Beauty of youth

Met Museum-new Greek and Roman wing

Central Park 05

Central Park 04

Central Park 03

Central Park 02

Central Park Today 01

Morningside park today

晒太阳

昨天阳光大好，上完瑜伽课，坐在Lower Library 前面，等朋友来晒太阳。本科生迫不及待地脱了上衣躺在草坪上晒beach, 几个男孩子还搬出来了几把老吉他，在女孩子丛中有的没的糊弄着。台阶上坐满了年轻人，睡觉、吃东西、或在手机上甜言蜜语，也有人在玩橄榄球、卖自己做的饼干，或者干脆排队等着领免费的薯条和汽水。热闹的地方当然少不了法论功的学员们到处散发传单，他们比春天来得早、来得勤。今年的春天来的迟，到现在学校里的桃花还没有开，只有紫玉兰花傻傻得先开了，一树的灿烂，在百老汇街上无人瞩目。花期就是这样，来得太早或者来得太迟都没有人注意。

哎，这个时候才觉得哥大像个大学，充满了一文不值的青春和百无聊赖的悠闲。阳光晒的人都酥了，浑身痒痒的，把刚才瑜伽课所受的折磨化解了。看着这样的校园，很难想象几天前弗吉尼亚理工大学里，几十个这样的年轻人和教授们被血腥地杀害了。大学本来是圣洁的地方，是求知的场所，是用来浪费百无聊赖的青春的地方。悲剧看起来突如其来，但是掩藏在校园平和生活背后的冲突和压力，我们每个人不都在经历着么？这个有点令人沮丧的想法，使这个春天的午后看起来都有点冷。

决定去买鞋，在Aerosoles 转了一圈儿又出来了。六十几块的新款凉鞋都够我买好多书了。还是在“迷宫”里舒服，买不买都没关系，坐在楼梯角上看书，或者在书架中间徘徊，真是忘掉生活中压力的好办法。书店里常常有book talk，二楼柜台前的折扣书架被推到后面，摆上几把椅子，作者和读者就这么亲密地坐着谈书、聊天，之后还有小小的reception，就着饼干和葡萄酒，大家可以继续聊天。这里不起眼的读书人，可能是大学里有名的教授，或者谪居纽约的作家，也有很多我这样无聊的学生，喜欢在书店里逛荡和打发时间的人，大概都是些无法在鞋店里得到满足的人吧。

据说最近纽约所流行的约会方式之一就是到书店、美术馆或者图书馆听讲座，既避免了初次见面的尴尬，也提供了交流想法的直接机会。一个人的兴趣、爱好和智识都可以在交谈中自然而然的表现出来。此外，约会的成本也会大大地下降。对忙碌和讲求实际的纽约客来说，同时听讲座和谈恋爱是比较经济的交友方式。在书堆里瞎翻，居然找到两本有意思的书。一本是艾柯谈文学的论文集，收录了他在各种学术和非学术论坛的讲演，表达了他对现代文学和作家的看法。另一本是莱昂.特里林的小说《中途》（The Middle of the Journey）[1]. 特里林是哥大英语系的著名教授，文论作品无数，但是平生只出了这么一本小说。我由此产生了一个疑问，教文学的老师是不是一定要会写小说？教艺术的老师是不是一定要会绘画或者雕塑？他们的艺术价值和学术价值是不是要统一？

晚上躺在床上看《光华》杂志。是台湾政府办给海外的杂志，介绍台湾的风土人情和当下的流行时尚。有一篇介绍台湾现在流行的部落格网站“无名小站”，我上去一看，都是年轻人的自拍照。杂志上有几篇文字讨论，认为照片网站是部落格出现之后的新一代网络交流模式。如果说部落格是连接私人写作和公共空间的桥梁，是对传统上有权威所把持的文字舆论空间的挑战， 那么照片交流就是对传统媒体的挑战，因为在这里每个人都有发布图像信息的权利和自由，图像和多媒体空间不再由权威媒体所把持。我有一点疑惑，像youtube和土豆网这样的网站上，到底多少是自由创作，有多少是从现有媒体上拷贝的作品？最新流行的电视剧和电影、流行音乐mv现在都可以在这些网站上找到，观众可以无成本的在线观看。当然上面也有许多个人创作作品，观看的人数也不少。现在的网络到底解决的是传统媒体的垄断问题，还是增加了新的信息传播渠道？我很想看看更多的学理上的讨论。

在另一篇文章中，有人感叹现代人丧失了许多集体回忆。比如人们不再需要一起观看电影，所有对影像的需求都可以在家里解决，所以就失去了集体回忆。我觉得不然，网络上影像和文字的分享不就是产生新的集体回忆的方式吗？如果要深究，我觉得我们得回到“集体”这个词的意义。过去的“集体”产生于同时接受的共同经验和体验，现在“集体”的产生更多的在于认同而非同时体验。而且，进一步的追问，到底“集体”和“集体回忆”的价值何在？我们当下社会的整合方式和以往已经有了很大的不同，所谓的“粉丝”是个集体，所谓的部落格也是一个集体，我觉得重要的不是“集体”是如何产生的，而是“集体”对于个人和社会的意义。就像是晒太阳，我们干嘛非得一块儿晒呢？我们各晒各的，然后一起交流体验不也很好吗？当然，少数想借晒太阳说事儿的同学除外。

