多年前,当我有了“人生中,不断有人向我迎面走来,不断有人与我擦肩而过”的感慨后,我开始认真思考起“友谊”来。有人抱怨这个社会变得越来越冷漠,而人与人之间的关系也越来越“实在”。其实,对此状况,我们自己有着不可推卸的责任。任何关系,无论是亲情、爱情,还是友谊,都需要双方去维系。当你向他人索要“真诚”时,先扪心自问,你付出“真诚”了吗?
我庆幸自己至今仍拥有着好几个知心好友,我们相约见面时根本不会去计算时间成本和交通成本,我们交往时也根本不会去考虑对方是否有“利用价值”,我们用尽所有方式“纠缠”对方,分享着彼此的一切喜怒哀愁。他们,是我这一辈子的珍宝。
如培根所言,“得不到友谊的人将是终身可怜的孤独者。没有友情的社会则只是一片繁华的沙漠。”
这是一篇你不该错过的好文。
——Lavender
文字难度：★★★☆
When I was 17 years old, I had the honor of being the youngest person in the history of New York Hospital to undergo surgery for a 1)herniated 2)disc. The day after my surgery, I awoke to find a friend of mine sitting in a chair across from my bed. I don’t remember much about his visit. I am sure I was too 3)sedated to say much. But I will not forget that he visited me on that day, and sat there for I know not how long, while my humanity was in the care of a morphine drip.
17岁那年,我因为椎间盘突出在纽约医院动了手术,因而“荣幸地”成为了这家医院历史上做这类手术的最年轻的病人。那天做完手术后,我醒来时发现我的一个朋友正坐在床对面的一张椅子上。对于他的来访,我记不起更多的细节。我确信,当时因为注射了镇静剂,我没怎么说话。但我不会忘记那天他来看望过我,我在打着吗啡点滴,他就在那里守着,坐了不知有多久。
The official 4)discourses of our relations with one another do not have much to say about the afternoon my friend spent with me. Our age, what we might call the age of economics, is 5)in thrall to two types of relationships which reflect the lives we are encouraged to lead. There are consumer relationships, those that we participate in for the pleasure they bring us. And there are entrepreneurial relationships, those that we invest in hoping they will bring us some return. In a time in which the discourse of economics seeks to hold us in its grip, this should come as no surprise.
我不太能用我们形容人与人之间关系的主流话语模式来谈论朋友陪我度过的那个下午。我们也许可以将身处的这个时代称为“经济学时代”,这个时代,人际关系园囿于两种类型,反映着其鼓吹的生活方式。一种是消费型关系,我们为其所带来的快乐而参与其中。另一种是投资型关系,我们投资于这种关系是希望获得回报。在这样一个经济学话语试图把我们牢牢掌控的时代里,这一切来得很正常。
6)Aristotle thought there were three types of friendship: those of pleasure, those of usefulness, and true friendship. In friendships of pleasure, “it is not for their character that men love 7)ready-witted people, but because they find them pleasant.” In the latter, “those who love each other for their utility do not love each other for themselves but 8)in virtue of some good which they get from each other.” For him, the first is characteristic of the young, who are focused on momentary enjoyment, while the second is often the province of the old, who need assistance to cope with their frailty. What the rise of recent public 9)rhetoric and practice has accomplished is to 10)cast the first two in economic terms while forgetting about the third.
亚里士多德认为友谊的类型有三种:为求愉悦的、为得裨益的,以及真正的友谊。在寻求愉悦之友谊中,“我们会喜欢机灵的人,不是欣赏他们的性格,只是觉得他们讨人喜欢。”而在第二种友谊中,“人们因为对方有用处才心生好感,而非喜欢对方本身,他们爱的是从彼此身上获得的某些好处。”对亚里士多德而言,第一类友谊为年轻人所特有,他们关注短暂的快乐,而第二类友谊常常发生在老年人身上,他们垂老病弱,需要别人帮助应付这种状况。最近兴起的舆论和行为所“成就”的是将前两种友谊换以经济学术语来表述,却遗忘了第三种友谊。
In our lives, however, few of us have entirely forgotten about the third—true friendship. We may not define it as Aristotle did—friendship among the already virtuous—but we live it in our own way nonetheless. Our close friendships stand as a challenge to the 11)tenor of our times.
