2008年8月30日 星期六

「「德國之聲」親華」記者....

过去几天里,互联网上以及诸多中文媒体中,就本台工作人员张丹红展开讨论。有误报称,张已被解职。事实是:张女士作为德国之声中文广播部的编辑还在继续工作。

德国之声的工作人员作为他们广播对象地区问题的专家,在德国乃至国际媒体中,是屡被问津的访谈客人。张女士过去以其篇幅众多的报道,在德国之声内外,证明了自己的专业能力。

在她接受的为数不少的媒体访谈中,有一次她的一些表述和德国之声所秉承的主导理念不相符合。德国之声主导理念中,也包含为民主,自由和人权伸张的内容。

就这一事件,德国之声有义务调查外界提出来的种种相关指责。在如上调查结束前,惯常的一个做法是暂停针对公众的活动,其中也包括在话筒前的工作。这就是本台目前对张丹红一事的处理方式。


---*****

日前多家德國媒體批評說,北京奧運前夕,張丹紅在接受德意志電台採訪時為迫害人權的中共發表親共言論,並為中共禁 止「自由西藏」以及法輪功網站開脫稱,稱「在德國也不能打開兒童色情或極右翼黨派的網站」。由於張的言論張狂不實,德國之聲在德國政界與輿論的壓力下做出 了停止張丹紅播音的決定。

對此,中國問題專家司馬泰指出,中共喉舌在這裡顛倒黑白,公然造假把張丹紅被停止播音事件栽贓於法輪功學員和大紀元記者,用意險惡,目的是為了煽動民眾對法輪功的仇恨。

----

新華網駐柏林記者時翔在8月28日發表的一篇題為「「德國之聲」記者因「親華」被停職」的文章中聲稱:「本報記者26日與張丹紅本人取得聯繫,經她 證實,『德國之聲』電台26日下午對她召開了『批判會』,並正式通知她無限期停職反省。……」。在同一天,德國華人興辦的《歐覽新聞網》則報導;「該台廣 播中文部副主任張丹紅女士並未被停職,而只是暫時停止播音工作。德國之聲發言人說,張丹紅目前在德國之聲的網絡部擔任編輯工作,而這項工作的變動和德國之 聲原先的計劃有關。」歐覽同時證明「《德國之聲》內部針對張丹紅的所謂『批判會』也並不存在。」經本報核實,張丹紅目前還在《德國之聲》工作,只是正如本 報8月26日的報導所言,被要求暫時停止主持節目。

另據大紀元瞭解的情況,張丹紅在《德國之聲》的要求下目前不接受任何採訪,也並未接受過 新華網駐柏林記者時翔的採訪,時翔所寫的:「據張丹紅女士介紹,導致她遭受《德國之聲》電台封殺的直接原因,就是她在8月4日德意志廣播電台的一檔採訪節 目中客觀評價中國改革開放成就的言論,以及她理解中國政府禁止『藏獨』和『法輪功』網站的態度」,並非張丹紅本人所言。

煽動仇恨 嫁禍法輪功

在 北京奧運召開的前四天,張丹紅在接受德意志電台採訪時稱,中共在實現人權宣言第三條方面做出了「比世界上任何政治力量都要大的貢獻」。她為北京方面禁止 「自由西藏」以及法輪功網站開脫,並稱,「在德國也不能打開兒童色情或極右翼黨派的網站」。張丹紅的相關言論,引起了德國政界和媒體的批評。

李國鼎:我的台灣經驗—李國鼎談台灣財經決策的制定與思考


李國鼎照片集

歷史真的能有教訓嗎
所有人真能學習嗎
李國鼎講座應該不限定在"科技"
應該的研討會是他關心的議題之新意

台灣今後無法再造就這種 "老臣" "重臣" 和具有如此宏觀的經濟-財政-科技等領域之"通才"
所以不應該只是給青年人用"



一個人的能力是相當有限的
我到台灣大學圖書館看李國鼎先生捐贈的一批複印資料
說實在 可能乏善可陳

這本書的編輯 最大缺點是沒索引--必須有人物的和主題的
文句似沒有發揮去蕪存菁的作用
我讀"中國失生產力"等章節 發現容冗餘處多
有些句子被莫名其妙刪除....

李國鼎:我的台灣經驗—李國鼎談台灣財經決策的制定與思考
出版社 : 遠流
作者 : 李國鼎/口述,劉素芬/編著陳怡如/整理
出版日期 : 2005/09/01

‧內容簡介
李國鼎是台灣經濟奇蹟的推手與領航者,有「台灣財經建築師」的稱譽。他歷任重要財經首長,參與台灣的重大財經決策,提出許多開創性的前瞻觀點,包括十九點財經改革措施、獎勵投資條例、出口導向政策等,建立了具體而微的台灣經驗。

   李國鼎具有高度嚴謹的歷史意識,妥善保存許多史料,而且博聞強記、深思熟慮,實為闡述台灣經濟發展歷程的不二人選。他於1996年開始與歷史學者合作此 項財經經歷口述訪問計畫,歷經五十餘次訪談,並花費三年時間親自校閱訪問稿,甚至連2001年5月20日病倒的那天早晨仍然埋首於文稿中,使得這項前後費 時七年的記錄成果更顯珍貴。

  本書談到台灣財經決策的制定、思考與轉型之因應對策,以及培育人才的重要性、整頓國營事業與金融改革之道等,不僅重現台灣經濟奇蹟年代的決策過程,也絕對是現今經濟轉型階段的重要借鏡。

  此外,書中附加大量的注釋,詳細解讀訪談內容的歷史背景,並附列360位相關人物之簡歷,呈現台灣財經發展史的人、事脈絡,亦為本書最重要的特色。

2008年8月29日 星期五

胡光麃 Kuang-piao Hu

胡光麃著【波逐六十年 Living In A Turbulent Era】~ 香港: 新聞天地社出版
民53年1964/1976年7刷

中國工業建設的過程與世界工業進步所產生的影響/


胡光麃: 中國現代化的歷程(傳記文學出版社1981)


影響中國現代化的一百洋客 * 著者胡光麃 聯經總經銷 1992

世紀交遇兩千人物紀 * 著者 胡光麃 聯經總經銷 1992

旅臺叢文三百則 * 著者 胡光麃 聯經總經銷 1992
胡駿太史詩文選 * 著者 胡光麃 聯經總經銷 1992



臺灣歷史辭典 - 九畫 - 胡光麃
胡光麃 年代:1897.9.28 - 1993.4.5 號叔潛,四川廣安人。庚子賠款最後一屆錄取之年齡最小的留學生,1920年畢業於美國麻省理工學院。

1931年返回四川,從事西南實業建設,與地方政府配 合,創辦數十種事業。1947年政府為獎勵抗戰有功之實業界人士,他得以低價購得上海閘北之揚子江木材株式會社,改名為揚子木材廠。1949年在高雄設立 新廠,1954年代表揚子公司與美海軍部簽約,承造100艘登陸艇。因此案,次年立委郭紫峻向行政院長俞鴻鈞質詢,指控胡光麃向各行庫、國防部及美援會騙 取貸款外匯,涉嫌官商勾結,其他立委亦指責揚子公司所造之登陸艇「偷工減料,貽誤軍需」,為此胡光麃遭法院羈押,並牽涉到尹仲容。4月美駐華大使館為此發 表聲明:指揚子木材公司製造登陸艇均經檢查驗收合格,亦未發現該公司有財務上越軌的證據。同年10月,臺北地方法院判決當事人尹仲容與胡光麃無罪。其後, 行政院命令臺銀等單位向法院申請宣告揚子公司破產,而法院亦依其要求為之,胡光麃不服判決,纏訟8年,最後由美國花旗銀行出具信用狀擔保,出售揚子公司, 償清債務,結束訴訟。揚子案後,胡光麃自商場退隱,專心著述。1993年病逝於加拿大。 薛化元 撰 董淑賢,〈胡光麃(1897~1993)〉,《傳記文學》,63卷1期,1993年7月 尹仲容 PDF檔:PDFFiles/0608.pdf

遠流出版事業股份有限公司 行政院文化建設委員

本篇撰文者:薛化元

Robert Peston and People in Leading Questions


Leading Questions
The BBC's business editor Robert Peston meets a variety of business leaders.


Robert Peston is an award-winning broadcaster, journalist and author. He has been the BBC's Business Editor since February 2006.

Robert meets global business leaders who run the multinational companies and corporations which shape all our lives. Each programme will focus on one person at the top of a well known company.

Looking at their businesses – how they run their companies, the problems they face, the skills they need and where they think the economy is heading, the programme also finds time to explore their lifestyles -looking their family life and what they do to relax.



Leading Questions: Paul Walsh

BBC business editor Robert Peston meets Paul Walsh, chief executive of Diageo, the world's biggest drinks company.

He talks of his doubts that imposing a minimum price for alcohol - which is mooted by the Government - will significantly reduce binge drinking and the abuse of alcohol.

Mr Walsh also gives revealing insights into what makes him tick, his love of game hunting in Africa, and why top-end whisky, costing several hundred pounds a bottle, is still selling like hotcakes.

SEE ALSO



BBC Press Office


Robert Peston

Biographies

Robert Peston

Business Editor


Last updated August 2008
Category: News
Printable version

Robert Peston is an award-winning broadcaster, journalist and author. He has been the BBC's Business Editor since February 2006.

On 13 September 2007 he exclusively revealed that the Northern Rock was close to collapse and had approached the Bank of England for emergency financial support, an event whose consequences are still reverberating around the City and in Government.

From 2002 to 2005 he was City Editor and assistant editor of The Sunday Telegraph, in charge of its Business and Money sections.

Until September 2000, he was the Financial Times' Financial Editor (in charge of business and financial coverage) and a member of the FT's editorial board as an assistant editor.

At the FT, which he joined in 1991, his previous positions were Political Editor, Banking Editor and head of an investigations unit (which he founded).

Robert Peston's scoop on Northern Rock's financial crisis won the Royal Television Society's Television Journalism 2007 Award for Scoop of the Year and the Wincott Award for Business News/Current Affairs Programme of the Year.

He was Journalist of the Year in the Business Journalism of the Year Awards for 2007/8, and also won in the Scoop category.

In 2007, he won the Work Foundation's Broadcast News Journalism Award and the foundation's Programme of the Year Award (for his File on 4, The Inside Story Of Northern Rock, broadcast on BBC Radio 4).

His blog – which can be found at bbc.co.uk/robertpeston – won the digital media category in the Private Equity and Venture Capital Journalist of the Year Awards.

Robert Peston is a past winner of the Harold Wincott Senior Financial Journalist of the Year Award (2005), the London Press Club's Scoop of the Year Award (2005), Granada Television's What The Papers Say award for investigative journalist of the year (1994) and the Wincott Young Financial Journalist of the year (1986).

In February 2008, Hodder & Stoughton published his latest book, Who Runs Britain? How The Super-Rich Are Changing Our Lives.

