關注社會:訃告:邁克爾.拉森
Obituary；Michael Lassen；
訃告；邁克爾.拉森；Michael Lassen, stained-glass artist, died on September 8th, aged 61；
邁克爾·拉森，彩花玻璃藝術家，卒於9月8日，享年61歲；ALMOST nothing is known of the men who built the great medieval cathedrals. A mason's mark chiselled on a column; a game of nine-men's-morris scratched on a stone; a gargoyle's half-human face, of foreman or master of works, are all that remind observers of the crowds of labouring souls who raised Canterbury or Winchester, Beauvais or Cologne.
對於建造中世紀大教堂的那些人我們幾乎一無所知。 一個被刻進圓柱的工匠的標記；一個在石頭上亂劃的九人莫里斯遊戲； 一個怪獸狀滴水嘴的半人臉，那些工頭或者大師的作品，都會讓觀者想起那些建造坎特伯雷，溫徹斯特，科隆或韋伯大教堂的那些千萬勞苦大衆的在天之靈。
The dangers of such projects were legion. Contemporary illustrations show cathedral spires collapsing, vaults caving in, high scaffolding keeling over in a chaos of planks and poles. Casualties were expected, and were many, though the fabric accounts often could not name them. In modern times the labour is no less perilous; but in the days of health-and-safety and hard hats, accidents are rare. Hence the horror in Durham when, on September 3rd, Michael Lassen fell from a ladder as he helped to fix a new stained-glass window in the south quire aisle of the cathedral. He died some days later in hospital.
這些大項目危險重重。 同時代的畫作顯示了大教堂尖塔的傾倒，拱頂的塌陷，高高的腳手架倒在一片八七八糟的木板和柱子中。 儘管憑零星的記錄難以命名，但意外事故的確在所難免而且經常發生。 時至今日，這種勞動的危險一點也沒有減少， 因此，在9月3日達勒姆發生了慘案，當邁克爾。拉森幫助修復一個大教堂南邊唱詩班席位的彩色玻璃窗時，他從梯子上摔了下來。 幾天後他在醫院裏死去。Climbing up in the south quire to look at the traceries originally, he had found them heavily fissured, like all Durham's ancient sandstone. Blocks were missing on the exterior, and one side of the main arch was worn away almost to a skeleton, as though two or three centuries of wild north-east weather had blown through it. But all the stone had been carefully stabilised before his work began.
爬到南唱詩班席位上去原本是去看花飾窗格，他卻發現他們已經嚴重破裂，就像所有達勒姆古老的沙岩那樣。 外圍那些石塊已經掉了，主拱經過兩三百年的東北風吹過，一側已經破損得只剩一個骨架， 但在他的工作開始之前是所有的石頭都被仔細地固定下來。The window was of the Transfiguration of Christ, made by Tom Denny, and one of the largest to be installed in Durham in modern times. Mr Lassen was working from top to bottom, fixing the glass he had leaded. He started with the small quatrefoil lights of the Holy Spirit and the crucifixion, proceeding down through the main panels of Christ and his followers on the mountain, with all the way the white shaft of God's transfiguring light growing broader through the fire-and-storm colours of the glass. The four principal lights, nicknamed after the chief figures in them, were Cuthbert, Moses, Elijah and Michael; they became familiar friends. He was fitting a small panel at the bottom left-hand side, a pane of bruised blue glass that showed the broken and suffering about to be transformed by light, almost the last piece in the window, when he fell. He was not particularly high up, working at the ledge. But stone flags are unforgiving.
窗戶是聖容顯現，爲湯姆丹尼所造，這是在現代達赫姆大教堂要安裝的最大的一個。 拉森的工作從頂部到底部，負責修復玻璃。 他從那些聖靈和十字架的四葉草光芒和開始，接下去通過基督的主體和他在山上的追隨者，從上到下，神的美麗的光線透過火紅色的玻璃逐漸變光，投射出白色的光柱。 四道主要的光，以裏面的主要任務命名，分別是庫斯伯特，摩西，以利亞和邁克爾，他們成爲熟悉的朋友。 當邁克爾墜落的時候，他正在安裝左手邊底部的一個小的鑲嵌板，那是一塊磨損了的藍色玻璃，幾乎是窗戶上的最後一塊玻璃。 他其實並不是特別的高， 也不是特別靠邊緣。但是石板是無情的。Mr Lassen had been called in late to lead and fix this window. The man originally contracted had fallen ill, and the deadline for the installation, the end of September, was fast approaching. Help was needed fast; Mr Lassen provided it, expertly and fully. The tight timetable troubled him; but he was not a keen marathon runner for nothing.