然而,在我们的生活中,几乎没有人全然忘记了第三种——真正的友谊。我们也许不会像亚里士多德如此定义——本性善良的人之间的友谊——但我们用自己的方式发展和维系这种友谊。我们的亲密友谊挑战着这个时代的主流人际关系。
Conversely, our times challenge those friendships. This is why we must reflect on friendship; so that it doesn’t slip away from us under the pressure of a dominant economic discourse. We are all, and always, creatures of our time. In the case of friendship, we must push back against that time if we are to sustain what, for many of us, are among the most important elements of our lives. It is those elements that allow us to sit by the bedside of a friend: not because we know it is worth it, but because the question of worth does not even arise.
反过来,我们的时代也挑战着那些真正的友谊,这也是我们要反思友谊的原因,为的是不让真正的友谊在强势的经济话语的压力下从我们身边溜走。我们所有人始终是时代的产物。就友谊而言,如果我们要继续持有生活中这些对我们大多数人而言最重要的元素,就必须逼退那股潮流。正是因为那些元素,我们才会坐在一个朋友的床边:不是因为我们知道这么做值得,而是因为我们根本不会去想“值不值”这个问题。
There is much that might be said about friendships. They open up new interests or deepen current ones. They offer us support during difficult periods in our lives. The aspect of friendship that I would like to focus on is its non-economic character. Although we benefit from our close friendships, these friendships are not a matter of calculable gain and loss. While we draw pleasure from them, they are not a matter solely of consuming pleasure. And while the time we spend with our friends and the favors we do for them are often 12)reciprocated in an informal way, we do not spend that time or offer those favors in view of the reciprocation that might 13)ensue.
论友谊,可以从方方面面谈起。友谊会激发新的兴趣,或是加深现有的兴趣。在我们生命的困难时期,友谊给予我们支持。对于友谊,我喜欢关注的方面在于其与利益无关的特点。虽然我们从亲密的友谊中获益,但这些友谊不能用“得失”来衡量。当我们从亲密的友谊中获得快乐,也不纯粹是在消费快乐。而我们和朋友们一块共度的时光,以及我们给予对方的帮助,常常以一种非正式的方式获得回报,但我们并非因为想到之后会获得回报才付出那些时间或是提供那些帮助的。
Friendships follow a rhythm that is distinct from that of either consumer or entrepreneurial relationships. Consumer pleasures are transient. They 14)engulf us for a short period and then they fade, like a drug. Entrepreneurship, when successful, leads to the victory of personal gain. We cultivate a colleague in the field or a contact outside of it in the hope that it will advance our career or enhance our status. When it does, we feel a sense of personal success. In both cases, there is the enjoyment of what comes to us through the medium of other human beings.
友谊的韵律明显不同于消费型关系或投资型关系。消费式的快乐是短暂的,那种快感一涌而上,只维持瞬间便消失,像毒品一般。投资要是成功,则会给我们带来个人收益。我们在业内培养同僚,或者是在业外拓展人脉,就是希望借此推进自己的事业,或是提升自己的地位。当目的达到时,我们获得了一种个人成功感。在这两种情况中,我们所获得的快乐都是藉由其他人作为媒介而获得的。
Friendships worthy of the name are different. Their rhythm lies not in what they bring to us, but rather in what we immerse ourselves in. To be a friend is to step into the stream of another’s life. It is, while not neglecting my own life, to take pleasure in another’s pleasure, and to share their pain as partly my own. Rather than the rhythm of pleasure followed by emptiness, or that of investment and then profit, friendships follow a rhythm that is 15)at once subtler and more persistent. It remains there, being part of the ground of our lives.
