George Orwell’s 5 greatest essays: No. 5, “A Hanging”
George Orwell's essential humanity shone through his writing from the first.
George Orwell’s essential humanity shone through his writing from the first. (Randall Enos / Los Angeles Times)
By Michael Hiltzik
Nov. 4, 2013 5:32 PM PT
喬治‧歐威爾最偉大的五篇散文：第五篇，《絞刑》
喬治·奧威爾的本質人性從一開始就在他的作品中閃耀。
喬治·奧威爾的本質人性從一開始就在他的作品中閃耀。 （蘭德爾·伊諾斯/洛杉磯時報）
作者： 麥可‧希爾茨克
2013年11月4日下午5:32（太平洋時間）
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對於任何對左右翼政治以及最高層政治新聞感興趣的人來說，喬治·奧威爾的作品都是必不可少的。本週，正值他誕辰 110 週年之際，我們列出了他最偉大的五篇散文。
《絞刑》是歐威爾最早的散文之一，但已展現出他高超而細膩的寫作技巧。這篇作品於 1931 年以奧威爾的真名埃里克·布萊爾 (Eric Blair) 發表在約翰·米德爾頓·默里的文學雜誌《阿德爾菲》上，取材於他 1922 年至 1927 年擔任帝國警察的經歷；它是否報道了真實事件尚不確定，因為奧威爾本人有時稱其為“只是一個故事”。
在其寫作生涯的初期，奧威爾的作品就展現了他本質的人性和他表現細節的技巧——獄卒急於執行絞刑，一隻雜種狗闖進來試圖舔囚犯，被六個高大的武裝獄卒看守的“弱小”囚犯的滑稽形象。被判刑男子的姓名和罪行均未透露。
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文章中最著名的場景是囚犯突然側身避開路上的水坑。 「真奇怪，」奧威爾寫道，「直到那一刻，我才明白毀滅一個健康、神誌清醒的人意味著什麼。當我看到囚犯閃到一旁躲避水坑時，我才明白在生命正值高潮時結束生命是多麼神秘，多麼不可言喻的錯誤。這個人沒有死，他還活著，就像我們一樣。他已經失去了一個全身的器官都在運轉兩分鐘後，巨響了一個世界——我們中的一個世界就消失了一個世界。
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For anyone interested in the politics of left and right -- and in political journalism as it is practiced at the highest level, George Orwell’s works are indispensable. This week, in the year marking the 110th anniversary of his birth, we present a personal list of his five greatest essays.
“A Hanging” is one of Orwell’s earliest essays, but already a demonstration of his superb and subtle craftsmanship. The piece, published in 1931 in John Middleton Murry’s literary magazine the Adelphi under Orwell’s real name, Eric Blair, was drawn from his experiences as a member of the Imperial Police from 1922 to 1927; whether it reports an actual event is uncertain, for Orwell himself sometimes called it “just a story.”
At the outset of his writing career, Orwell’s work displays his essential humanity and his skill at the presentation of textured detail -- the impatience of the jailer to get the hanging done, the intrusion of a mongrel dog trying to lick the prisoner, the ludicrous image of the “puny” prisoner guarded by six towering armed warders. Neither the condemned man’s name nor his crime is specified.
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The most famous moment in the essay is the prisoner’s sudden sidestep to avoid a puddle in the path. “It is curious,” Orwell wrote, “but till that moment I had never realized what it means to destroy a healthy, conscious man. When I saw the prisoner step aside to avoid the puddle, I saw the mystery, the unspeakable wrongness, of cutting a life short when it is in full tide. This man was not dying, he was alive just as we were alive. All the organs of his body were working ... and in two minutes, with a sudden snap, one of us would be gone -- one mind less, one world less.”
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