李翊云朗读威廉·特雷弗的作品

这里是《纽约客》杂志的纽约客小说播客。我是黛博拉·特雷斯曼，《纽约客》的小说编辑。每个月，我们都会邀请一位作家从杂志档案中挑选一篇小说来朗读和讨论。本月，我们将聆听威廉·特雷弗的《钢琴调音师的妻子们》，这篇小说发表于1995年10月的《纽约客》。

This is the New Yorker fiction podcast from the New Yorker magazine. I'm Deborah Treisman, fiction editor at the New Yorker. Each month, we invite a writer to choose a story from the magazine's archives to read and discuss. This month, we're going to hear The Piano Tuner's Wives by William Trevor, which appeared in The New Yorker in October 1995.

维奥莱特嫁给钢琴调音师时，他还是个年轻人。而贝尔嫁给他时，他已年迈。事情比这稍微复杂些，因为钢琴调音师选择维奥莱特作为妻子时，曾拒绝了贝尔。

Violet married a piano tuner when he was a young man. Belle married him when he was old. There was a little more to it than that because in choosing Violet to be his wife, the piano tuner had rejected Belle.

这个故事由李翊云挑选，她是八部小说的作者，包括长篇小说《鹅之书》和短篇小说集《星期三的孩子》，后者入围了2024年普利策奖。嗨，翊云。嗨，黛博拉。欢迎你。

The story was chosen by Yiyun Li, who's the author of eight books of fiction, including the novel The Book of Goose and the story collection Wednesday's Child, which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2024. Hi, Yi Yeon. Hi, Deborah. Welcome.

谢谢邀请。所以你一直

Thank you for having me. So you've always had

与威廉·特雷弗的作品有着非常紧密的联系。你认为这是为什么？

a really strong connection with William Trevor's work. Why do you think that is?

嗯，就我个人而言，我是通过阅读他的小说学习写作的，所以我一直视他为纸上的导师。后来，我和他成了朋友，通过观察他，我学到了很多。所以我一直非常喜欢他的作品。

Well, personally, I learned writing by reading his fiction, so I always considered him a mentor on the page. And then later, I made friends with him and I learned a lot from him just by observing him. So I'm always very fond of his work.

你是怎么和他成为朋友的？

How did you befriend him?

我写了一封粉丝信。在我的第一部小说集之后，我想它在爱尔兰获了奖，而他也在候选名单上。所以我感到非常不好意思又很荣幸。于是我就给他写了一封粉丝信，之后我们就开始通信了。是的。

I wrote a fan letter. After my first collection, I think it won a prize in Ireland and he was on a shortlist. So I just felt very bad and honored. So so so I wrote him a fan letter, and we started corresponding then. Yeah.

他对你的作品有过评论吗？

Did he have comments on your own work?

他读过我的一些短篇和几部长篇。在我职业生涯早期，当我写短篇小说时，我常常想着要写一个短篇来与他的故事对话。嗯。所以我很多故事都与他的故事有过对话。我还写过一部名为《善意》的中篇，就是为了与他的中篇《亚历山大之夜》对话。

He read a few of my stories and a couple novels. Early in my career, when I wrote short stories, I often thought I was going to write a short story to have a conversation with his stories. Mhmm. So many of my stories had a conversation with his stories. And there was a novella I wrote called Kindness to have a conversation with his novella, A Night at Alexandria.

他回信说，那篇作品完美无瑕。这样的评价，我一生中只得到过一次。对吧？

And he wrote back, he said it was flawless. That comment, I only got it once in my life. Right?

一次精彩的对话。他本人是什么样子的？

An excellent conversation. And what was he like in person?

非常善于观察。他受过雕塑家的训练，所以会非常细致地观察事物、观察人。从他的故事里我能看出，他对色彩和物件也观察入微。我最难忘的是有几次去德文郡拜访他。

Very observant. And he was trained as a sculptor. So he he looked very closely at at things, at people. And I could see in his story, he also looked at closely at colors and objects. My favorite moment was I visited him a couple times in Devon.

第一次去是在二月。我们共进午餐时，他让我坐在厨房餐桌旁。他说，我让你坐这里是为了你能看见花园里的花。

And the first time I went was in February. We were having lunch and he sat me down at the kitchen table. And he said, I'm sitting here so you can see the flowers in the garden.

然后

And

他看着我，突然说等一下。于是他起身调整了窗帘。他说，这样你既能看见花，阳光又不会刺眼。我当时想，这就是短篇小说作家对细节的专注力。

then he looked at me and he said, but wait a minute. So he got up and he fixed the curtain. He said, this way you can see the flowers, but the sun will not be in your eyes. And I thought that's a short story writer's attention to details. Yeah.

我觉得他对细节非常在意。

He was very attentive to details, I think.

是啊。还有场景调度。

Yeah. Yeah. And staging.

场景调度。没错。

Staging. That's right. Yeah.

这都是关于写故事的技巧。嗯。他在1977至2018年间在《纽约客》发表了约50篇故事，最后两篇是遗作。他2016年去世的。你为什么选择《钢琴调音师的妻子们》？

It's all about writing stories. Mhmm. And he published about 50 stories in the New Yorker between 1977 and 2018, and the last two were posthumous. He died in 2016. What made you choose The Piano Tuner's Wives?

这可能是威廉·特雷弗作品中我最喜欢的故事。我爱他所有的故事。但这个故事值得反复阅读，我也确实经常重读它。有时我会教授这篇作品。每次阅读都能让你对人性的理解更深一层，我想这么说。

This is possibly my most favorite story by William Trevor. I love all his stories. But this story just deserved rereading all the time, and I reread it all the time. I teach it sometimes. It feels like every reading you learn new things about human heart, I would say.

这就是我钟爱这个故事的原因。好了。

So that's why I love this story. Okay.

好的，我想我们可以在朗读后再多聊几句。现在有请李艺媛为大家朗读威廉·特雷弗的《钢琴调音师的妻子们》。

Well, think we should talk some more after the reading. And now here's Yi Yoon Lee reading The Piano Tuner's Wives by William Trevor.

《钢琴调音师的妻子们》。维奥莱特嫁给钢琴调音师时，他还是个青年。而贝尔嫁给他时，他已垂垂老矣。事情并非如此简单，因为调音师当年选择维奥莱特为妻时，曾拒绝了贝尔——当第二次婚礼的消息宣布时，这件事仍被人们津津乐道。"反正她得到的是他的残年余力了"，一位邻居农夫不带恶意地评价道，只是陈述他所见的事实。

The Piano Tuner's Wives. Violet married a piano tuner when he was a young man. Belle married him when he was old. There was a little more to it than that, because in choosing Violet to be his wife, the piano tuner had rejected Belle, which was something everyone remembered when the second wedding was announced. Well, she got the ruins of him anyway, a farmer of the neighborhood remarked, speaking without vindictiveness, stating a fact as he saw it.

其他人看法类似，虽然多数人会换种说法。调音师的头发已然雪白，每逢潮湿的冬季，他的膝盖关节炎就加重一分。他曾身材修长，如今不复当年，视力也比1951年6月7日星期四迎娶维奥莱特时更差了。如今萦绕他的阴影，比1951年时更模糊稀薄。"我愿意"，他在圣科尔曼小教堂里回答，站姿与当年那个下午几乎分毫不差。

Others saw it similarly, though most of them would have put the matter differently. The piano tuner's hair was white, and one of his knees became more arthritic with each damp winter that passed. He had once been svelte but was no longer so, and he was blinder than on the day he married Violet, a Thursday in 1951, June 7. The shadows he lived among now had less shape and less density than those of 1951. I will, he responded in the small Protestant church of St.

而年届五十的贝尔，在这座祭坛前复述着她昔日情敌曾说过的誓词。适当的间隔期已经过去。教堂里没人认为对维奥莱特的记忆未被尊重，或她的离世未得到痛彻的哀悼。"以我世间所有，与你共享"，调音师宣告着，而他的新娘却想着自己更愿身着洁白婚纱而非合宜的酒红礼服站在他身旁。

Colman, standing almost exactly as he had stood on that other afternoon. And Belle, in her 50 year, repeated the words her one time rival had spoken before this altar also. A decent interval had elapsed. No one in the church considered that the memory of Violet had not been honored, that her passing had not been distressfully mourned. And with all my earthly goods, I thee endow, the piano tuner stated, while his new wife thought she would like to be standing beside him in white instead of suitable wine red.

她虽受邀却未出席第一场婚礼。那天她用粉刷鸡舍来分散注意力，但依然泪流不止。即便泪眼婆娑，她仍比那个占据她思绪、令她嫉妒发狂的新娘年轻美丽近五岁。"可他偏偏选了维奥莱特——或是看中那栋终将属于她的房子"，贝尔在鸡舍里苦涩地自语，"还有那点能让盲人生活稍安的小钱"。

She had not attended the first wedding, although she had been invited. She'd kept herself occupied that day, whitewashing the chicken shed. But even so, she'd wept. And tears or not, she was more beautiful and younger by almost five years than the bride who so vividly occupied her thoughts as she battled with her jealousy. Yet he had preferred Violet or the prospect of the house that would one day become hers.

后来每当看见维奥莱特搀扶他行走，或想到维奥莱特为他打理好一切、给他完整生活时，她总被提醒这选择多么合理。"这些我也能做到啊"。离开教堂时奏响的是巴赫曲目，今日管风琴由他人演奏——这本该是他的职责。宾客们在灰白色小教堂周围的墓园里三五成群，那里长眠着调音师的父母和父系先祖。

Belle told herself bitterly in the chicken shed, and the little bit of money there was, uneasement in a blind man's existence. How understandable, she was reminded later on, whenever she saw Violet guiding him as they walked, whenever she thought of Violet making everything work for him, giving him a life. Well, so could she have. As they left the church, the music was by Bach, the organ played by someone else today, for usually it was his task. Groups formed in a small graveyard that was scattered around the small, gray building, where the piano tuner's father and mother were buried, with ancestors on his father's side from previous generations.

愿意前往两英里外新居的宾客将有茶点招待，但部分人此刻便道别祝福。调音师握着一只只熟悉的手，脑海中浮现首任妻子曾为他描述的面容。如1951年那般盛夏时节，阳光穿透厚重礼服灼烧他的前额、面颊和身躯。他毕生熟悉这座墓园，幼时曾为母亲摸索碑文拼读父系家族姓名。他和维奥莱特虽渴望却未有子嗣。

There would be tea and a few drinks for any of the wedding guests who cared to make the journey to the house two miles away, but some said goodbye now, wishing the pair happiness. The piano tuner shook hands that were familiar to him, seeing in his mental eye faces that his first wife had described for him. It was the depths of summer, as in 1951, the sun warmed on his forehead and his cheeks and on his body through the heavy, wedding clothes. All his life, he had known this graveyard, had first felt the letters on the stones as a child, spelling out to his mother the names of his father's family. He and Violet had not had children themselves, though they'd have liked to.

"他就是她的孩子"——这话每次传入贝尔耳中都令她恼火。她本可以给他孩子，对此她深信不疑。"我下月该去府上调音了"，新郎提醒仍握着他手的女士，那是他调校的所有钢琴中唯一一架施坦威的主人。"她琴艺精湛"。

He was her child, it had been said, a statement that was an irritation for Belle whenever she heard it. She would have given him children. Of that, she felt certain. I'm due to visit you next month, the old bridegroom reminded a woman whose hand still lay in his, the owner of a Steinway, the only one among all the pianos he tuned. She played it beautifully.

他每次调音时都请她旁听，向她保证能聆听便是足够的报酬。而她总坚持付清应付的费用。我想是三月三日星期一吧。对，是朱莉娅。她称他为先生。

He asked her to whenever he tuned it, assuring her that to hear was fee enough. She always insisted on paying what was owing. Monday the third, I think it is. Yes, it is Julia. She called him Mr.

