The gift of tongues.

语言的天赋。

What makes some people learn language after language?

何者吸引一些人接二连三地学习多门语言?

Babel No More: The Search for the World's Most Extraordinary Language Learners.

消逝的巴别塔：寻找世间最卓越的语言学习者。

CARDINAL MEZZOFANTI of Bologna was a secular saint. Though he never performed the kind of miracle needed to be officially canonised, his power was close to unearthly. Mezzofanti was said to speak 72 languages. Or 50. Or to have fully mastered 30. No one was certain of the true figure, but it was a lot. Visitors flocked from all corners of Europe to test him and came away stunned. He could switch between languages with ease. Two condemned prisoners were due to be executed, but no one knew their language to hear their confession. Mezzofanti learned it in a night, heard their sins the next morning and saved them from hell.

博洛尼亚的Mezzofanti红衣主教是一个身处于俗世的圣人。尽管他从未演示过任何奇迹而被正式册封为圣徒，其能力也近乎超自然了。据说Mezzofanti可以说72抑或50种语言，若说精通则是30种。对此，没人能说得准，但总之很多。成群结队从欧洲各地赶来验证他能力的游客都带着瞠目结舌的神情离去。他可以轻松地任意在几种语言之间切换。曾有两个被定罪的囚犯即将行刑，却因说一口无人知晓的语言使得最后的忏悔无人听得懂。Mezzofanti用一夜学会了这种语言，并于隔天早晨倾听了他们的罪孽，救赎了他们的灵魂以免于沦落地狱。

Or so the legend goes. In "Babel No More", Michael Erard has written the first serious book about the people who master vast numbers of languages—or claim to. A journalist with some linguistics training, Mr Erard is not a hyperpolyglot himself (he speaks some Spanish and Chinese), but he approaches his topic with both wonder and a healthy dash of scepticism.

如此这般，传言之谓。《消逝的巴别塔》是Michael Erard所写的有关于精通或声称自己精通许多种语言之人的第一本严肃书籍。Erard先生虽是个受过些许语言学训练的记者，但却并没有通晓超多种语言的特殊能力（他能说一点西班牙语和中文），不过他在处理论题时，即带着惊奇艳羡，又带着几许健康的怀疑态度。

Mezzofanti, for example, was a high-ranking clergyman born in 1774. In most of his interactions, he would have been the one to pick the topic of conversation, and he could rely on the same formulae he had used many times. He lived in an age when "knowing" a language more often meant reading and translating rather than speaking fluently with natives. Nonetheless, Mezzofanti clearly had speaking talent; his English accent was so good as to be almost too correct, an Irish observer noted.

如Mezzsfanti生于1774年，曾是高级神职人员。多数情况下，他可能正是在与人交流中掌握选择话题主动权的人，如此，他便能够仰仗用过许多次的同一种模式交谈了。他所生活的年代对于知晓一种语言的理解更多的是指能读能译而非能够流利地与母语使用者交流。尽管如此，Mezzofanti显然还是拥有语言天赋的：一个爱尔兰目击者指出，他的英语口音好到几乎过了头。

To find out whether anyone could really learn so many languages, Mr Erard set out to find modern Mezzofantis. The people he meets are certainly interesting. One man with a mental age of nine has a vast memory for foreign words and the use of grammatical endings, but he cannot seem to break free of English word-order. Ken Hale, who was a linguist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and died in 2001, was said to have learned 50 languages, including notoriously difficult Finnish while on a flight to Helsinki. Professional linguists still swear by his talent. But he insisted he spoke only three (English, Spanish and Warlpiri—from Australia's Northern Territory) and could merely "talk in" others.

为了弄清是否真有人能够学如此多的语言，Erard先生启程去寻找现代的Mezzofantis。他果真遇到了有趣之人。一个心理年龄仅9岁的男子拥有大量关于外语单词和词尾的记忆，但似乎不能打破英语词序的思维定式。另据说Ken Hale，这位于2011年去世的麻省理工学院的语言学家，生前学习了50种语言，甚至在一架飞往赫尔辛基的航班上学会被公认极难的芬兰语。语言专家们至今仍对他的天赋确信无疑。而他本人确坚称自己只会三门语言（英语，西班牙语和沃匹利语——来自于澳洲北领地），而对于其它语言，聊聊尚可。

Mr Erard says that true hyperpolyglottery begins at about 11 languages, and that while legends abound, tried and tested exemplars are few. Ziad Fazah, raised in Lebanon and now living in Brazil, once held the Guinness world record for 58 languages. But when surprised on a Chilean television show by native speakers, he utterly flubbed questions in Finnish, Mandarin, Farsi and Russian (including "What day is it today?" in Russian), a failure that lives in infamy on YouTube. Perhaps he was a fraud; perhaps he simply had a miserable day. Hyperpolyglots must warm up or "prime" their weaker languages, with a few hours' or days' practice, to use them comfortably. Switching quickly between more than around six or seven is near-impossible even for the most gifted.

Erard先生称真正的精通超多语言者应从掌握11门语言算起，而且尽管传言四起，能经受住考验的实例确少之甚少。成长于黎巴嫩现居于巴西的Ziad Fazah曾因会58种语言而被载入吉尼斯世界纪录，却在一台智利的电视节目中在无准备状态下受到母语使用的突袭，以至于完全弄错了用芬兰语、普通话、波斯语和俄语问的问题（包括俄语的今天周几？），这个失败带了的耻辱在因YouTube得以长存。也许Ziad Fazah是个骗子，也许他那天只是特别倒霉。精通超多语言者必须对他较薄弱的语言进行几小时甚至是几天的热身或者说是事先准备，才能自如运用这些语言。而迅速地在六、七种语言之间来回切换，即使对于那些天赋异禀者来说，也几乎是不可能的。

Does that mean they don't really know them? Is instant availability of native-like competence the only standard for "nowing" a language? How should partly knowing a tongue be tallied? What if you can only read in it? Mr Erard repeatedly peppers his text with such questions, feeling his way through his story as a thoughtful observer, rather than banging about like an academic with a theory to defend or a pitchman with a technique to sell.

