The Drowned Giant
On the morning after the storm the body of a drowned giant was washed ashore on the beach five miles to the north-west of the city. The first news of its arrival was brought by a nearby farmer and subsequently confirmed by the local newspaper reporters and the police. Despite this the majority of people, myself among them, remained sceptical, but the return of more and more eye-witnesses attesting to the vast size of the giant was finally too much for our curiosity. The library where my colleagues and I were carrying out our research was almost deserted when we set off for the coast shortly after two o’clock, and throughout the day people continued to leave their offices and shops as accounts of the giant circulated around the city.
暴风雨过后的一个早晨，溺亡的巨人尸体被冲到城市西北方五英里外的海滩上。最初是附近一位农民传来尸体出现的消息，随后本地的新闻记者和警察加以确认。即便如此，包括我在内的大多数人仍然持怀疑态度。然而越来越多的目击者归来后，证实了巨人庞大无比，也彻底勾起了我们的好奇心。两点刚过，我和同事向海边出发时，我们开展研究工作的图书馆几乎空无一人。这一整天，全市都在流传着关于巨人的各种说法，所以不断有人离开办公室和商店去观看。
By the time we reached the dunes above the beach a substantial crowd had gathered, and we could see the body lying in the shallow water two hundred yards away. At first the estimates of its size seemed greatly exaggerated. It was then at low tide, and almost all the giant’s body was exposed, but he appeared to be a little larger than a basking shark. He lay on his back with his arms at his sides, in an attitude of repose, as if asleep on the mirror of wet sand, the reflection of his blanched skin fading as the water receded. In the clear sunlight his body glistened like the white plumage of a sea-bird.
等我们来到海滩高处的沙丘，一大群人已经聚集在那里，我们能看见尸体就躺在二百码外的浅滩上。起初对巨人身材的估计夸大了很多，后来海水退潮，几乎整个巨人的身躯都暴露出来，不过他似乎比一只姥鲨大那么一点点。他仰面躺着，手放在身侧，姿态安详，仿佛睡在一片镜子般的湿沙滩上，泛白皮肤的倒影正随着潮水一起散退，在明媚的阳光下，他的尸体像海鸥的白羽一样闪闪发光。
Puzzled by this spectacle, and dissatisfied with the matter-of-fact explanations of the crowd, my friends and I stepped down from the dunes on to the shingle. Everyone seemed reluctant to approach the giant, but half an hour later two fishermen in wading boots walked out across the sand. As their diminutive figures neared the recumbent body a sudden hubbub of conversation broke out among the spectators. The two men were completely dwarfed by the giant. Although his heels were partly submerged in the sand, the feet rose to at least twice the fishermen’s height, and we immediately realized that this drowned leviathan had the mass and dimensions of the largest sperm whale.
我和同事不满于人群中一本正经的解释，难以理解眼前的奇观，于是我们走下沙丘，来到卵石滩。所有人似乎都不愿意靠近巨人，不过半小时后，两个穿着水靴的渔人走出人群，穿过沙滩。随着他们渺小的身形靠近躺倒的尸体，旁观者突然在一片哗然中谈论起来。跟巨人一比，那两个人完全变成了侏儒。尽管他的脚后跟部分埋在沙中，但是双脚立起的高度至少是那两个渔人身高的两倍。我们立即觉察出，这个溺亡的庞然大物有着跟最大的抹香鲸一样的尺寸和体重。
Three fishing smacks had arrived on the scene and with keels raised remained a quarter of a mile off-shore, the crews watching from the bows. Their discretion deterred the spectators on the shore from wading out across the sand. Impatiently everyone stepped down from the dunes and waited on the shingle slopes, eager for a closer view. Around the margins of the figure the sand had been washed away, forming a hollow, as if the giant had fallen out of the sky. The two fishermen were standing between the immense plinths of the feet, waving to us like tourists among the columns of some water-lapped temple on the Nile. For a moment I feared that the giant was merely asleep and might suddenly stir and clap his heels together, but his glazed eyes stared skywards, unaware of the minuscule replicas of himself between his feet.
眼前已经有三艘渔船返航，高高的龙骨距离岸边还有四分之一英里，船员们正在船头眺望。岸边的旁观者很慎重，没有蹚过浅滩，但所有人都渴望近距离观看，于是便急切地走下沙丘，在卵石滩上等待。巨人身体周围的沙子已经被冲走，形成一个坑洼，仿佛他是从天空而降一般。两个渔人站在双脚下巨大的沙质基座之间向我们招手，如同游客游览尼罗河上某座水漫过的庙宇，行走在立柱之间。一刹那，我害怕巨人只是睡着，可能会突然惊动，并拢脚跟。可他无神的眼睛凝望着天空，不知道双脚之间站着自己的微型复制品。
The fishermen then began a circuit of the corpse, strolling past the long white flanks of the legs. After a pause to examine the fingers of the supine hand, they disappeared from sight between the arm and chest, then re-emerged to survey the head, shielding their eyes as they gazed up at its Graecian profile. The shallow forehead, straight high-bridged nose and curling lips reminded me of a Roman copy of Praxiteles, and the elegantly formed cartouches of the nostrils emphasized the resemblance to monumental sculpture.
