理查德·福特朗读约翰·契弗

这是《纽约客》杂志的虚构类播客。

This is the fiction podcast from the New Yorker magazine.

我是《纽约客》的虚构编辑黛博拉·特雷曼。

I'm Deborah Treasman, fiction editor at the New Yorker.

在我们的第一期播客中，我们邀请了小说家兼供稿人理查德·福特从《纽约客》的档案中挑选一篇故事。

For our first podcast, we asked novelist and contributor Richard Ford to choose a story from the New Yorker archives.

他选了约翰·契弗的一篇非常短的小说，名为《重聚》。

He chose a very short story by John Cheever called Reunion.

这篇小说最初发表于1962年10月27日的《纽约客》期刊。

It was first published in the 10/27/1962 issue of the New Yorker.

我们问理查德，他为什么选择这篇故事。

We asked Richard why he chose this story.

从某种意义上说，它堪称短篇小说的完美典范——在我看来，它极为简洁，却蕴含了丰富的内容，仅凭这一点就让我深深喜爱。

It's such a perfect specimen of a short story in a sense by being, in my view, so economical and yet has so much packed into itself that I just loved it for that alone.

但此外，契弗的故事让我明白，如果你把场景设在中央车站的候车大厅，任何事情都可能发生，任何两个人都可能相遇。

But also, what Cheever's story made clear to me was that if you set something in the in the concourse of Grand Central Station, you could plausibly have anything happen, any two people meet.

我们不仅请理查德挑选了一个故事，他还会为我们朗读它。

Not only did we ask Richard to choose a story, he's also going to read it for us.

之后我们会稍微讨论一下这个故事。

We'll talk about the story a little bit afterwards.

但首先，让我们听理查德·福特朗读约翰·契弗的短篇小说《重聚》。

But first, let's hear Richard Ford read John Cheever's short story, Reunion.

我最后一次见到我父亲是在中央车站。

The last time I saw my father was in Grand Central Station.

我正从阿迪朗达克的祖母家前往母亲租下的科德角小屋，我写信告诉父亲，我会在纽约换乘时停留一个半小时，问他是否能和我一起吃午饭。

I was going from my grandmother's in the Adirondacks to a cottage on The Cape that my mother had rented, and I wrote my father that I would be in New York between trains for an hour and a half and asked if we could have lunch together.

他的秘书回信说，他会中午在信息台接我，结果十二点整，我就看见他穿过人群走来。

His secretary wrote to say he would meet me at the information booth at noon, and at 12:00 sharp, I saw him coming through the crowd.

他对我来说像个陌生人。

He was a stranger to me.

我母亲三年前和他离婚了，此后我就再没和他在一起过。

My mother divorced him three years ago, and I hadn't been with him since.

但一看到他，我就感觉到他是我的父亲，我的骨肉，我的未来，也是我的宿命。

But as soon as I saw him, I felt that he was my father, my flesh and blood, my future, and my doom.

我知道，等我长大后，我会变得和他很像。

I knew that when I was grown, I would be something like him.

我不得不在他的局限之内规划我的人生。

I would have to plan my campaigns within his limitations.

他是个高大英俊的男人，再次见到他，我感到无比开心。

He was a big good looking man, and I was terribly happy to see him again.

他拍了拍我的背，握了握我的手。

He struck me on the back and shook my hand.

嗨，查理，他说。

Hi, Charlie, he said.

嗨，孩子。

Hi, boy.

我想带你去我的俱乐部，但它在六十几街。

I'd like to take you up to my club, but it's in the sixties.

如果你要赶早班车，我想我们最好在这附近吃点东西。

And if you have to catch an early train, I guess we'd better get something to eat around here.

他把手搭在我肩上，我闻到了父亲的味道，就像母亲嗅着玫瑰一样。

He put his arm around me, and I smelled my father the way my mother sniffs a rose.

那是一种浓郁的混合气味：威士忌、须后水、鞋油、羊毛制品，还有成熟男性特有的体味。

It was a rich compound of whiskey, aftershave lotion, shoe polish, woolens, and the rankness of a mature male.

我希望能有人看到我们在一起。

I hoped that someone would see us together.

我多么希望我们能拍张照片。

I wished that we could be photographed.

我想要一些证据，证明我们曾经在一起过。

I wanted some record of our having been together.

我们走出车站，拐进一条侧街，来到一家餐馆。

We went out of the station and up a side street to a restaurant.

时间还早，店里空无一人。

It was still early and the place was empty.