In April 2008, BBC Two broadcast Super Rich: The Greed Game, a 60-minute film written and presented by Robert Peston on the causes and consequences of the credit crunch.

He is also the author of Brown's Britain (Short Books, 2005), a biography of Gordon Brown.

Robert Peston is married to the writer Sian Busby. They have two sons.

2008年8月28日 星期四

Martin Luther King "I have a dream"

Martin Luther King at the Lincoln Memorial, August 28th 1963

"I have a dream"

Martin Luther King

Forty-five years ago today, Martin Luther King delivered his famous "I have a dream" speech in Washington. His passionate and eloquent call for equality and tolerance inspired millions around the world. Find out more.

2008年8月25日 星期一

Ye Zhiping Saved School in Quake

How Angel of Sichuan Saved School in Quake


Published: June 16, 2008

SANGZAO, China — The students lined up row by row on the outdoor basketball courts of Sangzao Middle School in the minutes after the earthquake. When the head count was complete, their fate was clear: all 2,323 were alive.

Skip to next paragraph
Shiho Fukada for The New York Times

Classes at Sangzao Middle School, where all 2,323 students survived the earthquake, are held in tents set up on the basketball courts until the school gets rebuilt.

How to Help

A list of agencies providing relief in the earthquake zone.

Times Topics

Sichuan Earthquake

Sichuan Earthquake Complete coverage of the aftermath of China’s earthquake.

Photographs by Shiho Fukada for The New York Times

Ye Zhiping, the school’s principal, knew the building was shoddy, so he pressed the county government for $58,000 to upgrade it. If he hadn’t, he said, “I would be the one responsible.”

Shiho Fukada for The New York Times

Students collected their belongings from the school, which was still standing, although it suffered some structural damage.

The New York Times

Some 10,000 students were killed in Sichuan Province.

Parents covered in blood and dust hugged them and cried. So did the school principal, Ye Zhiping.

“That was the single most joyful thing,” he said.

Given that some 10,000 other children were crushed in their classrooms during the devastating quake on May 12, the survival of so many students in Sangzao counts as a minor miracle.

Students and parents credit that to the man they call Angel Ye.

Nervous about the shoddiness of the main school building, Mr. Ye scraped together $58,000 to renovate it in the 1990s. He had workers widen concrete pillars and insert iron rods into them. He demanded stronger balcony railings. He demolished a bathroom whose pipes had been weakened by water.

His school in Peace County probably withstood the 8.0-magnitude earthquake because he pushed the county government to upgrade it. Just 20 miles north, the collapse of Beichuan Middle School buried 1,000 students and teachers.

Mr. Ye’s tale sheds light on the lax building codes in this mountainous corner of Sichuan Province and what might have been done to address well-known shortcomings. In his case, a personal commitment and a relatively petty amount of cash sufficed to avert tragedy.

“We learned a lesson from this earthquake: the standards for schools should have been improved,” Mr. Ye, 55, said in an interview. “The standards now are still not enough.”

Mr. Ye not only shored up the building’s structure, but also had students and teachers prepare for a disaster. They rehearsed an emergency evacuation plan twice a year. Because of that, students and teachers say, everyone managed to flee in less than two minutes on May 12.

“We’re very thankful,” said Qiu Yanfang, 62, the grandmother of a student, as she sat outside the school knitting a brown sweater. “The principal helped ease the nation’s loss, both the psychological loss and the physical loss.”

The Chinese government estimates that more than 7,000 schoolrooms collapsed in the earthquake. The destruction has prompted grieving parents to take to the streets to demand investigations, and that in turn has become the biggest political challenge to government officials in the aftermath of the earthquake. The police began clamping down this month on the protests.

It has been difficult to establish responsibility for the school collapses partly because it is unclear in many cases which level of government is responsible for the original school construction and for ongoing inspections.

The building codes Mr. Ye criticized had been set by the central government in Beijing, he said. While county education officials did not take the initiative in improving Sangzao Middle School, they acceded to Mr. Ye’s requests and gave him money, he said.

Huang Zhichun, an official in the county’s education department, said in a telephone interview: “Based on the fact that so many schools have collapsed, the standard is not good enough. The central government sets the standard.”

Government officials in Beijing and Sichuan have said they are investigating the collapses. In an acknowledgment of the weakness of building codes in the countryside, the National Development and Reform Commission said on May 27 that it had drafted an amendment to improve construction standards for primary and middle schools in rural areas. Experts are reviewing the draft, the commission said.

They could do worse than consult with Mr. Ye. A squat man who speaks in sharp bursts, he now lives with his wife in a refugee camp of green tents on the school’s basketball courts. He started working at the school 30 years ago as an English teacher and has taught in every classroom. Some students say he is more playful than the teachers.

Sangzao is a farming town of 30,000 where merchants sell vegetables from blankets on the road. It has two middle schools, one administered by the township, where a dormitory collapsed during the earthquake, and the other administered by the county. Mr. Ye works in the second. Families from across Sichuan send their children there because of its reputation.

A large billboard on the school grounds lists the names of 90 students who earned top scores on a national exam last year. The school is one of the largest in Peace County. It has a half-dozen dormitory buildings and two classroom buildings, all five stories or lower. One of the classroom buildings was constructed after 2000, the other between 1983 and 1985.

The older one worried Mr. Ye when he became principal 12 years ago.

It is a four-story, white building with large, tinted-glass windows and blue, metal railings running along balconies onto which classrooms open.

“Quality inspectors were supposed to be here to oversee construction of this building,” Mr. Ye said. “When the foundation was laid, they should have been here. When the concrete was put into the pillars, they should have been here. But they weren’t. In the end, no government official dared to come inspect this building because it was built without any standards.”

Mr. Ye walked down the hallways with a visitor and pointed to the corners where the ceiling met wall. He said workers had stuffed trash into those crevices to seal them. In addition, the surfaces of the walls were coarse rather than smooth, a sign of shoddy construction, he said.

The balcony railings were originally made of cement, not metal. They were shaky and a foot too short, Mr. Ye said. They also lacked vertical pillars for support.

“I was among the first teachers who moved into this building, and I was pretty young,” Mr. Ye said. “Our awareness of safety wasn’t the same as now.”

He said his attitude changed after he became principal.

“If I knew there was a hidden danger, and I didn’t do anything about it, then I would be the one responsible,” he said.

From 1996 to 1999, Mr. Ye oversaw a complete overhaul. He said he pestered county officials for money. Eventually the education department gave $58,000. It was a troublesome process because the county was poor and thus tight with money, Mr. Ye said, but officials saw the need to ensure the safety of children.

So the renovations began. Most crucial were changes made to concrete pillars and floor panels. Each classroom had four rectangular pillars that were thickened so they jutted from the walls. Up and down the pillars, workers drilled holes and inserted iron reinforcing rods because the original ones were not enough, Mr. Ye said. The concrete slab floors were secured to be able to withstand intense shaking.

Structural engineers and earthquake experts outside China who have examined photos of collapsed schools point to two critical flaws: a lack of adequate iron reinforcing rods, and poorly built, hollow concrete slab floors.

Mr. Ye said construction codes improved after 2000, and buildings are now supposed to be rated a 6 or 7 on a scale of earthquake resistance.

“But we see from this earthquake that the standard should be lifted to 11 or 12,” he said.

Each classroom in the main school building holds about 60 students. Each room is now a frozen tableau of 2:28 p.m. on May 12. Backpacks and textbooks are scattered all around. A bag of oranges sits on a desk.

Students said they dove under desks when the tremor hit. Then teachers led them onto the basketball courts outside.

“Many parents ran to the school afterward,” said Yang Shihui, 40, an English teacher. “One mother started hugging her daughter and saying, oh my daughter. The daughter was fine. It was actually the mother who was covered in dirt and bleeding.”

Mr. Ye was in a city 30 miles away when the ground began shaking.

“On my way back, I saw that many buildings had been seriously destroyed,” Mr. Ye said. “I was pretty concerned. But when I saw that all of my students were safe, I was very happy.”

These days, students dart in and out of the school to grab textbooks, ducking beneath a thin blue ribbon with a handwritten sign that says “Danger.” To them, the building seems sturdy enough.

But Mr. Ye said it will be torn down, never again used for classes.

Huang Yuanxi contributed research from Beijing.

2008年8月24日 星期日

悼念賈植芳伯伯(彭小蓮)追憶文壇泰斗賈植芳

我一定讀過賈植芳先生的《一個老年人的自述》 對於留日時代1930s 的印象深刻 譬如說 丸善的送書服務 甚至於當時留學生也可以去花街.....


賈植芳小傳

 賈植芳,1915年出生於山西襄汾,筆名楊力、冷魂等。1935年在北平上高中,參加「一二·九」 學生運動,首次被北洋軍閥當局逮捕,經親人保釋出獄後,赴東京日本大學學習;1937年棄學回國參加抗戰,1945年在徐州從事偽軍策反活動被捕入獄,日 本投降後獲釋;1947年因「煽動學潮」被國民黨中統特務機關逮捕,一年後經親人保釋出獄;1949年後歷任震旦大學中文系教授,復旦大學教授,1955 年因「胡風反革命集團」事件蒙冤入獄11年,後回校接受「勞動改造」,1978年平反。

 此後在復旦任中文系博士生導師、圖書館館長、復旦大學中國古代文學研究中心顧問;並任中國比較文學學會名譽會長、中國現代文學研究會顧問、上海通俗文學研究會名譽會長等職。

 著有小說集《人生賦》、《賈植芳小說選》,散文集《熱力》、《暮年雜筆》、《彫蟲雜技》、《我的朋 友們》、《老人老事》,專著《近代中國經濟社會》、《中國新文學與傳統文學》。另有《賈植芳文集》(4卷)、《賈植芳回憶錄》、《賈植芳致胡風書札》、 《劫後文存─賈植芳序跋集》等,譯著《契訶夫的戲劇藝術》、《論報告文學》、《契訶夫手記》,回憶錄《獄裡獄外》等。






「醫院就像監獄」

 不得已在醫院「扎根」的賈植芳,似乎討厭了這被四面牆包圍起來的空間。他說要「好了趕快回家」,又囑咐記者「把報紙寄到家裡,不要寄到醫院」,鄭而重之地讓侄女遞上一張名片。在四度入獄的他的眼裡,「醫院這地方不能住,醫院就像監獄」。

 1996年底的一次「事端」,讓賈植芳的弟子張新穎至今難忘。那次是先生住院,他陪床,一如既往地 聽先生數說醫院的「不是」。起初賈先生還算平靜,卻越說越激動,「他說的還是醫院,我聽著,卻越來越像監獄了。到後來,已經分不清說的是醫院還是監獄,他 高聲罵起來。他罵醫生、罵護士,罵同病房的人,罵來看望他的人,見誰罵誰……」直到吃了鎮定藥安穩下來。很久以後,賈先生才向他說起,「那一刻出現了幻 覺,覺得就是在監獄裡」。


