6月 29, 2013

"Hope is a memory that desires"

「巴爾札克使巴黎令人難忘,並且運用想像力將巴黎建構成一個集體記憶的特殊處所,如此便為革命時刻『閃現』的政治敏感度奠下基礎。當植基於巴黎的革命性轉變出現時,現代性的神話也浮上台面。記憶『閃現』於一八三○年,如其閃現於一八四八與一八七一年一樣,在革命情感的表達上扮演著關鍵角色。這幾次的革命無疑都負載著傳統的訴求,但另外也有人強力主張與傳統決裂的現代主義,要求走出完全不同的未來道路。因此,並不是希望引導記憶,而是記憶與欲望連結在一起時產生了希望。也許就是基於這個理由,雨果與波特萊爾才會認為巴爾札克是革命思想家,儘管他具有反動的政治觀。」

-----David Harvey,《巴黎,現代性之都》,頁72-73



(原文如下)
"[Balzac] makes the city memorable and thereby constructs a distinctive locus in the imagination for a collective memory. This grounds a certain political sensibility that can ‘flash up’ at moments of revolution. This is the myth of modernity as revolutionary transformation grounded in the city at work. Memory ‘flashed up’ in 1830, as it did in 1848 and 1871, to play a key role in the articulation of revolutionary sentiments. While these revolutionary moments were undoubtedly burdened by appeals to tradition, there was also an aspect to them that was intensely modernist, seeking that radical break through which a completely different path to the future might be opened up. It is not hope, therefore, that guides memory but memory that generates hope when it connects to desire. It was perhaps for this reason that Hugo and Baudelaire both thought Balzac a revolutionary thinker in spite of his reactionary politics.”


-----David Harvey. Paris, Capital of Modernity. (54)

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