巴別圖書館

The Library of Babel

巴別圖書館

Jorge Luis Borges

豪爾赫.路易斯.博爾赫斯

作者簡介

豪爾赫.路易斯.博爾赫斯（Jorge Luis Borges，1899—1986），享譽世界的阿根廷詩人、翻譯家、小說家，尤以短篇小說著稱。他的短篇小說構(gòu)思奇特、結(jié)構(gòu)精巧、情節(jié)荒誕且充滿幻想。此外，他的散文和藝術(shù)隨筆同樣成就不小。其代表作包括《小徑分岔的花園》（The Garden of Forking Paths）、《巴別圖書館》（The Library of Babel）、《博爾赫斯口述》（Borges Oral）等。

《巴別圖書館》是博爾赫斯用西班牙語寫成的短篇小說，最初收入1941年的小說集《小徑分岔的花園》，后收入1944年的《虛構(gòu)集》（Fictions）。本文節(jié)選自1962年的英譯本。圖書館對博爾赫斯來說有不同尋常的意義：他先是在米格爾.卡內(nèi)圖書館工作多年，后來擔任阿根廷國立圖書館館長直至退休。他最為人熟知的名言“我心中一直暗暗設(shè)想，天堂該是圖書館的模樣”就與圖書館相關(guān)。

本文中，他以奇特的想象描繪了理想中的圖書館。在他的筆下，宇宙就是個圖書館，無窮無盡，極富變化。對愛書人來說，這或許是最令人神往之事。

The universe (which others call the Library) is composed of an indefinite and perhaps infinite number of hexagonal galleries, with vast air shafts between, surrounded by very low railings. From any of the hexagons one can see, interminably, the upper and lower floors. The distribution of the galleries is invariable. Twenty shelves, five long shelves per side, cover all the sides except two; their height, which is the distance from floor to ceiling, scarcely exceeds that of a normal bookcase. One of the free sides leads to a narrow hallway which opens onto another gallery, identical to the first and to all the rest. To the left and right of the hallway there are two very small closets. In the first, one may sleep standing up; in the other, satisfy one’s fecal necessities. Also through here passes a spiral stairway, which sinks abysmally and soars upwards to remote distances. In the hallway there is a mirror which faithfully duplicates all appearances. Men usually infer from this mirror that the Library is not infinite (If it were, why this illusory duplication?); I prefer to dream that its polished surfaces represent and promise the infinite...Light is provided by some spherical fruit which bear the name of lamps. There are two, transversally placed, in each hexagon. The light they emit is insufficient, incessant.

宇宙（也有人稱之為圖書館）由無窮無盡的六角書廊組成。書廊之間有巨大的通風井，周圍是低矮的欄桿。從任何一個六角書廊放眼望去，皆可看見無限延伸的上下樓層。書廊的布置整齊劃一，每間都有20個書架。除了兩面墻之外，其余四面墻邊各有5個長書架。每個書架都從地面一直頂?shù)教旎ò?，比普通書架略高一些。在沒有擺書架的其中一面墻上，有一條通往另一間六角書廊的狹窄走道。所有的六角書廊都一模一樣。走道左右有兩個很小的房間，一間可供人站著睡覺，另一間則做廁所使用。這里還有一座螺旋形的樓梯，上通碧落，下抵黃泉。走道中還有一面鏡子，能真實地復制一切。人們通常依此推斷，圖書館并非無限。（如果圖書館是無限的，為何還有復制的幻象？）我更樂于想象，鏡子光滑的表面反映了無盡，預示著無限……光線來自一些名叫“燈”的球狀物體。每個六角書廊都橫置著兩盞這樣的燈。它們發(fā)出的光線微弱而持久。

Like all men of the Library, I have traveled in my youth; I have wandered in search of a book, perhaps the catalogue of catalogues; now that my eyes can hardly decipher what I write, I am preparing to die just a few leagues from the hexagon in which I was born. Once I am dead, there will be no lack of pious hands to throw me over the railing; my grave will be the fathomless air; my body will sink endlessly and decay and dissolve in the wind generated by the fall, which is infinite. I say that the Library is unending. The idealists argue that the hexagonal rooms are a necessary form of absolute space or, at least, of our intuition of space. They reason that a triangular or pentagonal room is inconceivable. (The mystics claim that their ecstasy reveals to them a circular chamber containing a great circular book, whose spine is continuous and which follows the complete circle of the walls; but their testimony is suspect; their words, obscure. This cyclical book is God.) Let it suffice now for me to repeat the classic dictum: The Library is a sphere whose exact center is any one of its hexagons and whose circumference is inaccessible.