追憶文壇泰斗賈植芳 一生四陷囹圄 傲骨寫就人生


http://www.wenweipo.com [2008-05-19] 放大圖片

本報上海新聞中心記者:凌馨

 2008年4月24日18時45分,20世紀30年代文壇最後一人、「七月派」重要作家賈植芳走完 了92載人生。他著作等身、桃李滿門,在最動盪的時刻曾四次入獄卻從沒違背自己的良心,正如他生前為自己寫下的文字一樣:「檢點一生,出入於黑黑白白之 間,周旋於人人鬼鬼之中,但心裡所嚮往、所追求的理想之光,從未熄止。」2008年農曆年前,病中的賈植芳最後一次接受《文匯報》採訪,一個多小時中,他 健言談笑。臨別時,賈先生循著老習慣要贈書留念,用顫抖的手為客人寫下贈言,那些扭曲、難辨的字跡,彷彿時間在這個九旬老人身上留下的印記。最後一眼,是 看到他在窗前揚著手說再見。

 「喝水」、「吃糖」,甫一落座,賈植芳就招呼著侄女倒水、派糖。老人依舊好客,開著空調的病房甚 為乾燥,賈先生不時地喝口茶潤潤喉。除了每天都要喝茶,老人對煙酒的熱愛是出了名的,他也幾乎逢人都會講自己嗜煙酒。侄女桂馥說,姑父這兩年因為肺炎加 重,在家人的強迫下戒了煙酒。

「開心」坐監 笑言「牢飯」差

 少了煙酒的樂趣,賈先生似乎更愛外出了。每逢周六,他都要帶著家人逛超市、喝咖啡,吃完晚飯才回 家。弟子張業松亦道,先生除非被限制了自由,否則總是喜歡到處跑。弟子說賈植芳喜歡的地方很多,老家山西、解放初住過的蘇州、流亡時到過的香港……。 2003年,88歲的他還特意到澳門「公幹」,無奈當時沙士兇猛,令他三遊香港的計劃未能成行,至今念念不忘,一再地問起:「你們到過香港嗎?」

 坐監獄,總不會是什麼開心的事,但在賈先生看來,卻成了他一生中「開心」的經歷,因為「吃飯不要 錢,也不要房錢,還有保鏢」。他又說,長壽的「秘訣」就是「勞改把身體鍛煉好了」。他甚至「點評」了4次蹲監的伙食,「北洋軍閥、日本人、國民黨的監獄條 件都好,咱們的監獄最落後,吃不飽」;又說「還是人民民主專政厲害」,說完大笑起來。

 四度入獄都是因言賈禍,四次罪名都是「政治犯」,一生被「政治」帽子壓著的賈植芳卻耿直依舊。對於自己晚年的生活,他直言「待遇很低,因為我有前科」。但他頗自矜的,仍是「一生沒有參加過任何黨派」。

 賈先生反反覆覆地說,自己是共產黨的「同路人」,但卻覺得「入了黨好像就不自由了」。他要做的,是「有獨立人格的社會知識分子」。解放後曾經「受上面指揮」陷害胡風等人的周揚,平反後四處向人道歉,賈先生第一個原諒了他,卻仍然不齒他的為人。

檢點一生 周旋於人鬼之間

 世人最樂道的,正是賈先生的一生耿介,如他生前為自己寫下的文字一樣:「檢點一生,出入於黑黑白白 之間,周旋於人人鬼鬼之中,但心裡所嚮往、所追求的理想之光,從未熄止。所以合則留,不合則去,雖漂泊四方,心卻一念繫之,問心無愧」。先生故去,他的幾 代學生齊聚家中,陳思和、李輝、范伯群……堂前依然掛著身前友人贈送的一幅對聯:「倔強猶昔不易行不傲物,沉吟至今無伐善無施勞」。

「我與任敏結褵六十載」

 樂觀豁達的賈植芳,也有難以化解的心結─老妻任敏6年前因病撒手人寰。為了照顧老人的情緒,晚輩們從不主動在先生面前提及師母,「偶然提起他就要淚下」。他說:「(任敏)跟上我受苦,還進監獄,把她放到青海去,兩人分開38年」,這個數字,他記得很清晰。

「她喜歡我有個性」

 但賈植芳也有開懷的時候。說起自己的羅曼史,他總會講那段「沒有結婚證」的經歷,把「同居」兩個字 咬得很重,一臉的得意。問起「任敏看上你什麼」,他馬上自豪地答:「喜歡我有個性」。1942年,常在《七月》雜誌上讀到賈先生文章的任敏,傾慕他的才華 與之相識,又欣賞他的個性與之結合,從此相隨60餘載。在弟子們眼裡,他們是復旦最好的「模範夫妻」。沒有人會想到,這位平和的女性,曾經為了營救丈夫東 奔西走,又因為不願與之「劃清界線」被發配青海,在那裡戴過鐐銬、背過死屍,經歷了飢餓的生死邊緣。

「任敏!你要好起來」

 但賈植芳耿耿於懷。2000年任敏病危,賈先生緊緊握著任敏的手,大聲叫著她的名字。「任敏!任敏!任敏啊!以前別人整我們,我們沒有辦法,現在好了,我們一定不能被自己打倒!你要好起來!」老妻奇跡般地康復,但卻沒能撐過2002年的冬天。

 賈先生深情地為亡妻親擬了輓聯:「緣識古都,奔走黃河,尋覓鐵窗,相濡病榻側,不忍思,風雨白頭六 十年,再相逢,非此岸;讀梓東海,育苗西漠,農桑北地,煮字刊南港,休莫提,艱難攜手春寒路,家中婦,天地間。」他把任敏的遺像擺在家中,每天早晨和她一 起喝牛奶、吃早飯,中午喝些小酒,陪老妻說說各種各樣的趣事、往事。就在接受採訪前兩天,賈先生的新書《歷史背影》出版,賈先生對侄女說的第一句話還是, 「把這本書擺在你姑姑的遺像前」。

生前抱憾:「我的朋友們都死了」

 身在病中的賈植芳,常常回憶往事。而他想得最多的,就是那些自「五四」起一路同行的朋友。一生坎坷,他可以釋懷「都過去了」;對於友人,他卻道:「我還活著,我的朋友們都死了」。如今斯人亦逝,唯有他一字一句留下的回憶,仍在見證那些穿越世紀的情義。

「硬骨頭」的胡風分子

 1937年初,賈植芳首次給胡風主編的雜誌《工作與學習叢刊》投稿。1939年賈植芳到重慶,書信 告知同樣在渝的胡風。其時胡風已是知名左翼作家,被視作繼魯迅之後的「五四」文化擎旗者。面對這樣的「名人」,賈植芳卻「性情比較孤傲,不願意拜會名 人」,亦未在信中寫明住址。胡風跑遍重慶大小報館,終於在3天後見到賈植芳,兩人從此訂交。

 應該攀交的時候,賈先生選擇了迴避;但到了1955年,面對可能因胡風事件受到的牽連,他卻硬是 「黏」了上去。當上海市高教局長試圖「挽救」賈先生,要他「交待」與胡風的關係時,他答道:「我們舊社會裡共過患難,他在最困難的時候幫助過我,就是這麼 個關係。」從此便開始了長達25年的牢獄生活。

 賈先生不後悔,卻有怨恨。「說胡風是反革命,哪有這回事!」他突然用力拍了一下椅背,好像就要跳 起來罵人。他不願回憶與胡風交往的細節,只是反覆地說,「胡風是冤案」,直到侄女衝著他的耳朵大喊,「現在已經平反了,他們都知道了」。半生歷劫,賈先生 最介懷的,是這位相交一生的老友精神崩潰淒然而去。

為獄友邵洵美糾正訛誤

 1960年冬,賈先生偶然與「海上孟嘗君」之稱的出版家邵洵美同監。身患氣喘病的邵洵美對出獄甚感 絕望,曾鄭重其事向賈先生囑托兩件「後事」,請他一定寫篇文章。這兩件事,其一是1933年英國文豪蕭伯納訪滬時,邵洵美負責接待。因蕭伯納不吃葷菜,遂 在素菜館「功德林」宴請,「用了46塊銀元,由我自己出錢付出。參加宴會的有蔡元培、宋慶齡、魯迅、楊杏佛,還有我和林語堂。但當時上海的大小報紙的新聞 報道中,卻都沒有我的名字,這使我一直耿耿於懷」。至於另一件,則是邵洵美與魯迅之間的誤會。「我的文章是我自己寫的,但魯迅先生在文章中說我是花錢僱人 代寫的,這真是天大的誤會!」1989年5月,賈先生專程著文回憶與邵洵美的「獄友」生活,並履行了27年前的諾言,糾正了邵洵美掛懷不已的兩項訛誤。





一方淨土  悼念賈植芳伯伯 (彭小蓮)

  胡風分子、詩人冀汸的女兒殷殷給我打電話,她說:「賈(植芳)伯伯去世了。」「什麼時候?」「就剛才。」我一下被嚇住了,就在幾天前,我剛去醫院看望了他,進門只聽見賈叔叔大聲地說:「小蓮,你怎麼沒有給我帶水果來啊?」頓時引得邊上的人都哈哈大笑。

   任何時候,賈叔叔都是要讓大家快樂的人,他像一個做脫口秀的演員,隨便你怎麼笑,他就是唬著一張沒有表情的臉。笑聲依稀還在,可是人怎麼已經走了?我們 都堅信他是要活到一百歲的呀!我趕緊給胡風先生的孩子發了短訊,曉山立刻回信了。這時,我正在通知上海其他胡風分子。小顧(征南)叔叔說﹕「啊呀,小蓮, 你說好上星期天是要帶我去的,你就是在那裏瞎忙,我……唉……」他沒有說下去。羅飛叔叔急得話都說不出來,他說:「我心臟不行了,一會兒給你打回去!」只 有何滿子叔叔是冷靜的,他停頓了一下說:「老賈心臟不好……」後面就沒有聲音了。

以黑色幽默面對荒誕人生

   記得第一次去看賈叔叔的時候,他在贈送我的書上題簽的是:賢侄 小蓮留念。那是一九八○年代初。那時我還不大明白我怎麼成了他的侄女。後來,殷殷跟我說,你到全國任何有胡風分子的地方,稱說是「分子」的子女,都會被接 受,都會有好吃好住。他們這些人,即使在上個世紀,互相之間也不稱呼「同志」,他們稱呼為「兄弟」,於是我順理成章地成為賈叔叔的侄女了。後來我走遍全國 各地的「分子」家,果真被招待得像侄女一般,我被這一份溫暖和親情折磨了很久很久。

   冀汸叔叔比賈植芳年輕,所以他的女兒管賈叔叔叫「伯伯」,我父親(編按:彭小蓮父親彭柏山是一九四九年後接替夏衍的第二任上海市委宣傳部部長,在一九五 五年被打成黨內級別最高的「胡風分子」。)比賈叔叔大六歲,我稱他為「叔叔」。賈叔叔跟我說:「我沒有跟你父親說過話,我只聽過他作報告。他是當官的,我 們這樣的小民,就坐在下面老老實實地聽嘛。不過,你父親還不錯,還是一個讀書人。」

