刘霞:美国笔会自由写作奖答谢辞

 先生们，女士们：
    
    很遗憾，刘晓波和我都不能到场领奖。
    
    26年前，我们都写现代诗，并以诗为媒介，相识相知相爱，直至发生20年前那场史无前例的学潮和屠杀。刘晓波义无反顾地置身其间，成为家喻户晓的六四黑手。他的命运也由此改变，数次入狱，在家的时间也多半不自由。作为妻子，我别无选择地成了丈夫不幸命运的一部分。
    
    但是，我不是刘晓波的附庸，我酷爱诗歌和绘画，同时，我也没把刘晓波仅仅看作一个政治人物。他始终是笨拙而勤奋的诗人，即使在狱中，他也没放弃写诗，狱卒搜走纸笔，他就凭空构思着。这20年来，他和我的这种用于心灵对话的爱情诗，已经积累了几百首。其中一首这样写道：
    
    

进入坟墓前
    

别忘了用骨灰给我写信
    

别忘了留下阴间的地址
    
    
    另一位中国诗人廖亦武这样评论刘晓波的诗：他背负着六四亡灵在爱、在恨、在祈祷。这样的作品同样可以写于纳粹集中营或俄国十二月党人的流放途中，就像“奥斯维辛之后写诗是野蛮的”，适合八九后的中国国情。
    
    然而，我明白，这个奖在名义上，不是鼓励诗人刘晓波，而是鼓励《零八宪章》的起草人、政论家刘晓波。我提醒大家注意这两个身份之间的联系。我觉得刘晓波正是以诗人的激情在推动中国的民主，以诗人的激情一再对独裁者说不！不！不！
    
    在私底下，他却以诗人的温情，对六四至今得不到安息的冤魂们，对我，对他亲爱的朋友们一再说是。是。是。
    
    感谢美国笔会。感谢独立中文笔会。感谢在场的每一位先生和女士。
    
    刘霞于2009年4月17日，不自由的北京家中
    
    
    
    (Translated into English byTienchi M.-Liao)
    
    
    Thanks to the American PEN for awarding Liu Xiaobo to the Freedom of expression prize
    
    
    Ladies and Gentlemen,
    
    It is a pity that both my husband Liu Xiaobo and I could not be present this evening to receive this award.
    
    Twenty six years ago, both of us were writing modern poetry. It is through our poetry that we became acquainted and eventually fell in love. Six years later, the unprecedented student democratic movement and massacre occurred in Beijing. Xiaobo dutifully stood his ground, and, consequently, became widely known as one of the so-called June 4th \”black hands.\” His life then changed forever. He has been put into jail several times, and even when he is at home, he is still, for the most part, not a free man. As his wife, I have no other choice but to become a part of his unfortunate life.
    
    Yet, I am not a vassal of Liu Xiaobo. I am very fond of poetry and painting, but at the same time, I have not come to view Xiaobo as a political figure. In my eyes, he has always been and will always be an awkard and diligent poet. Even in prison, he has continued to write his poems. When the warden took away his paper and pen, he simply pulled his verse out of thin air. Over the past twenty years, Xiaobo and I have accumulated hundreds of such poems, which were born of the conversations between our souls. I would like to quote one here:
    
    
    Before you enter the grave
    
    Don’t forget to write me with your ashes
    
    Do not forget to leave your address in the nether world
    
    
    Another Chinese poet, Liao Yiwu, has commented on Xiaobo’s poem: “He carries the burden of those who died on June 4th in his love, in his hatred and in his prayers. Such poems could have been written in the Nazi’s concentration camps or by the Decembrist during the exile in Imperial Russia. I also want to quote the famous sentence: ‘It is barbaric to write poetry after Ausschwitz’”. Such statements are also characteristic of the situation in China after 1989.
    
    
    I understand, however, this award is not meant to encourage Liu Xiaobo, the poet, but rather to encourage Liu Xiaobo, the political commentator and initiator of Charter 08. I would like to remind everyone of the close connection between these two identities. I feel that Xiaobo is using his intensity and passion as a poet to push the democracy movement forward in China. He shouts passionately as a poet “no, no, no” to the dictators.
    
    
    In private, he whispers gently to the dead souls of June 4th, who, to this day, have not received justice, as well as to me and to all his dear friends: “yes, yes.”
    
    Finally, I extend my deepest gratitude to the PEN American Center, the Independent Chinese PEN and everyone in attendance at this event tonight.
    
    
    Liu Xia, April 17th, 2009 at my not free home in Beijing