第8章 惠特曼和狄金森
8.1 复习笔记
I. Brief Introduction（简介）
Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson were two major poets in the late 19th century. The two are of entirely different visions, styles and personalities.
沃尔特·惠特曼和艾米莉·狄金森是19世纪后期两位主流诗人。这两位诗人的视野、风格和个性迥异。
Whitman desired to be a public poet and confidently addressed the public in his poetry, while Dickinson was private to the extent of being a recluse.
惠特曼渴望成为一位公众诗人，并信心满满地将自己的诗歌向大众宣传，而狄金森则选择成为一位隐士。
The greatness of both poets is well established today and they prove to be the genuine precursors to the most serious modem American poetry.
如今，两位都被认为是伟大的诗人，并且认为是当代美国严肃诗歌真正的先驱。
II. Walt Whitman (1819-1892) （沃尔特·惠特曼）
1．Life（生平）
Whitman was born in 1819 in West Hill, Long Island, into a humble Quaker family. The family moved to Brooklyn in 1822. Whitman did not have too much of a formal education but primarily taught himself by reading and writing and by learning from life. He began working as an office boy at the age of 11. When he was older, he served in various editorial capacities for newspapers in the New York area. Twice he interrupted his editorial work to teach school.
1819年，惠特曼出生在长岛西山的一个贵格会教徒家庭里。1822年，他们搬往布鲁克林。惠特曼没有接受太多正规教育，但是他自学读写，善于从生活中学习。11岁时，他开始成为一位办公室勤杂工。当他大一点时，他为纽约的一些报社做编辑。期间，他曾两次停止编辑工作在学校教书。
When the Civil War began, he worked as a “wound dresser” in a military hospital. In 1873, he suffered a paralytic stroke and moved to New Jersey where he was taken good care of by his friends and where he spent the remaining years revising his Leaves of Grass.
内战开始后，惠特曼在战地医院做看护员。1873年，他患半身不遂迁至新泽西，在那儿得到朋友的照顾，他继续修订《草叶集》直至去世。
2．Themes（主题）
(1) He shows concern for the whole hard-working people and the burgeoning life of cities.
他关注辛勤劳动的人民和迅速发展的城市生活。
(2) He advocates the realization of the individual value. Most of the poems in Leaves of Grass sing of the “en-masse” and the self as well.
他提倡个体价值的实现。《草叶集》中大部分的诗作不仅歌颂了全体，还有个体。
(3) Pursuit of love and happiness is approved of repeatedly and affectionately in his lines. The individual person and his desires must be respected.
他的诗行中不断深情地赞颂对爱和幸福的追求。作为个体的人和他的欲望应受尊重。
(4) Some of Whitman’s poems are politically committed. Before and during the Civil War, Whitman expressed much mourning for the sufferings of the young lives in the battlefield and showed a determination to carry on the fighting dauntlessly until the final victory. Later, he wrote down a great many poems to air his sorrow over the death of Lincoln, and one of the famous is “When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d.”
惠特曼的一些诗中有坚定的政治立场。诗中他向在战场上遭受痛苦的年轻生命表达哀思，并展示了坚持无畏战斗直至最后胜利的决心。之后，他写下了很多诗表达对林肯遇刺的悲痛，其中著名的一首为《当紫丁香最近在庭院开放》。
3．Writing style（写作风格）
(1) Whitman broke free from the traditional iambic pentameter and wrote “free verse”, that is, poetry without a fixed beat or regular rhyme scheme.
惠特曼打破了五步抑扬格的传统，并创作“自由体”诗歌，也就是没有固定韵律的诗歌。
(2) There is a strong sense of the poems being rhythmical. Parallelism and phonetic recurrence at the beginning of the lines contribute to the musicality of his poems.
惠特曼的诗歌有很强的节奏感，诗行前几句排比和语音重复使他的诗歌颇具音乐美感。
(3) Most of the pictures he painted with words are honest, undistorted images of different aspects of America of the day.
