The Displacement of Fear: Frail Human Bonds in "Crooner" and "Nocturne"

本篇論文擬借用齊格蒙‧包曼「液態」概念，探討石黑一雄新作〈低吟歌手〉與〈夜曲〉中脆弱的人際紐帶。根據包曼的主張，生活在液態現代社會的人們都是身處在脆弱人際紐帶所引發的詭異情境中，因為液態社會裡人際紐帶的韌度降低，但它流動的力度卻讓人更靈活地彼此維繫，更靈活的人際關係是否能讓深陷液態之愛的男男女女克服就此被綁住的「恐懼」，抑或只是用不同的方式呈現焦慮？兩個短篇故事中的主角都因害怕孤單所以要找人同行，但新的不安卻從別處湧現，這種揮之不去的液態恐懼打破了原有的秩序與體制，導致他們幾近丑角的荒謬行徑，但在荒誕的背後卻是怕被遺棄的淒涼。如果明天就必須鬆開維繫此刻人際關係的安全帶，石黑一雄筆下的液態陌生人們仍會為追求生命遠景，毫不遲疑地繼續在液態愛的國度裡，尋找下一個可與之連結的人際紐帶。

關鍵字

液態現代性；液態恐懼；脆弱人際紐帶；詭異；憂喜參半的恩賜

並列摘要

This paper follows Zygmunt Bauman's observations of the frail human bonds exhausted in his theorization of ”liquidity” to examine the vulnerable human connections implied in Kazuo Ishiguro's ”Crooner” and ”Nocturne.” According to Bauman, people living in the liquid modern world cannot but experience the uncanny frailty of human bonds-the feeling of insecurity that frailty inspires and the conflicting desires that feeling prompts to tighten the bonds yet keep them loose. The human bonds only need to be loosely tied, so that they can be untied right afterwards when settings change. Connections thus become virtual relations because they are easy to enter and to exit. Immersed in the realm of liquid love, can dwellers in the liquid modern society prevent themselves from the fear of fixed connections by getting used to the virtual relations, or, project their anxieties of not being able to relate to ”people in the know”? Characters in ”Crooner” and ”Nocturne,” the habitants in the liquid society, are afraid of being left alone, so they have to find others like them to assist them in unraveling or unpacking the liquid fear and to draw from the knowledge that they are not alone in their efforts to cope with the quandaries. If tomorrow they have to live without the security of togetherness they experience today, Ishiguro's liquid strangers will still choose, with a view to a rosy picture in the realm of liquid love, to relate again without little delay.