文學的時空批判：由〈現此時先生〉論黃春明的老人系列小說

The Chronotopic Critique Literature : A Study of Huang Chun Ming’s Old People Series Novels by analyzing Mr. Meantime

〈現此時先生〉是黃春明1986年發表之短篇小說，也是停筆多年後開啟連串「老人系列」的作品，亦是台灣宣布解除報禁的前一年。劇情描述偏遠山村唯一識字的「現此時先生」，每天利用「過期報紙」把新聞當成故事朗讀給十餘名老人消磨時間，卻因讀到一則當地事件而引起懷疑並發生衝突。本文藉由巴赫金「時空體」及班雅明「說故事」等概念，分析這篇小說以「報紙」架構出來的多層次對立，包括鄉村與都市之對立、過期與現時之對立，及更重要的，文學敘事上的故事與報紙之對立。文分三個部分進行論證：一、分析〈現此時先生〉作品的「過期報紙」蘊含的故事與新聞之關係，並指出其中多種不同層次的時空體操作；二、分析〈現此時先生〉的時空設定，由此察知老人問題的原因不來自具體加害者、而是傳統與現代的時空衝突，老人問題的悲劇因而更顯深沈；三、分析〈現此時先生〉在黃春明創作階段的意義，指出老人問題的歸因延續到1986年之後的多篇小說，是《放生》系列與其他時期作品的結構性差異。

“Mr. Meantime” is a short novel written by Huang Chun-Ming in 1986, the yearright before the press ban was officially lifted in Taiwan. It is also considered as thepioneer work in his “Old People Series” novels. The plot of the novel is about thirteen elderlypeople in a remote village listening to Mr. Meantime to read outdated newspapersfor spending their time, and one day suspicion and conflict aroused when Mr. Meantimeread an incredible local report to the elderly. This paper adapting W. Benjamin’s conceptof story-telling, as well as M. Bakhtin’s methodology of “chronotope” argues that thenovel uses the “newspaper” to construct some complicated oppositions, including villagevs. city, out-of-date vs. up-to-date, and most importantly the theory of story vs. newspaperin the literature. These arguments are verified in three parts in the paper. First,the relationship between stories and news containing in the outdated newspapers of thenovel and its varied ways of chronotopic operation are analyzed. Second, through analyzingthe time-space setting in the novel, the causes of the elderly problems were notfrom particular perpetrators, but from the conflicts of time and space between traditionand modernity thus aggregating the tragic problems of the elderly are found. Third, thesignificant meaning of Mr. Meantime in Huang Chun-Ming’s writing career is discussed,and the paper also points out that the topic of the causes of elderly problems extendedto his other novels after 1986, which makes the structure of Life Set Free Series differentfrom his other works.