调酒师正在和一个送货男孩争吵，厨房门口有一位穿着红色制服的年迈侍者。

The bartender was quarreling with a delivery boy, and there was one very old waiter in a red coat down by the kitchen door.

我们坐下后，我父亲用很大的声音招呼侍者。

We sat down, and my father hailed the waiter in a loud voice.

服务员，他喊道。

Kellner, he shouted.

伙计，到阁楼来。

Garcon, come at the attic.

你。

You.

他在空荡荡的餐厅里如此喧闹，显得格格不入。

His boisterousness in the empty restaurant seemed out of place.

这儿能给我们一点服务吗？

Could we have a little service here?

他大喊道。

He shouted.

快点，快点。

Chop, chop.

然后他拍了拍手。

Then he clapped his hands.

这引起了侍者的注意，他慢悠悠地走到我们的桌子旁。

This caught the waiter's attention, and he shuffled over to our table.

你是在朝我拍手吗？

Were you clapping your hands at me?

他问。

He asked.

冷静点。

Calm down.

冷静点，侍酒师，我父亲说。

Calm down, Sommelier, my father said.

如果不太麻烦的话，如果这不算过分的话，我们想要两杯Beefeater吉布森鸡尾酒。

If it isn't too much to ask of you, if it wouldn't be too much above and beyond the call of duty, we would like a couple of Beefeater Gibsons.

我不喜欢被人拍手，服务员说。

I don't like to be clapped at, the waiter said.

我该带上我的口哨的，我父亲说。

I should have brought my whistle, my father said.

我有一个口哨，只有老服务员能听见。

I have a whistle that is audible only to the ears of old waiters.

现在拿出你的小本子和小铅笔，看看能不能记清楚。

Now take out your little pad and your little pencil and see if you can get this straight.

两杯Beefeater吉布森。

Two Beefeater Gibsons.

跟我重复一遍。

Repeat after me.

两杯Beefeater吉布森。

Two Beefeater Gibsons.

我想你最好去别处，服务员轻声说。

I think you'd better go somewhere else, the waiter said quietly.

我父亲说，这是他听过的最聪明的建议之一。

That, my father said, is one of the most brilliant suggestions I've ever heard.

来吧，查理。

Come on, Charlie.

我们赶紧离开这儿吧。

Let's get the hell out of here.

我跟着父亲离开了那家餐厅，进了另一家。

I followed my father out of that restaurant into another.

这次他没那么吵闹了。

He was not so boisterous this time.

我们的酒送来了，他盘问我关于棒球赛季的事。

Our drinks came, and he cross questioned me about the baseball season.

然后他用刀敲了敲空酒杯，又开始大喊起来。

Then he struck the edge of his empty glass with his knife and began shouting again.

侍者、酒保、服务员，你们能麻烦再给我们来两杯一样的吗？

Garcon, Kelner, Comerrieri, you, could we trouble you to bring us two more of the same?

这男孩多大了？

How old is the boy?

服务员问。

The waiter asked.

那，我父亲说，跟你他妈的没关系。

That, my father said, is none of your goddamn business.

对不起，先生，”服务员说，“我不能再给这男孩上酒了。

I'm sorry, sir, the waiter said, but I won't serve the boy another drink.

好吧，我有个消息要告诉你，我父亲说。

Well, I have some news for you, my father said.

我有个非常有趣的消息要告诉你。

I have some very interesting news for you.

这纽约可不止这一家餐厅。

This doesn't happen to be the only restaurant in New York.

街角新开了一家。

They've opened another on the corner.

来吧，查理。

Come on, Charlie.

他付了账，我跟着他离开了那家餐厅，进了另一家。

He paid the bill, and I followed him out of that restaurant into another.

这里的服务员穿着粉红色的夹克，像猎装一样，墙上挂满了马具。

Here, the waiters wore pink jackets like hunting coats, and there was a lot of horse tack on the walls.

我们坐下后，我父亲又开始大喊起来：猎队队长、出发吧，诸如此类的话。

We sat down, and my father began to shout again, Master of the hounds, tally ho, and all that sort of thing.

我们想要一点开胃酒，也就是两杯比布森·吉夫·伊特者。

We'd like a little something in the way of a stirrup cup, namely two bibson gif eaters.

两杯比布森·吉夫·伊特者？

Two bibson gif eaters?

服务员笑着问。

The waiter asked, smiling.

你他妈的清楚我要什么，我父亲生气地说。

You know damn well what I want, my father said angrily.