德拉姆古德。他自带一种令人不敢轻易亲近的气场。人们提起他时，常尊称为钢琴调音师——这个职业称谓折射出对天赋持有者的敬意。欧文·弗朗西斯·德拉姆古德是他的全名。教区那位年轻的新牧师评论道：今天天气倒挺配合。

Drumgoold. He had a way about him that did not encourage familiarity in others. Often when people spoke of him, he was referred to as the piano tuner, this reminder of his profession reflecting the respect accorded to the possessor of a gift. Owen Francis Drumgooved, his full name was. Well, we had a good day for it, the new young clergyman of the parish remarked.

预报说可能有阵雨，显然他们搞错了。这家伙？哦，没用的，德拉古德先生。真没用。

They said maybe showers, but sure they got it wrong. This guy? Oh, clutless, Mr. Drangooed. Clutless.

那真好。希望你能来家里坐坐。他当然必须答应，随后匆匆穿过墓园里聚集的人群重申邀请，因她决心要办场聚会。后来当新婚生活渐入常态，人们猜测这位钢琴调音师是否考虑退休。拖着病膝又老年骑车，在那些他施展技艺的宅邸、修道院和校舍里，本应得到体谅。

Well, that's nice. And you come on over to the house, I hope. He must, of course, bell pressed, then hurried through the gathering in the graveyard to reiterate the invitation, for she was determined to have a party. Sometime later, when the new marriage had settled into a routine, people wondered if the piano tuner would begin to think about retiring. With a bad knee and being cyclist in old age, he would readily have been forgiven in the houses and the convents and the schoolhouse where he applied his skill.

闲暇是他应得的福分，晚年有伴相随亦不为过。但当饶舌或好事者问及时，他矢口否认有此念头，唯认死亡降临才是终点。实则失去工作与奔波，失去每隔半年造访那些服务多年的小镇，他会茫然无措。不，他保证人们仍会看见白色沃尔克斯豪尔轿车拐进农场大门，停在修道院操场半小时，或是路边享用妻子从保温瓶倒出的茶和三明治午餐。这番事业多半是维奥莱特促成的。

Leisure was his due, the good fortune of company as his years slipped by, no more than he deserved. But when occasionally this was put to him by the loquacious or the inquisitive, he denied that anything of the kind was in his thoughts, that he considered only the visitation of death as bringing any kind of end. The truth was he would be lost without his work, without his traveling about, his arrival every six months or so in one of the small towns to which he had offered his services for so long. No, no, he promised, they'd still see the white wax hall turning in at a farm gate or parked for half an hour in a convent play yard or drawn up on a verge while he ate his lunchtime sandwiches, his tea poured out of a thermos by his wife. It was Violet who had brought most of this activity about.

婚后他仍与母亲同住巴纳霍姆庄园的门房。那时他刚开始调音，仅处理庄园内两架钢琴、镇上另一架及四英里外农舍的一架。因目盲之故，他偶尔被请去修理藤编椅凳——这是他曾习得的技能，或在活动上演奏童年时母亲买给他的小提琴。但维奥莱特嫁给他后改变了一切。她搬进门房，与婆婆虽偶有争执却相处尚可。

When they married, he was still living with his mother in the gate lodge of Barnaghorm House. He had begun to tune pianos, the two in Barnaghorm House, another in the town of Barnaghorm, and one in a farmhouse he walked to four miles away. In those days, he was a charity because he was blind, was now and again asked to repair the seagrass seeds of stools or chairs, which was an ability he had acquired, or to play at some function or other, the violin his mother had bought him in his childhood. But when Violet married him, she changed his life. She moved into the gate lodge, she and his mother not always agreeing but managing nonetheless.

她有辆车，能载他去任何发现钢琴的地方——那些琴通常年久失修。最远开到四十英里外的宅邸。她制定收费标准，将油耗和车辆损耗纳入考量。她高效地管理通讯录，在日记本标记下次调音日期。收入显著提升后，她发现小提琴演奏尚有未开发的盈利空间。

She possessed a car, which meant she could drive him to wherever she discovered a piano, usually long neglected. She drove to houses as far as 40 miles. She fixed his charges, taking the consumption of petrol and wear and tear to the car into account. Efficiently, she kept an address book and marked in a diary the date of each next tuning. She recorded a considerable improvement in earnings and saw that there was more to be made from the playing of the violin than had hitherto been realized.

偏僻酒馆的乡村西部之夜，十字路口的夏日露天舞会——这类活动在1951年尚未绝迹。欧文·德拉古德钟爱小提琴，无论有无报酬都愿演奏。但维奥莱特看重收益。首段婚姻忙碌推进，当她继承父亲房产后便携丈夫入住。这曾作为农舍的土地早已因家族世代酗酒的恶习变卖，唯维奥莱特幸免于此。

Country and Western evenings in lonely public houses, the crossroads platform dances of summer, a practice that in 1951 had not entirely died out. Owen Drumgud delighted in his violin and would play it anywhere, for profit or not. But Violet was keen on the profit. So the first marriage busily progressed, and when eventually Violet inherited her father's house, she took her husband to live there. Once a farmhouse, it was no longer so, the possession of the land that gave it this title, having long ago been lost through the fondness for strong drink that for generations had dogged the family but had not reached Violet herself.

早年丈夫常请求：“给我讲讲这里的样子。”维奥莱特便描述这栋坐落山麓的孤宅——某些天光下远山泛蓝，退离小道些许距离。她细数房间角落的木制百叶窗，他听着她推合闩锁的声音。东风曾扰得客厅炉火摇曳。她讲述楼梯地毯纹样、橱柜青花瓷把手，以及那扇永不开启的正门。

Now, tell me what's there, her husband requested often in their early years, and Violet told him about the house she had brought him to, remotely situated on the edge of the mountains that were blue in certain lights, standing back a bit from a band in a lane. She described the nooks in the rooms, the wooden window shutters. He could hear her pulling over and latching. One wind from the east caused a draft that disturbed the fire in the room, once called the parlor. She described the pattern of the carpet on the single flight of stairs, the blue and white porcelain knobs of the kitchen cupboards, the front door that was never opened.

他爱听这些。母亲始终未能接受他的残疾，总显不耐。父亲——巴纳霍姆庄园的马夫——坠亡时他尚在襁褓。维奥莱特凭着留存照片形容他父亲瘦若灵缇。她为他勾勒庄园大厅的阴冷景象。

He loved to listen. His mother, who had never entirely come to terms with his affliction, had been impatient. His father, a stableman at Barnaghorm House who'd died after a fall he had never known. Lean as a greyhound, Violet described his father from a photograph that remained. She conjured up the big, cold hall of Barnaghorm House.

我们走向楼梯途中经过的是一张摆放着孔雀的桌子，那是一只巨大的银白色鸟儿，翅膀展开的部分镶嵌着彩色玻璃，用以表现羽毛的华美。‘绿色和蓝色’，当他询问颜色时她这样回答。是的，她确信那只是玻璃而非宝石。因为有一次，当他在客厅里费力修补严重破损的格兰特画像时，有人告诉她：楼梯是弧形设计的。他因频繁上下通往育儿室小教堂的楼梯而熟知这一点。

What we walk around on the way to the stairs is a table with a peacock on it, an enormous silvery bird with bits of colored glass set in the splay of its wings to represent the splendor of the feathers. Greens and blues, she said when he asked the color. And yes, she was certain it was only glass, not jewels. Because once, when he was doing his best with the badly flawed Grant in the drawing room, she had been told, The stairs were on a curve. He knew from going up and down them so often to the chapel in the nursery.

维奥莱特说，第一个楼梯平台暗如隧道，两端各放一张沙发，墙上挂着一排排神情严肃的肖像画，半隐在阴影中。‘我们正经过杜西家’，维奥莱特会说，‘菲利神父在加油站加油’。仿佛事情就发生在杜西家，而他清楚这个词的写法——因为他曾询问并得到了答案。当时使用了两种不同的颜色。

The first landing was dark as a tunnel, Violet said, with two sofas, one at each end, and rows of unsmiling portraits half lost in the shadows of the walls. We're passing Doocy's now, Violet would say. Father Phili is getting petrol at the pumps. As though it was at Doocy's and he knew how the word was written, because he'd asked and had been told. Two different colors were employed.

图案的形状被比作他能触摸到的形状。通过维奥莱特的眼睛，他看到了橡树山郊外麦柯迪家房屋的荒凉门面，看到了基莱奥斯文具商苍白的脸，看到了母亲去世时紧闭的双眼和交叠在胸前的双手，看到了那些山脉——有些日子是蓝色的，其他日子则雾霭朦胧化为灰色。

The shape of the design had been compared to shapes he could feel. He saw through Violet's eyes the gaunt facade of the McCurdy's house on the outskirts of Oak Hill. He saw the pallid face of the stationer in Kileios. He saw his mother's eyes closed in death, her hands crossed on her breast. He saw the mountains, blue on some days, misted away to gray on others.

‘报春花并不艳丽’，怀特黑德说，‘更像稻草或乡村黄油，中间带一点颜色’。他会点头表示理解。‘柔和的蓝色，像烟雾’，她这样描述山脉，而中间那点颜色‘更接近橙色而非红色’。他对烟雾的认知仅来自她的描述，但他能辨别那些声音。他坚称自己知道红色是什么——因为那个声音。

A primrose isn't flamboyant, Whitehead said, more like straw or country butter, with a spot of color in the middle. And he would nod and know. Soft blue, like smoke, she said about the mountains, the spot in the middle more orange than red. He knew no more about smoke than what she had told him, but he could tell those sounds. He knew what red was, he insisted, because of the sound.

橙色是因为你能尝到它。他能在埃索标志中看到红色，在报春花中看到橙色斑点。稻草和乡村黄油帮助他理解事物，当维奥莱特形容威滕先生‘粗糙多节’时，这个词就足够了。某位女修道院院长则是‘严肃刻板’的。

Orange because you could taste it. He could see red in the Esso sign and the orange spot in the primrose. Straw and country butter helped him, and when Violet called Mr. Witten gnarled, it was enough. A certain Mother Superior was austere.

安娜·克雷吉对眼睛的描述充满想象力。锯木厂的托马斯是个白化病人。巴德·康芒长着马雷克斯猎犬般的额头——每次有人打理马雷克家宽阔的木材时都会抚摸它。在两位女性照顾他的间隙期，这位钢琴调音师独自应付生活：被钢琴处理商接走送往客户家中，在购物和家务方面获得协助。他觉得自己成了别人的累赘，并知道维奥莱特不会希望如此。

Anna Craigie was fanciful about the eyes. Thomas in the sawmills was an albino. Bad Common had the forehead of the Marex retriever, which was stroked every time the Marek's broad wood was attended to. In the time between one woman and the next, the piano tuner had managed without anyone, fetched by the processors of pianos and driven to their houses, assisted in his shopping and his housekeeping. He felt he had become a nuisance to people and knew that Violet would not have wanted that.

她同样不会希望因自己的离世而让他苦心经营的事业荒废。她曾为他能在圣科尔曼教堂演奏管风琴而自豪。‘永远不要停止演奏’，在她临终低语前的某个时刻，她这样叮嘱。于是，他独自前往教堂。

Nor would she have wanted the business she built up for him to be neglected because she was no longer there. She was proud that he played the organ in St. Coleman's Church. Don't ever stop doing that, she whispered sometime before she whispered her last few words. And so, he went alone to the church.