接下来渔人开始围着尸体绕行，从白色的长腿旁边经过，停下来仔细检查手心朝上的手指，他们消失在手臂与胸廓之间，然后又重新出现，去观察头部。他们用手遮挡阳光，抬头凝望巨人古希腊风格的侧脸。矮额头、笔挺的鼻子和曲线嘴唇让我想起一件罗马人复制的普拉克西特列斯雕塑，鼻孔仿佛优雅的象形茧，更加凸显了跟不朽雕塑杰作的相似性。
Abruptly there was a shout from the crowd, and a hundred arms pointed towards the sea. With a start I saw that one of the fishermen had climbed on to the giant’s chest and was now strolling about and signalling to the shore. There was a roar of surprise and triumph from the crowd, lost in a rushing avalanche of shingle as everyone surged forward across the sand.
突然，人群中爆发出一声叫喊，好多人抬手指向大海。我吃惊地看见一个渔人已经爬上巨人的胸膛，此时正四处走动并向岸上示意。人群中掀起一阵惊讶和喜悦的喧嚣，所有人都向前拥动，冲过浅滩，飞溅的卵石淹没了人声。
As we approached the recumbent figure, which was lying in a pool of water the size of a field, our excited chatter fell away again, subdued by the huge physical dimensions of this moribund colossus. He was stretched out at a slight angle to the shore, his legs carried nearer the beach, and this foreshortening had disguised his true length. Despite the two fishermen standing on his abdomen, the crowd formed itself into a wide circle, groups of three or four people tentatively advancing towards the hands and feet.
我们接近仰卧的身体，他正躺在大小跟一块农田相当的水面上，我们兴奋的交谈再次平息，这个死亡巨人的庞大身躯令我们陷入沉默。他稍稍歪斜地伸展在岸边，双腿被冲得离海滩更近，这种显小的透视效果掩盖了他真正的体长。尽管两个渔人站在他的腹部，人群还是围成一大圈，三四个一组试探着朝他的手脚靠近。
My companions and I walked around the seaward side of the giant, whose hips and thorax towered above us like the hull of a stranded ship. His pearl-coloured skin, distended by immersion in salt water, masked the contours of the enormous muscles and tendons. We passed below the left knee, which was flexed slightly, threads of damp sea-weed clinging to its sides. Draped loosely across the midriff, and preserving a tenuous propriety, was a shawl of heavy open-weaved material, bleached to a pale yellow by the water. A strong odour of brine came from the garment as it steamed in the sun, mingled with the sweet but potent scent of the giant’s skin.
我和同伴们绕到巨人靠海的那一侧，他的臀部和胸部像搁浅的船体，高出我们许多，珍珠色的皮肤因为浸泡海水而肿胀，掩盖了大块的肌肉和筋腱的轮廓。我们经过稍有弯曲的左膝下方，一簇簇潮湿的海草粘在膝盖侧面。一条稀疏编织的厚围巾已经被海水漂成淡黄色，松垮地横搭在腹部，为他略微保留了一点体面。一股强烈的盐渍气味从被阳光晒干的织物上散发出来，跟巨人皮肤上浓郁的甜美气息混合在一起。
We stopped by his shoulder and gazed up at the motionless profile. The lips were parted slightly, the open eye cloudy and occluded, as if injected with some blue milky liquid, but the delicate arches of the nostrils and eyebrows invested the face with an ornate charm that belied the brutish power of the chest and shoulders.
我们在他的肩膀处停下脚步，抬头注视他一动不动的侧颜。他的嘴唇微微开启，睁开的眼睛阴翳浑浊，仿佛被注入了某种蓝色的奶液，但是鼻孔和眉毛的精致弧线为这张脸赋予了华贵的魅力，跟胸膛和肩膀展现的野性力量格格不入。
The ear was suspended in mid-air over our heads like a sculptured doorway. As I raised my hand to touch the pendulous lobe someone appeared over the edge of the forehead and shouted down at me. Startled by this apparition, I stepped back, and then saw that a group of youths had climbed up on to the face and were jostling each other in and out of the orbits.
他的耳朵高悬在我们头顶上方，仿佛雕刻出的入口。我伸手触摸悬垂的耳垂，这时有人从前额侧缘探出头，对着我叫喊。我被这诡异的场面吓到，后退了一步，然后看见一群年轻人已经爬到巨人脸上，互相横冲直撞。
People were now clambering all over the giant, whose reclining arms provided a double stairway. From the palms they walked along the forearms to the elbow and then crawled over the distended belly of the biceps to the flat promenade of the pectoral muscles which covered the upper half of the smooth hairless chest. From here they climbed up on to the face, hand over hand along the lips and nose, or forayed down the abdomen to meet others who had straddled the ankles and were patrolling the twin columns of the thighs.
