Mr. Holmes Would Have Mused Here
LONDON – A riveting exhibition here at the Museum of London has capitalized on the obsession with Sherlock Holmes that seems to have seized the Western world, judging by a new spate of movies, television shows and books.
從雨後春筍般冒出的電影、電視節目和書籍判斷，夏洛克．福爾摩斯熱潮正席捲西方世界，倫敦博物館趕搭順風車，推出引人入勝的展覽。
The show, “Sherlock Holmes: The Man Who Never Lived and Will Never Die,” does not focus on the stories about Holmes or his creator, Arthur Conan Doyle. “It’s about the character,” said Alex Werner, the lead curator, “and although I had a bit of trepidation about putting on an exhibition about a fictional being, we tried to set him firmly against the real city of London in which the stories take place.”
展覽名為「夏洛克．福爾摩斯：從未活過也永不會死的人」，並未把焦點擺在福爾摩斯的故事或作者柯南．道爾身上。主要策展人艾力克斯．維爾納說：「重點是角色。雖然我對辦一場以虛構人物為主角的展覽有些忐忑，我們仍然嘗試讓真實存在的故事發生地倫敦襯托他。」
The exhibition neatly demonstrates the way Holmes has become entwined with an idea of the city itself. From the detective’s rooms at 221B Baker Street to the mental map of the city that Holmes keeps in his head and its foggy, gaslamp-lighted streets, London is a palpable character, evoked through paintings, photographs and archival films.
展覽巧妙展現福爾摩斯如何與倫敦城的概念緊緊相連。從貝克街221號他的住所到他腦中的城市心智圖，以及倫敦霧濛濛、煤氣燈照明的街道，經由繪畫、照片和檔案影片，倫敦的角色顯而易見。
Monet’s 1902 “Pont de Londres” (Charing Cross Bridge, London) is on display, as are Whistler prints and other evocations of the late-19th-century city, along with a collection of smoky photogravures by the American photographer Alvin Langdon Coburn.
莫內1902年的畫作《倫敦查令十字大橋》在展示之列，還有惠斯勒的複製畫與其他能勾起19世紀晚期倫敦意象的作品，以及美國攝影師阿爾文．蘭登．柯本煙燻般的手工照相凹版印刷的照片選集。
There are rarely seen original illustrations by Sidney Paget, who gave the character the angular features and deerstalker cap, in the stories published in The Strand Magazine that made Conan Doyle and his characters famous.
還有相當罕見的插畫，是席尼．派吉特當年為柯南道爾的福爾摩斯探案在《岸邊》雜誌連載所畫。派吉特筆下的福爾摩斯五官有稜有角，戴著獵鹿帽。（譯註：柯南道爾1887年首度發表福爾摩斯小說，直到1891年起在《岸邊》雜誌連載短篇小說才算是聲名大噪。）
Paget produced some 350 illustrations of the detective between 1891 and 1904, but only 27 are known to have survived. Eight are on view in the exhibition, which continues until April 12.
1891至1904年間，派吉特大約為福爾摩斯探案畫了350幅插畫，但已知僅27幅流傳至今。這次展出8幅，到4月12日結束。
“I doubt very much there will ever be so many original illustrations and documents together again,” said Roger Johnson of the journal for the Sherlock Holmes Society of London, a club founded in 1951 that now has 1,200 members worldwide.
倫敦福爾摩斯學會雜誌的羅傑．強森說：「我非常懷疑以後還能讓這麼多原版插畫與資料齊聚一堂。」學會創於1951年，在全球有1,200名會員。
Conan Doyle, whose first Sherlock Holmes tale, “A Study in Scarlet,” was published in 1887, was amazed by its success. He might be even more surprised by the renewed attention.
1887年出刊的《血字的研究》是柯南．道爾的首部福爾摩斯小說，所獲成功讓他大吃一驚。如今重新獲得注意，他也許會更吃驚。
“Mr. Holmes” had its premiere at the Berlin International Film Festival last month and stars Ian McKellen as the detective, now elderly; and there were the Sherlock Holmes movies starring Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law (as Doctor Watson); and two television series – the BBC’s “Sherlock” and CBS’s “Elementary” – that set Holmes and Watson in a contemporary context. Anthony Horowitz gained official sanction by the Conan Doyle Estate to write a Holmes novel. “The House of Silk” (2011), and his “Moriarty” was published in December. He said he thought Sherlock Holmes was the father of all modern detective fiction.
上個月在柏林影展首映的《福爾摩斯先生》，由伊恩麥克連主演年事已高的偵探；還有小勞勃道尼和裘德洛（飾華生醫師）主演的《福爾摩斯》，和兩部電視影集：英國廣播公司的《新世紀福爾摩斯》和哥倫比亞廣播公司的《福爾摩斯與華生》，讓福爾摩斯和華生處在當代的背景。安東尼．霍洛維茲獲得柯南．道爾遺產管理人的正式批准，撰寫福爾摩斯小說。《絲之屋》在2011年出版，《莫里亞蒂》在去年12月發表。他認為福爾摩斯是現代偵探小說的始祖。
“Every single detective story you read has the same structure: mystery, investigation, solution,” he said. “And the tradition of the detective’s sidekick comes from there – Poirot has Hastings, Morse has Lewis,” he added, referring to the well-known characters in novels by Agatha Christie and Colin Dexter.
「你讀的每一篇偵探小說都有相同的架構：謎團、調查、破案，」霍洛維茲又說：「偵探助手的傳統也源於此，波洛有黑斯廷斯，摩斯探長有路易斯。他指的是阿嘉莎．克莉絲蒂和柯林．德克斯特小說裡面的名探。
“He also embodies an idea of Englishness,” Mr. Horowitz said. “If you were to ask for 10 things that define this country, I’d say Sherlock Holmes is one of them.” (Some others? “The queen, Yorkshire pudding, marmalade,” Mr. Horowitz answered promptly.)
「他也是所謂英國味的一個具體代表，」霍洛維茲說：「假如你要找十樣代表英國的事物，我會說少不了福爾摩斯。」（其他呢？女王、約克夏的布丁、橘子果醬，霍洛維茲的反應很快。）
Conan Doyle wrote four Sherlock Holmes novels and 56 short stories about the detective between 1887 and 1927, and they have provided material for radio personalities, directors, writers and obsessed fans ever since.
柯南．道爾從1887到1927年共寫了有關福爾摩斯的四本長篇和56篇短篇小說，一直為廣播節目主持人、導演、編劇提供題材，並令讀者著迷。
“The fascination with him today is really a bit special,” Mr. Werner said. “There are parallels between our modern lives and late-19th-century London, when I think people were struggling to make sense of a changing world. There was the telegraph, films, life was speeding up, and I think we have a similar thing going on now. We have too much to assimilate, and here you have a character who can see through things more clearly than we can.”
「今天的風靡程度還真有點特別，」維爾納說：「我們現在的生活和19世紀末的倫敦頗有幾分相似，我想人們都努力去理解變動中的世界，當時有電報、電影，生活步調加速，我認為類似的事情也發生在現在。我們有太多東西需要吸收消化，又有這樣一號人物對事情看得比我們更透徹。」
（張佑生 譯）
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