奧威爾

說起Orwell，大部份人會想起的都是他最代表性的政治諷剌小說《1984》和《Animal Farm》，但是奧威爾不只是寫諷刺小說厲害，他真正地功力是展現在寫實小說。

記得很久之前自己寫過一篇關於奧威爾的博文，有粗略地談過《Down and out in Paris and London》這本書。其實裏面有一些部份我很喜歡，也是第一次發現到奧威爾的厲害。

跟你分享下面這一小段，是他在法國打工的時候，對於法國大廚污糟蠟遢的描述，禁不住再說一次，這真是一等的好文筆。
He is an artist, but his art is not cleanliness. To a certain extent he is even dirty because he is an artist, for food, to look smart, needs dirty treatment.

When a steak, for instance, is brought up for the head cook's inspection, he does not handle it with a fork.

He picks it up in his fingers and slaps it down, runs his thumb round the dish and licks it to taste the gravy, runs it round and licks it again, then steps back and contemplates the piece of meat like an artist judging a picture, then presses it lovingly into place with his fat, pink fingers, every one of which he has licked a hundred times that morning.

還有一段，是在《A Clergyman's Daughter》這本書第一章裡頭的一段描述。

She was a good hard-working servant once she was awake,but she was one of those girls whom Devil and all his angels cannot get out of bed before seven in the morning.

我覺得好的文字往往是在平實裡頭見真章，你若覺得奧威爾的政治諷刺小說寫得好？那你更應該去讀讀他的寫實小說，還有散文，嘗試瞭解這位大文豪，會是一件對自己最好的事，因為不只是提升英文，而是提升對文字的鑒賞能力。

相較于歐威爾或那些比他早期出現的作家，就不難明白為何現今時代，再也沒有經典。那個時代，作家的出現是爲了成為經典；那個時代，不是人人都是作家。而非現在這樣，那些人都只能是寫手，充其量是賣字為生而已，不是“作家”。