-*-
60
啊，是的，我真是应该抽身而出了。从加利亚尼老师家里出来，我感觉非常苦涩，嘴里也很干。我没有勇气对老师说，她不应该那么对待我：尽管她可能很早就有我写的那本书了，她一定已经看过了，至少大概看过了，她对我写的书只字不提也就算了，她没要我专门给她带去的、上面有题赠的那本。在离开之前，因为懦弱，也因为想要以一种柔和的方式中断这段关系，我还是坚持把那本书留给她了。她没有说接受，也没说不接受，她微笑了一下，继续和莉拉说话。特别是，关于我的文章，她只字未提，她提了一句也只是为了引出对《团结报》的负面评价。她拿出了莉拉写的那几页纸，和莉拉谈了起来，就好像关于那个话题，我的观点一文不值，就好像我已经不在房间里了。我本想对着她喊：“是的，莉拉非常聪明，这是真的，我一直都知道她很聪明，我爱她的聪明，她影响了我做的所有事情，但我是通过自己的努力，才取得现在的成就，所有人都很欣赏我，我不像你女儿那样，一点儿用处也没有。”但我一直沉默不语，我在那里，听她们讨论工厂里的工作，还有工人的诉求。一直走到楼梯间时，她们还在那里交谈，到最后，加利亚尼老师漫不经心地跟我打了招呼，但她还在对莉拉说话。她们已经开始用“你”相互称呼了：“你要常和我联系啊！”然后拥抱了她。这让我觉得很屈辱。娜迪雅和帕斯卡莱一直没再出现，我没机会向他们发泄我内心郁积的怒火：帮助一个朋友有错吗，为了帮助她，我不是一样出头露面了吗？他们怎么能那样批评我的所作所为。最后在楼梯上，在门厅那儿，在维托利奥·埃马努埃莱街上的人行道上，只有我和莉拉两个人了。我感觉自己迫不及待地想对着她叫喊：“你真的觉得，我怕你给我丢脸，你脑子到底怎么想的，你为什么要说那两个人是对的，你真的太没有良心了。我想尽一切办法想帮你，想和你在一起，你就是这样对待我的？你的脑子真是有病。”但我们刚一到外面，我开没有开口（假如我说了，事情有什么不一样吗？），她就挽住了我的胳膊，开始捍卫我，说起了加利亚尼的坏话。
Oh yes, it was really time to get out. I
left the Galiani house embittered, my mouth dry, without the courage to say
to the professor that she didn’t have the right to treat me like that. She
hadn’t said anything about my book, although she’d had it for some time and
surely had read it or at least skimmed it. She hadn’t asked for a dedication
in the copy I had brought for that reason and when, before leaving—out of
weakness, out of a need to end that relationship affectionately—I had offered
anyway, she hadn’t answered, she had smiled, and continued to talk to Lila.
Above all, she had said nothing about my articles, rather she had mentioned
them only to include them in her negative opinion of l’Unità, and then pulled
out Lila’s pages and began to talk to her as if my opinion on the subject
didn’t count, as if I were no longer in the room. I would have liked to yell:
Yes, it’s true, Lila has a tremendous intelligence, an intelligence that I’ve
always recognized, that I love, that’s influenced everything I’ve done; but
I’ve worked hard to develop mine and I’ve been successful, I’m valued
everywhere, I’m not a pretentious nobody like your daughter. Instead, I
listened silently while they talked about work and the factory and the
workers demands. They kept talking, even on the landing, until Professor
Galiani absently said goodbye to me, while to Lila she said, now using the
familiar tu, Stay in touch, and embraced her. I felt humiliated. Moreover,
Pasquale and Nadia hadn’t returned, I hadn’t had a chance to refute them and
my anger at them was still raging inside me: why was it wrong to help a
friend, to do it I had taken a risk, how could they dare to criticize what
I’d done. Now, on the stairs, in the lobby, on the sidewalk of Corso Vittorio
Emanuele, it was only Lila and me. I was ready to shout at her: Do you really
think I’m ashamed of you, what were you thinking, why did you say those two
were right, you’re ungrateful, I did all I could to stay close to you, to be
useful to you, and you treat me like that, you really have a sick mind. But
as soon as we were outside, even before I could open my mouth (and on the
other hand what would have changed if I had?), she took me by the arm and
began to defend me against Professor Galiani.
无论是关于她支持帕斯卡莱和娜迪雅，还是说我不让她参加我婚礼的事儿，我根本找不到任何机会指责她。谈到这些事情，她现在表现得像是另一个莉拉，一个根本就不知道刚才是怎么回事儿的莉拉，让她解释也没用。真是一帮烂人——我们一路走到阿梅戴奥广场的地铁站时她都是这么说的——你看看，那老女人是怎么对你的，她想报复。她根本无法容忍你写书、写文章，她无法容忍你嫁得好。尤其让她无法忍受的是：娜迪雅从小受到的教育，就是要成为人上人，娜迪雅本应该成为她的骄傲，但现在却一事无成，不仅如此，她还和一个泥瓦匠搞在一起，在她母亲眼皮底下，做那些伤风败俗的事。是的，加利亚尼根本就无法容忍这一点，你不应该为此感到难受，管她怎么说呢。你不应该把那本书留给她，你不应该问她要不要，你不应该给她写赠言。这些人，应该用脚踹他们的屁股，你最大的缺点，就是你太好心了，人家说什么你都听。那些上过学的人，觉得只有自己有头脑，但事情不是这样的，你要放松，去吧，去结婚，蜜月旅行。你已经照顾我太长时间了。你要赶紧再写一本小说，你知道我期望你活得精彩，做出很棒的事儿，我爱你。
I couldn’t find a single opening in order
to reproach her for aligning herself with Pasquale and Nadia, or for the
senseless accusation that I didn’t want her at my wedding. She behaved as if
it had been another Lila who said those things, a Lila of whom she herself
knew nothing and whom it was pointless to ask for explanations. What terrible
people—she began, and spoke without stopping all the way to the subway at
Piazza Amedeo—did you see how the old woman treated you, she wanted to get
revenge, she can’t bear that you write books and articles, she can’t bear
that you’re about to marry well, she especially can’t bear that Nadia,
brought up precisely to be the best of all, Nadia who was to give her so much
satisfaction, isn’t up to anything good, is sleeping with a construction
worker and acting like a whore right in front of her: no, she can’t bear it,
but you’re wrong to be upset, forget about it, you shouldn’t have left her
your book, you shouldn’t have asked if she wanted it inscribed, you especially
shouldn’t have done that, those are people who should be treated with a kick
in the ass, your weakness is that you’re too good, you swallow everything
that educated people say as if they’re the only ones who had a mind, but it’s
not true, relax, go, get married, have a honeymoon, you were too worried
about me, write another novel, you know that I expect great things from you,
I love you.