[1] Published in 1947, as the cold war was heating up, Lionel Trilling’s only novel was a prophetic reckoning with the bitter ideological disputes that were to come to a head in the McCarthy era. The Middle of the Journey revolves around a political turncoat and the anger his action awakens among a group of intellectuals summering in Connecticut. The story, however, is less concerned with the rights and wrongs of left and right than with an absence of integrity at the very heart of the debate. Certainly the hero, John Laskell, staging a slow recovery from the death of his lover and a near-fatal illness of his own, comes to suspect that the conflicts and commitments involved are little more than a distraction from the real responsibilities, and terrors, of the common world. A detailed, sometimes slyly humorous, picture of the manners and mores of the intelligentsia, as well as a work of surprising tenderness and ultimately tragic import, The Middle of the Journey is a novel of ideas whose quiet resonance has only grown with time. This is a deeply troubling examination of America by one of its greatest critics.

独自莫凭栏

浪淘沙 　　帘外雨潺潺， 　　春意阑珊。　　罗衾不耐五更寒。 　　梦里不知身是客， 　　一晌贪欢. 　　独自莫凭栏， 　　无限江山， 　　别时容易见时难。 　　流水落花春去也， 　　天上人间。 独自莫凭栏。 昨天一个人站在栏杆边，想起了这句话。为什么呢？ 一个人站在那儿，很有跳下去的欲望。 面前是巨大的枝形吊灯，流光溢彩，美的不似人间。 有一天看了一部老电影《遭遇激情》，发现原来每个人都有跳下去冲动。里面袁越演的那个有点二的替身演员，为找了300块钱去救一个陌生人，就从二楼跳了下去，把吕丽萍吓得半死。电影太短，好像还没开始就结束了。主人公既没kiss, 更没有情话绵绵，这也许是1990年电影的极限了。电影中有两个情节让我印象深刻，第一是无处不见的“盼盼”形象。对啊，就是那个傻二盼盼，体恤衫上的盼盼、脸盆上的盼盼、大街小巷广告牌上的盼盼、你我他的盼盼。第二就是冯小钢原来一直那么贫，那会儿当编剧就一点儿正经没有。

André Chénier

I saw Umberto Giordano's opera Andrea Chenier yesterday at Met. According to Wikipedia,

"André Marie Chénier (October 30, 1762 – July 25, 1794) was a French poet and is associated with the events of the French Revolution of which he was an innocent victim. His sensual, emotive poetry marks him as one of the precursors of the Romantic movement. His career was brought to an abrupt end when he was guillotined for alleged "crimes against the state", just three days before the end of the Reign of Terror." His life was also the subject of Dickens' Tale of Two Cities.

Ben Heppner played the poet Chenier who struggled between love and ideal and Violeta Urmana wonderfully performed the beautiful and tragic heorin Maddalena. Set in the peak of French Revolution, Chenier's fate is a reflection of fate of intellectuals who held their political ideals dear to their heart. There was tention between classes, between lovers, between revoluation ideas, and between the past and the present. All consumated in the tragic ending of the two young lovers.

Two of opera’s most famous arias, “La mamma morta” and “Un dì, all’azzurro spazio" come in Act II and III, highlighted the emotional and dramatic encounters of Maddalena and Chenier. In their last aria, they claimed they found the truth of "the whole existence" and "in death, we live".

================================================================

青年女囚

(Chenier 作于圣·拉萨尔狱)

“青的麦穗成熟着，受到镰刀的矜惜；青的葡萄整夏天不怕榨床的辚轹，酣饮着朝露之珠；而我呵也和它们一样地貌美年轻，不管当前的时日有什么祸乱灾棱，我还不愿意死去。

“让那铁石心肠去干着眼慷慨赴死，我却哭着，希望着，顺着北风的威势倒下又抬起头来。日子诚然有苦的，但有些确实鲜甜!(以上郑克鲁译)唉!哪有那种蜜呵，吃后不感到腻烦?哪有无风的沧海?

“我的胸中藏着有丰富的奇思妙想。牢狱之墙尽管高，我有希望的翅膀，再高压也是徒然： 正如那菲罗美尔逃出了猎户网罗，更活泼、更快乐地飞，中着，引吭高歌，在那冥冥的霄汉。

“会轮到我去死吗?安闲地我去就寝，安闲地我又醒来；不管睡眠或清醒，我都是自问无亏。我活着，大家眼里都闪出庆幸之光!那许多沉忧之脸看到我在这地方，又几乎有了欢意。

“我这美好的征程离尽头还太遥远!我才出发哩，那标树排在路的两面，我才走过了几棵；这人生的筵席呵，才不过勉强开端，我手里捧的金樽仍然是满到边缘，我才衔到了片刻。

“我还是在春天哩，我定要看到收获；像太阳完成一年，要四时循序而过，我也有我的四时。我正在枝头焕发，构成园圃的精华，我曾见到照耀的还只是朝日之霞，我要过我的一日。

“死神呵!不要匆忙，离开，且离开这里；有些心灵被羞愧、惊慌或失望吞噬，快去为它们解除。对于我吗，巴莱丝还留有良辰美景，爱神还留有蜜吻，缪斯还留有和声：我还不愿意死去。”

