【英文报刊翻译090506】法国人的美丽谎言
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出处：不详
翻译：JEAN-CLAUDE GUILLEBAUD
FORTY years after the French student and worker uprisings of May 1968, we are experiencinga flood: dozens of books, hundreds of articles, special editions of magazines are devoted to the riots and strikes of that month. A day doesn't pass without the radio and television stations offering a retrospective, a debate or a portrait of the main characters of the era. Since mid-April, all we seemed to have talked about in France is 1968. We've never had such an outpouring of reminiscences, not even in 1989, when the bicentennial of the French Revolution was celebrated.
1968年5月，法国学生与工人发起了暴动。40年之后，我们又经历了一场浪潮。关于当年的暴乱与罢工，已出版了数十本专著，报刊上相关的文章数以百计，许多杂志也纷纷推出特刊。每一天广播与电视台都要播出相关的节目，有时是历史回顾，有时是公开辩论，有时则是描写那个时代主要人物的专题片。从4月中旬以来，"1968"话题成了法国上下唯一关注的热点。即使是1989年法国大革命两百周年纪念之时，也不曾有过如此大规模的纪念活动。
Why such a frenzy of nostalgia? I lived through May '68. I was a 24-year-old graduate
student and a journalist who covered the revolt, during which students armed with cobblestones battled the police, and 10 million workers went on strike. Forty years ago today, the agitation reached its peak, with the Paris stock exchange set on fire and fearful government ministries destroying their papers. And I'm astonished that this anniversary is being accorded such importance.
这场如痴如狂的怀旧思潮从何而起？1968年，我刚刚24岁，刚刚从大学毕业，也曾亲身经历过那场动乱。那时，学生们挥舞着石块与警察对峙，上千万工人参加了暴工。四十年前的今天，激荡的民情达到了顶峰。巴黎股票交易市场被付之一炬，惊恐不已的政府官员把手中的报纸撕得粉碎。而今，我们这场运动如此大张旗鼓的重视，也令我很是震动。
There are four explanations for this, I think. The first involves the event itself. Even
after four decades, it retains an ambiguous character, enough to satisfy the French taste for polemic and debate. The word "ambiguous" is apt: the "revolution" of mores that we ascribe to May '68 had, in truth, already been accomplished. The great judicial reforms concerning the rights of women and family law (divorce, contraception, sexual relationships outside marriage, etc.) had been made between 1965 and 1967. That two-year period has even been baptized by legal scholars the "legislative spring." Marching in the streets in May '68, we were merely marking a change that had already occurred.
我认为，原因主要有四。首先当然是那场事件本身值得关注。虽然过去了四十年，然而68动乱的性质仍未有定论。这充分满足了法国人对口舌之争的偏好。将那场运动称为"悬案"再合适不过了：我们更倾向于将68年的五月运动称为一场"革命"，然而事实上，在那之前革命便已经结束了。 1965-1967年期间，司法系统进行了一次大改革，内容女权运动与包括离婚、避孕、婚外性行为在内的家庭法案。那两年时间被法学界称为"立法之春"。而到了1968年，在大街上游行的时候，我们所要求进行的变革其实已经成为了过去时。
Ambiguity applies also to the contrast between the revolutionary language of the students, which was impregnated with Marxist rhetoric and nostalgia for the Paris Commune and the Bolshevik revolution, and the content of the movement. You could say that in 1968 we "spoke Marxist," just as you say someone lisps or speaks through his nose, because at the university it was the dominant language. But it was to say things that weren't Marxist at all.
