The Death of the Moth

飞蛾之死
by:Virginia Woolf


Moths that fly by day are not properly to be called moths; they do not excite that pleasant sense of dark autumn nights and ivy-blossom which the commonest yellow-underwing asleep in the shadow of the curtain never fails to rouse in us. They are hybrid creatures, neither gay like butterflies nor somber like their own species. Nevertheless the present specimen, with his narrow hay-coloured wings, fringed with a tassel of the same colour, seemed to be content with life. It was a pleasant morning, mid-September, mild, benignant, yet with a keener breath than that of the summer months. The plough was already scoring the field opposite the window, and where the share had been, the earth was pressed flat and gleamed with moisture. Such vigour came rolling in from the fields and the down beyond that it was difficult to keep the eyes strictly turned upon the book. The rooks too were keeping one of their annual festivities; soaring round the tree tops until it looked as if a vast net with thousands of black knots in it had been cast up into the air; which, after a few moments sank slowly down upon the trees until every twig seemed to have a knot at the end of it. Then, suddenly, the net would be thrown into the air again in a wider circle this time, with the utmost clamour and vociferation, as though to be thrown into the air and settle slowly down upon the tree tops were a tremendously exciting experience.

确切地说，日间飞行的蛾不叫飞蛾。它们不似最常见的黄蛾，枕于夜幕下，每每教人想起秋夜幽幽和常春藤花开；也不似蝴蝶般色彩斑斓，亦不似同类般黯然失色。尽管如此，眼前这东西，却看似怡然自得。只见它翼窄，色呈灰黄，带一抹同是灰黄的流苏。时值九月中旬，一上午清风送爽，使人心旷神怡，只是风吹起来较夏日疾劲罢了。窗外，地里被划成一道道的痕迹，犁头所到之处，泥土被压得平平的，湿湿的，亮亮的。好一派生气勃勃的景象，从田野及其背后的丘陵向人席卷而来，教人禁不住要分神、释卷。连白嘴鸦们也在欢度其一年一度的节日。它们在树梢上空低回，犹似当空撒出一张大网，网上有千千个黑色的结。少顷，大网徐徐落下，光秃秃的树枝上仿佛长了一个个的结。冷不防大网又被抛起，霎时一片蜩螗，却见空中划了一个比先前更大的圆；仿佛忽匆匆而去再慢悠悠而来，是什么赏心乐事似的。
　　

The same energy which inspired the rooks, the ploughmen, the horses, and even, it seemed, the lean bare-backed downs, sent the moth fluttering from side to side of his square of the window-pane. One could not help watching him. On was, indeed, conscious of a queer feeling of pity for him. The possibilities of pleasure seemed that morning so enormous and so various that to have only a moth's part in life, and a day moth's at that, appeared a hard fate, and his zest in enjoying his meager opportunities to the full, pathetic. He flew vigorously to one corner of his compartment, and after waiting there a second, flew across to the other. What remained for him but to fly to a third corner and then to a fourth? That was all he could do, in spite of the size of the downs, the width of the sky, the far-off smoke of houses, and the romantic voice, now and then, of a steamer out at sea. What he could do he did. Watching him, it seemed as if a fibre, very thin but pure, of the enormous energy of the world had been thrust into his frail and diminutive body. As often as he crossed the pane, I could fancy that a thread of vital light became visible. He was little or nothing but life.

　 使白嘴鸦、犁地者、马儿，乃至贫瘠瘦削、童山濯濯的丘陵，全都透着生气的这股力量，亦使飞蛾不由自主地在其玻璃方格上鼓翼飞翔，从东飞到西，从西飞到东。忍不住便盯着它看，说实在的，还会莫名其妙地可怜它。这个上午，似应兴高采烈，多姿多采，却偏偏只有一只飞蛾，而且还是一只白日飞蛾，在自个儿唱独角戏。命至于此，看来是残酷的。而它居然还能乐此不疲，偷得浮生，更是教人为之恻然。只见它奋力飞向一角，旋即又飞向另一角。除了飞往第三第四角外，它还能做些什么呢？仅此而已。至于那茫茫草原，那浩浩苍穹，远处那袅袅炊烟，以及从海上那轮船传来的此起彼伏的浪漫的气笛声，它全不在乎。它已尽了力。看着它这么飞，觉得仿佛有人在其纤弱的躯体内插了一片很薄但很纯，集世间无穷力量的纤维。每逢它飞过窗格时，我便觉得看到了生命之光。它尽管微不足道，但毕竟是活的。


Yet, because he was so small, and so simple a form of the energy that was rolling in at the open window and driving its way through so many narrow and intricate corridors in my own brain and in those of other human beings, there was something marvelous as well as pathetic about him. It was as if someone had taken a tiny bead of pure life and decking it as lightly as possible with down and feathers, had set it dancing and zig-zagging to show us the true nature of life. Thus displayed one could not get over the strangeness of it. One is apt to forget all about life, seeing it humped and bossed and garnished and cumbered so that it has to move with the greatest circumspection and dignity. Again, the thought of all that life might have been had he been born in any other shape caused one to view his simple activities with a kind of pity.

