失去是一种艺术吗？

伊丽莎白·毕肖普在诗里说，是的。

她是一位特立独行的美国诗人，一生动荡不安。她是一位同性恋，在诗中将爱情娓娓道来。她经历过常人未曾体会过的痛苦，她也得到过举世的赞美与殊荣。

接下来，就让我们在阅读中了解这位女诗人，以及她眼中的the art of losing。

The art of losing

［1］ELIZABETH BISHOP did not like to give much away about herself. While others were writing confessional poetry, she ensured that she wrote at a distance. Poems which in original drafts mentioned characteristics of a lover were revised, sometimes as many as 17 times, in order to make the final work as polished and as impersonal as possible. She was a lesbian who never publicly admitted to the term, even as younger gay poets in the 1970s embraced it (partners were friends or even a “secretary”). She was an alcoholic who was ashamed of her drinking, but never sought long-term treatment. Poetry was a way of "thinking with one’s feelings”, but those feelings were often obscured, hidden within a parenthesis or written from the perspective of someone very different from herself. This is why she makes a fascinating subject for a biographer.

confessional：忏悔室，（教堂内的）告解室;忏悔的; 自白的; “confession”的派生;

impersonal：没有人情味的; 非个人的，和个人无关的; 不具人格的，一般性的; [语] 非人称的;非人称动词; 非人称代名词; 不具人格的事物;

lesbian：女同性恋的; 莱斯博斯岛的;女同性恋者; 莱斯博斯岛人;

alcoholic：酒精的，含酒精的；酒精中毒的;酗酒者，酒鬼; 酒精中毒者;

obscured：使…模糊不清，掩盖(obscure的过去式和过去分词);[例句]The veil she was wearing obscured her features.她罩的面纱遮掩了她的面容。

parenthesis：圆括号;插入语;插入成分;间歇;[例句]In parenthesis, I'd say that there were two aspects to writing you must never lose sight of.插一句，关于写作，我认为有两个方面你绝不能忽视。

biographer：传记作者;[例句]She's a successful novelist and biographer.她是一个成功的小说家和传记作家。

伊丽莎白·毕肖普不愿意交待太多自己的事。当其他人都在写自白诗时，她却坚持自己和写出的诗保持距离。初版里提到情人特征的诗都会被修订17次之多，为了保证最终版本尽可能的完美和无关乎个人。她是一个女同性恋，但未曾公开承认过。即使是20世纪70年代，更年轻的同性恋诗人公开拥抱着另一半（伴侣是朋友甚至是一个“秘书”）的时候。她是一个为自己的贪饮而深感羞愧的酗酒者，但一直没有寻求长期治疗。诗歌是一种“用情感思考”的方式，但是那些情感常常被掩盖，隐藏在一个括号里，或是写自与她自己非常不同的视角。这也是为什么她对于传记作者来说非常有吸引力。

［2］ “A Miracle for Breakfast”, the first full-length biography in two decades, ably manages to bring Bishop to life. Megan Marshall, who was taught by the poet at Harvard in 1976, recalls how she could seem prim and aunt-like to her students: “a grimmer, grayer, possibly even smaller woman than I’d remembered…dressed smartly but uncomfortably” Yet beneath this prim veneer of control was a rich, turbulent personality. Bishop herself was aware of the contrast, writing to one lover while she was teaching at the University of Washington in 1966: “Everyone treats me with such respect and calls me Miss B—and every once in a while I feel a terrible laugh starting down in my chest…how different I am from what they think, I’m sure.”

ably：巧妙地; 熟练地; 精明强干地; 灵巧地;[例句]He was ably assisted by a number of other members.他得到其他一些成员的鼎力相助。

prim：整洁的; 循规蹈矩的;（人）一本正经;循规蹈矩地，整洁地;[例句]On her blonde wavy hair, the white hat looked nicely prim.这顶白色的帽子戴在她金色的卷发上显得非常雅致。

grim：冷酷的，残忍的; 严厉的; 阴冷的; 可怕的，讨厌的;[例句]They painted a grim picture of growing crime他们描绘了犯罪率上升的严峻情形。

veneer：饰面，护面; 外饰，虚饰; 表层饰板; 薄木片;胶合; 给…镶以饰片; 虚饰，粉饰; 镶盖;

turbulent：骚乱的，混乱的; 激流的，湍流的; 吵闹的; 强横的;[例句]They had been together for five or six turbulent years of rows and reconciliations他们在一起生活了五六年，一直吵吵闹闹，分分合合，没有片刻安宁。

给早餐的一个奇迹，二十年来第一部长篇传记，巧妙地把毕肖普带到生活中。1976年在哈佛大学师从这位诗人的摩根·马歇尔回忆她对于她的学生来说她看起来如何整洁，像阿姨一样：比我记忆的更加严厉，更加苍白，更小的女人，穿得很精致但不舒服。但是在这严谨之下，是一个丰饶动荡的性子。毕肖普自己知道这种反差，1996年当她在华盛顿大学教书时，给一个恋人的信中这样写：每个人都非常尊敬我，，叫我毕小姐，每次我想放声大笑时，就觉得，我和他们以为的样子是多么不同啊，我敢保证。”

