Han Kang's Nobel Prize Banquet Speech (2024)

As I was leaving my afternoon abacus lesson, the skies opened in a sudden downpour倾盆大雨.

当我结束下午的珠算课时，天空突然下起了倾盆大雨。

This rain was so fierce that two dozen children wound up huddled蜷缩 under the eaves of the building.

雨势如此猛烈，二十多个孩子不得不挤在建筑物的屋檐下避雨。

Across the street was a similar building, and under those eaves, I could see another small crowd.

街对面有一座类似的建筑，在那屋檐下，我看到另一小群人。

If I could see another small crowd, it was almost like looking into a mirror.

既然我能看到另一群小人物，这简直就像照镜子一样。

Watching that streaming rain, the damp soaking浸透 my arms and cuffs, I suddenly understood.

看着那连绵不断的雨水，感受着浸透我手臂和袖口的湿气，我突然明白了。

All these people standing with me, shoulder to shoulder, and all those people across the way were living as an 'I' in their own right.

所有这些与我肩并肩站着的人，以及对面那些人都作为独立的个体在各自生活着。

Each one was seeing this rain just as I was; this damp on my face, they felt it as well.

每个人都像我一样看着这场雨；我脸上的湿气，他们也感同身受。

It was a moment of wonder—this experience of so many first-person perspectives视角.

这是一个充满奇迹的时刻——体验如此众多的第一人称视角。

Looking back over the time I have spent reading and writing, I have relived重温 this moment of wonder again and again, following the thread of language into the depth of another heart.

回顾我阅读和写作的时光，我一次次重温这个奇迹时刻，沿着语言的线索深入他人的内心。

An encounter with another interior内心, taking my most vital and most urgent questions, trusting them to that thread and sending them out to other selves.

与另一个内心世界相遇，带着我最重要、最紧迫的问题，信任这些线索，并将它们传递给其他的自我。

Ever since I was a child, I have wanted to know the reason we are born, the reason suffering and love exist.

自童年起，我就想知道我们为何出生，痛苦与爱为何存在。

These questions have been asked by literature for thousands of years and continue to be asked today.

这些问题千百年来一直由文学提出，并延续至今。

What is the meaning of our brief stay in this world?

我们在世间短暂停留的意义是什么？

How difficult is it for us to remain human, come what may, in the darkest night?

无论发生什么，在最黑暗的夜晚，我们要保持人性是多么困难啊！

There is language that asks what we are made of.

有一种语言在追问我们是由什么构成的。

It insists on imagining into the first-person perspectives of the people and living beings that inhabit居住于 us, one another.

它坚持去想象栖息于我们体内、彼此之间的那些人和生灵的第一人称视角。

Literature that deals in this language inevitably不可避免地 holds a kind of body heat.

处理这种语言的作品不可避免地带有一种体温。

Just as inevitably, the work of reading and writing literature stands in opposition to all acts that destroy life.

同样不可避免的是，阅读和创作文学的工作与一切毁灭生命的行为相对立。

I would like to share the meaning of this award, which is for literature, with you—standing here in opposition to violence—together.

我想与大家分享这一文学奖的意义——我们站在这里，反对暴力，共同分享这份属于文学的荣誉。

Thank you.

谢谢。