Phantom or Symptom: Narcissus, Ahab, and the Whale

生命的幻影，儘管難以言詮捉摸，卻絕非鏡花水月，無痕無力。透過完美的投射，幻象補全了生命裡缺殘的存在，與真實以同等力道共存，嘲弄地展現人類正是自斨成瞎的Oedipus，是傷殘累累的漁夫王Ahab，一生命定不足全和不完美，而永恆無解的人類與他的存在之謎，亦因此更加迷離。大鯨曰白曰黑，既善又惡，能愛能恨，忽雄忽雌，一直就泅泳於人類歷史之旁，且遠且近，在真實與虛幻間，曖昧翻攪，見證人類的現在與過往，並且預言人類的未來終是反覆不止的盲目、欠缺、矛盾與殘傷。不管是幻是實，是水仙花或大鯨，是Narcissus或Ahab，吾人所見所知俱是浩瀚宇宙中的迷離原子，神秘冷漠，聽憑命運任性地推轉它「恐怖極樂」的轉輪，惹起無盡驚嘆與磨折，迴響謎惑與爭辯不止。

關鍵字

幻象；徵兆；自戀

並列摘要

Ungraspable and hardly explicable as it is, the phantom of life is not the least incapable nor ”intangible.” With its perfect projection, the phantom image complements the deficient existence of life, co-exists with the substance in equal power, ironically manifests the incurable insufficiency and imperfection of human fate as the self-blinded Oedipus/the maimed Fisher King Ahab, and double mystifies the eternally insolvable myth of human and his existence. The Whale of both white and black, good and evil, love and hate, male as well as female has always been swimming as far as near alongside human history, turns and tosses its ambiguities between the real and unreal, testifies the human present with his past, and prophesies human future of repetitive blindness, lack, conflict, and wound. Phantom or symptom, flower or whale, Narcissus or Ahab, all that we see and perceive are but enigmatic atoms of the universe whose mystery and indifference indulge the wayward fate and its wheel of terror-joy to turn and incur incessant excitement and torment as well as echoes of puzzle and debate.