耐人寻味的指代对象换位:马洛夫的小说《忆起了巴比伦》

Meaningful Inversion of the Referents:Malouf's Novel Remembering Babylon

在《圣经》中,耶路撒冷是美好的象征,而巴比伦是邪恶的象征。在白人移民看来,故土英格兰是耶路撒冷,而澳洲大陆则是巴比伦。但小说主人公盖米和土著人对此的看法却正相反,因而在这不同的两类人眼里,耶路撒冷和巴比伦这两个象征所指代的对象换了位。马洛夫在小说中生动细腻地展现了这种换位现象,并巧妙地借用《圣经》中的思想,暗示在经历了尖锐种族对立所造成的创痛并对其深刻反思之后,澳大利亚必将走向光明的未来。

In the Bible, Jerusalem is the symbol of goodness, while Babylon is that of evil. For white immigrants, England is Jerusalem, while Australia is Babylon. In the eyes of the protagonist Gemmy and the Aborigines, however, it is just the other way around. Thus the two kinds of people see different referents of the symbols. In his novel, Malouf gives a detailed description of this inversion, and hints, by borrowing the ideas in the Bible, that Australia is bound to step into a bright future after undergoing the ordeal caused by acute ethnic conflicts and making a sufficient reflection upon it.