Myparentsownedsixbooksbetweenthem

1、My parents owned six books betweenthem. Two of those were Bibles and thethird was a concordance to the Old andNew Testaments. The fourth was TheHouse At Pooh Corner. The fifth, TheChatterbox Annual 1923 and the sixth,MaloryMorte dArtliur.I found it necessary to smuggle books inand of the house and I

2、 cannot claim toomuch for the provision of an outside toiletwhen there is no room ofenesown. It wason the toilet that I first read Freud and D H Lawrence, and perhaps that was thebest place, after all. We kept a rubbertorch hung on the cistern, and I had todivide my money from a Saturday job,between

3、 buying books and buyingbatteries. My mother knew exactly howlong her Ever Readys would last if usedonly to illuminate the hap that separatedthe toilet paper from its .Once I had tucked the book back downmy knickers to get it indoors again, I findsomewhere to hide it, and anyone with asingle bed, st

4、andard size, and paperbacks,standard size, will discover that seventyseven can be accommodated per layerunder the mattress. But as my collectiongrew, I began to worry that my mothermight notice that herdaughterbed wasrising visibly. One day she did. Sheburned everything.I had been brought up to memo

5、rize verylong Bible passages, and when I left homeand was supporting myself so that I couldcontinue my education, I fought offloneliness and fear by reciting .In thefuneral parlor I whispered Donne to theembalming fluids and Marvell to thecorpses. Later, I found thatTennysonsLdy of Shalott had a soo

6、thing,because rhythmic, effect on the mentallydisturbed. Among the disturbed Inumbered myself at that time.The healing power of art is not a rhetoricalfantas y. Fighting to keep language,language became my sanity and mystrength .It still is, and I know of no painthat art cannot assuage. For some, mu

7、sic,for some, pictures, for me, primarily,poetry, whether found in poems or inprose, cuts through noise and hurt, opensthe wound to clean it, and then graduallyteaches it to heal itself. Wounds need tobe taught to heal themselves.The psyche and the spirit do not share theinstinct of damaged bod y. H

8、ealing isautomatically triggered nor is dangerusually avoided. Since we put ourselvesin the way of hurt it seems logical to putourselves in the way of healing. Art hasmore work to do than ever before but itcan do that work .In a self-destructivesociety like our own, it is unsurprisingthat art as a h

9、ealing force is despised. Formyself, when I returned to my to myborrowed room night after night, andthere were my books, I felt relief andexuberance, not hardship and exhaustio n.I intended to avoid the fate of Jude theObscure, although a reading of that bookwas a useful warning. What I wanted didno

10、t belong to me by right and whilst itcould not be refused tome in quite sameway, we still have subtle punishments foranyone who insists on what they are andwhat they want. Walled inside the littlespace marked out for by family and class,it was the limitless world of imaginationthat it possible for m

11、e to scale the sheerface of other peopleassumptions. Insidebooks there is perfect space and it isthat space which allows the reader toescape from the problems of gravity.By Jeanette Winterson藝術與生命我父母兩人共有六本書。其中兩本是圣 經(jīng)、第三本是新舊約用語索引、第四本 是噗噗熊街角的屋子(The House atPooh Corner)、第五本是1923年話 匣子年鑒(The Chatterbox 19

12、23 Annual),而第六本是馬洛禮(Malory) 的 阿瑟王之死 (MortdArthur)。我發(fā)現(xiàn)有必要把書偷運進岀家里，而且 沒有屬于自己的房間時，對于于屋外廁 所的供應品，我不能要求太多。我第一 次讀到弗洛依德和D.H.勞倫斯，是坐 在馬桶上的，而或許，那終究是最佳之 處。我們在馬桶水箱上懸吊了一個橡膠 手電筒，而我必須將周六那份工作賺來 的錢，平分花在買書和買電池上面。我 母親清楚知道，她那些永備牌電池，如 果光是用來照明區(qū)分衛(wèi)生紙和其功能的 空隙，能夠維持多久。有一回我又把書塞在內(nèi)褲里，好帶進屋 里。我必須找個地方把書藏起來，而任 何人，若擁有一張單人床，標準尺寸的, 以及平裝

13、書籍，標準尺寸的，就會發(fā)現(xiàn), 床墊底下每一層可容納七十七本。不過 當我的收集品增加時，便開始擔心母親 會注意到，用眼睛就看得出女兒的床正 逐漸升高。有一天她真的發(fā)現(xiàn)了。她全.我成長過程中， 必須背下很長的圣 經(jīng)段落。到我離開家庭，自己賺錢以便 繼續(xù)求學時，便靠背誦來抵擋寂寞和恐 懼。在殯儀館里，我稍稍對著防腐香料 液念約翰？多恩（Donne）、對著尸體 念安德魯？馬維爾（Marvel）。后來，我 發(fā)現(xiàn)丁尼生（Tennyson）的夏洛特（“Ladyof Shalott”，因為有節(jié)焰感, 對于心智失衡者具有一種安撫作用。在 那個時候我把自己也算在失衡者之列。藝術的療愈力量并非夸大其詞的幻想。 我奮

14、力留住語言，語言因而讓我心智正 常，具有力量。到現(xiàn)在仍是如此，而且 我所知道的痛苦，無一不透過藝術而得 到舒緩。對某此人來說，是音樂，另一 些人，是繪畫，對我來說，是主要的是， 不論岀現(xiàn)在詩歌或散文中，詩能夠切穿 嘈雜和傷痛，將傷口打開以清理之，然 后逐漸教導它自我療愈。心靈和精神不像受損了的身體具有一種 本能。療愈不會自動給引發(fā)， 而危險也 通常無以避免。既然我們會讓自己受傷， 那么讓自己得到療愈也是合乎邏輯的。 比起以往任何時候，藝術要做更多的工 作，但是這份工作它是做得來的。像我 們這樣一個自我毀滅的社會里，藝術之 為一種療愈的力量，會受到鄙視，并不 令人感到訝異。對我自己來說，夜復一夜回到借來的房 里時，我感到放心且滿溢，而非