Feet first
步行至上
Have you ever been so heartbroken that you felt a need to cover yourself in effluent?Erling Kagge, a Norwegian explorer, has. In his latest book, “Walking: One Step at a Time” (translated by Becky Crook), he describes how the sewer he was navigating once became so small that he was forced to shuffle on his stomach, his nose skimming a river of muck. He emerges into daylight head to toe in human waste, yet feeling better for his jaunt.
你是否曾经伤心至极，以至于想要把自己泡在污水里？挪威探险家艾林·卡格(Erling Kagge)就曾如此。在最新著作《行走：一步一个脚印》(贝基·克鲁克Becky Crook翻译)中，他这样写道，他曾经穿行的那条下水道变得十分狭小，迫使他不得不趴着挪动，鼻子掠过肮脏的水流。重见天日的时候，他从头到脚都沾满了人类的排泄物，但他对这段短途旅行感觉好极了。
In his previous book, “Silence: In the Age of Noise”, Mr Kagge emphasised the quiet of subterranean New York. In “Walking” he revisits the urban underworld to reflect on the therapeutic effects of exploration. The first person to complete the “Three Poles Challenge”—ie, reaching both poles and the summit of Mount Everest—on foot, Mr Kagge reminisces about how far he has gone to escape. In those sewers he took a break from his crumbling marriage and dodged arrest for trespassing. He lives out his notion that pain can be “beneficial and pleasurable”; his credo is that shortcuts make any endeavour “superficial” and pointless.
在其上一部著作《寂静：喧嚣的年代》中，卡格先生重点描写了地下纽约的宁静。在《行走》中，他重新探访这座城市的地下世界，思考探险的治愈作用。作为第一个徒步完成“三极挑战”的人——即到达两极和登顶珠峰——卡格缅怀着自己漫长的“逃亡”之路。在那些下水道里面，他暂时摆脱了支离破碎的婚姻，并躲过了警方以非法入侵罪对他进行的抓捕。他用行动证实了自己的想法——痛苦可以是“有益的和愉快的”；他坚信，捷径会让任何努力变得“肤浅”且毫无意义。
Initially his book risks becoming a didactic screed about the dangers of modern technology, as the author laments the way cars, trains, buses and gawking at a smartphone speed life up, leaving little to be savoured. Yet in the end it is much more subtle than a typical self-help tome. He does not expect his readers to visit the meanest streets of Los Angeles, as he has done, or become so hungry that they crouch in the snow to retrieve a single lost raisin, as he did in Antarctica. Instead he uses his acquaintance with extreme environments to reflect on the mental and physical benefits of walking.
这本书的一开始，给人的感觉似乎是要进行一番关于现代科技危险性的繁冗说教，因为作者连连哀叹，坐着汽车、火车、公共汽车，盯着智能手机，日子越来越快，却几乎没有留下值得细细品味的东西。不过，相比一般的自助大部头书，它的描写到底还是要精细得多。他不希望读者像他那样，去造访洛杉矶最破陋的街道，或者像他在南极洲那样，饿得蹲在雪地里捡拾一颗丢失的葡萄干。相反，他借助自己对极端环境的了解，思考了步行对身心的益处。
“He who walks lives longer,” he writes, but that is “only half the truth”. The other half is that the act of walking also slows down time, and forces you to consider your surroundings. “The mountain up ahead, which slowly changes as you draw closer, feels like an intimate friend by the time you’ve arrived.” Walking, in other words, prolongs the experience of life, as well as life itself.
“步行的人活得更长，”他写道，但这只是“一半的真相”。另一半是，步行也会放慢时间，迫使你考虑周围的环境。“前面的山，随着你越走越近而慢慢改变，当你到达时，它看上去就像一个亲密的朋友。”换句话说，步行延长了生命的体验，也延长了生命本身。
（陈继龙译自《经济学人》杂志2019年4月6日刊）