我非常震惊，一直在听她说话，跟她在一起，根本没办法平静。我们之间的关系每次停顿，迟早都会出现一些意外的情况，她脑子里会蹦出来一个什么东西，让她失衡，也会让我失衡。我不明白，这番话是不是为了向我道歉，还是她故意这么说的，来掩饰自己，不想向我坦白她的真实感受，还是要和我彻底告别。当然，她很虚伪，也没什么良心。我呢，尽管我的处境发生了变化，我还是依附于她。我觉得，对于她的这种依附，可能我一辈子都摆脱不了了，这让我觉得难以忍受。我希望——我没办法抑制自己的冲动——那个心脏病医生的诊断是错的，阿尔曼多是对的，我希望她真的病得要死了。
I simply listened, overwhelmed. With her,
there was no way to feel that things were settled; every fixed point of our
relationship sooner or later turned out to be provisional; something shifted
in her head that unbalanced her and unbalanced me. I couldn’t understand if
those words were in fact intended to apologize to me, or if she was lying,
concealing feelings that she had no intention of confiding to me, or if she
was aiming at a final farewell. Certainly she was false, and she was
ungrateful, and I, in spite of all that had changed for me, continued to feel
inferior. I felt that I would never free myself from that inferiority, and
that seemed to me intolerable. I wished—and I couldn’t keep the wish at
bay—that the cardiologist had been wrong, that Armando had been right, that
she really was ill and would die.
从那时候起，有很多年，我们都没见面，我们只通电话。对彼此而言，我们都成了断断续续的声音，没有任何目光的交流。但渴望她死去的那种念头，留在了我脑子的某个角落里，一直驱之不散。
For years after that, we didn’t see each
other, we only talked on the phone. We became for each other fragments of a
voice, without any visual corroboration. But the wish that she would die
remained in a far corner, I tried to get rid of it but it wouldn’t go away.
-*-
61
出发去佛罗伦萨的前夜，我没法入睡，心里有很多让我痛苦的事情，最难让我消化的是帕斯卡莱对我的批评，他的话一句句刺痛着我的神经。刚开始，我尽量不去想这些，但现在我不确信我做得对不对。我想到，莉拉说他们说得有道理，也许我真的错了。最后，我做了一件我从来没有做过的事情：凌晨四点，我从床上起来，在太阳升起之前一个人从家里出去。我感到非常不幸福，希望会发生一些意外，一些非常糟糕的事情，来惩罚我的这些错误举动和我糟糕的想法，从而也惩罚到她。但什么事儿也没发生，我一个人走在空荡荡的街道上，外面比白天拥挤时还安全。我来到了海边，天空开始发紫，在黯淡的天色下，大海像一张发灰的纸，天空上没几朵云彩，天边是粉色的。天光把奥沃城堡切成了两段，靠维苏威火山那边，是一片辉煌的赭红色，靠火车站和波西利波那边，是一道长长的褐色，沿着礁石的那条路空荡荡。大海悄无声息，散发出一股强烈的气息。假如每天早上，我不是在老城区醒来，而是在靠海的那些房子里醒来，不知道我会对那不勒斯、对我自己会有什么样的看法。我在追求什么？我要改变自己的出身吗？改变我自己，还有别人？我要让眼前这个空荡荡的城市住满新居民？他们不为贫穷或贪婪所折磨，他们没有愤恨，也没有怒火，他们就像以前居住在这里的神灵一样，能欣赏到这辉煌的景色。我还是要顺从我内心的恶魔，自己过上好生活，自己幸福？我利用艾罗塔一家的权力，来帮助莉拉，艾罗塔几代人都为社会主义做斗争，他们站在帕斯卡莱或者莉拉这类人一边，但我那么做，并没有想着要改变全世界的不公正，而是要帮助一个我爱的人。假如我不那么做的话，我会觉得愧疚。我做错了吗？我应该任由莉拉陷入麻烦之中吗？我再也不做这种事儿了，我再也不会为任何人动一根手指了。我要离开了，我要去结婚。
The night before I left for Florence I
couldn’t sleep. Of all the painful thoughts the most persistent had to do
with Pasquale. His criticisms burned me. At first I had rejected them
altogether, now I was wavering between the conviction that they were undeserved
and the idea that if Lila said he was right maybe I really had been mistaken.
