Always On The Side of The Egg

耶路撒冷文學獎在二月的時候頒給了日本小說家村上春樹。

根據報導：「耶路撒冷文學獎創辦於1963年，每兩年頒發一次，意在表彰其作品涉及人類自由、人與社會和政治間關係的作家。往屆得主包括亞瑟‧米勒、蘇珊‧桑塔格、伯特蘭‧羅素、VS.奈波爾、J.M.柯慈、博爾赫斯、米蘭‧昆德拉、西蒙‧波娃、奧克塔維奧‧帕斯（Octavio Paz, 1914-1998，墨西哥詩人、散文家）和巴爾加斯‧略薩等人，皆為大名流。耶路撒冷書展在其官方網站上形容，村上乃「當代最偉大的作家之一」，其作品已被譯成40種語言，廣受嘉許，在以色列，他也是讀者最多的外國作家之一。該獎聲明讚揚了村上的藝術成就和「對人民的愛」，並稱：「他的人道主義清晰地呈現於其作品中。」第24屆耶路撒冷國際書展將於2月15日至20日舉行。村上春樹將於書展開幕當天在耶路撒冷國際會議中心受獎。」

村上獲獎是其次，我想說的是他在加薩發表的那場演講，以及中東加薩走廊地區的複雜背景，所引發出對生而為人的思考。

2008年底，中東加薩走廊爆發戰火，震驚世界。先是哈瑪斯組織12月24日對以色列南部進行猛烈攻擊，發射了六、七十枚火箭與迫擊砲，接著就是以色列27日開始的強力報復，一連五天空中攻擊，造成加薩傷亡逾千。這裡面的新仇舊恨錯綜複雜，操盤主導的當然是政治利益的角力，種族與宗教的神聖藉口不過是被操弄的工具。

村上演講的全文內容如下，有網友將其翻譯成了中文。值得一讀。

"Always on the side of the egg"  By Haruki Murakami

I have come to Jerusalem today as a novelist, which is to say as a professional spinner of lies.

Of course, novelists are not the only ones who tell lies. Politicians do it, too, as we all know. Diplomats and military men tell their own kinds of lies on occasion, as do used car salesmen, butchers and builders. The lies of novelists differ from others, however, in that no one criticizes the novelist as immoral for telling them. Indeed, the bigger and better his lies and the more ingeniously he creates them, the more he is likely to be praised by the public and the critics. Why should that be?

My answer would be this: Namely, that by telling skillful lies - which is to say, by making up fictions that appear to be true - the novelist can bring a truth out to a new location and shine a new light on it. In most cases, it is virtually impossible to grasp a truth in its original form and depict it accurately. This is why we try to grab its tail by luring the truth from its hiding place, transferring it to a fictional location, and replacing it with a fictional form. In order to accomplish this, however, we first have to clarify where the truth lies within us. This is an important qualification for making up good lies.

Today, however, I have no intention of lying. I will try to be as honest as I can. There are a few days in the year when I do not engage in telling lies, and today happens to be one of them.

So let me tell you the truth. A fair number of people advised me not to come here to accept the Jerusalem Prize. Some even warned me they would instigate a boycott of my books if I came.

The reason for this, of course, was the fierce battle that was raging in Gaza. The UN reported that more than a thousand people had lost their lives in the blockaded Gaza City, many of them unarmed citizens - children and old people.

Any number of times after receiving notice of the award, I asked myself whether traveling to Israel at a time like this and accepting a literary prize was the proper thing to do, whether this would create the impression that I supported one side in the conflict, that I endorsed the policies of a nation that chose to unleash its overwhelming military power. This is an impression, of course, that I would not wish to give. I do not approve of any war, and I do not support any nation. Neither, of course, do I wish to see my books subjected to a boycott.

Finally, however, after careful consideration, I made up my mind to come here. One reason for my decision was that all too many people advised me not to do it. Perhaps, like many other novelists, I tend to do the exact opposite of what I am told. If people are telling me - and especially if they are warning me - "don't go there," "don't do that," I tend to want to "go there" and "do that." It's in my nature, you might say, as a novelist. Novelists are a special breed. They cannot genuinely trust anything they have not seen with their own eyes or touched with their own hands.

And that is why I am here. I chose to come here rather than stay away. I chose to see for myself rather than not to see. I chose to speak to you rather than to say nothing.

This is not to say that I am here to deliver a political message. To make judgments about right and wrong is one of the novelist's most important duties, of course.