此时人们已经爬到巨人身上的各个部位，他平放的手臂被当做一段双层楼梯使用，大家从掌心沿着小臂走到臂弯，然后爬过高高隆起的肱二头肌，来到便于走动的平坦胸肌，这部分覆盖了光滑没有毛发的胸膛的上半部分。从这里他们可以爬上脸庞，一点点地沿着嘴唇和鼻子行走，也可以冒险向下，沿腹部去加入其他已经跨坐在脚踝和行走在两条柱状大腿上的人们。
We continued our circuit through the crowd, and stopped to examine the outstretched right hand. A small pool of water lay in the palm, like the residue of another world, now being kicked away by the people ascending the arm. I tried to read the palm-lines that grooved the skin, searching for some clue to the giant’s character, but the distension of the tissues had almost obliterated them, carrying away all trace of the giant’s identity and his last tragic predicament. The huge muscles and wrist-bones of the hand seemed to deny any sensitivity to their owner, but the delicate flexion of the fingers and the well-tended nails, each cut symmetrically to within six inches of the quick, argued a certain refinement of temperament, illustrated in the Graecian features of the face, on which the townsfolk were now sitting like flies.
我们穿过人群，继续绕行，停下来查看巨人伸出的右手。一小汪水残留在掌心，仿佛是另一个世界的遗迹，此时正在被登上这条胳膊的人踩踏溅开。我努力分析皮肤上刻画的掌纹，寻找巨人性格特征中的一丝线索，但是组织的膨胀几乎抹光了它们，带走了巨人所有的身份特征和他最后的悲剧性处境。手上巨大的肌肉和腕骨似乎在替主人拒绝一切感伤，然而精致的手指曲线和精心修剪的指甲——每个指甲都对称地多留出不到六英寸的长度——展现出一定程度的高雅气质，这种气质也呈现在古希腊风格的面部特征中，然而此时，小城居民却像苍蝇一样坐在他的脸上。
One youth was even standing, arms wavering at his sides, on the very tip of the nose, shouting down at his companions, but the face of the giant still retained its massive composure.
一个年轻人甚至就站在他的鼻尖上，晃动着平伸的手臂保持平衡，朝下方的伙伴大喊，然而巨人的表情仍然无比沉着。
Returning to the shore, we sat down on the shingle, and watched the continuous stream of people arriving from the city. Some six or seven fishing boats had collected off-shore, and their crews waded in through the shallow water for a closer look at this enormous storm-catch. Later a party of police appeared and made a half-hearted attempt to cordon off the beach, but after walking up to the recumbent figure any such thoughts left their minds, and they went off together with bemused backward glances.
回到岸边，我们坐在卵石滩上，看着持续不断的人流从城市来到这里。六七艘渔船已经返回到近海，船员们蹚过浅滩，想要仔细看看被暴风雨送来的庞然大物。后来一伙警察来到沙滩上，敷衍地想要封锁海滩，但是走到躺倒的巨人跟前时，任何警戒的想法都已被抛到九霄云外，然后他们集体离开，还不时一脸茫然地回头观望。
An hour later there were a thousand people present on the beach, at least two hundred of them standing or sitting on the giant, crowded along his arms and legs or circulating in a ceaseless mêlée across his chest and stomach. A large gang of youths occupied the head, toppling each other off the cheeks and sliding down the smooth planes of the jaw. Two or three straddled the nose, and another crawled into one of the nostrils, from which he emitted barking noises like a dog.
一小时后，海滩上聚集了有一千人，至少有二百人站在或坐在巨人身上，挤在手臂和双腿上，或者在整个胸部和腹部不停地打闹。一大群年轻人占据了头部，在脸颊上互相推搡，顺着光滑的颌部滑下。两三个人跨坐在鼻子上，还有一个人爬进鼻孔，在里边学狗叫。
That afternoon the police returned, and cleared a way through the crowd for a party of scientific experts – authorities on gross anatomy and marine biology – from the university. The gang of youths and most of the people on the giant climbed down, leaving behind a few hardy spirits perched on the tips of the toes and on the forehead. The experts strode around the giant, heads nodding in vigorous consultation, preceded by the policemen who pushed back the press of spectators. When they reached the outstretched hand the senior officer offered to assist them up on to the palm, but the experts hastily demurred.
那天下午警察又回到海滩，在人群中为一队来自大学的科学家开路，他们都是大体解剖学和海洋生物学的权威学者。那群年轻人和其他大多数人从巨人身上爬下去，剩下几个顽固分子还站在脚趾和前额上。专家们在巨人周围大步绕行，热烈磋商点头，警察在他们前方开路，推开迫近的旁观者。来到张开的手掌时，那名高级警官主动要帮他们登上去，但是专家们急忙表示反对。
After they returned to the shore, the crowd once more climbed on to the giant, and was in full possession when we left at five o’clock, covering the arms and legs like a dense flock of gulls sitting on the corpse of a large fish.
