我画《人间四月天:林徽因诗全集英译》后记
刘亚莉
林徽因（1904—1955），中国著名建筑师、诗人、作家，她的名字早已家喻户晓。
我读林徽因诗歌，是许多年前了。现在回想，当时便觉得林徽因的诗歌很有“气质美”，似曾相识，心有灵犀。她那超凡脱俗的诗句给我留下美好的印象。
数月前，经李建波先生举荐，示为赵彦春先生英译林徽因诗集《人间四月天：林徽因诗全集英译》绘图，盛情难却，我虽欣然接受，但又深感艰巨，恐力有不逮。怎么画它呢？从何画起呢？当时，我心里一片茫然。冥冥中，我似乎无意间翻检旧作中的素描风景画作，挑出十余幅来与林徽因诗歌匹配，同时，在赵先生英译诗集（电子版）文本里配上插画。
我觉得面对林徽因的诗歌与唯美的诗意时，让我很自然地选择了素描的语言去表现我眼里的诗意画。用细腻、写实的风景刻画方式去画，“我不能设想还有比这更合适的语言来传达我的感受”。
过了些时日，在得到赵教授的嘉许后，我便全身心的投入到画的创作之中。 但我坚持用素描的写实画法去表现林徽因诗意画的印象。也懂得在完成这些画作时，其实是体会诗与画相结合所“孕育的神圣”，更懂得画进书里的图画，不应把它变成“率性”而画的让其白白流失的感觉。另外，绘画风格尽量“细腻”。
值得一提的是，我最初画林徽因诗意画作时，确信与我原先的绘画路径要迥然有别，我得改变一下以往惯常的素描题材。
在此之前，我虽有六十余幅素描画作结集出版，但题材多为中国古代建筑和古迹、古镇等，而读林徽因笔下的描写对象，多是日出、晚霞、星空、月夜、黄昏、高峰、柳树、小溪、荷花等意境，假如按照我以往的绘画题材去表现林徽因诗作，自难吻合相得。这样，经过一番反思，我一连画了许多与这类题材有关的黑白风景画作，其主要灵感皆得益于林徽因的诗歌熏染。
在画之前，从诗人的诗歌中去寻找我想表达的画作主题，之后，心随笔动，达到融情入景，情景交融的境地，且让笔下的景致全部统一在黑白灰的色调之中，那种感觉还是十分美妙的。在此，举一个画例，有一天上午，我画“充满画意的山峰”与海和云素描画时，是读了林徽因的诗歌《孤岛》中的一句诗后有感而画。
诗人感叹“遥望它是充满画意的山峰 远立在河心里高傲的凌耸 ”。 这首诗歌《孤岛》还写到：“可怜它只是不幸的孤岛，——天然没有埂堤，人工没搭座虹桥。他同他的映影永为周围水的囚犯；陆地于它，是达不到的希望！早晚寂寞它常将小舟挽住！风雨时节任江雾把自己隐去。晴天它挺着小塔，玲珑独对云心；盘盘石阶，由钟声松林中，超出安静。特殊的轮廓它苦心孤诣做成，漠漠大地又那里去找一点同情？”
读着读着，我的思绪回到此前读过的《浪漫希腊—爱琴海的眼泪》的意境之中，那“一片充满浪漫气息的海”，它的魅力“不仅在于水，还有那些充满神话传说的岛屿”…,…我想起此前两次去希腊看海看岛的游历，想起看到的蓝色的爱琴海……。等我画“充满画意的山峰”和海与云时，以墨色渲染太阳西尽，落日的余晖浸染大海…,。我仿佛再次看见“近海处是一片澄清，像一块起伏波动着的翡翠，重重叠叠的海浪尽情地把天光吸纳、摇匀，在深海处酿成整幅整幅粘稠似酒的蔚蓝，浓烈似情人的眼波”，（注：引自《美国国家地理》评论希腊爱琴海）让我望着望着便痴了过去。”
现在想想，读林徽因诗歌、画她的诗意画，和自己的行走经验，使得我留恋的应该是一种美好的情境，它如梦似幻，亦真亦假…。就这样，我画“晓天的烟霞”以及“天空外旷碧，是颜色同颜色浮溢，腾飞"；画“月圆了残……隔过老杨柳”、“山野，和枝叶中间，象醉了的蝴蝶”；画“紫藤花开了”、“衰柔的青草”；画“水光浮动着你梦中的白莲”、“朵朵露凝的娇花”、“野荷的香馥”、“林叶笑声里染红”、“花香，红白的相间着一条小曲径”；画“雪夜，有泥泞”、“太阳带点暖，斜照在每棵树梢头，画“隔山灯火，漫天的星”……，一笔笔的辅以墨水、铅笔等变化，来表现画中的笔法、色调、造型、构图。为了使画面效果更富有意境之妙，以形、色、线、情、意的结合方式来表现林徽因诗歌的魅力之美。
在那些日子里，我一边阅读林徽因诗歌一边思考，一边画画一边写画记。几乎每天画完画了，都要借助现代传媒与友人分享我的创作感受体悟。时常通宵达旦，足不出户，而沉浸其中。
数周后，也就是9月23日上午，我终于完成诗集的绘图，并将画稿一一对应诗集中六十余首诗歌，如释重负。
写到这里，我想起张信哲唱的一首歌的歌名《爱是一种信仰》，假如画画是我的挚爱，我觉得别人对我的画作的认可或不理喻，这都不重要。重要的是，画完画作后，那种心里说不出的滋味，一言难尽。这么说吧，我作为一位画者，如果不是对林徽因有相当的热忱,不可能那样如此执著的去画的。 它也是我从事数十年的绘画创作，几经艰辛摸索，又经历获得的新尝试，新突破吧。
而今天，提笔写这篇画记时，觉得往事已缥缈，皆茫茫……
在此，我要感谢李建波先生和赵彦春教授的信赏。如果没有李先生的推荐，我不可能有幸为赵先生的英译诗歌绘图。而没有赵先生的托任，我也不会有这次难得的合作机缘，也不可能构思和创作与林徽因诗歌有关的颇有难度的画作。云映日而成霞，泉挂崖而成瀑。正是这次绘画创作，使我走进林徽因诗歌的精神世界，使我在林徽因这样的诗作中汲取了绘画创作的新灵感，提升了艺术创作的新境界。
Afterword
Illustrating Phyllis Lin’s Poems Translated by Zhao Yanchun
Liu Yali
