《摹仿剧》的摹仿与创造

Imitation and Creation in Pantomime

沃尔科特的《摹仿剧》将鲁滨孙故事置换至加勒比海的多巴哥,借“漂流者客栈”逆写西方现代神话。如果说英国老板哈里的故事停留于生活对艺术的简单摹仿,雇工杰克逊则从历史的维度,展开创造性摹仿。一如其吟唱的卡利普索,杰克逊代表着外在于西方中心结构的创造性力量。须知这部两幕剧诞生于1978年,同年出版的还有萨义德的《东方主义》。面对西方学界的殖民主义与反殖民主义对峙,沃尔科特旁逸斜出,在艺术摹仿的创造性游戏中呼唤审美体验,实现了鲁滨孙神话的去殖民化和克里奥尔化,还提出了以艺术为解决方案的理想生活模型。

In Pantomime,Derek Walcott attempts to relocate the myth of Robinson Crusoe to Tobago and represents a story of pantomime rehearsal in an inn called Castaway.While Englishman Harry,the inn owner,conceives a version of simple imitation,his local handyman Jackson generates a creative adaptation from a historical perspective.In much the same as the calypso he chants,Jackson represents the creative supplementary force to the West center.Composed in 1978,the same year in which Edward Said's Orientalism was published,Pantomime transcends the dichotomy of colonialism and anti-colonialism by invoking an aesthetic experience through a creative play of imitation.In so doing,Walcott proposes the art-happiness model as the ideal model for living while decolonizing and creolizing the Robinson Crusoe myth.