以为的不朽,其实都如流水般易逝。在时间的长河里,经典也起起伏伏。

Take other celebrated works of art that, along with da Vinci’s “Mona Lisa”, define the European canon. Until the end of the 19th century Michelangelo’s “David” had only his figleaf to protect him from the elements in Piazza della Signoria in Florence. He attracted more pigeons than pilgrims; most connoisseurs preferred the artist’s sculpture of Moses in Rome. Before the “Venus de Milo” was discovered in 1820, viewers swooned over the “Venus de Medici”, an exquisite but rather demure sculpture most people alive today have never heard of.

除了达芬奇的《蒙娜丽莎》,同为欧洲艺术瑰宝的其他艺术名作也有类似遭遇。直到19世纪末,米开朗基罗(Michelangelo)的雕塑作品《大卫》(David)一直立在佛罗伦萨的领主广场(Piazza della Signoria)上,只有(被强行加上的金属)无花果叶来抵挡自然环境的侵蚀。前来欣赏它的人甚至还没鸽子多;相比之下,大多数鉴赏家更偏爱这位艺术家创作的、如今在罗马的《摩西》(Moses)雕像。在1820年《米洛斯的维纳斯》(Venus de Milo)被发现之前,人们为之倾倒的是《美第奇的维纳斯》(Venus de Medici)。这是一件精美内敛的雕塑作品,然而在今天,大多数人都没有听说过它。

The rise and fall of classics is not just a matter of changing tastes; art itself has changed. Artists used to strive to depict ideal forms of beauty. Genius was the “child of imitation”, explained Joshua Reynolds, a British portraitist in the 18th century and first president of the Royal Academy. Artists learned by studying and imitating classical masterpieces, often Roman copies of Greek sculptures.

经典的兴衰不仅仅是欣赏品味的变化;艺术本身也在改变。艺术家过去想要尽力描绘美的至臻形态。天才是模仿的产物18世纪英国肖像画家、皇家美术学院首任院长约书亚·雷诺兹(Joshua Reynolds)解释道。艺术家通过临摹和模仿经典杰作来学习,学习对象往往是古罗马人复制的古希腊雕塑。

But such classical ideals were challenged by “discoveries”. Lord Elgin tried to fix up the magnificent friezes that once graced the Parthenon, but restorers refused. When the marbles went on display in 1807 British visitors did not see the fully intact, immaculately cleaned Roman sculptures they were used to. Timeless “ideals” paled in comparison with the timeworn marbles, and artists began to experience a “progressive alienation” from the classical tradition, writes Ms Gurstein.

但这类经典臻品受到了发现的冲击。埃尔金伯爵试图修复帕特农神庙瑰丽的横饰带,但遭到了修复师的拒绝。当这些大理石于1807年展出时,英国参观者并没有见到他们曾经熟悉的完整无缺、光洁无暇的古罗马雕塑。永恒的无瑕经典在历经岁月洗礼的真大理石雕塑面前显得黯然失色;从此艺术家们开始逐渐远离经典传统,古尔斯坦写道。

The writing of art history has also changed tastes. In the 16th century Giorgio Vasari, an Italian painter, advanced an influential narrative of artistic progress that culminated in the realism of Raphael and Michelangelo. But in the 19th century John Ruskin, a critic, called attention to the pre-Raphaelite movement when he argued that the real “Old Masters” were actually medieval Christian painters. Walter Pater, an English critic, later elevated the individual interpretation of art as the most important criterion of judgment, planting the seeds for the aesthetic relativism that still reigns. Seeing today’s coveted contemporary “masterpieces” sold at auction for millions, you are bound to wonder how critics 100 years from now will feel about them.

艺术史的写作品位也有所改变。16世纪,意大利画家乔尔乔·瓦萨里(Giorgio Vasari)关于艺术演进的论述颇有影响力,拉斐尔和米开朗基罗的现实主义是这一艺术演进过程中的高潮。但在19世纪,评论家约翰·拉斯金(John Ruskin)认为真正的绘画大师实际上是中世纪的基督教画家,他把人们的注意力引到了拉斐尔前派运动。再后来,英格兰评论家沃尔特·佩特(Walter Pater)将个人对艺术的解读升级为最重要的判断标准,为至今仍盛行的美学相对主义埋下了种子。看到今天令人觊觎的当代杰作在拍卖会上售出数百万高价,你一定会好奇100年后的评论家会如何看待它们。

Much as in art, the “classics” of music and literature have not always been set in stone either. Today Johann Sebastian Bach is often regarded as the master of classical music. But after his death in 1750 Bach’s contrapuntal compositions fell out of fashion until Felix Mendelssohn, a German composer, rediscovered them in the 1820s. John Keats, probably the greatest of the Romantic poets, had such bad reviews that many believed critics caused his early death, at 25, in 1821. Herman Melville and his maritime masterpiece “Moby Dick” were largely forgotten until critics such as Raymond Weaver, a professor at Columbia University, rescued him from the depths of obscurity around the centenary of his birth in 1919.

和美术圈一样,音乐和文学圈的经典也不是一成不变的。如今,人们常常认为约翰·塞巴斯蒂安·巴赫(Johann Sebastian Bach)是古典音乐大师。但他于1750年去世以后,其对位作曲就不再流行了,直到19世纪20年代,德国作曲家菲利克斯·门德尔松(Felix mendelsson)再次将它们拾起。约翰·济慈(John Keats)或许可以称得上是最伟大的浪漫主义诗人,而他的风评却非常差,以至于许多人认为是这些评论导致其在1821年刚刚25岁就英年早逝。很多人本来一句遗忘了赫尔曼·梅尔维尔(Herman Melville)和他的海洋巨著《白鲸记》(Moby Dick),直到哥伦比亚大学教授雷蒙德·韦弗(Raymond Weaver)等批评家在1919年作者诞辰100周年之际才将他从默默无闻的深渊中拯救了出来。

Ms Gurstein’s narrative shows that the “status of a classic” depends on critics, and is testimony to the power of passionate writers to change the way people look at art. Taste evolves, and it should. But culture lives on only as long as people continue to argue over what counts as a classic today. The true enemy of the classic is not relativism or wokeness. It is silence. 
格斯汀的叙述表明,经典作品的地位取决于评论家,也证明了热情的作家有能力改变人们看待艺术的方式。品位会进化,也应该进化。但只要人们继续争论什么是今天的经典,文化就会继续存在。经典的真正敌人不是相对主义或觉醒,而是沉默。
翻译组:
Ryan,译海徜徉的一条咸鱼

CassieECNU口译小菜鸡,体制内摸爬滚打教书匠

Qianna,对语言有点敏感,对逻辑十分执拗,对摇滚太过着迷


校对组:

雪迪,开眼看世界

Rachel,学理工科,爱跳芭蕾,热爱文艺的非典型翻译

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