论叶芝的布莱克阐释与《奥辛的漫游》中的“凯尔特–爱尔兰”神话

William Blake and the Mythmaking of W.B.Yeats’s The Wanderings of Oisin

长篇叙事诗《奥辛的漫游》是叶芝早年尝试讲述"凯尔特–爱尔兰"神话的初步尝试之一。除却《莪相学会会刊》中的盖尔语文学作品和英国浪漫主义诗人如雪莱等人的影响而外,叶芝在创作此诗同时进行的另一个写作计划--对英国诗人威廉·布莱克的注释和阐发--也对《奥辛的漫游》的意象使用和主题产生了特别的影响。本文尝试通过梳理相关文本,说明叶芝的布莱克阐释对阐释《奥辛的漫游》的可能意义:叶芝对布莱克的阐释伴随着《奥辛的漫游》创作过程的始终,对《奥辛的漫游》的选材、结构都产生了影响,叶芝在解读布莱克时对布莱克"对立"观念的痴迷、他在对布莱克的误读中所表达的自我意识也为理解《奥辛的漫游》中凯尔特–爱尔兰神话的讲述方式和讲述效果提供了独特的线索。并且,叶芝在注解布莱克时的神智学观点及他在《奥辛的漫游》中的创作实践,都在逐渐塑形叶芝此时的文化观念:来自个体或群体心灵状态最深处的文化象征–形象的连续性构成了个人、民族或国家获得一种"统一"身份和认同的关键,而此种连续性的获得十分艰辛,需要富于想象力的心灵不断超逸现实,使无限想象力从有限的生命中"脱壳而出"。在这一意义上,叶芝的布莱克阐释和《奥辛的漫游》中对"凯尔特–爱尔兰"的最初描绘,尽管带着"天真之歌"的印记,却也是叶芝尝试从以追寻和定义"爱尔兰"的方式参与一个现代国家的形塑过程的最初"经验之歌"。

Yeats’s narrative poem The Wanderings of Oisin is his first overt poetic attempt to retell and reinvent Celtic-Irish mythologies.Aside from the influence of English Romantic poets such as Shelley and the Gaelic literature published in Transactions of the Ossianic Society on The Wanderings of Oisin,it is significant to address another source:while Yeats was writing the poem,he was also writing commentaries on the poems of William Blake.By examining the relevant texts,this paper attempts to show that Yeats’s interpretation of Blake accompanies the creative process of The Wanderings of Oisin.Not only does Yeats’s understanding of Blake have an impact on the imagery,the structure,and the themes of the poem,but Yeats’s self-consciousness expressed in his interpretation of Blake also provides clues to understanding the particular manners in which the Celtic-Irish mythology is told in The Wanderings of Oisin.Furthermore,Yeats’s theosophical readings of Blake and his application of these interpretations in The Wanderings of Oisin also participate in the shaping of his core cultural values:it is the continuity of cultural symbols in the mindset of individuals as well as communities that constitutes a unified identity of an individual,a cultural entity,and a nation.Obtaining this continuity requires the imaginative mind to constantly transcend reality and to make the infinite imagination emerge from the finite life.In this sense,despite the fact that they still bear the stamp of youthful compositions of"songs of innocence,"Yeats’s interpretation of Blake and his initial portrayal of a"Celtic Ireland"in The Wanderings of Oisin are also his attempts to overtly define Ireland’s cultural identity.Seen in this light,they are in fact the first"songs of experience"in which the young poet attempts to participate in the process of the shaping of a modern nation.