Finally I did something I had never done: I got out of bed at four in the
morning and left the house by myself, before dawn. I felt very unhappy; I
wished something terrible would happen to me, an event that, punishing me for
my mistaken actions and my wicked thoughts, would as a result punish Lila,
too. But nothing happened. I walked for a long time on the deserted streets,
which were much safer than when they were crowded. The sky turned violet. I
reached the sea, a gray sheet under a pale sky with scattered pink-edged
clouds. The mass of Castel dell’Ovo was cut sharply in two by the light, a
shining ochre shape on the Vesuvius side, a brown stain on the Mergellina and
Posillipo side. The road along the cliff was empty, the sea made no sound but
gave off an intense odor. Who knows what feeling I would have had about
Naples, about myself, if I had waked every morning not in my neighborhood but
in one of those buildings along the shore. What am I seeking? To change my
origins? To change, along with myself, others, too? Repopulate this now
deserted city with citizens not assailed by poverty or greed, not bitter or
angry, who could delight in the splendor of the landscape like the divinities
who once inhabited it? Indulge my demon, give him a good life and feel happy?
I had used the power of the Airotas, people who for generations had been
fighting for socialism, people who were on the side of men and women like Pasquale
and Lila, not because I thought I would be fixing all the broken things of
the world but because I was in a position to help a person I loved, and it
seemed wrong not to do so. Had I acted badly? Should I have left Lila in
trouble? Never again, never again would I lift a finger for anyone. I
departed, I went to get married.
-*-
62
现在，我一点儿都想不起来我结婚的情景。当时留下来的几张照片，并没有激起我的回忆，反倒把我的婚礼冻结在几张图像上：彼得罗一副漫不经心的样子，我看起来有些气愤，我母亲被拍得有些模糊，但永远带着她那副不悦的表情。关于这个仪式本身，我一点儿也想不起来了，但我清楚记得在结婚之前我和彼得罗长时间的讨论。我对他说，我不想马上要孩子，我要吃避孕药，因为当务之急是要写一本新书。我很确信他一定会答应我，但让我惊异的是，他提出了反对。他先提出了合法不合法的问题，他说，那些药片还没正式销售。然后又说，他听说这些药对人身体有害，他关于性、爱和繁衍说了一大通非常复杂的话。最后他嘟囔着说，假如你真有东西要写，怀孕了也可以写。我很难受，也很气愤，我觉得他的反应，不是一个要在民政局结婚的年轻学者该有的反应。我跟他说了我的想法，我们吵架了。最后到了结婚那天，我们还没有和好，他一声不吭，我冷冰冰的。
I don’t remember anything about my
wedding. A few photographs, acting as props, rather than inspiring memory,
have frozen it around a few images: Pietro with an absent-minded expression,
me looking angry, my mother, who is out of focus but manages nevertheless to
appear unhappy. Or not. It’s the ceremony itself that I can’t remember, but I
have in mind the long discussion I had with Pietro a few days before we got
married. I told him that I intended to take the Pill in order not to have
children, that it seemed to me urgent to try first of all to write another
book. I was sure that he would immediately agree. Instead, surprisingly, he
was opposed. First he made it a problem of legality, the Pill was not yet
officially for sale; then he said there were rumors that it ruined one’s
health; then he made a complicated speech about sex, love, and reproduction;
finally he stammered that someone who really has to write will write anyway,
even if she is expecting a baby. I was unhappy, I was angry, that reaction
seemed to me not consistent with the educated youth who wanted only a civil
marriage, and I told him so. We quarreled. Our wedding day arrived and we
were not reconciled: he was mute, I cold.
还有另一件让人吃惊的事情，那场宴席让我还有些记忆。我们已经决定，登记完结婚，我们和亲戚们打个招呼，然后就回家，不举办任何类型的婚宴。这个选择，是出于彼得罗的苦修主义倾向，我也想表示出，我已经彻底不属于我母亲的世界了，这是我和彼得罗一起决定的。但我们的准则被阿黛尔秘密的策划搅乱了。她把我们拉到了她的一个女性朋友家里，说是要喝一杯，庆祝一下。但到了那儿，我和彼得罗发现，自己变成了一场盛宴的中心，那是佛罗伦萨一间非常奢华的居所，来宾中有艾罗塔家的很多亲戚、他们认识的很多名人，以及身份非常显赫的人，他们一直待到晚上。我丈夫脸色阴沉下来了，我很迷惘地问，这是为什么？这是一场庆祝我的婚礼的宴席，我只邀请了我父母和弟弟妹妹。我对彼得罗说：
There was another surprise, too, that
hasn’t faded: the reception. We had decided to get married, greet our
relatives, and go home without any sort of celebration. That decision had
developed through the combination of Pietro’s ascetic tendency and my intention
to demonstrate that I no longer belonged to the world of my mother. But our
line of conduct was secretly undone by Adele. She dragged us to the house of
a friend of hers, for a toast, she said; and there, instead, Pietro and I
found ourselves at the center of a big reception, in a very aristocratic
Florentine dwelling, among a large number of relatives of the Airotas and
famous and very famous people who lingered until evening. My husband became
taciturn, I wondered, bewildered, why, since in fact it was a celebration for
my wedding, I had had to be limited to inviting only my immediate family. I
said to Pietro:
“你知道这是怎么回事儿吗？”
“Did you know this was happening?”
“不知道。”
“No.”
