生于贫民窟，她曾写下“饥饿是我的胎教”，女儿的出生却让她写出童话（福利送书）丨读书者说

虹影的名字总是和“争议”相关联。

她在发表的自传体小说中坦然揭露作为私生子的身世，作品英文版在欧洲大卖，《K-英国情人》被英国《独立报》评为2002年“Books of the Year”，又因为同一本书惹来官司，在第二部自传体小说《好儿女花》中爆出错综复杂的三角恋关系……千禧年前后的虹影几乎每次在媒体出现都会引起轩然大波。

但在2014年，虹影出人意料地出版了她的第一部儿童文学作品、神奇少年桑桑系列的第一部《奥当女孩》，再次带领读者走进自己的家乡重庆，但这一次却是跟着一个小男孩经历一场奇幻的探险。

虹影在那之后陆续出版《米米朵拉》以及神奇少年桑桑的另外四部，而前不久出版的《彩虹之心》，代表着神奇少年桑桑的正式完结。

桑桑系列插图

最近很流行超越年龄限制的“少女感”，虹影就是一个典型的例子。

参加新书发布会的虹影，白净瘦削，留着微卷的及肩长发，齐刘海半丸子头，紫色衬衣蓝色牛仔裤，完全看不出她在个人自传中写到的苦难的痕迹。

虹影开始写儿童文学无疑是和女儿的出生有关，从给女儿讲睡前故事开始，到完成6本书献给女儿。虹影的文风也从一开始无情地揭露现实变得童话般温暖柔软。

我结婚了，有了孩子，生命也走了一半，对整个世界有包容心。这种态度写出来的东西心神气定，转移到故事中就是宽容的，同情的。特别是女儿出生后，我再也没有时间忧郁了，身上总有使不完的劲。女儿的童年和我不一样，有父母的关爱，我希望她健康快乐。

许多作家，最初写作的动因，也许包含着对父母以及对原生家庭的某种现状、要求和做法与自身无法协调的一次反叛和无声的抗议。

但也许长大成人，为人父母之后，或在另外某个瞬间，突然会领悟到父母的初衷，也许并不足以遗忘或原谅，但足够谅解，足够达成与童年时或青少年时自我的和解。

❶

《饥饿的女儿》

大多数读者听说虹影都是因为《饥饿的女儿》这部自传体小说。

在这部作品中，虹影毫无掩饰地描写了自己从小生活的重庆贫民窟环境和人性的肮脏，在描写自己和父母、五个哥哥姐姐若即若离的关系时逐渐揭露家庭背后的惊人故事和自己被人唾弃的身世。

我从不主动与人提起生日，甚至对亲人，甚至对最好的朋友。先是有意忘记，后来就真的忘记了。十八岁之前，是没人记得我的生日，十八岁之后，是我不愿与人提起。不错，是十八岁那年。

I never bring up the subject of my birthday, not with my family and not with my closest friends. At first an intentional omission, eventually I truly forgot. No one remembered my birthday for my first eighteen years, and after that I simply avoided the issue. No mistake about it, it all happened in my eighteenth year.

故事从“我”的十八岁开始，开篇就以自己被陌生男子跟踪将读者引入一个紧张且严酷的氛围之中。

我从未告诉母亲和父亲，不知如何说才好，说不清楚。很可能，他们会认为是我做了什么不规之事，臭骂我一顿。好多年我独自承担这个秘密，渐渐这件事失去了任何恐惧意味，甚至不再神秘。每次有目光盯着背脊——大约隔半月或十天，我总有背脊发凉的感觉。事情本身没什么可怕可恨，可能与生俱来，可能每个人都会遇到。人一辈子，恐怕总会有某个目光和你过不去，对此，我可以装作不在乎。说实在的，平时愿意看我一眼的人本来就太少。

I never told my father or mother. What was there to tell? They might think I’d done something shameful and give me hell. So I kept this a secret for years, until eventually my fears vanished and there was no more mystery. Perhaps being stared at is a normal part of life that everyone experiences at sometime or other, and shouldn't be seen as frightening or loathsome. It would be difficult to get through life without ever suffering irksome looks, and I could easily have pretended I wasn't bothered by them, particularly since so few people back then were willing even to look my way.

loathsome adj. 令人憎恶的；令人呕吐的

美国国家公共电台（National Public Radio）的Karen Ma形容《饥饿的女儿》用一种让人揪心且直言不讳（gut-wrenching and unflinchingly frank）的文字，用其真挚坦诚打动读者。

And this is the second extraordinary thing about Hong Ying's memoir: its unapologetic honesty. There's not a shred of pretension, nor any effort to sugarcoat the truth — whether it's focused on the author's life or China's history.
这就是虹影的回忆录的第二个非凡之处：一种毫无歉意的坦诚。不管是谈及作者的生活还是中国的历史，它都没有丝毫的假装，没有试图美化事实。