［3］Bishop’s past was indeed more complicated than many knew, even those close to her. Ms Marshall has had access to a previously unknown trove of letters that Bishop wrote to her psychiatrist and to various lovers, which became available after the death of her executor and last lover, Alice Methfessel, in 2009. These depict an unsettled, unhappy childhood. When Bishop was just three her mother was hospitalised for mental illness. She was brought up by a series of relatives. One uncle molested her and was violent, grabbing her by the hair and dangling her over of the railing of a second-floor balcony. “Maybe lots of people have never known real sadists at first hand,” Bishop later wrote to her psychiatrist. “I got to thinking that they [men] were all selfish and inconsiderate and would hurt you if you gave them a chance.”

trove：（物主不明的）发掘出来的金银财宝;[例句]This Islington shop is a treasure trove of beautiful bridalwear.这家位于伊斯灵顿区的商店里汇聚了各种漂亮的新娘服装。

psychiatrist：精神病医生; 精神病专家，精神病医生;

executor：遗嘱执行人; 执行者; 实行者;

molest：妨害; 骚扰，干扰; 调戏，（对女性）动手动脚;

dangle：悬荡，垂着摆动; 尾随，追逐;使摇晃地挂着或摆荡; 悬而未定;[例句]A gold bracelet dangled from his left wrist一只金手镯在他的左手腕上晃来晃去。

balcony：阳台; 包厢; （电影院等的） 楼厅，楼座;[例句]She led us to a room with a balcony overlooking the harbour她把我们领进了一个带阳台的房间，从那里可以俯瞰海港。

sadist：（性）施虐狂者;

inconsiderate：轻率的; 不替别人着想的; 不体谅别人的; 考虑不周的;

毕肖普的过去实际上比很多人知道的更复杂，即使是那些和她很亲近的人。马歇尔女士已经接触到了之前不为人知的信件，这些信件是毕肖普写给她的心理咨询师和不同的情人的，这些信件在2009年她的遗嘱执行人和她最后一个爱人爱丽丝·梅思费塞尔死后流传出来的。这些信描述了一个居无定所的不幸童年。当毕肖普仅仅三岁时，她的母亲就因为精神问题住院了。她是被许多不同的亲戚抚养长大的。一个叔叔猥亵她，非常残暴，曾抓着她的头发并将她吊在二楼阳台栏杆上。“也许许多人从没和性虐狂直接接触过”，毕肖普不久写给她的精神医生说：我开始认为他们都很自私，不体谅别人，只要你给他机会就会伤害你。

［4］Bishop’s adult life was no less tumultuous. A man she briefly dated committed suicide a year after she rejected his marriage proposal. He sent her a postcard as a suicide note: “Elizabeth, Go to hell.” One of her lovers managed to crash a car carrying Bishop and one of her friends (whom she was also in love with); Bishop and her lover were fine, but her friend, who had been a painter, lost her arm and could not paint again. Bishop often drank herself into a stupor, starting “the hour before dawn” and sometimes continuing even until she was hospitalised. Her partner of over a decade, Lota de Macedo Soares, a Brazilian self-taught landscape designer, overdosed after a breakdown partly caused by Bishop’s infidelity.

tumultuous：骚乱的; 吵闹的; 狂暴的; 激烈的;

stupor：昏迷; 恍惚; 目光呆滞; 惊愕;[例句]He fell back onto the sofa in a drunken stupor他烂醉如泥，瘫倒在沙发上。

overdosed：使…用药过量(overdose的过去式和过去分词);[例句]The city, he concluded, had overdosed on design.他的结论是这座城市过分重视规划设计了。

infidelity：无信仰; 不忠实; 不贞的行为;[例句]George ignored his partner's infidelities乔治对伴侣的不忠行为视而不见。

毕肖普的成人生活也很混乱。一个她短期约会过的男人，在她拒绝他的求婚的一年后自杀身亡。他给她送了一张明信片作为自杀信条：“伊丽莎白，下地狱去吧。”她的一个情人撞车了，车上带着她和她的一个朋友（也是一个她爱的人）；她和她的爱人没事，但是她的朋友，原本是个画家，失去了她的胳膊再也不能画画了。毕肖普常常喝的不省人事，从“黎明前的那一刻”甚至到她住院时。她的伴侣，一个巴西的自学成才的景观设计师，由于毕肖普不忠而崩溃服药过量。

［5］Ms Marshall’s skill prevents this narrative from becoming depressing. The Bishop that emerges from her telling may be at times morose or ashamed of her drinking (wishing, as she wrote to Methfessel, that she could be more like writers who “drink worse than I do, at least badly & all the time, and don’t seem to have any regrets or shame—just write poems about it”). But she also appears vivacious, attractive and full of life. Even the worst heartbreak brought out wonderful poetry, such as her most famous poem, “One Art”, which starts: “The art of losing isn’t hard to master;/so many things seem filled with the intent/to be lost that their loss is no disaster.”

