Life Beyond Death: Holism and Transcendence
in Mahler’s Symphony No. 2
马勒《第二交响曲》的全局观和超越性
生命超越死亡（上）
By Tristan Frank
校对：王立舟 Cloud
The Second Symphony of Gustav Mahler, subtitled “Resurrection”, certainly emerged from unusual circumstances. While in the process of composing a symphonic poem calledTodtenfeier,Mahler experienced a distinct, vivid hallucination of himself “dead, laid out in state, beneath wreaths and flowers.”[1]It was this image that inspired him to compose an entire symphony relating to the theme of resurrection, withTodtenfeieras its first movement.
古斯塔夫·马勒的《第二交响曲》，其副标题为“复活”，显然是在不同寻常的情况下创作出来的。在写作交响诗《葬礼》的过程中，马勒感受到清晰而逼真的幻觉，他“死去的（遗体）躺在花圈和鲜花之上供人瞻仰。”正是这幅画面赋予了他灵感，从而创作出这首与复活主题有关的交响曲，他把《葬礼》作为这首交响曲的第一乐章。
The foundation on which the Symphony lies is twofold; the primary results ofSymphony No. 2are to convey a grand, large-scale conception of human existence, and to proclaim a message of hope: that death can never overcome life. Mahler’sSymphony No. 2serves as an empowering statement by treating death not as an ending point to life, but rather as an intermediate step in a more holistic sense of existence.
这首交响曲是基于两部分创作的；《第二交响曲》的重点是传达对人类存在的宏大构想以及宣告充满希望的讯息：死亡永远无法战胜生命。马勒的《第二交响曲》如同强有力的宣言：死亡并不是生命的终结，从更加全局性的人生观角度出发，死亡是一个中间阶段。
I will investigate the meaning at the heart ofSymphony No. 2by first examining what Mahler himself and important scholars said about the work, then will undertake a thematic and programmatic analysis of the finale to determine how the movement answers the questions posed in the prior movements, the way in which it relates to the titular “Resurrection” and how it brings closure to the symphony.
我将通过以下步骤研究《第二交响曲》核心含义，首先查看马勒本人与重要学者对这部作品的评价，接着对最后一个乐章进行专题的有计划的分析，以确定这个乐章是如何对前面乐章提出的问题作出解答，并确定它是如何与“复活”的标题联系起来，以及确定它是如何结束这首交响曲的。
The Resurrection Symphony considers philosophical questions of an immense nature. The work consists of five movements, the last of which is by far the longest—nearly all performances of the fifth movement extend beyond thirty minutes. Three known programs exist for the Symphony, two of which originate directly from Mahler.[2]
《“复活”交响曲》认为哲学问题的本质是非常宏大的。这首作品包括五个乐章，最后一个乐章是目前为止最长的——全五个乐章的演奏几乎超过三十分钟。这首交响曲有三个已知的作品解说，其中两个版本是马勒写的。
The third, a report by Natalie Bauer-Lechner, is in its entirety a direct quote from Mahler discussing his conceptions of the symphony and is the earliest of the three programs. Dated 1896, the Bauer-Lechner report was written well after the time of composition and additionally after the premiere in December 1895.
第三个版本是娜塔莉· 鲍尔-莱赫纳写的报告，全部直接引自马勒对这首交响曲的构思，这也是三个版本里最早的一个版本。鲍尔-莱赫纳的这份日期为1896年的报告，正好是在这首作品创作完成后并且是在1895年12月作品首演后写的。
The report explains that in Mahler’s mind, the first three movements have a particular narrative concerning a character – according to him, “a mighty being”, possibly the “Titan” of his first symphony – and the being’s struggle with broad concepts: life, eventual death, love, and a sense of identity. At the onset of the fourth movement, though, the work turns to a decidedly philosophical tone.
