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The author of “How to Think More About Sex” was impressed as a young man by Kierkegaard’s claim to read only “writings by men who have been executed.” 《如何思考性这件事》(How to Think More About Sex)的作者年轻时看到克尔恺郭尔(Kierkegaard)说他只读“被处死的人写的作品”，大为震撼。 What book is on your night stand now? 你的床头柜上现在放的是什么书？ I’m reading “Zona,” the latest book by one of my favorite contemporary writers, Geoff Dyer. The premise of the book sounds immensely boring — an essay on Andrei Tarkovsky’s fim “Stalker” — but fortunately, like most of Dyer’s works, it isn’t about anything other than the author: his obsessions, his fears, his encroaching (and always endearing) feelings of insanity. The book is held together by the sheer quality of the author’s voice, a feat in itself. 我在读我最喜欢的其中一位当代作家杰夫o戴尔(Geoff Dyer)的新作《地带》(Zona)。这本书的主题听起来非常无味——关于安德列o塔科夫斯基(Andrei Tarkovsky)的电影《潜行者》(Stalker)的随笔——但幸运的是，像戴尔的大部分作品一样，它其实讲述的是作者自己：他的痴迷，他的恐惧，他越来越强烈的（还总是讨人欢喜的）疯狂感。这本书全靠作者的声音将其撑起，这本身就是一个成就。
What was the last truly great book you read? 你读的上一本真正伟大的书是什么？ I remain predictably in thrall to Marcel Proust’s “In Search of Lost Time.” There is so much in the novel, it’s possible for two committed Proustians to love it for entirely different reasons. Some like the dinner parties, some the art history, some the jealousy, some the young girls in bloom. The Proust I respond to is the psychological essayist who observes the motives and emotions of his characters with some of the forensic acuity (and dry deadly wit) of the great French moralists like Pascal, La Rochefoucauld and Stendhal; the Proust who writes things like: “There is no doubt that a person’s charms are less frequently a cause of love than a remark such as: ‘No, this evening I shan’t be free.’” 我一直很痴迷马塞尔o普鲁斯特(Marcel Proust)的《追忆似水年华》(In Search of Lost Time)。这本小说内涵丰富，两个忠诚的普鲁斯特迷可能因为完全不同的原因而爱上这本书。有的喜欢里面的晚宴，有的喜欢其中讲述的艺术史，有的喜欢书中对嫉妒的描绘，有的则喜欢里面正值花样年华的女孩。而我喜欢的普鲁斯特是他作为心理散文家的那一面，他以帕斯卡(Pascal)、拉罗什富科(La Rochefoucauld)和司汤达(Stendhal)等伟大的法国道德家们的那种法医般的敏锐（加上十足的冷幽默），观察他笔下人物的动机和情感；我喜欢他写的这样的句子：“毫无疑问，生发出爱情的，往往不是一个人的魅力，而是他说的这样的话：‘不，我今晚没空。’”
What is your favorite literary genre? Any guilty pleasures? 你最喜欢的文学体裁是什么？有哪种体裁是让你有阅读的快乐但同时又产生罪恶感的？ I’m devoted to the essay. This is a much less defined genre than, say, the history book or the novel. The kind of essays I have in mind come down in a line from Montaigne, and tackle large quasi — philosophical themes in a tone that is warm, human, digressive and touching. You feel like you have come to know a friend, not just a theme. I have loved essays by, among others, Emerson, Thoreau, Virginia Woolf, Donald Winnicott, Cyril Connolly, Joseph Brodsky, Lawrence Weschler, Milan Kundera, Julian Barnes, Adam Gopnik and Nicholson Baker. 我钟爱散文。这种体裁不像历史书或者小说那样有那么多限定。我头脑中的散文是自蒙田(Montaigne)一脉相承下来的，以温暖的、人性化的、随意的、感人的语调，来处理大量的准哲学主题。你会觉得你认识了一个朋友，而不只是一类主题。