（沉默的）觀看之道與政治寓言

Seeing comes before words. The child looks and recognises before it can speak.

重讀《觀看之道》，沒想到這也是一本當今數字監控時代的政治寓言。雖說一千人眼中，有一千個哈姆雷特，早已是陳詞濫調，但其中蘊含的道理仍不過時。只是哈姆雷特如今是什麼樣貌，取決於我們身在何處，從哪裡出發。

書中所言，觀看先於文字，就像孩童在牙牙學語前，早就瞪大個眼睛，四處觀看辨識周遭的世界了。

But there is also another sense in which seeing comes before words. It is seeing which establishes our place in the surrounding world; we explain that world with words, but words can never undo the fact that we are surrounded by it.

當然，除開如此淺顯的意思，是觀看先建立了我們存於世界的位置，然後我們再用文字/言語來解釋這一切。因而是觀看，讓我們有了“周遭”。這並非是說文字不重要，我們使用文字來表達，詮釋，描繪和虛構我們的所見所聞。但沒有了文字，我們所看的，我們的周遭，並不會因此而消失。那麼，這是不是可以說，所寫無法否認和消滅所看。文字和言語，宣傳和鼓動，可以影響我們看什麼，我們如何去看，但不可否認，我們與這真假難辨的一切的遭遇，是因為我們在看著。

The relation between what we see and what we know is never settled. Each evening we see the sunset. We know that the earth is turning away from it. Yet the knowledge, the explanation, never quite fits the sight. The Surrealist painter Magritte commented on this always-present gap between words and seeing in a painting called The Key of Dreams.

但我們所看到的和我們所知的並不等同。所看與所知的關係總是在變化，我們好像永遠也沒法將我們所看的與所知的完全對上。我們看到太陽東昇西落，於是我們說，太陽升起來了。但其實我們知道，太陽是不會升起來的。是我們的仰望，我們的觀看，如此以為。而我們的所知告訴我們，這是地球的自轉。因此，文字與直觀之間永遠有一條補不上的縫隙，讓我們沒法講到底：我們到底看到了什麼，又到底從中知道了些什麼。超現實主義畫家，馬格里特的畫作The Key of Dreams 就是這麼一個評論的問號，畫在了所知與所看的等式之間。

The way we see things is affected by what we know or what we believe. In the Middle Ages when men believed in the physical existence of Hell the sight of fire must have meant something different from what it means today. Nevertheless their idea of Hell owed a lot to the sight of fire consuming and the ashes remaining- as well as to their experience of the pain of burn.

When in love, the sight of the beloved has a completeness which no words and no embrace can match: a completeness which only the act of making love can temporarily accommodate.

所看與所知總是相互影響。這其中少不了，相信的力量。這力量可不小，足以改變地獄和火焰。中世紀時期篤定地獄存在的人們看到熊熊烈火時，心中的印象應該與現在的人所看到的火焰大相徑庭吧。如果沒有見過烈火，沒有看到過大火燃燒之後，寸草不生，滿地焦痕，沒有體驗過灼燒，又如何想像、相信末日與地獄呢？

但我們總是少不了要相信點什麼吧？我們相信我們所看到的，有時就是這麼簡單。可這卻引來了深深的矛盾，哪怕只是字面上的。因為我們常常說，人們盲目相信... 但有時卻是看到了才相信的啊！現今的反智主義在信息的繭房中，在柏拉圖的洞穴中，堅信他們的所見。也許在這時候，所見就真成了所知。

Yet this seeing which comes before words, and can never be quite covered by them, is not a question of mechanically reacting to stimuli. (It can only be thought of in this way if one isolates the small part of the process which concerns the eye's retina.) We only see what we look at. To look is an act of choice. As a result of this act, what we see is brought within our reach- though not necessarily within arm's reach. To touch something is to situate oneself in relation to it. (Close your eyes, move around the room and notice how the faculty of touch is like a static, limited form of sight.) We never look at just one thing; we are always looking at the relation between things and ourselves . Our vision is continually active, continually moving, continually holding things in a circle around itself, constituting what is present to us as we are.

所幸，觀看總為我們留有餘地，再貪婪暴力的文字都填不滿。在觀看與文字之間的空隙即自由。觀看絕不是唯物的，除非我們硬是要剝開生活與萬物間的聯繫，改造世界，只談一個原子的“科學”。觀看是一種選擇，我們只看到我們所選擇看到的。因而當我們閉眼不看，閉而不聽時，我們其實也是在選擇我們的周遭，我們的世界。周圍的牆的磚瓦是我們自己添的，我們的自身也隨之而改變。因為，我們能所見的，我們選擇所見的，我們觀看的方式，永遠將我們與周遭緊密聯繫在一起。我們從來不是看單個的事物，我們所看的，不管明顯與否，都是一種關係，一種聯繫。

Soon after we can see, we are aware that we can also be seen. The eye of the other combines with our own eye to make it fully credible that we are part of the visible world. If we accept that we can see that hill over there, we propose that from that hill we can be seen. The reciprocal nature of vision is more fundamental than that of spoken dialogue. And often dialogue is an attempt to visualise this-- an attempt to explain how, either metaphorically or literally, ' you see things', and an attempt to discover how 'he sees things'.

當我們在看山時，也理應假想當我們站上山頭時，我們也能眺望到剛剛在遠處觀望的自己。我們的眼睛里永遠有倒影。當我們想看到自己時，必須要望向別處，不管是鏡子，還是別人的眼睛。主動與被動，在觀看中，成了相互包含的關係。我們的視線，在不斷的移動中，將事物聯繫起來；周遭在改變，在流動，我們也是。在這個意義上，觀看即行動，即使沉默。