《X-Only》

Dainty, ferocious and extravagant
很美很凶很奢华（陈继龙 草译）
Mar 13th 2008 | FLORENCE
From TheEconomist print edition

Italy's Renaissance jewel is a fine setting for treasures from China's golden age
中国盛世的珍品在意大利文艺复兴时期瑰宝的映衬下熠熠生辉



IT HAS already been billed as Renaissance squared—China's golden age meets Italy's era of glory. But this exhibition is far more ambitious than that.
有人认为这是文艺复兴时期的重现——中国的盛世邂逅了意大利的光荣时代，不过，此次展览会的着眼点远高于此。

More than 200 Chinese paintings, sculptures and works of art—among them pieces never before seen in the West—are on display at the magnificent arcaded Palazzo Strozzi in the centre of Florence. Its focus is the art of the Tang dynasty, the high point of Chinese cosmopolitan culture.
佛罗伦萨市中心宏伟的斯特罗兹宫展出了来自中国的至少200件绘画、雕塑及其它艺术品，其中不少都是首次在西方国家展出。展会最引人瞩目的是唐代艺术，而唐代也是中国多民族文化融合最盛的时期。

The Tang emperors ruled from 618 to 907, but the earliest pieces in the show date from 700 years before that. Sabrina Rastelli, the curator, who lectures in Chinese art at the University of Venice, has chosen to include these and other works from the period before the Tang came to power to illustrate how a traditional interpretation of Chinese history is gradually being revised.
自618年至907年，唐朝皇帝君临天下，而此次展出的艺术品中，年代最久的却比这一时间还要早700年。萨布里纳•拉斯泰利（Sabrina Rastelli）是斯特罗兹宫的负责人，也是威尼斯大学中国艺术专业讲师。他这次之所以将唐代及唐代之前的艺术品同时展出，是希望展示对中国历史的一贯理解正在发生着怎样的变化。

It has long been believed that the centuries between the Han and Tang dynasties were China's Dark Ages—a time as devoid of cultural merit as Arabia's Empty Quarter is of trees. Ms Rastelli is among the scholars now arguing that there existed innovators during those volatile, fragmented centuries on whose work Tang artists were able to build.
长期以来人们一直以为，汉唐之间的数百年是中国的黑暗时代，其时中国一如寸草不生的阿拉伯鲁卡哈利沙漠，在文化上纯属一片空白。不过，包括拉斯泰利在内的学者如今却认为，动荡不定、诸侯割据的凡此数百年，并不乏改革创新者，也正是他们的劳动，才让唐朝艺术家有了创作基础。

By the eighth century, the Silk Road linking China with the Mediterranean and the maritime routes around China itself had brought to its capital Chang'an (now Xian, and then the biggest city in the world) dancers and musicians from central Asia; long-legged horses; Persian, Arab, Turkish and Jewish merchants; and acrobats and boxers from Java.
到8世纪，通过连接中国与地中海的丝绸之路和中国周边的海上航线，中亚地区的舞蹈和音乐，长腿马，波斯、阿拉伯、土耳其和犹太的商人，以及爪哇国的杂技和搏击，都纷纷来到唐都长安（即现在的西安，当时世界第一大城市）。

During its 300 years of relative peace, works of extraordinary elegance, grace and power were made. A solitary, 36.2cm (14.3-inch) pottery Tang woman wearing a hooped head-dress is especially seductive. There are literally dozens of other memorable Tang objects—some dainty, others ferocious, extravagant or meditative—beginning with a four-tonne, smiling Buddha in the palace courtyard.
在相对太平的300年间，人们创作了很多有着非凡韵味、美感和魅力的艺术品。展品中有一件高36.2厘米、戴头巾的单个女陶俑尤为诱人。令人难忘的唐代文物实在还有很多，有的小巧精致，有的则凶神恶煞；有的尽显奢侈之风，有的则作沉思之状，其中给人印象最深的是宫殿大厅中的一座重达4吨的弥勒佛像。