他们回到岸上以后，人群再次爬到巨人身上。我们五点钟离开那里时，他们已经把巨人完全占领，挤满双臂和双腿，仿佛一群海鸥密密麻麻地聚在一条死去的大鱼身上。
I next visited the beach three days later. My friends at the library had returned to their work, and delegated to me the task of keeping the giant under observation and preparing a report. Perhaps they sensed my particular interest in the case, and it was certainly true that I was eager to return to the beach. There was nothing necrophilic about this, for to all intents the giant was still alive for me, indeed more alive than many of the people watching him. What I found so fascinating was partly his immense scale, the huge volumes of space occupied by his arms and legs, which seemed to confirm the identity of my own miniature limbs, but above all the mere categorical fact of his existence. Whatever else in our lives might be open to doubt, the giant, dead or alive, existed in an absolute sense, providing a glimpse into a world of similar absolutes of which we spectators on the beach were such imperfect and puny copies.
三天后我又一次造访海滩，我在图书馆的朋友已经重拾工作，他们委托我持续观察巨人并准备一份报告。或许是他们感受到我对此事产生了特别的兴趣，当然毫无疑问，我迫切希望返回那片海滩。这与恋尸癖无关，因为对我而言，无论从哪方面来看，那个巨人都还活着，的确比很多围观者更加鲜活。我发觉他如此迷人的原因部分在于极大的身材，四肢所占据的大量空间，这似乎确认了我四肢微小的特征，不过更重要的，纯粹就是他存在于世上这个绝对的事实。不管我们的生活中还有什么其他事情可以公开质疑，巨人死也好，活也好，他都是绝对的存在，让我们稍微感受了一下类似的绝对真理造就的世界，而沙滩上我们那些旁观者都是非常不完美的渺小复制品。
When I arrived at the beach the crowd was considerably smaller, and some two or three hundred people sat on the shingle, picnicking and watching the groups of visitors who walked out across the sand. The successive tides had carried the giant nearer the shore, swinging his head and shoulders towards the beach, so that he seemed doubly to gain in size, his huge body dwarfing the fishing boats beached beside his feet. The uneven contours of the beach had pushed his spine into a slight arch, expanding his chest and tilting back the head, forcing him into a more expressly heroic posture. The combined effects of sea-water and the tumefaction of the tissues had given the face a sleeker and less youthful look. Although the vast proportions of the features made it impossible to assess the age and character of the giant, on my previous visit his classically modelled mouth and nose suggested that he had been a young man of discreet and modest temper. Now, however, he appeared to be at least in early middle age. The puffy cheeks, thicker nose and temples and narrowing eyes gave him a look of well-fed maturity that even now hinted at a growing corruption to come.
我来到海滩时，人群数量已经少了很多，二三百人坐在卵石滩上野餐，或者观看群群游客动身走过沙滩。后续的几次潮水把巨人进一步冲向岸边，推动头部和肩膀更接近海滩，所以他似乎又大了一倍，巨大的躯体让脚边停放的渔船显得相形见绌。海滩不平整的地形把巨人的脊柱撑起一个微小的弧度，导致胸膛扩张，头部后仰，迫使他形成一个更加明显的英勇姿态。海水的作用和组织肿胀的效果相互结合，让脸庞显得更光滑，没有那么年轻。虽然无法根据巨大的五官评估巨人的年龄和性格，但是我上次来看时，古典模特风格的嘴巴和鼻子表明，他曾是个温和谨慎的年轻人。不过此时他显得至少已经初入中年。肿胀的脸颊、增厚的鼻子和太阳穴、变窄的眼睛都带给他一种养尊处优的成熟样貌，甚至现在都预示了加剧的腐朽即将降临到他身上。
This accelerated post-mortem development of the giant’s character, as if the latent elements of his personality had gained sufficient momentum during his life to discharge themselves in a brief final resumé, continued to fascinate me. It marked the beginning of the giant’s surrender to that all-demanding system of time in which the rest of humanity finds itself, and of which, like the million twisted ripples of a fragmented whirlpool, our finite lives are the concluding products. I took up my position on the shingle directly opposite the giant’s head, from where I could see the new arrivals and the children clambering over the legs and arms.
巨人的性格特征在他死后得到加速发展，似乎他个性中的潜在因素在他在世期间获得了充足的动量，并在这简短的最终总结里释放出来，继续让我为之着迷。它标志着巨人屈服于严苛的时间体系，我们其余的人类在这套体系中找到了自身，如同破碎的旋涡中无数扭曲的水波，我们有限的生命也是这套系统的终极产物。我来到正对着巨人头部的卵石滩上，能看见新来这里的人和攀爬巨人四肢的孩子。
Among the morning’s visitors were a number of men in leather jackets and cloth caps, who peered up critically at the giant with a professional eye, pacing out his dimensions and making rough calculations in the sand with spars of driftwood. I assumed them to be from the public works department and other municipal bodies, no doubt wondering how to dispose of this gargantuan piece of jetsam.
