《卫报》评文学：我们需要诺贝尔文学奖
The Guardian view on literature: we need the Noble prize
《卫报》2019 年 3 月 9 日
ⅠAfter cancelling last year’s Nobel prize in literature because of a high-profile scandal in its ranks, the Swedish Academy is making up for lost ground by awarding two this year. A double award is not unprecedented, but on the earlier occasions the money was split. The former permanent secretary, Sara Danius, suggested, the prize for 2018 should have been left as a gap in the record, as an acknowledgment of the scandal.
由于去年的诺贝尔文学奖因其成员引人注目的丑闻而取消，因此瑞典学院今年将授予两位作家，以弥补去年额奖项空缺。“双蛋黄”并非史无前例，但是此前的获奖奖金被获奖者评分。瑞典文学院常任秘书，萨拉 丹尼乌斯提议，2018奖项应该在记录上留作空白，作为对丑闻的承认。
high-profile 引人注目的；备受关注的
ranks 全体成员
split  分享、分得
permanent 终生的。长期的
ⅡSince last year’s complete failure, oceans of ink have been spilled debating whether the secretive Academy is in any fit state to remain the world’s premier arbiter on world literature. In response to these criticisms, the Nobel Foundation has purged the Academy of most of the key figures in the scandal that convulsed it last year, and brought in five independent members to help the prize committee in its decision-making. But, entertaining as the continuing quarrels are, they are a sideshow to the central question: do we actually need a Nobel prize in literature any more?
自去年的惨败以来，不计其数的口诛笔伐涌向瑞典文学院，讨论遮遮掩掩的文学院是否能继续承担世界上最权威的世界文学批判官。为对这些指责做出交代，诺贝尔基金会已经清洗了文学院中去年身陷丑闻。殃及文学院的大部分关键人物，并引入五位独立成员来协助评审委员会进行评议。但是，虽然持续的争吵不发趣味，这些只是连带事件，其核心问题是：我们还需要诺贝尔文学奖吗？
in a fit state (to do sth)状态良好
secretive 深藏不露的
premier 最好的，最重要的
arbiter 权威，决定者
purge 洗清，肃清
convulse 身体颤抖，抽搐
sideshow 附带事件，附属活动
Ⅲ Like them or not, the Nobels have a historic status, and to take literature out of the family, leaving medicine, chemistry, economics, physics and peace, would be to create a fracture line with a symbolism far bigger and more important than the money involved. Canny old arms manufacturer that he was, Nobel knew what he was doing when he gave literature equal standing with peace and science. It plays a critical role in the ethical ecology. You only need to look at the work of a few previous winners to see this principle in action: Svetlana Alexievich’s witnesses to the fallout from Russia’s big ambitions; Kazuo Ishiguro’s explorations of identity at the end of empire. Or, going further back, Pablo Neruda’s articulation of Latin America’s stubborn soul.
无论如何，诺贝尔奖项都有其历史地位，如果将文学奖从诺贝尔奖项中拿走，只留下医学、化学、经济学、物理学以及和平奖，那将造成割裂，其象征意义比奖项所涉及的金额更宏大、更重要。作为一名久经商场的精明的武器制造商，诺贝尔给予文学与和平和科学同等地位必有其用意。诺贝尔文学奖在伦理生态方面起着至关重要的作用。只稍看几位往年获得诺贝尔文学奖的作品便可明了这一原则的体现：Svetlana Alexievich笔下那些亲历了俄罗斯勃勃野心幻灭之人；Kazuo Ishiguro对帝国末期身份探索。或者，更早一些，Pablo Neruda表达的拉丁美洲固执的灵魂。
historic 历史性的；具有重大历史意义的
fracture 破裂，骨折
symbolism 象征意义；象征
Canny 精明的，头脑灵活的
ethical 道德的，伦理的
fallout 余波，后果
articulation 思想或感情的表达
ⅣIn our increasingly bewildering universe, literature also imagines into being things that are later proved to exist: just look at the relationship between science fiction and the frontiers of physics. The physicist James Kakalios even wrote a book called The Physics of Superheroes, in which he argued that writers of comics in the 1930s beat future generations of quantum physicists to the conceptual breakthroughs that are now keeping us in MRI scanners and CDs. Great scientists have always recognised this phenomenon. The Hungarian mathematician George Pólya went so far as to enshrine it in his inventor’s paradox, which noted that progress was often based on a vision of things beyond those immediately present.
在愈发令人迷惑的宇宙中，文学也构想出了许许多多的事物，这些事物后来确实出现在我们的生活中，只需看一下科幻小说和物理学前沿的关系便可明了。物理学家James Kakalios甚至写了一本名为《超级英雄物理学》的书，他在书中主张，二十世纪三十年代的漫画作家比未来数代的量子物理学家都捷足先登，他们提出的一些概念突破为我们源源不断地输送了核磁共振扫描仪和CD.伟大的科学家经常能认识到这一现象。匈牙利数学家波利亚·哲尔吉甚至将这一现象列入他的发明者悖论中，该理论指出进步总是基于对尚未出现事物的展望。
bewildering 令人困惑的，令人不知所措的
frontiers 前沿，领域
beat sb, to sth 抢先，捷足先登
quantum 量子的
paradox 悖论，自相矛盾的说法
conceptual 概念的，观念的
enshrine 把..庄严地载入
vision 想象，展望
ⅤScience fiction has not often been rewarded by the Swedish Academy; for critics this is one of its oversights. The default has been firmly Eurocentric: 102 of 114 prizes have gone to European languages. There have been some downright bad choices. But, to invert the inventor’s paradox, you can’t fix something if it no longer exists. The world needs literature, and literature needs to be seen and cherished and even – just occasionally – given a really big pat on the back to demonstrate that we still know it matters. 
科幻小说并非经常受到瑞典文学院奖励，对于批评者来说这也是其失察之一。诺贝尔文学奖一直坚定地以欧洲为中心，114个奖项中，102个将被颁给欧洲语言作品。其中有些是槽糕透顶的选择。但是，反观发明者悖论，若某事物不再存在，便无可修正。世界需要文学，而文学需要被看到、被珍视，甚至-只是偶尔-被大力赞赏，以表明我们依然知道它影响重大。
oversights 疏忽，失察
default 默认状态，系统预设状态
downright彻头彻尾地，十足地
invert  使颠倒
pat on the back 赞许，表扬