这份报告说明了在马勒看来，前三个乐章是关于一个角色的特定的描述，马勒认为，主角是一个“强大的存在”，可能是他《第一交响曲》里的“巨人”，也描述了这个存在与生命、最终的死亡、爱、自我认同感的斗争。尽管在第四乐章的开始，这首作品的音调明显变得具有哲思性。
Mahler writes: “The ‘Urlicht’ [fourth movement] represents the soul’s striving and questioning attitude towards God and its own immortality”. Here he has laid down critical questions about the character’s fate, but questions whose essence is not fully clear until the recapitulation of the fifth movement. Accepting this character as a microcosm of human life, Mahler essentially poses transcendent questions of death and the afterlife. Although the Symphony undeniably constitutes program music, the nature of the work’s message is decidedly ambiguous and can be interpreted by the individual listener.
马勒写道：“《太阳之歌》（第四乐章）代表了这个灵魂对神和它的永生抱有反抗和质疑的态度。这里马勒对主角的命运提出了非常重要的问题，但是问题的实质一直到第五乐章的再现部才完全清晰。马勒把这个角色等同于人生的缩影，实质上提出了关于死亡和来生的超然的问题。不可否认，虽然这首交响曲构成了标题音乐，但是毫无疑问，作品传达的信息的本质是不明确的，每位听众都可以有自己的解读。
Throughout the Bauer-Lechner essay, Mahler declines to provide details about the character’s quest; he offers guidelines rather than an actual narrative. Mahler had grown to develop a distaste for program notes at performances.[3]He believed that when such descriptions were provided, audiences lost their ability to perceive the music critically and instead would blindly believe what the program – surely written by the composer or a reputable scholar – stated. Above all, Mahler wished for each listener to create his or her own personal meaning when hearing his compositions.
在鲍尔-莱赫纳的通篇文章里，马勒拒绝具体透露主角在追求什么；他没有实际的叙述，而是提供了参考。马勒渐渐开始厌恶音乐会的作品解说。他认为当提供了这些作品描述时，听众会丧失批判性地感知音乐的能力，相反，他们会盲目相信作品解说中所说的，当然这些作品解说是作曲家或者有声誉的学者写的。最重要的是，马勒希望每位听众在听他的作品时，能够产生自己的个人思考。
His opinion was that music transcends language, and that therefore it was seemingly trivial to attach a specific narrative to a piece of music. Interestingly, this school of thought parallels that of Felix Mendelssohn, who did not write program music at all.[4]Eventually, due to his disgust for the way programs affected audiences, Mahler made an emphatic statement by banning the use of programs for his music.[5]
马勒认为，音乐超越了语言，因此给一首乐曲加上一个具体的描述似乎不那么重要了。有意思的是，这种观点与门德尔松的非常相似，门德尔松从来不写标题音乐。最终，由于马勒讨厌作品解说对听众的影响，他强烈地表明了态度：他禁止在他的音乐中使用作品解说。
In addition to his dislike of program notes, Mahler shows his aversion to revealing a particular religion for his music: “In fact, as all revealed religions do, it [a piece that reflects the clear influence of one specific religion] leads directly to misunderstanding, to a flattening and coarsening, and in the long run to such distortion that the work, and still more, the creator, is utterly unrecognizable … “.[6]
除了讨厌作品解说外，马勒也反感将他的音乐与某种宗教对应：“事实上，就像所有天启教那样，它（一首明显受了某一宗教影响的音乐）会直接导致误解，使作品变得扁平而粗俗，并最终遭受曲解，以至于作品甚至创作者都变得不再具有辨识度…”
Evidently Mahler believed that revealing a religion would lead only to a simplistic and derivative view of the symphony and its themes. It seems logical, then, that Mahler made every effort to paint each religious reference inSymphony No. 2with a shade of ambiguity.[7]There are multiple allusions to religion within the work. In the C section of the fifth movement, Mahler uses theDies iraemelody in one motive, which certainly seems to imply a Christian aesthetic.
