| Abstract: | 非裔美國劇作家威爾森(August Wilson 1945-2005)透過戲劇來書寫／匡正非裔美國人歷史的計畫為他贏得了無數美譽。在劇本中，他不但刻畫美國黑人的勤奮和毅力，他也發展出非常獨特的角色塑造。威爾森在《喬透那來了又去了》(1988)的角色塑造和傳統亞里斯多得式角色塑造或其他美國劇作家的角色塑造方法不同，他的角色塑造是富含層次的。《喬透那來了又去了》的背景是1911年匹茲堡的一間寄宿舍裡，房東是石德和白莎夫婦。這時已是黑奴解放後三十年，很多南方的黑人到北方大都市來工作尋求更好的生活。在這群住在石德寄宿舍的流浪黑人當中有陸明斯和他十一歲的女兒琮妮亞，他正在找他失散已久的太太瑪莎；一個叫做拜南的巫醫，他專門幫助黑人把他們“綁”在一起；一個年輕男子傅洛，他到處找工作做；一個年輕女子麥娣，她正在找她不告而別的丈夫；及另一個年輕貌美的女子茉莉。陸明斯也付施洛格一塊錢來幫他找他太太，因為施洛格善於幫人找失散的人。施洛格在威爾森劇中是個罕見的白人角色，他往來於南方和北方之間沿途販賣石德手工製做的畚箕。這齣戲描述的就是這些房客在白莎的廚房兼飯廳的談話及生活的點點滴滴。在這齣劇最後，施洛格也達成使命找到瑪莎並將她帶到寄宿舍與陸明斯父女相見。中學輟學但是自學不遺餘力的威爾森深受莎士比亞或其他的西方戲劇大師影響，因此他的角色塑造也是依循亞理斯多得式寫實的傳統。但是他非常善於角色塑造的創新；他創造出的角色不但真實刻畫當時的人物（例如，《喬透那來了又去了》劇中1910年代的人物），這些人物對當代觀眾也深具啟發性。除了傳統的角色塑造外，威爾森其實有二種非常獨到、非常特別的角色塑造：隱喻式角色塑造及混合價值式角色塑造。前者是用在像拜南及陸明斯這樣的主要角色身上，這種角色塑造和劇本的主題密切結合，因此這些隱喻式角色的代表意涵也較顯明。後者主要是用在像石德和施洛格等次要角色身上，他們的塑造是為彰顯本戲的主要意涵。然而，就因為這些次要角色所具有的混和評價，或說是，看來較負面的性格成分，觀眾其實較不易捉住這一類角色塑造的特殊意義。本計畫即是研究《喬透那來了又去了》劇中主要人物的隱喻式角色塑造及次要或「負面」人物的多面向角色塑造。這二種角色塑造方式是獨特的威爾森式的，也是很特別的非裔美國式的。《喬透那來了又去了》教導非裔美國人要正面擁抱他們的非裔身份，所以觀眾可以很容易的把拜南視為將離散後的人緊密綁在一起的非洲巫醫。這些非洲人第一次是在十七世紀被迫從非洲移民至美洲，第二次則是在解放後這二、三十年大量的自美國南方移民到美國北方。陸明斯在劇中就代表每一個非裔美國人。他流離失所，藉著拜南的導引和協助找到自我肯定，詠唱自己的歌。因為他曾經被喬透那捉走，和其他黑人監禁在一起做強迫勞役七年，所以即使被放出來後，他仍是無法找到生活重心，因為他已經內化白人的意識型態，以為自己(黑人)是無用之人。因此現在對他而言，生活最重要的是就是找到他太太瑪莎。威爾森在戲中用二件事幫助失魂落魄的陸明斯回到正常生活軌道，同時並藉此教導觀眾：一件是他受到黑人裘巴舞引出的恍神起乩，另一件則是他在拒絕瑪莎基督教救贖後的自我救贖。這二個事件的安排都非常有威爾森的個人風格，因為威爾森一直都在思索非洲宗教和基督教。為了要能夠解析此種譬喻式角色塑造，我將援引巴克汀的時空型理論。巴克汀對文學中的角色所處的時間和空間的看法可以幫助我們看清劇中特有的非裔基督教觀點。為什麼威爾森在形塑拜南和陸明斯時會顯現出對基督教愛恨交織的心結？這一點的剖析對整劇來說是很重要的。主要角色的隱喻式解讀可以替混亂心境的美國黑人帶來些解答，而本戲中次要角色的混雜價值形塑則可清楚的傳達本戲睿智的訊息。然而，目前多數的評論家對施洛格及石德多半只有負面的解讀。他們把「尋人者」施洛格視為現代版本的奴隸販，把石德則看做是被白人種族歧視觀念洗腦的北方自由黑人。施洛格被討厭或貶視是可以理解的，因為他不但是戲中唯一的白人角色，他的形象還令人想起奴隸販子，因為他自己都說當年他祖父的工作就是把非洲黑人給押到美國來當黑奴，而他父親則是幫南方白人農莊主人抓逃跑黑奴的人。石德也被批評的體無完膚。因為受到了白人資本主義的影響，他這個商人對主角陸明斯不太友善，而且後來陸明斯起乩恍神後他又堅持要把陸明斯和琮妮亞給趕出寄宿舍。然而，這二個一黑一白的「壞人」角色對戲中美國黑人的自我賦加能力(self-empowerment)還是很有貢獻的。施若格的確完成使命找到瑪莎，因而幫助陸明斯在生命旅程中再站起來。雖然他讓人連想起白人壓迫者的意象，但是施若格的角色形塑有新意，他也像是一個白人兄弟讓這對失散的夫妻重聚。石德則是已完全獨立的個人呈現，雖然他看起來很現實，他卻讓陸明斯看到一個非裔美國人真正自由是甚麼樣子。除了巴克汀時空型的理論之外，我將使用梅海在他《重要的矛盾：易卜生、史特林堡、契科夫、和歐尼爾戲劇中的角色塑造》書中「重要的矛盾」的觀念來探索本戲中施若格和石德角色塑造的矛盾與生命力。在《海洋寶石》中也出現的施洛格，很有勇氣的幫助劇中的黑人男主角，使他這個白人成為黑人的好弟兄。在《藍妮夫人的黑臀》中的白人老闆，和《圍籬》中的次要人物都有這種混雜價值的角色塑造。在《鋼琴課》中的男孩威利也展現出正面和負面的角色塑造。威爾森不喜歡武斷的二元對立，《喬透那來了又去了》的主題和角色塑造上也顯示出這一點。透過拜南和陸明斯譬喻式的角色塑造，威爾森傳達他們非洲身分認同的重要性。就像三百年前從非洲經由中間之道來到美國所帶來的流離失散，從美國南方移民到北方的大遷移也讓黑人又經歷一次族群的流離失散。拜南和陸明斯的隱喻式角色塑造就是要告訴黑人，非裔美國人一定要透過與他們歷史的連結來獲得他們的自我決定和自我實現。再者，威爾森也透過次要角色的塑造來帶出教導，因此創新了角色塑造詩學。他讓觀眾可以從一個較有建設性的觀點來看待白人尋人者施若格，也把石德視為一個自由獨立的個人。威爾森多面向的角色塑造給美國戲劇文學增添更多光彩。
Poetics of Characterization in Wilson’s Joe Turner’s Come and Gone African American playwright August Wilson’s (1945-2005) project to write/right African American history via drama has won him resounding fame. He not only demonstrates dedication and perseverance of African Americans in his plays, but he also develops highly unique characterization in his drama. Different from Aristotelian characterization or other American playwrights’ characterization, Wilson in his Joe Turner’s Come and Gone (1988) molds his characters in multilayer textures. Set in Pittsburgh in 1911, Joe Turner’s Come and Gone centers on a boarding house owned by Bertha and Seth Holly. Just a few decades after the emancipation, many southern blacks come to the North in search of a better life. Among these wandering blacks who stay at Seth’s boarding house are Herald Loomis and his eleven-year-old daughter Zonia in search of his estranged wife Martha, a conjure man Bynum Walker, who helps bind people together, a day laborer