歷史誰來寫？

我從學姐K的網誌址借來了這個題目。歷史誰來寫？我看答案還真是簡單－－不就是作家來寫嗎？尤其今天我讀過《太陽報》後，想法更是堅定。新聞組上的朋友都提到《太陽報》今天刊了一篇奇文，害我不得不到網上翻了一遍。細讀之下，但覺此文一鳴驚人。區區本著「奇文共享」之網絡精神，將之轉載如下：

共患難不可共富貴

24/10/2006
文： 黃擎天

黃袍加身的宋太祖朱元璋看透人性的弱點，明白「共患難不可共富貴」的道理，來個「杯酒釋兵權」。那夜，他召喚開國功臣石守信、高懷德等喝酒。酒興正濃時，他嘆道當皇帝還不如從前跟大夥兒當節度使快樂。如今擔心王位被搶，夜夜難安枕。眾人表明沒有異心，宋太祖卻道：「你們雖然無異心，然而你們部下想要富貴，一旦把黃袍加在你的身上，你即使不想當皇帝，到時也身不由己了。」大家聽明白弦外之音，第二天齊齊上表聲稱自己有病，要求解除兵權。宋太祖欣然同意，將兵權集中到自己手上。

宋太祖為保王位，先下手為強，因歷史上屢見這樣的故事：江山打下來，主帥成為皇帝後論功行賞，讓一眾將領冊地封王。天下太平，諸侯沒有用武之地，開始計較誰的封土較大。野心大的心埋怨不公平，江山明明是自己冒死換取得來，為甚麼當皇帝的不是我？諸侯們各懷鬼胎，先是對皇帝的命令陽奉陰違，然後得寸進尺，擺明車馬忤逆，最後是密謀造反。

明明大夥兒揭竿起義，好不容易才奪得江山。為甚麼環境變好了，反而變質？共患難與共富貴，竟是前者易後者難。打仗時，敵愾同仇，萬眾一心，目標一致，大家稱兄道弟無分彼此，亦沒有喘氣機會計較其他。打勝仗後，失去共同目標，大家有餘暇便開始諸多歪念，正如飽暖思淫慾。

歷史循環不斷，主僕、朋友、夫妻之間，共患難不可共富貴的個案比比皆是。人要變質難以預防，只能做足兩手準備，一旦出事，勿要大驚小怪啊！

http://the-sun.orisun.com/channels/fea/20061024/20061023222803_0000.html

也不打算追究「宋太祖朱元璋」之大謬了。作者只藉「杯酒釋兵權」的故事，就評宋太祖其人兔死狗烹，可「共患難不可共富貴」，真是太委屈了趙匡胤了。《宋史．石守信傳》中太祖言「人生駒過隙爾，不如多積金，市田宅，以遺子孫。歌兒舞女，以終天年，君臣之間，無所猜嫌，不亦善乎？」石守信等聽後拜謝說「陛下念及此，所謂生死而肉骨也」。這分明是說宋太祖許石守信等一生富貴，換他們自動交出職權，作者怎麼在故事中就略去不提呢？太祖此舉，不過是以「肥雞餐」叫公務員提早退休，怎麼能說是「共患難不可共富貴」呢？

況且「杯酒釋兵權」的故事也不見得是真確。有關「杯酒釋兵權」的紀錄最早才見於仁宗年間的《丁晉公談錄》和《王文正公筆錄》。這樣的開國大事，為什麼不見於更早更重要的《太祖實錄》和《三朝國史》？再說《丁晉公談錄》和《王文正公筆錄》兩書中對「杯酒釋兵權」的說法也不盡相同，可見「杯酒釋兵權」未必是確有其事。

據說此文乃本港新進作家執筆，其作品更是入選「中學生好書龍虎榜」六十本候選書目云云。

又：同日《太陽報》論壇有文章題為「不可竄改歷史教科書」，真是夠煞風景。

Perfume (1985)

