量子的生活呢喃
愛人，被愛，珍惜，寬待
Bel Canto 在意大利文的意思是“美妙的歌聲”，也意指歌劇的美聲唱法。
南美某國副總統府邸中，來自世界各地的權貴顯要聚集一堂，正為日本最大的電子公司總裁Hosokawa舉辦一個盛大的生日宴會（為的是吸引他來此國投資設廠）。 宴會的高潮是舉世聞名的歌劇女高音Roxane Coss的獻唱。 一曲告終，正當眾人還如癡如醉沉浸在餘音繞梁之際，一群荷槍實彈的恐怖分子突然從天而降，喝令交出總統。 沒料到總統正在家裏追看電視連續劇，根本沒有出席這個派對，倒黴的副總統和幾百號貴賓就這麽陰差陽錯地被扣為人質。 恐怖分子還算人道，放走了婦女兒童仆人等，也並沒有大開殺戒；但政府態度強硬，不肯接受和談條件，場麵遂陷入僵局，屋裏的綁匪和人質開始了漫長的劫持煎熬。
雖然整部小說裏都沒寫出東道主國名，但不用猜都知道那是秘魯。 可不要以為這是一部劫持人質的驚悚小說，除了開頭和結尾，全書沒有任何染血的情節。 但小說的靈感確實來自當年的秘魯人質危機－－1996年年末，在秘魯首都利馬，日本大使宮邸正慶祝天皇誕辰，一夥武裝恐怖分子入侵，劫持了數百名外交官（包括18個國家的大使）、政要和企業高管。 恐怖分子先後釋放了300多名人質，但秘魯政府始終沒有讓步。 這場危機持續了四個多月，期間秘魯政府打通一條地道入館，最後成功突襲，全數擊斃了恐怖分子，營救了人質。
精彩的開場後，整個故事的核心登台－－一大堆來自不同國度、素未平生的人物本來毫無交集，甚至語言上完全不通，卻被拋入這樣一個極其荒謬的處境。 隻有Hosokawa的日本翻譯Gen是個通曉多國語言的天才，一下要跟老板說日文，跟Roxane說英文，跟綁匪說西班牙文，還要跟其他各國賓客講俄文、德文、法文、瑞典語、葡萄牙文、希臘文等等等，連恐怖分子都要仰賴他下命令。 這個翻譯是個關鍵，在人和人充滿隔閡時，他成為最需要的理解和互信橋梁。 而更全球化、更動人的語言，則是最初吸引眾人來到這裏的Roxane天籟美聲。 Roxane堅持每天練習聲樂，她那圓潤宛轉的歌喉似乎能穿透身心，震撼靈魂，令全屋的人質和綁匪一同淪陷。 而除去了頭銜、事業、名利，遠離了從前的身份和社會等級，高官顯貴退回凡夫俗子的原形－－以前極少在家的副總統日日以雙手勞作愛護家園，總裁先生對自己人生重新審視，思念妻子的法國大使成為廚房大廚，年輕神父滿懷救世關懷，翻譯先生從扮演傳聲筒而成為中心人物，俄國官員感性表白對美對愛的追求和勇氣，企業高管重拾鋼琴演奏，害羞又勇敢的Carmen，還有一個個身懷天賦和熱情的叢林小孩。。。綁匪和俘虜們漸漸成為一個與外界隔絕，而相互共生的團體，而隨之發生的愛情故事更是令人匪夷所思。
正如歌劇的誇張炙熱的藝術手法，整篇小說的情節浪漫、夢幻，但並不煽情。 Patchett的文字淡雅輕靈，人物刻畫栩栩如生。
Ann Patchett 描摹歌聲的手法非常引人入勝。
“…and the first breath of music stirred from someplace far below them. Tiny people, insects, really, slipped out from behind the curtains, opened their mouths, and with their voices gilded the walls with their yearning, their grief, their boundless, reckless love that would lead each one to separate ruin.”
“It was soaring, that voice, warm and complicated, utterly fearless.”
“It was different in ways he never could have imagined, as if the voice were something that could be seen. Certainly it could be felt, even where he stood in the very back of the room. It trembled inside the folds of his cassock, brushed against the skin of his cheeks. … How far she must have gone inside herself to call up that voice. It was as if the voice came from the center part of the earth and by the sheer effort and diligence of her will she had pulled it up through the dirt and rock and through the floorboards of the house, up into her feet, where it pulled through her, reaching, lifting, warmed by her, and then out of the white lily of her throat and straight to God in heaven.”
這部2001年出版的小說贏得the Orange Prize for Fiction還有PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction. 去年更已經被改編為現代歌劇。 作曲者Jimmy Lopez就來自利馬。
其他節選：
“It was too much work to remember things you might not have again, and so one by one they opened up their hands and let them go.”
“For a man to know what he has when he had it, that is what makes him a fortunate man.”
“When you think of love you think as an American. You must think like a Russian. It is a more expansive view.'
'Americans have a bad habit of thinking like Americans,' Roxane said kindly.”
“They were so taken by the beauty of her voice that they wanted to cover her mouth with their mouth, drink in. Maybe music could be transferred, devoured, owned. What would it mean to kiss the lips that had held such a sound?”
“Most of the time, we're loved for what we can do rather than for who we are. It's not such a bad thing, being loved for what you can do.'
'But the other is better.'
'Better. I hate to say better, but it is. If someone loves you for what you can do then it's flattering, but why do you love them? If someone loves you for who you are then they have to know you, which means you have to know them.”
“But together they moved through the world quite easily, two small halves of courage making a brave whole.”
“The light was cut to lace by the trees that had grown so thick with leaves in the last few months.”
日本總裁做人質一周後脫掉鞋子的這一段讓人忍俊不禁：“Wearing shoes in the house was barbaric. There was almost as much indignity in wearing shoes in the house as there was in being kidnapped.”