这就意味着他们并非真正知晓这些语言么？拥有与母语使用者那样呼之即来来之能用的能力即是知晓一种语言的唯一标准吗？该如何评估部分知晓一门语言呢？又如果你仅能阅读呢？Erard先生在他的文章中接二连三地提出问题，如一个善思考的观察者根据故事寻找线索，而非言辞激烈地如同一个专家用理论来辩解或像个宣传员以技巧来销售自己的观点。

Hyperpolyglots are more likely to be introverted than extroverted, which may come as a surprise to some. Hale's son always said that, in his father's case, languages were a cloak for a shy man. Another, Alexander Arguelles, has learned dozens of languages only to read them, saying "It's rare that you have an interesting conversation in English. Why do I think it would be any better in another language?" Emil Krebs, an early-20th-century German diplomat who was also credited with knowing dozens of languages, was boorish in all of them. He once refused to speak to his wife for several months because she told him to put on a winter coat.

令很多人感到惊奇的是，精通超多语言者们的性格更趋于内向。Hale的儿子总是说，在他父亲看来，语言是腼腆者的伪装。另一个名为Alexander Arguelles的人会许多种语言却都仅限于阅读，他解释说如果你对用英语交谈都罕有兴趣的话，又怎会对说其他语言有更多好感呢？20世纪上半叶的德国外交官Emil Krebs也被公认会几十种语言，但不管说哪一种都是生硬无礼。他曾有一次几个月都拒绝跟他妻子说话仅因为她让他添一件冬衣。

Different hypotheses may explain part of the language-learner's gift. Some hyperpolyglots seem near-autistic. In support, Mr Erard points to the theory of Simon Baron-Cohen, of Cambridge University, that autists have an "extreme male brain" that seeks to master systems. Another hypothesis is the "Geschwind-Galaburda" cluster of traits. Supposedly resulting from abnormal antenatal exposure to hormones, this cluster includes maleness, homosexuality, left-handedness, poor visual-spatial skills, immune disorders, and perhaps also language-learning talent. Brain areas are also keyed to certain skills. The left Heschl’s gyrus is bigger than average in professional phoneticians. People who learn new vocabulary quickly show more activity in the hippocampus. Krebs's brain, preserved in slices at a laboratory in Düsseldorf, shows various unusual features.

不同的假说也许能够解释语言学习者的部分天赋。有一些精通超多语言者显现出自闭的倾向。Erard先生以剑桥大学Simon Baron-Cohen的理论作为例证，即自闭症患者拥有极端男性大脑以寻求对事物系统性地掌握。另一个假设则是Geschwind-Galaburda的特征簇。这一被推测为因孕期非正常接触到荷尔蒙而导致的特征包括男性向、同性恋、左撇子、立体空间辨别力差、免疫系统紊乱，也可能是学习语言的天赋。大脑的区域与特定的人体机能相联系。专业语音学者的左听皮质区比常人大，而能够快速学习新词汇的人大脑海马区域较常人活跃。Kreb的大脑切片被保存在杜塞尔多夫的一个实验室里，其显示出多种不同寻常的特质。

The discovery of the FOXP2 brain gene, a mutation of which can cause language loss, was met with considerable excitement when it was announced over a decade ago. But the reality is that many parts of the brain work together to produce speech and no single gene, region of the brain or theory can explain successful language-learning. In the end Mr Erard is happy simply to meet interesting characters, tell fascinating tales and round up the research without trying to judge which is the best work.

十多年前，对FOXP2大脑基因突变会导致语言能力丧失这一发现的公布使众人激动不已。事实上，话语能力是大脑的许多部分共同运作而产生的，没有任何单独的基因、大脑区域或理论的不同领域可以成功解释语言学习。最后，Erard先生只能满足于结实有趣之人、叙述精彩故事和搜集科研的喜悦之情，而非对这些研究的优劣妄加评判。

At the end of his story, however, he finds a surprise in Mezzofanti's archive: flashcards. Stacks of them, in Georgian, Hungarian, Arabic, Algonquin and nine other tongues. The world's most celebrated hyperpolyglot relied on the same tools given to first-year language-learners today. The conclusion? Hyperpolyglots may begin with talent, but they aren't geniuses. They simply enjoy tasks that are drudgery to normal people. The talent and enjoyment drive a virtuous cycle that pushes them to feats others simply shake their heads at, admiration mixed with no small amount of incomprehension.

然而，在著述的末尾，他在Messofanti的档案资料中找到令人惊讶的发现：抽认卡——一大堆的抽认卡，格鲁吉亚语，匈牙利语，阿拉伯语，阿尔贡金语以及另外九中语言——举世最著名的通晓超多语言者也要依靠这一现今我们为语言初学者所准备的工具。结论呢？精通超多语言者最初确实可能由能力而起，但他们也并非天才而只是能够对一般人觉得单调乏味的工作感到乐在其中。这一由天赋和兴趣所形成的良性循环驱策着他们成就另他人望而却步的事业，而在得到他人钦佩的同时也伴随着更多的不解。