She (1904—1955), a trinity of architect, poet and author, is now a household word in China.
Her name is Phyllis Lin.
It was quite a few years ago that I read Phyllis Lin. Her elegance, then I felt, was familiar to me, touching the strings of my soul. The detached beauty of her lines stirred the niche of my memory!
A few months ago, I was recommended by Professor Li Jianbo to illustrate Zhao Yanchun’s
translation of Phyllis Lin’s poems. It was something I could not decline, but I felt the dilemma. Could I manage it? How should I do it? Where to start? I felt at a loss. As if inspired by an unknown force, I leafed through my landscape drawings and found some, about 10, very agreeable to Phyllis’ art. So I chose a dozen as illustrations for Mr. Zhao’s translations.
Phyllis’ poems or her autotelic (art for arts’ sake) representations led me to adopt the technique of line sketch to express what I thought her poetic beauty was. Being delicate and realistic, yes, it’s the best way for the poetic scene. “I could not imagine any other alternative to express my feel than this appropriate method ”.
A few days later, having had Mr. Zhao’s approbation, I threw myself into the pool of artistic creation, upholding the spirit of delicate realism. I knew that through my work I was experiencing the holiness conceived through the marriage of poetry and drawing, and I fully understood that the drawings I entered in the book should not be something arbitrarily done, and they should not stay there in vain. In addition, delicateness was all I was striving at.
What is worth mentioning is that when I first entered Phyllis’s Lin’s world, I was sure I should adopt a quite different approach, keeping off my usual track of sketching. Before that time, I had published more than sixty sketches in a collection, most of which are drawings of Chinese ancient buildings, relics and old towns. Most of Phyllis’s poems, however, are depictions of sunrise, afterglow, starry sky, moonlit night, dusk, peaks, willows, creeks, lotuses and so on. My usual touch might fail to touch her spirit. Thus, after some rumination, I set upon the course and from the fountain of my soul flew out black-and-white pictures commensurate to Phyllis’ soul and inspired by her soul as well.