他用语言描述的大部分画面都是反映美国社会当时各个方面的真实景象。
(4) Whitman’s language is relatively simple and even rather crude. Another characteristic in Whitman’s language is his strong tendency to use oral English. Whitman’s vocabulary is amazing. He would use powerful, colorful, as well as rarely-used words.
惠特曼语言相对简单朴实，甚至十分粗犷，另一个特点是口语化。惠特曼词汇惊人，他总能用有力的、生动的、别人不常用的语言。
4．Influence（影响）
Whitman’s influence over modern poetry is great in the world as well as in America. Whitman has been compared to mountain in American literary history. For his innovations in diction and versification, his frankness about sex, his inclusion of the commonplace and the ugly and his censure of the weakness of the American democratic practice—these have paved his way to a share of immortality in American literature.
惠特曼对美国甚至世界当代诗歌产生了深远的影响。惠特曼被比作美国文学历史上的高山。他在措辞和诗律方面的创新、对性这一话题的坦率、诗作中反映有平凡和丑陋的题材、以及他对美国民主弊端的指责，都为他在美国文学上的不朽地位奠定了基础。
Whitman’s poetry also made a huge impact on Chinese new poetry in the May Fourth Movement, especially on Guo Moruo.
惠特曼的诗歌也对中国五四运动时的新诗产生了巨大影响，尤其影响了郭沫若的诗歌。
5．Major works（主要作品）
Leaves of Grass
《草叶集》
“Song of Myself”
《自我之歌》
“The Poet”
《诗人》
“When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d”
《当紫丁香最近在庭院开放》
“O Captain, My Captain”
《哦，船长，我的船长》
“I Hear America Singing”
《我听到美国在唱歌》
“There was a Child Went Forth”
《有一个孩子向前走去》
“Out of Cradle Endlessly Rocking”
《从永久摇荡的摇篮里》
Two Riverlets
《两条小河》
Drum Traps
《桴鼓集》
6．Appreciation of Works（选读作品）
◆“Song of Myself” （《自我之歌》）
Whitman extols the ideals of equality and democracy and celebrates the dignity, the self-reliant spirit, and the joy of the common man, “Song of Myself” reveals a world of equality, without rank and hierarchy.
惠特曼赞美了平等和民主的理想，赞美了人的高尚、自力更生的精神和普通人的快乐。《自我之歌》呈现了一个没有阶层和等级的平等的世界。
◆“I Sit and Look Out” （《坐观世间》）
It reveals the sorrows and miseries of the world which deeply shock the poet’s heart. The last line “See, hear, and am silent” shows the poet’s attitude towards this sorrowful world, which we can understand in two ways: on the one hand, the poet has no idea about these sorrows and he can only see, hear, and keep silent; on the other hand, although these sorrows seem to be overwhelming, the poet still cherishes hopes and believes that people can go through.
诗歌揭示了深深震撼诗人心灵的世间的苦难和悲惨。最后一行“我眼看，耳听，沉默不语”表明了诗人对世间疾苦的态度，可以有两种理解：一方面，诗人对世间苦难束手无策，只能看、听、保持沉默；另一方面，虽然这些苦难异常深重，诗人仍怀有希望，相信人类能够战胜。
III. Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) （艾米莉·狄金森）
1．Life（生平）
Emily Dickinson was born in Amherst, Massachusetts and lived there all her life. Emily attended Amherst-Academy and South Hadley Female Seminary (known today as Mount Holyoke College). After she turned 26 and after her father’s death, Emily lived the life of a recluse in Amherst.
艾米莉·狄金森出生在马萨诸塞州的艾摩斯特市，并一生生活在那里。艾米莉曾就读于艾摩斯特学院和南哈德利女神学院（现在的曼荷莲学院）。当她26岁，父亲去世后，艾米莉便在艾摩斯特市过着隐居生活。
Emily was in frail health most of her life and she died of Bright’s disease.
艾米莉时常身体虚弱，她因布赖特氏病去世。
2．Themes of Writing（写作主题）
(1) Based on her own experiences, joys or sorrows, she writes about doubt and belief about religious subjects, suffering and frustration caused by love, success and failure.