Buddhism reached China from India in the first century but only in the fourth—after the collapse of the Han—did it spread rapidly through the country. The growth of Buddhist iconography in the Tang era is a persuasive part of the argument that China's golden age did not rise suddenly from the ashes of the chaos preceding it, but was built on the inventions and creations of the tumultuous years before.
早在1世纪，佛教就已自印度传入中国，但直到4世纪，也就是汉朝灭亡之后，佛教才迅速传遍整个国家。唐代佛雕艺术的发展在一定程度上表明，中国的盛世并非是继之前那段混沌年代灰飞烟灭之后的横空而至，而恰恰是这段动荡岁月中的发明和创新为盛世的到来奠定了基础。

One charming and effective illustration of this is a display of several groups of small, ceramic figures. All were excavated; none is more than 30cm high. The earliest group, celadon-glazed in the mid-third century, consists of four attendants about 15cm high, flanking a seated musician. Two ladies with large heads and sculptural hats follow. They are from the late third century. Next there are four seated female musicians, dating from the late fourth century, each holding her instrument and wearing identical blunt bobs. Two female attendants from the early fifth century are slightly more elaborate, the clay here incised with details of clothing and hairdos. Finally there are four Tang dancers who seem to be swaying to a tune. Suddenly all the other figures seem static and mute. Visitors need no words to understand that for many centuries craftsmen were drawn to similar themes, handling them with progressive sophistication until in the Tang dynasty they leapt up to become art.
对于这一点，几组小陶俑给出了漂亮的实证。全部陶俑都是出土文物，均不到30厘米高。年代最久的一组为青瓷釉，产于3世纪中叶，展现的是4个约高15厘米的侍从站在一个坐着的乐师两侧。其次是两个大头女像，各雕有一顶帽子，出自3世纪末期。接下来是4世纪末期的4个女乐师的坐像，每人手里都拿着乐器，留着一色的平头短发。出于5世纪早期的两个侍女雕像制作则略为精细，衣服和发式的细微之处都通过陶土得以表现。最后是四个唐代的舞姬，她们似乎正随着一首乐曲摇曳身躯，霎那间让人放佛觉得其他所有的陶俑都变得静寂无声。唐朝之前的数百年里，工匠们所追求的主题几乎一成不变，但手艺却不断精进，至唐朝才终于成为艺术。就这一点而言，无需多说，观赏者自能心领神会。

Romeo Gigli, an Italian fashion designer, installed the show. Many of the three-dimensional works are displayed on a series of large, amorphously shaped islands that resemble flat-topped, pale yellow sand dunes. Initially this seems odd. Almost everything on view comes from tombs, Buddhist cave monasteries or buried treasure. But the sandy colour suits the muted colours of many of the objects. The labelling is also well done. Best of all, there are none of the glass cases that can be such a deadening barrier to viewers.
负责此次布展工作的是意大利时装设计师罗密欧•吉利（Romeo Gigli）。立体艺术品多数都陈列在一连串巨大的形状各异的展台上，这些展台很像是淡黄色的平顶沙丘，这一布置起先看上去很怪。几乎所有的展品都出自墓穴、佛教洞窟或者地下宝藏，不过那种沙子的颜色正好能与多数文物的柔和色调相一致。标签设计得也很出色。最妙的地方在于，所有的展品都没有用可能损及文物美感的玻璃容器罩起来。

Wall paintings, of interest because so little Tang painting on silk survives, are among the show's highlights. Unlike frescoes, the ground applied to walls was dry when Tang painters set to work. (The nature of this ground is still not known.) Some are amusing, like the animated picture of a woman playfully teasing an indignant goose. One of the most moving is a larger painting of two grooms struggling to lead a beautiful white horse who does not want to move. It was found at the entrance to the tomb of Precious Consort Wei, a great horsewoman. Ms Rastelli rightly describes it as a work of “stupefying quality”.
壁画是此次展览的亮点之一，其吸引人的原因在于存世的唐代丝绸画作非常罕见。与湿壁画不同的是，唐代画工创作时在墙上打的画底是干燥的（该画底特性至今仍无人知晓）。有些画十分有趣，比如有一幅画描绘的是一女正逗弄一只怒鹅，栩栩如生。有一幅巨大的壁画也极为令人触动，它表现的是两名马夫正在与一匹不愿动弹的漂亮白马较劲。该画出土自韦贵妃（尤擅骑）墓入口处，拉斯泰利称之为“惊艳之作”，这不难理解。

