悠游度过一天的24小时：第十一章 认真研读

CHAPTER XI Serious Reading

第十一章 认真研读

Novels are excluded from "serious reading," so that the man who, bent on self-improvement, has been deciding to devote ninety minutes three times a week to a complete study of the works of Charles Dickens will be well advised to alter his plans. The reason is not that novels are not serious—some of the great literature of the world is in the form of prose fiction—the reason is that bad novels ought not to be read, and that good novels never demand any appreciable mental application on the part of the reader. It is only the bad parts of Meredith's novels that are difficult. A good novel rushes you forward like a skiff down a stream, and you arrive at the end, perhaps breathless, but unexhausted. The best novels involve the least strain. Now in the cultivation of the mind one of the most important factors is precisely the feeling of strain, of difficulty, of a task which one part of you is anxious to achieve and another part of you is anxious to shirk; and that feeling cannot be got in facing a novel. You do not set your teeth in order to read Anna Karenina. Therefore, though you should read novels, you should not read them in those ninety minutes.

小说被排除在“认真研读”的范畴之外，因此若有意自我提高的人决定每周三次，每次花90分钟的时间全面研究查尔斯.狄更斯的作品，还是建议他们更改计划。原因并不是小说不严肃——事实上世界上一些伟大的文学作品就是散文小说——原因是：粗劣小说不应该读，而好小说根本不需读者费神。就像梅瑞狄斯的小说只有一些败笔让人难以读下去。读一本好小说，有如乘一叶扁舟顺流而下，快速顺畅地到达终点，也许你喘气不已，但毫无倦意。出色的小说往往不会让读者费劲。陶冶性灵的要素之一就是疲惫和困难的感觉，你渴望完成一项任务的同时又想逃避完成；读小说可不会有那样的感受。读《安娜.卡列尼娜》，无须咬紧牙关。因此，虽然你应该读小说，但不应该在那90分钟阅读。

Imaginative poetry produces a far greater mental strain than novels. It produces probably the severest strain of any form of literature. It is the highest form of literature. It yields the highest form of pleasure, and teaches the highest form of wisdom. In a word, there is nothing to compare with it. I say this with sad consciousness of the fact that the majority of people do not read poetry.

读幻想诗比读小说更耗脑力，诗很可能是让人神经绷得最紧的，也是最高层次的文学形式，给人最大的愉悦并予人最深邃的智慧。一句话，没有什么可跟诗歌相提并论。然而，很遗憾，事实上大多数人不读诗。

I am persuaded that many excellent persons, if they were confronted with the alternatives of reading Paradise Lost and going round Trafalgar Square at noonday on their knees in sack-cloth, would choose the ordeal of public ridicule. Still, I will never cease advising my friends and enemies to read poetry before anything.

我相信如果要许多优秀的人在阅读《失乐园》和中午时分衣衫褴褛地在特拉法尔加广场乞讨中做出选择，很多人会选择后者，哪怕遭受公众耻笑。然而，我还是奉劝朋友们，包括我的敌人，诗歌应是阅读的首选。

If poetry is what is called "a sealed book" to you, begin by reading Hazlitt's1 famous essay on the nature of poetry in general. It is the best thing of its kind in English, and no one who has read it can possibly be under the misapprehension that poetry is a mediaeval torture, or a mad elephant, or a gun that will go off by itself and kill at forty paces. Indeed, it is difficult to imagine the mental state of the man who, after reading Hazlitt's essay, is not urgently desirous of reading some poetry before his next meal. If the essay so inspires you I would suggest that you make a commencement with purely narrative poetry.

如果诗歌对你来说像“天书”一般高深莫测，不妨先读黑兹利特的著名小品文《诗歌总论》，讲到了诗歌的特点，英语中类似的文章无出其右。看完后，你就不会误认为诗歌是中世纪的酷刑，或疯狂的大象，或是40步以内就会走火误杀人的枪支。要是一个人在读完黑兹利特的文章后，不急切地想在下一餐之前读几首诗歌的话，他的内心世界真是令人难以想象。如果这篇文章的确给你很大启发，我建议你接下来可以从读叙事诗开始。

There is an inf initely f iner English novel, written by a woman, than anything by George Eliot or the Brontes, or even Jane Austen, which perhaps you have not read. Its title is Aurora Leigh, and its author E.B. Browning2. It happens to be written in verse, and to contain a considerable amount of genuinely fine poetry. Decide to read that book through, even if you die for it. Forget that it is fine poetry. Read it simply for the story and the social ideas. And when you have done, ask yourself honestly whether you still dislike poetry. I have known more than one person to whom Aurora Leigh has been the means of proving that in assuming they hated poetry they were entirely mistaken.

