《少年维特之烦恼》中的媒介问题

Media Issues in Die Leiden des jungen Werthers

德国18世纪的文本化进程与文学发展的关联构成了歌德小说《少年维特之烦恼》的基本历史语境。文本化进程不仅为远程交流提供了可能,同时也削弱了身体在场的交往;媒介发展不仅服务于情感交流的需求,同时也生成了新的交往模式。小说在把印刷文化促进的“编者”、“前言”等辅助文本运用于虚构叙事的同时,将被虔诚主义与感伤主义推向发展高潮的交往媒介——书信推向极致,小说中收信人的缺席留下的空位,由匿名的读者填补。真实与虚构的交互杂糅,导致读者接受的困惑,提出了审美反思的挑战。印刷文化的进程不仅生成了新的表述方式,促进了文化技术的发展,同时也限制了面对面的交往。而体验要求的直接性与媒介需要的距离似乎总是处在一种紧张关系之中。

The correlation between the process of textualization and the development of literature in the eighteenth-century Germany constituted the basic historical context of Goethe’s novel,Die Leiden des jungen Werthers.The textualization not only made long-distance communication possible,but also minimized physical interaction.The development of media served the needs of emotional exchanges and,at the same time,generated new patterns of social interactions.The novel incorporates paratexts like“editor”and“preface”,which were promoted by the print culture,into its fictional narrative while perfecting the epistolary narrative,namely,the media of communication that had been pushed onto a more advanced stage by the pietism and sentimentalism.The void,which occurs due to the absence of the letter receiver in the novel,may be filled by the anonymous reader.The confusing mixture of reality and fiction leads the reader to a baffling reception and poses a challenge to aesthetic reflection.The advancement of print culture produced new forms of articulation and promoted the development of cultural technologies while curtailing face-to-face interactions.Experience and media always find themselves in a tense relationship simply because the former requires directness,whereas the latter needs distance.