暴动中，法国学生高呼着马克思主义主义的口号，无限怀恋巴黎公社与布尔什维克革命的时代。然而全国运动的内容却与此大相径庭，这也是另一个令人无法准确为那场运动定性的原因。你可以说1968年我们"宣扬了马克思主义"，在大学校园里占据了绝对的话语霸权，然而那只是嘟嘟囔囔地哼唧了几句而已。事实上，当年发生的事与马克思主义相去甚远。
Perhaps more than an ambiguity, it was an irony of history. The real legacy of May '68, as we see in France today, is individualism, the rejection of civic sense and ideology, the rehabilitation of the idea that personal and financial success is a worthy pursuit - in short, a revival of capitalism. To borrow an expression of Lenin's, we were useful idiots. Indeed, the uprising was more a counterrevolution than a revolution.
也许那并非一宗历史的悬案，而只是一段反讽。时至今日，68年五月风潮的真正影响，是个人主义，是人们对国民性与意识形态的摒弃，是"个人地位与资产收入高于一切"这一理念的回归。一言以辟之，是资本主义的复兴。借用列宁的话说，我们不过是"有用的白痴"。事实上，那场运动不是一次革命，而是一次对革命的反动。
The second explanation lies in the subsequent success of the leading figures of May 1968, notably in the press, advertising, film and politics. This generation of baby boomers largely controls the news media and cultural life. The majority of broadcast chiefs and newspaper, magazine and book publishers and senior editors "did" May '68. They are simply indulging their own nostalgia. The media flood is less political than it appears. In ordering up a special issue, a film or TV program, the boomers are first and foremost celebrating their own youth - whether younger generations find it interesting or not.
另一个解释是，1968年动乱中的领导人物在那之后走上了成功的道路，在出版业、广告业、电影业和政界，他们的影响尤为突出。婴儿潮中出生的一代已经控制了新闻媒体和文化生活。 "六八一代"已经成了各广播公司的管理者，掌握着报纸、杂志、书籍的出版和编辑工作。这次媒体上的"思潮"看起来充满着政治色彩，其实只不过是他们在怀念自己年轻时的经历而已。出一期特辑，拍一部电影或是电视片，通过这种途径来纪念自己的青春岁月，乃是"六八一代"们的首要目标。至于今天的年轻人是否对此有兴趣，他们才懒得去管。
Third reason: after 40 years, the French have ended up convincing themselves that May '68 was a sort of Parisian exception, even though it was part of a worldwide effervescence. Comparable uprisings took place in Japan, Latin America, Germany and Britain. Today, we mention those foreign examples only in passing, without making them part of our collective memory. For us, May '68 remains a French phenomenon.
第三个原因是：时隔四十年之后，法国人已经把68年的五月事件当作是巴黎人特有的活动，而非那场席卷世界的风潮的一个组成部分。在日本，在拉美，在德国，在英国，都有着与之类似的动乱。而今，那些外国动乱对我们只是过眼云烟，不再出现在我们的集体记忆中。对我们来说，1968年的五月仍然是一种法国式现象。
In truth, the only distinguishing aspect of the French events was that the student demonstrations ran alongside a powerful social movement involving a general strike, the occupation of factories and the participation of unions and leftist parties. It was the strike, not the student revolt, that truly paralyzed the country for three long weeks. The paradox is that these two movements never encountered each other. The students marching toward the factories to "meet the workers" found the doors closed. The unions didn't want them: the workers found the students disorganized and irresponsible.
事实上，当时的法国唯一独树一帜之处在于，除了全国罢工、工人占领工厂、工会与左翼党派结盟之外，还伴随着一场学生的游行示威。然而导致了整个国家瘫痪长达三周之久的，是工人的罢工，而非学生的游行。讽刺的是，这两起运动并没有彼此相遇。学生们向工厂行进，准备"与工人阶级会师"，然而却吃了闭门羹。工会并不想让学生加入其中，工人们觉得学生缺乏组织性与责任感。
The last factor is the current situation in France. With a society that is less forgiving
and still more precarious than that of 1968, with a fading left and bleak prospects, the French want to turn toward a time when we had hope that the future would be brighter. The commemoration and the wallowing in mythical memories is an alarming symptom of a search for consolation in a country that no longer dares to think about what is to come.
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