我喜欢的散文家很多，比如爱默生(Emerson)、梭罗(Thoreau)、弗吉尼亚o伍尔夫(Virginia Woolf)、唐纳德o温尼科特(Donald Winnicott)、西里尔o康诺利(Cyril Connolly)、约瑟夫o布罗茨基(Joseph Brodsky)、劳伦斯o韦施勒(Lawrence Weschler)、米兰o昆德拉(Milan Kundera)、朱利安o巴恩斯(Julian Barnes)、亚当o高普尼克(Adam Gopnik)和尼克尔森o贝克(Nicholson Baker)。 Have you read any good books on philosophy lately? 你最近有没有读到哲学方面的好书？ I have been consoled by Arthur Schopenhauer’s delightfully morbid pessimism in “The Wisdom of Life.” “We can regard our life as a uselessly disturbing episode in the blissful repose of nothingness,” he tells us. “It may be said of it: ‘It is bad today and every day it will get worse, until the worst of all happens.’ ” It’s a mistaken prejudice of our times to think that the only way to cheer someone up is to tell them something cheerful. Exaggerated tragic pronouncements work far better. 亚瑟o叔本华(Arthur Schopenhauer)的《人生的智慧》(The Wisdom of Life)中愉悦而病态的悲观主义带给我很多慰藉。他告诉我们，“我们可以把生命看作是‘虚无’所具有的充满喜悦安宁中的一段毫无用处、令人不安的插曲。”“也许可以这么说：‘今天很糟糕，而且以后只会越来越糟，直到最糟糕的事情发生。’”我们的时代有个错误的成见，认为让一个人高兴起来的唯一方法是告诉他高兴的事。而实际上，告诉他一些夸张的悲哀的事，效果要好得多。 If you could require the president to read one book, what would it be? The prime minister? 如果你可以要求美国总统读一本书，你会选哪本？给英国首相呢？ Your president is a complex case, a man of passion, courage and oratory. And also, a diligent, prickly, practical law professor. I’ve got a weakness for the former side, so would want to put books in front of him that could bolster what I think of as his best impulses. I’d particularly keep him close to Whitman and Thoreau, those great American voices of openhearted humanity, daring and liberty. As for the British prime minister, he urgently needs to read John Locke and Thomas Hobbes, and read up on constitutional matters from a historical perspective. 你们的总统是个复杂的人，他充满激情、勇气和雄辩。同时他也是一个勤奋、易怒、务实的法律专家。我偏爱前面那一方面，所以我想在他面前放一些能帮助他产生正确的直觉的书。我会特别让他关注惠特曼(Whitman)和梭罗，这两位伟大的美国作家有着坦诚的仁慈、勇气和自由。至于英国首相，他迫切需要读一读约翰o洛克(John Locke)和托马斯o霍布斯(Thomas Hobbes)的作品，从历史的角度去看待宪法问题。 What were your favorite books as a child? Did you have a favorite character or hero? 你孩提时代最喜欢的书有哪些？有没有特别喜欢的小说人物或者主人公？ I was a very un-literary child, which might reassure parents with kids who don’t read. Lego was my thing, as well as practical books like “See Inside a Nuclear Power Station.” It wasn’t till early adolescence that I saw the point of books and then it was the old stalwart, “The Catcher in the Rye,” that got me going. By 16, I was lost — often in the philosophy aisles, in a moody and melodramatic state. I was impressed by Kierkegaard’s claim that he was going to read only “writings by men who have been executed.” 我小时候很不喜欢文学，父母们是不是可以因此不必那么担心孩子们不爱读书。我喜欢的是乐高积木，以及一些实用性的书，比如《核电站内部探秘》(See Inside a Nuclear Power Station)。直到青春期的早期，我才意识到书的意义，然后让我继续读下去的是经典著作《麦田里的守望者》(The Catcher in the Rye)。16岁的时候，我有点迷茫——通常是在哲学书架的通道里，在一种郁郁寡欢、戏剧化的状态里。让我印象深刻的一点是，克尔恺郭尔(Kierkegaard)声称他只读“被处死的人写的作品”。 What books had the greatest influence on you when you were a student? 在学生时代，哪些书对你的影响最大？ The French essayist Roland Barthes was, and in many ways continues to be, my greatest influence. I responded to his way of approaching very large topics (love, the meaning of literature, photography) in oblique ways, with great formal innovation and originality. His essay on photography, “Camera Lucida,” is a model of what a highly rigorous but personal essay should be like. I couldn’t have written my first book, “On Love,” without reading his “A Lover’s Discourse.” Barthes taught me courage and innovation at the level of form. 法国散文家罗兰o巴特(Roland Barthes)对我的影响最大，直到现在他在很多方面还在影响着我。我喜欢他用隐晦的方式谈论非常大的主题（像是爱、文学的意义、摄影），在形式上很新颖、有独创性。他关于摄影的散文《投影描绘器》(Camera Lucida)，是高度严密而又私人化的散文的典范。如果我没有读过他的《恋人絮语》(A Lover’s Discourse)，我不可能写出我的第一本书《关于爱》(On Love)。巴特在形式层面上教给了我勇气和创新。 What was the last book that made you cry? 上一本让你大哭的书是什么？ I’m always close to tears reading Judith Kerr’s delightful children’s story, “The Tiger Who Came to Tea.” It tells of a tiger who turns up, quite unexpectedly, at teatime at the house of a girl called Sophie and her mother. You’d expect them to panic, but they take the appearance of this visitor entirely in their stride — and their reaction is a subtle invitation for us to approach life’s unexpected challenges with resilience and good humor. 在读朱迪丝o克尔(Judith Kerr)可爱的儿童故事《老虎来喝下午茶》(The Tiger Who Came to Tea)时，我始终被感动得要流下泪来。它讲的是一位叫苏菲(Sophie)的小女孩和她的妈妈在房子里喝下午茶的时候，一只老虎意外出现了。你以为她们会吓坏了，但实际上她们非常从容地应对这位来客——她们的反应是在悄悄暗示我们要用达观的态度和好心情来应对生活中意想不到的挑战。 The last book that made you laugh? 上一本让你大笑的书呢？ I’ve been reading a nonfiction cartoon called “Couch Fiction,” by a British psychoanalyst, Phillippa Perry. The book is simply the best single volume on analysis I’ve ever read, and takes us through one man’s analysis, and his attempts to resolve a range of problem with his mother and his girlfriend. It’s done with images and speech bubbles by Junko Graat; it’s constantly charming and always deeply accurate and thought-provoking. 我一直在读一本非虚构类的漫画书，名叫《沙发小说》(Couch Fiction)，作者是英国心理分析学家菲利帕o佩里(Phillippa Perry)。这本书是我读过的最好的心理分析图书，带我们探视了一个男人对自己与母亲和女友之间的一系列问题的分析，以及他努力解决这些问题的尝试。里面的图画和对白是琼科o格拉特(Junko Graat)创作的；这本书有很多地方很有趣，而且总是一语中的，发人深省。 The last book that made you furious? 上一本让你大怒的书呢？ I got very angry about the food industry reading Jonathan Safran Foer’s excellent “Eating Animals.” Now, a few years later, I’m bewildered and deeply worried by the way one can be impressed and moved by a book and yet do absolutely nothing about one’s indignation and simply put all the good arguments to one’s side — frightening evidence of the impotence of books in the hands of fickle readers. 我在读乔纳森o萨夫兰o弗埃(Jonathan Safran Foer)精彩的《吃掉动物》(Eating Animals)一书时，对食品行业非常气愤。这本书如此震撼和感动了我，可是几年过去了，我却没有就自己的义愤采取任何行动，而只是站在了正义这一边，我为此感到迷惑和深深的焦虑。这也令人恐惧地证明，在变化无常的读者手中，书籍有时完全不起作用。 What’s the best love story you’ve ever read? 你读过的最好的爱情故事是什么？ Goethe’s “Sorrows of Young Werther” is like a distillation of all the themes of the Western approach to love. It’s also a study in immaturity. Werther’s love for Charlotte depends on not being reciprocated. Had she said yes, his love might have foundered in the routines of child care. In other words, it’s a love story that subtly points out how much the standard love story doesn’t prepare us for what mature relationships are like. It’s a book that should be given to the young, with warning. 