It is left to each writer, however, to decide upon the form in which he or she will convey those judgments to others. I myself prefer to transform them into stories - stories that tend toward the surreal. Which is why I do not intend to stand before you today delivering a direct political message.

Please do, however, allow me to deliver one very personal message. It is something that I always keep in mind while I am writing fiction. I have never gone so far as to write it on a piece of paper and paste it to the wall: Rather, it is carved into the wall of my mind, and it goes something like this:

"Between a high, solid wall and an egg that breaks against it, I will always stand on the side of the egg."

Yes, no matter how right the wall may be and how wrong the egg, I will stand with the egg. Someone else will have to decide what is right and what is wrong; perhaps time or history will decide. If there were a novelist who, for whatever reason, wrote works standing with the wall, of what value would such works be?

What is the meaning of this metaphor? In some cases, it is all too simple and clear. Bombers and tanks and rockets and white phosphorus shells are that high, solid wall. The eggs are the unarmed civilians who are crushed and burned and shot by them. This is one meaning of the metaphor.

This is not all, though. It carries a deeper meaning. Think of it this way. Each of us is, more or less, an egg. Each of us is a unique, irreplaceable soul enclosed in a fragile shell. This is true of me, and it is true of each of you. And each of us, to a greater or lesser degree, is confronting a high, solid wall. The wall has a name: It is The System. The System is supposed to protect us, but sometimes it takes on a life of its own, and then it begins to kill us and cause us to kill others - coldly, efficiently, systematically.

I have only one reason to write novels, and that is to bring the dignity of the individual soul to the surface and shine a light upon it. The purpose of a story is to sound an alarm, to keep a light trained on The System in order to prevent it from tangling our souls in its web and demeaning them. I fully believe it is the novelist's job to keep trying to clarify the uniqueness of each individual soul by writing stories - stories of life and death, stories of love, stories that make people cry and quake with fear and shake with laughter. This is why we go on, day after day, concocting fictions with utter seriousness.

My father died last year at the age of 90. He was a retired teacher and a part-time Buddhist priest. When he was in graduate school, he was drafted into the army and sent to fight in China. As a child born after the war, I used to see him every morning before breakfast offering up long, deeply-felt prayers at the Buddhist altar in our house. One time I asked him why he did this, and he told me he was praying for the people who had died in the war.

He was praying for all the people who died, he said, both ally and enemy alike. Staring at his back as he knelt at the altar, I seemed to feel the shadow of death hovering around him.

My father died, and with him he took his memories, memories that I can never know. But the presence of death that lurked about him remains in my own memory. It is one of the few things I carry on from him, and one of the most important.

I have only one thing I hope to convey to you today. We are all human beings, individuals transcending nationality and race and religion, fragile eggs faced with a solid wall called The System. To all appearances, we have no hope of winning. The wall is too high, too strong - and too cold. If we have any hope of victory at all, it will have to come from our believing in the utter uniqueness and irreplaceability of our own and others' souls and from the warmth we gain by joining souls together.

Take a moment to think about this. Each of us possesses a tangible, living soul. The System has no such thing. We must not allow The System to exploit us. We must not allow The System to take on a life of its own. The System did not make us: We made The System.

That is all I have to say to you.

I am grateful to have been awarded the Jerusalem Prize. I am grateful that my books are being read by people in many parts of the world. And I am glad to have had the opportunity to speak to you here today.

當我們看到媒體在報導雙方的政治或武力衝突時，其實應該看看還有一群手無寸鐵的巴勒斯坦人民過著什麼樣的生活，不然就會只看見媒體上所報導的誰先攻擊誰，誰不得不以強大的武裝回擊對方的表面戲碼。

如果追根究柢加薩走廊地區的衝突根源，會發現其實當時的歐美強權才是這場戲的始作俑者。除了中東地區以外，東歐、非洲地區的宗教種族衝突其實也跟歐美的帝國主義脫不了關係。而現在倒好了，這些強權們扮演起仲裁者的角色，當時貪婪的爛攤，現在卻以維持世界秩序的正義角色出現。說穿了，要是沒有影響到自己國家的利益，誰管加薩走廊打得你死我活。

重點是受苦的巴勒斯坦人民呢?