正是在某个周日，差不多两年后，他与贝尔的浪漫故事开始了。自遭拒以来，贝尔始终无法摆脱嫉妒——她怨恨自己拥有美貌而维奥莱特没有，更因她觉得失明的惩罚同样是对自己的惩罚而痛苦。除了惩罚，你还能如何称呼失明者所处的黑暗？若非惩罚，为何要让黑暗笼罩她的美丽？

It was on a Sunday, when two years almost had passed, that the romance with Belle began. Since the time of her rejection, Belle had been unable to shake off her jealousy, resentful because she had looks and Violet hadn't bitter because it seemed to her that the punishment of blindness was a punishment for her, too. For what else but a punishment could you call the dark the sightless lived in? And what else but a punishment? Was it that darkness should be thrown over her beauty?

然而她并无该受惩罚的罪过，他们本该是登对的一对，她虽年长却风韵犹存。这本该是种恩典——将美丽赐予一个不知其存在的男人。正因为这种不幸不断啃噬着她，贝尔始终未婚。她先协助父亲，后协助兄弟经营家族店铺：填写待修钟表的票据，记录体育奖杯刻字细节。她在唯一柜台后忙碌，圣诞季是旺季，玻璃器皿和晴雨表是最受欢迎的结婚礼物，打火机和廉价珠宝则适合次要场合。

Yet there had been no sin to punish, and they would have been a handsome couple, she an old when drawn good. An act of grace it would have been, her beauty given to a man who did not know that it was there. It was because her misfortune did not cease to nag at her that Belle remained unmarried. She assisted her father first and then her brother in the family shop, making out tickets for the clocks and watches that were left in for repair, noting the details for the engraving of sports trophies. She served behind a single counter, the Christmas season, her busy time, glassware and weather indicators, the most popular wedding gifts, cigarette lighters and inexpensive jewelry for lesser occasions.

后来钟表只需更换电池，于是礼品业务得以扩展。但岁月流逝，镇上再无人能及那个被夺走的男人。贝尔出生在店铺楼上，当房屋和店铺归兄弟所有后，她仍住那里。兄弟的孩子相继出生，但仍有她的容身之处，她在店里的地位也未被动摇。正是她负责照看后院的鸡群——自十岁生日被赋予这个责任起，便一直掌管着它们。

In time, clocks and watches required only the fitting of a battery, and so the gift side of the business was expanded. But while that time passed, there was no man in the town who lived up to the one who had been taken from her. Belle had been born above the shop, and when House and Shop became her brothers, she continued to live there. Her brother's children were born, but there was still room for her, and her position in the shop itself was not usurped. It was she who kept the chickens at the back, who always had been in charge of them, given the responsibility on her tenth birthday.

那份失望也持续着。长久以来，与她共存的失望已成为她的一部分，塑造了她对侄女侄子的形象。有人注意到，这份失望藏在她眼里，甚至为她的美貌增添了一种特质。当与曾拒绝她的男人重燃旧情时，她的兄嫂认为她在犯错，却未明言，只打趣问她是否打算带着那群鸡一起嫁过去。早在童年时，对他的爱就让她感到幸福。

That, too, continued. That she lived with a disappointment had long ago become part of her, had made her what she was for her nieces and her nephew. It was in her eyes, some people noted, even lent her beauty, a quality that enhanced it. When the romance began with the man who had once rejected her, her brother and his wife considered she was making a mistake, but did not say so, only laughingly asked if she intended taking the chickens with her. As long ago as childhood, her love of him had made her happy.

后来，爱情的期待也曾有过。步入中年后，她忆起那个与如今截然不同的自己。她的一部分已然枯萎。但当爱的感觉再度萌生时，仿佛枯萎从未发生。周遭灰暗的世界明亮起来，一切为时未晚。

Later, there had been love's expectation. Passing through middle age, she remembered a person who was herself, whose nature seemed different from that of the woman she became. Some part of her had withered. But when the feeling of love began again, it was as though that had not happened. All around her, a dinginess brightened, and it was not too late.

那个周日，当其他寥寥几位教友散去后，两人站在墓园里交谈。'来，我带你看看这些墓碑，'他熟门熟路地引着路，手指抚过第一块墓碑的刻痕。'这是祖母，'他说，'父亲的母亲。'有那么一刻，贝尔想亲自触摸那些凹刻的字母，而非仅仅凝视。

That Sunday, the two stood talking in the graveyard when the handful of other parishioners had gone. Come, and I'll show you the graves, he said, and led the way, knowing exactly where he was going. Stepping onto the grass and feeding the first gravestone with his fingers. He's grandmother, he said, on his father's side. And for a moment, Belle wanted to feel the incised letters herself instead of looking at them.

穿行在墓碑间时，二人都清楚先走的教友们正暗暗留意这对滞留者。自维奥莱特去世后，每逢周日除非下雨——那时他会搭普德泰尔老太太的便车——他总徒步往返于家和教堂之间。'想散散步吗，贝尔？'介绍完家族墓穴后他问道。

They both knew, as they moved among the graves, that the parishioners who'd gone on were very much aware of the two who had been left behind. On Sundays, ever since Violet's death, he had walked to and from his house, unless it happened to be raining, in which case the man who drove old Mrs. Purdtail to church took him home also. Would you like a walk, Belle? He asked when he had shown her his family graves.

她答应了。贝尔出嫁时没带走那些鸡，她说已受够了它们。后来她为此后悔，因为每当她在维奥莱特的旧居做任何事，都感觉是步其后尘。切炖肉时，站在维奥莱特用过的砧板前，光线洒在那把刀上，她觉得自己像个模仿者。

She said she would. Belle didn't take the chickens with her when she became a wife. She said she'd had enough of chickens. Afterward, she regretted that, because every time she did anything in the house that had been Violet's, she felt it had been done by Violet before her. When she cut up meat for a stew, standing with the light falling on the board that Violet had used, and on a knife, she felt herself a follower.

她把胡萝卜切丁，暗自希望维奥莱特当年是切片。她买了新木勺，因为维奥莱特的已干裂变形。她粉刷楼梯扶手直柱，漆了永不开启的前门内侧，清空了阁楼橱柜里积年的女性杂志堆。

She diced carrots, hoping that Violet had sliced them. She bought new wooden spoons because Violet's had shriveled away so. She painted the upright rails of the banisters. She painted the inside of the front door that was never opened. She disposed of the stacks of women's magazines, years old, that she found in an upstairs cupboard.

她扔掉了自认不卫生的煎锅，为厨房地板订购了新乙烯基。但后院的花床她坚持除草，生怕访客说她任由宅院荒废。永远存在这种矛盾：该保留什么，该改变什么。料理花床时，她是否在向维奥莱特妥协？

She threw away a frying pan because she considered it unhygienic. She ordered new vinyl for the kitchen floor. But she kept the flower beds at the back weeded, in case anyone coming to the house might say she was letting the place become run down. There was always this dichotomy: what to keep up, what to change. Was she giving in to Violet when she tended her flower beds?

扔掉煎锅和三把木勺时，她是否在屈从于琐碎？贝尔的每个举动都伴随自我怀疑。维奥莱特矮胖的身影——灰白头发，眼睛渐小，面颊松弛——仿佛在恼人地发号施令。而她们共有的丈夫，在某个房间轻柔拉着小提琴，不知首任妻子衣着邋遢，身材走样，烹饪不洁；不知活着的贝尔拥有他全部爱意，占据其他女人的物品、卧室和汽车。这本该足够，本该是一切，但随时间流逝，对贝尔而言却近乎虚无。

Was she giving in to pettiness when she threw away a frying pan and three wooden spoons? Whatever Belle did, she afterwards doubted herself. The dumpy figure of Violet, gray haired as she had been in the end, her eyes gone small and the plumpness of her face, seemed irritatingly to command. And the unseen husband they shared, softly playing his violin in one room or another, did not know that his first wife had dressed badly, did not know she had thickened and become sloppy, did not know she had been an unclean cook, that Belle was the one who was alive, that she was offered all a man's affection, that she plundered his other women's possessions and occupied her bedroom and drove her car, should have been enough. It should have been everything, but as time went on, it seemed to Bell to be scarcely anything at all.

他沉浸在近四十年婚姻所允许的神圣哀伤里。这情绪始终存在。婚后一年午餐时分，当贝尔将车停进田间小道时，他说：'若你力不从心会告诉我的吧。'力不从心？欧文。驾车穿越郡县，搀我进出，坐听琴声。

He had become sad in ways that had been allowed and hallowed in a marriage of nearly forty years. That was what was always there. A year after the wedding, as the couple sat one lunchtime in the car which Belle had drawn into the gateway to a field, he said, You'd tell me if it was too much for you. Too much, Owen. Driving all over the county, having to get me in and out, having to sit there listening.

'我没问题。你很好，这么有耐心。' '我觉得自己一点也不好。那天礼拜日我知道你在教堂，闻到了你身上的香水味。'

It's not too much. You're good, the way you've patience. I don't think I'm good at all. I knew you were in church that Sunday. I could smell the perfume you had on.

即便在管风琴旁，我也能闻到那气味。我永远忘不了那个周日。当你允许我带你去看那些坟墓时，我就爱上了你。在那之前我就爱上了你。我不想因为跟着钢琴四处奔波而让你疲惫不堪。

Even at the organ, I could smell it. I'll never forget that Sunday. I loved you when you let me show you the graves. I loved you before that. I don't want to tire you out with all the traipsing about after pianos.

你知道，我可以放手。他说话时，她心想，他会为她那么做。他另一次说过，他对女人没多大兴趣，一个盲人走向生命尽头。他承认最初想娶她时，犹豫了两个多月才开口，因为他比她更清楚答应后要面对什么。贝尔现在长什么样了？

I could let it go, you know. He would do that for her, her thought was, as he spoke. He wasn't much for a woman, he had said another time, a blind man moving on toward the end of his days. He confessed that when first he wanted to marry her, he hadn't put it to her for more than two months, knowing better than she what she would be letting herself in for if she said yes. What's that Belle look like these days?

几年前他问过维奥莉特，维奥莉特起初没回答。后来她显然说过，贝尔仍像个女孩。欧文，我不希望你停下工作，永远不要。亲爱的，你那颗老心脏，别说自己不行。你知道，这让我也出门走动，比这辈子任何时候都多，走遍那些从不知道的街道，去从未到过的小镇，见素不相识的人。

He had asked Violet a few years ago, and Violet hadn't answered at first. Then apparently, she'd said, Belle still looks a girl. I wouldn't want you to stop your work, not ever, Owen. Your old heart, my love, don't say you're not good. It gets me out and about, too, you know, more than ever in my life, down all those avenues to houses I didn't know were there, towns I've never been to, people I never knew.

以前是受限制的。这个词脱口而出，但没关系。他没有回应说自己理解限制，那不是他的作风。教堂那个周日之后他们逐渐了解时，他说常想象她在哥哥的珠宝店里包装商品，就像她曾为他包装给维奥莉特生日买的手表。想象她傍晚给窗户装上铁栅，锁上店门，上楼与哥哥一家同坐。

It was restricted before. The word slipped out, but it didn't matter. He did not reply that he understood about restriction, for that was not his style. When they were getting to know one another after that Sunday by the church, he said he'd often thought of her in her brother's jeweler's shop, wrapping up what was purchased there, as she had wrapped for him the watch he bought for one of Violet's birthdays. He'd thought of her putting up the grills over the windows in the evenings, unlocking the shop door, and then going upstairs to sit with her brother's family.