刚开始，我们一起面对这个局面。但很快，他就摆脱了他母亲和姐姐，因为她们想要把他介绍给这个介绍给那个，他躲在一个角落里，和我的父母待在一起，一直在和他们聊天。刚开始我有些不自在，但只能顺水推舟，慢慢地习惯了我们落入的陷阱，但后来我渐渐觉得很兴奋，因为我面对的那些人是有名的政治家、高级知识分子、年轻的革命者，甚至有一位非常有名的诗人和一位小说家，他们都对我和我的小说表示出极大的兴趣，他们赞扬了我在《团结报》上发表的文章。时间飞快地过去了，我感觉自己完全融入了艾罗塔的世界。我公公甚至把我拉到他身边，很客气地问了我关于工厂工作的问题。很快，有很多人聚集在一起，都是致力于在报纸和杂志上讨论劳工问题的那些人，我们讨论了在整个国家掀起的各种劳动者请愿的浪潮。我就在那儿和他们在一起讨论，那天晚上是我的节日，我是整个谈话的中心。
For a while we confronted the situation
together. But soon he evaded the attempts of his mother and sister to
introduce him to this man, to that woman; he entrenched himself in a corner
with my relatives and talked to them the whole time. At first I resigned
myself, somewhat uneasily, to inhabiting the trap we had fallen into, then I
began to find it exciting that well-*-known poet and a famous novelist showed
interest in me, in my book, and spoke admiringly of my articles in l’Unità.
The time flew by, I felt more and more accepted in the world of the Airotas.
Even my father-*-law wanted to detain me, questioning me kindly on my
knowledge of labor matters. A small group formed, of people engaged in the
debate, in newspapers and journals, over the tide of demands that was rising
in Italy. And me, here I was, with them, and it was my celebration, and I was
at the center of the conversation.
我公公后来提到了一篇发表在《工人世界》上的文章，他说那篇文章写得很好，一针见血地指出了意大利的民主问题。文章里列举了一系列数据，揭示出电视、大报纸、学校、大学还有法律机构，整天为一种已经确立的意识形态服务，所以选举也有很多弄虚作假的成分，工人阶级的党派永远不会有足够的选票来统治这个国家。这篇文章有理有据，引用了很多别的文章。最后艾罗塔教授用他充满权威的语气，提到了那篇文章的作者——乔瓦尼·萨拉托雷，也就是说尼诺——在他说出这个名字之前，我已经知道是他了。我当时非常高兴，情不自已地说，我认识他。因为阿黛尔也认识尼诺，我让阿黛尔对她丈夫，还有在场的人说，我的这个那不勒斯的朋友是多么才华横溢。
At some point, my father-*-law warmly
praised an essay, published in Mondo Operaio, that in his view laid out the
problem of democracy in Italy with crystalline intelligence. Drawing on a
large number of facts, the piece demonstrated that, as long as the state
television, the big papers, the schools, the universities, the judiciary
worked day after day to solidify the dominant ideology, the electoral system
would in fact be rigged, and the workers’ parties would never have enough
votes to govern. Nods of assent, supporting citations, references to this
article and that one. Finally, Professor Airota, with all his authority,
mentioned the name of the author of the article, and I knew even before he
uttered it—Giovanni Sarratore—that it was Nino. I was so happy that I
couldn’t contain myself, I said I knew him, I called Adele over to confirm to
her husband and the others how brilliant my Neapolitan friend was.
尼诺虽然没有出现，但他也参与了我的婚礼，提到他的时候，我感觉有必要说一下我自己，我开始参与工人斗争的原因。我说，需要给他们提供帮助，使左派政党和议会代表能尽快赶上来，要让他们了解到现在的政治和经济局势，以及其他我刚刚学会，但已经能自如运用的东西。我感觉自己很棒，我的心情越来越好。我喜欢站在我公公婆婆的身边，感到自己被他们的朋友们所欣赏。最后，我家人很羞怯地向我告别，他们要离开，不知道要在哪里待着，等第一辆开往那不勒斯的火车。我一点也不想忍受彼得罗的怨气，他也应该感受到了这一点，因为他先软了下来，我们之间的关系缓和了。
Nino was present at my wedding even if he
wasn’t present, and speaking of him I felt authorized to talk also about
myself, about the reasons I had become involved in the workers’ struggle,
about the need to provide the parties and parliamentary representatives on
the left with hard data so that they could address the delays in their
understanding of the current political and economic period, and so on with
other stock phrases I had learned only recently but used with assurance. I
felt clever. My mood brightened; I enjoyed being with my in-laws and feeling
admired by their friends. At the end, when my relatives timidly said goodbye
and hurried off somewhere to wait for the first train to take them back to
Naples, I no longer felt irritated with Pietro. He must have realized it,
because he, in turn, softened, and the tension vanished.
我们一到住的地方，门在身后关上，我们就开始做爱。刚开始的时候，我觉得很喜欢，但这一天还发生了另一件让我惊讶的事情。安东尼奥，我的第一个男朋友，当他在我身上磨蹭的时候，他的高潮很快就会来，也很强烈；弗朗科在做的时候，会一直强忍着，后来会喘着气，抽身而出，或者他戴着避孕套时，他会忽然停下来，会在我耳边笑，他整个人压下来，好像整个人变得很沉重。我觉得，彼得罗的时间长到无边无尽。他深思熟虑，非常有力地冲击着我，刚开始的快感慢慢减弱了，他的节奏很单调，而且时间很长，让我的肚子疼。因为长时间的辛苦，让他出了一身汗，看到他脸上和脖子上的全是汗，摸着他满是汗的背，再加上疼痛，我的欲望全部消失了。但他没有察觉到这一点，他一直在用力、有节奏地进入我的身体，一直都没停下来。我不知道该怎么办，我抚摸着他，我对他说了很多甜言蜜语，我希望他能停下来。当他最后大声呻吟着停下来时，我觉得他很感性，尽管我感到又疼又不满足。
As soon as we got to our apartment and
closed the door we began to make love. At first it was very pleasurable, but
the day reserved for me yet another surprising fact. Antonio, my first
boyfriend, when he rubbed against me was quick and intense; Franco made great
efforts to contain himself but at a certain point he pulled away with a gasp,
or when he had a condom stopped suddenly and seemed to become heavier,
crushing me under his weight and laughing in my ear. Pietro, on the other
hand, strained for a time that seemed endless. His thrusting was deliberate,
violent, so that the initial pleasure slowly diminished, overwhelmed by the
monotonous insistence and the hurt I felt in my stomach. He was covered with
sweat from his long exertions, maybe from suffering, and when I saw his damp
face and neck, touched his wet back, desire disappeared completely. But he
didn’t realize it, he continued to withdraw and then sink into me forcefully,
rhythmically, without stopping. I didn’t know what to do. I caressed him, I
whispered words of love, and yet I hoped that he would stop. When he exploded
with a roar and collapsed, finally exhausted, I was content, even though I
was hurting and unsatisfied.