But it's not all dark; this is ultimately a book about hope and the resilience of human nature, as we watch Hong Ying rise out of destitution and family shame to become an accomplished writer.
但它并不全是黑暗的；这最终还是一本关于希望和人性的韧性的书，因为我们看到虹影从穷困和家庭的耻辱中挣脱出来，成为一位有成就的作家。

虽然虹影以无比现实的笔法展现出了她的世界，但对于跟我一样没有经历过类似环境的读者来讲，《饥饿的女儿》充满了超现实感，打开书就好像一下子被拖进几十年前重庆的艳阳下，跟着六姑娘一起经历或目睹周围的一切，真实却难以置信。

❷

《好儿女花》

在《饥饿的女儿》里，我们看到一个叛逆、愤怒的六姑娘，无情地揭露丑恶现实，仅仅关心自己的身世和缺失的爱。

而在十余年后虹影的另一部自传体小说《好儿女花》中，她明显对亲情、母爱有了更深刻的思考，“十八岁的我成天跟母亲赌气，一心想考上大学，离家远远，哪会愿意去弄懂母亲的心”。

《好儿女花》以母亲的葬礼为开始，六姑娘急急忙忙地赶回家，却没能在母亲去世前见最后一面。

这次，再次回到故乡的六姑娘以一种不一样的心境回忆母亲、讲述自己离家后的故事。

在这本回忆录中，“母亲”的形象变得温柔、亲切起来，在冷漠的表象之下，读者得以看到一个历经苦难而愈加坚韧的母亲形象。

家里少有的发黄黑白照片里，倒有母亲穿旗袍和高跟皮鞋烫发的照片，她高额头，忧郁娴静，嘴角微带笑意，很妩媚。眼睛深情地看着什么地方，不见多幸福，却是焕然一新的亮堂，一派韵味。想来，少有人能抗拒这种美。

Among the few black-and-white photographs still in the house, there was a shot of mother in a cheongsam and high heels with her hair permed. She looks lovely in the yellowing photo, her high forehead giving her an air of elegant yet melancholy serenity, and a hint of a smile on her lips. Her eyes are gazing intently at something out of the frame, and while they don’t necessarily look happy, there's a brightness in them that seems fresh and alive. Not many people could resist that kind of beauty.

没人说我们四姐妹丑，可我们心里都清楚，我们四姐妹只是沾了点母亲长相的光，没一个胜过母亲。

No one had ever called me or my sisters ugly, but we’d been blessed with only a shadow of our mother’s looks. We couldn’t hold a candle to her.

在重新认识母亲的六姑娘眼中，母亲不再是一个“一身病痛的女人”形象，她终于开始承认母亲的美，也不再因为偏见而下意识地删去记忆中仅存的美好回忆。

爬起来一看，母亲没在床上，我找遍船厂，也没她的影子。我大哭着叫妈妈，醒来，发现是一个梦。可是母亲不在房间里，月亮透过乌云堆，孱弱地从窗外照耀下来，这小房间变得阴惨惨，更加冷飕飕。我躺在母亲的床上，害怕极了，关严蚊帐，不敢拉亮灯，也不敢叫。旁边的单人床，罩着蚊帐，没一会儿，母亲提着两瓶开水进来，她走过来，掀开蚊帐看看我，用手把我脸上的泪痕擦掉我马上放心地闭上眼睛继续睡。

Before long, mother came in carrying two thermoses of hot water. She walked over, looked into my eyes, and wiped away my tears with her hand. Reassured, I went straight back to sleep.

那是母亲吗？母亲一向对我蛮横、出奇冷淡，似乎她脸上总挂着串冰柱子，与我隔阂，是前世后生都不可改变的，像一个后妈，不像别人的母亲那么宠爱孩子，呵护有加，表示亲热。

Had it really been her, or was I still dreaming? My mother had always been short-tempered with me, and could be so extraordinarily cold it felt like a curtain of icicles separated us. She was like a stepmother, never doting on me the way other mothers did on their children, never making any of those little gestures that express a mother's affection for her child.

面对母亲的关爱温柔，我反倒不习惯了，认为自己在梦里。果然母亲第二天早上对我冷冰冰，她把已干的衣服放在我面前，埋怨地说，“要不是昨夜妈把衣服拿到锅炉房烘干，哪有你穿的，真是净给妈添麻烦！”她显得急躁，一副随时要发脾气的样子。

Sure enough, the next morning she had resumed her usual icy demeanor. She dropped the dry clothes in front of me, complaining, "You wouldn't have a stitch to wear if I hadn't taken your clothes to the boiler room to dry. You cause your mother nothing but trouble!" She seemed like she might lose her patience at any moment.

我在心里对自己说，就算那是一个梦，不管母亲之后对我如何不像母亲，我也该满足。

I told myself that even if it was only a dream, I should remember it always and feel content.