Before I started, I tried to find what I wanted to express from Phyllis’ poems. Once I started, my heart and pencil fused into one thing, and what was produced was a Kantian confusa of sense and scenes, unified in the universal hue of white-gray-black, a mysterious euphoria.
The poet so exclaims:
Seen from afar, it is a peak picturesquely grand;
In the river, erect with pride, it does afar stand.
Her poem, A Lone Island, continues:
What a pity, it’s but an unlucky lone island, --by nature without a dike,
Without an artificial rainbow bridge.
With its reflection, it’s a prisoner of the surrounding water for e’er;
The land to it is a hope it can reach ne’er!
The solitude often holds fast to the small boat night and day!
In this rainy season, it leaves itself by the mist hidden away.
On a fine day, its small tower turns its lively face to the clouds alone;
The winding stone steps amid the toll in the pine trees go beyond the calmness.
Its particular contour it has made with the greatest care;
In this vast land, where can one find sympathy, something to share?
While I was reading, my thought led me to The Tears of Aegean Sea, Romantic Greece, a poem I read some time ago. “That stretch of sea replete with romance”. Her charm lies in “not only the water, but also the isles resonant with fairy tales”..., ...my two visits to the Greek isles now occurred to me, that blue Aegean Sea! ... When I finished drawing the peak picturesquely grand, the sea and the clouds, the sunset was made visible in ink, the afterglow immersed in the sea... Once again, I seemed to have seen the near sea rolling an expanse of clarity, like a fluctuating piece of emerald, waves upon waves inhaling daylight and blending it well and in the interior of the sea brewing whole sketches of blue thick like wine, intense like a lover’s ogle, (Review of Aegean Sea, National Geographic). I was infatuated while gazing and gazing.
Now back to normal, I feel what I have tried to cling to should be a kind of good setting, like a dream, between being and non-being--reading Phyllis’ poems, drawing sketches of them and my own travels... In this way, I drew “the dawning cloud” and “A blue expanse of sky, colors fluctuating with colors, leaping to fly...”; I drew “ The moon round fades...Past the old willows”, “Their hues are displaced everywhere, on the hills, and between leaves and twigs, like drunk butterflies ”, I drew “The wisteria blows”, “The weak and soft green lawn”, I drew “In the light of water your dreamlike white lotus flowers sway”, ”The buds of brilliance with dew”, “the fragrance of wild lotuses”, “Your leaves with laughter are immersed in red dye”, “The fragrance of flowers, red and white, was strewn on a small meandering path”, I drew “The snow night outside, and the muddy lot”, “The sun with some warmth cast a slanting light to every treetop”, and I drew “The same lamplight beyond the hill, Stars all over the sky”...Stroke after stroke, with the variation of ink and pencil, to express brushstrokes, hues, shapes and figures in the drawings. For the best effect of artistic configuration, I applied a combination of form, color, line, feeling and meaning to express Phyllis’s charm of poetry.
In those days, I thought it over while reading her poetry, wrote a familial essay of it while drawing. Every day I finished my work, I would share my experience with my friends on wechat. It was a wonderful experience indeed. I stayed indoors from morning to evening, lost in the happiness.
Several weeks later, on 23rd September, I finally finished all the drawings and matched them with the poems. A release of sigh!
Right now, Love Is a Faith, a song by Zhang Xinzhe, occurs to me. If drawing is my true love, I don’t think it matters whether others appreciate or understand me. What matters is the inexplicable feeling when my work has been done. Let me put it this way, as an artist, if without true love for Phyllis, I would not have persevered that way. This work may be deemed as my breakthrough after tries and trials for dozens of years as an artist.
Today, while I write, I feel what is gone is gone, a new sense of void ahead....
Here I wish to express my sincere thanks to Mr. Li Jianbo and Mr. Zhao for their trust and appreciation. Without Mr. Li’s recommendation, I would not have had the chance to illustrate Mr. Zhao’s translations; without Mr. Zhao’s trust, I would not have had the chance for cooperation, and I would not have had the chance to configure or create drawings of Phyllis’s art, a task. I felt quite challenging. A cloud makes the sun outshine all; a spring gives the peak a waterfall. Just with this opportunity, I have entered Phyllis’s spiritual world, so inspired that I feel being raised up to a new realm of creation.