narrative：故事; 记叙文; 叙述，记事; 叙述手法;叙述的，叙事体的; 善于叙述的;

morose：闷闷不乐的，阴郁的;

vivacious：活泼的，快活的;快活地，活泼地;

马歇尔女士的写作技巧使这篇故事不那么沉闷。她的讲述中出现的毕肖普有时闷闷不乐或因酗酒而羞愧（像她写给爱人的信中提到，毕肖普希望自己能更像那些“比我喝的更严重，至少很沉迷，或者一直，没有任何羞愧——只是写相关的诗”）的诗人。但这个毕肖普也显得活泼，迷人，充满活力。即使是最糟糕的心碎也带来了美妙的诗歌，就像她最著名的诗歌《一种艺术》所描绘的：“失去这种艺术并不难掌握；这么多事物似乎充满被丢失的意图，那失去它们也就不算灾祸”。

［6］Three relationships in particular illuminate a lighter side to Bishop: her time with Soares in Brazil, which inspired some of her finest work (“Hidden, oh hidden/in the high fog/the house we live in,/beneath the magnetic rock…”); her later years with Methfessel; and her friendship with Robert “Cal” Lowell, the one other writer with whom she immediately felt at ease.

illuminate：照亮，照明; 阐明，说明; 装饰; 使灿烂;照亮;[例句]No streetlights illuminated the street这条街上没有照明的路灯。

三段关系对毕肖普而言比较轻松：她和索尔斯在巴西的日子，激励了她一些最好的作品（躲了又躲，隐藏在高高的雾里，我们栖居的房子，上边是磁性的岩石……）她接下来几年和梅思费塞尔在一起的日子，和她和罗伯特·罗威尔的友谊——另一位能让她感到轻松自在的作家。

［7］Bishop first met Lowell in 1947 at a dinner party in New York. They stayed in touch for the rest of their lives, writing over 400 letters to one another. Lowell supported her and helped her find grants and postings, and praised her work. He carried around a poem of hers in his wallet as a talisman. They were so different; Lowell wrote hundreds of confessional poems, often quoting from other people’s letters to him.

postings：任命，委派(posting的名词复数);

talisman：护身符; 法宝; 驱邪物; 有不可思议的力量之物;

毕肖普是在1947年纽约一次晚餐上首次遇到罗威尔的。他们余生一直保持联系，彼此来信有400多封。罗威尔支持帮助她查找基金和任命，并表扬了她的作品。他总是随身带着她的一首诗在钱包里作为护身符。他们是如此的不同，罗威尔写了几百首自白诗，常常引用别人写给他的信中的话。

［8］The relationship between the two is one of the joys of this book. As Ms Marshall puts it: “Elizabeth would always remember the younger poet’s endearingly ‘rumpled’ dark-blue suit and the ‘sad state of his shoes’ on the night of their first meeting, how handsome he was despite needing a haircut, and, most of all, ‘that it was the first time I had ever actually talked with someone about how one writes poetry’.”

endearingly：讨人喜欢地;[例句]Rather endearingly, Mr Goh admitted he did not quite know what people wanted.有点可爱的是，吴作栋承认，他不太清楚人们的需求。

rumpled：弄皱，使凌乱(rumple的过去式和过去分词);

这两人的关系是这本书一个趣味所在。就像马歇尔女士所说：“伊丽莎白将会永远记住第一次见面的晚上，年轻诗人穿的讨人喜欢的皱巴巴的深蓝西装和脏脏的鞋子，虽然没有理发但是依然各种帅气，还有最重要的是他是第一个她可以真正讨论如何写诗的人。”

［9］Ms Marshall intersperses chapters about Bishop with chapters of memoir, which touch upon her time as Bishop’s student. This gives the biography a sense of authenticity, but it interrupts the flow of the narrative. It also seems in sharp contrast with her intensely private subject. But this is a small price to pay for a biography which at last illuminates one of America’s finest, and most elusive, poets.

intersperse：点缀; 散布，散置;

memoir：回忆录，自传; 记事录;

Authenticity：可靠性，确实性，真实性;[例句]The entire production evinces authenticity and a real respect for the subject matter整部作品表现出真实性以及对主题的真正尊重。

elusive：难以捉摸的; 不易记住的; 逃避的; 难以找到的;

马歇尔女士 的回忆录散布有关于毕肖普的章节，当她还是毕肖普学生的那段时间。这给了传记真实感，但它打断了叙事的流程。这也与她强烈的私人话题形成鲜明对比。但是对于一部记录了美国最优秀的也最难以捉摸的诗人之一的传记，这点代价实在是太微不足道了。

当毕肖普写下失去是一种艺术，是不是想着自己半生的坎坷，幼年流离，疾病缠身，感情周折，也许，她把这些痛苦的经历都看作对自己的磨练，那独特的灵魂从中升腾起来，化到诗中流传于世，这就是the art of losing。

英文原文：

http://www.economist.com/news

讲解：霞姐 / Tiassa / Angel

编排 / 校对：Angel

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