我聽他的補充,哈哈大笑,這算是他對父親很高的評價了。賈叔叔也領會了我的笑聲,朝我眨了眨眼,又說﹕「我在日本當流亡學生的時候,在書店看見你父親的小說翻成的日文書,魯迅先生給他寫的序。」

「胡風分子」相識恨晚

   其實胡風分子之間大都不相識——這是一群很奇怪的朋友——一直到文革結束以後,這群因為戴著「胡風分子」帽子的人,都很想看看被打成一個集團——胡風反 革命集團裏的都是些什麼人,用何滿子叔叔的話說:「一看,哎喲,真有相見恨晚的感覺!」後來,他們自覺地「團」在一起,這讓這些老人的晚年比任何人都多了 一份溫馨。

   現在回想這些事情,年輕的一代幾乎不能相信,所有的罪行和證據,竟然是一九五五年五月十三日《人民日報》發表的舒蕪《關於胡風反革命集團的一些材料》 ——舒蕪交出他與胡風多年的通信所構成的,其中包含舒蕪本人斷章取義、上綱上線的分析,再加上同日《人民日報》編者按語的評論,一場大規模的政治運動就在 全國展開了。胡風先生信中涉及的詩人和作家,後來都成了「分子」。當時誰都不知道編者按語是毛澤東主席親自撰寫的,但是按語中的「雷霆萬鈞之勢,絕不可等 閒視之」的氣氛,已經籠罩了整個國家。五五年六至七月,《關於胡風反革命集團的材料》作為單行本的小冊子,僅僅在上海就印刷達八次之多,數量為六十萬冊。 官方正式文件公布的資料是:一九五五年五月,共九十二人被正式逮捕,其後有六十三人被隔離監禁,七十三人停職審查;二千一百多人被株連。

   直到一九六五年,這個案子才送上法庭。這時胡風反革命集團的骨幹分子,都已經被關押了十年之久。但是最後只有三個人正式判刑:胡風先生十四年,詩人阿 十二年,賈植芳叔叔十二年。其他「分子」免於起訴。我們認真審視這個事件的話,發現事情十分荒誕。原來他們不是在一個平等的條件下論爭現實的。陷害是一開 始就被確定的,這完全是不合乎法律的。有意思的是,這樣違反法律的事情,卻又用法律的形式來解決。正式開庭,依然出示證人,而證人的供詞是被事先審查過, 並且指定證人必須背誦證詞。阿先生在天津出庭的時候,如臨大敵,警察全部出動。因為阿先生堅持自己無罪,堅持認為胡風反革命集團是人為的,是捏造的。 胡風先生雙手攏在自己的袖子裏,站在北京最高人民法院的被告席上,他還想保持一份人的尊嚴,因為他不願意讓人看見他戴著手銬!

「我沒有背叛朋友」

  面對荒誕,賈叔叔竟然用黑色幽默,用自己的生命面對它,開了一個玩笑。

   賈叔叔用插科打諢的方式向我憶述被拉出去判刑的那一天:「一九六五年的一天,他們在叫一千七百八十三號……原來上午那個老法警來了,他跟我說就是你,你 還不結案啊?你不懂規矩,你上去。我後來上了車,他們問我吃過飯了嗎?我說我沒吃,他就給我一碗飯,還有一碗青菜,一個豆腐乾,我都吃了。他問我吃飽了 嗎?我說沒有。他說要吃飽,只有死刑犯才讓他吃飽。我想死都要死了,那就吃它個飽,不要做個餓死鬼。後來他說你在這裏等一下,不到兩點鐘,來了兩個青年幹 警。他們說,走,走。把我送到一個武警大廳,一到裏面,已經坐滿人了。一個審判長說,把這個老反革命賈植芳帶上來。

   「胡風應該是六五年十一月二十六日由最高人民法院判決十四年,他們跟我說:『罪犯服法……』我聽成『伏法』,即把胡風槍斃了。我想怪不得不槍斃我,已把 胡風給槍斃了。我想胡風都槍斃了,我不要聽了。我想多少年了,搞了這麼一個結果。於是隨便他們講,然後他們問我,上訴不上訴?我說不上訴!判決書要我簽 名,我看都不看就簽了。他媽的這個混蛋,我們過去為了追隨共產黨,監獄進進出出,餓肚子。後來宣判完了,就把手銬給我戴上。我感到蠻光榮。」

「為什麼感到光榮?」

  「我不是舒蕪,我不做那些下流事情。我沒有背叛朋友。災害期間,我腿腫得不得了,那會兒就把我帶到提籃橋監獄,把我帶到病號間,現在我不用麻煩人家了,我多少年跟共產黨的關係到這裏結束了。蠻光榮。」

幽默裏包含了智慧

   當這個吃飽了不做餓死鬼的賈叔叔,在面對死刑的可能時,他的坦然和幽默,實在讓我笑不出來。可是他就是這樣一路走了過來。二○○三年春節,我去給他拜 年,正趕上「分子」何滿子叔叔夫婦、小顧叔叔都在那裏。我一進門,賈叔叔就說:「你最近拍的電視劇,我看了。不錯。」我一聽就笑了,不知道他是裝糊塗還是 真有點糊塗,或者是沒話找話說。我什麼時候拍過電視劇啊?他說:「怎麼不拍拍你爸爸的事情,這不比什麼故事都好看嗎?」「沒有你這樣的人物在裏面,還有什 麼會好看的?」「那就把我和這些『分子』都拍出來啊。」於是,邊上的「分子」都笑了。

可是我卻笑不出來了。我知道,賈叔叔的幽默裏總是含著思考。後來,我和朋友魏 時煜一起把攝像機對準了他們。但是在對準賈叔叔的時候,因為在同期錄音,我不敢笑出聲,只有停下拍攝時才讓放肆的笑聲爆發。賈叔叔還是舉著那支骽,吸一 口,然後繼續往下說。我只好大叫著:「等等,我機器還沒開呢。」在那裏,他似乎比在自己家還自由,因為賈叔叔的個性,他把所有的約束都給打碎了。

   賈叔叔又吸了口骽,變得稍微嚴肅一點:「斯大林也好,希特勒也好,你不聽話,我就把你殺掉。毛澤東是搞群眾專政,叫你寂寞難忍,寂寞得受不了,就自殺 吧,就說你是畏罪自殺,所以我就不自殺。我天天脖子上套著一塊大牌子,上面寫著『胡風反革命集團骨幹分子賈植芳』。小孩子圍上來問我,人家牌子上都只寫一 個名字,你上面怎麼寫了兩個人的名字?我說,他是我朋友就一起寫上去了。大家一出校門,就都把牌子摘下來,他們帶著包包去學校,摘下牌子就放在包裏。我從 來不帶包,提在手裏也重,我就掛著牌子往宿舍走。工宣隊說,賈植芳,你還掛出癮來了!『你們給我掛的呀。』『拿掉它!』其實,是後來上面說不要掛了,影響 不好。我也不知道影響誰了。」

遠大的精神境界

   二十多年過去了,從我踏進賈叔叔的小屋那天起,他就再也沒有搬走。一個普通得不能再普通的水泥單元樓宿舍,幾乎所有的「分子」都是這樣生活著。不論他們 的著作在書架上排了多少本,不論他們得到多少個文學獎,不論他們建樹了多深學問,他們的生活依然是簡單、樸素和淡泊的。沒有一件豪華的家具和擺設,貼牆是 一大排書櫥,裏面塞滿書。賈叔叔把我的書也放在顯眼的位置上,那不是因為我,而是因為我寫了那個時代,寫了他們的故事,寫了一本他認可的書。

   有一個教授離開上海調往北京的時候說,即使在上海的大學裏,大家見面仍不是談股票和買房子,就是談自家的孩子,沒有什麼學術氣氛,不像北京。真的很遺 憾,上海就是給人這樣的印象。但是,我是幸運的,因為父親的朋友,這些「分子」給了我一份很珍貴的饋贈——那就是他們的追求,他們的精神境界。

一代人慢慢地都走了

   「到了七九年,我到北京去看蕭軍。我頭上還戴著帽子。我是去開會收集資料的。我叫那個講師到師範大學查資料去,藉此把他打發開,就去找蕭軍去了。我說﹕ 『老蕭,你還認識我吧?』他說﹕『怎麼敢忘記呢?胡風家裏的那個賈植芳。』他說﹕『你在我這裏吃個便飯。』他老婆在生病,我說﹕『算了吧,咱們就見見面。 再見面就是開追悼會了。』我再碰到蕭軍,頭髮都白了。不久訃告就來了,向遺體告別。

   「小蓮,我們這代人慢慢地都走了。前幾年,我還到龍華開追悼會,這幾年都不去了。最多送個花圈。咱們這個追悼會,還講黨籍……還有待遇。掛個照片,級別 高的站在第一排,都是老頭子,低個頭。我說,不要低頭不要哭……。小蓮,你記住我的話,追悼會天天在開,牆上掛的肖像也天天在變,一個一個都死了。那個釘 子不變,照片在變。釘子還是那口釘子,下回,我掛在那個地方,你站在這個地方。都是這樣,這個地方就是平等的,每個人都要到這個地方來的。」

  說這話的時候,是二○○三年夏天,我和魏時煜帶著賈叔叔和何滿子叔叔回訪提籃橋監獄。天很熱,那時候我還沒意識到重新面對關押過他們的監獄,他們是什麼感受。那天氣溫三十八度,兩位八十多歲的老人,居然在炎熱的大太陽下走著,他們看上去那麼冷靜。

  監獄的政委對我們說:「監獄裏面不能拍攝,不能參觀。」

  賈叔叔問:「能看看我當年關押的地方嗎?」

  政委說:「不行!但是我可以帶你去看看我們的展覽廳。」

  賈叔叔微笑著問道:「那裏有我的照片嗎?」

  政委說:「沒有!」

  「那就不看了吧!」

  政委有點尷尬,這是在監獄裏啊。我這才體驗到賈叔叔的幽默,體會到他個性中的力量。但是我緊張得不敢對他的幽默發出笑聲。

「我從來沒有當過官,我是讀書人」

   我從來不知道這些「分子」改變了我多少;我從來不知道我會在對他們的採訪中,學到了多少;更沒有意識到,因為他們,我對痛苦有了重新的理解。二○○二年 春天,我去看(王)元化叔叔,他非常感慨地說:「你要去看看老賈啊,他現在退休工資只有一千元多一點點,還不如一個技術工人。我託人給他送了西瓜去,聽說 他感動得都要流淚了。」我趕緊去找何滿子叔叔,說我們一起去看看賈叔叔吧。萬萬沒有想到的是,何叔叔堅決地說:「不去,我春節剛去看過他,他很好!」於是 我轉述了元化叔叔的話。何叔叔更加是一臉不屑的表情。