Published 20 years ago finally Patrick Suskind's novel Das Parfum is adapted into a film. Reasons are obvious for the delay. Translated to the screen the whole story will be degraded to a serial killer thriller. Yes, the subtitle is 'the story of a murderer' but the story is far from being Hitchcock material. This is a good example where the power of printed words triumph over images. Jean-Baptiste Grenouille the murderer is driven by an olfactory lust to possess the 'essence', the 'soul' of being, which in his term is the scent. The world exists for him only in olfactory terms. Only in printed words can an animal like him be created to perfection. Hyperbolically satirical and grotesque, the book is a lot more than the pace of plot or visual stimulation or the fishy stench of blood, which are now sadly the only elements that appeal to the public. The stench of 18th century Paris, which most historians might have left out as insignificant, is stuffed right under our noses. Undoubtedly the sublime perfumery world of the half-animal half-saint chimera in the story won't appear on screen. Ironically the producers of the film are acting as an inverted Jean-Baptiste Grenouille: the very 'essence' of the book will be distilled away and the scum will be wiped all over the the screen. The film will stink; it will reek of naked girls, which I don't mind seeing anyway. Man is made of the spiritual and carnal; both of which should be amply nurtured. Can't wait to be carnally fed when the film hits Hong Kong. For the time being, I read the book and indulge in the power of words.

Dangerous Books

Woe to the age when the most dangerous book becomes the worthiest. This deceptively polemic statement shouldn't be mistaken for the outrageous commonplace juvenile outbursts which condemn anything contemporary but worship anything that is 50 years before: like now when we look back on the 60s everything seems more romantic and picturesque; rusty old electric fans from the 60s can be sold at an obscene price at G.O.D. (which has really, by the way, lived up to its name in transforming the dirt on my soles to unaffordable luxury.)

'Public opinion exists when there are no ideas.' Whatever books that are ingenius enough to have earned public distaste are the worthiest ones. JK Huysmans rasied hell in Victorian England. A sure sign of genius. A story without a plot. Provocative images where artificial beauty takes over natural beauty.

Very much to my surprise Nathaniel Hawthorne's short story Young Goodman Brown has unwittingly touched a nerve or two in some pious young Hong Kong dames. The young gentleman in the portrait above with premature receding hairline is that very unpardonable sinner. The Scarlet Letter is his opus magnum; but his spark of ingenuity shines the brightest in his short stories. Young Goodman Brown at one dusk leaves his wife, aptly named 'Faith', for the forest on an unnamed errand. Torn between the dark forest and his 'Faith' he ventures into the forest and on his way he meets the devil himself. 'Take my staff if you feel too weary,' the devil says. Deep in the forest Young Goodman Brown is shocked to see all the pious villagers and priests are involved in a mid-night Black Sabbath - a devil worship ritual. His wife 'Faith', without the pink hair ribbons she ususally wears, stands in front of him perplexed and frightened. The devil baptises them with blood from a blood basin.

All the sexual symbols are here: the long staff (in the shape of a Serpent), the blood basin, the pink ribbons, the all too obvious Adam and Eve scene where the man and the woman are perplexed and frightened at their sexuality, the errand that 'can only be done at night', the wife that is afraid of 'loneliness' at night when the husband is away...

In class, one pious dame, whose freckles tell of sleepless nights without her Hello Kitty stuffed doll which has gone to the dry-cleaner's, whose dangling ends of trousers, exposing innocent white socks, tell of pubertal hormonal rush that surpasses her feeble mind, whose glazed eyes speak an eternal heaven with dancing virgins like in Disneyland, blushes and askes in her grotesquely horrid voice that inspires nothing but infernal wrath in me, 'Where is the sex?'

In my mind's eyes, I envision the hellish scene of her chatting joyfully about the Holy Scruptures with good people in a Saturday fellowship gathering of a third-floor church, strategically placed beside heavenly brothels, in a commercial building in Mong Kok.

《江山美人》的幽默

無線電視最近推出一輯叫《江山美人》的節目，以林保怡與王喜兩名小生掛帥主持。節目推出前循例自然先發宣傳片斷。片斷中林王二人步入酒吧，對四周逢迎獻媚的美女卻是不屑一顧。兩人瀟灑的走到長檯邊喝起酒來。只聽旁白以讚嘆的口吻說出一句－－「無動於衷，只因境界不同（大意）」－－林王二人於是相顧而笑， 美女們就只顰眉欲嗔了。這條宣傳片大概是點出林王二人見過神州的天香國色，因而看不上那些爭相獻媚的庸脂俗粉吧。

老套的宣傳片有時也收到意想不到的效果－－最少我看過後笑上了半天。想來無線的高層也真夠壞呢！據說林王二人是眾口相傳的龍陽癖了，偏偏給叫來主持這樣的一個節目；宣傳片的導演也幽默頂透，一句「無動於衷，只因境界不同」就讓人玩味不已了。不知道林王二人最後相顧無言，擠出來的不會是苦笑來吧？

