他山之石 | 写诗的十个提示
这是 是光诗歌 第 292 次 与你的动人分享
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他山之石，为“是光”新的固定栏目。通过定期翻译国外关于现代诗歌的朗读、创作、活动的文章，实现诗歌更大程度上的探索和借鉴推广。
这篇文章来自Dennis G. Jerz 的博客。文章简洁明了，生动形象地介绍了诗歌创作中的一些心得。其中的一些观点，比如如何避免陈词滥调，用具体的形象代替抽象概念等等不仅对于多种文体的写作，甚至对日常的交流形式都很有启发。
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If you are writing a poem because you want to capture a feeling that you experienced, then you don’t need these tips. Just write whatever feels right. Only you experienced the feeling that you want to express, so only you will know whether your poem succeeds. If, however, your goal is to communicate with a reader— drawing on the established conventions of a literary genre (conventions that will be familiar to the experienced reader) to generate an emotional response in your reader— then simply writing what feels right to you won’t be enough.
如果你是因为想要捕捉到你所经历的感觉而写一首诗，那么你就不需要这些技巧。只要写出正确的感觉就可以了。因为只有你体验到了你想要表达的感觉，所以只有你才能知道你的诗是否成功。但是，如果你的目标是与读者沟通——那么你就需要结合文学体裁的既定惯例（经验丰富的读者熟悉的惯例），了解你的文字会在读者中产生情感反应。只需写出符合感觉的东西或许是不够的。
These tips will help you make an important transition:
away from writing poetry to celebrate, commemorate, or capture your own feelings (in which case you, the poet, are the center of the poem’s universe)
towards writing poetry in order to generate feelings in your reader (in which case the poem exists entirely to serve the reader).
以下这些提示将帮助您在两种目的和方式之间转换：
不是为了庆祝，纪念或捕捉自己的感受来写诗（在这种情况下，诗人是诗歌宇宙的中心）；
而是为了让读者产生某种感情而写诗（在这种情况下，诗完全是为乐读者服务）。
Tip #1 Know Your Goal
提示1 了解你的目标
If you don’t know where you’re going, how can you get there?
You need to know what you are trying to accomplish before you begin any project. Writing a poem is no exception.
Before you begin, ask yourself what you want your poem to “do.” Do you want your poem to explore a personal experience, protest a social injustice, describe the beauty of nature, or play with language in a certain way? Once you know the goal of your poem, you can conform your writing to that goal. Take each main element in your poem and make it serve the main purpose of the poem.
如果你不知道你的目的地，那么该如何前行？
在开始任何项目之前，您需要知道自己的任务。写一首诗也不例外。
在你开始之前，问自己——你希望你的诗“做什么”。你想要你的诗探索个人经历，抗议社会不公正，描述大自然的美丽，或以某种方式玩文字游戏吗？一旦你了解了你写诗的目标，你就可以使你的写作符合这个目标。使你诗中的每一个主要元素都服从于诗歌的主要目的。
Tip #2 Avoid Clichés
提示2 避免陈词滥调
Stephen Minot defines a cliché as: “A metaphor or simile that has become so familiar from overuse that the vehicle … no longer contributes any meaning whatever to the tenor. It provides neither the vividness of a fresh metaphor nor the strength of a single unmodified word. The word is also used to describe overused but nonmetaphorical expressions such as ‘tried and true’ and ‘each and every'”
Cliché also describes other overused literary elements. “Familiar plot patterns and stock characters are clichés on a big scale”. Clichés can be overused themes, character types, or plots. For example, the “Lone Ranger” cowboy is a cliché because it has been used so many times that people no longer find it original.
A work full of clichés is like a plate of old food: unappetizing.
斯蒂芬迈诺特将陈词滥调定义为：“过度使用已经变得熟悉的隐喻或比喻......不再对表意有任何意义。它既没有新鲜的生动性，也不再有单个字词的力量……这个情况也适用于过度使用但非隐喻的表达，如‘tried and true’（亲试有效）和‘each and every’（一个每一个）。”
陈词滥调还出现在其他过度使用的文学元素中，“熟悉的情节模式和角色是常见的陈词滥调的形式”。这可能是过度使用的主题，角色类型或情节。例如，“Lone Ranger” （孤独的护林员）牛仔是一种陈词滥调，因为它已被使用了很多次，人们不再觉得它是原创的。
一部充满陈词滥调的作品就像一盘剩菜一样使人没有胃口。
Clichés work against original communication. People value creative talent. They want to see work that rises above the norm. When they see a work without clichés, they know the writer has worked his or her tail off, doing whatever it takes to be original. When they see a work full to the brim with clichés, they feel that the writer is not showing them anything above the ordinary. (In case you hadn’t noticed, this paragraph is chock full of clichés… I’ll bet you were bored to tears.)
Clichés dull meaning. Because clichéd writing sounds so familiar, people can complete finish whole lines without even reading them. If they don’t bother to read your poem, they certainly won’t stop to think about it. If they do not stop to think about your poem, they will never encounter the deeper meanings that mark the work of an accomplished poet.
陈词滥调是没有原创性的交流。大家重视创新的人才，希望看到超出常规的工作。当他们看到一部完全没有陈词滥调的作品时，他们知道作家已经尽到了他的最大努力 。当读者看到满满的陈词滥调时，他们觉得作家并没有向他们展示任何超越平凡的东西。（你可能已经注意到，这段话充满了陈词滥调......我敢打赌你会无聊到想流泪。）
陈词滥调使得意义沉闷。因为陈词滥调如此让人熟悉，读者甚至不用读就可以自动补全内容。如果他们都懒得读你的诗，他们肯定不会去仔细思考它。如果他们不愿仔细思考你的诗，他们就不会领会到作品的深层含义，也不会认为你是出色的诗人。
Examples of Clichés:
busy as a bee
tired as a dog
working fingers to bone
beet red
on the horns of a dilemma
blind as a bat
eats like a horse
eats like a bird
陈词滥调的例子：
像蜜蜂忙碌
累得像狗
工作到把手指磨成骨头
甜菜红
陷入两难境地
盲目的像蝙蝠
像马一样吃
像鸟一样吃
How to Improve a Cliché
I will take the cliché “as busy as a bee” and show how you can express the same idea without cliché.