「不可能!你想想這是老賈的性格嗎?什麼時候會掉淚?胡說八道。不去,不去!」

  但是,我還是去了。一看賈叔叔依然坐在他那把破藤椅裏,雙腳擱在另外一張條凳上,拿著一本紀德寫的《從蘇聯歸來》。他看見我走進去,只是扔下書,連姿勢都沒有改變,問:「小蓮,要喝水嗎?不要,那就隨便找個地方坐吧。」

  「賈叔叔,你退休工資只有一千多塊錢啊?」

  他奇怪地看著我,似乎懷疑我為什麼為了這樣一個問題從大老遠的靜安寺跑到復旦來吧。他幾乎沒有反應過來,我著急了,再追問他:「是嗎?」回答很簡單:「是的。」「憑什麼?」「因為我坐了二十五年牢,教齡不夠,只能算一般教師退休,所以大家都是這點錢,我怎麼辦?」

  我完全楞住了,他身旁的學生解釋:「是賈先生自己不要的。因為他參加過「一二.九」學生運動,解放前一直幫助共產黨,坐過日本人的牢,還坐過國民黨牢。學校要給他作為離休幹部辦理,那待遇完全是不一樣的。他不要!」

  我大聲問:「為什麼不要?你跟錢有什麼好過不去的。」這時候,賈叔叔顯得有點不耐煩了。他說:「我不是幹部!我從來沒有當過官,我是讀書人!」

  賈叔叔回答我的話,何叔叔也曾經說過:「我們不要做官。我們是讀書人,我們是知識分子。知識分子意味著什麼?沒有權,沒有錢。但是,我們有自己獨立的人格和思想!」

   我把採訪賈叔叔的提問修改了,原來有一個問題:你後悔成為胡風分子嗎?我知道,他永遠不會後悔,即使在文革期間,那麼多人像躲避瘟疫一樣躲避著胡風這個 名字,但是賈叔叔還會對那些譏笑他的孩子說,胡風是我的朋友。這份黑色幽默裏蘊含了多深刻的思考,體現了多麼強大的人格力量。

  其實賈叔叔很了解胡風先生書生氣太甚,政治上幼稚,容易被傷害。

   「馮雪峰在開國前在上海的,後來北京打電話叫他到北京去。他回來後跟我們講,毛澤東同志把他叫去,問上海文化界的情況。毛問他,聽說胡風他們有一幫人? 馮雪峰聽這個話覺得很奇怪,就對我們講。我一聽這話就警惕了,我想怎麼把一個把文學社團看成一個政治集團?毛都是從政治權術方面看問題,不是從文化方面看 問題。那時候,一直不給胡風安排工作,胡風很苦悶。我就勸他不要和他們爭什麼了。我買了一本英文版的《十日談》,我勸胡風翻譯一點書,好好寫一本魯迅傳, 不要去管他們。」

賈叔叔的幽默原來是建立在他政治上的成熟、敏銳和深刻上。他是一個大智若愚的人。你完全不會想到,他那麼輕鬆的笑聲裏,積蓄了準確的觀察和思考。

人生就是遊戲

  我終於忍不住問,我要賈叔叔親口告訴我。

  「跟胡風做朋友,你後悔嗎?」

  「我不後悔!」

  「如果沒有這個朋友,你的生活會是怎麼樣的?」

   「不會比這個更好。文化大革命連劉少奇都打倒了,老革命都打倒了,周揚四條漢子也進了監獄,我說毛主席五五年把我們抓進去了,六六年我們差不多都出來 了,卻把四條漢子抓進去了。文化大革命以後,把四條漢子放出來了,把四人幫又抓進去。監獄大家輪流坐。我們是勞改第一期畢業,是老資格了。你說,我怎麼會 感到幻滅?人生就是遊戲,我念的中學是美國教會學校,只想回家結婚,娶個媳婦。這個時候,人就很容易感到幻滅,這叫虛無。我大學也沒有念完,高中念了三個 月就被開除了。我只有初中文憑。我那個不安分,在『一二.九』運動被抓進去,但我不是共黨黨員,我和他們沒有關係,我當初就是要爭取民主自由,反對封建統 治,反法西斯。到抗戰的時候,我在日本是流亡學生,受日本警察監視,後來回國參加抗戰,國共合作。後來在國民黨那裏當個編輯。內戰的時候,我又被國民黨抓 進去。終於解放了,你都看見了。」

患難夫妻鶼鰈情深

   賈叔叔與任敏阿姨的情感老而彌篤。任敏阿姨從青海勞改回上海之後,就沒有了醫療保險。後來她病得很重,住進醫院以後,一天的醫藥費就要五百多元,這時候 大家也都看明白任敏阿姨的病是很難治癒的,可是沒有人敢告訴賈叔叔真相。只有醫生暗示賈叔叔不要花這個錢了。那時候,真的是賈叔叔經濟上最拮据的時候。賈 叔叔不想跟大家爭論,他裝作什麼都聽不見,就是不肯動搖,堅持治療!正在這個時候,出版社給賈叔叔送來了一萬多元稿費,他連點都來不及點,把錢壓在學生的 手裏說:「快,快快,給醫院送去。」賈叔叔唯恐醫生不再支持他,親自找到醫生跟他們說:「我和任敏來上海時,手裏只有幾個銅板,一捲鋪蓋,現在是有一個像 樣子的家了,我大不了再拿幾個銅板回老家去住。」最後賈叔叔的真情打動了上帝,任敏阿姨活下來了,可惜成了植物人。賈叔叔在學生的攙扶下到醫院,他緊緊地 握著任敏阿姨的手,大聲叫道:「任敏!以前別人整我們,我們沒有辦法,現在好了,我們一定不能自己打倒自己啊!」所有在場的人都嚇呆了,閉著眼睛、不能動 彈的任敏阿姨淚如泉湧!

賈家的奇蹟

   任敏阿姨出院回家以後,賈叔叔每天都走到任敏阿姨的床前,對著完全是植物人的任敏阿姨,一點一點匯報自己一天的生活。說完後再走到她的床尾,把任敏阿姨 冰涼的腳握在手心裏,慢慢地把它搓熱,為她捂好被角,這才走到自己的床前。每天如此,一直堅持到任敏阿姨去世。就這樣,在任敏阿姨去世的半年前,有一天她 突然醒過來了,賈叔叔叫她,她對著賈叔叔點頭;跟她說話,她也有反應了。

  奇蹟永遠在賈叔叔家發生!

   賈叔叔的眼淚,在五五年被捕坐牢以後,只流過兩次,一次是胡風先生去世,另一次是二○○二年的十一月尾,任敏阿姨去世時。那時,大廳裏擁滿了幾代賈叔叔 的學生,大家在為師母送行!賈叔叔在學生的攙扶下走進來,走到夫人的遺體面前時,誰都沒有想到,這個八十多歲的老人,突然「啪」地一下在夫人面前跪了下 來,大家拉都拉不住他,老人哭了。他說:「你跟我苦了一輩子啊……」

   生命就像賈叔叔對我詮述的那樣,有一天,他不會再感到幻滅。在他九十二歲高齡,在他思維依然那麼敏捷的時候,二○○八年四月二十四日他的遊戲結束了,那 麼殘酷,卻是那麼瀟灑。我記住了賈叔叔的話:「不要哭泣,站在我的相片面前不要哭泣,這個地方就是平等的,每個人都要到這個地方來的。」

  二○○八年六月一日於加州

(作者是內地電影導演。)




2008年8月21日 星期四

The 'Bolt' Inspires Copycats, and Ire from the IOC


The 'Bolt' Inspires Copycats, and Ire from the IOC

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2008年08月22日11:13
It's called the 'Bolt,' and it's fast replacing the 'V' sign and the Rafael Nadal-style 'medal bite' as the cheesy gesture of choice for Olympic photo taking.

Ever since Usain Bolt sizzled to victory in the 100-meter, his gesture — one arm pulled back, one arm extended forward, like an archer shooting upwards — has been copied by everyone from Estonian discus gold medalist Gerd Kanter to light-hearted spectators outside the Bird's Nest. Bolt even broke into his trademark pose (among others) before the start of the 200 meter race on Wednesday night, moments before the Jamaican went on to smash a second world record in this Olympics.

Usain Bolt's sponsor, could trademark that gesture, 'we'd be golden,' joked a spokesman at Puma's Beijing flagship store, who said Bolt's limited edition Theseus spikes have sold out. The Cell Meio golden shoes that Puma designed for Bolt, and which he posed with on the track, won't be in stores until next week.

But before everyone starts copying the many other moves in Bolt's flashy repertoire (which include dancing victory laps around the stadium, pounding his chest and shouting 'I'm number one!' into the cameras), the International Olympic Committee came out with a criticism of the athlete, quite a rare occurrence during these harmonious Games. Jacques Rogge, president of the IOC, said Bolt's unsportsmanlike showboating and his failure to congratulate his competitors were regrettable.

'That's not the way we perceive being a champion,' said Rogge, according to the AP. 'I have no problem with him doing a show. I think he should show more respect for his competitors and shake hands, give a tap on the shoulder to the other ones immediately after the finish and not make gestures like the one he made in the 100 meters.'

Mei Fong / Sky Canaves

“博爾特式”慶祝遭國際奧委會批評

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2008年08月22日11:13
下﹐奧運會上最瀟洒的拍照姿勢已經不是V字手勢﹐不是拉菲爾•納達爾(Rafael Nadal)首創的“啃獎牌”﹐而是“博爾特式”。

AP
“博爾特式”
自 從尤塞恩•博爾特(Usain Bolt)在男子100米決賽中以絕對優勢奪冠以來﹐他那彷彿射箭運動員拉弓動作般的一手後拉、一手前伸姿勢成了許多人模仿的對象﹐從愛沙尼亞的鐵餅金牌 獲得者戈德•坎特(Gerd Kanter)到鳥巢外輕鬆愉快的觀賽者﹐誰都想來上那麼一下。博爾特甚至在週三晚間的200米決賽開始之前就早早擺出了他的這個招牌姿勢﹐之後不久﹐這 位牙買加選手再次打破一項世界紀錄。

博爾特的贊助商可能會將這個姿勢申請成商標﹐“我們就是金牌”﹐彪馬(Puma)北京旗艦店一位發言人開玩笑說。他說﹐博爾特的限量版Theseus釘鞋已經售完。彪馬為博爾特專門設計的Cell Meio金色跑鞋要到下週才能上架﹐他奧運奪冠時穿的就是這款鞋。

點擊下圖查看更多圖片

border=0博 爾特的保留劇目還有其他多種姿態﹐包括獲勝後繞場一週邊舞邊跑、對著攝像機鏡頭捶打胸脯大喊“我是第一”等等。不過﹐在大家還沒來得及模仿他的這些花哨動 作之前﹐國際奧委會(IOC)已出面對他提出了批評﹐這在一向氣氛祥和的奧運會歷史上還是少有的事。奧委會主席羅格(Jacques Rogge)說﹐博爾特的炫耀行為和他不向同台競技的其他運動員表示祝賀的做法令人感到遺憾。

