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楼主 |
发表于 2011-6-23 17:15:43
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英語版で~~~す。
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VOX POPULI: 'Subway dress' conjures nostalgia for the good old days
A piece of news from the United States made me think of the poem "Hatsunatsu no Kaze" (Winds of early summer) by woodblock artist Sumio Kawakami (1895-1972), who was also a poet. "I want to be a wind/ I want to be a wind of early summer/ And stand before her/ I want to be an early summer wind/ And blow from behind her."
The poem is engraved on Kawakami's well-known woodblock print of the same name that dates back to the late Taisho Era (1912-1926). It depicts a woman in a dress standing in the wind printed in green. Some readers may have guessed why I brought up the poem. The dress that actress Marilyn Monroe (1926-1962) wore in a well-known scene in the film "The Seven Year Itch" was put up for auction and sold for $4.6 million (about 370 million yen).
It is the wind-blown dress that was famously lifted well above her knees as she stood over a subway grate. The dress, which was expected to sell for around $1.24 million, actually fetched a much higher price. Unlike "Hatsunatsu no Kaze," both the plot of the movie and what really happened after that scene was shot were much more worldly.
One of the most memorable scenes in film history was shot on location in central New York. The shooting attracted a crowd of 2,000 onlookers. But Monroe's husband, Joe DiMaggio (1914-1999), a former New York Yankees slugger, was furious that it showed her bare legs and the couple soon divorced. Thus, the scene became legendary.
I read in a book by Shunsuke Kamei, a scholar of American literature, that American writer Norman Mailer once referred to Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961) and Monroe as two of the most beautiful Americans and said their names should be left alone.
This year marks the 50th anniversary of Hemingway's suicide. And it will be half a century next year from Monroe's mysterious death. Perhaps the staggering price of Monroe's dress has to do with nostalgia for the United States as it was in the good old days. It is an everlasting legend that remains dormant in a world in which truth and fiction are mixed together. |
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