他在床上没待多久就起床了，他去了洗手间。我等了他几分钟，但我太累了，就睡了过去，我后来忽然惊醒，发现他并没有回到床上。我看他在书房，坐在书桌前。
He didn’t stay in bed long; he got up and
went to the bathroom. I waited for him for a few minutes, but I was tired, I
fell asleep. I woke with a start after an hour and realized that he hadn’t
come back to bed. I found him in his study, at the desk.
“你在做什么？”
“What are you doing?”
他对我微笑了一下，说：
He smiled at me.
“工作。”
“I’m working.”
“你来睡觉吧。”
“Come to bed.”
“你先去睡，我马上来。”
“You go, I’ll join you later.”
我确信，我就是在那天晚上怀孕的。
I’m sure that I became pregnant that
night.
-*-
63
我发现自己怀孕了，马上变得非常不安，我给我母亲打电话。尽管我们之间一直都充满矛盾，但在当时的情况下，我非常需要她。那是一个错误，她马上变得让人讨厌。她想马上出发，来我这里帮助我，引导我，她还想把我带回城区，让我生活在她家里，把我交到一个老接生婆，就是给她所有孩子接生的那个女人的手里。我很难听进去她的话，我跟她说，我婆婆有个朋友，是个妇科医生、大教授，他在给我做检查，我会在他的诊所里生孩子。她生气了，她一字一句地对我说：“你更爱你婆婆，不喜欢我，那你就不要给我打电话了。”
As soon as I discovered that I was
expecting a child I was overwhelmed by anxiety and I called my mother.
Although our relationship had always been contentious, in that situation the
need to talk to her prevailed. It was a mistake: she immediately started
nagging. She wanted to leave Naples, settle in with me, help me, guide me,
or, vice versa, bring me to the neighborhood, have me back in her house,
entrust me to the old midwife who had delivered all her children. I had a
hard time putting her off, I said that a gynecologist friend of my
mother-*-law was looking after me, a great professor, and I would give birth
in his clinic. She was offended. She hissed: you prefer your mother-*-law to
me. She didn’t call again.
几天之后，莉拉给我打了电话。我离开那不勒斯之后，我们通过几次电话，但通话时间都很短暂，我们不想花太多电话费。那次她很愉快，但我很冷淡，她用开玩笑的语气，问我新婚生活怎么样，我很严肃地询问了她的健康状况。她发现有些东西不对劲儿。
After a few days, on the other hand, I
heard from Lila. We had had some telephone conversations after I left, but
brief, a few minutes, we didn’t want to spend too much, she cheerful, I
aloof, she asking ironically about my life as a newlywed, I inquiring
seriously about her health. This time I realized that something wasn’t right.
“你生我的气啦？”她问我。
“Are you angry with me?” she asked.
“没有，为什么我要生你的气？”
“No, why should I be?”
“你什么都没跟我说。我听到这个消息，是因为你母亲向所有人炫耀，说你怀孕了。”
“You don’t tell me anything. I got the
news only because your mother is bragging to everyone that you’re pregnant.”
“我也是才知道的。”
“I just got the confirmation.”
“我还以为你会吃药呢。”
“I thought you were taking the Pill.”
我觉得很尴尬。
I was embarrassed.
“后来我决定不吃。”
“Yes, but then I decided not to.”
“为什么呢？”
“Why?”
“因为时间不等人。”
“The years are passing.”
“你要写的书呢？”
“And the book you’re supposed to write?”
“你会看到的。”
“I’ll see later.”
“记住你说的。”
“You’d better.”
“我会尽力的。”
“I’ll do what I can.”
“你应该尽全力。”
“You have to do the maximum.”
“我会尝试的。”
“I’ll try.”
“我在吃药呢。”
“I’m taking the Pill.”
“所以，你和恩佐还好？”
“So with Enzo it’s going well?”
“相当好，但我再也不想怀孕了。”
“Pretty well, but I don’t ever want to be
pregnant again.”