配得上“友谊”这名称的友谊则截然不同。其个中韵律不在于友谊能带给我们什么,而在于我们沉浸在什么当中。成为他人的朋友即踏入了他人生命的河流里。在没有忽略自己生活的同时,我们在真正的友谊中为别人的快乐感到快乐,并且在一定程度上把别人的痛苦视为自己的痛苦来分担。不同于空虚如影随形的那种快乐,也不同于先投资后收益的韵律,真正的友谊其韵律更微妙,也更持久。这韵律一直在那儿,是我们生活根基的一部分。
To be this ground, friendships have a relation to time that is16)foreign to an economic orientation. Consumer relationships are focused on the momentary present. It is what brings immediate pleasure that matters. Entrepreneurial relationships have more to do with the future. How I act toward others is determined by what they might do for me down the road. Friendships, although lived in the present and assumed to continue into the future, also have a deeper tie to the past than either of these. Past time is 17)sedimented in a friendship. It 18)accretes over the hours and days friends spend together, forming the foundation upon which the character of a relationship is built. This sedimentation need not be a happy one. Shared experience, not just common amusement or advancement, is the ground of friendship.
作为生活根基的一部分,友谊和时间之间有一种联系,而那些具有交易性的人际关系则与时间毫无关联。消费型关系聚焦于短暂的存在,看重的是能带来即时快乐的东西。投资型关系则与未来的联系更密切,我对他人的行为取决于他们将来可能会为我做些什么。友谊,尽管存在于当下,并且被假设为能延续到将来,但相比前面两种关系,它与过去的联系更为紧密。过去的时光在一段友谊里沉淀了下来。它存在于朋友们一起度过的时日,友谊的特性就是在这一日积月累的根基上建立起来的。这种沉淀并非必须是快乐的。不仅仅是一起嬉笑玩乐或并肩发展,共同经历人生才是友谊的基础。
We might say of friendships that they are a matter not of 19)diversion or of return but of meaning. They render us 20)vulnerable, and in doing so they add dimensions of significance to our lives that can only arise from being friends with this or that particular individual, a party to this or that particular life.
我们可以说友谊不是用来消遣或是获得回报的,而是有着深刻的含义。友谊让我们变得不能独善其身,而在此过程中又为我们的生活增添另一些层面的意义,而这只会在当你和这个或是那个特殊个体成为朋友,参与到这种或是那种特殊生活之时才会发生。
It is precisely this non-economic character that is threatened in a society in which each of us 21)is thrown upon his or her resources and offered only the22)bywords of ownership, shopping, competition, and growth. It is threatened when we are encouraged to look upon those around us as the stuff of our current enjoyment or our future advantage. It is threatened when we are led to believe that friendships without a recognizable gain are, in the economic sense, irrational. Friendships are not without why, perhaps, but they are certainly without that particular why.
在我们所处的社会里,人人都在自我拓展,换来的全是“拥有”、“购买”、“竞争”、“增长”这类概念的代名词,在这样的氛围下,备受威胁的正是友谊所包含的这种非交易性质。当我们被鼓励去把周围的人视作我们当下娱乐,或对将来有用处的东西时,友谊的这一特质受到了威胁;当我们被引导去相信看不见利益前景的友谊从经济学意义上来讲不理智时,友谊的非交易性也受到了威胁。也许,友谊并非没有目的性,但它们一定没有上述那些特殊目的。
In a world often ruled by the dollar and what it can buy, friendship, like love, opens other vistas. The critic 23)John Berger once said of one of his friendships, “We were not somewhere between success and failure; we were elsewhere.” To be able to sit by the bed of another, watching him sleep, waiting for nothing else, is to understand where else we might be.
在一个经常被金钱以及金钱的购买力所统治的世界里,友谊就像爱情一般,开启了一个个别样的境界。评论家约翰·伯格曾谈起他的一段友谊:“我们不在成功和失败之间的某处;我们在别处。”能坐在他人的床边,注视着他入眠,等待着却别无所求,就能理解我们还能在哪个“别处”。