Jeremy Furlow, a young woman Mattie Campbell in search of her husband, and another young woman Molly Cunningham. Loomis also pays one dollar to Rutherford Selig, the people finder, to find his wife. Selig is a rare white character in Wilson’s plays, traveling South and North selling dust pans made by Seth. The play depicts the life of these roomers through the dialogues in Bertha’s kitchen and dining room. At the end of the play, the people finder Selig does accomplish the mission by bringing Martha back to the boarding house to meet Loomis and Zonia. Though a high school drop-out, Wilson was a very hardworking self-taught playwright, tremendously influenced by great western dramatists such as Shakespeare and other masters. Wilson’s plays therefore are very much in line with Aristotelian realistic characterization; however, Wilson is definitely adept in creating characters who are authentically real to that particular decade (for example, the 1910s in the case of Joe Turner’s Come and Gone) and significantly revealing to spectators now. In addition to traditional characterization, Wilson has two extraordinary ways of characterization: characterization of metaphor and characterization of mixed values. The former, more applied to the main characters such as Herald Loomis and Bynum Walker in the play, tend to be closely connected to the thematic issues; hence, the meaning of their metaphorical characterization may be grasped directly. The latter, mainly employed for minor characters such as Seth Holly and Rutherford Selig, help elucidate the main message in the play. However, because of their mixed values or ostensibly negative character qualities, spectators may not comprehend the significance of this kind of characterization. This research, therefore, intends to explore the metaphorical characterization of the main characters and the multifarious characterization of the minor or even “villainous” characters in Joe Turner’s Come and Gone. These two kinds of characterization are uniquely Wilsonian, and African American par excellence. Joe Turner’s Come and Gone teaches the African American to embrace their African identity, so it is easy to view Bynum Walker to be an conjure man who binds together people of dispersal due to firstly their forced migration from Africa to America three hundreds years ago and secondly the Big Migration from American South to American North after the emancipation. With Bynum’s guidance and assistance, Herald Loomis, the Everyman in the African American context, has to find his song/self for self-validition. Once imprisoned by Joe turner to do forced labor for seven years, Loomis has lost all the anchorage in life even after he has been released, because he has internalized the white man’s ideology to think himself (the black) worthless. The only meaningful thing in his life now is to find his wife Martha. Wilson uses two incidents in the play to gear a lost soul like Loomis back to the right track and to enlighten the spectators: Loomis’s trance invoked by the Juba dance and Loomis’s self-redemption after rejecting Martha’s Christian salvation. Both incidents are uniquely Wilsonian style because Wilson has been preoccupied by African and Christian religions. For the analysis of such metaphorical characterization, I will use Mikhail Bakhtin’s theory of chronotope. Bakhtin’s attention to the time and space in which a literary character is situated may shed light on the perspective of Afro-Christianity. It