就是这样，我虽然惨凄凄身在囹圄我的琴却苏醒了，听一个狱中少女作这番怨诉祈求；我摆脱着我奄奄待尽的沉重心情，把她那天真小口自然流露的哀音依韵律谱成诗句。

这几章诗是我的牢狱的和谐见证，谁有那闲情逸致，读这诗定会追问那个妙人儿是谁：她的面容和词语都那么风致嫣然，凡是接近她的人都将会和她一般，怕自己临到末日。

========================================================

Can not sleep. So I finished this film: Dust (2001). According to wikipedia, Dust (Macedonian: Прашина; Transliteration: Prašina) is a 2001 Macedonian film starring Joseph Fiennes, David Wenham, Adrian Lester, Anne Brochet, Nikolina Kujaca, Vera Farmiga and Rosemary Murphy. It was directed and written by Milčo Mančevski. The music was created by Kiril Dzajkovski.

Shifting periodically between two parallel stories, Dust opens in present-day New York City with a young criminal being confronted at gunpoint by an ailing old woman whose apartment he is attempting to burglarize. While he awaits an opportunity to escape, she launches into a tale about two outlaw brothers, at the turn of the 20th century, who travel to Ottoman controlled Macedonia. The two brothers have transient ill will between them, and they become estranged when confronted with a beautiful woman. In the New York storyline, the young man (named Edge) hunts for the old woman's gold to pay back a debt, and gradually grows closer to the woman. In the Macedonian story, the brothers end up fighting for opposite sides of a revolution, with the religious Elijah taking up sides with the Ottoman sultan and gunslinger Luke joining "the Teacher", a Macedonian rebel.

In the end of the movie, Luke died when he tried to save the woman and her baby and Elijah took the baby back to U.S. The old woman also died in emergency room, Edge took the ashes of the old woman (in fact the baby in the other part of the story) back to her homeland. In the last shot of the film, Elijah held the baby and looked over the sky. There was the plane which took Edge and the ashes of the baby. Time and space meet each other perfectly and the conflict of life is resolved in a circle of life.

Beautiful and sad movie.

Laugh of the day--happiness promised

From my friend's email Hi Folks, Take a break after a day-long email discussion and work and/or news reading. At least we have Ben & Jerry's free cone and, if you don't like ice cream,you will like the following, I promise.

1. go to www.google.com

2. click on "maps"

3. click on "get directions"

4. type "New York" in the first box (the "from"box)

5. type "London" in the second box (the "to" box)

6. Check out the time it costs.

7. scroll down to step #23

Use Poetry to dry our tear

**************************************************************** CUCSSA - Chinese Poetry Symposium **************************************************************** This Thursday (April.19) Columbia EALAC (Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures) and CUCSSA present you with a distinguished Chinese poetry symposium titled "Who/What Travels in Poetry Translation?" This event is featuring some of the most prominent poets, literary critics and scholars of contemporary China, Zhai Yongming, Xi Chuan, Tang Xiaodu and Zhou Zan to name a few. The Columbia Chinese poetry society will be previliged to hear their verses and voices and join them in a real conversation. The event is free and open to public. Refreshments will be served. We welcome all! Event: Chinese Poetry Symposium: Who/What Travels in Poetry Translation? Time: 1:00pm-3:00pm, April. 19, 2007 Place: Lerner Hall, C555 Speakers:*Tang Xiaodu (唐晓渡), distinguished critic of contemporary Chinese poetry **Chen Chao (陈超), distinguished scholar of poetry and poetics **Zhai Yongming (翟永明), major Chinese poet, essayist **Luo Ying, poet and philanthropist **Zhao Ye (赵野), poet and film maker **Sun Yi (孙怡), poet, graduated student at NYU **Xi Chuan (西川), poet, essayist, and translator; visiting professor at NYU **Zhou Zan (周瓒), poet, critic, and visiting scholar at Columbia University*

Life is unpredictable

In the past Friday, a CU female student was raped and toutoured for 19 hours in her appartment near 137 street and Broadway and the criminal tried to burn her alive. In the past Monday, 32 students at Viginia Tech were shoot to death. This evening, my student from my online course sent me email to explain why she was late for homework--because her boyfriend was killed in a car crash near Maryland. I am so sorry for those lives lost too early. ====================================================