據美聯社報導﹐羅格說﹐這不符合我們對冠軍的期望。我覺得他做出各種姿勢本身沒有問題。我認為在比賽一結束的時候他應該尊重其他選手﹐跟他們握握手、拍拍肩膀﹐而不是像100米決賽結束後那樣做出各種動作。

Mei Fong / Sky Canaves


(“中國日誌”(China Journal)關注全球第一人口大國的發展變化﹐《華爾街日報》獲獎團隊數十位記者傾情獻稿﹐Sky Canaves主筆。歡迎讀者發送郵件至chinajournal@wsj.com或在下面評論欄中發表評論和建議。)

2008年8月18日 星期一

劉翔Liu Xiang 2008

直擊奧運:從兩個極端看劉翔退賽

BBC中文部奧運特派記者
高毅

劉翔退出比賽無緣衛冕
劉翔退出比賽無緣衛冕

劉翔退賽並不是什麼天大的新聞,這從劉翔起身、獨自平靜地走下跑道就看得出來。

就在兩分鐘前,也是處在第二道的美國名將特拉梅爾也因傷退賽。要知道,特拉梅爾是兩屆奧運會110米欄的銀牌得主,實力與劉翔不相上下。

運動員因傷退賽,人之常情。但當中國數億觀眾將目光聚集在劉翔身上時,劉翔做出這一選擇的確需要很大的勇氣。

自從雅典奧運會奪金後,劉翔能否在家門口衛冕就成了中國備戰奧運最熱門的話題。程度之深,令人吃驚,彷彿08北京奧運的成敗就在此一舉。

鋪天蓋地

行走在北京街頭和地鐵,劉翔的廣告畫隨處可見。中央電視台播出的一則耐克公司的廣告,主角劉翔目光炯炯而深邃地準備起跑,隨後打出耐克廣告語"想做就做"(Just Do It)。

在劉翔退出比賽後,看到這則廣告,有另外一種感受。

想起奧運開幕前夕,中國的報紙和互聯網有關姚明和劉翔的消息鋪天蓋地,新浪網有關中國軍團備戰奧運的報道幾乎都被這兩人充斥,兩人彷彿托起了中國百年奧運的夢想。

劉翔出戰的運動衣如何? 會穿什麼跑鞋?能否擔當主火炬手?秘密訓練揭秘、甚至傳出劉翔的擇偶標準和"神秘女友"、與恩師孫海平推齣電影處女作等八卦新聞,無所不包。

中國為奧運會籌備了七年,中國人希望劉翔衛冕冠軍憋了四年。四年來,新聞媒體對劉翔全程跟蹤,無所不包,甚至不留任何隱私,各種消息泛濫,是為一種極端。

如此極端,最後迫使中國田徑管理中心也不得不發話,呼籲社會"忘記"劉翔,直至開賽前夕將劉翔"隔離"備戰。

密不透風

很多人贊同,劉翔受到的壓力太大了。中國田徑隊總教練馮樹勇說,劉翔這種心理素質超常好的人,最後也受不了這種壓力。

如果說這是一種極端,那麼,在奧運開賽前夕,劉翔又被外界送進了另一極端,即"密不透風"的極端。

8月18日,當劉翔踏上跑道時,無人知道他是怎麼想的。有消息說,劉翔過去幾天跟腱腳傷加重,可能無法參賽。

當天,數百名記者在媒體採訪混合區等候著,等待著劉翔完美跑完預賽,然後自信地滿臉笑容地接受採訪的那一幕。

當大家從電視熒屏上看見劉翔背對跑道而去時,所有的在場記者都懵了,其中也包括那些常年跟蹤報道中國田徑賽事、與教練和運動員頗有私交的"老記"。

在當天的新聞發佈會上,一名外國記者也提出了這樣的質疑:劉翔有傷,為什麼沒有向外界透露呢?是不是官方有規定不要對外界說呢?

田徑隊總教練馮樹勇說,上周六劉翔的傷勢加重,但沒有料到會這麼嚴重,導致今天無法參賽。

確實,當七月份劉翔被徹底"雪藏"後,有關他的消息則變得密不透風,甚至是正常的訓練和傷痛的消息都沒有。在這一情形下,劉翔無論如何,也必須出現在"鳥巢"內。

劉翔因傷退出比賽並不稀奇,而是兩個極端造成心理落差後的茫然稀奇。這種茫然讓劉翔的教練孫海平面對全球媒體鏡頭泣不成聲,讓在場記者為之動容。

今夜,劉翔難以入眠,但或許是一種解脫。


China’s Big Hope in Track Doesn’t Get Out of Blocks


Published: August 18, 2008

BEIJING — The most anticipated event of the Beijing Games ended stunningly and prematurely Monday morning when China’s most popular athlete, Liu Xiang, limped off the track with an Achilles’ tendon injury and withdrew from the 110-meter hurdles, depriving the host country’s fans of what they had hoped would be the signature triumph of the Olympics.

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Gero Breloer/European Pressphoto Agency

Liu Xiang wore an expression of pain as he limped off the track before the first round of the 110-meter hurdles on Monday.

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Fans reacted as Liu Xiang dropped out of the 110-meter hurdles Monday.

Liu had become the first Chinese man to win a track and field gold medal by taking the 110 hurdles at the 2004 Athens Games. He became a celebrated symbol that China could compete with North Americans and others in events that required speed and sophisticated technique.

He was also considered China’s lone certainty for a gold medal in track and field at the Beijing Games. As the Olympics approached, Liu’s picture was everywhere on billboards. Pressure on him to repeat as champion in his home country had mounted, even as news began to surface that his injuries may be more serious than previously thought.

With a grimace and a limp, Liu brought fans at Olympic Stadium, Chinese reporters and his coach to tears Monday. He left the track, exasperated, ripping from his side the adhesive number that signified that he was competing in Lane No. 2. Fans who had waited for this moment for years began walking toward the exits. Soon they were questioning the Chinese track coaches’ handling of Liu’s injury, a national conversation that may last longer than these Games.

Another victory by Liu, 25, had been considered essential for China to stage a completely successful Olympics, even if the country’s overall lead in gold medals may now temper some of the national disappointment.

In recent days, the Chinese public had been cautioned not to expect too much from Liu, given that he had not competed since May 23 because of a hamstring injury.

That injury had healed, but last Saturday, Liu suffered a recurrence of chronic inflammation in his right Achilles’ tendon, according to China’s track and field federation.

By Monday morning, the pain had become “almost intolerable” and Liu began to shiver in discomfort, said Feng Shuyong, head of the track association.

During warmups, Liu seemed to grab his left hamstring at one point. His face creased in apparent agony. He then staggered out of the block, pulled up after another runner false-started and walked gingerly on his injured right leg.

Feng described Liu as being “very depressed.” No doubt much of China feels the same.

Liu’s coach, Sun Haiping, apologized for the injury then grew overcome with grief, covering his eyes and sobbing in a post-race news conference. Some Chinese reporters also cried in an area under the stadium where interviews with athletes are conducted.

“It is a very hard moment for all of us,” Sun said.

Sun said the Achilles’ tendon injury had recurred over the past six or seven years, seemingly describing a condition inflamed by a bone spur.

“I’m very disappointed, very disappointed,” said Wang Jifei, a reporter with The Chengdu Economic Daily. “Liu Xiang is our, you know, national hero. But right now he has failed.”

He Liu, 23, of Beijing, had come to the Bird’s Nest, as the Olympic Stadium is called, to see Liu in person for the first time.

“It’s very regretful,” He said of Liu’s departure. “Everybody has been waiting for such a long time. We hold very high expectations. But I think people understand.”

Liu’s injury came just minutes after the American hurdler Terrance Trammell, a silver medalist at the 2004 Athens Games, also withdrew because of a strained hamstring, crumpling to the track.

“We have been waiting a whole week for this,” said Guang Chunhua, 46, who, like Liu, is from Shanghai. “What a regret. But he’s injured and that happens to everybody. An American got hurt, too. There must be something wrong with the track. Maybe it’s just unlucky.”

Peng Siyuan, an 8-year-old boy from Beijing, had traveled to see Liu with his family, including an 82-year-old grandfather who sat in a wheelchair.

“I’m not mad at him,” Peng said of Liu. “I’m sure he’ll recover very soon and grab another championship in the future.”

Liu has not competed since May 23, when he participated in a pre-Olympic test event at the Bird’s Nest. He withdrew from Reebok Grand Prix meet in New York on May 31, saying he felt a balky hamstring. On June 8, he false-started — some believe purposely — at the Prefontaine Classic in Eugene, Ore.

Liu then returned to China, skipping the European circuit, which many found puzzling. The hurdles require technical precision; athletes compete frequently against each other to hone their skills and maintain their race sharpness.

While Liu was shelved, he lost his world record of 12.88 seconds, to Cuba’s Dayron Robles, who ran 12.87 in June at a meet in Slovakia.

Anxiety about Liu continued to grow when he did not appear at the opening ceremony of the Beijing Games on Aug. 8. Reportedly, he had been running some simulated races in training, but rumors and news accounts persisted that he was not healthy.

Sunday, a posting on Liu’s official Web site said that he was suffering from an inflamed Achilles’ tendon. “I am very worried about the final,” Sun, Liu’s coach, said on the site, referring to Thursday’s gold-medal race. “In the final, Liu has to strive with all effort and when he uses the force from the foot, the pain gets worse. It will definitely affect his performance.”

Meanwhile, China Daily, the official English-language newspaper, described Monday that Liu’s injury was a strained hamstring. A headline referred to the expected duel with Robles, the Cuban, and said ominously: Injured Liu vs Terrifying opponent.

His mother was described in the article as worrying that he might suffer muscle cramps from training too seriously. She was said to phone him every day, urging caution.

Just before noon, everyone’s greatest fears were realized. Liu was gone from the Olympics. Robles seemed to have only one serious challenger, David Oliver of the United States. And China’s greatest hope had been dashed.

“Of course there are great expectations because in the last four years, Liu Xiang has had great achievement,” Feng, the head of the track federation, said. “He is a great athlete. There is widespread information about Liu Xing. It is encouraging to him to have this. No. 2, it is hard. Even though he does not go out often, when he goes, he sees his own picture. When he goes on the Internet, he sees all kinds of information about Liu Xiang. There is great pressure on him as well.”

At Monday’s news conference, Feng and Sun faced questions about why they had not given more information about Liu’s injury to the Chinese public.

After Liu received medical treatment on Saturday, officials didn’t realize the injury was so serious, Feng said.

“At the time nobody thought that he couldn’t compete today,” Feng said.

He was also asked about whether Liu had been forced to compete, even though he was injured.