有一部小说，它出自一位女作家之手，比乔治.艾略特、布朗特姐妹，甚或简.奥斯丁的作品都要好，或许这位作家的作品你没读过。这本小说就是《奥罗拉.利》，E.B.布朗宁著，全文采用诗体形式，里面有许多的优美诗句。一定要把它读完，哪怕为之献身。不要想那是一本好诗集，阅读时只要注意其情节和社会思想就行了。读完后，诚实地问自己是否还讨厌诗歌。我知道不止一个人，开始以为自己讨厌诗，读完《奥罗拉·利》之后才发现自己大错特错了。

Of course, if, after Hazlitt, and such an experiment made in the light of Hazlitt, you are finally assured that there is something in you which is antagonistic to poetry, you must be content with history or philosophy. I shall regret it, yet not inconsolably. The Decline and Fall is not to be named in the same day with Paradise Lost, but it is a vastly pretty thing; and Herbert Spencer's First Principles simply laughs at the claims of poetry and refuses to be accepted as aught but the most majestic product of any human mind. I do not suggest that either of these works is suitable for a tyro in mental strains. But I see no reason why any man of average intelligence should not, after a year of continuous reading, be fit to assault the supreme masterpieces of history or philosophy. The great convenience of masterpieces is that they are so astonishingly lucid.

当然，如果读完黑兹利特的文章并按他的提示去做了之后，你深信自己是排斥诗歌的，那你则一定会从历史或哲学中获得满足。我对此有些遗憾，但并不是毫无安慰。《罗马衰亡史》虽不能和《失乐园》相提并论，但前者读起来也是饶有兴味的；赫伯特.斯宾塞的《第一原理》只是在嘲笑那些提倡诗歌的主张，并认为诗歌不能被称作是人类最崇高思想的结晶。我认为这些作品不适合推荐给入门者，让他们一开始就精神紧张。但我觉得有普通智力的人经过一年不断的阅读后，没有理由不去涉猎一些最杰出的历史或哲学著作。杰作显著的优点在于它们是如此清晰晓畅，令人惊佩。

I suggest no particular work as a start. The attempt would be futile in the space of my command. But I have two general suggestions of a certain importance. The first is to define the direction and scope of your efforts. Choose a limited period, or a limited subject, or a single author. Say to yourself: "I will know something about the French Revolution, or the rise of railways, or the works of John Keats3." And during a given period, to be settled beforehand, conf ine yourself to your choice. There is much pleasure to be derived from being a specialist.

开始时我不推荐任何特定的作品，在我的要求之下所做的尝试通常都毫无效果。但我有两条比较重要的建议：其一，界定你努力的方向和范围，选择一定的期限、某个特定的主题、或是某位作家。要对自己说：“我想了解法国革命、或铁路的兴建、或是约翰.济慈的作品。”在一定时间内，事先做好准备，然后把精力集中在自己的选择上。能成为某方面的专家是非常令人欣喜的事情。

The second suggestion is to think as well as to read. I know people who read and read, and for all the good it does them they might just as well cut bread-and-butter. They take to reading as better men take to drink. They fly through the shires of literature on a motor-car, their sole object being motion. They will tell you how many books they have read in a year.

其二，要边读边想。我知道有的人会不停地读啊读，但读书的所得却比他们切切面包和黄油学到的多不了多少。他们热爱阅读就像好酒之徒沉湎于饮酒一样。他们驾车在文学领域里翱翔，唯一的目标就是运动。他们会告诉你一年里他们读了多少书。

Unless you give at least forty-five minutes to careful, fatiguing reflection (it is an awful bore at first) upon what you are reading, your ninety minutes of a night are chiefly wasted. This means that your pace will be slow.

除非花上至少45分钟来细心地、甚至是有些令人疲惫地思考你所读的内容（起初你会觉得相当乏味），否则，你一晚上90分钟的时间基本上就被浪费了。这意味着你将进展缓慢。

Never mind.

没关系。

Forget the goal; think only of the surrounding country; and after a period, perhaps when you least expect it, you will suddenly find yourself in a lovely town on a hill.

抛开目标；只想着周围的乡野；一段时间后，也许是你最不经意的时候，突然发现自己已置身于山丘上的一个可爱小镇。

(1)黑兹利特（1778—1830），英国著名散文家、文学评论家。

(2)E.B.布朗宁（1806—1861），又称布朗宁夫人，是19世纪英国著名女诗人。

(3)约翰•济慈（1795—1821），英国19世纪浪漫主义诗人。