總是要站在弱勢的一方...。


對於加薩走廊的歷史恩仇，當時在中國時報以及苦勞網上有一篇精簡的評論。轉貼如下，或許能對這歷史衝突的背景有些許了解。

2009/01/05 中國時報

《國際專欄》巴勒斯坦人權 日暮途遠

   周世瑀    英國雪菲爾大學博士生

　　以色列自上周空襲加薩警察局、大學、清真寺、醫院已遭成三百八十人死亡，其中多數為平民（見下圖，歐新社）。公元二千年迄今，僅二十三名以色列人死於哈瑪斯火箭攻擊。自十二月二十八日起，英國已有超過十個主要城市抗議加薩屠殺。每日皆有約三千人群集倫敦以色列使館示威抗議。在一月三日當天將有超過二十個英國城市同步示威。

　　台灣媒體常將六日戰爭視為「忍辱求全」的以色列和「強橫」阿拉伯國家衝突的論述起點。此一論述和真實面貌天差地遠。第一次世界大戰結束前的巴勒斯坦（即現今以色列和約旦）原為鄂圖曼土耳其帝國轄境。鄂圖曼帝國戰敗領土遭英法朋分後，巴勒斯坦為大英帝國託管。

　　一九二一年英國為鞏固勢力範圍重劃巴勒斯坦領土。英國先以約旦河為界建立東岸附庸國外約旦，後協助猶太人遷入巴勒斯坦為日後猶太附庸國奠基。錫安主義（Zionism）領袖為建立猶太國家，遂以「無人之境歸屬無國之人」號召猶太移民。

　　錫安主義領袖不時挑釁阿拉伯人，並視世居巴勒斯坦之阿拉伯人為蠻夷，導致兩方積怨日深。在美國強力運作下，英國將巴勒斯坦問題交由聯合國決議。聯合國於一九四七年建議將巴勒斯坦分設比鄰而立之兩國，分由猶太人和阿拉伯人治理。百分之五十六之巴勒斯坦領土劃歸猶太人。兩國各有猶太人和阿拉伯人散居其中。

　　以色列學者帕裴（Ilan Pappe）曾指出，錫安主義者為盡去阿拉伯人，於一九四八年立國之時，發動種族淨化戰爭以屠戮以色列國境內的巴勒斯坦人。此難即阿拉伯語之浩劫（Nakba）。倖存的七十五萬巴勒斯坦人遂成難民，流離轉徙於以色列鄰國。以色列經此一役兼併百分之七十八之巴勒斯坦領土。聯合國安理會於同年之一九四號決議案要求以色列承認阿拉伯人返鄉之權（right of return）。但以色列對聯合國決議全然置若罔聞。

　　一九九三年以巴雙方簽定奧斯陸和平協議後，以色列加速於約旦河西岸擴張殖民地以絕巴勒斯坦人建國之念。以色列以一百二十個殖民地及近七百個軍事檢查站棋布於約旦河西岸。一百二十個殖民地皆為無償強制徵收占領區巴勒斯坦人房舍田地而來。約旦河西岸大城希伯蘭即為以色列蠶食領土的顯例。五百名持衝鋒槍的「屯民」聚居希伯蘭城，日日暴力滋擾巴勒斯坦人。四千名以國士兵挨家挨戶生事作耗。以色列坦克更於城內夜以繼日穿街走巷。數以千計的希伯蘭巴勒斯坦人因不堪其擾遠離家園。

　　從公元二○○二年六月迄今，以色列在約旦河西岸內建構綿延七百二十一公里長的（八公尺）高牆。即阿拉伯人所謂的種族隔離牆。該建築的長度為以色列和約旦河西岸邊界長度之二倍。

　　種族隔離牆連接星羅於約旦河西岸的一百二十個以色列殖民地，該建築不旦鯨吞約旦河西岸近四成的土地，更將約旦河西岸村鎮支離成上百個互不接壤的「群島」。以色列各處殖民地之猶太屯民可於高牆內的屯民專用公路直達地中海的台拉維夫，沿途未須遇一阿伯人。七百二十一公里種族隔離牆行經之處若同摧枯拉朽。阿拉伯人田地房舍皆遭以色列無償徵收，無一倖免。國際法庭於二○○四年裁定該建築違反國際法。

　　以色列自二○○五年後雖未屯兵加薩，然而仍掌控加薩邊境、領海、領空、水電基礎設施。為迫使哈瑪斯彈盡糧絕、棄械投降，以色列自二○○七年末起封鎖加薩邊界並對境內一百五十萬人集體斷水、斷 電，並斷絕人道救援物資、醫藥物資。加薩鄰海，然而以色列不容巴勒斯坦人捕魚為生。食物短缺造成加薩百分之九十的兒童營養不良或貧血。

　　覆巢無完卵，人權非天賦。常隨英美起舞的台灣媒體應思考孤軍頑抗的「基本教義派」哈瑪斯究竟是「恐怖分子」，或是「自由鬥士」？