is of particular significance to dissect the playwright’s ambivalence toward Christianity when he characterizes both Bynum and Loomis. While the metaphorical reading of the major characters may bring forth the solution to the confused African Americans, the mixed-valued characterization of the minor characters indeed consolidates the play’s insightful message. However, most of the critics so far have had only negative readings of Rutherford Selig and Seth Holly. They regard Selig, the white people finder, a modern version of slaver and Seth a northern free black man brainwashed by white’s racism. It is easy to understand why Selig is disliked or devalued because he is not only the only white character in the play but he also evokes the image of slaver since he mentions his grandfather’s job before was a slaver, and his father used to be a slave hunter in search of run-away slaves for white southern plantation owners. Seth is relentlessly attacked by some critics because this businessman who is said to be influenced by white capitalism acts unkindly to the protagonist Loomis and is stern on driving Loomis and Zonia out of his boarding house after Loomis’s trance. However, these two characters, one “a white devil” and the other “a black devil,” do offer positive contribution to African American’s self-empowerment in the play. The former does accomplish his mission to find Martha and thus helps Loomis to “stand up” again in the journey of life; although his image reminds one of the white oppressor, Selig, as a white brother, brings the estranged couple together eventually. The latter presents himself as a totally independent individual; although he looks practical, Seth shows Loomis how African American can be truly free. Other than using Bakhtin’s theory of chronotope, I intend to use Michael Manheim’s concept of “vital contradictions” in his Vital Contradictions: Characterization in the Plays of Ibsen, Strindberg, Chekhov and O’Neill to explore the contradiction and vitality of Selig and Seth’s characterization. Other plays by Wilson will also be used to illustrate this characterization of mixed values. Selig, who also appears in Gem of the Ocean, offers his courageous help to the black protagonist in the play, making this white man a friend of blacks. The white bosses in Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom and minor characters in The Fences are all examples of such mixed-valued characterization. Boy Willie in The Piano Lesson also demonstrates both the positive and negative readings of characterization. Wilson dislikes arbitrary binary opposition and this distaste can be found both in the theme and the characterization in Joe Turner’s Come and Gone. Through the metaphorical characterization of Bynum and Loomis, Wilson asserts the importance of their African identity. Like the dispersal of the Middle Passage three hundred years ago, the Big Migration also results in another dispersal of American blacks. Only through reconnecting with their past can these African Americans acquire self-determination and self-fulfillment. Furthermore, Wilson also renovates poetics of characterization by allowing minor characters to offer remarks of edification. Hence, he makes his spectators look at the white people finder Selig from a more constructive perspective and to take Seth as a fully free and independent individual. His special way to characterize has indeed enriched the different arrays of American dramatic literature |