This exhibition is part of an ongoing series of major loan shows through which China is educating foreigners about its culture. These are now so numerous that the Chinese authorities have introduced a rationing system for lending artefacts from their museums. National treasures are never loaned; everything else is categorised according to its perceived importance. The proportion of the best work that is given to any one show is limited to around 20%. Happily, the quality of art in this exhibition is far higher than this system of allocation suggests.
此次展览是中国正在举办的文物出国巡展之一。借助这些展览，中国得以向国外输出本国文化。由于展会众多，中国相关方面现已对出国文物实行了配给制度。国宝一级的文物绝不允许出国，而其他所有文物都要根据其重要程度进行分类，而且任何一次展会的展出品中，顶级文物所占比例最多只能是20%左右。幸好，此次展出的艺术品，其水准要大大高于这种配给制。

Empty Quarter： “空旷的四分之一区” ，即鲁卡哈利（Rub al Khali）沙漠，阿拉伯半岛东南境内的沙漠地区。实际上没有任何水，也没有人居住，1932年英国探险者首次到此的，但一直没有被完全开发。

摘自：http://www.ecocn.org/forum/viewthread.php?tid=9896&extra=page%3D1

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL ASIA
《华尔街日报评论》亚洲版

February 1, 2008
2008年2月1日

It's easy to have a partially liberalized market economy when times are good. But as Beijing is now discovering, it's a lot harder when things stop going your way. With food prices rising and power supplies disrupted by bad weather on the eve of the Lunar New Year holiday, policy makers are facing a winter of discontent instead of the social harmony they usually try to encourage.
在风调雨顺时，实施局部自由市场经济体制并不困难；然而，北京现在却发现：一旦事与愿背，诸事将倍难对付。在农历春节前夕，随着物价的上涨和电力供应因恶劣天气而中断，决策者正面临一个充满牢骚的严冬，远非往日竭力宣扬的和谐社会。

Consumer prices were up 4.8% for all of last year, but inflation for January is expected to clock in at 7%. Food accounts for about 85% of that increase, and it's confined mainly to two categories: pork, a staple of the Chinese diet, and cooking oil. Thanks to strong competition among most manufacturers, prices for other goods are increasing by only about 1.5%.
居民消费价格曾是去年全年的4.8%，但一月份的通货膨胀率预计将敲向7%。在物价上涨方面，食品约占85%，主要局限在两大类：猪肉（中国民众的主食）和食用油。但由于大多数生产商在激烈竞争，其他食物价格只大约上升了1.5%。

The "good" news is that most of the recent price spikes were sparked by actions outside Beijing's control. Prices of cooking oil, much of which China imports, are being driven higher by global supply factors such as America's ethanol fervor, while domestic pork producers have been hit by a period of low prices in 2006 that pushed some producers out of the market. An outbreak of a pig disease last year further reduced supply. Cooking oil prices are up 35% year-on-year and pork 60%; other food prices are rising less dramatically.
“好”消息是：远非北京所能控制国际市场活动是引发近期物价上涨的罪魁祸首。受到全球供应因素的影响，如美国乙醇需求过热，食用油（大多是进口）的价格正被抬得越来越高。2006年猪肉价格的持续走低促使许多养猪户被迫退出市场，这使国内猪肉生产商受到重创。上年猪瘟的爆发进一步减少了供应量。食用油价格比去年同期上涨了35%，猪肉上涨了60%，而其他食品价格上涨幅度不是很大。

