（外文电子版资料）Chiang, Ted - 72 Letters.pdf

file:///G|/Program%20Files/eMule/Incoming/Ted%20Chiang%20-%2072ltrs.htm Seventy-Two Letters by Ted Chiang Originally published in Vanishing Acts, ed. Ellen Datlow. Published in hardcover by Tor Books, July 2000; trade paperback, July 2001. Copyright 2000 by Ted Chiang. All rights reserved. Reprinted by permission. When he was a child, Robert’s favorite toy was a simple one, a clay doll that could do nothing but walk forward. While his parents entertained their guests in the garden outside, discussing Victoria’s ascension to the throne or the Chartist reforms, Robert would follow the doll as it marched down the corridors of the family home, turning it around corners or back where it came from. The doll didn’t obey commands or exhibit any sense at all; if it met a wall, the diminutive clay figure would keep marching until it gradually mashed its arms and legs into misshapen flippers. Sometimes Robert would let it do that, strictly for his own amusement. Once the doll’s limbs were thoroughly distorted, he’d pick the toy up and pull the name out, stopping its motion in mid-stride. Then he’d knead the body back into a smooth lump, flatten it out into a plank, and cut out a different figure: a body with one leg crooked, or longer than the other. He would stick the name back into it, and the doll would promptly topple over and push itself around in a little circle. It wasn’t the sculpting that Robert enjoyed; it was mapping out the limits of the name. He liked to see how much variation he could impart to the body before the name could no longer animate it. To save time with the sculpting, he rarely added decorative details; he refined the bodies only as was needed to test the name. Another of his dolls walked on four legs. The body was a nice one, a finely detailed porcelain horse, but Rober