早晨的参观者中有许多人身穿皮夹克，头戴布帽，用专业的目光审慎地抬头端详巨人，用脚步丈量他的尺寸，在沙地上用石头和浮木粗略计算。我猜他们来自公务部门和其他市政机构，无疑是在思考如何处理掉这件巨大的海上残骸。
Several rather more smartly attired individuals, circus proprietors and the like, also appeared on the scene, and strolled slowly around the giant, hands in the pockets of their long overcoats, saying nothing to one another. Evidently its bulk was too great even for their matchless enterprise. After they had gone the children continued to run up and down the arms and legs, and the youths wrestled with each other over the supine face, the damp sand from their feet covering the white skin.
The following day I deliberately postponed my visit until the late afternoon, and when I arrived there were fewer than fifty or sixty people sitting on the shingle. The giant had been carried still closer to the shore, and was now little more than seventy-five yards away, his feet crushing the palisade of a rotting breakwater. The slope of the firmer sand tilted his body towards the sea, and the bruised face was averted in an almost conscious gesture. I sat down on a large metal winch which had been shackled to a concrete caisson above the shingle, and looked down at the recumbent figure.
好几个穿戴潇洒的家伙、马戏团老板和类似人物都来到这里，双手插进长大衣的口袋，绕着巨人缓缓溜达，互相不说一句话。显然巨人庞大的身躯对于他们无与伦比的企业而言也是难以承受的。他们离去以后，孩子继续在四肢跑上跑下，年轻人在仰着的脸上摔跤，他们脚上沾的湿沙都蹭在白色的皮肤上。第二天，我故意把参观巨人的时间推迟到午后。当我到达时，有五六十人坐在卵石滩上。巨人已经被冲到离海岸更近的地方，此时在七十五码稍远一点的地方，他的脚正挤压着腐朽的防波堤栅栏，坚实的沙滩形成一道斜坡，令他的身体略微倾朝大海，瘀青的脸庞被扭转成一个几乎像是清醒过来的姿势。卵石滩上的一口混凝土沉井用锁链绑着一台大金属绞车，我就坐在那上面观看下方躺着的巨大身躯。
His blanched skin had now lost its pearly translucence and was spattered with dirty sand which replaced that washed away by the night tide. Clumps of sea-weed filled the intervals between the fingers and a collection of litter and cuttle-bones lay in the crevices below the hips and knees. But despite this, and the continuous thickening of his features, the giant still retained his magnificent Homeric stature. The enormous breadth of the shoulders, and the huge columns of the arms and legs, still carried the figure into another dimension, and the giant seemed a more authentic image of one of the drowned Argonauts or heroes of the Odyssey than the conventional human-sized portrait previously in my mind.
他发白的皮肤此时已经失去了珍珠般半透明的光泽，身上的泥沙被夜里的潮水冲走，但是白天又被人沾得到处都是，大团海草填满了手指之间，一批垃圾和乌贼骨堆在屁股和双膝下方的缝隙里。不过尽管如此，尽管面貌特征在不断肿胀，巨人还保持着《荷马史诗》中描述的壮丽身姿。宽阔的肩膀和粗壮的四肢，仍然把他呈现在另一个维度上，这位巨人更像是一位淹死的阿尔戈英雄或者《奥德赛》中的英雄人物，而不是此前我头脑中刻画的人类大小的惯常形象。
I stepped down on to the sand, and walked between the pools of water towards the giant. Two small boys were sitting in the well of the ear, and at the far end a solitary youth stood perched high on one of the toes, surveying me as I approached. As I had hoped when delaying my visit, no one else paid any attention to me, and the people on the shore remained huddled beneath their coats.
我走到下方滩涂，蹚过一滩滩海水走向巨人。两个小男孩正坐在耳洞里，远端一个年轻人独自站在高高的脚趾上，趁我走过去时仔细打量着我。跟我推迟观看巨人时期待的一样，没有别人注意我，岸上的人仍然披着大衣挤作一团。
The giant’s supine right hand was covered with broken shells and sand, in which a score of footprints were visible. The rounded bulk of the hip towered above me, cutting off all sight of the sea. The sweetly acrid odour I had noticed before was now more pungent, and through the opaque skin I could see the serpentine coils of congealed blood-vessels. However repellent it seemed, this ceaseless metamorphosis, a visible life in death, alone permitted me to set foot on the corpse.
巨人手心朝上的右手里覆盖着泥沙和破碎的贝壳，其中还有许多脚印清晰可见。圆滚滚的臀部耸立在我旁边，把海景遮挡得严严实实。我此前闻到的甜美的强烈气味，此时更加刺鼻，透过晦暗的皮肤我能看见血管蜿蜒盘绕，里边的血液已经凝固，不管看起来多么让人心生厌恶，这种不停的变化如同死亡中呈现的生机，足以接纳我踏足尸体之上。
Using the jutting thumb as a stair-rail, I climbed up on to the palm and began my ascent. The skin was harder than I expected, barely yielding to my weight. Quickly I walked up the sloping forearm and the bulging balloon of the biceps. The face of the drowned giant loomed to my right, the cavernous nostrils and huge flanks of the cheeks like the cone of some freakish volcano.