Duino Elegies

by Rainer Maria Rilke Translated by Stephen Mitchell

The First Elegy

Who, if I cried out, would hear me among the angels' hierarchies? and even if one of them pressed me suddenly against his heart:I would be consumed in that overwhelming existence.For beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror, which we are still just able to endure, and we are so awed because it serenely disdains to annihilate us.Every angel is terrifying.And so I hold myself back and swallow the call-note of my dark sobbing.Ah, whom can we ever turn to in our need?Not angels, not humans, and already the knowing animals are aware that we are not really at home in our interpreted world.Perhaps there remains for us some tree on a hillside, which every day we can take into our vision; there remains for us yesterday's street and the loyalty of a habit so much at ease when it stayed with us that it moved in and never left.Oh and night: there is night, when a wind full of infinite space gnaws at our faces.Whom would it not remain for--that longed-after, mildly disillusioning presence, which the solitary heart so painfully meets.Is it any less difficult for lovers?But they keep on using each other to hide their own fate.Don't you know yet? Fling the emptiness out of your arms into the spaces we breathe; perhaps the birds will feel the expanded air with more passionate flying. Yes--the springtimes needed you. Often a star was waiting for you to notice it.A wave rolled toward you out of the distant past, or as you walked under an open window, a violin yielded itself to your hearing.All this was mission. But could you accomplish it?Weren't you always distracted by expectation, as if every event announced a beloved?(Where can you find a place to keep her, with all the huge strange thoughts inside you going and coming and often staying all night.)But when you feel longing, sing of women in love; for their famous passion is still not immortal.Sing of women abandoned and desolate (you envy them, almost) who could love so much more purely than those who were gratified.Begin again and again the never-attainable praising; remember: the hero lives on; even his downfall was merely a pretext for achieving his final birth.But Nature, spent and exhausted, takes lovers back into herself, as if there were not enough strength to create them a second time.Have you imagined Gaspara Stampa intensely enough so that any girl deserted by her beloved might be inspired by that fierce example of soaring, objectless love and might say to herself, "Perhaps I can be like her?"Shouldn't this most ancient of sufferings finally grow more fruitful for us?Isn't it time that we lovingly freed ourselves from the beloved and, quivering, endured: as the arrow endures the bowstring's tension, so that gathered in the snap of release it can be more than itself.For there is no place where we can remain. Voices. Voices. Listen, my heart, as only saints have listened: until the gigantic call lifted them off the ground; yet they kept on, impossibly, kneeling and didn't notice at all: so complete was their listening.Not that you could endure God's voice--far from it.But listen to the voice of the wind and the ceaseless message that forms itself out of silence.It is murmuring toward you now from those who died young.Didn't their fate, whenever you stepped into a church in Naples or Rome, quietly come to address you?Or high up, some eulogy entrusted you with a mission, as, last year, on the plaque in Santa Maria Formosa.What they want of me is that I gently remove the appearance of injustice about their death-- which at times slightly hinders their souls from proceeding onward. Of course, it is strange to inhabit the earth no longer, to give up customs one barely had time to learn, not to see roses and other promising Things in terms of a human future; no longer to be what one was in infinitely anxious hands; to leave even one's own first name behind, forgetting it as easily as a child abandons a broken toy.Strange to no longer desire one's desires.Strange to see meanings that clung together once, floating away in every direction.And being dead is hard work and full of retrieval before one can gradually feel a trace of eternity.Though the living are wrong to believe in the too-sharp distinctions which they themselves have created.Angels (they say) don't know whether it is the living they are moving among, or the dead.The eternal torrent whirls all ages along in it, through both realms forever, and their voices are drowned out in its thunderous roar. In the end, those who were carried off early no longer need us: they are weaned from earth's sorrows and joys, as gently as children outgrow the soft breasts of their mothers.But we, who do need such great mysteries, we for whom grief is so often the source of our spirit's growth--: could we exist without them?Is the legend meaningless that tells how, in the lament for Linus, the daring first notes of song pierced through the barren numbness; and then in the startled space which a youth as lovely as a god has suddenly left forever, the Void felt for the first time that harmony which now enraptures and comforts and helps us.

Terrible Crime against CU Grad Student near my home

PERVERT TRIED TO KILL HER TIED-UP COLUMBIA STUDENT LEFT TO DIE USED FIRE SET BY CREEP TO FREE HERSELF

BY JIMMY VIELKIND, LISA L. COLANGELO and MELISSA GRACE DAILY NEWS WRITERS

Posted Monday, April 16th 2007, 4:00 AM

Tied up and left to die in a burning apartment, a Columbia student used the blaze set by her sadistic rapist to free herself, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said yesterday. "It appears she was able to escape as a result of the fire," Kelly said. "She was tied, and the flame was used by her to break the bond." The 23-year-old woman, identified by sources as a student at the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism, endured 19 hours of rape and torture at the hands of a sick creep in her Hamilton Heights apartment Friday night. In what Kelly called a "particularly vicious" assault, the fiend tied his victim to a bed, cut her, raped her, burned her with scalding water and chemicals - and then set the woman's futon on fire to cover up the crime, police said. He was so brutal he slit her eyelids, Kelly said. The student used the flames to free herself and fled her fifth-floor apartment with her hands still bound to each other to get help from a neighbor, officials said. The woman remains hospitalized in serious but stable condition. Cops yesterday were combing through surveillance video for images of the attacker, who followed the woman into her building near City College at 9:30 p.m. Kelly said detectives were looking to see if there was any evidence the rapist had attacked before, but said, "It does not appear right now to be part of a pattern." One man said he saw the victim in the basement of the building shortly after she escaped. "She just kept saying, 'I've been raped,' " said Ronald Ward, 19, who spotted the fire and ran downstairs for help, where he found the building's superintendent, Carl Peroune, trying to soothe the woman as they waited for an ambulance. "She was down there crying," Ward said. Police were hunting for the attacker, described as a bald, 6-foot-1, 180-pound black man in his 30s with a goatee and a scar on his abdomen. Several residents of the woman's six-story Hamilton Terrace building, located on a quiet treelined block of neat rowhouses, said she had moved in within the last two months. "I've been living in this building 30 years, and nothing like this ever happened," said another resident, Teddy Perkins, 55. "This is real shocking." mgrace@nydailynews.com With Ernie Naspretto

