經典科幻文學:《生命 宇宙及一切》第18章5
The names of some of those commemorated were underlined and had asterisks against them. So, for instance, the name of a cow which had been slaughtered and of which Arthur Dent had happened to eat a fillet steak would have the plainest engraving, whereas the name of a fish which Arthur had himself caught and then decided he didn’t like and left on the side of the plate had a double underlining, three sets of asterisks and a bleeding dagger added as decoration, just to make the point.
And what was most disturbing about all this, apart from the Statue, to which we are, by degrees, coming, was the very clear implication that all these people and creatures were indeed the same person, over and over again.
And it was equally clear that this person was, however unfairly, extremely upset and annoyed.
In fact it would be fair to say that he had reached a level of annoyance the like of which had never been seen in the Universe. It was an annoyance of epic proportions, a burning searing flame of annoyance, an annoyance which now spanned the whole of time and space in its infinite umbrage.
And this annoyance had been given its fullest expression in the Statue in the centre of all this monstrosity, which was a statue of Arthur Dent, and an unflattering one. Fifty feet tall if it was an inch, there was not an inch of it which wasn’t crammed with insult to its subject matter, and fifty feet of that sort of thing would be enough to make any subject feel bad. From the small pimple on the side of his nose to the poorish cut of his dressing gown, there was no aspect of Arthur Dent which wasn’t lambasted and vilified by the sculptor.
Arthur appeared as a gorgon, an evil, rapacious, ravening, bloodied ogre, slaughtering his way through an innocent one-man Universe.
With each of the thirty arms which the sculptor in a fit of artistic fervour had decided to give him, he was either braining a rabbit, swatting a fly, pulling a wishbone, picking a flea out of his hair, or doing something which Arthur at first looking couldn’t quite identify.
His many feet were mostly stamping on ants.
Arthur put his hands over his eyes, hung his head and shook it slowly from side to side in sadness and horror at the craziness of things.
And when he opened his eyes again, there in front of him stood the figure of the man or creature, or whatever it was, that he had supposedly been persecuting all this time.
HhhhhhrrrrrraaaaaaHHHHHH! said Agrajag.
He, or it, or whatever, looked like a mad fat bat. He waddled slowly around Arthur, and poked at him with bent claws.
Look!.. protested Arthur.
HhhhhhrrrrrraaaaaaHHHHHH!!! explained Agrajag, and Arthur reluctantly accepted this on the grounds that he was rather frightened by this hideous and strangely wrecked apparition.
Agrajag was black, bloated, wrinkled and leathery. His batwings were somehow more frightening for being the pathetic broken floundering things they were that if they had been strong, muscular beaters of the air. The frightening thing was probably the tenacity of his continued existence against all the physical odds.
He had the most astounding collection of teeth.
They looked as if they each came from a completely different animal, and they were ranged around his mouth at such bizarre angles it seemed that if he ever actually tried to chew anything he’d lacerate half his own face along with it, and possibly put an eye out as well.
Each of his three eyes was small and intense and looked about as sane as a fish in a privet bush.
I was at a cricket match, he rasped.
This seemed on the face of it such a preposterous notion that Arthur practically choked.
Not in this body, screeched the creature, not in this body! This is my last body. My last life. This is my revenge body. My kill-Arthur-Dent body. My last chance. I had to fight to get it, too.
But…
有的名字帶有下劃線和星號。比如，被阿瑟當作裏脊牛排吃了的一頭母牛的名字，下面什麼也沒加；而先被阿瑟捉住、後來他又不想要了於是丟到一邊的一條魚，名字下面有兩條下劃線，三顆星號，還有一把滴血的匕首圖案，起強調作用。
最令人難受的一點——除了那尊雕像，我們會談到的——是這些人物、動物顯然都是翻來覆去的同一個人。
同樣很顯然，這個人無比氣憤、無比惱怒——雖然有點不公平。
實際上，公平地說，他的確經受着宇宙中前所未有的惱怒，那可是史詩級別的惱怒，是灼熱如火的惱怒，這惱怒中包含着無限的不爽，可以覆蓋整個時間和空間。
他已將這惱怒傾注於中間那尊雕像的創作中。那，就是阿瑟·鄧特的雕像——可一點兒也沒有美化他的意思。五十英尺高的雕像，沒有一寸不是充滿着對所雕對象的侮辱。五十英尺的侮辱，足夠讓任何被雕者不高興了。從他鼻子一側的痘痘，到他睡袍毛糙的邊緣，阿瑟·鄧特的每個細節都是雕刻者的鞭笞對象。
阿瑟被塑造成一個戈耳工②，一個惡魔，專橫、貪婪、嗜血，在一個無辜者的世界裏大肆屠殺。
他那三十隻手臂，凝聚了雕塑家最多的心血和感情。有的手正砸開一隻兔子的頭，有的在拍蒼蠅，有的在拉許願骨③，有的在捉頭髮裏的跳蚤，還有的阿瑟自己也看不懂。
他的腳大多是踩着螞蟻的。
阿瑟用手矇住雙眼，低下了頭，慢慢地搖着頭，深感難過，也深感恐懼。
他再次睜開眼時，面前站了一個人，或動物，或別的什麼，總之就是他一直在殘害那個傢伙。
“哼啊！！！！！！！！！！！！！”阿格拉賈格吼道。
他，或它，或別的什麼，看上去像只瘋瘋癲癲的胖蝙蝠。他顫巍巍地圍着阿瑟走着，用他彎曲的爪子碰着阿瑟。
“你瞧……”阿瑟想要申辯。
“哼啊！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！！”阿格拉賈格不依不撓。阿瑟只得放棄爭辯，看在這傢伙古怪可怕的、破破爛爛的外表的份上。
阿格拉賈格渾身漆黑、臃腫、粗糙、皺巴巴的，他的蝙蝠翅膀也許曾經強勁有力，但現在卻是破得可憐，瑟瑟發抖，反而更加恐怖。而最恐怖的，還得數他不顧千難萬險、堅持生存到現在的執著了。
他有一口最最駭人的牙齒。
看上去，那些牙齒似乎分別來自不同的動物。它們聚集在這張嘴裏，角度相當詭異，看上去根本不可能嚼什麼東西。因爲只要一嚼，恐怕就會撕裂他自己的臉，可能連眼睛都會爆出來。
他那三隻眼睛，都是小小的，目光銳利，眼神正如一條被丟在灌木叢中的魚那樣抓狂。
“我去看過一場板球比賽！”他怒吼道。
阿瑟覺得他說這話時表情非常荒謬，因此不知該說些什麼。
“不是這個身體！”那個生物尖叫着，“不是這個身體！這是我最後的身體，我最後的生命。這是我的復仇體。用來殺阿瑟·鄧特的身體，我最後的機會。也是我努力爭取才的到的。”
“可是……”
