Means of Delivery
傳遞的方式

By Joshua Cohen
[美]喬舒亞 科恩

譯者：吳洪

Smuggling Afghan heroin or women from Odessa would have been more reprehensible, but more logical. You know you’re a fool when what you’re doing makes even the post office seem efficient. Everything I was packing into this unwieldy, 1980s-vintage suitcase was available online. I don’t mean that when I arrived in Berlin I could have ordered more Levi’s 510s for next-day delivery. I mean, I was packing books.
相比之下，從阿富汗走私海洛因或從熬德薩販運婦女雖然更令人不齒，但也更具合理性。當你做的事情讓郵局都顯得更加高效的話，那你準是在做傻事了。我往那只笨重的、上世紀八十年代古董行李箱里塞進去的東西其實都是能網購的。當然，我不是指到了柏林后可以多訂購幾條并在第二天就能送達的李維斯510款牛仔褲；我是指打包進去的書。

Not just any books — these were all the same book, multiple copies. “Invalid Format: An Anthology of Triple Canopy, Volume 1” is published, yes, by Triple Canopy, an online magazine featuring essays, fiction, poetry and all variety of audio/visual culture, dedicated — click “About” — “to slowing down the Internet.” With their book, the first in a planned series, the editors certainly succeeded. They were slowing me down too, just fine.
還不是普通的書——都是同一本書，許多冊復本。是的，它是由三冠出版的《無效格式：三冠選集之卷一》。三冠是一個以隨筆、小說、詩歌以及各種視聽文化為主的在線雜志，其宗旨是——點擊網頁上的“關于”可以知道——放慢互聯(lián)網的速度。隨著系列計劃中的第一本書的出版，編輯們顯然取得了成效。他們也放慢了我的速度，挺好。

“Invalid Format” collects in print the magazine’s first four issues and retails, ideally, for $25. But the 60 copies I was couriering, in exchange for a couch and coffee-press access in Kreuzberg, would be given away. For free.
《無效格式》合集印刷了該雜志的前四期內容，還有個不錯的零售價：25美元。但我要運送的這60本書是免費派送的。作為交換，我可以在克洛伊茨貝格書展上得到一個休息的座位和進出新聞發(fā)布會的許可。

Until lately the printed book changed more frequently, but less creatively, than any other medium. If you thought “The Quotable Ronald Reagan” was too expensive in hardcover, you could wait a year or less for the same content to go soft. E-books, which made their debut in the 1990s, cut costs even more for both consumer and producer, though as the Internet expanded those roles became confused. Self-published book properties began outnumbering, if not outselling, their trade equivalents by the mid-2000s, a situation further convoluted when the conglomerates started “publishing” “self-published books.” Last year, Penguin became the first major trade press to go vanity: its Book Country e-imprint will legitimize your “original genre fiction” for just under $100. These shifts make small, D.I.Y. collectives like Triple Canopy appear more traditional than ever, if not just quixotic — a word derived from one of the first novels licensed to a publisher.
相對于其他媒體而言，紙質圖書的變化雖然頻繁，但創(chuàng)意不夠。這種情況直到近期才有所改觀。如果你覺得精裝的《羅納德 里根言論集》太貴，你可以等上一年半載再去買同樣內容的平裝本。二十世紀九十年代問世的電子書更加節(jié)省了讀者和出版商雙方的開支；盡管隨著互連網的擴展這兩者的腳色變得模糊不清了。到了2005年前后，自費出版物已經在數(shù)量上——即便還沒有在銷量上——超過了傳統(tǒng)的商業(yè)出版物。隨著大型出版集團也開始涉足自費出版的領域，這一局面變得更加復雜。去年，企鵝成為第一家趕時髦的大型出版商：它旗下的“書國電子印刷”只需花費你不到一百美元就能正式出版你的“原創(chuàng)類型小說”。這些變化使得三冠出品的小規(guī)模、自助類的選本顯得愈加傳統(tǒng)，如果不僅是唐吉訶德式的話——這個詞還源自歷史上最早授權給出版商的小說之一。

Kennedy Airport was no problem, my connection at Charles de Gaulle went fine. My luggage connected too, arriving intact at Tegel. But immediately after immigration, I was flagged. A smaller wheelie bag held the clothing. As a customs official rummaged through my Hanes, I prepared for what came next: the larger case, casters broken, handle rusted — I’m pretty sure it had already been Used when it was given to me for my bar mitzvah.
在肯尼迪機場沒有遇到任何問題；在戴高樂機場的轉機也很順利。我的行李完好無損地運抵了泰格爾機場。但一出海關，我就被攔下了。一只小攔桿箱里裝的是我的衣物。當一名海關官員在翻弄我的恒適內衣時，我已經在為接下來的麻煩做準備了：那只大箱子，腳輪壞了，把手銹了——我敢肯定它當作成年禮的禮物送給我時早已被用過了。