拉森很晚的時候被召來領導修復窗戶。 起初簽約的那個人生病了，而九月底工期的最後時限即將到來。 拉森專業而不遺餘力地提供了急需的幫助。 緊張的時間表給他添了麻煩，但拉森不是一個只顧跑步的馬拉松運動員。His training had been traditional, in the Government School of Stained Glass at Hadamar in Germany; though English, he had spent many childhood years in Bavaria. After working as a glazer and glass-restorer, he had turned to glass-painting and designing, gradually obtaining commissions in churches all over Britain. His own windows, at St Cadoc's chapel in Cowbridge in South Wales, or in the Church of Sts Peter and Paul at Great Somerford in Wiltshire, showed a love of blocks of pure colour carefully contained within thick, angular leads, especially glowing blues and rich reds: the medieval way of glass. His figures, too, had a medieval solidity, dignity and stillness about them.
拉森在德國哈達馬爾的國立彩花玻璃學校受到過傳統的訓練，儘管是個英國人，但他很多童年時光都是在巴伐利亞度過的。 在成爲一名上釉和玻璃安裝工後，他轉而從事玻璃彩繪和設計，逐漸獲得了英國各地教堂的任務。 他自己的彩窗作品，遍佈南威爾士考布里奇的聖卡多克禮拜堂，威爾特郡大薩默福德的聖彼得聖保羅教堂， 展示了他對於仔細地填滿又厚又尖的純色塊的熱愛，尤其是鮮豔的藍色和飽滿的紅色：這是中世紀式的玻璃。 他的形狀，也具有中世紀的堅固，端莊和沉靜。The techniques needed to lead and fix his own glass had barely changed. He would stretch the H-section lead strips, or cames, to stop “creep” in the soft, ductile metal; cut them expertly straight with his pliers, so as to leave no gaps between them when they were moulded round the glass pieces; apply the hot chisel-tip of the soldering iron just long enough to melt the solder, not the lead, when joining the strips together. The double-layered and plated technique of leading Mr Denny's glass, with the lines almost lost in the painting, was at first new to him, and correspondingly tricky. But by the time of the Durham project he had become an enthusiast, and all was going well until he fell.
他固定和修復自己的玻璃所需要的技術幾乎沒有什麼變化。 他伸展H型鉛條，或卡梅斯，消除柔軟韌性金屬的脆性； 熟練地用他的鉗子把它們弄直，這樣當鑲嵌上玻璃後就不會產生空隙； 用滾燙的帶鑿頭的焊接烙鐵剛好溶化焊條，當把兩個條焊接起來時不會化掉鉛條。 起初這種在塗色中幾乎不留線條的雙層鍍金屬的工藝對他來說是全新的，而且技術性很強。 但是隨着達赫姆項目的進行，他對此越發癡迷，一直到他從那裏墜落。
A memorial service for him was held at the foot of the window while the scaffolding still covered it. Mr Lassen, who worked from Bristol, was barely known in Durham, although he had once had a studio at Worship Farm, not far away. To most of the people who attended, extending the human crowd in the bottom panels of the window, he was just “that nice chap” who had had the accident. But when September 25th came, the day of dedication, he was remembered in a different way. The clue lay in George Herbert's poem “The Windows” which was sung as an anthem at evensong. Man was “a brittle crazy glass”:
一個爲他舉辦的紀念儀式就在那窗戶腳下進行，腳手架還沒有拆掉。 來自布裏斯托爾的拉森在達赫姆幾乎不爲人知，儘管他在不遠的禮拜農場有一個工作室。 對於來參加紀念儀式的人羣來說，他就是那個出事故的“好小夥”。 但是當9月25日，奉獻日這天到來的時候，他以一種不同的方式被懷念。 而線索就藏在喬治·赫伯特的一首詩裏“窗”，這是晚禱的一首讚美歌。 人是一塊“易脆的瘋狂的玻璃”：Yet in thy temple thou dost him afford This glorious and transcendent place To be a window, through thy grace.
然而，棲身在你的聖殿，透過你的恩典，他這一光榮而超然的地方是一扇窗As the congregation pressed through afterwards into the south quire aisle they found the windows still wreathed in incense, like the cloud of God that had enveloped Jesus on the mountain. Through it shone the glass. Its golds and blues were smoky in the evening light, but the central column blazed white, like the transfiguration of a man; and of all men, named or un-named, whose lives and skills are embedded in the stone and glass of great cathedrals.
衆人在集會通過南唱詩班的走廊，他們還發現窗戶依然在香繚繞，像神雲籠罩了耶穌在山上。 通過它閃耀的玻璃， 金色和藍色在夜色裏顯得煙霧迷茫，但中央縱隊開闢白色像一個人變身， 和所有的人，有名的無名的，他們的生命和手藝，都早已嵌入大教堂的石頭和玻璃中。