...

與圖書館里的所有人一樣，我年輕時也曾旅行。我曾為尋找一本書——或許是目錄的總目錄——而漫游；而如今，我已很難看清自己寫下的文字，準備在自己出生的六角書廊附近死去。我死后，將有虔誠之手將我扔過欄桿；我的墓穴將是深不可測的天空；我的身體將不斷墜落，并在無限的墜落中隨風而散，化為無形。我說圖書館是無窮無盡的。理想主義者則聲稱，六角形房間是絕對空間[1]的必要形式，或者至少是人類空間直覺的必要形式。他們分析，三角形或五角形的房間是不可思議的。（神秘主義者則宣稱，他們在迷幻狀態(tài)下看見一個環(huán)形的房間，里面有一本環(huán)形的大書，它的書脊沿著環(huán)形墻壁連續(xù)不斷。但他們的證詞十分可疑；他們的話語含糊不清。這本循環(huán)的書是上帝。）現(xiàn)在讓我重申那句經(jīng)典格言：圖書館是個球體，以任意六角書廊為圓心，圓周長不可測。

……

Five hundred years ago, the chief of an upper hexagon came upon a book as confusing as the others, but which had nearly two pages of homogeneous lines. He showed his find to a wandering decoder who told him the lines were written in Portuguese; others said they were Yiddish. Within a century, the language was established: a Samoyedic Lithuanian dialect of Guarani, with classical Arabian inflections. The content was also deciphered: some notions of combinative analysis, illustrated with examples of variations with unlimited repetition. These examples made it possible for a librarian of genius to discover the fundamental law of the Library. This thinker observed that all the books, no matter how diverse they might be, are made up of the same elements: the space, the period, the comma, the twenty-two letters of the alphabet. He also alleged a fact which travelers have confirmed: In the vast Library there are no two identical books. From these two incontrovertible premises he deduced that the Library is total and that its shelves register all the possible combinations of the twenty-odd orthographical symbols (a number which, though extremely vast, is not infinite): Everything: the minutely detailed history of the future, the archangels’ autobiographies, the faithful catalogues of the Library, thousands and thousands of false catalogues, the demonstration of the fallacy of those catalogues, the demonstration of the fallacy of the true catalogue, the Gnostic gospel of Basilides, the commentary on that gospel, the commentary on the commentary on that gospel, the true story of your death, the translation of every book in all languages, the interpolations of every book in all books.

500年前，上層六角書廊的主管偶然看見一本像其他書一樣令人費解的書，但其中近兩頁中的句子是類似的。他向一位云游四海的破譯員請教自己的發(fā)現(xiàn)。那個人告訴他，這些句子是葡萄牙語寫成的；也有人認為那是意第緒語。一個世紀之內(nèi)，那種語言得到了確認——薩摩耶——立陶宛語的瓜拉尼方言，帶有傳統(tǒng)阿拉伯語的屈折變化。句子內(nèi)容也得到了破譯：一些綜合分析的概念，用無限重復又有變化的事例加以闡釋。這些事例使得一位天才圖書館員發(fā)現(xiàn)了圖書館的基本法則。這位思考者發(fā)現(xiàn)，所有的書無論有多大差別，都由相同的要素組成：空格、句號、逗號和字母表里的22個字母。他還指出了一個已得到旅行者確認的事實：浩瀚無邊的圖書館里，沒有兩本完全相同的書。從這兩個無可爭議的前提出發(fā)，他得出了結(jié)論：圖書館無所不包，架上的書窮盡了20多個書寫符號的一切組合。（這個數(shù)字盡管龐大，卻并非無窮。）這些字母組合能表達一切，包括未來的詳盡歷史、天使長的自傳、圖書館的真實書目、成千上萬的偽書目、對偽書目中問題的論證、對真書目中問題的論證、巴西里德斯的諾斯底福音[2]、對這個福音的評論、對這些評論的評論、關(guān)于你死亡的真相、每本書的所有語言的譯本以及所有書里的增補部分。

