小说开篇,前几段的第一句:
”The town itself is dreary; not much is there except the cotton-mill, the two-room houses where the workers live, a few peach trees, a church with two coloured windows, and a miserable main street only a hundred yards long. … …
If you walk along the main street on an Augest afternoon there is nothing whatsoever to do. … …
However, here in this very town there was once a cafe. … …
The place was not always a cafe. … …
With all things which could be made by the hands Miss prospered. … …
It was towards midnights on a soft quiet evenning in April. …. …
One of the twins, who had been looking down the empty road, was the first to speak. ‘I see something coming,’he said.
… …
在小说行云流水般描述到Miss Amelia爱上Cousin Lymon时,穿插了一段极其精彩的爱情议论,表面解释这段感情的合理性,实则阐述了作者Carson McCullers对于爱情中爱者与被爱者的理解。
”First of all, love is a joint experience between two persons – but the fact that it is a joint experience does not mean that it is a similar experience to the two people involved. There are the lover and the beloved, but these two come from different countries. Often the beloved is only a stimulus for all the stored-up love which has lain quiet within the lover for a long time hitherto. And somehow every lover knows this. He feels in his soul that his love is a solitary thing. He comes to know a new, strange loneliness and it is this knowledge which makes him suffer. So there is only one thing for the lover to do. He must house his love within himself as best he can; he must create for himself a whole new inward world – a world intense and strange, complete in himself. Let it be added here that this lover about whom we speak need not necessarily be a young man saving for a wedding ring – this lover can be man, woman, child or indeed any human creature on this earth.
首先,爱情是发生在两个人之间的一种共同的经验——不过,说它是共同的经验并不意味着它在有关的两个人身上所引起的反响是同等的。世界上有爱者,也有被爱者,这世界人不同的两种人。往往,被爱者仅仅是爱者心底平静的蕴积了许久的那种爱情的触发剂。每一个恋爱的人都多少知道这一点。他在灵魂深处感到他的爱恋是一种很孤独的感情。他逐渐体会到一种新的、陌生的孤寂,这是这种发现使他痛苦。因此,对于恋爱者来说只有一件事可做。他必须尽可能深的把他的爱情禁锢在心中;它必须为自己创造一个全新的内心世界——一个认真地、奇异的、完全为他单独拥有的世界。……
Now, the beloved can also be any description. The most outlandish people can be the stimulus for love. A man may be a doddering great – grandfather and still love only a strange girl he saw in the streets of Cheehaw one afternoon two decades past. The preacher may love a falllen woman. The beloved may be treacherous, grasyheaded, and given to evil habits. Yes, and the lover may see this as clearly as anyone else – but that does not affect the evolution of his love one whit. A most mediocre person can be the object of a love which is wild, extravagant, and beautiful as the poison lilies of the swamp. A good man may be the stimulus for a love both violent and debased, or a jabbering madman may bring about in the soul of someone a tender and simple idyll. Therefore, the value and quality of any love is determined solely by the lover himself.
至于被爱者,也可以是任何一种类型的人。……是的,恋爱者也能像别人一样对一切认识得清清楚楚——可是这丝毫也不影响他的感情的发展。……因此,任何一次恋爱的价值与质量纯粹取决于恋爱者的本身。
It is for this reason that most of us would rather love than be loved. Almost everyone wants to be the lover. And the curt truth is that, in a deep secret way, the state of being beloved is intolereable to many. The beloved fears and hates the lover, and with the best of reasons. For the lover is for ever trying to strip bare his beloved. The lover craves and possible relation with the beloved, even if this experience can cause him only pain.”
正因如此,我们大多数人都宁愿爱而不愿被爱。几乎每一个都愿意充当恋爱者。道理非常简单,人们朦朦胧胧的感到,被人爱的这种处境,对于许多人来说,都是无法忍受的。被爱者惧怕而且憎恨爱者,这也是有充分理由的。因为爱者总是想把他的所爱者剥的连灵魂都裸露出来。爱着疯狂的渴求与被爱者发生任何一种可能的关系,总是这种经验只能给他自身带来痛苦。
小说结尾处,再次回到“是的,小镇是很沉闷的。”呼应开头。“艾米利亚小姐的屋子向右倾斜的更厉害了,彻底倒塌仅仅是一个时间的问题。”似乎预示着结局的悲惨,她再也等不回李蒙表哥了,虽然爱他,但他却没有交待地爱上了她的前夫马文·马西。主旨凸显的是麦卡勒斯式的主题:孤独是绝对的,最深切的爱也无法改变人类最终极的孤独。绝望的孤独与其说是原罪,不如说是原罪的原罪。也就正如《心是孤独的猎手》中,在辛格的心中,只想着他在精神病院里的安多那波利。
两篇小说中均没有交待他和他,她和他是如何相爱的,也许只能相信那句俗语爱是不需要理由的。艾米利亚小姐和辛格都属于爱者,李蒙表哥和安多那波利则是被爱者。爱者都是毫无保留的全心全意地爱着,而被爱者则是心安理得索取,“无法接受或回报他人的爱”,而后突然一走了之,李蒙表哥是跟马文·马西跑了,安多那波利是毫无征兆的死了。被爱者解放了,而爱者受尽彻骨的孤独。
That was how Miss Amelia was left alone in the town. the people would have helped her if they had known how, as people in this town will as often as not be kindly if they have a chance. … …
Miss Amelia let her hair grow ragged, and it was turning grey. … …
When anyone mentioned the hunchback she would say only this: … …
For three years she sat out on the front steps every night, alone and silent, looking down the road and waiting. But the hunchback never returned. … …
Yes, the town is dreay. On August afternoons the road is empty, white with dust, and the sky above is bright as glass. … …