As for electricity, China is suffering from rising global coal prices -- 70% of its electricity generation is coal-fired -- and coal supply problems at home. This price crunch is partly due to the higher prices China must pay in dollar-pegged yuan for commodities that are already soaring on a U.S. Fed-fueled weak-dollar commodity boom. The closure of some smaller coal mines due to safety fears, plus all-around bad weather, is also helping to push up prices for electricity producers, while retail prices remain at artificially low levels thanks to longstanding price controls.
在电力方面，中国正遭受全球煤炭价格的上涨之苦。国内电力供应的70%依赖燃烧煤炭，而煤炭供应在国内却是问题不断。价格危机部分归结于中国必须以紧钉美元的人民币来高价支付货物，而在美联储激起的美元疲软的商品繁荣基础上，这些货物价格已正飞速上涨。出于对安全的忧虑，对一些小型煤矿的关闭，再加上大规模的恶劣天气，也正对电力生产商提高价格起着推动作用。但由于价格受到长期地控制，零售物价尚保持在人为的低水平。

This situation, which comes amid terrible winter weather and a coming holiday travel rush, would try any policy maker's free-market patience. Beijing has not been reluctant to dive back into the price controls it abandoned earlier, particularly for food prices that had previously been almost completely liberalized. The National Development and Reform Commission issued rules requiring large food producers to request permission 10 days ahead of time for any price increase; food sellers are required to register any price increases and might be asked to scale back the rises, presumably if Beijing thinks they're too dramatic.
受严冬恶劣天气的影响以及假期春运高峰的临近，严峻的形势将会考验决策者对自由市场的耐性。北京已不愿重走早年尚已抛弃的对物价限制的路线，尤其是在对以前几乎完全自由的食品价格方面。国家发改委已颁布法令，要求大型食品生产商在价格提升前10天要获得许可，要求食品经营者登记价格上涨的情况，如果北京当局认为物价上涨幅度过高，可能会要求价格回弹。

So far, signs are mixed on whether Beijing intends to follow through on these restrictions, or whether the rules are just a way of trying to "talk down" inflation. Even assuming it's the latter, though, this bit of PR could backfire. Brokerage firm CLSA Asia-Pacific Markets noted this week that some food producers are slightly reducing the amount of product in each package as a way of surreptitiously raising prices without attracting attention.
到目前为止，北京当局是否打算对物价加以限制，或制定法规是否只是尝试“高呼抑制”通货膨胀，这些迹象还很模糊。即便是后者，部分公关可能会适得其反。经纪公司里昂证券亚太区市场于本周指出，一些食品生产商正在稍微地减少每包产品的数量，去偷偷摸摸地提价。

Whatever the proximate causes this time around, China's bigger inflation problems generally trace back to Beijing's attempts to control the economy's growth and the resulting resource misallocations. That Beijing's first instinct when the going gets tough is to re-institute price controls is a bad augur for the Year of the Rat. 　
无论此次事件何去何从，中国较大的通货膨胀问题总的来说就在于北京当局对控制经济增长的尝试和能源分配的不当。在形势严峻时，北京方面恢复价格控制的第一本能反应对鼠年来说未必是好的征兆。

摘自：http://www.ecocn.org/forum/viewthread.php?tid=9043&extra=page%3D1

一位80后向我抱怨，她实在是忙得飞起来，一点“闲暇”都没有。天天加班么？也不是。除了工作，还有太多的事情要做掉：比如玩任天堂的Wii，网络游戏，朋友之间的K歌、饭局等约会，看新出来的美剧，更别提那大堆大堆买来还没拆封的DVD了。商品如此发达，消磨“闲暇”的东西越出越多，而且越来越便宜，以致于“闲暇”反倒成了稀缺资源。

　　有位女精英大忙人在拜访了法国南部小镇的一位友人后，回来最大的感悟就是：原来一个人静静地呆在家里也可以生活——在阳台上坐一会儿，喝杯咖啡，沙发上看看书……她原来回到家后就会习惯性地把所有能发出声音和图像的东西打开，如果没有工作可以做，就马上拿出手机约人出去玩。她的生活被分为两部分，一部分是忙着工作，打拼天下，另一部分是忙着娱乐，享受天下。被法国友人的生活方式触动后，她试图给自己建立另一种消磨“闲暇”的生活氛围，但没坚持两个礼拜就迅速放弃了，她发现自己已经无法忍受没有听觉和视觉刺激的生活。

