雙語文章精讀——Space Invaders 空間入侵者

SpaceInvaders

空間入侵者

RichardStengel

理察·斯坦格爾

At my bank the other day, I was standingin a line snaking aroundsome tired velvetropes when a man in a sweat-suit started inching toward me in his eagerness to deposit his Social Security check. As he did so, I minutely advancedtoward the woman reading the WallStreet Journal in front of me, who, in mild annoyance, began to sidle up to the manscribbling a check in front of her, who absentmindedly shuffled toward the white-haired lady aheadof him, until we were all hugger-muggeragainst each other, the original lazy line having collapsed in on itself like a Slinky.

幾天前，我去銀行排隊，隊伍沿著松松垮垮的天鵝絨圍欄蜿蜒前伸，這時一位身穿運動套裝的男子急不可耐地從我後頭向前挪步，想儘早辦理社會保險支票存儲業務。當他這麼做的時候，我只好謹小慎微地向排在我前面閱讀《華爾街日報》的女士挪動步子。她略有不快，於是側身向她前面那位正在塗寫一張支票的男士走去，而這位男士則漫不經心地拖著腳走向他前面的銀髮老太。這樣我們的隊伍就變得七歪八扭，原來慵懶的隊伍活脫脫變成了個「機靈鬼」。

I estimate that mypersonal space extends eighteen inches in front of my face, one foot to each side, and about ten inches in back — though it isnearly impossible to measure exactly how far behind you someone is standing.The phrase "personal space" has a quaint, seventies ring to it ("You're invading my space,man"), but it is one of those gratifying expressions that are intuitively understood by allhuman beings. Like the twelve-mile limit around our national shores,personal space is our individual border beyond which no stranger can penetratewithout making us uneasy.

我估計我個人空間的範圍身前有18英寸，身後10英寸，兩側各1英尺——儘管要估算某人站在你身後多遠幾乎是不可能的。「個人空間」這個詞組帶有一種古雅的、70年代的味道(「老兄，你侵犯了我的空間」)，但這是一個能讓全人類一下子明白過來的令人滿意的詞組之一。就像我們國家擁有12海裡領海權一樣，個人空間就是我們的邊界，只要有陌生人穿過這個邊界，就會使我們感到不安。

Lately, I've foundthat my personal space is being invaded more than ever before. In elevators,people are wedgingthemselves in just before the doors close; on the street, pedestrians are zigzagging through thehuman traffic, jostlingothers, refusing to give way; on the subway, riders are no longer taking pains to carve out little zonesof space between themselves andfellow-passengers; in lines at airports, people are pressing forward like fidgety taxis at red lights.

最近，我發現我的個人空間比以往任何時候所遭受的侵犯都更加厲害。電梯裡，人們搶在關門之前拼命擠進來；馬路上，行人奮勇向前，在人流中穿梭，推推搡搡，拒不讓路；地鐵中，乘客不再刻意在自己和別人之間留出狹小空間；在機場隊伍中，人們拼命向前壓上，就像等待紅燈時煩躁不安的計程車一樣。

At first, Iattributed this tendency to the "population explosion" and the relentless Malthusian logicthat if twice as manypeople inhabit the planet now asdid twenty years ago, eachof us has half as much space. Recently, I've wondered if it's the season:T-shirt weather can make proximitymore alluring (ormuch, much less). Or perhaps the proliferation of coffee bars in Manhattan — the number seems todouble every three months — is infusing so much caffeine into the already jangling locals thatpeople can no longer keep tothemselves.