显然马勒认为，表明宗教信仰只会导致人们对交响曲及其主题产生一个过于简单的和衍生而出的想法。那么在《第二交响曲》中，马勒尽力把每处涉及宗教的地方处理得模棱两可，这似乎是合理的。在这首作品里有很多对宗教的暗示。在第五乐章的c部分中，马勒在一个动机里使用了圣歌《最后审判日》里的旋律，似乎暗示了基督教的美学。
Both the fourth and fifth movements contain text that refers to “God” or “the Lord”. Additionally, the narrative of the finale relates strongly to the concept of a final judgment, such as the story of Revelations in the Christian Bible. However, despite the numerous implications, Mahler never directly references Christianity or any other religion.
第四和第五乐章都包含了暗指“神”或者“主”的歌词。另外，最后一个乐章所叙述的内容与最终审判的概念紧密相关，比如基督教圣经里《启示录》的故事。然而，尽管有如此多的暗示，马勒从未直接参照基督教或者任何其他的宗教信仰。
The text never introduces Christ, only “God”, which is a concept that can hold meaning for any theistic religion. Similarly, there is no evidence that the Christian God is the deity involved in the final judgment. The text could indicate a judgment in any religion or an abstract representation of judgment, such as karma or simply one’s own moral conscience.
歌词也没有引入基督，只引入“神”的概念，任何有神论的宗教都可以赋予含义。同样的，没有证据证明基督教的上帝是最终审判里的神。歌词可以暗示任何宗教信仰里的审判或者是对审判的抽象的描述，比如因果报应或者只是某人自身道德上的愧疚。
With the absence of explicit denominational references, one cannot fairly assume that any one belief system is more generously represented than another. By omitting a specific narrative and presenting religious implications in an opaque manner, Mahler clearly transmits the creed that no person or religion has all the answers to life’s meaning or to what happens after death, and therefore fosters a holistic view of existence. However, the symphony is not just a message of all-inclusiveness; the finale takes the previous questions a step further and conjures a resounding declaration of the “afterlife”.
缺少了明确的宗教的参照，每个人不能公然认为任何一个信仰体系更能代表另一个。通过省去一个具体的描述以及用晦涩难懂的方式表示出对宗教的暗示，马勒明显想传达的信条是没有人也没有宗教能对生命的意义或者死后会发生什么作出解答，所以促进了一种全局的人生观。然而，这首交响曲不仅仅想传达兼收并蓄的理念；最后一个乐章把前面的问题再推进了一步，作为对“来世”响亮的宣告。
In the process of determining how the fifth movement,Im Tempo des Scherzos, resolves the symphony both musically and thematically, the form and text take on vital importance.Im Tempo des Scherzosis set in a highly modified variant of sonata form.[8]The movement contains the typical structure of Exposition–Development–Recapitulation found in the Classical sonata form, but is much more tonally advanced than the I-V-I or i-III-i/I harmonic progression generally found in such compositions.
第五乐章在音乐性和主题性这两个方面对交响曲予以了解决。在判断这个问题的过程中，曲式和歌词至关重要。第五乐章采用了修改过的奏鸣曲式的变体。这个乐章包含古典奏鸣曲式的“呈示部-展开部-再现部”的典型结构，但是比起在一般作品里采用的I-V-I或者i-III-i/I的和声进行，这个乐章的调性更加突破传统。
The recapitulation, for example, does not begin in the same key as the exposition but instead is raised a half step, from F minor to G-flat minor. In the context of the essential questions that were posed earlier in the work, this Sonata-like structure is best viewed as a narrative that takes the listener through the most critical aspects of the symphony’s program.
例如，再现部不是以和呈示部一致的调性开始的，而是升高了半音，从F小调到降G小调。基于这首作品中早先提到的一些重要问题，这个像奏鸣曲式的结构最好被当成是一个叙述体，带领听众聆听这首交响曲的标题内容当中最关键的部分。
未完待续