我要两杯牛肉干吉布森，快点上。

I want two beefeater Gibsons and make it snappy.

我那位公爵朋友告诉我，英格兰已经大不一样了。

Things have changed in jolly old England, so my friend the duke tells me.

咱们看看英格兰能拿出什么样的鸡尾酒来。

Let's see what England can produce in the way of a cocktail.

这可不是英格兰，服务员说。

This isn't England, the waiter said.

别跟我争，我父亲说。

Don't argue with me, my father said.

照我说的做就是了。

Just do as you're told.

我只是想让你知道你现在在哪儿，服务员说。

I just thought you might like to know where you are, the waiter said.

如果有什么是我无法容忍的，我父亲说，那就是无礼的仆人。

If there's one thing I cannot tolerate, my father said, it is an impudent domestic.

来吧，查理。

Come on, Charlie.

我们去的第四个地方是意大利餐厅。

The fourth place we went to was Italian.

博尼奥诺，我父亲说，佩尔法博雷，波扎米奥，阿韦雷，来一杯鸡尾酒，美国人，烈的，烈的，多放金酒，少放苦艾酒。

Bongiorno, my father said, perfabore, pozziamo, avere, do a cocktail, Americani, forti, forti, molto gin, poco vermoot.

我不懂意大利语，服务员说。

I don't understand Italian, the waiter said.

得了吧，我父亲说。

Oh, come off it, my father said.

你懂意大利语，而且你心里清楚得很。

You understand Italian, and you know damn well you do.

服务员离开了我们，去和领班说了话，领班走到我们的桌旁说：‘对不起，先生，这张桌子已经有人预订了。’

The waiter left us and spoke with the captain who came over to our table and said, I'm sorry, sir, but this table is reserved.

好吧，我父亲说。

Alright, my father said.

给我们另找一张桌子。

Get us another table.

所有桌子都已预订，船长说。

All the tables are reserved, the captain said.

我明白了，我父亲说。

I get it, my father said.

你们不希望我们光顾，是吗？

You don't desire our patronage, is that it?

那好吧，去你的吧，卑鄙又芬太尼。

Well, the hell with you then, vile and fentanyl.

走吧，查理。

Let's go, Charlie.

我得赶火车了，我说。

I have to get my train, I said.

对不起，桑尼，我父亲说。

I'm sorry, Sunny, my father said.

我非常抱歉。

I'm terribly sorry.

他伸出胳膊搂住我，把我紧贴在他身上。

He put his arm around me and pressed me against him.

如果还有时间去我的俱乐部，我就送你回车站。

I'll walk you back to the station if there'd only been time to go up to my club.

没关系，爸爸，我说。

That's all right, daddy, I said.

我给你买份报纸，他说。

I'll get you a paper, he said.

我给你买份报纸在火车上看。

I'll get you a paper to read on the train.

然后他走到报摊前，说：‘先生，您能行个好，给我一张你们该死的、没用的十美分下午报吗？’

Then he went up to a newsstand and said, kind sir, would you be good enough to favor me with one of your goddamn no good 10¢ afternoon papers?

那个小贩转过身去，盯着一本杂志的封面。

The crook turned away from him and stared at a magazine cover.

这要求过分吗，先生？

Is it asking too much, kind sir?

我父亲说。

My father said.

你卖我一份你这种令人厌恶的黄色新闻报纸，这要求过分吗？

Is it asking too much for you to sell me one of your disgusting specimens of yellow journalism?

我得走了，爸爸。

I have to go, daddy.

我说，已经晚了。

I said it's late.

等等，孩子，他说。

Now just wait a second, sonny, he said.

等等，再等一下。

Just wait a second.

我想激怒这家伙。

I want to get a rise out of this chap.

再见了，爸爸，我说。

Goodbye, daddy, I said.

我走下楼梯，赶上了火车，那是我最后一次见到我父亲。

And I went down the stairs and got my train, and that was the last time I saw my father.

这是理查德·福特朗读约翰·契弗的《重聚》，该作品最初发表于1962年的《纽约客》，可在《纽约客全集》DVD以及《约翰·契弗短篇小说集》中找到。

That was Richard Ford reading Reunion by John Cheever, which was originally published in The New Yorker in 1962 and can be found in The Complete New Yorker on DVD and also in the collection The Stories of John Cheever.

我是希帕·乌斯科科维奇。

I'm Shilpa Uskokovich.

我是杰西·泽普齐克。

And I'm Jesse Zepczyk.

