Reading for Pleasure No.32

　クリスマスが近づくと、私が住む北九州市の小倉駅周辺では素敵なライトアアップが毎晩、見られます。その美しい光景を見て「もうすぐ、クリスマスがくる」と思うと、毎年、読みたくなる物語があります。それは、O. Henry のThe Gift of the Magi です。その物語に、Lisbeth Zwergerさんという方が描いた挿絵がページごとに添えられている絵本が、私のお気に入りです。その繊細な筆遣いで描かれた優美な挿絵を目で味わうだけで、物語の世界を堪能できます。

　O. Henry といえば、中学校の英語教科書でThe Last Leaf (最後の一葉) という物語を読んだ人が多いと思います。中学生が読めるように表現し直した英語でも、皆さんの記憶に残っていると思います。同じように、O. HenryのThe Gift of the Magi をはじめ、5つの短編を大学生がスラスラ楽しんで読める本があります。その本のタイトルはNew Yorkers: Short Stories とつけられています。New York を舞台に20世紀前半の人々が、現代の私たちと同じように喜怒哀楽を経験しながら生きていたことが伝わってきます。そのことを、本の最初で次のように述べています。

　What makes one city different from another city? Is it the buildings, the weather, the people? It is the people who make a city, and to know a city, you must know its people. You must know what makes them laugh and cry, know the small details of their everyday lives.
　What kind of people lived in New York at the beginning of the twentieth century? Are New Yorkers different now from a hundred years ago? Cities grow bigger with the years, new buildings are put up and old buildings are pulled down, horses are replaced by cars and buses, fashions change. But people do not change. The New Yorkers in these stories are very different from each other, but the hopes of a tramp are as important as the hopes of a lawyer; the love of a waitress is as exciting as the love of an actress. And we see that people's hopes and fears and dreams do not change with the years.

　そして、最初の物語がThe Gift of the Magi で、タイトルはThe Christmas Presents とつけられています。物語は次のようなシーンで始まります。

　One dollar and eighty-seven cents. That was all. Everyday, when she went to the shops, she spent very little money. She bought the cheapest meat, the cheapest vegetables. And when she was tired, she still walked round and round the shops to find the cheapest food. She saved every cent possible.
　Della counted the money again. There was no mistake. One dollar and eighty-seven cents. That was all. And the next day was Christmas.
　She couldn't do anything about it. She could only sit down and cry. So she sat there, in the poor little room, and she cried.
　Della lived in this poor little room, in New York, with her husband, James Dillingham Young. They also had a bedroom, and a kitchen and a bathroom - all poor little rooms. James Dillingham Young was lucky, because he had a job, but it was not a good job. These rooms took most of his money. Della tried to find work, but times were bad, and there was no work for her.

　このような辛い状況の中で、夫婦が互いに相手を思いやりクリスマス・プレゼントを買ってクリスマス・イブをむかえる姿が、8ページという短いページ数の中で、目の前に浮かんでくるように書かれています。ぜひ、今年はクリスマス・プレゼントを選ぶ前に、この物語を読んでみてください。きっと、大切な家族や友人や恋人に対する思いを胸いっぱい膨らませながら、プレゼントを選ぶことができると思います。

　この物語は、ぜひMP3 Pack を購入して聴いていただきたいです。感情が込められた素敵な「声」から、夫婦の気持ちを想像しながら物語を心の中に創り出してみてください。