J K Huysmans

J K Huysmans (1848 - 1907), a French novelist suffering from a civil servant position produced a number of outlandish novels during his off-work hours. Among them are the infamous ones like A Rebours (Against Nature) (1884) and La Bas (Down There) (1891) which show extraoridnary hard work of research on the subjects dealt with.
A Rebours has earned its name 'the dangerous book' or 'the yellow book' in Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray in which the anti-hero, Dorian Gray, indulges in aesthetic perversities suggested by this yellow book.
Des Esseintes in A Rebours throws afternoon dinner parties in which the dining room is darkened as night by heavy dark curtains and illuminated with candle light. Table cloths and drapes are all in black; all courses on the menu comprise food in black like black pudding, contrasted by a guilded live tortoise crawling around the living room. Masked waitresses with elaborous headgear adorned with black feathers serve food stark naked. Des Esseintes's tastes in literature are most exquisite: his favourite classics he especially ordered from publishers: all printed with purple ink on silk paper, with silk hardcover in different colours, which atone our hero's mood: in sulky mood he picks up a purple one to drown himself in his purple mood. Once he wants to get some fresh air and plans to embark on a long ship journey to London. Hours of packing tires him out and he decides he have the effect of an exquisite journey without the trouble: decorators are called upon and a house with panelled walls are to be built. On the walls small round cabin windows with steel rims are built. Between the panelled walls the space is filled with salt water in which clockwork, wind-up, mechanical fish swim - it is virtually a room surrounded by walls of aquarium. Giant worn out ropes soaked with salty water and rusted anchors and fishnets are ordered to adorn the room. Oakwood deck chairs and tables are custom-made decorated with compasses and maps and monoculars. In this room our hero gazes through the cabin windows, admiring the mechinical fish swimming joyfully, breathing in the salty air, caressing moist oakwood tables... nothing of a genuine sea journey is lacking.

我的名字要紅

奧罕‧柏慕克（Orhan Pamuk）最近火紅起來了。土耳其人今年以大熱門姿態榮膺諾貝爾文學獎，著作少不免洛陽紙貴，難得是連本地歌手楊千嬅也因此叨了光。原來此妹早對柏慕克 那本《我的名字叫紅》青眼有加，還在年前的港台主辦的「十大好書」活動中公開推薦。現在柏氏龍門一登，楊千嬅大概可以博得不少名聲了。看看年前她怎樣說：

「選擇推介這本書，首先是被書名吸引，作為演藝人，希望我也人如其『名』吧﹗雖 然奧罕‧帕慕克這位土耳其作家寫的故事，發生在十六世紀的伊斯坦堡，但這份異國風情配合一個驚慄的謀殺之迷，教我看得『愛不釋手』。書厚五百多頁。無論是頁數還是讀後的感覺，都可以用這四個字形容：『份量十足』。」

我就是喜歡「名字要紅」－－說話直率得要命呢。也不知道柏氏聽過後會不會笑出來了。雖然說《我的名字叫紅》一書的確奠定了柏氏的文壇地位，可大家都知道現下 諾貝爾文學獎多少都染有政治的色彩。年前柏慕克公開犯禁，指責土耳其前身奧圖曼帝國在1915年種族清洗上百萬的亞美尼亞人，結果給人告上法庭指其有辱國 格，不就是贏得了「捍衛言論自由」的稱許嗎？難得是他事後都說，犯禁是為著挑動人們關注土國言論自由的情況，給亞美尼亞人打抱不平是次要罷了。

Black Friday

1307 年10月13日星期五，窮得發慌的法王菲力普四世（Philip IV）幾乎同時拘捕了全國的聖堂武士。首領莫雷（Jacques de Molay）自然落網，家當也被國王抄得清光。國王宣佈聖堂武士都是異端，只有快快悔改獻寶才是正道。當然，審訊異端自是擴持日久，好讓裁判們有時間施以不同的折磨。七年後莫雷始終被送上火刑台。他赴刑前循例臭罵了法王，又詛咒了他的家族；圍觀的群眾也沒有向莫雷丟雞蛋，只是聽著他的呻吟慢慢給火焰吞沒消失掉。