Before the official could open the clasps and start poking inside, I presented him with the document the Triple Canopy editor, Alexander Provan, had e-mailed me — the night before? two nights before already? I’d been up one of those nights scouring New York City for a printer. No one printed anymore. The document stated, in English and German, that these books were books. They were promotional, to be given away at universities, galleries, the Miss Read art-book fair at Kunst-Werke.
沒等那位官員打開鎖扣進行翻查，我先遞給他一份由三冠社的編輯亞力山大 普洛文電郵給我的文件——是前一天晚上發(fā)的？還是兩天前？反正有一個晚上我整夜沒睡地在紐約遍地找打印機。如今沒人還在打印東西了。文件上用英文和德文說明：這些書就是書。它們是用作宣傳的，將在大學、美術館、以及柏林KW閱讀小姐藝術書展上免費發(fā)放。

“All are same?” the official asked.“
都是同一本書？”官員問。

“Alle gleich,” I said.“
同一本，”我用德語回答。

An older guard came over, prodded a spine, said something I didn’t get. The younger official laughed, translated, “He wants to know if you read every one.”
一個上了年紀的警衛(wèi)走過來，戳了戳書脊，說了幾句我沒聽懂的話。年輕的官員笑著翻譯道，“他想知道你是否每本都讀了?！?/div>

At lunch the next day with a musician friend. In New York he played twice a month, ate food stamps. In collapsing Europe he’s paid 2,000 euros a night to play a quattrocento church.
第二天和一位搞音樂的朋友一起午餐。在紐約他一個月演奏兩次，領政府的食品卷。在經濟崩潰的歐洲他演奏一晚文藝復興時期的宗教音樂可以掙2000歐元。

“Where are you handing the books out?” he asked.
“你打算在哪里分發(fā)這些書？”他問。

“At an art fair.”
“在藝術展上?！?/div>

“Why an art fair? Why not a book fair?”
“為什么是藝術展，不是書展？”

“It’s an art-book fair.”
“是個藝術圖書展?！?/div>

“As opposed to a book-book fair?”
“相對于一般的圖書展而言的？”

I told him that at book-book fairs, like the famous one in Frankfurt, they mostly gave out catalogs.
我告訴他在一般的圖書展上，比如著名的法蘭克福書展，他們頂多發(fā)些圖書目錄。

Taking trains and trams in Berlin, I noticed: people reading. Books, I mean, not pocket-size devices that bleep as if censorious, on which even Shakespeare scans like a spreadsheet. Americans buy more than half of all e-books sold internationally — unless Europeans fly regularly to the United States for the sole purpose of downloading reading material from an American I.P. address. As of the evening I stopped searching the Internet and actually went out to enjoy Berlin, e-books accounted for nearly 20 percent of the sales of American publishers. In Germany, however, e-books accounted for only 1 percent last year. I began asking the multilingual, multi-ethnic artists around me why that was. It was 2 a.m., at Soho House, a private club I’d crashed in the former Hitler-jugend headquarters. One installationist said, “Americans like e-books because they’re easier to buy.” A performance artist said, “They’re also easier not to read.” True enough: their presence doesn’t remind you of what you’re missing; they don’t take up space on shelves. The next morning, Alexander Provan and I lugged the books for distribution, gratis. Question: If books become mere art objects, do e-books become conceptual art?
在柏林乘坐火車和電車時，我注意到人們都在看書。我指的是真正的書，而不是巴掌大小像探測器似的畢畢作響的電子設備；在那上面讀莎士比亞也像是在流覽表格。全球銷售的電子書有一半是美國人買的——除非有歐洲人定期飛往美國，專程為了用美國的IP地址下載讀物。就在我停止上網、真正出門去享受柏林生活的那個晚上作個統(tǒng)計的話，電子書占了美國出版業(yè)百分之二十的銷售額；而在德國，去年的電子書的銷量只占百分之一。我開始向周圍那些會講多種語言、涉及多個種族的藝術家門詢問其原因。那是凌晨兩點，在蘇荷館。那是一個我擅自闖入的私人會所，以前曾經是希特勒青年團的總部。一位裝置藝術家說，“美國人喜歡電子書是因為購買容易?！币晃恍袨樗囆g家說，“買了不讀也容易?！贝_實如此：電子書不會提醒你遺漏了什么，它們不占書架的空間。第二天早上，亞力山大 普洛文和我拖著書去分發(fā)，免費的。突然想到個問題：如果圖書只是藝術品，電子書可以稱為概念藝術嗎？