婚后她告诉他更多，她大半生如何度过，只有那些鸡属于自己。维奥莉特说他拒绝的女人仍像女孩时，还补充说她衣着时髦。他们没有蜜月。但几个月后，当他怀疑四处奔波是否让她吃不消时，他带贝尔去了他和维奥莉特常去的海滨度假地。他们住在同一家苏西旅馆，走在漫长空旷的海滩上，在开满倒挂金钟的小径和悬崖间，云雀时隐时现。

When they were married, she told him more, how most of the days of her life had been spent, only her chickens her own. Smart in her clothes, Violet had added when she said the woman he'd rejected still looked a girl. There hadn't been any kind of honeymoon. But a few months after he had wondered if traveling about was too much for her, he took Belle away to a seaside resort where he and Violet had many times spent a week. They stayed in the same boarding house, the song Susie, and walked on the long empty strand and in lanes where larks gathered in and out of the fuchsia and on the cliffs.

他们在马利酒馆喝酒。秋日的沙丘上躺着晒太阳。你能想到真是太好了。贝尔对他微笑，因他想让她快乐而欣喜。为过冬养精蓄锐吧。

They drank in Mali's public house. They lay in autumn sunshine on the dunes. You're good to have thought of it. Belle smiled at him, pleased because he wanted her to be happy. Set us up for the winter bell.

她知道这对他不容易。来这儿是因为他不熟悉别处。出发前他就意识到抵达时情绪可能复杂。她从他脸上看到了为她强装的坚忍。私下里，他背负着被海风海藻气味勾起的背叛愧疚。

She knew it wasn't easy for him. They had come to this place because he knew no other. He was aware, before they set out, of the complication that might develop in his emotions when they arrived. She had seen that in his face, a stoicism that was there for her. Privately, he bore the guilt of betrayal, stirred up by the smell of the sea and seaweed.

旅馆里的声音是维奥莉特听过的声音。对维奥莉特来说，金银花的香气也持续到十月。是维奥莉特最先说秋日晒一周太阳能为过冬做准备。他说完这话后，那神情也流露出来。我告诉你我们要做什么，他说。

The voices in the boarding house were the voices Violet had heard. For Violet, too, the scent of honeysuckle had lingered into October. It was Violet who first said a week in the autumn sun would set them up for the winter. That showed in him also, a moment after he spoke the words. I'll tell you what we'll do, he said.

回去后给你买电视贝尔。哦，但你会告诉我的。他们在海角灯塔附近散步时他这么说。他本会为维奥莉特买电视。但维奥莉特准说过不想为这东西烦心。

When we are back, we'll get you the television bell. Oh, but you you'd tell me. They were walking near the lighthouse on the cape when he said that. He would have offered the television to Violet. But Violet must have said she wouldn't be bothered with the thing.

她可能争辩说电视永远不会打开。反正只能看到蠢节目。你对我真好，贝尔却这么说。哦，不，不。当他们离灯塔足够近时，他喊了一声，有人从窗口回应。

It would never be turned on, she had probably argued. You only got silliness on it anyway. You're good to me, Belle said instead. Oh, no, no. When they were close enough to the lighthouse, he called out and a man called back from a window.

“稍等一下，”男人说道。当他打开门时，想必已猜到他所熟知的妻子已然离世。“喝一杯吧，”待他们进屋提及死亡与再婚后，他提议道。威士忌斟满，贝尔感觉三只举杯致意的玻璃杯仿佛在默默向她致敬，尽管无人明言。假期最后一晚返回寄宿公寓时，雨一直下。

Hold on a minute, the man said. And by the time he opened the door, he must have guessed that the wife he'd known had died. You'll take a drop, he offered when they were inside, when the death and the remarriage had been mentioned. Whiskey was poured, and Belle felt that the three glasses lifted in salutation wore an honoring of her, although this was not said. It rained on the way back to the boarding house the last evening of the holiday.

“冬天正合适，”次日她驾车穿过不停歇的雨幕时，他望着电视机说道。电视机送来后，被安放在厨房旁曾称作客厅的小房间里。这里曾是收音机常驻之地，如今成了他们主要的休憩处。电视机到来两周后，贝尔收养了农夫不要的小黑绵羊犬——它因惧怕羊群而被遗弃。这狗成了她的专属，永远被唤作她的狗。

Nice for the winter, he said as she drove the next day through rain that didn't cease the television. When it came, it was installed in a small room that was once called the parlor next to the kitchen. This was where mostly they sat where the radio was. A fortnight after the arrival of the television set, Belle acquired a small black sheepdog that a farmer didn't want because it was afraid of sheep. This dog became hers and was always called hers.

她喂养照料它，训练它习惯随车出行，赋予它新名字“玛吉”，狗狗最终也学会了回应。但即便有狗和电视作伴，历经家中物件的添置与清理，被真诚地保证过被爱，被称赞善良，贝尔的生活依然如故。那个长久挽着丈夫手臂、引领他进入各家修复钢琴的女人，依然如影随形——不是作为恼人的幽灵或怨念的幻影，而是如同她将部分灵魂留在了所爱之人身上。

She fed it and looked after it. She got it used to traveling with them in the car. She gave it a new name, Maggie, which it answered to in time. But even with the dog and the television, with additions and disposals in the house, with being so sincerely assured that she was loved, with being told she was good, nothing changed for Belle. The woman who for so long had taken her husband's arm, who had guided him into rooms of houses where he coaxed pianos back to life, still claimed existence, not as a tiresome ghost, some unforgiving specter, uncertainly there, but as if some part of her had been left in the man she'd loved.

欧文·德拉姆古德有着异于常人的敏锐，始终感知着第二任妻子的不安。她心知肚明：正因如此他才提出放弃工作，带她去紫罗兰海岸承受背叛的愧疚，才有了电视机和绵羊犬。他猜到她重铺厨房地板的原因。在认识紫罗兰的男人面前，他曾骄傲地向她举杯。

Sensitive in ways that other people weren't, Oven Drumgud continued to sense his second wife's unease. She knew he did. It was why he had offered to give up his work, why he'd taken her to Violet Seashore and borne there the guilt of his betrayal, why there was a television set now and a sheepdog. He had guessed why she'd recovered the kitchen floor. Proudly, he had raised his glass to her in the company of a man who had known Violet.

他骄傲地与她并肩坐在寄宿公寓的餐厅，坐在马利酒馆里。贝尔强迫自己记住这些：从灯塔橱柜取出的约翰詹姆森威士忌，寄宿公寓里的嘈杂人声。她明白他已竭尽所能安慰她，他的爱意渗透在每件小事中。

Proudly, he had sat with her in the dining room of the boarding house and in Mallee's public house. Belle made herself remember all that. She made herself see the bottle of John Jameson taken from a cupboard in a lighthouse and hear the boarding house voices. He understood he did his best to comfort her. His affection was in everything he did.

但若是紫罗兰，会告诉他哪些树叶正在变色，会汇报潮汐涨落。贝尔醒悟得太迟——紫罗兰曾是他的眼睛，而紫罗兰没给她留下呼吸的空间。

But Violet would have told him which leaves were on the turn. Violet would have reported that the tide was going out or coming in. Too late, Belle realized that. Violet had been his blind man's vision. Violet had left her no room to breathe.

某日从最远的一户人家离开时（那是贝尔首次造访），他说：“见过比那更阴郁的房间吗？是那些圣像画的缘故吗？”贝尔倒车调整，缓缓驶过三十年前未粉刷够白的门廊。她阴郁地坐在河床般的巷子里，竭力避开坑洼。

One day, coming away from the house that was the most distant they visited, the first time Bell had been there. He said, Did you ever see a room as somber as that one? Is it the holy pictures that do it? Bell backed the car and straightened it, then edged it through a gateway that thirty years ago hadn't been made white enough. Somber, she sat on a lane like a riverbed, staring around the potholes as best she could.

“我们总猜，他们不用彩色墙纸是不是怕对圣像不敬？”贝尔没有接话。她将沃克斯豪尔车滑上柏油路，沉默着驶过树皮地。格拉纳汉夫人放钢琴的房间里，那些圣像画历历在目：圣母与圣婴、圣心、持百合的圣凯瑟琳、独处的圣母、荣光中的耶稣。

We used to wonder, could it be they didn't want anything colorful in the way of a wallpaper in case it wasn't respectful to the pictures? Belle didn't comment on that. She eased the vox hall out onto the tarred road and drove in silence over a stretch of barkland. Vividly, she saw the holy pictures in the room where Mrs. Guanagham's piano was: Virgin and Child, Sacred Heart, Saint Catherine with her lily, the Virgin on her own, Jesus in glory.

它们悬挂在毫无特色的棕褐色墙面上。壁炉台和角落书架摆着雕像。格拉纳汉夫人端着茶点走进这忧郁的小屋时，连说话都压低声音，仿佛圣洁要求如此。“什么画？”

They hung against nondescript brown. There were statues on the mantelpiece and on a corner shelf. Mrs. Granahan had brought tea and biscuits to that small melancholy room, speaking in a hushed tone as if the holiness demanded that. What pictures?

贝尔目视前方问道（其实大可转头，毕竟荒原道路笔直无车）。“那些画不在里面了吗？满屋子的圣像画。肯定被取下来了。当时有吗？”

Belle asked, not turning her head, although she might have, for there was no other traffic and the bog road was straight. Aren't the pictures still in there? Holy pictures all over the place. They must have taken them down. Was there then?

贝尔加快了些脚步。她说有只狐狸不知从哪儿冒出来，出现在左侧。她说那狐狸像所有狐狸那样静止站着。你想停车看看它吗，贝尔？不，不用了。

Belle went a little faster. She said a fox had come from nowhere, over to the left. It was standing still, she said, the way foxes do. You want to pull up and watch him, Belle? No, no.

它现在已经走开了。是格拉纳汉夫人的女儿弹的那架钢琴吗？哦，是的。她已经很多年没见过那姑娘了。

He's moved on now. Was it Mrs. Granahan's daughter who played that piano? Oh, it was. And she hasn't seen that girl in years.

我们过去常说可能是那些圣像画把她吓跑的。现在墙上挂的什么？条纹壁纸。贝尔补充道，壁炉架上还摆着那女儿的照片。后来某天，当他提到米纳修道院有位修女的脸颊像苹果般红润时。

We used to say the holy pictures maybe drove her away. What's on the walls now? A striped paper. And Bell added, There is a photograph of the daughter on a mantelpiece. Sometime later, on another day, when he referred to one of the sisters at the convent in Mina as having cheeks as flushed as an eating apple.

贝尔说那位修女如今面色惨白，脸庞下垂凹陷。她生病了，他说道。贝尔突然变得自信起来，不顾旁人眼光，把维奥莱特的花从后花园拔起，重新翻整了花床。她告诉丈夫杜西加油站换了招牌，埃索换成了德士古。她描述着德士古的红色大星标志，以及字母的排列方式。

Belle said that that nun was chalky white these days, her face pulled down and sunken. She has an illness so, he said. Suddenly more confident, not caring what people thought, Belle rooted out Violet's plants from the flower beds at the back and grasped the flower beds over. She told her husband of a change at Doocy's garage, Texaco sold instead of essel. She described the Texaco logo, the big red star, and how the letters of the word were arranged.

她避免在杜西加油站停留，以防有人问起埃索是否让杜西失望之类的话。关于巴纳格罗姆大厅的孔雀雕像，贝尔说：不，我不会说它是银色的，如果清理干净，底下应该是黄铜。楼梯平台两端的沙发换了新套子，上面印着各色菊花图案。不，不是林。

She avoided stopping at Doocy's in case a conversation took place there, in case Doocy were asked if Essel had let him down or what. Well, no, I wouldn't call it silvery, exactly, Bell said about the peacock in the hall of Barnergrom House. If they clean it up, I'd say it's brass underneath. Upstairs, the sofa at each end of the landing had new loose covers, bunches of different colored chrysanthemums on them. Well, no, not Lin.

