爱华网荆棘鸟，是自然界一种奇特的动物，它一生只唱一次歌。从离开巢开始，便执着不停地寻找荆棘树。当它如愿以偿时，就把自己娇小的身体扎进一株最长、最尖的荆棘上，流着血泪放声歌唱——那凄美动人、婉转如霞的歌声使人间所有的声音刹那间黯然失色！一曲终了，荆棘鸟终于气竭命陨，以身殉歌——以一种惨烈的悲壮塑造了永恒的美丽，给人们留下一段悲怆的绝唱。
荆棘鸟体型小，高昂着头，美观，气派。
-- 摘自网上
Writers of bookssuch as Le Mis, Gone with the Wind and The Thorn Birds seemed to have allthe time in the world, nothing to do but tell you a story, from themoral of the tale, the fate of the characters to details such asthe color of one’s hair when the morning light strikes.
“Sit down, child.Let me tell you a story of a lifetime. Listen to me, not just for aday, a month, but a year. Keep me company and I will tell you allthe wisdom I know, just listen to my story.” The book seems tosay.
Some say The Thorn Birds is the Gone with the Wind of Australia.It does remind you of it, the small print, the length of the book,the expanse of the story and the fineness of the details. But Idon’t see the resemblance in the souls of the two books. Meggielived for another man while Scarlett lived for herself. One so softyou pity her, the other so headstrong you can’t bother feelingsorry for her. One can’t hold on to the man she loves, the otherthrew aside her one true love.
In spirit, it’smore like The ScarletLetter. Forbidden love is always more tantalizing than romanceof plain nature, always more intense with a lifetime of bittersweetaftertaste. Let’s not envision what would have happened if thefallen priest does marry the woman he loves. Reality never fails torub the shine off any great passion. It’s the best cure tolove-sickness.
Ralph, the handsomepriest, so charming and perfect that from an old woman of seventyto a child of ten, no woman can escape from his pull, whether ornot he does any intentional pulling. He was made for trouble, talland attractive, but cloaked in the soutane of a priest. And aboveall his faith, his love for the church and for God, is thereanything more frustrating than a perfectly sculptured man, trainedwith the elegance of a gentleman and the pureness of a saint, butthrown into the lay crowd, to be loved and adored, but nottouched.
Our little Meggiesteals the readers’ hearts right from the start. With its nearly600 pages of flowing words and unrolling scenes, I remember thefirst scene the best. It’s the one that touches me the most. Ittells you right away who is the gentle victim of the wholeepic.
Little Meggie,dressed in her Sunday best, was squatting down behind the gorsebush, holding her very first gift on her fourth birthday. It was alittle doll, bought from a store in town with money, with money!Meggie saw the doll in the store on her only trip to town and fellin love with it. Their lives on the raw land in rural New Zealandin the early twentieth century didn’t involve much buying, not tomention wasting money on buying a gift for a little girl, even avery good little girl.
She held Agnes, thename she gave the doll the moment she saw it. She marveled at thedoll’s golden hair, her cream lace dress and her eyes that closewhen you lie her down and then open when you stand her up. Agneswas all the desire that Meggie knew and she sat there taking it allin.
It’s a sweetpicture until the boys came into the scene. Meggie’s elder brotherssaw their baby sister so engrossed that they had to poke theirnoses in. I knew it smelt of trouble and I wish I had the power topush the stop button and erase the boys or turn their crude mindselsewhere. But that’s not to be. Little Meggie will be hurt bylittle boys, just like the older Meggie will be hurt by grown men.No one can push the stop button and rewrite the scene.
The boys took thedoll that was barely warm in Meggie’s hands, with their rough anddirty paws pulled the doll apart, like dissecting anything thatthey didn’t understand. It’s all just some plastic to them, nofeelings.
My heart aches forlittle Meggie, so helpless, so young and so weak. She cried andbegged but she couldn’t get her doll back. Tears washed down herface, blurring her entire world. On her fourth birthday, shelearned what it meant to have her heart broken. And she was to knowmore.
Do you believe infate? Do you believe in destiny? You know how in some movies youjust know two people will fall in love even before they have achance to speak. Like Meryl Streep and Client Eastwood in Bridge of Madison County; likeMatthew and Mary in DowntonAbbey. There is no other way. Ralph was bound to love Meggie.Meggie was made for the sacrifice.
But of course sucha huge piece of work is not just a love story, as forbidden as itis. Maybe people will close the book with different answers to thequestion of “What’s the book about?” I won’t be surprised if manysay that it’s about the love story between a handsome Catholicpriest and a gentle woman who is used to suffering. It is the mostprominent theme of the book. But it’s much more than that. It’salso about the harsh conditions of making a living in the new landof Australia in the early 20th century. It was aconstant battle with droughts and sand storms and endless flies,with loneliness and helplessness in face with the severity ofnature at its raw state.
I will alsoremember it as a book about the suffering of women, especially inthe hands of men, all kinds of men. Meggie’s brothers deprived herof her first gift in life, but this grief will be forgotten in faceof the many more to come. The man who thought of her as the love ofhis life traded her for 13 million pounds, which bought him hisfuture career. He has loved her ever since he saw her as a timidten year old, but it’s not enough to lead him astray from his pathin serving God. For her whole life, she would feel abandoned by herRalph. She lost, even if it’s to God.
Then there was herhusband Luke, who married her for her money and took every penny,and then sent her to work as a housemaid in exchange for moremoney. I wonder if Meggie hadn’t felt so abandoned by Ralph andgiven up on love, would she have accepted this? Even then, Lukeleft her to make more money. She was a beautiful woman, yetsomehow, not wonderful enough to hold any man. But the truth is,the men were not good enough to deserve her.
Meggie’s motheralso had her scar in life. She was the daughter of a prominentfamily. An affair with a married man left her with a child andrejection from her family. The married man had too much to loose tomarry her, or even to reveal who he was. Her own father married herand the child to one of their farm hands in exchange for takingthem away. From then on, it was endless house chores and farmlabor, then child bearing and raising the children.
Is there a happywoman in the story?
Even the rich oldwidow, Mary Carson, the most powerful figure in the region whoowned all the property and money, wasn’t happy. She was also inlove with the perfect priest, who was decades younger and detestedher. Her only satisfaction was in knowing that the one whom sheloved would be tortured. She made him choose between an inheritanceof 13 million pounds and fulfilling his love withMeggie.
The only happywoman, or a woman who had a chance of being happy, was Justine,daughter of Meggie and Luke. She was rebellious and dared to goafter what she desired. She always knew what she wanted and alwayswent after what she wanted. She despised men but was lucky enoughto have met one that treasured her and waited for herawakening.
But above allthese, I think the author wants to write about the power of fate,the force of nature, the tendency for us to be whom we are meant tobe even if it leads to suffering. I think she wants to say that allthe struggle and going against the current are just people beingwhat they are meant to be. Meggie was meant to be in love, forever,even if it meant she would be unhappy all her life, except the fewtimes that his love for her was confirmed and their relationshipfulfilled. She knew he would leave her, to seek his own destiny ofbeing married to the church. She couldn’t change her own destinyand she couldn’t change that of another man. But she had him. Sheonly needed it once to know that she was In love. She didn’t justlove.
For that oneconfirmation she would suffer for the rest of her days. But justlike the thorn birds, she lived for that one song tosing.