生命，到底谁该对你负责？

这几天网上和收音机里全是关于弗吉尼亚理工大学枪杀案的报道，舆论不外乎两种—美国早该严格枪支管制和学校管理无能。有人用杀手的国籍开玩笑，也有人翻出此前研究生杀导师的许多报道。这件事让我想起了读研究生的时候的一件事。当时，北大光华管理学院的一个博士研究生杀死了同宿舍的另一个研究生，然后从新宿舍楼的顶层一跃而下，自杀了事。每个系里都组织学生讨论，每个人都得发言，我觉得尴尬极了。这么一个悲剧非得上纲上线的讨论实在是滑稽。大家不探讨这么个普通人走上绝路的原因，反而讨论他自杀方式的拙劣，这样的讨论有没什么意思？每个人每天的生活都是这么的郁闷，郁闷到不想和别人说话，郁闷到采取极端的报复社会的行动，到底谁该对此负责？ 生命，到底谁该对你负责？

妈妈的生日

怎么看着日历怎么觉着4月17日怪眼熟的，原来是妈妈的生日。早上起来，不知道为什么就想给她打电话，一杯热咖啡下肚，舒坦地就把这事儿给忘了。现在想起来了，北京时间已经是4月18日了。哎，起了个大早赶了个晚集，瞧这事儿办的。

妈妈1944年生人，今年63了. 不过她精神极了，每天都忙着乘坐咱们首都北京四毛钱一趟的公共汽车，视察能使用老年公园通票的大小公园们。根据她最近一期的报告，北京北城的公园保养水平明显高于北京南城的公园，据说大观园和她十几年前去看的时候没什么变化，除了更加破败。对比之下，颐和园、圆明园和香山这些地方当然显得气派多了。瞅我妈的精神头儿，我觉得她比我更像老舍笔下的小坡，所以，今天就祝贺这个老“小坡”生日快乐，心想事成。

Virginia Tech Shooting Kills at Least 33

April 16, 2007 Virginia Tech Shooting Kills at Least 33 By CHRISTINE HAUSER and ANAHAD O’CONNOR