利用他伸出的拇指作为楼梯扶手，我爬上手掌并开始攀登。皮肤比我预期的要硬，几乎不受我体重的影响。我很快走上倾斜的小臂和二头肌呈球形隆起的大臂，溺亡巨人的脸渐渐展现在我右边，鼻孔幽深，巨大的颧骨侧围仿佛一座奇特的火山锥。
Safely rounding the shoulder, I stepped out on to the broad promenade of the chest, across which the bony ridges of the ribcage lay like huge rafters. The white skin was dappled by the darkening bruises of countless footprints, in which the patterns of individual heel-marks were clearly visible. Someone had built a small sandcastle on the centre of the sternum, and I climbed on to this partly demolished structure to give myself a better view of the face.
我稳稳绕过肩头，踏上宽阔平坦的胸肌，穿过像巨椽一样的胸廓骨质凸起。白色皮肤上斑驳地印着脚踩出来的深色瘀青，每个人的脚印形态都清晰可辨。有人在胸骨的中间堆了一小座沙堡，我踩上这座部分损毁的结构，从更好的角度观察他的脸。
The two children had now scaled the ear and were pulling themselves into the right orbit, whose blue globe, completely occluded by some milk-coloured fluid, gazed sightlessly past their miniature forms. Seen obliquely from below, the face was devoid of all grace and repose, the drawn mouth and raised chin propped up by its gigantic slings of muscles resembling the torn prow of a colossal wreck. For the first time I became aware of the extremity of this last physical agony of the giant, no less painful for his unawareness of the collapsing musculature and tissues. The absolute isolation of the ruined figure, cast like an abandoned ship upon the empty shore, almost out of sound of the waves, transformed his face into a mask of exhaustion and helplessness.
那两个小孩正在攀上耳朵，爬进右眼眶，里边的蓝色眼球浸满了牛奶状的液体，并没有把两个小孩的渺小身躯看在眼里。我以倾斜的角度看着脸庞，原来的优雅与宁静全都不见了，绷紧的嘴以及一条条硕大肌肉撑起的脸颊类似于一艘遇难大船被撞碎的船首。我头一次注意到巨人身上这种极度的痛苦，不会因为他察觉不到肌肉和组织的瓦解就会有所减缓。巨人被毁的形象含有一种绝对的孤独，仿佛一艘船被抛弃在空旷的海滩上，几乎没有海浪的声音，他的脸也化作一张显得精疲力竭且无能为力的面具。
As I stepped forward, my foot sank into a trough of soft tissue, and a gust of fetid gas blew through an aperture between the ribs. Retreating from the fouled air, which hung like a cloud over my head, I turned towards the sea to clear my lungs. To my surprise I saw that the giant’s left hand had been amputated.
我向前走去时，脚踩进一团软组织，恶臭的气体从肋骨间的一道切口喷出来。难闻的气味像一朵云悬在头顶，我向后躲避，转向大海呼吸新鲜空气，结果惊讶地发现巨人的左手已经被截去。
I stared with bewilderment at the blackening stump, while the solitary youth reclining on his aerial perch a hundred feet away surveyed me with a sanguinary eye.
我困惑不解地盯着发黑的残肢，而那个单独的年轻人斜倚在他的空中领地，从一百英尺外用残暴的目光审视着我。
This was only the first of a sequence of depredations. I spent the following two days in the library, for some reason reluctant to visit the shore, aware that I had probably witnessed the approaching end of a magnificent illusion. When I next crossed the dunes and set foot on the shingle the giant was little more than twenty yards away, and with this close proximity to the rough pebbles all traces had vanished of the magic which once surrounded his distant wave-washed form. Despite his immense size, the bruises and dirt that covered his body made him appear merely human in scale, his vast dimensions only increasing his vulnerability.
His right hand and foot had been removed, dragged up the slope and trundled away by cart. After questioning the small group of people huddled by the breakwater, I gathered that a fertilizer company and a cattle food manufacturer were responsible.
这只是一系列劫掠的开始。接下来的两天我留在图书馆，出于某种原因不愿意再去海岸边。我心里明白，自己可能已经见证了一个伟大幻象走向终结。等我下次翻过沙丘、走上卵石滩时，巨人距离岸上只有二十码出头，曾经在远处，有一种魅力围绕着他被海浪冲刷的身躯，现在距离高低不平的卵石滩如此之近，那种魅力已经消失殆尽。尽管他身形巨大，可是覆盖身体的瘀青和泥沙衬得他只有人类大小，巨大的身材更加凸显了他的脆弱。他的左手和左脚已经被切下并拖上山坡，然后用推车运走。问过挤在防波堤上的一小群人之后，我了解到一家肥料公司和一家家畜饲料生产商对此负责。
The giant’s remaining foot rose into the air, a steel hawzer fixed to the large toe, evidently in preparation for the following day. The surrounding beach had been disturbed by a score of workmen, and deep ruts marked the ground where the hands and foot had been hauled away. A dark brackish fluid leaked from the stumps, and stained the sand and the white cones of the cuttlefish. As I walked down the shingle I noticed that a number of jocular slogans, swastikas and other signs had been cut into the grey skin, as if the mutilation of this motionless colossus had released a sudden flood of repressed spite. The lobe of one of the ears was pierced by a spear of timber, and a small fire had burnt out in the centre of the chest, blackening the surrounding skin. The fine wood ash was still being scattered by the wind.
