『譯作 · THE LIMNER』

画匠（节选）

[英] 朱利安·巴恩斯

译 / 顾忆青

（译文）

维兹华斯开始关心起顾客对他说的话了。虽然在他看来这很重要，但他始终没让自己的视线离开画笔。他指着一本装订像样的笔记本让顾客把话写下来。这本子里记着的都是那些曾经被画像的人褒贬不一的留言，有些倒是挺明智，有些则显得很愚蠢。他也可能会随手翻到一页，就让顾客写下适当的意见。一旁已经写有过去某个顾客的留言，那可能是五年甚至十年以前的事了。迄今为止，这个征税员的留言最无新意可言，就如同他马甲上那些中规中矩的纽扣，更别提有趣了。幸运的是，画这个马甲，维兹华斯可是收费的，然而满足顾客的额外要求则不一样了。当然，事实要复杂得多。他画马甲、假发和马裤的时候，其实就是按照顾客的要求画的——确切地说，画的是整个身体。马甲和马裤将他下半身画了出来，假发和帽子则勾勒出下面的脑袋。在某些情况下，这只是一种夸张的画法，随便哪个脑袋其实都一样。

（原文）

The Limner
(Excerpt)

by Julian Barnes

From the edge of his eye, Wadsworth became aware that his client had spoken, but he did not divert his gaze from the tip of his brush. Instead he pointed to the bound notebook in which so many sitters had written comments, expressed their praise and blame, wisdom and fatuity. He might as well have opened the book at any page and asked his client to select the appropriate remark left by a predecessor five or ten years before. The opinions of this customs collector so far had been as predictable as his waistcoat buttons, if less interesting. Fortunately, Wadsworth was paid to represent waistcoats, not opinions. Of course, it was more complicated than that: to represent the waistcoat, and the wig, and the breeches, was to represent an opinion—indeed, a whole corpus of them. The waistcoat and breeches showed the body beneath, as the wig and hat showed the brain beneath—though, in some cases, it was a pictorial exaggeration to suggest that any brains lay beneath.

◎ 关于作者：Julian Barnes

朱利安·巴恩斯（1946-），英国后现代主义作家。自1980年以来，他就跻身于英国80年代最具影响力的作家群之列，他和马丁·艾米斯（Martin Amis）、伊恩·麦克伊万（Ian McEwan，《赎罪》的作者）一道成为当代英国文坛的佼佼者。他下笔极有灵气，睿智过人，文字俏丽圆熟，技艺炉火纯青。凭借其《福楼拜的鹦鹉》（Flaubert's Parrot, 1984）、《英格兰，英格兰》（England, England, 1998）、《亚瑟与乔治》（Arthur & George, 2005），巴恩斯三度冲击“布克奖”；他还曾获得“杰弗里·费伯纪念奖”、“福斯特奖”、“古腾堡奖”、“莎士比亚奖”及法国“美第契外国作品奖”（1986）和“费米娜外国小说奖”（1992）。

◎ 延伸阅读：

The Limner by Julian Barnes
(from The New Yorker, January 5, 2009 )