孟冬十月，北风徘徊，天气肃清，繁霜霏霏。今天继续为大家推荐德国大文豪歌德的《浮士德》。这部巨著包含作者的心血和智慧，在欧洲灿烂文化的巍峨殿堂里屹立不倒。伟大的作品激发伟大的思想，岁末天寒，让我们一起手捧名篇，感悟哲思。

 

前言（节选自《浮士德》人民文学出版社，2018）

……人们有理由说，《浮士德》绝不是一个讽刺世人为欢乐、财富、权势等等出卖灵魂的浅薄寓言。浮士德和梅菲斯特的契约并不是灵魂和物质利益的简单交换，而是人类不断奋发进取的精神向以梅菲斯特为代表的怀疑与否定的挑战。事实上，在浮士德身上亦即在人类身上，始终有两个灵魂在斗争——可以说，梅菲斯特就在浮士德本人身上，二者的斗争始终贯穿着一股躁动不安的向绝对真理追根究底的精神力量，不断抵抗着梅菲斯特陷人于满足、怠惰和堕落的种种诱惑。然而，对于人类而言，完善境界永远不可及。浮士德临终所欢呼的那“最崇高的一刹那”，也不是作者暗示的人生的目标之所在。人类所能达到的最高成就，恰在于一种自强不息的创造性的生活本身，一种不断进步的道路或过程本身。一个人只要追求一个高尚的目标，并在追求过程中又把每个实际步骤当作目标加以追求，他就值得享受并一定能够获得最广义的报偿。正是这点人生观拯救了浮士德，帮助他击败了梅菲斯特的一再挑战，从而使他的“悲剧”赋有鲜明的乐观主义的性质……

 

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（插图选自《浮士德》人民文学出版社，2018）

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FAUST  Medicine, and Law, and Philosophy --

You’ve worked your way through every school,

Even, God help you, Theology,

And sweated at it like a fool.

Why labour at it any more?

You’re no wiser now than you were before.

You’re Master of Arts, and Doctor too,

And for ten years all you’ve been able to do

Is lead your students a fearful dance

Through a maze of error and ignorance.

And all this misery goes to show

There’s nothing we can ever know.

Oh yes, you’re brighter than all those relics,

Professors and Doctors, scribblers and clerics;

No doubts or scruples to trouble you,

Defying hell, and the Devil too.

But there’s no joy in self-delusion;

You search for truth ends in confusion.

Don’t imagine your teaching will ever raise

The minds of men or change their ways.

And as for worldly wealth, you’ve none --

What honour or glory have you won?

A dog could stand this life no more.

And so I’ve turned to magic lore;

The spirit message of this art

Some secret knowledge might impart.

No longer shall I sweat to teach

What always lay beyond my reach;

I’ll know what makes the world revolve,

Its inner mysteries resolve,

No more in empty words I’ll deal --

Creation’s wellsprings I’ll reveal!

Sweet moonlight, shining full and clear,

Why do you light my torture here?

How often have you seen me toil,

Burning last drops of midnight oil.

On books and papers as I read,

My friend, your mournful light you shed.

If only I could flee this den

And walk the mountain-tops again,

Through moonlit meadows make my way,

In mountain caves with spirits play --

Released from learning’s musty cell,

Your healing dew would make me well!

 

 

词汇学习

• sweat  v. 出汗

    n. 汗

• ignorance  n. 无知，愚昧；不知道
• defy  vt. 违抗，反抗；蔑视
• worldly  adj. 世俗的；世间的；尘世的
• revolve  v. 旋转

（单词注释来自有道词典）

冯至是中文世界研究歌德的开拓者。本书据1948年上海正中书局出版的《歌德论述》和1986年上海文艺出版社的《论歌德》，对其收录相同文章指出异文之处，以供读者参阅；此外还收录了冯至译注的《歌德年谱》（1749-1808），并补译了冯至未翻译的部分（1809-1832）；冯至在1947年所作的以歌德为题的演讲，以及1982年为《中国大百科全书》所作的“歌德”词条，也收录书中。本书由德语文学翻译家、歌德研究学者陈巍主编，开篇附有论述冯至研究歌德的编者前言。

A masterful intellectual portrait, this book is celebrated as the seminal twenty-first-century biography of the writer considered to be the Shakespeare of German literature. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832), a remarkably prolific poet, playwright, novelist, and -- as Rudiger Safranksi emphasizes -- a statesman and naturalist, first awakened not only a burgeoning German nation but the European continent with his electrifying novel The Sorrows of Young Werther. Safranski has scoured Goethe’s entire oeuvre, relying exclusively on primary sources, including his correspondence with contemporaries, to produce a “fresh and authentic” portrait of the avatar of the Romantic era. As Safranski ultimately shows, Goethe’s greatest creation, even in comparison to his masterpiece Faust, was his own life.

 

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