Suffering from Forms
- a fragmentary récit
（非譯）自甘受苦於形式之中
2021.11
張健文 Cheong Kin Man
英文翻譯—劉培安 Liu, Pei-An
張健文，1987年生於澳門。曾任職澳門政府翻譯，離職後於德國柏林自由大學視覺人類學碩士畢業。曾發表《澳門的水源》一文並製作同題紀錄片（二零零八年首映）。二零零九年首映另一部紀錄片《澳門人》五年後完成碩士畢業影片《小說無用》。曾旅居葡萄牙、比利時、德國和新加坡，通曉多種語言。
Cheong Kin Man worked as a translator and interpreter for the Macau government and studied Visual Anthropology at Freie Universität Berlin, Germany. A Useless Fiction is his first film.
《小說無用》
The visual ethnography “a useless fiction” (original title “uma ficção inútil – 小說無用 – tiểu thuyết vô dụng”, 2014/5) has been refused by most ethnographic film festivals worldwide, with the exception of “Anthropologies Numériques (Digital Anthropologies)” at Le Cube in Paris, France in 2016 and the Macedonian “ЕТНОФФ” (International Student Ethnographic Film Festival) at the Cinematheque of Macedonia in the same year. It is considered an “experimental film” and has been shown in 40 countries and territories.
視覺民族誌《uma ficção inútil – 小說無用 – tiểu thuyết vô dụng》（2014/5年）為國際上大多數民族誌影展所拒，法國數碼人類學（2016年於巴黎「Le Cube」首映）、馬其頓國際學生民族誌影展（同年於馬其頓電影資料館首映）是少數將該片接納為人類學作品的影展。該片被認定為「實驗影片」，至今已在四十個國家、地區公映。
Fragment I: Origin of a fragmentary récit.
On my own will, I have been suffering from forms. Suffer, coming from souffrir (French); souffrir, coming from sub and fero (Latin), I bear it up and down. I teen, I loathe, ich leide (German). In German: Leiden, suffering; leiden, to suffer; Leidenschaft, passion. Suffering is a pleasure, is a mission, is of human nature and human need.
（非譯）之一：絮文源起
英字我寫我甘願、自願受苦。英字「suffer」源自拉丁文，原義係「我擔著上」、「擔著下」。現代中文（北方語）要在本亦可自作動詞的「苦」字前加上「受」字、「吃」字，表明苦者的（被逼）自願，亦即以受者為中心。德文用日耳曼本字譯耶穌受難，受難即成激情。受苦、享樂既（不）相反、又（不）相融。兩者猶如陰陽，均為人性所需。
Fragment II: Gender(s) controlled by grammar
“Homo homini lupus (A man is a wolf to another man).” The word man is masculinized. Man is masculinized. Men are masculinized. Genders are too often controlled by grammar, a (de)masculinized and (un-de)feminized one. Emotions, ex. the expressions of suffering, are (to-be-de)masculinized and (to-be-un-de)feminized. There are better and worse grammars.
（非譯）之二：洋語決定性別
洋語中「人」字的「去性別化」、語文二法性別平等只是極少部份人的一廂情願，所以並未有威脅到洋人諸語的語法、文法權威。同時，二十世紀急於現代化的中日韓越諸語也要西化、簡接雄性化儒家世界諸語的「人」字，唯「人」似乎並未被受到雄性化，反而變得更中性。本義甚廣的漢字「人」，由原來的「天地之性最貴者」到「庶民」，再到近代洋化，成為「生而平等」。西洋諸語中，除英文外，筆者所學的法、德、葡、波語中，性別都由語文二法所操控。語文二法也因此有「好、壞」之別。
Fragment III: Language as a supreme power
Suffering within a language-like form of a temporal linearity and a grammatical hierarchy is its highest and most legitimate way of expression. Counter-temporality and anti-grammar seem to be a solution and illusion at the same time. Suffering is verbal, or even textual. Structuralized, if not controlled or even censored, by several categorizing forces and imaginative rules. There is no difference between the expectation and the expected, between the rules and the ruled.
（非譯）之三：語、言合體是最高權威／絮文之一：
漢字「言」出於甲骨、「語」出金文，固先有「言」後有「語」，甲骨「言」字象形舌而從一，「語」則從言，「吾」聲，而「吾」亦係金文，從「口」，「五」聲。《說文》：「五行也。从二，陰陽在天地閒交午也。凡五之屬皆从五。」把整個story羅曼蒂克化亦通：天地萬物，皆出「吾」「語」。受苦、吃苦在各大漢方言中似乎毋須像洋文一樣受到語法、文法的嚴苛限制、控制。「苦」字最早或出於《詩經》，本義苦菜，語、文法上名、動、形皆可用。寫到這裹，筆者概是無法，同時也是自願投入批判「西」方、重返「東」方的任務／陷阱。
Fragment IV(/Non-translation I): Self-victimization
It is both a trap and a mission, while staying in the “East,” to euphorize the (non-)coloniality, to (re)appropriate the (non-)colonial heritage, to produce knowledge; or while staying in the “West,” to reject the (non-)coloniality, to (re-/de)colonize the (re-/de)colonial and the (re-/de)colonized, to produce knowledge. The knowledge-producing ones who refuse to self-victimize are quickly unseen.
絮文之二／（非譯）之四：徘徊東、西間；被殖、非殖之間
「東」方給予的任務是要宏揚「東」、「西」方之間的交流成果，「西」方給予的任務則是要讓「西」方改正在歷史上的錯誤，讓「西」方在全球化背景中的各種現代社會繼續有正當性，或明或間地保衛「西」方文明作為世界思考摸式的中心和發源地。被／受害者／化的非「西」方知識份子必須站起來，建立作為「他」者的代表在「西」方世界內的代表敘述「他」方，為「西」方服務。
Fragment V(/Non-translation II): To suffer properly
Roughly defined and more or less situated now, suffering has the potential to be considered proper. Its forms are still to be contested for their own good, but once accepted by any kind of recognized systems, they are no longer purely contestable for the good of contesting.
© 張健文．跨文化電影研究．2021