Determine what the clichéd phrase is trying to say.
In this case, I can see that “busy as a bee” is a way to describe the state of being busy.
Think of an original way to describe what the cliché is trying to describe.
For this cliché, I started by thinking about busyness. I asked myself the question, “What things are associated with being busy?” I came up with: college, my friend Jessica, corporation bosses, old ladies making quilts and canning goods, and a computer, fiddlers fiddling. From this list, I selected a thing that is not as often used in association with busyness: violins.
Create a phrase using the non-clichéd way of description.
I took my object associated with busyness and turned it into a phrase: “I feel like a bow fiddling an Irish reel.” This phrase communicates the idea of “busyness” much better than the worn-out, familiar cliché. The reader’s mind can picture the insane fury of the bow on the violin, and know that the poet is talking about a very frenzied sort of busyness. In fact, those readers who know what an Irish reel sounds like may even get a laugh out of this fresh way to describe “busyness.”
Try it! Take a cliché and use these steps to improve it. You may even end up with a line you feel is good enough to put in a poem!
如何避免陈词滥调？
我将用“像蜜蜂一样忙”作为例子，并展示如何在没有陈词滥调的情况下表达同样的想法。
1.确定陈词滥调短语试图说出的内容。
在这种情况下，我可以看到“像蜂一样忙”是描述忙碌状态的一种方式。
2.想一个新的方式来描述陈词滥调的词语试图描述的内容。
我考虑忙碌是什么样的。我问自己一个问题：“什么事情与忙碌有关？”我联想到：大学，我的朋友杰西卡，公司老板，老太太制作棉被和罐装商品，还有一台电脑，小提琴被摆弄。从这个列表中，我选择了一个不常用于忙碌的东西：小提琴。
3.使用非陈词滥调的描述方式创建短语。
我把我的物品与忙碌联系起来，并把它变成了一句话：“我觉得自己像是一个演奏爱尔兰舞曲的弓。”这句话传达了“忙碌”的想法，比熟悉的陈词滥调更好。读者可以想象出小提琴上弓的疯狂，并且知道诗人正在描述一种非常疯狂的忙碌。事实上，那些知道爱尔兰舞曲听起来像什么的读者甚至可以通过这种描述“忙碌”的新方式大笑。
试试吧！找一个陈词滥调的表达并使用这些步骤来改进它。你可能得到一句足以放入诗中的表达！
Tip #3 Avoid Sentimentality.
提示3 避免感伤
Sentimentality is “dominated by a blunt appeal to the emotions of pity and love …. Popular subjects are puppies, grandparents, and young lovers。When readers have the feeling that emotions like rage or indignation have been pushed artificially for their own sake, they will not take the poem seriously。
Minot says that the problem with sentimentality is that it detracts from the literary quality of your work. If your poetry is mushy or teary-eyed, your readers may openly rebel against your effort to invoke emotional response in them. If that happens, they will stop thinking about the issues you want to raise, and will instead spend their energy trying to control their own gag reflex.
多愁善感被模糊的对怜悯和爱的诉求而占据。流行的主题如：小狗，祖父母和年轻的恋人。当读者感到诗人在故意的为了煽情而煽情时，会感到愤怒或愤慨，他们就不会认真对待这首诗。
迈诺特说，多愁善感的问题在于它会降低你作品的文学品质。如果你的诗歌是糊涂的催泪的，你的读者可能试图反抗你的努力 。如果发生这种情况，他们将不再关注你想要表达的主题，而是会花功夫来控制自己的呕吐反射。
Tip #4 Use Images.
提示4 使用图像
“BE A PAINTER IN WORDS,” says UWEC English professor emerita, poet, and songwriter Peg Lauber. She says poetry should stimulate six senses:
sight
hearing
smell
touch
taste
kinesiology (motion)
Examples：
“Sunlight varnishes magnolia branches crimson” (sight)
“Vacuum cleaners whir and hum startle my ferret” (hearing)
“Penguins lumber to their nests” (kinesiology)
Lauber advises her students to produce fresh, striking images (“imaginative”). Be a camera. Make the reader be there with the poet/speaker/narrator.
UWEC英语教授、诗人和词曲作者Peg Lauber说道，“做一个言语界的画家”。她说诗歌应该刺激六种感官：
•视觉
•听觉
•嗅觉
•触觉
•味觉
•运动
例子：
•“阳光给玉兰枝的深红色枝条涂上清漆”（视觉）
•“吸尘器的呼呼声和嗡嗡声让我的雪貂感到震惊”（听觉）
•“企鹅摇摆到它们的巢穴”（运动）
劳伯建议她的学生写出新鲜醒目的图像（“富有想象力”）。做一个相机。让读者与诗人/演说家/叙述者身临其境。
（未完待续）
文章来源：Jerz’s literacy weblog (est.1999)
Source:https://jerz.setonhill.edu/writing/creative1/poetry-writing-tips-how-to-write-a-poem/#2
插画: 日本艺术家Hiramatsu Reiji
译者·何靖莹
美国威斯康星大学社会学博士在读，喜欢艺术和哲学。
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