At least 33 people were killed today on the campus of Virginia Tech in what appears to be the deadliest shooting rampage in American history, according to federal law-enforcement officials. Many of the victims were students shot in a dorm and a classroom building. "Today the university was struck with a tragedy that we consider of monumental proportions," said the university's president, Charles Steger. Witnesses described scenes of mass chaos and unimaginable horror as some students were lined up against a wall and shot. Others jumped out of windows to escape, or crouched on floors to take cover. There were two shootings on the campus in Blacksburg, Va., and in both instances there were fatalities with "multiple shooting victims," Mr. Steger said. The attacks started early in the morning, with a call to police at 7:15 a.m., as students were getting ready for classes or were on their way there. As the rampage unfolded over nearly three hours, details emerged from witnesses describing a gunman going room to room in a residence hall, and of gunfire later at a building where classes were held. When it was over, sidewalks were stained with blood. Among those dead was the gunman. The identification of the gunman was proving difficult, because the suspected shooter did not have identification among his effects and because of the severity of an apparently self-inflicted wound to the head, according to a federal law enforcement official. He said investigators were trying to trace purchase records for two handguns found near the body. At least 22 people were injured. At least 17 Virginia Tech students were being treated for gunshot wounds and other injuries at Montgomery Regional Hospital, and four of them were in surgery, according to a hospital spokesperson. At Lewis-Gale Medical Center, in Salem, Va., four students and a staff member were treated. Two were in stable condition, and the conditions of the other three were described as "undetermined." Officials said there could have been more injured and taken to other medical facilities. The university has more than 25,000 full-time students on a campus that is spread over 2,600 acres. It was not clear how many of the victims were notified of the dangers. Kirsten Bernhards, 18, said she and countless other students had no idea that a shooting had occurred when she left her dorm room in O'Shaughnessy Hall shortly before 10 a.m., more than two hours after the first shootings. "I was leaving for my 10:10 film class," she said. "I had just locked the door and my neighbor said, 'did you check your email?'" The university had, a few minutes earlier, sent out a bulletin warning students about an apparent shooter. But few students seemed to have any sense of urgency. Ms. Bernards said she walked toward her class, preoccupied with an upcoming exam and listening to music on her IPOD. On the way, she said, she heard some loud cracks, and only later concluded they had been gunshots from the second round of shootings. But even at that point, many students were walking around the campus with little if any sense of alarm. It was only when Ms. Bernhards got close to Norris Hall, the second of two buildings where the shootings took place, that she realized something had gone wrong. "I looked up and I saw at least 10 guards with assault rifles aiming at the main entrance of Norris," she recalled. Up until today, the deadliest campus shooting in United States history was in 1966 at the University of Texas, where Charles Whitman climbed to the 28th-floor observation deck of a clock tower and opened fire, killing 16 people before he was gunned down by police. In the Columbine High attack in 1999, two teenagers killed 12 fellow students and a teacher before killing themselves. A police official at Virginia Tech, Wendell Flinchum, said some of the victims were shot in the classroom. News of the number of the fatalities sent up an audible gasp in the news conference, said one television reporter in the broadcast. While few confirmed details about the gunman and the motive were clear, students told reporters at WTKR, a local television station, that the gunman had been looking for his girlfriend, and at one of the locations he lined up some students and shot them all, according to Mike Mather, a reporter for the station. President Bush offered condolences this afternoon to relatives of the victims, and said federal investigators would help the Virginia authorities in any way possible. "We hold the victims in our hearts; we lift them up in our prayers," Mr. Bush said at the White House. President Bush was "horrified" at the news of the shooting, said Dana Perino, a White House spokeswoman, earlier in the day. One student captured partial images, broadcast on CNN, using his cellphone video camera showing grainy dark-clad figures on the street outside of campus buildings. Popping sounds from the gunfire were audible. "This place is in a state of panic," said a student who was interviewed on CNN, Shaver Deyerle. "Nobody knew what was going on at first." He said that the shooting reminded him of the Columbine High School killings. Today's shooting at Virginia Tech comes in the same week, eight years ago, as the April 20 shooting at Columbine. The police were slowly evacuating students from campus buildings and all classes have been canceled. Families were told to reunite with students at the Inn at Virginia Tech, a facility of conference space and hotel rooms. The university community was told to assemble on Tuesday at the Cassell Coliseum to start to deal with the tragedy, a campus statement said. A few details emerged from the news conference. At 7:15 a.m., an emergency 911 call came in to University police department about a shooting at the dormitory, West Ambler Johnston, which houses about 900 freshman students. About two hours later it was followed by a second shooting at a classroom in a science and engineering building on the opposite end of campus, Norris Hall. The shooter died there, the police said. Images on CNN showed police with assault rifles swarming several buildings, sirens blaring in the background and a voice over a loudspeaker warning people across the campus to take cover in buildings and stay away from windows. Many students could be seen crouching on floors in classrooms and dormitories. Police evacuated students and faculty, many of them to local hotels, and witnesses said that some students were seen scrambling out of windows to get to safety. A Montgomery County school official said that all schools throughout the county were being shut down. The shooting was the second in the past year that forced officials to lock down the campus. In August of 2006, an escaped jail inmate shot and killed a deputy sheriff and an unarmed security guard at a nearby hospital before the police caught him in the woods near the university. The capture ended a manhunt that led to the cancellation of the first day of classes at Virginia Tech and shut down most businesses and municipal buildings in Blacksburg. The accused gunman, William Morva, is facing capital murder charges.

赖小子（Walking on the Wild Side）

昨晚看了《赖小子》（Walking on the Wild Side），是导演韩杰的处女作，也是哥大中国电影界的闭幕影片。韩杰自编自导，把自己在山西的成长经历变成了一部带有时代挽歌色彩的绝唱。三个山西乡下的年轻人开始酗酒打人，以为出了人命，只好选择亡命天涯。一路上在黑店嫖妓，差点丢了汽车，随后在鸡毛店歇脚，一个朋友投了汽车和钱自己溜了。剩下的两个朋友开始靠盗窃和抢劫生活，很快地，在一次劫持出租车的作案中，一个朋友失手打死了另一个朋友。最后，这个误杀了朋友的年轻人回到老家，发现他们之前的案子已经被私了了，他情人的丈夫也在矿难中死了，现在他可以和情人一起带着抚恤金一走了之。但是他失去了行动的勇气，变得和那些沉默的煤堆一样。 影片描述了这群年轻人无知而又绝望的生活，他们试图用性、用酗酒和抽烟来逃离自己的现实生活，但是很快地就意识到他们根本无出可逃。在出逃的途中，他们关于友谊、信任、爱情和亲情的幻想都破灭了，甚至生命本身也失去了。他们为了生存，自然而然地选择了犯罪，而犯罪不过是加快了他们走向自己终点的进程。在张艺谋的《红高粱》里面，出现过大片的红色高粱地，用以渲染性高潮的来临和不可阻挡的血腥命运的降临。《赖小子》用收割之后的玉米地对《红高粱》致敬，但是，这里的玉米地是主人公的死亡之地。那些失去生命的玉米秆在风中发抖，象征着最后一个主人公也变成了只会发抖的弱者。在影片开始他所拥有的无所畏惧的勇气和对未来的希望，都随着朋友的死和他的负罪感而消失了。 整部影片非常压抑，山西农村由于过度开采煤矿所造成的严重污染比比皆是。多数人依赖这些小煤窑生存，这些小煤窑也无情地吞噬他们的生命。那些想逃脱这个宿命循环的年轻人，最后仍然被社会所吞没。如果说贾樟柯的《小武》还带着一点乐观和诙谐，这部由他监制的电影完全泯灭了那一点点地希望。《赖小子》明显地模仿了《猜火车》的情节和叙事手法，不过整部影片看起来还不错，除了让你觉得郁闷地要死，也让你感到一点幸存者的喜悦—毕竟你不用选择对着你的朋友拿起一把手枪。