最開始我把這種趨勢歸結於「人口爆炸」以及無情的馬爾薩斯理論。該理論認為，如果現在居住在地球上的人口比20年前多一倍，每個人得到的空間就縮小一半。近來，我懷疑是不是季節的原因：穿著T 恤衫的天氣使彼此靠近更具吸引力(抑或使吸引力大大減少) 。或許是因為曼哈頓咖啡廳的激增——數量每3個月翻一番——將如此多的咖啡因注入原來就已經煩躁不安的當地人體內，使他們更加難以離群索居。

Personal space ismostly a public matter; we allow all kinds of invasions of personal space inprivate. (Humanity wouldn't exist without them.) The logistics of it vary according togeography. People who live in Calcutta have less personal space than folks inColorado. "Don't tread on me" could have been coined only by someone with a spread. I would wager that people in theNorthern Hemisphere have roomierconceptions of personal space than those in the Southern. To an Englishman, ahandshake can seem like trespassing,whereas to aBrazilian, anything less than a hug may come across as chilliness.

個人空間基本上是個公眾場合的問題；私下裡，我們允許對個人空間進行各種各樣的侵犯。(沒有這些「侵犯」，人類不可能存在。) 如何界定個人空間的大小因地而異。住在加爾各答的人比科羅拉多的人個人空間要來得少。「別踩我」這句話只可能是由擁有大牧場的人杜撰發明的。我敢擔保北半球的居民比南半球的個人空間的概念要寬大。對英國人來說，握個手簡直就是擅闖禁地，而對巴西人來說，不給你來個擁抱就會給人一種冷若冰霜的感覺。

Like drivers who plow into your parked andempty car and don't leave a note, people no longer mutter "Excuse me" when they bumpinto you. The decline of manners has been widely lamented. Manners, it seems to me, are about giving peoplespace, not stepping on toes, granting people their private domain.

就像司機撞上你停著的空車連個條子也不留，人們撞上人再也不說聲「對不起」。世風日下，哀聲遍野。在我看來，禮貌就是給別人以空間，不冒犯他人，允許別人有隱私。

I've also noticed anincrease in the ranksof what I think of as space invaders, mini-territorial expansionists who seizepublic space with a sense of manifestdestiny. In movie theatres these days, people are stakinga claim to both armrests, annexing all the elbowroom, while at coffee shops and on the Long Island Railroad, individualsroutinely commandeerbooths and sets of facing seats meant for foursomes.

我還注意到，那些我所認為的空間入侵者們的規模在不斷擴大，這些小小的領土擴張主義者們帶著捨我其誰的架勢堂而皇之地侵佔著公共空間。這些日子，在影劇院中，人們霸佔著兩邊的扶手，吞併手肘的全部空間；在咖啡廳裡和長島的鐵路上，往往一個人就佔領了面對面的火車座，而這種座位本來是給4位顧客或乘客的。

Ultimately,personal space is psychological, not physical: it has less to do with the spaceoutside us than with our inner space. I suspect that the shrinking of personalspace is directlyproportional to the expansion of self-absorption: people whose attentionis inward do not bother tolook outward. Even the focus of science these days is micro, not macro. The Human GenomeProject is mappingthe universe of the genetic code, while neuroscientists are using souped-up M.R.I. machinesto chart the flight ofneurons in ourbrains.

歸根結底，個人空間是個心理上的問題，而非物理上的問題：與其說它與我們的外部空間相關，不如說它與人的內心空間相關。我懷疑個人空間的縮水直接與自我專注的擴大成比例：那些只關注自我的人根本不屑於關注外部世界。這些日子，甚至科學研究都聚焦於微觀世界而非宏觀領域。人類基因組工程正力圖繪製基因代碼的全貌，神經科學家們正使用加強型磁共振成像機捕捉腦神經元的飛速漫遊。

In the same way that the breeze from a butterfly's wings in Japan may eventually producea tidal wave in California, I have decided to expand the contracting boundaries of personal space. In theline at my bank, I now refuse to move closer than three feet to the person in front of me, evenif it means that the fellow behind me starts breathing down my neck.

正如日本一隻蝴蝶輕舞飛揚可能最終引發加利福尼亞的一場海嘯，我決心一己之力拓展不斷收縮的個人空間。在我辦事銀行的隊伍中，如果前面有人，我一定和他最少保持3英尺的距離，即便排在我後面的人的呼吸在我脖頸上都感受得到也在所不惜。