When it was proclaimed that the Library contained all books, the first impression was one of extravagant happiness. All men felt themselves to be the masters of an intact and secret treasure. There was no personal or world problem whose eloquent solution did not exist in some hexagon. The universe was justified; the universe suddenly usurped the unlimited dimensions of hope. At that time a great deal was said about the Vindications: books of apology and prophecy which vindicated for all time the acts of every man in the universe and retained prodigious arcana for his future. Thousands of the greedy abandoned their sweet native hexagons and rushed up the stairways, urged on by the vain intention of finding their Vindication. These pilgrims disputed in the narrow corridors, proffered dark curses, strangled each other on the divine stairways, flung the deceptive books into the air shafts, met their death cast down in a similar fashion by the inhabitants of remote regions. Others went mad…The Vindications exist (I have seen two which refer to persons of the future, to persons who are perhaps not imaginary) but the searchers did not remember that the possibility of a man’s finding his Vindication, or some treacherous variation thereof, can be computed as zero.

人們得知圖書館收藏了所有的書時，第一反應便是感到幸福滿溢。所有人都覺得自己是一座保存完好的神秘寶庫的主人。所有的私人問題或關(guān)于世界的疑問都能在某些六角書廊里找到可靠的解答。宇宙合理化了，人類希望的無限維度卻突然受到了宇宙的限制。那時有很多用于辯護的書：懺悔書和預言書。那些書總是為宇宙中每個人的行為辯解，并記錄著有關(guān)每個人未來的奧秘。成千上萬貪婪的人試圖為自己尋找辯護。受到這種徒勞企圖的驅(qū)使，他們放棄了自己溫馨的六角書廊，沖上樓梯。這些朝圣者在狹窄的走道里爭論不休，惡語相向，在神圣的樓梯上相互廝殺，把騙人的書本扔進通風管。他們自己則被遠方居民以同樣的方式扔進通風管，死于非命。還有些人瘋了……辯護確實存在。（我看見過兩本關(guān)于未來人類的辯護書，那些人不像是虛構(gòu)出來的。）但搜索者忘記了一點：找到為自己辯護的書，或是一些不可靠的替代品的可能性可能為零。

At that time it was also hoped that a clarification of humanity’s basic mysteries—the origin of the Library and of time—might be found. It is verisimilar that these grave mysteries could be explained in words: if the language of philosophers is not sufficient, the multiform Library will have produced the unprecedented language required, with its vocabularies and grammars. For four centuries now men have exhausted the hexagons...There are official searchers, inquisitors. I have seen them in the performance of their function: they always arrive extremely tired from their journeys; they speak of a broken stairway which almost killed them; they talk with the librarian of galleries and stairs; sometimes they pick up the nearest volume and leaf through it, looking for infamous words. Obviously, no one expects to discover anything.

As was natural, this inordinate hope was followed by an excessive depression. The certitude that some shelf in some hexagon held precious books and that these precious books were inaccessible, seemed almost intolerable. A blasphemous sect suggested that the searches should cease and that all men should juggle letters and symbols until they constructed, by an improbable gift of chance, these canonical books. The authorities were obliged to issue severe orders. The sect disappeared, but in my childhood I have seen old men who, for long periods of time, would hide in the latrines with some metal disks in a forbidden dice cup and feebly mimic the divine disorder.

