“尼罗河畔的巴黎复刻品”:《欧洲一隅》中开罗市中心的“凝视者”

"A Replica of Paris on the Nile":The"Gazer"of Downtown Cairo in A Piece of Europe

埃及女作家拉德娃·阿舒尔的小说《欧洲一隅》以19世纪下半叶伊斯梅尔赫迪夫城市现代化工程的标志区域开罗市中心为叙事框架,从空间之维营造主人公“凝视者”与开罗市中心之间的多重凝视机制,并借“欧洲一隅”之名指涉其对西方现代性的拟仿。本文结合社会历史背景,聚焦“凝视者”的象征性主体实践活动,揭橥视觉聚焦开罗市中心的多维表征意义。阿舒尔以敏锐的历史意识,塑造了一个第三世界“凝视者”形象,对西方在权力场中的主体地位予以解构,开拓了埃及后殖民文学创作的新思路。

A Piece of Europe,by Egyptian woman writer Radwa Ashour,takes downtown Cairo,a landmark area of Khedive Ismail's urban modernization project in the second half of the nineteenth century,as the narrative frame to create a multiple gazing mechanism between the protagonist"gazer"and downtown Cairo from a spatial dimension.It also uses the term"a piece of Europe"to refer to its imitation of Western modernity.Against the novel's social and historical background,this paper focuses on the symbolic and subjective practice of the"gazer"and reveals the multidimensional representational significance of the visual focus on downtown Cairo.With a keen historical consciousness,Ashour creates the image of a"gazer"in the Third World,deconstructs the dominance of Western powers,and offers new ideas for postcolonial Egyptian literary creation.