然而，窗前的力量是如此汹涌澎湃，而它的力量是如此细小，如此单薄，却居然也可以闯进我和他人的脑子里，在错综复杂的狭缝中来回穿梭，真是可叹复可悲。这不啻于有人取来一颗细小的生命之珠，轻轻饰以绒羽，然后让其蹁跹起舞，向我们展示生命的真谛。然而，我们却无法凭此来识破生命的玄机。我们动辄忘却生命为何物，只知道生命是奔波劳碌的，是不由自主的，是虚浮矫饰的，是不胜负荷的；因而，一举一动势必诚惶诚恐，毕恭毕敬。再说，倘使它投生为他物，其生命又是何种情状呢？一想到这里，我们不由得对它这种简单的动作产生一种怜悯之情。

After a time, tired by his dancing apparently, he settled on the window ledge in the sun, and the queer spectacle being at an end, I forgot about him. Then, looking up, my eye was caught by him, he was trying to resume his dancing, but seemed either so stiff or so awkward that he could only flutter to the bottom of the windowpane, and when he tried to fly across it he failed. Being intent on other matters I watched these futile attempts for a time without thinking unconsciously waiting for him to resume his flight, as one waits for a machine, that has stopped momentarily, to start again without considering the reason of its failure. After perhaps a seventh attempt he slipped from the wooden ledge and fell, fluttering his wings, on to his back on the window sill. The helplessness of his attitude roused me. It flashed upon me that he was in difficulties, he could no longer raised himself; his legs struggled vainly. But, as I stretched out a pencil, meaning to help him to right himself, it came over me that the failure and awkwardness were the approach of death. I laid the pencil down again.

过了一会儿，但见它已伏于窗框上，一动不动地晒着太阳，显然是跳累了。奇观迹近尾声，我也就不管它了。可是，一抬头却又给它吸引住。它想重新起舞，但似乎碍于身体过于僵硬或笨拙，而只能在窗格底下扑腾；想飞过去，却又无能为力。我另有心事，只看它徒然试了几遍，没作任何思考；下意识里只等它重新飞起来，像等一台临时停下来的机器重启一样，却没去考虑它失败的原因。大概试了七次之后，它从木质窗框上失足掉下，底儿朝天地落到窗台上，掉时还不住地扇着翅膀。我被此无助的姿势一举惊醒。这才猛然发现，它正身陷困境，自己起不来，蹬腿也是枉然。我拿一支铅笔打算帮它翻过身来，但忽然想起，它之所以飞不起来，之所以行动笨拙，是因为大限将至。我又把铅笔放下。


The legs agitated themselves once more. I looked as if for the enemy against which he struggled. I looked out of doors. What had happened there? Presumably it was midday, and work in the fields had stopped. Stillness and quiet had replaced the previous animation. The birds had taken themselves off to feed in the brooks. The horses stood still. Yet the power was there all the same, massed outside, indifferent, impersonal, not attending to anything in particular. Somehow it was opposed to the little hay-coloured moth. It was useless to try to do anything. One could only watch the extraordinary efforts, made by those tiny legs against an oncoming doom which could, had it chosen, had submerged an entire city, not merely a city, but masses of human beings; nothing, I knew, had any chance against death. Nevertheless, after a pause of exhaustion the legs fluttered again. It was superb this last protest, and so frantic that he succeeded at last in righting himself. One's sympathies, of course, were all on the side of life. Also, when there was nobody to care or to know, this gigantic effort on the part of an insignificant little moth, against a power of such magnitude, to retain what no one else valued or desired to keep, moved one strangely. Again, somehow, one saw life, a pure bead. I lifted the pencil again, useless though I knew it to be. But even as I did so, the unmistakable tokens of death showed themselves. The body relaxed, and instantly grew stiff. The struggle was over. The insignificant little creature now knew death. As I looked at the dead moth, this minute wayside triumph of so great a force over so mean an antagonist filled me with wonder. Just as life had been strange a few minutes before, so death was now as strange. The moth having righted himself now lay most decently and uncomplainingly composed. O, yes, he seemed to say, death is stronger than I am.

又是一阵乱蹬腿。我望出门外，像是找和它拼搏的敌人似的。怎么回事？大概是中午了吧，田里的活都停了。先前的生气换成了静谧。鸟儿都飞到小溪旁去饮水、歇息。马儿一动不动地站着。然而，外面那股力量并没有散去，还是那般无动于衷，目空一切。这不免有些与小家伙作对的意味。一切均枉然。我们只能眼睁睁地看着它蹬着小腿，与即将降临的死神作多余的挣扎。这位死神，倘若它看上了一座城市，这座城市便会湮灭。不独一座城市，天下苍生亦然。我知道，死神不会放过任何东西。尽管如此，它歇过后便又蹬起腿来。好家伙，这一最后的、疯狂的挣扎，使它终于翻了过来。我们固然只同情活的，但如果在他人不闻不问的情况下，一只微不足道的小飞蛾，尚且极力与强权对抗，以求拾回他人认为一钱不值或不欲保存的东西的话，谁还会无动于衷呢。况且，我们多少以为生命是极为渺小的。我又举起了铅笔，尽管我知道这样做是枉然的。然而，这时候死神的印记却已清楚可见。只见它身体一松，旋即变得硬直。斗争结束。微不足道的小家伙如今尝到了死亡的滋味。我凝望着死去的飞蛾，惊叹不已，原来强权要将卑微的对手击败是如此轻而易举的。一如几分钟前生命是那么奇妙，死亡如今也是那么奇妙。已经翻过身来的飞蛾，神情肃穆地躺着，无怨无尤。噢，是的，它似乎在说，我不如死神般强大。