文中的母亲在冰冷的表象之下隐藏着无法言说的对六姑娘的深深的温柔与爱。

也许我们也该认识到，母爱也许也有不同的表现形式，也许母爱也可以和父爱一样如山般深沉。

也许只需要一个小小的契机，就能在沟通中打破隔阂，而不是在失去后遗憾终生。

❸

《彩虹之心》

虹影在2006年女儿Sybil出生前就开始阅读儿童文学，并在2012年花了两年时间完成了桑桑系列的第一部《奥当女孩》。

桑桑系列的开始让读者见证了虹影文风的转变，从现实变得奇幻，从尖锐变得柔美。

虹影自己说：“她来到这世上拯救了我，陪伴着我，我很幸福。我用所有的时间来陪她，见缝插针地写作，不再一个人随时背起行囊去远行。但爱幻想的本性没有变。”

这次虹影笔下的故乡不再仅仅是一个散发着恶臭的贫民窟，而是开辟了一个充满幻想和无限可能的世界。

“讲给女儿的故事，便还原了自己童年的梦。”

但虹影并不认为她所创作的是纯粹的儿童文学，童话或是幻想仅仅是一种形式，写出的也是将现实与幻想相结合的、既适合成人也适合儿童的故事。

在虹影的“现代童话”里，世界是一个既有黑暗也有光明的真实世界，但正是因为这些黑暗面让人性的真善美显得格外动人。

虹影和女儿

从制作上来说，桑桑系列也是一套制作非常精美、让人很有收藏欲的幻想作品。

全套作品的插图由英国著名插画师Cherry Denman完成，虹影为了让插画师更了解她想要的风格，准备了一百多张各个年代的照片中国物品的照片，最后用一种清新唯美却国际化的画风将中国故事展现给全球的读者。

桑桑系列插图

此外，桑桑系列还是国内少有的中英双语童书系列。有趣的是，虹影请了一位音乐家Nicholas Smith来翻译这套书。Smith是一位英国音乐家、指挥，并因为他为音乐和中英关系作出的卓越贡献获得了大英帝国勋章。选择音乐家来翻译让译文充满了音乐的韵律与节奏感，也更符合虹影作品语言的独特美感。

桑桑系列插图

在新发布的《彩虹之心》中，母爱也是一个重要的主题。少年桑桑和母亲相依为命、在母亲失踪后踏上奇幻的寻母之旅，让母子相聚的时刻变得格外珍贵与美好。

在江边一座吊脚楼里，有个女孩子在唱歌，歌声婉转动听。桑桑捡起露台上一片金黄的银杏树叶，上面有露水，他递给母亲：“哎，妈妈，我们来吹水花吧。”

In one of the houses propped up by stilts down by the river, a girl was singing in a pleasing voice. Sangsang picked some golden ginko leaves up from the rooftop. Their undersides were covered with dew. He handed one to his mother, saying, "Mum let's blow water flowers."

母亲低下身来，两个人的嘴一起吹起树叶上的露水，水珠花像小雨点一样散落开来。

Sangsang’s mother bent over, and the two of them blew the dew off the leaves, the pearls of water scattering like droplets of rain.

桑桑只想全身心地陪母亲，起码可以一天不去想这之外的事、将发生的事。他抬头看母亲，发现母亲也在看他，他笑了倘若有一天，这儿都没有了，也没关系，一切都在他的心里。

Sangsang’s only thought was to be with his mother. At least for one day he did not need to think about what had happened or consider the future. He looked up to find that she was also looking at him. He laughed. If, one day, all this was no more, it wouldn't matter. It was all in his heart.

那天桑桑和母亲手拉手地回家。他照常上学，母亲照常夜班，她说，等到桑桑上完学，有了工作，可以独立了，她就尽量不上夜班了。

That day, Sangsang and his mother went home hand in hand. He went to school as he usually did, and that evening, as his mother was leaving for the night shift, she told him that once he finished school and got a job, he would be independent and she would not have to work the night shift so much any more.

“不，那时，妈妈不必上班，桑桑养妈妈。”桑桑说。

“No, by then you won’t need to work. I'll look after you,” Sangsang said.

母亲高兴地一把抱住桑桑。

Sangsang’s mother hugged him happily.

“我喜欢听。真是，你一天一天长大，我倒真是喜欢你现在的样子和更小时的样子，老跟在我身后，不停地叫妈妈，像话包子一样问我这问我那。”

“That’s nice of you. And really, you are more grown up every day. I like you now, and I like your younger selves too, when you followed me around, always calling out to me—Mum, Mum! You talked your head off, constantly asking me about this and that.”

成为母亲之后的虹影明显对于母爱有了不一样的认识，从十八岁对母亲的冷漠不解变成了无需理由的满满的爱。