西川的谢幕

前两天在朋友的朋友家做客。芝加哥拥有美丽而安静的郊区，在那里高尔夫球场和大大小小的池塘夹杂在中产阶级的别墅中间，偶尔也可以看到几百万美元的豪宅。哈哈，生活在这里的人每天“绿水青山带笑颜，夫妻双双把家还”。原来生活还可以这样惬意，这样舒服的没谱。朋友夫妇招待得非常殷勤，弄得我都不好意思了。原定第二天一早离开，但是机票出了问题，芝加哥下起了四月的大雪，无论如何是走不了了，只能再叨扰一天。朋友怕我无聊，就搬出一堆书来，让我映雪读书，加上红袖添香的招待。随便挑了一本书开始读，是西川的《深浅》。这一阵子认识了不少原来毕业于北京外国语学院外语学校的老“附校生”，中间又有不少北大的校友，聊起来格外亲切。我打扰的这个朋友在附校就是西川的师兄，后来在北大也是他的师兄。这么多年来他们还保持着联系，这本书就是西川的赠书。

在北大混了六年，多少听说过西川、海子、驼一禾这些名字，但是从来没有真正读过他们的作品。社会学系的系歌唱到“未名湖是个海洋，诗人都沉在水底”，我以为北大的诗人都已经自戕了，没想到西川还在中央美院好好地教书和写诗。这一本《深浅》是他最近的合集，收录了1990年以后创作的作品，“其内容包括西川诗歌精粹、文化随笔，以及与若干国内外作家、学者关于当代中国社会文化的热点问题的对话和争辩。全书由六辑构成。第一、二辑为诗歌，收录了《致敬》、《厄运》、《鹰的话语》、《蚊子志》、《契丹面具》等著名篇章。第三辑为一部具有诗歌特有的韵律美的、想象丰富奇特的诗剧《我的天》。第四辑为散文集，余下两辑为论文，对话，答记者问等等”。

我这个人既是文盲，更是诗盲，所以跳过了诗和戏剧的部分，直接开始读西川的散文。散文中间影响比较深的是西川回顾自己“淘书”生涯的一篇文字（《与书籍有关》），诙谐幽默，半文半白，把淘书和读书的甘苦描摹得淋漓尽致，不愧是个海王屯里的作家。他通过写书来忆人，有的是他的同学和朋友（比如申铭和《太平广记》），有的是旅途中遇到的奇人（比如《爱欲经》和Lance Dane）。最感人的回忆是那段得到阿赫玛托娃的《安魂曲》的经历。他青年时代的诗友老金落魄巴黎，从跳蚤市场淘得此书，不远万里托人带回北京相赠。后来老金过世，西川写下了这段文字“校友说他最后一次见老金是在巴黎沙特赖地铁车站。时老金失魂落魄，精神崩溃。我曾长久徘徊于沙特赖地铁车站站台，冀老金或老金幽魂拍打我肩，但不是生死两茫茫就是生生两茫茫。一个朋友，就这么没了。回到旅馆，我不禁伏枕一哭。在《安魂曲》中，阿赫玛托娃说道："我知道人的脸怎样憔 悴，／恐惧怎样从眼睑下窥视，／痛苦怎样在脸颊上刻绘／一页页 无情的楔形文字……”。我觉得西川不仅是在向老金作别，也是在向逝去的诗的年代作别。

另一篇《想象我居住的城市》非常有趣。他描写北京，不是把它作为自己当下居住的城市，而是作为想象中的异乡，因此而获得了巨大的想象空间。他引用了不少外国人写北京的作品，比如谢阁兰的小说《勒内·莱斯》，来呼应Coehle的《炼金术士》，以想象来重构现实。他写道“因此，北京的确存在着另一个北京，是老舍那类人所不曾见过的，就像这世界上存在着老舍不曾见过的生活、不曾读过的诗篇。日常生活的北京还不是全部的北京。你需要想象北京，北京会满足你的想象；即使它暂时没有你所想象的东西，它也会应着你的想象长出你所想象的东西。我们都从想象中来。”我尤其喜欢他下面的一段文字：

“你看，我想象我居住的城市，一半是出于主动，一半是出于被迫。除了市中心那栖居着幽灵的九千九百九十九间半空屋以及那有着历史走向的皇家大道，一个旧北京基本上已经被一个新北京所替代。我并不怀念那个旧北京，因为我从未见过那个旧北京；而那些钢筋水泥的新骨董，根本无法唤起我回到旧北京的感觉。我只是在回味"北京"这个专有名词时，会幽幽然获得一种历史的纵深感，我因此而领会想象的乐趣，我因此思索我的天命所在。北京，一个词汇，除了它的方位所指没有大的改变，它的政治所指、经济所指、文化所指，乃至道德所指均已大不同于从前。我从北京的名与实之间看出了距离。而名与实，或称词与物之间的距离，恰恰是想象的巨大空间。名与实，或词与物，永远只能有瞬间的叠合。那叠合的一刹那，便是创造的一刹那，其余时间，名与实的距离越拉越大，这对想象的好处也越来越大，直到它们之间再也无法维持对称的关系，于是想象的琴弦绷断。”