我们是《Bon Appetit 烘焙俱乐部播客》的主持人。

And we're the hosts of the Bon Appetit Bake Club Podcast.

烘焙俱乐部是《Bon Appetit》的自信而好奇的烘焙爱好者社群。

Bake Club is Bon Appetit's community of confident, curious bakers.

杰西和我都喜欢烘焙。

Jesse and I love to bake.

有些人甚至会说我们有点偏执，但我们非常乐于谈论烘焙过程中所有的方法、原因以及那些不成功的地方。

Some might even call us obsessive, and we love to talk about all the hows and whys and what didn't works that come with it.

每个月，我们都会在bonappetit.com上发布一个食谱，介绍一个我们认为你应该了解的烘焙技巧。

Every month, we publish a recipe on bonappetit.com that introduces a baking concept we think you should know.

然后你去烘焙，把任何问题发给我们。

Then you'll bake, Send us any questions you have.

我们会在这里的播客中聚在一起讨论这个食谱。

And we'll get together here on the podcast to talk about the recipe.

所以，这是你正式的邀请。

So consider this your official invitation.

来加入

Come join the

BA烘焙俱乐部。

BA Bake Club.

每月第一个星期二上线新一期节目，各大播客平台均可收听。

New episodes on the first Tuesday of every month wherever you get your podcasts.

烘焙愉快。

Happy baking.

所以，理查德，你读过这个故事多少遍了？

So, Richard, how many times have you read that story?

哦，我大概读了三百遍吧。

Oh, I probably read it, oh, 300 times.

它直接启发了我写了一个故事，那个故事被《纽约客》刊登了，我称之为《重逢》，纯粹是对它的致敬。

It was the direct inspiration to a story that I wrote was The New Yorker published called which I called Reunion, just an homage to

我正想问你这个呢。

was gonna ask you about that.

你的故事里发生了什么？也许给那些最近没看过的人介绍一下？

What happened in your story, maybe for people who haven't seen it recently?

在我的故事里，一个男人在下班后步行回家，穿过车站时，瞥见了他曾经有过一段婚外情的女人的丈夫。

In my story, a man is walking home at the end of the work day through the station, and he spies the husband of a woman he has had a love affair with.

而那个丈夫是个曾经殴打过他的男人。

And the husband is a man who had cuffed him around and beaten him up.

我让这个讲故事的角色做了一件事：当他看到那个多年未见的人时，竟不由自主地走过去跟他说了些什么。

And what I made my character do, who speaks this story, is when he sees this man who he hasn't seen for a long time, he unaccountably walks over and says something to him.

这确实是一种非常不同的重逢。

That's a very different kind of reunion

非常不同。

Very much.

你的故事所探讨的正是这一点。

That your story deals with.

因为我以前在朗读自己那本《罪恶万千》中的故事时，总会先读契弗的故事，然后再读我的故事。

Because one of the things that I that I used to do when I was reading stories out of my own book, A Multitude of Sins, was I would read the Cheever story and then I would read my story.

在公开场合？

In public?

在公开场合。

In public.

是的。

Yeah.

是的

Yeah.

但这样做既是对契弗的致敬，让他不至于被我们忽视，也是为了强调一个故事如何真正影响另一个故事。

But both as an homage to Cheever who somehow must be kept from slipping out of our notice and also to bring attention to how one story can really influence another story.

你知道，在美国的批评法学中，'影响'这个词常被视为一个负面的词。

You know, in in in American critical jurisprudence, influence is thought to be kind of a nasty word.

如果你希望成为第一个写故事的人，那么每次你写一个故事时，它 somehow 总是不如它本该有的样子。

If you haven't if if you want the first person ever to write a story, every time you write one, it's somehow it's somehow not as good as it should be.

所以我只是想展示一下，读完故事后，我会跟听众们讨论这个话题。

So I wanted to just show and and then after I read the stories, would talk to the people about it.

我只是想展示一个故事如何影响另一个故事，同时激发它。

I wanted to just show how one story can influence another, and at the same time, inspire it.

观众们的反应如何？

How do the audiences respond?

嗯，他们非常喜欢契弗的故事。

Well, they love the Cheever story.

然后我总是告诉他们，我在读完契弗的故事之后读自己的故事有多勇敢，因为我的故事不是母语写的，所以

And then I always tell them how how brave I am to read my own story after I read the Cheever story about because mine is not native, so

他没有读你的重聚

he's not reading your reunion

是的。

Yes.

连同它一起？

With it?