基于她个人的经历，喜与悲，她的诗歌是关于宗教主题的疑惑和信仰，爱情中的痛苦和挫折，成功与失败。
(2) The largest portion of Dickinson’s poetry concerns death and immortality. For Dickinson, death leads to immortality.
狄金森的大部分诗歌是关于死亡与永生的。对狄金森来说，死亡导向永生。
(3) Dickinson sees nature as both gaily benevolent and cruel.
狄金森认为自然是仁慈并冷酷的。
(4) On the ethical level, Dickinson holds that beauty, truth and goodness are ultimately one.
从道德层面上讲，狄金森认为真善美是合而为一的。
(5) She emphasizes free-will and human responsibility.
她强调自由意志和人类责任。
3．Styles（风格）
(1) The visual appearance of her poems: short phrases and words separated and joined by dashes. It is such pauses that create a highly individualized and flexible rhythm and convey the poet’s vision.
艾米莉诗歌的视觉外观是：短语和词语被分开并由破折号连接。这种间断产生了一种高度个性化和灵活的韵律，表达了诗人的视野和见地。
(2) Her poetry abounds in telling images. In the best of her poems, every word is a picture. So she is regarded as the precursor of Imagism poetry.
她的诗歌充满各种意象。在她最出色的诗歌中，每一个词都是一幅画。所以她被视作意象派诗歌的先驱。
(3) Her poetic idiom is noted for its conciseness, directness and plainest words.
她的诗风简明、直接，善用最平易的词。
(4) Dickinson’s poems are usually short, and the first line of Dickinson’s poems is used to be the title.
狄金森的诗歌通常篇幅较短，第一句往往是诗歌的题目。
(5) The capital letters in her poems are used for emphasis.
诗歌中大写的词均用做强调。
4．Major Works（主要作品）
“The Soul selects her own Society”
《心灵选择自己的友伴》
“My life closed twice before its close”
《我的生命在结束之前已结束了两次》
“Because I could not stop for Death”
《因为我不能等待死神》
“I heard a fly buzz when I died”
《我死时听到了苍蝇的嗡嗡声》
“Mine—by the Right of the White Election”
《我的——根据白色选举的权利》
“Wild Nights—Wild Nights”
《狂风夜——狂风夜！》
“Death is a Dialogue between”
《死是一场对话》
“I died for Beauty—but was scarce”
《我为美而死》
5．Appreciation of Works（作品赏析）
◆ “I taste a liquor never brewed” （《我品尝味酿之酒》）
The “liquor” in this poem refers to nature, by which the poet is very fascinated and enchanted. Dickinson uses the metaphor or intoxication to express how the beauty of nature cheers her up.
诗中的“美酒”是指令诗人如痴如醉的大自然。狄金森使用隐喻手法通过描写醉酒状态表达了振奋人心的大自然之美。
◆“I felt a Funeral, in my Brain” （《在脑海，我感受到了——葬礼》）
This poem shows the poet’s mind state in a very obvious and concrete way.
诗歌清晰、具体地显示了诗人的思想状态。
◆“A Bird came down the Walk—”（《一只鸟儿停在道上——》）
It is a keen observation of the poet when she sees the bird on the road and she tries to feed it some crumb, but it has some kind of fear and flies away.
当诗人看到一只鸟儿在路边时，仔细观察了它，并试图喂食面包屑，但是鸟儿却感到了惊吓飞走了。
◆“I heard a fly buzz— when I died—”（《我听到苍蝇的嗡嗡声——当我死时——》）
It depicts the subtle and sensitive feelings and thought of the speaker at the moment of dying.
诗歌描写了主人公弥留之际细致、敏感的情感和思想。
◆“Because I could not stop for Death—”（《因为我不能等待死神——》）
In this poem, Dickinson reveals the theme of the poem by describing death and immortality in the dominate metaphor of a carriage on a journey.
诗中狄金森将死亡和永恒隐喻为旅程中的马车，揭示了诗歌的主题。