那時，人們還希望找到對人類基本奧秘——圖書館和時間起源——的解釋。這些嚴肅的奧秘似乎真的可以用文字解釋：如果哲學家的語言不足以表達，那么，各種各樣的圖書館會提供所需的語言，一種前所未見的語言，包含詞匯和語法。400年來，人們已踏遍所有六角書廊……官方搜索者被稱為“稽查員”。我見過他們工作的情形：他們到達目的地時總是筋疲力盡；他們談起斷裂的樓梯差點害自己喪命；他們與圖書館員談論書廊和樓梯；他們有時會拿起身邊的書隨意翻閱，尋找傷風敗俗的字眼。顯然，他們不指望能發(fā)現(xiàn)什么。

自然而然，過分的希望帶來的是極度的失望。一種篤定的觀點認為，某個六角書廊的某個書架上藏有珍本，但這些珍本人手難及。這個觀點似乎讓人難以接受。一個褻瀆神明的教派建議人們停止搜索，提議所有人隨意擺弄字母和符號，直到它們在不太可能的機緣巧合中組合成符合教義的書。官方被迫頒布嚴格的法令。這個教派消失了。但在我小時候的很長一段時間里，我曾見過老人躲在廁所里，用被禁的骰盅搖著金屬片，有氣無力地模擬神界的混亂。

Others, inversely, believed that it was fundamental to eliminate useless works. They invaded the hexagons, showed credentials which were not always false, leafed through a volume with displeasure and condemned whole shelves: their hygienic, ascetic furor caused the senseless perdition of millions of books. Their name is execrated, but those who deplore the “treasures” destroyed by this frenzy neglect two notable facts. One: the Library is so enormous that any reduction of human origin is infinitesimal. The other: every copy is unique, irreplaceable, but (since the Library is total) there are always several hundred thousand imperfect facsimiles: works which differ only in a letter or a comma. Counter to general opinion, I venture to suppose that the consequences of the Purifiers’ depredations have been exaggerated by the horror these fanatics produced. They were urged on by the delirium of trying to reach the books in the Crimson Hexagon: books whose format is smaller than usual, all-powerful, illustrated and magical.

相反，另一些人相信根除沒用的書是關(guān)鍵。他們闖進六角書廊，出示或真或假的身份證件，滿懷怒氣地翻翻一本書，然后給所有的書架定罪。他們衛(wèi)道士、苦行僧般的狂熱，導致上百萬本書莫名其妙地毀于一旦。他們的名字遭人咒罵，但那些譴責“珍寶”毀于狂熱的人，忽視了兩個明顯的事實。其一，圖書館如此龐大，任何人為的削減都微不足道。其二，每本書都獨一無二、無可替代，但由于圖書館無所不包，總能找到幾十萬本略有瑕疵的復制品。它們與原書的差別，不過是一個字母或一個逗號。我斗膽設(shè)想——這個設(shè)想與人們普遍的觀點相反——這些清道夫蹂躪書籍帶來的影響，被狂熱分子營造的恐怖氣氛夸大了。他們受到狂熱的驅(qū)使，試圖得到深紅色六角書廊中的書。那些書的開本略小于普通書籍，書中蘊含無窮力量，配有插圖，帶有魔力。

We also know of another superstition of that time: that of the Man of the Book. On some shelf in some hexagon (men reasoned) there must exist a book which is the formula and perfect compendium of all the rest: some librarian has gone through it and he is analogous to a god. In the language of this zone vestiges of this remote functionary’s cult still persist. Many wandered in search of Him. For a century they have exhausted in vain the most varied areas. How could one locate the venerated and secret hexagon which housed Him? Someone proposed a regressive method: To locate book A, consult first book B which indicates A’s position; to locate book B, consult first a book C, and so on to infinity...In adventures such as these, I have squandered and wasted my years. It does not seem unlikely to me that there is a total book on some shelf of the universe; I pray to the unknown gods that a man—just one, even though it were thousands of years ago! —may have examined and read it. If honor and wisdom and happiness are not for me, let them be for others. Let heaven exist, though my place be in hell. Let me be outraged and annihilated, but for one instant, in one being, let Your enormous Library be justified.

...

