初看时我感觉他重新使用了很多中国三部曲的元素来描写埃及,比方《江城》中利用中文语言教材里面的词组来演示他对中国循序渐进的了解,在这里变成阿拉伯文的词组和埃及;比方《甲骨文》里陈梦家和各个古中国的考古遗址,青铜器,在这里变成尼罗河两岸国王谷里各种法老的墓穴,金字塔;比方《寻路中国》里面他自驾走长城访问逐渐萧条的小村庄和浙江的各种工厂,在这里变成自驾在尼罗河岸访问各种选举现场和一群中国生意人。本书中有他一直拿手的多线性的人物描绘,古今交汇的伸展挖掘,悲天悯人的处事态度,和幽默生动的矛盾细节。而他的语言,一如既往的优美简洁。读来让人口舌生香。
回头细品才发现虽然有很多面熟的元素,这书的结构其实跟中国三部曲很不一样。中国三部曲基本都是经纬交织,还是线性的。这本书则围绕着古埃及两种不同的时间定义来安排故事,结果其实是对这种时间的双重性进行了解析。而要解说这本书的结构,得先看一下古埃及对时间的这两种定义。
这几个段落写的可真好看啊!我抄得译得都心旷神怡。Ancient Egyptians had words for two different kinds of time: djet and neheh. These terms cannot be translated into English, and it may be impossible for them to be grasped by the modern mind. In our world, time is a straight line, and one event leads to another; the accumulation of these events, and the actions of the people who matter, are what make history. But for ancient Egyptians, time was not linear, and events - kheperut -- were suspect. They were oddities, distractions; they interrupted the world’s natural order. History did not exist as we would define it. The Egyptians were writing by 3300 BC, and they were still writing in 332 BC, when they were conquered by Alexander the Great, but across those three millennia they never produced anything that would be considered a work of history in the modern sense.
古埃及定义了两种不同的时间: djet 和 neheh。这两个词无法翻译成英文,现代人可能都无法理解它们。在我们的现代世界里,时间是线性的,事件有因果;事件的积累,重要人物的行为,组成了历史。但是对古埃及人来说,时间是非线性的,而事件-- kheperut --是不可信的。它们是意外,是干扰;它们打断了世界本来的节奏。我们定义出来的历史对他们来说不存在。古埃及人从公元前3300年就开始书写,一直写到公元前332年被亚历山大征服的时刻,但是在那横跨三千年的时光里,他们没有写出任何符合现代人定义的可以被叫做历史的东西来。
Neheh is the time of cycles. It’s associated with the movement of the sun, the passage of the seasons, and the annual flood of the Nile. It repeats; it recurs; it renews. Djet, on the other hand, is time without motion. When a king dies, he passes into djet, which is the time of the gods. Temples are in djet, as are pyramids, mummies, and royal art. The term is sometimes translated as “eternal,” but it also describes a state of completion and perfection. Something in djet time is finished but not past: it exists forever in the present.
Neheh 是一种循环的时空。它跟太阳的轨迹,季节的变换,和尼罗河每年都会发的洪水有关。它重复,再现,更新。Djet 则是静止的时空。当君王死去,他进入djet,神的时空。神殿,金字塔,木乃伊,皇室艺术都处于djet之内。有时 djet 被翻译成“永恒”,但是它同时还描述了一种终极完美状态。处于djet之内的事物已经完结但不会过去,它永远存在于当下。
The world that was created by the gods is not permanent. It’s an island, in the words of the Egyptologist Erik Hornung, “between nothingness and nothingness.” The place where we live will disappear. But ancient Egyptians weren’t obsessed with forecasting this future, just as they didn’t concern themselves with analyzing and replaying the past. Perhaps when time is non-linear, it’s easier to focus on today. Raymond Johnson, a scholar at the University of Chicago, has written that ancient Egyptians “saw normal time as a circle that described an endlessly repeating present.” Johson believes this to have been a natural response to the southern terrain. In his view, neheh was inspired by the cycles of the river valley, while djet reflected the desert’s timelessness. And the proximity of these radically different landscapes -- that abrupt transition from the Buried to the fields -- prepared Egyptians to envision time in two parts. Anywhere in Upper Egypt you can walk from eternity to now.
众神创造的世界并不是不变的。它是一座岛屿,用古埃及学者 Erik Hornung话来说,“存在于虚空与虚空之间。” 我们现在所处的世界会消失。但是古埃及人没兴趣预言这样的未来,也不会费神分析或者重新演绎过去。也许当时间是非线性的时候,人们自然的更关注当下。芝加哥大学的学者Raymond Johnson曾经这样写,古埃及人“视时间为一个由不断重复的当下组成的圆。“ Johnson认为这是对南埃及地理状态的自然反应。在他看来,neheh 的定义是受到河谷周期的启发,而djet则反映了沙漠的永恒。如此极端不同的两种地貌被放在一处 -- 从阿比多思的沙漠到河谷田野的突然交接 -- 有助于古埃及人想象时间的二重性。 在上埃及的任何一处你都可以从永恒走进当下。
(未完待续)