她不说话了，我也什么都没说。当她再次开口时，她不但跟我讲了她第一次怀孕的感觉，也讲了第二次怀孕的感受，她说两次都非常糟糕的体验。她说：“第二次，我很确信那个孩子是尼诺的，尽管我很不舒服，但我心里很高兴，但无论你高不高兴，你看，你的身体在遭罪，在变形，太痛苦了。”从那刻之后，她的语气越来越阴沉了，那都是她曾经告诉过我的事情，但她从来都没像现在这样，要把我拉入她的痛苦，要让我也感受到她的痛苦。就好像她要我做好准备，她对我，还有我的未来感到担心。她说，另一个人的生命，先是寄居在你肚子里，当他彻底出来时，就会囚禁你，会拴住你，你再也不属于自己。她把她怀孕的每个阶段和我的进行比较，还是像之前一样绘声绘色、入木三分。她感叹说，那就像你在给自己制造了麻烦。她觉得，我的感觉应该和她一样，她没法想到她是她，我是我。她也无法理解我的妊娠体验会和她完全不一样，对孩子的感觉也完全不一样。她想当然地认为，我也会遇到同样的困难。假如我在孕期感到快乐和幸福，她一定会觉得这是一种背叛。
She was silent, and I didn’t say
anything, either. When she began talking once more, she told me about the
first time she had realized she was expecting a baby, and the second. She
described both as terrible experiences: the second time, she said, I was sure
the baby was Nino’s and even though I felt sick I was happy. But, happy or
not, you’ll see, the body suffers, it doesn’t like losing its shape, there’s
too much pain. From there she went on in a crescendo that got darker and
darker, telling me things she had told me before but never with the same
desire to pull me into her suffering, so that I, too, would feel it. She
seemed to want to prepare me for what awaited me, she was very worried about
me and my future. This life of another, she said, clings to you in the womb
first and then, when it finally comes out, it takes you prisoner, keeps you
on a leash, you’re no longer your own master. With great animation she
sketched every phase of my maternity, tracing it over hers, expressing
herself with her habitual effectiveness. It’s as if you fabricated your very
own torture, she exclaimed, and I realized then that she wasn’t capable of
thinking that she was her self and I was my self; it seemed to her
inconceivable that I could have a pregnancy different from hers, and a
different feeling about children. She so took it for granted that I would
have the same troubles that she seemed ready to consider any possible joy I
found in motherhood a betrayal.
我不想再和她说这些，我把听筒从耳边拿开了一点，她让我觉得害怕。我们毫无热情地说了再见。
I didn’t want to listen to her anymore, I
held the receiver away from my ear, she was scaring me. We said goodbye
coolly.
“假如你需要我，”她说，“那你就打声招呼。”
“If you need me,” she said, “let me
know.”
“好。”
“All right.”
“你帮助过我，现在我想帮你。”
“You helped me, now I want to help you.”
“好。”
“All right.”
和她通话对我一点儿帮助也没有，相反，她让我觉得更加不安。我生活在一个陌生的城市，虽然在我丈夫的带领下，我已经熟悉它的角角落落，对于那不勒斯，我都不能说有那么了解。我很喜欢阿诺河，我经常在河岸上散步，但我不喜欢那些房子的颜色，那些房子会让我心情很坏。还有这个城市居民那种讨厌的语气，我住的那栋房子的门房、卖肉的、卖面包的，还有邮递员都让我觉得讨厌，我对这个城市无缘无故就产生了抵触。还有，我公公婆婆的那些朋友，他们在结婚那天显得那么热情，但之后就再也没出现过，彼得罗也没有和他们再见面的意思。我感到又孤单又脆弱。我买了一些书，说的是如何成为完美的母亲，我像往常一样刻苦读了起来。
That phone call didn’t help me at all;
rather, it left me unsettled. I lived in a city I knew nothing about, even if
thanks to Pietro I now was acquainted with every corner of it, which I could
not say of Naples. I loved the path along the river, I took beautiful walks,
but I didn’t like the color of the houses, it put me in a bad mood. The
teasing tone of the inhabitants—the porter in our building, the butcher, the
baker, the mailman—incited me to become teasing, too, and a hostility with no
motivation emerged from it. And then the many friends of my in-laws, so
available on the day of the wedding, had never showed up again, nor did
Pietro have any intention of seeing them. I felt alone and fragile. I bought
some books on how to become a perfect mother and prepared with my usual
diligence.
日子一天天过去，一周一周过去，让我惊异的是，怀孕这件事情并不是一种负担，反倒让我很轻盈。那种恶心的感觉很轻微，我的身体没变得虚弱，我的心情也没有受到影响，我还是像之前那样，想做什么做什么。在我怀孕三个月时，我的书获得了一项比较重要的奖项，这给我带来了更多声誉，还有一些钱。尽管当时的政治气氛很排斥那个奖项，但我还是去领奖了，我为自己感到骄傲，身体和精神上的实现，让我忘记了羞怯，我变得很开朗。在致谢的发言中，我讲得太多，我说我感觉很幸福，就像宇航员走在白色的月球上。几天之后，我感觉自己很强大，就给莉拉打了电话，跟她讲了那个奖项的事情。我想告诉她，事情并不像她预测的那样糟糕，我现在一切顺利，我很满意。我感觉自己那么得意，我想超越她带给我的不安。莉拉在《晨报》上看到了那则消息，还有我说的关于宇航员的话——那不勒斯的报纸用几行文字谈到这了个奖。还没等我告诉她这个奖项的事，她就很辛辣地批评我了。她讽刺说，白色的月球上？有时候最好闭嘴，也不要说这些废话。然后她补充说，月亮是一块大石头，是几十亿石头中的一块，石头就是石头，你最好脚踏实地，面对地球上的这些麻烦。
Days passed, weeks, but, surprisingly,
the pregnancy didn’t weigh on me at all; in fact it made me feel light. The
nausea was negligible, I felt no breakdown in my body, in my mood, in the
wish to be active. I was in the fourth month when my book received an
important prize that brought me greater fame and a little more money. I went
to the prize ceremony in spite of the political climate, which was hostile to
that type of recognition, feeling that I was in a state of grace; I was proud
of myself, with a sense of physical and intellectual fullness that made me
bold, expansive. In the thank-you speech I went overboard, I said I felt as
happy as the astronauts on the white expanse of the moon. A couple of days
later, since I felt strong, I telephoned Lila to tell her about the prize. I
wanted to let her know that things were not going as she had predicted, that
in fact they were going smoothly, that I was satisfied. I felt so pleased
with myself that I wanted to skip over the unhappiness she had caused me. But
Lila had read in Il Mattino—only the Naples papers had devoted a few lines to
the prize—that phrase of mine about the astronauts, and, without giving me
time to speak, she criticized me harshly. The white expanse of the moon, she
said ironically, sometimes it’s better to say nothing than to talk nonsense.