手持丈夫父亲的照片时，贝尔说：我不会那么形容他，应该说是一张坚毅的脸。那位曾被形容长着猛犸象牙齿的教师如今装了假牙，笑容端庄。时光显然冲刷了麦柯迪家外墙的亮白，现在近乎灰色。有天贝尔望着天气映蓝的远山说：勿忘我蓝。

I wouldn't call him that, Belle said, with the photograph of her husband's father in her hand. A sturdy face, I'd say. A school teacher whose teeth were once described as mammoth had false teeth now, less of a mouthful, her smile sedate. Time had apparently drenched the bright white of the McCurdy's facade, almost a gray you'd call it. Forget me not, Blue, Belle said one day, speaking of the mountains that were blue when the weather brought that color out.

你几乎难以置信。此后再没人说琴师家那种山色是烟霭般的淡蓝。老德伦古德曾用手指抚过树皮，能辨别树叶轮廓的差异，能区分金雀花和黑莓的尖刺。

You'd hardly credit it. And it was never again said in a piano tuner's house that the blue of the mountains was the subtle blue of smoke. Old and drun good had run his fingers over the bark of trees. He could tell the difference in the outline of their leaves. He could tell the thorns of gorse and bramble.

他凭鸣叫识鸟，吠声辨狗，腿边触感认猫。墓碑上的铭文、管风琴残件、他的小提琴。他能看见红色——冬青浆果与复活节棉絮。能闻出薰衣草与百里香。这些都无法被剥夺。

He knew birds from their song, dogs from their bark, cats from the touch of them on his legs. There were the letters on the gravestones, the stubs of the organ, his violin. He could see red, berries on holly and cotton Easter. He could smell lavender and thyme. All that could not be taken from him.

橱柜把手掉漆无关紧要，厨房瓷灯罩出现未听闻的裂纹也无妨。重要的是如梦境般脆弱之物的损伤。他最初选择的妻子衣着灰暗。如今他更多从沉默与语调而非言语中明白这点。

And it didn't matter if overnight the color had worn off the kitchen knobs. It didn't matter if the China light shade in the kitchen had a crack he hadn't heard about before. What mattered was damage done to something as fragile as a dream. The wife he had first chosen had dressed drabbly. From silence and inflections more than from words, he learned that now.

她的灰发蓬乱垂肩，背部微驼。他摸索前行，当他们外出巡游时，两个老人比他们永恒幸福时更显苍老。她连苍蝇振翅都听不见，她不是会让人嫉妒的那种人。

Her gray hair straggled to her shoulders. Her back was a little humped. He poked his way about, and they were two old people when they went out on their rounds, older than they were in their ageless happiness. She wouldn't have heard a fly. She wasn't a person you could be jealous of.

当然，对一个新婚妻子来说，被幸福萦绕、被过往的单纯所困扰是件痛苦的事。他将自己献给了两个女人。他未曾从第一个女人那里抽身，对第二个亦是如此。每栋摆放钢琴的房子都孕育着矛盾。

Yet of course, it was hard on a new wife to be haunted by happiness, to be challenged by the simplicities there had been. He had given himself to two women. He hadn't withdrawn himself from the first. He didn't from the second. Each house that contained a piano brought forth its contradictions.

老普渡夫人戴的珍珠其实是蛋白石。基维耶夫文具商松弛的皮肤上布满雀斑。橡树丘上那两排橡树无疑是山毛榉。当然，当然，欧文·德兰古德附和道，既然他理应如此表态。

The pearls old Mrs. Purdue wore were opals. The padded skin of the stationer in Kiviyev was freckled. The two lines of oaks above Oak Hill were surely beaches. Of course, of course, Oven Drangood agreed, since it was fair that he should do so.

贝尔提出主张无可厚非，而任何主张都难免造成伤害或破坏。贝尔终将胜出，因为生者总是如此。这似乎也公平，毕竟维奥莱特最初赢得了胜利，并拥有更美好的年华。

Belle could not be blamed for making her claim, and claims could not be made without damage or destruction. Belle would win in the end because the living always do. And that seemed fair also since Violet had won in the beginning and had had the better years.

刚才李艺云朗读的是威廉·特雷弗的《钢琴调音师的妻子们》。该小说发表于1995年10月的《纽约客》，后收录于特雷弗1996年由维京出版社出版的短篇集《雨后》。

That was Yi Yun Lee reading The Piano Tuner's Wives by William Trevor. The story appeared in The New Yorker in October 1995 and was included in Trevor's collection After Rain, which was published by Viking in 1996.

大家好，我是泰勒·福格特，《纽约客》高级编辑，也是《政治现场》播客的主持人之一。当前许多人感到恐慌情有可原，而我认为《政治现场》的职责就是鼓励人们停下来思考那些在当下极具意义的特定新闻事件。通过与撰稿人深入对话，我们真正剖析当前局势及其造成的损害。这不是激进主义式的抵抗，但在我看来，这是在抵抗被混乱吞噬的感觉。

Hi. I'm Tyler Foggett, a senior editor at the New Yorker and one of the hosts of the political scene podcast. A lot of people are justifiably freaked out right now, and I think that it's our job at the political scene to encourage people to stop and think about the particular news stories that are actually incredibly significant in this moment. By having these really deep conversations with writers where we actually get into the weeds of what is going on right now and about the damage that is being done. It's not resistance in the activist sense, but I think it is resistance in the sense that we are resisting the feeling of being overwhelmed by chaos.

欢迎加入我和同事大卫·雷姆尼克、埃文·奥斯诺斯、简·梅耶尔及苏珊·格拉瑟的《纽约客·政治现场》播客。新节目每周更新三期，各大播客平台均可收听。

Join me and my colleagues, David Remnick, Evan Osnos, Jane Mayer, and Susan Glasser on the political scene podcast from the New Yorker. New episodes drop three times a week, available wherever you get your podcasts.

那么艺云，我们来聊聊故事的开头，那些令人惊叹的起始句——'维奥莱特嫁给钢琴调音师时，他还是个年轻人。贝尔嫁给他时，他已垂垂老矣。事情大抵如此。'当然，背后的故事远不止于此。

So, Yiyun, let's talk about the beginning of the story, those sort of incredible opening lines. Violet married the piano tuner when he was a young man. Belle married him when he was old. There was little more to it than that. And, of course, there's a whole lot more to it.

你认为作者为何要用这种看似否定后续故事的概括作为开头？

Why do you think he begins with this kind of summary that sort of dismisses the story that comes?

这是最有趣的故事开场——整个故事都藏在这两句话里。确实，极少作家会这么写。我想他有这份自信，同时也带着狡黠的幽默说：这两行字已道尽故事，不过还有些许未尽之言。由此引领读者进入故事。

It's the most interesting opening of a story, is the whole story is in those two lines. Yeah. And very few writers would do that. I suppose he had the confidence, but also he had this sort of sly humor saying, these two lines tell you the story, but there's a little more to that. And it leads you into the story.

那两行文字看似平静，但随后的内容却极具冲击力。我想他是在营造一种平静的开篇基调。同时这两句话引出了故事最重要的两个名字——贝尔与维奥莱特。钢琴调音师辨不出颜色，却能感知色彩。

And those two lines are quite just calm two lines. And what comes after those lines are quite shattering. So I suppose he is setting up like a sort of like a calm tone at the beginning. And also those two lines introduce the two most important names in the story, Belle and Violet. The piano tuner cannot see color, but he can feel color.

调音师看不见美，却时刻见证着美。所以我感觉他选择这两个名字时，一开始就给了我们很多思考的空间。嗯。

The piano tuner cannot see beauty, but he sees beauty all the time. So I feel that by choosing those two names, he's giving us a lot to think at the beginning. Mhmm.

而就在那一刻，我们其实还不知道调音师是盲人。我们一无所知。至少当时如此。实际上可能在下一句话里，我们才得知他像是废墟般的存在。她得到的是他的残骸。

And right at that moment, we actually don't know that the piano tuner's blind. We don't know anything. Not yet. In fact, in maybe the next sentence, we learn that he's sort of the ruins. She got the ruins of him.

农民总是直言不讳。

Farmers always speak up their mind.

对吧？确实。没人能说得如此精辟。对我来说，开篇这两行文字奠定了贯穿整个故事的基调——在某种程度上，他的两段婚姻是同时存在的。

Right? Exactly. No one else put it quite that way. For me, the first two lines do something that continues to happen throughout the story, which is he has both marriages happening at once in a way.

是啊。这是个耐人寻味的三角恋。这个三角关系中有一个顶点已经逝去却仍在场。而你说的两段婚姻，它们某种程度上融合成了一段婚姻。

Yeah. This is an interesting love triangle. It is a love triangle that one point of the triangle already died but remains in place. And the two marriages, as you said, they sort of collapse into one marriage.

没错。故事临近结尾时有句类似的话：他把自己交给了两个女人。既没有从第一段婚姻抽身，也没能脱离第二段。就在那一刻，我们看清了这点。

Yeah. And there's kind of a parallel line toward the end of the story that says he had given himself to two women. He hadn't withdrawn himself from the first. He didn't from the second. So at that moment, we see it.

他依然同时与两个人保持着婚姻关系。他仍是维奥莱特的丈夫，这正是故事的核心所在。

He's still married to two people. He's still married to Violet, and that's the heart of this story.

是的。不仅同时与两个女人维持婚姻，她们还共享着同一空间。为他做着相同的事——开车载他，带他去调琴。最令人心碎的是行车途中他说'我们以前常这么说'，这话脱口而出。

Yes. And not only he's still married to two women, they occupy the same space. They're doing the same activities for him, driving him around, you know, getting him to tune the piano. And what's heartbreaking for me is on their drive, he said, We used to say this. He let it slip.

他说'我们以前说房子'。你会意识到这个'我们'如此沉重。但对他而言这个'我们'或许很自然，毕竟他在这段婚姻里存在了四十年。这是属于'我们'的婚姻，可现在他却对着第二任妻子说着'我们'。这相当震撼。

He said, We used to say the house. And you realize that we is so heavy. But that we is probably natural for him because he has existed in this marriage for forty years. It's a marriage of we, but now he's talking about we to the second wife. That is quite shocking.

我不禁想，他为何会犯这种错？怎么发生的？为什么？

And I just thought, why would he make that mistake? How? Why?

是的。嗯，他对贝尔以及她所经历的一切很敏感。他尝试想出各种不同的办法，对吧？比如给她买台电视或一只狗，你知道，就是些能让她与众不同的东西。

Yeah. Well, he is sensitive to Belle and to what she's going through. And he tries to come up with these different things. Right? Like getting her a television or a dog or, you know, things to distinguish her.

但与此同时，对他来说婚姻就是婚姻。是的。而妻子是一种稳定、不变的存在。

But at the same time, marriage is marriage for him. Yeah. And a wife is a sort of steady, unchanging force

没错。

Right.

无论是维奥莱特还是贝尔。

Whether it's Violet or Belle.

是的。这段二婚可悲之处在于，除了破坏与伤害外毫无新意。有什么好事发生吗？

Yes. And the sad thing about this second marriage, nothing is new other than destruction and damage. Is there good things that happen?

这段二婚中的好事？嗯，我想他至少不再孤单。他还能调钢琴。但你知道，我是从贝尔的角度来思考这一切的，因为在某种程度上，我们读这个故事时会觉得贝尔有点像反派。嗯。

Good things in this in this second marriage? Well, I suppose he's not alone. He can still tune pianos. But, you know, I'm thinking about everything from Belle's point of view because I think in a certain way, we read this story, and Belle's a bit of a villain. Mhmm.

对吧？我们稍后再谈她的反派行为。贝尔已经坐着等了四十年。讽刺的是，她坐在店里整天修理坏掉的手表和钟表，与停滞的时间打交道。

Right? And we can get to her villainy in a bit. Belle has sat and waited for forty years. And ironically, she has sat in a shop dealing with broken watches and clocks, dealing with the stoppage of time.