“Of course, we recognize the fact that the Chinese track and field team will not have a great caliber, will not have a great level,” Feng said. “If we do not have success in the Beijing Games, it is much larger than the other teams. We ask our athletes to give the biggest performance they are able to. We ask, with all the pressure, please do what you can.”

According to the Xinhua News Agency, an Internet poll taken earlier this month indicated that 70 percent of respondents would react calmly to defeat by Liu. Because he was already an Olympic champion, he would not be viewed as a failure, said Ren Hai, a professor at Beijing Sport University.

“Everybody wants him to win a gold medal, but in competition, anything is possible,” Ren said in a recent interview. “Nothing is guaranteed. I don’t think it would be a big problem.”

A number of Chinese fans interviewed Monday said they did not realize the extent of Liu’s injuries. Some blamed the track federation and wondered whether he had been given proper medical treatment.

“This is a pity,” said Li Sida, 37, a Beijing businessman. “The whole country is disappointed. I wonder why Liu’s coach and the track federation didn’t prevent this from happening. Who ruined him?”

Jeffery Jong, 26, who works for a financial company in Beijing, said he thought that Liu had been “overestimated.”

“He was publicized and praised by the media too much.”

Many others reacted more sympathetically.

“The gold medal really doesn’t matter,” said Wang Weiben, 39, a futures broker. “There’s nothing to be regrettable about. I think it’s enough that he showed up on the field. It must be very suffering, as I saw from his facial expression. He couldn’t continue, obviously.”

Lynn Zinser contributed reporting; Zhang Jing and Huang Yuanxi contributed research.


In Games, China Is Denied Its Signature Moment

Fabrice Coffrini/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Liu Xiang limped off the track before the first round of the 110-meter hurdles.


Published: August 18, 2008

BEIJING — Olympic gold medals? China has no shortage, with its athletes prevailing here in diving, weight lifting, shooting, badminton, archery, table tennis, swimming, rowing, gymnastics, fencing and perhaps soon, even beach volleyball in a nation where bikinis were frowned upon until quite recently.

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But the country that spent seven years and many more billions preparing to stage this grand return-to-prominence party will not get its Cathy Freeman moment.

Freeman lit the cauldron at the 2000 Olympics in Sydney and then lit up the night again little more than a week later by winning the 400 meters with the combined weight of Australia and her Aboriginal heritage loading down her slender frame.

Liu Xiang, no hulking figure himself, was China’s version of Freeman: an upbeat, upwardly mobile embodiment of national progress who had thrived long enough in his event, the 110-meter hurdles, to build up expectation on a scale that the Chinese emperors would have appreciated. Liu was proof that China, long a stockpiler of diving and table tennis medals, could compete in a mainstream, truly global sport, as well.

But not every flesh-and-blood Olympic symbol thrives on the rare air of such an occasion. And in this instance, there will be no occasion at all as the date of Aug. 21 that has long been marked in bold in China will now feature a hurdles final that will be lacking Liu and a Bird’s Nest full of buzz.

Liu was wincing instead of smiling shortly after he walked into the fabulous, new National Stadium on Monday to begin defense of his Olympic title. Instead of reaching, as meticulously planned, for the stars, Liu ended up reaching for his right leg in pain. And he was soon removing the lane number affixed to each of his thighs and limping miserably away from his presumed role in Olympic history before his first-round heat had officially begun.

When the race started without him, he was sitting slumped against a wall in the labyrinthine passageways of the place that had been conceived, in part, as a showcase for his event.

Even in Cuba, the island home of Liu’s chief rival, Dayron Robles, one imagines there was no rejoicing at Liu’s distress. How to begrudge an agreeable young man like Liu an opportunity?

The pity is that neither the Chinese nor anyone else will ever know if Liu could have followed Freeman’s template and handled the pressure. Monday appeared to be a case of Liu’s body, not his mind, letting him down.

He has proven his toughness since he surprised the field in the Athens Olympic final in 2004: winning a world outdoor title last year, despite plenty of worthy challengers, and capturing the world indoor title in March.

But this was hardly the first case of an iconic Olympic athlete faltering before the first hurdle at home. Much of the pre-Olympic expectation in Athens was centered on the Greek sprinter Ekaterini Thanou and her training partner, Konstantinos Kenteris.

Thanou and Kenteris, with remarkably impeccable timing, had restored Greece to prominence in track and field, the traditional showcase sport of the Games, before the Olympics’ return to its traditional home. But neither Kenteris nor Thanou were permitted to compete after they missed a doping test the night before the opening ceremony. Both were banned from the Games by the International Olympic Committee.

At least Greece still ended up with six gold medals. At the 1976 Games in Montreal, no Canadian athlete managed to win even one, which was the first time before or since that the host nation had failed to take gold.

Yet there was no singular figure like Liu or Freeman in Montreal, no protagonist whose back story and lofty expectations came to symbolize the Olympic competition. Nor was there any true equivalent in Atlanta in 1996, when the United States last staged the Summer Games, although the Americans Michael Johnson and Carl Lewis certainly had to cope with massive expectations at home.

Each handled the pressure in style, with Lewis winning his fourth straight title in the long jump and Johnson sweeping the 200 and 400 sprints, taking the 200 world record to a faraway place.

Then came Sydney, where Freeman, the reigning world champion in the 400, was thrust into a more central role. There were plenty of other Australian sports stars about, including the swimmers Ian Thorpe and Kieren Perkins. But Freeman, with her Aboriginal heritage, represented a link between Australia’s past and present. That made her irresistible to both her compatriots, many of whom were eager for rapprochement, and also to visiting foreign journalists looking for a great athlete and a story to help demonstrate the arc of Australia’s history.

The intensity of support for Freeman proved too much for her French rival, Marie-Jose Perec, who fled feeling threatened before the race began. And for those who had witnessed the buildup to the 400, it was still difficult to believe Freeman would be able to put one foot in front of the other, much less complete a lap in under 50 seconds. But on Sept. 25 with 112,000 fans in full roar — 21,000 more than would have filled the Bird’s Nest for Liu — Freeman stepped onto the track and, in an atypical sartorial gesture, pulled a racing hood over her head before she started. It was as if she were trying to shield herself. But she ended up feeding off the energy and then dropped to the track, emotionally spent.

“Sport is this great arena for drama,” she said later with the gold medal and her positive place in the narrative secure. “It’s a reflection of life. Anything can happen. Favorites don’t always win, but my Olympic dream came true when I crossed that line.”

The hardest part for Liu was that he never got the chance to cross the line at all.

Robert Coles: From Tykes to Tolstoy 1997

cover







January 11, 2008 We are sorry to report that the magazine has ceased publication. We are very grateful to those subscribers and donors who supported the magazine as it published its last four issues in 2006 and 2007. We have heard from many subscribers, telling us how unique and special the magazine is. We are happy to have produced the four issues that we did, but also saddened that we are unable to produce more.—The Editors







1997

Robert Coles: From Tykes to Tolstoy
Presents an interview with Robert Coles, author of 50 book and a professor at Both Harvard and Duke Universities, regarding his book about the moral and spiritual life of kids entitled 'The Moral Intelligence of Children.' What the book is all about; Reason why Coles become interested in children; Cole's most admired persons.

By: PT Staff

Few physicians have written as extensively and eloquently on the moral andspiritual life of kids as child psychiatrist Robert Coles, M.D., whose most recent meditation on the subject was recently Published as The Moral Intelligence of Children (Random House). Author of more than 50 books, and a professor at both Harvard and Duke Universities, the 67-year-old Coles shows no signs of slowing down: He's just co-authored yet another book, this time with his three sons.

PT: You've spoken with thousands of kids over the years. Do they still surprise you?

RC: Hardly a week passes that I don't find myself thinking, "Look what he said." If you find yourself bored by children, you're not really observing them.

PT: What's the most common misconception parents have?

RC: A lot of parents underestimate how watchful children are and how that watchfulness determines their behavior. That's what The Moral Intelligence of Children is about. If we want our children to be moral, the first thing we have to do is figure out who we are and what we want transmitted to the next generation. Because we're going to convey that--not by what we say, but by how we behave.

PT: How did you become interested in children?

RC: I had planned to become an English teacher. I wrote my college thesis on the poetry of William Carlos Williams, who was a pediatrician, and sent him a copy. He invited me to meet him, and I was so taken with him and his energy as a physician that I decided to go to medical school and become the kind of doctor he was. I started in pediatrics, but I had trouble being tough, giving shots. I went to see him and he said, "Why don't you try working with kids psychologically instead of medically?"

PT: Why do you think you've been so successful?

RC: People used to ask my wife about how I did my work, and she would say, "Children feel sorry for him. They're not sure what he's trying to do, so they try to help him out. The truth is, he doesn't quite know what he's doing while he's doing it; he's conscientious about leaving himself open to experience."

PT: Whom do you most admire?

RC: Dr. Williams obviously had a great effect on me. Also [social activist] Dorothy Day--I worked in her soup kitchen when I was in medical school. And Walker Percy, another writer-physician. I've written about all of these people as testimony of my admiration. Anna Freud and Erik Erikson are the two people in my field I've most admired. Who else? Alec Wilkinson and Ian Frazier, who are literary journalists, and certain poets, such as Adam Zagajewski.

PT: I thought that there might be more psychiatrists.

RC: I'm no great fan of academic social science. The kind of social science I like is that done by people like Erikson and Anna Freud. It's not only the work they did, but the way they wrote it up. They had the sensibility of a Leo Tolstoy or George Eliot--they could accommodate themselves to the complexities and ironies of life.

PT: What are you most looking forward to?

RC: I'm editing a quarterly magazine, Double Take. It's an effort to render the world around us--as as it is and as it might be--through good fiction, photography, poetry, and nonfiction. I've poured my mind, heart and soul into this with my coeditor, Alex Harris.

PT: Speaking of good writing, a colleague of mine insists that the greatest psychologist of all time was I William Shakespeare.

RC: He's absolutely right. Freud suggested Dostoevski, but Shakespeare, Tolstoy, Eliot--they'll all do.




Double Take is published by Duke University's Center for Documentary Studies; for more information call 1-800-964-8301. A one-year subscription costs $24. PHOTO (COLOR): Coles at work: "My wife used to say, `Children feel sorry for him. They're not sure what he's trying to do, so they try to help him out.'"


Psychology Today, May/Jun 97
Article ID: 938







2008年8月13日 星期三

Barbara Tuchman Dead at 77; A Pulitzer-Winning Historian

Barbara Tuchman Dead at 77; A Pulitzer-Winning Historian


Published: February 7, 1989

LEAD: Barbara W. Tuchman, whose skill at writing histories of men at war and on the brink of war won her two Pulitzer Prizes, died of complications of a stroke yesterday afternoon at Greenwich (Conn.) Hospital. She was 77 years old and was admitted to the hospital Saturday after suffering the stroke at her home at Cos Cob, Conn.