是的。

Yeah.

是。

Was.

我觉得你说这个故事很紧凑很有意思，因为它可能只有一千字左右。

I I think it's interesting what you said about this story being compact because it's probably a thousand words.

大约。

About.

但它包含了上万字故事的素材

And it has the material of a 10,000 word story

天啊，这么早就开始了。

Damn so and early.

九千字都是未说出口的。

9,000 words are unspoken.

当我读到或听到这个故事时，这就是我的感受。

That's that's my feeling when I read this or listen to this.

我们不知道父母为什么离婚。

We don't know why the parents divorced.

我们不知道他为什么三年没见父亲，为什么这次给他打电话。

We don't know why he hasn't seen the father in three years, why he calls him this time.

所有这些都未说出口，这正是这个故事对我而言的精髓。

The fact that all of that is unspoken is what makes this story for me.

我不确定这是否

I don't know if that's

哦，我太喜欢了。

Oh, I love that.

我读这个故事时，完全不觉得契弗漏掉了什么。

I I can't think Cheever thought he was leaving anything out though when I read that story.

我认为契弗只是把最重要的部分写了出来，其余的都会被即时的戏剧性所涵盖。

I think that Cheever thought he was putting in only the most important bits and all the rest would be subsumed by the instant drama.

直到你这么说之前，我从未想过那些被省略的内容。

So I I, until you said that, never thought of all the things that were left out.

我只关注了那些确实存在的部分，而这其实只是同一枚硬币的两面。

I just thought of all the things that were there, which is just two sides of the very same coin.

这种类似俳句般的精炼风格，如今已经非常罕见了。

This kind of haiku like compactness is very rare now.

我不确定在契弗创作这类故事的时候，这种风格是否更普遍，这些故事是否属于当时已存在的某种形式。

I don't know if it was around more when Cheever was writing this kind of story, whether these stories were written, whether it was a sort of existing form that he was working with.

对他来说，这个篇幅相当不寻常。

It's a quite unusual length for him to have written in.

《大红书》中的大部分故事，也就是这些合集故事，都比这个故事长得多，也丰富得多。

Most of the stories in the Big Red Book, this this collected stories are are much longer, much more capacious than than this story is.

你知道，契弗在《纽约客》上发表了130篇故事，可以说是从三十年代一直到七十年代初最早的一批《纽约客》作家之一。

You know, Cheever published a 130 stories in the New Yorker and in a way became one of the early New Yorker writers from the thirties right on down into the into the early seventies.

甚至在他生前，他的作品就已经被人们视为理所当然了。

And even while he was alive, began to be taken for granted.

直到七十年代中期，他的合集故事由克诺夫出版社出版，人们才终于退后一步，看到这本大红书，意识到：天啊，这里有一位伟大的大师。

And it really wasn't until the middle seventies when his collected stories were published by Knopf that people finally stood back and saw this big red book and thought to themselves, my god, here was a great master.

是的。

Yeah.

我的意思是，作为一名小说编辑，如果你收到一篇一千字且写得很好的故事，你会非常高兴。

I mean, I feel for, you know, as a fiction editor, if you get a thousand word story that works, you're delighted.

这看起来就像他某天随手写下的一个完美小故事，恰好就凝练成了这样。

It seems like a story, a perfect little story that he just simply knocked off one day, and it just happened to crystallize as it did.

这并不是说他写完并草草完成之后，没有回头去打磨、修改、挤压、做所有你必须做的工作，但在我看来，它几乎就像一次完整的表达。

Which isn't to say that after he wrote it and knocked it off, he didn't go back and and scrub it and twist it and squeeze it and do all the things you have to do, but it seems to me to be almost one utterance.

非常感谢你，理查德。

Thank you very much, Richard.

很高兴，黛博拉。

Real pleasure, Deborah.

谢谢。

Thank you.

理查德·福特最新的小说《土地的传说》由克诺夫出版社出版。

Richard Ford's latest novel is the lay of the land out from Knopf.

你也可以在《纽约客》网站newyorker.com以及《纽约客》完整版DVD上找到他的故事《重聚》。

You can also find his story, Reunion, on the New Yorker website, newyorker.com, as well as on the complete New Yorker on DVD.

你正在收听来自《纽约客》杂志的虚构故事播客。

You've been listening to the fiction podcast from the New Yorker magazine.

我是黛博拉·特雷曼。

I'm Deborah Treisman.

感谢收听。

Thanks for listening.

由PRX出品。

From PRX.