Juxtaposing psychiatric case notes by the physician-novelist Rivka Galchen with a dramatically illustrated investigation into the devastation of New Orleans, “Invalid Format” is among the most artful new attempts to reinvent the Web by the codex, and the codex by the Web. Its texts “scroll”: horizontally, vertically; title pages evoke “screens,” reframing content that follows not uniformly and continuously but rather as a welter of column shifts and fonts. Its closest predecessors might be mixed-media Dada (Duchamp’s loose-leafed, shuffleable “Green Box”); or perhaps “I Can Has Cheezburger?,” the best-selling book version of the pet-pictures-with-funny-captions Web site ; or similar volumes from and . These latter books are merely the kitschiest products of publishing’s recent enthusiasm for “back-engineering.” They’re pseudoliterature, commodities subject to the same reversing process that for over a century has paused “movies” into “stills” — into P.R. photos and dorm posters — and notated pop recordings for sheet music.
在書中并置地編排醫(yī)生作家瑞夫卡 蓋爾芩的精神病例記錄和配有醒目圖片的奧爾良遭受重災的調查報告，《無效格式》在用文本重塑網絡、用網絡重塑文本上作了極富藝術性的新嘗試。它的正文卷軸似地展開，有橫向的，也有縱向的；標題頁給人以“屏幕”的感覺；后面內容的排列也毫不統(tǒng)一和連貫，更像是雜亂無章的字行跳躍和鉛字的堆砌。和它最相近的前身也許是混合媒介達達派作品（例如杜尚的活頁綠盒子）；或者是《我能吃乳酪漢堡嗎？》，一個登載動物圖片和搞笑文字的同名網站的暢銷圖書版；亦或者是相似的《白人的怪癖》、《滑稽家庭照》等諸如此類的網站的圖書版。這些書不過是出版業(yè)近來熱衷于“逆向工程”的媚俗之極的產物。它們是偽文學，是同一種反向過程下的產物；這種過程在過去的一個世紀里把電影停頓為“定格畫面”——成了“宣傳海報”和“宿舍招貼畫”——把流行唱片記錄成了散頁樂譜。

Admittedly I didn’t have much time to consider the implications of adaptive culture in Berlin. I was too busy dancing to “Ich Liebe Wie Du Lügst,” a k a “Love the Way You Lie,” by Eminem, and falling asleep during “Bis(s) zum Ende der Nacht,” a k a “The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn,” just after the dubbed Bella cries over her unlikely pregnancy, “Das ist unm?glich!” — indeed!
說實話，我在柏林沒有太多時間去思考適應性文化的含意。我忙著跟隨“Ich Liebe Wie Du Lugst” ,也就是艾米納姆11 的“愛你說謊的樣子”的音樂一個勁地跳舞；然后在“Bis(s) zum Ende der Nacht ”,也就是“暮光之城”播到貝拉的配音演員為她意外的懷孕尖叫道“這不可能！”時睡著了——真是這樣。

Translating mediums can seem just as unm?glich as translating between unrelated languages: there will be confusions, distortions, technical limitations. The Web and e-book can influence the print book only in matters of style and subject — no links, of course, just their metaphor. “The ghost in the machine” can’t be exorcised, only turned around: the machine inside the ghost.
不同媒體間的轉換就好比兩種不相關的語言的翻譯一樣不可能；會有混淆、曲解和技術上的限制。網絡和電子書只能在樣式和題材上影響紙質書——它們當然不是鏈接的關系，只是隱喻關系。“機器中的鬼魂”不能被驅除，只好換個位：“鬼魂中的機器?！?/div>

As for me, I was haunted by my suitcase. The extra one, the empty. My last day in Kreuzberg was spent considering its fate. My wheelie bag was packed. My laptop was stowed in my carry-on. I wanted to leave the pleather immensity on the corner of Kottbusser Damm, down by the canal, but I’ve never been a waster. I brought it back. It sits in the middle of my apartment, unrevertible, only improvable, hollow, its lid flopped open like the cover of a book.
我呢，則被行李箱攪得心神不寧——那只多余的空箱子。我在克洛伊茨貝格的最后一天一直都在考慮它的去處。我的拉桿箱整理好了，電腦也裝進了隨身帶的包里。我想把這只人造革的大家伙丟在運河邊的科特布斯大街的角落里。但我生性節(jié)約，最終還是把它帶了回來。如今它就擺放在我寓所的中央，原貌已無法復原，只有少許恢復的空間。箱內空空如也，箱蓋打開著，像一本書的封面。

注釋：

1. 烏克蘭南部城市。

2.美國著名牛仔褲品牌。

3.原文為Triple Canopy。

4.位于柏林的一個藝術家聚集區(qū)。

5.英國大型出版集團。

6.由小說《唐吉訶德》的主人公名字衍生的詞，有“理想主義”、“不切實際”、“愚腐落后”等意思。

7.原文為Hanes，美國的內衣品牌。

8.原文為Kunst-Werke,是柏林的一個藝術學院。

9.法國達達主義藝術代表杜尚將他創(chuàng)作過程中的手稿和筆記印刷成頁，一張張不固定地放置在一個綠盒子里，故命名為《綠盒子》。

10.歌曲“愛你說謊的樣子”的德文。

11.美國說唱歌手。

12.電影“暮光之城”的德文。

13.原文這里用的是德語。

14.“不可能”一詞用的是德文。

15.源自英國哲學家吉爾伯特 萊爾的著作《心的概念》，表示心靈和身體的存在方式。作者在此用來比喻電子書和紙質書的關系。