　　事实上她的生活方式正在被无数年轻人效仿。一位刚工作两年的年轻女士曾对我说过：我生活中主要就是两件事，上班挣钱，下班花钱。这位年轻精英月入已然不菲，经常需要加班的她以购物和换发型为工作之外的乐事。

　　有位欧洲学者指出，“闲暇”的稀缺会导致思想和创意的匮乏。思想和创意是否一定要在安静和独处的环境中才能产生，这还有待于学者们进一步的研究，但越来越多的设计师不约而同地选择离开城市，去孤僻的岛上离群索居一段时间，可能与此有一定的关系。虽然嘈杂的环境容易让人忘却孤独，收获欢乐，但相信对大多数人来说，理清思路还是在安安静静的氛围中更有效率。

　　只是快节奏和程式化的工作及休闲方式已经让现代人在面对闲暇时手足无措。精干的城市人在解决和处理工作及生活中的难题时往往指挥若定，一旦闲下来，再无人事叨扰时便心里发慌。比如一位刚换了工作的朋友，终于烧完了新官的三把火，稳住局面后，发现自己可以在7点前下班了。突然，他不知道该怎么办了。对他来说，一个人在家里应对着“闲暇”，还不如在办公室扑火更快乐。

一位从技术研发转行做产品销售的成功人士突然感到了不安，那是在他接了一个客户的电话后。他们发出的货物并没有像他在收首付款时承诺的那样如期到达，当客户电话来质疑时，他不假思索压低嗓门用气声说：“哦，真的吗？我现在开会，马上打给你。”当然，首先，他不在开会。其次，也不会马上打回给他。真实的情况是，他正坐在办公桌前翻看网上的八卦新闻，希望再拖半天或一天，货物能够送到。放下电话后，这种不安开始隐隐发作，不是为了货物的抵达时间，而是为了自己脱口而出的谎言和浑然天成的表演。他开始有点害怕，从什么时候起，他变成这样一个某种意义上的“浑蛋”了呢？

　　而对一位在美国读完了MBA回国担任显要职位的当代陈世美，他的朋友则这样评价：他本来就是个“浑蛋”，只是居住在美国黑人区时，他没钱、没工作、他的见解无人喝采，于是他只好暂时把自己“浑蛋”的那面压在箱底，乖乖地在租来的地下室里洗衣、煮面，搂着太太轧马路，看晚上的白月光，至少这能够使他成为身边女人心目中的才子兼完美丈夫。当然这一切在他回中国担任总经理这个职位后完全改变。每次他出差回来，漂亮的前台会对他调情：怎么样，想不想我啊？公司单身的女同事永远对他的幽默和学识做倾倒状，他出入的高级会所或声色场所则一次又一次提醒着他对自己的意识：我是一个杰出的、成功的、出人头地的人。因此他开始嫌弃家里的老婆吃鱼时的姿势不优雅，对日复一日温吞水一样的家庭生活不甘心，而对于来自年轻漂亮姑娘们的调情或倾慕，则甘之如饴。顺理成章的下文是找外遇并且和家里的丑老婆拜拜，过风流逍遥的钻石王老五生活。

 　　研读哲学的博士警告我，不要试图用人品问题来定义这些所谓的“混蛋”，更不要试图用道德对他们做出评判。更公道的看法应该是，他们正在根据周围的环境对自己的工作和生活做出技术性调整，让自己活得更自由、更开心。

 　　我的一位女朋友，最近正在为老公频频出入夜总会感到忧虑。虽然每次都是因为陪客户，是为了工作，但她试图让她的老公明白：在那样的地方被应召女郎的甜言蜜语环绕，是不正常的，温暖平静的家庭，才是正常的。然而时间长了，连她自己也觉得这样的说辞很说教，很无力。

 　　在当今中国万花筒一样的职场，什么是堕落，什么是快乐，什么是正常，什么是不正常，没有人能说得清，也没有人有时间来说得清。或许等到大部分人都过上体面的生活时，这些问题才可能有机会被拿出来正式讨论。