A foul smell enveloped the cadaver, the undisguisable signature of putrefaction, which had at last driven away the usual gathering of youths. I returned to the shingle and climbed up on to the winch. The giant’s swollen cheeks had now almost closed his eyes, drawing the lips back in a monumental gape. The once straight Graecian nose had been twisted and flattened, stamped into the ballooning face by countless heels.
巨人剩下的右脚悬在空中，一根钢索固定在大脚趾上，显然是为第二天拖走做准备。周围的海滩上已经被许多工人弄得乱七八糟，巨人手脚被拖走的地方也留下了深深的沟壑。断肢处渗出一种深色的咸涩液体，沾染了沙滩和白色的乌贼骨。我走下卵石滩，看见灰色皮肤上刻着大量幽默标语、万字符和其他标志，似乎截断这个一动不动的巨人突然释放出一股被压抑的怨恨。一侧的耳垂被一根尖利的木材刺透，胸口中间还有一小堆已经燃尽的篝火，周围的皮肤都已经被熏黑，细腻的木灰正在被风吹散。一股难闻的气味笼罩着尸体，这是腐败难以掩饰的标志，至少驱散了通常聚在这里的年轻人。我回到卵石滩，爬上绞车。巨人此时因为脸颊肿胀几乎闭上了双眼，抻得双唇大张。古希腊风格的挺拔鼻子已经扭曲扁平，被无数只脚踩进肿成气球一样的面孔里。
When I visited the beach the following day I found, almost with relief, that the head had been removed.
第二天我又到海滩时，几乎是放心地发现，巨人的头颅已经被移走。
Some weeks elapsed before I made my next journey to the beach, and by then the human likeness I had noticed earlier had vanished again. On close inspection the recumbent thorax and abdomen were unmistakably manlike, but as each of the limbs was chopped off, first at the knee and elbow, and then at shoulder and thigh, the carcass resembled that of any headless sea-animal – whale or whale-shark. With this loss of identity, and the few traces of personality that had clung tenuously to the figure, the interest of the spectators expired, and the foreshore was deserted except for an elderly beachcomber and the watchman sitting in the doorway of the contractor’s hut.
接下来我再去海滩已经是几周之后，那时，我之前注意到的巨人身上与人类的相似之处再次消失。仰卧的胸部和腹部无疑跟人类类似，可是四肢先是从膝盖和手肘处被砍掉，然后是从大腿和肩膀处，剩下的躯干类似任何一种无头的海兽身体——鲸鱼或鲸鲨。巨人缺失了身份以及若即若离地依附在身体上的少量个性特征，旁观者的兴趣也被耗尽，海滩上只剩下一位上了年纪的拾荒者和一位坐在承包商小屋门口的守夜人。
A loose wooden scaffolding had been erected around the carcass, from which a dozen ladders swung in the wind, and the surrounding sand was littered with coils of rope, long metal-handled knives and grappling irons, the pebbles oily with blood and pieces of bone and skin.
一座松动的木质脚手架已经被竖立在尸体周围，上面伸出的十几架梯子在风中摇晃，周围的沙地上散落着一盘盘绳索、金属柄长刀和钩锚，卵石上沾着血液、碎骨和皮肤，显得滑腻腻的。
I nodded to the watchman, who regarded me dourly over his brazier of burning coke. The whole area was pervaded by the pungent smell of huge squares of blubber being simmered in a vat behind the hut.
我朝守夜人点点头，他阴郁地隔着燃烧的炭火盆注视我。小屋后面的一个容器里炖煮着大块的油脂，致使这里到处弥漫着刺鼻的气味。
Both the thigh-bones had been removed, with the assistance of a small crane draped in the gauze-like fabric which had once covered the waist of the giant, and the open sockets gaped like barn doors. The upper arms, collar bones and pudenda had likewise been dispatched. What remained of the skin over the thorax and abdomen had been marked out in parallel strips with a tar brush, and the first five or six sections had been pared away from the midriff, revealing the great arch of the rib-cage.
在一辆小型起重机的助力下，两根大腿骨裹着曾经覆盖巨人腰部的网状围巾被移走，断开的关节像谷仓敞开了大门。上臂、锁骨和外生殖器也同样被运走。胸部和腹部残留的皮肤上已经用焦油刷平行标记成一段一段，最靠前的几段已经从腹部切割下来，展现出胸腔巨大的弧度。
As I left a flock of gulls wheeled down from the sky and alighted on the beach, picking at the stained sand with ferocious cries.