西川在文中几次提到海子的死、驮一禾的死、戈麦的死和张风华的死，在《生命的故事》中，他回忆了那些不合时宜的朋友和他们的不合时宜的生存年代，以及他们所选择的“义人之路”。在他深深的惋惜之情背后，我似乎感觉到一点点的不安，甚至嫉妒。朋友们死了，正是由于他们悲剧性的死亡和对他们死亡的浪漫渲染（西川本人出力不少），使得他们成了诗歌界的“神灵”，成了不折不扣地精神领袖和偶像。提到海子他们，每个人都感到自惭形秽。我们不具有他们那样的才华去写诗，也缺乏他们那样的勇气去死亡。他们变成了神，因为他们见证了八十年代和那个时代的精神，且身体力行地把对后来世界的失望转化成了极为暴烈的死亡形式。他们在极之年轻的时候选择了死亡，故而他们流传下来的作品都是他们盛年时代最好的作品，因为他们还没来得及写一些次等的作品。一个人写100首诗，根据概率论，至少有五首不怎么样。但是如果你只来得及写了30首，那么说不定字字珠玑，而且别人会想象其他的70首也是传世之作。年轻的诗人们死了，因此他们不用随着年龄的增长而与这个丑陋的世界妥协，他们不用变成萎缩的中年人和无力的老年人。他们的诗就是青春的本身，带着青春所有的锐气和灵感，带着所向披靡的勇气和无畏，完全没有年齿日长所带来的畏惧和彷徨，没有生活压力之下的妥协和沉沦。从这个意义上说，这些死去的年轻诗人是幸运的 — 尼采在《悲剧的诞生》里不是说过，这个世界上最大的幸运就是不必出生，或者尽早死去么？

西川没有这么幸运，他变成了一个衰老的偶像。他的诗非常“理性”，或者说非常的“辛弃疾化”。他不停地掉书袋子,不断地把古往今来的知识分子和文学人物引到书里来，一方面的确有利于意向的展开和情绪的铺展，但是另一方面却给阅读带来巨大的困难。如果你不是像西川一样博学，如果你不像他一样博览群书、走遍世界，那么面对一大堆陌生的人名和地名，你所看到的不过是大量的没有所指的名词而已，这些诗歌对你不会产生任何意义。西川的诗是少数人的诗歌，他不断地提炼自己的技巧，使得他的机构无懈可击，用词完美无瑕，但是他生产出来的是汝窑的精品，不是老百姓也能享用的青花。当然，诗歌从来不是也不应该是“人人的诗歌”，“凡有水井处，人人皆歌柳词”不过是夸张而已。但是，作为一个衰老的偶像，西川是不是在用《深浅》来向诗坛告别？或者他是在委婉地为自己的青年时代谢幕？

偶像如何在自己的黄昏时代自处是一个严肃的问题。因为他不仅要面对世事的变幻，年轻诗人的竞争，而且要挑战年轻时代的自己。弥尔顿提出了对这个问题最好的回答。他在政治失意和失明之后，完成了自己的《失乐园》、《复乐园》和《巨人参孙》三部曲，开创了撒旦诗篇的传统。弥尔顿成名极早，是个少年天才诗人。他的成年时代花费在政治斗争当中，直到晚年才回到文学创作中来。在《失乐园》中，我们看到的不是一个老年诗人对岁月的留恋，而是充满了力量和反叛精神的精神领袖撒旦，他以十倍、百倍的精神挑战自己的命运。但是几千年的文学史中，不就是一个弥尔顿吗？

最近几天网上在纪念王小波逝世十周年，褒贬不一，但是多数文章是在“造神”。中国人似乎有一个倾向，总是借死者说事儿。一个时代有一个时代的偶像，（虽然有的时代出现的是愚蠢的偶像，比如现在），王小波是90年代的偶像，现在我们纪念他到底是什么意思？我觉得以制造偶像的方式来纪念王小波是非常危险的，这种脱离语境、脱离时代环境的无限拔高和过去使用意识形态来制造偶像如出一辙。现在像吹捧韩寒一样来吹捧王小波只有一个后果，就是使他更快的被人忘记。现在的偶像所拥有的是安迪.沃霍意义上的成名，即“everyone should have five minutes of celebrity time”。从这个角度来看，如果王小波活着，他一定会看出这场造神运动的荒谬，而且会拒绝参与其中。我觉得对他最好的纪念，是以他的姿态来思考。我有一个大胆的想象，假如王二还活着，而且变成了一个五十多岁的中老年作家，这十年中他会写出怎样的文字？毕竟他的《黄金时代》已经过去了，他所倡导和代表的新自由主义精神已经得到了社会的普遍认可，他所反对的专制意识形态已经在强大的消费文化冲击下衰退了。在假想敌消失的时候，一个愤怒的小说家应该何为？他会寻找新的值得愤怒的理由，还是取消自己愤怒的姿态，或者开始像西川一样沉湎在回忆中过活？