抵達日本

本期推薦節選自愛麗絲·門羅（Alice Munro）封筆前的最后一部短篇故事集《Dear Life： Stories》的開篇第一則短篇故事《To Reach Japan》。大家應該聽說過愛麗絲·門羅那如雷貫耳的大名吧？如果沒有，那就真的OUT了！2013年斬獲諾貝爾文學獎的就是這位加拿大女作家，她被譽為“加拿大的契訶夫”。1968年，門羅發表的第一部短篇小說（《快樂影子之舞》）就獲得了加拿大總督文學獎，隨后其發表的所有作品都陸續獲獎，更是被譯為13種文字傳遍全球，受到讀者與媒體的高度評價，門羅因此榮獲“當代短篇小說大師”的稱號。

《To Reach Japan》是二十幾頁的一則短篇小說，講述了母親格里塔帶著女兒凱蒂在去往多倫多的路途中所發生的故事，年輕母親暫時脫離了丈夫彼得的牽制，在火車上邂逅一名對其極為欣賞的男子，在這段艷遇并未有何實質發展之時，女兒凱蒂不見了……這一切到底為何會發生？彼得又為何會令格里塔感覺被牽制？本期黃金書屋選段為大家一一揭曉。

其實在讀完整則短篇之后，小編一直在想門羅為何會選用這個標題，整個故事的情節與日本毫無關聯，從加拿大到日本又遙遠至極，更甚的是幾年前的日本又遭遇了海嘯及核輻射的重創，那是一個災后有待重建的地方。或許，門羅的深意便在于此，只要是還有人類生存的地方，那個地方便會重生，重生希望。

重生希望，不管在何時何地，也不管何人，應該都會吧！格里塔是如此，我們亦如是。

hen they went to see a movie， he never wanted to talk about it aferwards. He would say that it was good， or pretty good， or okay. He didn’t see the point in going further. He watched television， he read a book in somewhat the same way. He had patience with such things. The people who put them together were probably doing the best they could. Greta used to argue， rashly asking whether he would say the same things about a bridge. The people who did it did their best， but their best was not good enough so it fell down.

Instead of arguing， he just laughed. I

t was not the same thing， he said.

No？

No.

Greta should have realized that this attitude—hands off， tolerant—was a blessing for her， because she was a poet， and there were things in her poems that were in no way cheerful or easy to explain.

當他們一起去看電影的時候，結束之后他從來都不想再談論它。