And she added that the moon was a rock among billions of other rocks, and
that, as far as rocks go, the best thing was to stand with your feet planted
firmly in the troubles of the earth.
我感觉胃里一阵绞痛。她为什么要这样伤害我？她不希望我幸福吗？或者她一直都没有好起来，是她的心脏病一直在增强她邪恶的一面？我想说一些难听话，但我没法说出口。而她就好像根本没有意识到她已经伤害到我了，就好像她觉得自己有权利伤害我。接着她用一种友好的语气，跟我讲她的事情，她已经和她哥哥、母亲甚至是父亲和好了。她和米凯莱·索拉拉因为鞋子的牌子，还有他应付给里诺的钱的问题发生了争执。她还和斯特凡诺进行交涉，希望从经济角度，他能做詹纳罗的父亲，而不只是给玛丽亚当父亲。无论是针对她哥哥里诺，还是针对索拉拉兄弟和斯特凡诺，她都说了一些非常恼怒的话，有时候很粗俗。最后她问我，就好像真的迫切需要我的看法：“我做得对吗？”我没回答她。我得了一个奖，她只记得我说的关于宇航员的话。也许是为了刺激她，我问，她还有没有那种脑子连不上线的感觉。她说没有，她重复了好几次，说自己很好，只是有时候，我用眼睛余光看到，有人从家具里出来。她说这些话时，还带着一种自嘲的笑。后来她问我，怀孕怎么样了？很好，非常好，我说，我从来都没这么好过。
I felt a viselike grip in my stomach. Why
did she continue to wound me? Didn’t she want me to be happy? Or maybe she
hadn’t recovered and her illness had heightened her mean side? Bitter words
came to me, but I couldn’t utter them. As if she didn’t even realize she had
hurt me, or as if she felt she had the right, she went on to tell me what was
happening to her, in a very friendly tone. She had made peace with her
brother, with her mother, even with her father; she had quarreled with
Michele Solara on the old matter of the label on the shoes and the money he
owed Rino; she had been in touch with Stefano to claim that, at least from
the economic point of view, he should act as Gennaro’s father, too, and not
just Maria’s. Her remarks were irascible, sometimes vulgar: against Rino, the
Solaras, Stefano. And at the end she asked, as if she had an urgent need for
my opinion: Did I do the right thing? I didn’t answer. I had won an important
prize and she had mentioned only that phrase about the astronauts. I asked
her, maybe to offend her, if she still had those symptoms that unglued her
head from her body. She said no, she repeated a couple of times that she was
very well, she said with a mocking laugh: Only, sometimes out of the corner
of my eye I see people coming out of the furniture. Then she asked me: Is
everything all right with the pregnancy? Good, very good, I said, never felt
better.
那几个月，我经常出行，我经常受到邀请，不仅仅是因为那本书，也因为我写的一些文章。为了写这些文章，有时候我不得不出去，近距离接触罢工的新形式，还有老板们的反应。我从来都没想过自己会成为一个公共知识分子。我做这些事让我很高兴，我感觉自己在桀骜不驯、充满力量地进行反抗，我柔顺的外表是一种乔装。实际上，因为这个缘故，我混迹在工厂门口的人群里，我和男女工人，还有工会的人谈话，我在警察中间游走，我一点儿也不害怕。农业银行被炸时，我当时在米兰的出版社里，但我一点儿也不担心，我没有不祥的预兆。我觉得，我是那种无法抵挡的力量中的一股，我感觉自己坚不可摧，没人能伤害到我，还有我肚子里的孩子。我们俩是一体的，是一种持久的存在，我是抛头露面的，他（或者她——彼得罗希望那是一个男孩）到现在还看不到。剩下的就是一溜风、一阵阵声音和影像，无论是好是坏，都构成了我工作的材料，这些东西要么随风而逝，要么就成为我写作的材料，通过神奇的语言，变成一个故事、一篇文章或者一段公众演讲，我根本就不在乎我说的、我写的符不符合社会规范，或者说艾罗塔一家、出版社、尼诺喜不喜欢这些，尼诺一定在某个地方看着我写的这些东西，帕斯卡莱、娜迪雅和莉拉也一定会看到，为什么不呢？他们一定会想着：看吧，我们曾经对莱农不公正，她一直站在我们这边，你看看她写得这些东西。
I traveled a lot in those months. I was
invited here and there not only because of my book but also because of the
articles I was writing, which in turn forced me to travel to see close up the
new kinds of strike, the reactions of the owners. I never thought of trying
to become a freelance journalist. I did it because doing it I was happy. I
felt disobedient, in revolt and inflated with such power that my meekness
seemed a disguise. In fact it enabled me to join the pickets in front of the
factories, to talk to workers, both men and women, and to union officials, to
slip out among the policemen. Nothing frightened me. When the Banca di
Agricoltura in Milan was bombed I was in the city, at the publisher’s, but I
wasn’t alarmed, I didn’t have dark presentiments. I thought of myself as part
of an unstoppable force, I thought I was invulnerable. No one could hurt me
and my child. We two were the only enduring reality, I visible and he (or
she: but Pietro wanted a boy) for now invisible. The rest was a flow of air,
an immaterial wave of images and sounds that, whether disastrous or
beneficial, constituted material for my work. It passed by or it loomed so
that I could put it into magic words in a story, an article, a speech, taking
care that nothing ended up outside the frame, and that every concept pleased
the Airotas, the publishing house, Nino, who surely somewhere was reading me,
even Pasquale, why not, and Nadia, and Lila, all of whom would finally have
to think: Look, we were wrong about Lena, she’s on our side, see what she’s
writing.