时间。是啊。

Time. Yeah.

甚至整个世界也反映了这一点，因为故事始于1951年的婚礼，结束于九十年代。这个村庄似乎没有任何改变。参加第二场婚礼的还是当年参加第一场婚礼的那些人。

And even the world sort of reflects it because the story begins with a marriage in 1951 and ends in the nineteen nineties. Nothing seems to have changed in this village. People go to the second wedding who went to the first one.

第一场婚礼。没错。没多少人去世，但有趣的是计时工具变了。它们不再需要修理，装个电池就能用。

First wedding. Yes. Not many people died, but it's interesting because the timepieces changed. They don't need to be fixed anymore. They can just battery.

是啊。这似乎是这个村庄里唯一的现代气息。

Yeah. That seems to be the only modern touch in this village.

对。这也让我想到，或许是因为她叫贝儿，尽管我意识到那是另一个童话故事。这让我联想到睡美人。

Yeah. I also it makes me think, maybe it's because she's called Belle, though I realize that's the wrong fairy tale. It makes me think of Sleeping Beauty.

哦，没错。

Oh, right.

你知道，这种她因某事受伤的感觉，就是欧文与维奥莱特结婚这件事。

You know, this sort of sense that she's wounded by something, which is Owen's marriage to Violet.

对。

Right.

然后她就陷入了长达四十年的沉睡。沉睡。

And she just goes into a forty year sleep. Sleep.

是的。是的。和那些鸡一起。

Yes. Yes. With the chickens.

和那些鸡一起。没错。那些鸡实际上是唯一属于她、让她活下去的东西。

With the chickens. Yes. Those are the only things that belong to her that keep her alive, actually.

你会意识到那些鸡是她唯一能称之为自己的东西。而她并没有把鸡带到新的婚姻中，我认为这是一种牺牲。

And you realize the chickens are the only things that she can call her own. And then she didn't bring the chickens to the new marriage, which is a sacrifice, I think.

是啊。这是个错误。对吧？

Yeah. It was a mistake. Right?

这是个错误。她认为这是个错误。她后悔这个决定。

It is a mistake. She thinks it's a mistake. She regrets the decision.

是啊。是啊。那四十年里她都做了些什么？我虽然同情她，但她也有责任，因为是她自己无法释怀。对吧。

Yeah. Yeah. What does she do in those forty years? Because I'm sympathetic to her, but she also bears some blame because she's the one who does not move on. Right.

谁会用四十年时间怨恨维奥莱特，怨恨她的拒绝。

Who spends those forty years resenting Violet and resenting the rejection of her.

没错。特雷弗用了嫉妒这个词。对吧？她活在那种嫉妒中四十年。但昨天重读时我在想，这不止是嫉妒，是妒忌。

Yeah. Trevor used this word jealousy. Right? She's lived in that jealousy for forty years. But I was thinking when I was rereading it yesterday, I thought it's more than jealousy, it's envy.

这是比嫉妒强烈得多的情绪。而妒忌——我记得但丁描写过——当人被妒忌折磨时，他们会失明或被妒忌蒙蔽双眼。所以有意思的是，她是能看见的人，却被某种东西蒙蔽了双眼。所以她才会困在那里。

It's a much stronger feeling than jealousy. And envy, I think it's in Dante's envy. When people suffer from envy, they're blind or their eyes are blinded by envy. So I thought it was interesting that she's the seeing one, but she is also blinded by something. That's why she gets stuck there.

她无法从那种妒忌中走出来。我不认为嫉妒能让人执念四十年，但妒忌是更强烈的受伤感。

She cannot move on from that envy. I don't think jealousy can keep someone going for forty years, but envy is a stronger wounded feeling.

对吧？妒忌。是的。她渴望别人拥有的东西。

Right? Envy. Yes. She wants what someone else has.

然后她不惜毁掉他拥有的。

And then she's willing to destroy what he has.

是啊。我觉得她经常表达的是一种不公感。你知道，正义没有得到伸张，因为她才是更美的那个。在她心里，那本该是决定性因素。除了美貌，她一无所有。

Yeah. I think what she sort of expresses often is a sense of injustice. You know, justice hasn't been done because she was the more beautiful one. And, you know, in her mind, that was supposed to be the important factor. Here, she didn't have anything going for her, but she had this beauty.

美貌。

Beauty.

但随后她说，这是惩罚。是的。失明的惩罚。这是她必须承受的。

But then she said, it's the punishment. Yeah. Punishment of the blindness. It's for her to bear.

是啊。他的失明惩罚了她。但她也说过如果他们结了婚，

Yeah. His blindness punished her. But she also said if they were married,

她的美貌将成为他的恩典。所以我就在想，这种不公中也蕴含某种宗教式的激情。

her beauty would be grace for him. So I just thought there's also some sort of religious passion there in this injustice too.

没错。她觉得这是不公。我是说，她从未真正停下来想过，或许即便他能看见，他依然会选择维奥莱特。对。因为她有其他品质。

Yeah. She feels it's injustice. I mean, she never actually stops to consider that perhaps if he'd been able to see, he would have still chosen Violet. Right. Because she had other qualities.

是的。而且很难想象贝尔在四十年里能像维奥莱特那样为他付出。

Yes. And it's hard to picture Belle over the course of forty years doing for him what Violet did for him.

对。维奥莱特给了他那种钢琴调音师的头衔。嗯。

Right. And Violet gave him sort of that piano tuner's title. Mhmm.

给了他人生

Gave him a life

她给予了他人生、事业，还有作为有用之人的骄傲。我觉得贝尔是那种认为爱就足够了的角色。是啊。但爱是关于她，而不是关于他。

for She gave a life, a career, and pride of being useful, I think. I just imagine Belle is one of those characters who think love is enough. Yeah. But love is about her, not about him.

这是因为她心智不成熟。对吧？她的发展停滞了。这是你20岁时的想法。是的。

And it's because she's stunted. Right? She has stunted development. That's what you think when you're 20. Yes.

她当年被拒绝时就是20岁。是的。她从未真正理解婚姻是什么，比如，你知道的，一种伙伴关系。不仅仅是吸引力。

Which she was when she was rejected. Yeah. And she's never quite got to the point of thinking about what a marriage is, like, know, a partnership. It's not just about an attraction.

没错。然后维奥莉特提到她看起来依然像个女孩。

Right. And then Violet mentioned that she still looks like a girl.

是啊。嗯，那是个耐人寻味的时刻对吧？因为我们一直听说维奥莉特是个圣人，为欧文付出一切。嗯。

Yeah. Well, that's an interesting moment. Right? Because we hear of Violet being such a saint and doing everything she does for Owen. Mhmm.

我们视她为品德高尚之人。嗯。但就在他问她如今模样的那一刻，她却沉默了。她沉默不语。显然，她在犹豫是否要说出真相。

And we think of her as virtuous. Mhmm. And then there's this moment where he asks what she looks like now, and she's silent. She's silent. Because obviously, she's considering whether to tell him the truth.

对。确实如此。

Right. Right.

至少我是这么解读的。你也这么认为吗？

At least that's how I read it. Is that how you read it?

我觉得这其中也夹杂着一丝嫉妒。对吧？不过另一方面，虽然书中没明说，但我们能感觉到维奥莉特和贝尔在那四十年里几乎没什么交集。是钢琴调音师去商店为维奥莉特买怀表。

I mean, I I think there is a bit of jealousy there too. Right? Yeah. But on the other hand, well, it doesn't say but we got a sense that Violet and Belle really rarely interact in those forty years. It's the piano tuner who goes to the store to buy watch for For Violet.

而贝尔负责刻字，对吧？这就形成了有趣的三角关系——这两个女人彼此知晓对方的存在，却始终没有交流或互动。

For Violet and Belle has to engrave it, right? So there's that interesting triangle, those two women, you know, they are aware of each other the entire time, but they don't speak or interact with each other.

确实如此。而且她们相差五岁。是的。所以她们在学校或...

That's true. And there's five years between them. Yes. So they wouldn't have really known each other in school or,

你知道的，

you know,

在村子的日常生活中并不相识。

in the local life of the village.

是的。但你问了个好问题。那四十年间发生了什么？总是那四十年最关键。对吧？

Yes. But you asked a good question. What happened in those forty years? It's always those forty years that matter. Right?

对，对。欧文经历了很多事。还有维奥莉特也是。

Yeah. Yeah. And a whole lot happened for Owen Yes. And Violet. Yes.

你觉得贝尔有变得成熟些吗？

Do you think that Belle matured at all?

这问题很有意思。我记得之前他说她发育不良。她确实停滞不前，但故事里她有过一次自我反省的时刻。她问自己，这就是她变成的女人吗？但那种怀疑是存在的。

That's an interesting question. I think earlier, he said she's stunted. She is stunted, but she did have one moment of that self reflection in the story. She said, you know, is this the woman she has become? But she has that doubt.

我觉得很悲哀的是，她每做一件事都会怀疑。而她的怀疑其实是对的，对吧？她并没有以我们以为对她有益的方式成熟起来。她积累了些想法，但更多的是疑虑。

I think it's very sad whenever she does something, she doubts. And I think she's right to doubt, right? So she has not matured in the way that, you know, we may think that would help her. But she has accumulated some thoughts, but a lot of doubts, I think.

就像她脑海里不断循环着这些念头。是啊。我以前更漂亮。我以前更美丽。

And it's like there's just been a constant loop in her mind. Yeah. Was prettier. I was more beautiful.

我本可以...我值得的。我本可以给他生儿育女。那句话真的让我心碎。

I could give I deserved it. I could have given him children. That's that line just broke my heart. Yeah.

可能也会让维奥莉特心碎吧。然后她身处婚姻中，而她的婚姻与维奥莉特的是同时进行的，因为她就在维奥莉特的厨房里。她试图切胡萝卜，却希望维奥莉特来切。她甚至想拔掉花坛里的花，显得特别小心眼。

Would have broken Violet's too, probably. And then so she's in the marriage, and her marriage is happening simultaneously with Violet's because she's in Violet's kitchen. Right. She's trying to dice carrots and hoping Violet slice them. She's you know, she wants to rip out her flowers in the flower beds, which seems particularly petty.

我是说，尤其欧文根本看不见那些花

I mean, especially since Owen can't see them like

我...这个...知道。

I this is know.

而她正睡在他们的婚床上。她住在他们的婚房里。

And she's sleeping in their marriage bed. She's living in their marriage house.

她开着自己的车。

She's driving her car.

是的，维奥莱特的车。这两件事同时发生着，然后贝尔想到了她打破现状的方式。嗯。改变的方式。

Yes. Violet's car. And these two things are happening, and then Belle comes up with her way of making a break. Mhmm. Of changing.

摆脱维奥莱特的婚姻。

Getting out of Violet's marriage.

开始写小说。她确实...是的。

Starting to write fiction. She's Yeah.

那么你如何看待她那个灵感迸发的时刻？

So what do you think of that moment of inspiration that she has?

我是说，我们总说写作是出于必要。我认为她开始编造故事是出于她的无奈。我觉得她根本无法逃离那段婚姻。而且她意识到维奥莱特也赋予了烤箱视觉，对吧，某种视角。我想她必须先摧毁那个视角，才能继续维持婚姻。

I mean, we always say we write out of necessity. I think she starts to make up things out of her necessity. I don't think she has any way to go away from that marriage. And I think her realization that Violet also has given Oven sight, right, vision. Well I suppose she has to destroy that vision before she can stay in that marriage.

你觉得呢？为什么你认为她会有那个灵感时刻？这是不可避免的吗？

So what do you think? Why do you think that she has that moment of inspiration? Is it inevitable?