我离开时，一群海鸥从天空盘旋着落在海滩上，一边凶恶地鸣叫，一边啄食染血的沙子。
Several months later, when the news of his arrival had been generally forgotten, various pieces of the body of the dismembered giant began to reappear all over the city. Most of these were bones, which the fertilizer manufacturers had found too difficult to crush, and their massive size, and the huge tendons and discs of cartilage attached to their joints, immediately identified them. For some reason, these disembodied fragments seemed better to convey the essence of the giant’s original magnificence than the bloated appendages that had been subsequently amputated. As I looked across the road at the premises of the largest wholesale merchants in the meat market, I recognized the two enormous thighbones on either side of the doorway. They towered over the porters’ heads like the threatening megaliths of some primitive druidical religion, and I had a sudden vision of the giant climbing to his knees upon these bare bones and striding away through the streets of the city, picking up the scattered fragments of himself on his return journey to the sea.
几个月后，巨人出现的新闻事件基本被人遗忘，他身体上被肢解下来的各个部分开始在全城范围内重新出现，其中的大部分都是化肥生产商难以粉碎的骨头。它们尺寸惊人，有大块的筋腱和连在关节处的片片软骨，让人一下就能识别出来。出于某种原因，这些脱离了身体的部位似乎比后来被切割的肿胀四肢更有效地传达出巨人原本的宏大精髓。我望向街对面肉类市场最大批发商的店铺，认出门口两边的两根巨型大腿骨，它们高高耸立在搬运工的头顶，如同某种古德鲁伊教的骇人巨石。我仿佛突然看见，巨人靠这两根光溜溜的大腿骨，用膝盖大步踏过城市的街道，在返回大海的途中拾起自己散落的身体部件。
A few days later I saw the left humerus lying in the entrance to one of the shipyards (its twin for several years lay on the mud among the piles below the harbour’s principal commercial wharf). In the same week the mummified right hand was exhibited on a carnival float during the annual pageant of the guilds.
又过了几天，我看见左肱骨横放在一座船坞的入口（右肱骨一直都在港口第一商业码头下边桩柱间的泥沙上）。同一周里，风干的右手在行业协会年度庆典的游行彩车上展出。
The lower jaw, typically, found its way to the museum of natural history. The remainder of the skull has disappeared, but is probably still lurking in the waste grounds or private gardens of the city – quite recently, while sailing down the river, I noticed two ribs of the giant forming a decorative arch in a waterside garden, possibly confused with the jaw-bones of a whale. A large square of tanned and tattooed skin, the size of an indian blanket, forms a backcloth to the dolls and masks in a novelty shop near the amusement park, and I have no doubt that elsewhere in the city, in the hotels or golf clubs, the mummified nose or ears of the giant hang from the wall above a fireplace. As for the immense pizzle, this ends its days in the freak museum of a circus which travels up and down the north-west. This monumental apparatus, stunning in its proportions and sometime potency, occupies a complete booth to itself. The irony is that it is wrongly identified as that of a whale, and indeed most people, even those who first saw him cast up on the shore after the storm, now remember the giant, if at all, as a large sea beast.
不出所料，下巴得以收入自然历史博物馆，头颅的其他部分已经不见，不过它可能仍然潜藏在荒地或者城中的私人花园里——不久之前，沿河向下游航行时，我注意到两根肋骨在一座水滨花园被做成装饰拱门，大概被误认为是鲸鱼的下颌骨吧。在游乐场附近的一间新奇物品商店，印第安毛毯那么大的一块鞣制文身皮肤被用作娃娃和面具的背景衬布。在城里的其他地方，有些酒店或高尔夫俱乐部无疑是把巨人风干的耳朵或鼻子挂在了壁炉上方。至于那根巨型阴茎，它最终被一家在西北部到处演出的马戏团收入了畸形博物馆。这个巨大的组织器官体现出惊人的尺寸和曾经出色的性能力，独自占据一间帐篷展出。讽刺的是，它被误认为是鲸鱼的阴茎。其实大部分人，甚至最初看见巨人被暴风雨冲上海滩的那些人，如今都把他记成了一只大型海兽。
The remainder of the skeleton, stripped of all flesh, still rests on the sea shore, the clutter of bleached ribs like the timbers of a derelict ship. The contractor’s hut, the crane and the scaffolding have been removed, and the sand being driven into the bay along the coast has buried the pelvis and backbone. In the winter the high curved bones are deserted, battered by the breaking waves, but in the summer they provide an excellent perch for the sea-wearying gulls.
余下的骸骨被剥去所有肉体组织，仍然停留在海滩上，那簇被海水漂白的肋骨仿佛是一艘废弃船只的散落木材。承包商的小屋、起重机和脚手架都已不见，被冲进海湾沿岸的沙子已经埋住骨盆和脊椎。冬天，高耸的弯骨被强劲的海浪拍打，显得孤单寂寞；不过到了夏天，它们为飞累的海鸥提供了绝佳的休息之处。