我們還知道那時的另一種迷信，即相信存在“書人”。（人們推斷）在某個六角書廊的某個書架上，存在這樣一本書——這本書是其余所有書的模板和完美綱要。某位圖書館員曾讀過此書，而后變得近似于神。對這個人的古老的狂熱崇拜，在此區(qū)域遺留的語言中仍然存在。許多人四處尋找這個人。一個世紀以來，他們筋疲力盡地走遍各地，卻一無所獲。如何找到他住過的那間受人崇敬的神秘六角書廊？有人提議用倒推法：為了找到甲書，先查看標出甲書位置的乙書；為找乙書，先看丙書；以此類推，直至無窮……在這樣的探索中，我揮霍了多少光陰。在我看來，在宇宙的某個書架上，確實有一本無所不包之書。我向未知的神明禱告，祈盼已有人調(diào)查并讀過此書——哪怕只有一個人，哪怕是在數(shù)千年之前。讓榮譽、智慧、幸福屬于別人吧——如果它們不屬于我。讓天堂存在吧，即使我身處地獄。讓我遭受侮辱、陷入毀滅吧，只要有那么一瞬，通過一人之身，能證明偉大的圖書館確實存在。

……

The methodical task of writing distracts me from the present state of men. The certitude that everything has been written negates us or turns us into phantoms. I know of districts in which the young men prostrate themselves before books and kiss their pages in a barbarous manner, but they do not know how to decipher a single letter. Epidemics, heretical conflicts, peregrinations which inevitably degenerate into banditry, have decimated the population. I believe I have mentioned suicides, more and more frequent with the years. Perhaps my old age and fearfulness deceive me, but I suspect that the human species—the unique species—is about to be extinguished, but the Library will endure: illuminated, solitary, infinite, perfectly motionless, equipped with precious volumes, useless, incorruptible, secret.

I have just written the word “infinite.” I have not interpolated this adjective out of rhetorical habit; I say that it is not illogical to think that the world is infinite. Those who judge it to be limited postulate that in remote places the corridors and stairways and hexagons can conceivably come to an end—which is absurd. Those who imagine it to be without limit forget that the possible number of books does have such a limit. I venture to suggest this solution to the ancient problem: The Library is unlimited and cyclical. If an eternal traveler were to cross it in any direction, after centuries he would see that the same volumes were repeated in the same disorder (which, thus repeated, would be an order: the Order).

有條不紊的寫作任務讓我不再關(guān)注人類的現(xiàn)狀。一種篤定的觀點認為，萬物都已被寫盡。這種觀點抹殺了人類的存在，或?qū)⑽覀兓癁榛糜?。我知道在有些地方，年輕人拜倒在書前，粗野地親吻書頁，但他們一個字母都不認識。傳染病、異教沖突以及游歷不可避免地導致盜寇橫行，使人口數(shù)量驟減。我相信，我提到了近年來愈發(fā)頻繁的自殺行為。或許高齡和恐懼欺騙了我，但我懷疑，人類這個獨一無二的物種將走向滅亡，圖書館卻將永存——它發(fā)出光芒、遺世獨立、無窮無盡、安然靜止，深藏無用、不朽、秘密的珍貴書籍。

我剛寫下“無窮無盡”這個詞。我插入這個形容詞，并非出于修辭的習慣；我認為，“世界無邊無際”這個想法合乎邏輯。那些認為“世界有限”的人假設(shè)在某個遙遠的地方，走道、樓梯、六角書廊都有盡頭——這真是荒謬。那些想象“世界無限”的人，忘記了書籍的數(shù)量或許有限。我斗膽為這個古老的問題給出解答：圖書館沒有止境且周而復始。如果一位永生的旅行者朝任意方向穿越圖書館，許多個世紀之后，他會看見同樣的書以同樣的無序再次出現(xiàn)。（這種無序一旦重復，便形成了秩序，即“規(guī)律”。）

我懷疑，人類這個獨一無二的物種將走向滅亡，圖書館卻將永存——它發(fā)出光芒、遺世獨立、無窮無盡、安然靜止，深藏無用、不朽、秘密的珍貴書籍。

Jorge Luis Borges 豪爾赫?路易斯?博爾赫斯

[1] 物理學概念，牛頓認為宇宙中存在一個與任何物體均無相互作用，而且永遠靜止的空間，即“絕對空間”。

[2] 諾斯底福音，受諾斯底派影響寫成的福音書，被正統(tǒng)教派視為異端和“偽福音”。