这段时间她一直在忍受痛苦，无法改变维奥莱特带来的影响。是的。也无法将维奥莱特从...是的。从他们的家中、从过去、甚至从他脑海中抹去，即便他们去短暂度假时——哦——很明显灯塔看守人也在想着维奥莱特等等。

She's been suffering through this period of time, unable to make a change to what happened with Violet. Right. And unable to erase Violet from Right. Their home, from the past, from his mind, even when they go on the little holiday and Oh. And it's clear that the lighthouse keeper is thinking of Violet and so on.

突然间，她看到了一个能彻底抹去她的方法。

And suddenly, she sees a way to erase her.

没错。但我确实认为，是的，她看到了抹去自己的方法。

Right. But I do think, yeah, she sees the way to erase her.

同时也是为了彰显自我。

To assert herself too.

是的。让我觉得有趣的是，这是一个关于理解的故事。所以她明白自己在做什么。她也明白他明白她在做什么。

Yeah. What's interesting to me is it's a story about understanding. So she understands what she's doing. She also understands he understands what she's doing.

你觉得她知道他明白吗？

You think she knows that he knows?

我在想或许她也知道他清楚她的所作所为。

I thought maybe she also knows he knows what she's doing.

有可能。他没有质疑。没错。这就是他给她的礼物。对。

It's possible. He doesn't question. Right. And that's his gift to her. Right.

他表现得像是相信她的话。是的。是的。并且接受它。说，好吧，如果修女的脸颊不再红润，那她一定是生病了。

That he appears to believe what she's saying. Right. Right. And to accept it. To say, okay, well, if the nun's cheeks aren't rosy anymore, she must have an illness.

寻找能让贝尔的描述合理的解释。对。但我不确定她是否看穿了这一点。

To find explanations that make Belle's descriptions make sense. Right. But I don't know if she sees through that or not.

或者也许这正是驱使她不断编造事情的原因。嗯。因为她必须让它可信。嗯。但问题是，死亡还不够吗？

Or maybe that's what drives her to keep making up things. Mhmm. Because she has to make it believable. Mhmm. But just, I mean, my question is, isn't death enough?

可问题就在于，维奥莱特并没有死。

That's the problem though. Violet's not dead.

哦，是的。

Oh, yes.

她只是活在欧文心中。她是他的幻象，是他的双眼，是他所经历的一切。对吧？

She's just alive in Owen. She's his vision. She's his eyes. She's everything he experiences. Right?

没错。

Yeah.

但贝尔只是在与一场永远无法取胜的战斗抗争。对吗？

But then Belle is just fighting with something that she would never win that battle. Right?

对。她无法杀死维奥莱特而不杀死欧文。对，对。这设定很棒。

Right. She can't kill Violet without killing Owen. Right. Right. That's very good.

这不再让她觉得自己是反派，而是感到非常悲伤。

That doesn't make her feel like a villain anymore. That makes her feel very sad.

是啊。而且她被萦绕不散。她被...萦绕。而欧文倒没那么受困扰。不。

Yeah. And she's haunted. She's haunted Yeah. By Owen isn't so haunted. No.

我是说，他为妻子哀悼。但拥有这些他很快乐。是的。

I mean, he grieves for his wife. Right. But he's happy to have Yes.

要我说，这是个鬼故事，最令人魂牵梦萦的鬼故事之一。

I mean, is a ghost story, one of the most haunting ghost story.

没错。所以某种程度上，我觉得贝尔大半生都没在想欧文，而是在想维奥莱特。哦。是的。这四十年她一直专注于此。

Yeah. So in a way, I feel that most of Belle's life has been spent not thinking about Owen, thinking about Violet. Oh. Yes. This has been the focus of those forty years.

不是她原以为想要的那个男人，而是这个女人

Not the man she thought she wanted, but the woman

是的。他做出了选择。而她本可以做得更好

Yes. He chose. And how much she could do better than

是啊。她是这么告诉自己的。但我不确定她是否真的相信，因为她知道自己不会有房子和车子。可能也不会想到要为他招揽生意，或是帮他争取小提琴演奏的工作。

Yeah. Well, she tells herself that. I don't know if she believes it because she knows she wouldn't have a house and a car. She probably wouldn't have thought to go drumming up business for him or getting him hired to play his violin.

而且她也没有维奥莱特那么敏感，你知道的，就像维奥莱特描述山峦时说的，胶水般的烟雾。

And she's also less sensitive than Violet, you know, just how Violet describes the mountain, glue as smoke.

没错。你得有艺术细胞

Yeah. You have to have art

才能说出那样的话。是啊。乡间的黄油与樱草中的稻草。维奥莱特有着艺术家的灵魂，她观察事物。

in you to be able to say those things. Yeah. The country butter and straw in the primrose. And Violet has an artistic soul. Violet looked at things.

维奥莱特会注意，而她不会。

Violet pays doesn't.

再次强调，这真有趣。美让她盲目了。

Again, it's so interesting. Beauty is blinding her.

故事没有深入探讨这点。但欧文是个钢琴调音师，所以他有绝对音感。没错。他能听出...是的，分毫不差。

The story doesn't really go into depths about this. But Owen's a piano tuner, so he has perfect pitch. Yes. He hears things Yes. Perfectly.

是啊。所以他可能听出了贝尔话语中的弦外之音。

Yeah. So he probably hears Belle's words and hears what she's actually saying.

是的。但他想维持那种表象，那种他相信的幻觉。对。而且，贝儿不喜欢音乐。我原以为维奥莱特会热爱音乐。

Yes. But he wants to maintain that facade, the illusion that he believes. Yeah. Also, Belle doesn't like music. I was thinking Violet loves music.

维奥莱特很喜欢听他拉小提琴。小提琴。还有跳舞。

Violet loved having him play the violin. Violin. And dances.

没错。贝儿那边还抱怨过丈夫在某个房间拉小提琴什么的。是啊。第二次婚姻真是错配。

Yes. And Belle sort of there was that complaining that the husband playing the violin in one room or the other. Yeah. It's a mismatch, the second marriage.

确实。那么如果他先娶了贝儿，也会是错配吗？他们或许会以不同方式互相适应。

It is. So would would it have been a mismatch if he had married Belle first? They might have adapted to each other in different ways.

对。但他就不会成为钢琴调音师了。不会。他只会一直是个靠救济过活的人。

Right. But he would not have become the piano tuner. No. He would just have remained the charity case.

还住在他母亲家里。

Still living at his mother's.

但那样的话他们可能会有孩子。

But then maybe they would have had children.

嗯。

Yeah.

但我总觉得钢琴调音师这个头衔对他太重要了。嗯。这是第一次婚姻带来的。对吧？

But I just feel that piano tuner, that title is so important for him. Mhmm. That comes with the first marriage. Right?

嗯。他还是管风琴手。他身兼多职。维奥莱特让他成为真正的男人。让他成为一个完整的人。

Mhmm. And he's also the organ player. He has so many roles. Violet makes him a man. He makes him a fulfilled person.

他本不会放弃所有工作直到死去。但他愿意为贝尔放弃这一切。好吧，他知道自己已经承担了责任。

And he would not have given up all the work until he dies. But he was willing to give it up for Belle. Well, he knows he's taken

对她负有责任。对，没错。

on a responsibility with her. Right. Right.

为什么你觉得他会娶贝尔？

Why why do you think he married her, Belle?

是啊，这是个好问题。我们知道他对她有想法。他向维奥莱特打听她的情况，包括她的外貌，这对他很重要。他还清晰地记得去找她买手表的情景。

Yeah. It's a good question. We know he had thoughts of her. He asks Violet about her and what she looks like, and that's important to him. And he remembers very clearly going to buy the watch from her.

对。所以在他心里，她是那个错失的人

Right. So, you know, in his mind, she was the one who got away

嗯。

Mhmm.

即使她不是挚爱，或者他对拒绝她感到愧疚。我想他们在学校时是朋友。

Even if she wasn't the great love, or else he feels bad about rejecting her. They were friends in school, I think.

是朋友。对。从童年开始。是的。所以她一直爱着他。

Were friends there. Yeah. From childhood. Yeah. So she always loved him.

没错。所以在某种程度上，拒绝她让他失去了一个朋友。那是他生命中曾经有意义的存在。所以你能看出他有些怀旧，也能看出他的孤独和无法继续工作的状态。

Yeah. So in a way, by rejecting her, he lost a friend. Something had been meaningful in his life. So you can see him having some nostalgia, and you can see him being lonely and not being able to do his work.

是啊。陪伴。对。

Yeah. Companionship Yeah.

也是。对。没错。但我觉得他误判了她的感受。

Too. Yes. Yeah. But I think he misjudged what her feelings would be.

没错。我认为他犯了个错误。当戴尔决定结婚时，她的嫂子和她哥哥都说她犯了错。嗯。其实犯错的是他。

Right. I think he made a mistake. When Dale decided to marry, her sister-in-law and her brother said she made a mistake. Mhmm. Which is really he made the mistake.

你说得对。他误判了女人的情感。

You're right. He misjudged a woman's feelings.

是啊。最有趣的是那一刻，他从贝尔的沉默而非言语中领悟到——

Yeah. So interesting, the moment also when he sort of learns like, it says not exactly from Belle's words, but from her silences that

而且是亲眼所见。

And in the flesh.

维奥莱特身材臃肿、邋里邋遢。她灰白的头发凌乱不堪。

Violet was dumpy and bedraggled Bedraggled. Her gray hair straggled.

当他们走出去时，看起来就像两个老人。对。但在他的想象里，我喜欢那种超越年龄的幸福。嗯。

And when they too went out, they were like two old people. Yeah. But in his mind, I like that their happiness is ageless happiness. Mhmm.

你觉得贝尔明明在对外界事物撒谎时，是否对他造成了伤害？他知道自己看到的并非真实。对吧。这会伤害他吗？

Do you think that Belle does any damage when she's clearly lying to him about what's out there? So he knows he's not actually seeing what's there. Right. Does that harm him?

我认为当下没有伤害，但某种程度上剥夺了他过去的某些东西。文中说伤害施加在脆弱的梦境上。贝尔可能让他感觉自己不再只是平等的伴侣。盲人怀特向他描述的世界充满诗意与美好。

Well, I think it doesn't harm him now, but it sort of retrospectively takes away something from him. I think the sentence is the damage is done to the fragile dream. Belle probably makes him feel no longer just an equal partner. Blind White describes things to him. It's all about poetry and the beauty of the world.

而贝尔始终像个修女，不再如苹果般鲜亮。她面色灰黄。是啊。她通过描述带给他的世界，在我看来已失去所有美好与诗意。

And Belle is always a nun, it's no longer looking like an apple. She's sallow. Yeah. Yeah. So the world she's brought to him by her descriptions seem to me there's no beauty anymore and no poetry.

讽刺的是。是啊。这很可悲。对。确实。

Ironically. Yeah. Which is very sad. Yeah. Yeah.

也许这就是伤害，你知道的。

Maybe that's the damage, you know.

嗯。所以你认为这个故事不会以幸福结局收场？

Yeah. So do you think that the story ends not with a happy ending?

我几乎想不出威廉·特雷弗有哪部作品是以幸福结局收尾的。幸福的。或者说圆满结局。但最后一段确实让我觉得很有意思。我想问你的问题是，我认为他比大多数作家多写了一个节拍的长度。

I hardly can think of any story from William Trevor that ends happily. Happily. Or a happy ending. But it it does feel to me the final paragraph is interesting. The question I want to ask you is, I think he has written the story a beat longer than most writers.

嗯。

Mhmm.