It was Mrs. Tuchman's fourth book, ''The Guns of August,'' a study of the background and beginning of World War I, that made her a celebrity after it came out in 1962, winning reviewers' salutes, a durable niche on best-seller lists and her first Pulitzer Prize.

The second Pulitzer came for ''Stilwell and the American Experience in China, 1911-45.'' The 1971 biography of Gen. Joseph W. Stilwell, a hard-driving American officer who played a major role in China during World War II, was combined with a history of modern China. Her other books included ''The Zimmermann Telegram,'' ''The Proud Tower'' and ''A Distant Mirror.'' Latest Book a Best Seller

Her most recent book, ''The First Salute,'' sets the American Revolution in international perspective. It has been on the New York Times best-seller list for 17 weeks, and last week was No. 9.

Born into a New York family that had long been eminent in finance and public service, Mrs. Tuchman could have had an easy, conventional life as the wife of a prominent physician. But as her three daughters grew older, she took up the historian's profession.

She had neither an academic title nor even a graduate degree. ''It's what saved me,'' she later said. ''If I had taken a doctoral degree, it would have stifled any writing capacity.'' Her Primary Obstacle

But to be a writer was difficult, she found, simply because she was a woman. ''If a man is a writer,'' she once said, ''everybody tiptoes around past the locked door of the breadwinner. But if you're an ordinary female housewife, people say, 'This is just something Barbara wanted to do; it's not professional.' ''

In fact, Mrs. Tuchman had a firm, even contentious, sense of her vocation. In history and biography, she told an audience at the National Portrait Gallery in 1978, ''the writer's object is - or should be - to hold the reader's attention.''

''I want the reader to turn the page and keep on turning to the end,'' she added. ''This is accomplished only when the narrative moves steadily ahead, not when it comes to a weary standstill, overloaded with every item uncovered in the research.'' An Impression of Authority

In her person as well as in her choice of words, Mrs. Tuchman gave an impression of authority. She had strong features, a high forehead, wise hazel eyes and a somewhat serious manner that gave way, now and then, to a dazzling smile.

Summing up her view of the historical process, she wrote in 1981, in the preface to ''Practicing History,'' a selection of her short writings, that she had arrived at ''a sense of history as accidental and perhaps cyclical, of human conduct as a steady stream running through endless fields of changing circumstances, of good and bad always coexisting and inextricably mixed in periods as in people, of cross-currents and counter-currents usually present to contradict too-easy generalizations.''

Lofty though her views might be, Mrs. Tuchman was down to earth in her research. Before she wrote ''The Guns of August,'' she rented a Renault sedan and toured the appropriate battlefields. When she took notes, it was always on index cards measuring 4 by 6 inches - a convenient size, she said, for storing in shoeboxes and carrying in her purse.

That sort of prosaic concern was far from her exalted birthright. Barbara Wertheim was born on Jan. 30, 1912, in New York, the daughter of Maurice Wertheim, an investment banker, art collector and philanthropist, and Alma Morgenthau Wertheim, a sister of Henry Morgenthau Jr., who was Secretary of the Treasury under President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Miss Wertheim attended the Walden School before entering Radcliffe College, where she concentrated on history and literature and received her bachelor's degree in 1933. Worked in Japan

Since, as she put it, ''paying jobs did not hang from the trees'' in that Depression year, she took an unpaid position with the American Council of the Institute of Pacific Relations.

The following year, she went to Tokyo to help work up an economic handbook of the Pacific area. While there, she wrote for two journals, Far Eastern Survey and Pacific Affairs.

An early contribution was a review of a French historian's book about Japan. Not long after it was printed, she later recalled: ''I was thrilled to receive from the author a letter addressed 'Chere consoeur' (the feminine of confrere, or as we would say, 'colleague'). I felt admitted into an international circle of professionals.''

In 1936, Miss Wertheim went to work for The Nation, which her father had bought to keep it from going bankrupt. Her first job was clipping newspaper articles, but soon she was writing herself, and in 1937, during the Spanish Civil War, she went to Valencia and Madrid as The Nation's correspondent. 'Heroes, Hopes, and Illusions'

From Spain she traveled elsewhere in Europe, savoring what she later called ''a somber, exciting, believing, betraying time, with heroes, hopes, and illusions.''

In London, she put together a short book, ''The Lost British Policy,'' about British policy toward Spain and the Western Mediterranean. Her later appraisal of the work, which came out in 1938, was that it was only ''a respectable piece of research,'' and she sometimes omitted it in listing her books.

By 1939, she was back in New York, writing largely on Spain, and the next year she married Dr. Lester Reginald Tuchman, a New York internist.

Mrs. Tuchman was soon showing her strength of will. With Nazi Germany looming, she later wrote, her husband ''not unreasonably felt at that time that the world was too unpromising to bring children into.

''Sensible for once, I argued that if we waited for the outlook to improve, we might wait forever, and that if we wanted a child at all we should have it now, regardless of Hitler.''

''The tyranny of men not being quite as total as today's feminists would have us believe,'' she added, writing in 1981, ''our first daughter was born nine months later.'' Separated by Wartime

After Pearl Harbor, Dr. Tuchman went overseas to a United States military hospital, and Mrs. Tuchman got a job in New York with the Office of War Information, preparing material on the Far East for use in broadcasts to Europe.

''After the war, when my husband came home, we had two more children, and domesticity for a while prevailed,'' she wrote later, ''combined with beginning the work I had always wanted to do, which was writing a book.''

''When the children were very small,'' she once recalled in an interview, ''I worked in the morning only and then gradually, as they spent full days at school, I could spend full days at work. I could never have done any of this work if I hadn't been able to afford domestic help.''

The fruit of those labors, ''Bible and Sword,'' about relations between Britain and Palestine, came out in 1956. It attracted relatively little notice, though what there was of it was favorable.

Two years later ''The Zimmermann Telegram'' appeared, about a message sent from Berlin to a German diplomat in Mexico in January 1917, raising the possibility of ''an understanding on our part that Mexico is to reconquer territory in Texas, New Mexico and Arizona,'' and about the message's repercussions after it was intercepted and made public by the British.

Writing in The New York Times, Samuel Flagg Bemis, the Yale diplomatic historian, said the value and importance of the book lay in Mrs. Tuchman's ''brilliant use of well known materials, her sureness of insight and her competent grasp of a complicated chapter of diplomatic history.'' 'The Guns of August'

Attempting something that might have seemed a bit beyond her reach, Mrs. Tuchman took up a far broader and more important topic in her next book, which was ''The Guns of August.'' World War I, as she saw it, was no less than ''the chasm between our world and a world that died forever.''

Though the book was largely about arms and men, it was also about aspirations and ideals. ''Men,'' she concluded, in one widely quoted passage, ''could not sustain a war of such magnitude and pain without hope - the hope that its very enormity would insure that it could never happen again.''

Clifton Fadiman, writing in the Book-of-the-Month-Club News, said: ''Its virtues are almost Thucydidean: intelligence, concision, weight, detachment.''

Writing in The New York Times, Cyril Falls, a British officer turned military historian, said Mrs. Tuchman ''writes so brilliantly and inspiringly.'' The book, he said, was ''lucid, fair, critical and witty.''

But he contended that her performance was uneven, and ''the errors and omissions amount to a formidable total.'' For his part, Bruce Bliven, writing in The New Yorker, complained that ''Mrs. Tuchman leans toward seeing issues as black and white.'' Emphasized Human Qualities

The book's emphasis on the human qualities of the leaders of the time helped make it popular with the public, and it served as the basis for a 1964 documentary film, produced by Nathan Kroll, with the same title.

The quarter-century preceding World War I was the subject of Mrs. Tuchman's next book, ''The Proud Tower,'' which came out in 1966. In a review in The New York Times, Martin Duberman, a Princeton history professor, praised her skill at narrating events, making historical personages come alive, and writing clearly and powerfully about complex matters.

But he said the book did ''not come up to the high level of 'The Guns of August.' '' It was not a portrait of the period, he contended, but merely ''random brush strokes, leaving a canvas unoccupied by any ruling vision.''

When ''Stilwell and the American Experience in China, 1911-45,'' came out, it was hailed as ''brilliant'' in a review in The New Republic by the dean of American China scholars, John K. Fairbank, the director of Harvard University's East Asian Research Center. 'A Distant Mirror'

Another book about Asia, ''Notes From China,'' a slim volume about a six-week trip Mrs. Tuchman had taken, appeared in 1972. But six years went by before the appearance of her next work, ''A Distant Mirror,'' a study of the 14th century, an era that was racked by plague and war.

Reviewing the book in The New York Times, Eric Cochrane, a professor of history at the University of Chicago, said, ''This book abounds in the same elements that have made her previous books masterpieces of popular scholarship: vivid battle scenes, scenes from daily life, brilliant portraits.'' But he also argued that she was guilty of grave omissions and misinterpretations.

In ''The March of Folly: From Troy to Vietnam,'' a 1984 book, Mrs. Tuchman scrutinized the Trojans' decision to admit the Greek horse into their city, the refusal of six Renaissance Popes to arrest church corruption in advance of the Protestant Reformation, British misrule under King George III and America's mishandling of the Vietnam conflict.

Mrs. Tuchman had an occasional fondness for twitting figures of authority. She once began a speech to the Army War College by noting that her subject, generalship, had been suggested by the college's commandant.

''No doubt,'' she observed, ''he could safely assume that the subject in itself would automatically interest this audience in the same way that motherhood would interest an audience of pregnant ladies.''

Mrs. Tuchman is survived by her husband, who is an emeritus professor of clinical medicine at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine; a sister, Anne W. Werner of Manhattan; three daughters, Lucy T. Eisenberg of Los Angeles, Jessica Tuchman Mathews of Washington, and Alma Tuchman of Cos Cob and Manhattan, and four grandchildren.

The funeral will be private. A memorial service is be held at 2 P.M. Sunday in the Celeste Bartos Forum at the main branch of the New York Public Library. Her Books And the Subjects ''The Lost British Policy'' (1938): British policy toward Spain and the Western Mediterranean.

''Bible and Sword'' (Alfred A. Knopf, 1956): Relations between Britain and Palestine.

''The Zimmermann Telegram'' (Alfred A. Knopf, 1958): A 1917 diplomatic message and its international repercussions.

''The Guns of August'' (Macmillan, 1962): The background and beginning of World War I. ''The Proud Tower'' (Alfred A. Knopf, 1966): The quarter-century preceding World War I. ''Stillwell and the American Experience in China, 1911-45'' (Macmillan, 1971): A biography of Gen. Joseph W. Stillwell. ''Notes From China (Macmillan, 1972): A trip to China.

''A Distant Mirror'' (Alfred A. Knopf, 1978): The 14th century.

''Practising History'' (Alfred A. Knopf, 1981): A collection of her shorter writings.

''The March of Folly: From Troy to Vietnam'' (Alfred A. Knopf, 1984): Some historical mistakes.

''The First Salute'' (Alfred A. Knopf, 1988): The American Revolution placed in an international perspective.

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