我怀孕的那个阶段是一个非常活跃的时期。让我惊异的是，怀孕之后，我更渴望做爱了。是我在激发彼得罗的兴致，我拥抱他，吻他，尽管他对于接吻没什么兴趣，想马上进入主题，用他那种长时间的、疼痛的方式折磨我，然后他会起身，一直工作到很晚。我睡一两个小时之后会醒来，我在床上找不见他，就会打开灯读书，一直到疲倦为止。这时候，我会去他的房间，让他来上床睡觉，他会听我的话，但一大早就会起来，就好像他很畏惧睡眠，而我却睡到中午。
It was a particularly intense time, that
period of the pregnancy. It surprised me that being pregnant made me more
eager to make love. It was I who initiated it, embraced Pietro, kissing him,
even though he had no interest in kissing and began almost immediately to
make love in that prolonged, painful way of his. Afterward he got up and
worked until late. I slept for an hour or two, then I woke up, found him
gone, turned on the light, and read until I was tired. Then I went to his
room, insisted that he come to bed. He obeyed, but he got up early: sleep
seemed to frighten him. Whereas I slept until midday.
只有一件事情让我很不安。那时候，我已经怀孕到了第七个月了，我的肚子很大、很沉重。我在新比隆的栅栏门那儿，当时发生了冲突，我赶紧逃走了。也许是因为我做了一个不该做的动作，不知道为什么，我忽然感觉右边的臀部一阵剧痛，一直延续到整条腿，就好像一根热的铁棍。我一瘸一拐回到家里，躺到了床上，慢慢等着剧痛过去了。但那种疼痛时不时会再出现，就是大腿和腹沟那里疼。我慢慢习惯了这种疼痛，尝试变换不同的姿势待着来缓解那种疼痛，但当我察觉到，我走路一瘸一拐的，我感到很害怕。我去了那个给我定期检查的大夫那里。他让我放心，他说一切都正常，我肚子里的孩子越来越重，这引起了我的坐骨神经痛。为什么您要那么担心呢？他很温和地问，您一直都是一个开朗的人。我说，我不知道我为什么那么担忧。我说谎了，实际上我心里很清楚，我很担心我母亲的脚步在我的身上得到印证，我会像她那样一瘸一拐的。
There was only one event that distressed
me. I was in my seventh month and my belly was heavy. I was outside the Nuovo
Pignone factory when scuffles broke out, and I hurried away. Maybe I made a
wrong movement, I don’t know, I felt a painful spasm in the center of my
right buttock that extended along my leg like a hot wire. I limped home, went
to bed, and it passed. But every so often the pain reappeared, radiating
through my thigh toward my groin. I learned to respond by finding positions
that alleviated it, but when I realized that I was starting to limp all the
time I was terrified, and I went to the gynecologist. He reassured me, saying
that everything was in order, the weight I was carrying in my womb tired me
out, causing this slight sciatica. Why are you so worried, he asked in an
affectionate tone, you’re such a serene person. I lied, I said I didn’t know.
In reality I knew perfectly well: I was afraid that my mother’s gait had
caught up with me, that she had settled in my body, that I would limp
forever, like her.
妇科医生对我说了一番安慰的话，我平静下来了，我的疼痛又持续了一阵子，最后消失了。彼得罗禁止我做其他疯狂的事情，他不让我跑来跑去的。我听他的，在怀孕的最后阶段，我一直在家里看书，几乎什么都没写。
I was soothed by the reassurances of the
gynecologist; the pain lasted for a while longer, then disappeared. Pietro
forbade me to do other foolish things, no more running around. I admitted
that he was right, and spent the last weeks of my pregnancy reading; I wrote
almost nothing. Our daughter was born on February 12, 1970, at
five-*-in-*-haired, a violet organism that, full of energy, writhed and
wailed, I felt a physical pleasure so piercing that I still know no other
pleasure that compares to it. We didn’t baptize her; my mother screamed
terrible things on the telephone, she swore she would never come to see her.
She’ll calm down, I thought, sadly, and anyway if she doesn’t it’s her loss.
我们的女儿是一九七〇年二月十二日早上五点半出生的。我们叫她阿黛尔，尽管我婆婆一直在说：“可怜的孩子，阿黛尔是一个很糟糕的名字，你们还是给她另取个名字吧，什么名字都比这个好。”在经历了剧烈的阵痛之后，我生下了这个孩子，但疼痛时间不是很长。当孩子生出来之后，我看着她漆黑的头发，发紫的小身体在扭动着，哭得很有力气，我感到一种无法言说的愉悦，在此之前，我还从来没感受过类似的愉悦。我们没给孩子举行洗礼，我母亲在电话里说了很多难听话，她发誓说，她不会来看这个孩子。我想，她会平静下来的，我忽然伤心起来了，假如她不来，那是她的损失。我一能起身就打电话给莉拉，我要尽快告诉她，我已经生产了，我不希望她生气。
As soon as I was back on my feet I
telephoned Lila, I didn’t want her to be angry that I hadn’t told her
anything.
“这是一种非常棒的体验。”我对她说。
“It was a wonderful experience,” I told
her.
“什么？”
“What?”
“怀孕生子，阿黛尔很漂亮，而且很乖。”
“The pregnancy, the birth. Adele is
beautiful, and very good.”
她回答说：
She answered:
“每个人想怎么描述自己的生活都可以。”
“Each of us narrates our life as it suits
us.”
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