我觉得多数作家会在某个节点收尾，比如'重要的东西已破碎成梦一般脆弱'。这看似自然结尾，但他又续写了两段。在这两段里他回到了开篇那两句话。这手法非常富有音乐性。开头那两行句子，结尾时又以变奏形式重现，既精妙绝伦，又令人心碎。

I think most writers would end somewhere, you know, what mattered was damaged down to something as fragile as a dream. That seems a natural ending but he went on for two more paragraphs. What he did in those two paragraphs is he went back to the beginning of those two lines. I mean, this is very musical movement. He has those two lines and now he has a variation of those two lines at the end, which is so beautifully done, but also so heartbreaking in a way.

没错。如果停在'破碎成梦一般脆弱'，我们感受到悲伤但不会不安。大师总是这样：当我们以为结束时，他继续推进，引入微妙不同的情绪。

Right. If you end with what matters, what's damaged down to something as fragile as a dream, we get a sadness but we don't get unsettled. I mean, I always think that is how a master does things. We thought he's finished. He goes on, he introduces something else, a little bit different mood.

最后两段让我觉得这是个充满暴力的故事。

I I thought the last two paragraphs make me feel that it's a violent story.

你要再读一遍最后那段吗？好的。

Do you want to just read the last paragraph there again? Okay.

每栋摆放钢琴的屋子都显露着矛盾。老普渡太太戴的珍珠其实是蛋白石。基比昂文具商起皱的皮肤长着雀斑。奥奇沃上方的两排橡树必定是山毛榉。

Each house that contained a piano brought forth its contradictions. The pearls old Mrs. Purdue wore were opals. The padded skin of the stationer in Kibiav was freckled. The two lines of oaks above Auchiw were surely beaches.

当然，当然，奥文·德兰古德同意了，因为这样做是公平的。贝儿提出主张无可厚非，而主张的提出难免会造成伤害或破坏。贝儿终将胜出，因为生者总是如此。这似乎也很公平，毕竟维奥莱特最初赢得了胜利，并度过了更美好的岁月。

Of course, of course, Oven Drangud agreed, since it was fair that he should do so. Belle could not be blamed for making her claim, and claims could not be made without damage or destruction. Belle would win in the end because the living always do. And that seemed fair also, since Violet had won in the beginning and had had the better years.

看，这让我觉得很有意思，因为我不认为贝儿赢了。

See, that's fascinating to me because I don't think Belle wins.

你不这么认为？

You did not?

不。她赢得了什么？她把这个男人掏空了。

No. What does she win? She's hollowed out this man.

对。嗯，毁灭。感觉存在某种毁灭...那就是胜利。是的。对她来说，我想是的。

Right. Well, annihilation. Felt there was some sort of annihilation of That's the a triumph. Yes. For her, I suppose.

是啊。所以我一直觉得，最后那段文字里藏着些暴力。这是个三角恋故事，也是个鬼故事。但那里，战斗一直持续到了最后。

Yeah. That's why I always thought, what the final paragraph, there's some violence in that. It's a triangle love story. It's a ghost story. But there, the battle came all the way.

对吧？从某种角度说，贝儿是唯一站着的人。对吧？所以从这个角度看，她赢了。但这不意味着她得到了想要的。

Right? In a way, Belle's the only one left standing. Right? So in that way, she wins. But it doesn't mean she got what she wanted.

我知道。我知道。但她不会这么想。我觉得难就难在生者总是衰败——其实生者并非总是衰败。

I know. I know. But she can't think so. I think that's the hard one that the living always wane. The living don't always wane.

是啊。但生者总以为自己会衰败。而逝者无法为自己辩护。

Yeah. But the living think they always wane. I think the dead cannot defend themselves.

对。对。我是说，这和故事前面部分有点矛盾，那里他说贝儿是活着的那个人，她得到了一个男人全部的爱，掠夺了另一个女人的财物，占据了她的卧室，开走了她的车——这些本该足够了。本该就是一切。但随着时间的推移，对贝儿来说，这些似乎变得微不足道。

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's a slight contradiction with an earlier part in the story where he says that Belle was the one who was alive, that she was offered all a man's affection, that she plundered his other woman's possessions and occupied her bedroom and drove her car should have been enough. It should have been everything. But as time went on, it seemed to Belle to be scarcely anything at all.

所以对她而言，她并未真正获胜。当然，那是在她发明这个装置之前。

So to her, she hasn't won. Of course, that's before she comes up with this

没错，就是这个装置。我同意你的看法，这装置不会给她带来任何胜利。

Right. This device. Right. I think I agree with you. This device will win her nothing.

她确实成功同时伤害了钢琴调音师和紫罗兰。

She did succeed in cutting both the piano tuner and violet down.

是的，或者说她切断了他们之间的联系，我想。对，那段记忆。那个记忆。

Yeah, or she's cut the connection between them, I suppose. Yes. That memory. The memory.

我刚想到这是最残忍的事了。真的，你能对一个人做出的最狠毒的事。这让你不禁想象

And I just thought that's the most violent thing Yeah. You can do to a man. It makes you think

她婚礼当天穿着暗酒红色的样子。暗

of her on her wedding day in dark wine red. Dark

酒红色。而她多希望能穿白色。

wine red. And she wished she could wear white.

是啊。

Yeah.

这一切都太

It's all very

太迟了。简直像童话故事一样。是的，你明白吗？

It's too late. It's so very fairytale like. Yes. You know?

是的。但这童话让人非常不安。

Yes. But it's a very upsetting fairytale.

对啊。令人不适。其实大多数

Yeah. Disturbing. Well, most

童话故事都是这样。哦，确实如此。没错。没错。

fairytales are actually. Oh, that's true. That's true. That's true.

归根结底，这是一场不值得赢的战争，

Ultimately, it was a battle that wasn't worth winning,

我想是吧。多数战争都是为些愚蠢理由发动的。对吧？

I suppose. Most battles are fought for very silly reasons. Yes?

嗯。嗯。

Mhmm. Mhmm.

我觉得这正是人性所在。威廉·特雷弗要是换成其他作家，可能会用不那么残酷的方式写这个故事。

I mean, I feel that's the human heart part. I mean, William Trevor, I just imagine another writer would have written the story in a less brutal way.

是啊。有趣的是人们有时认为特雷弗是个，你知道的，文风含蓄的作家。这似乎成了常用的大帽子——当某人是个含蓄的作家时。有时候最含蓄的瞬间反而是最，你知道的，最具毁灭性的。

Yeah. It's funny because people think of Trevor sometimes as, you know, a quiet writer. That seems to be like a big insult that's used all the time when when someone's a quiet writer. Sometimes the quiet moments are the most, you know, devastating Yeah.

我觉得他们说含蓄作家时，意思是贝儿没有拿起刀做什么激烈举动。

I think when they say quiet writer, means, you know, Belle didn't pick up a knife to do something.

对。她做了更暴力的事。

Yeah. She did something much more violent.

是的。没错。我认为那些表面上看不到的戏剧性冲突最具毁灭性，比厨房里上演的明面冲突更令人心碎。对吧？

Yes. Yes. And I think all those dramas you cannot see on the surface are most devastating, more devastating than the dramas you can see played out in the kitchen. Right?

确实。这正是特雷弗作品中的一层深意——那些潜藏于表象之下的东西。

Yeah. And that's kind of a layer to all of Trevor's work, What's isn't not on the surface?

采访中有人问他是否信仰宗教。他自称是'神明扰动者'。神明扰动者？

In the interview, someone asked him if he was a believer. He said he called himself a god perturber. A god perturber?

你觉得上帝被扰动了吗？

Do you think god was perturbed?

读者可能会被扰动。

A reader can be perturbed.

我是说，这些故事确实...

I mean, I do think these stories

蕴含着与生俱来的暴力。还有那种天然的残酷性，那些以你无法想象的方式造成的创伤——生活中所有看不见的阴暗面都会在特雷弗的故事里浮现。

have their innate violence. And also just the innate brutality, just wounds afflicted in a I way that you cannot think it's all the things you cannot see that happen in life come into Trevor's story.

感谢李翊云，感谢黛博拉。威廉·特雷弗（2016年逝世）著有三十多部小说和短篇集，包括惠特布莱德奖获奖作品《费利西娅的旅程》《露西·高尔特的故事》《山里的单身汉》，以及遗作《最后的故事》（2018年出版）。1977至2018年间，他在《纽约客》发表了50篇短篇小说。李翊云出版过八部小说作品，包括《我该走了》《鹅之书》（获笔会/福克纳小说奖），以及入围2024年普利策奖的短篇集《星期三的孩子》。

Well, thank you, Yi Yoon. Thank you, Deborah. William Trevor, who died in 2016, was the author of more than three dozen novels and short story collections, including the Whitbread Prize winning Felicia's Journey, The Story of Lucy Galt, The Hill Bachelors, and Last Stories, which was published posthumously in 2018. He published 50 stories in The New Yorker between 1977 and 2018. Yiyun Li has published eight books of fiction, including the novels Must I Go and The Book of Goose, a winner of the PEN Faulkner Award for fiction, and the story collection Wednesday's Child, which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2024.

其新非虚构作品《万物自然生长》已于五月出版。您可下载210多期《纽约客》小说播客往期节目（含李翊云朗读约翰·麦加恩与帕特里夏·海史密斯作品的集数），或在苹果播客免费订阅。通过《作家之声》播客，可收听杂志作者亲自朗读的短篇小说。您可在播客应用中搜索《作家之声》及其他《纽约客》播客节目。欢迎在脸书页面留言反馈，或在苹果播客为我们评分评论。

A new nonfiction work, Things in Nature Merely Grow, was published in May. You can download more than 210 previous episodes of the New Yorker fiction podcast, including ones in which Yi Yun Lee reads stories by John McGaern and Patricia Highsmith, or subscribe to the podcast for free in Apple Podcasts. On the Writer's Voice podcast, you can hear short stories from the magazine read by their authors. You can find the Writer's Voice and other New Yorker podcasts on your podcast app. Tell us what you thought of this program on our Facebook page, or rate and review us in Apple Podcasts.

本期《纽约客》小说播客由克洛伊·普罗西诺斯制作。我是黛博拉·特雷斯曼，感谢收听。大家好，我是《纽约客》小说编辑黛博拉·特雷斯曼。

This episode of the New Yorker fiction podcast was produced by Chloe Prosinos. I'm Deborah Treisman. Thanks for listening. Hi. I'm Deborah Treisman, fiction editor of The New Yorker.

每周在《作家之声》播客中，《纽约客》的小说作家们会朗读他们最新发表在杂志上的故事。你可以听到科尔森·怀特黑德等作家的作品。

Each week on the writer's voice podcast, New Yorker fiction writers read their newly published stories from the magazine. You can hear from authors like Colson Whitehead.

特纳用肘轻推了埃尔伍德，后者脸上露出惊恐的表情。他们看到了。格里夫不打算退缩。无论之后发生什么，他都要放手一搏。

Turner nudged Elwood, who had a look of horror on his face. They saw it. Griff wasn't going down. He was gonna go for it, no matter what happened after.

或是乔伊·威廉姆斯。她的父亲沉默不语。他缓缓用手捋过头发。这通常意味着他正前往一个不受她存在影响的地方，一个实际上与她存在相矛盾的地方。她不如去吃午饭算了。

Or Joy Williams. Her father was silent. Slowly, he passed his hand over his hair. This usually meant that he was traveling to a place immune to her presence, a place that indeed contradicted her presence. She might as well go to lunch.

聆听新故事或深入探索我们精彩的虚构作品档案。你可以找到最喜爱的小说家作品，并发现新锐作家。收听并关注《作家之声》，无论你在何处获取播客内容。

Listen to new stories or dive into our archive of great fiction. You can find the work of your favorite fiction writers and discover new ones. Listen and follow The Writer's Voice wherever you get your podcasts.

来自PRX。

From PRX.