歌德(Goethe)的《少年维特之烦恼》(Sorrows of Young Werther)像是西方爱情故事所有主题的精华。它也是对“不成熟”的一种探究。维特对夏洛特(Charlotte)的爱的基石是他的爱无法得到回报。假设夏洛特答应了他，也许他的爱早已化为乌有了。换句话说，这个爱情故事巧妙地指出了标准的爱情故事在多大程度上向我们隐藏了成熟的恋情的真实面貌。应该让年轻人看看这本书，它有一种警示作用。 Are there any architects that you think are also particularly good writers? What are your favorite books on architecture? 你有没有觉得哪位建筑师同时也是非常优秀的作家？你最喜欢的建筑类图书是什么？ id="medium-rectangle-ad-3" "mid4 Le Corbusier is an outstanding writer. His ideas achieved their impact in large measure because he could write so convincingly. His style is utterly clear, brusque, funny and polemical in the best way. His books are beautifully laid out with captions and images. I recommend “Towards a New Architecture.” It’s a deep pity that while Le Corbusier’s style has been much copied by architects, very few have drawn the right lessons from him about literature and prose style. 勒o柯布西耶(Le Corbusier)是一位非常出色的作家。他的思想能够产生那么大的影响，很大程度上是因为他的文章很有说服力。他的风格特别清晰、直率、有趣、善辩。他的书配有美丽的插图和图片。我推荐《走向新建筑》(Towards a New Architecture)这本书。非常遗憾的是，尽管很多建筑师在模仿勒o柯布西耶的风格，但是极少有人从他那里吸取了关于文学和散文风格的正确经验。 If you could meet any writer, dead or alive, who would it be? What would you want to know? 如果你能与一位作家会面，包括过世的和还活着的，你会选谁？你想从他/她那里知道什么？ I would have liked to meet John Ruskin, who has been a big influence on me, and whose eccentric visions of the ideal society (at the level of architecture and morality) I am constantly inspired by. He felt sad, persecuted, lonely and misunderstood. I would have wanted to try to be his friend. 我想见见约翰o拉斯金(John Ruskin)，他对我的影响很大，他对理想社会（在建筑和道德方面）的不同寻常的愿景不断地启发着我。他在世的时候感到悲伤、孤独、被迫害、被误解。我想试试做他的朋友。 And if you could meet a character from literature, who would it be? 如果你能与一个文学人物见面，你想见到谁？ Proust’s Albertine sounds high maintenance but rewarding — and, in my eyes, a proper woman, a tomboy, rather than a hermaphrodite. 普鲁斯特笔下的阿尔伯蒂(Albertine)听起来不好对付，但是却让人受益——在我眼里，她是一个正派女子，一个假小子，而不是阴阳人。 Who are your favorite writers of all time? And among your contemporaries? 在所有的作家中，哪些是你最喜欢的？在同辈作家中呢？ My life has been variously overtaken (and ruined by) Montaigne, Stendhal, Freud and W. H. Auden. I think a lot about W. G. Sebald and Ryszard Kapuscinski. A contemporary of sorts, albeit in a different generation, was Norman Mailer. His largely forgotten book, “Of a Fire on the Moon,” fascinates me: a big sprawling essay on technology and America that deserves a wider audience. Among the living, I deeply love: Milan Kundera, Michel Houellebecq, Philip Roth and Nicholson Baker. 我的人生在很多方面被蒙田、司汤达、弗洛依德和W.H.奥登(W. H. Auden)控制（以及毁灭）着。我经常想起W. G.西博尔德(W. G. Sebald)和雷沙德o卡普钦斯基(Ryszard Kapuscinski)。当代作家中我喜欢诺曼o梅勒(Norman Mailer)，尽管他跟我不是同一代人。他被人遗忘的著作《月之火》(Of a Fire on the Moon)让我着迷，这本书是关于科技和美国的长篇散文，内容丰富，值得更多人阅读。在世的作家中，我非常喜欢的有：米兰o昆德拉、米歇尔o维勒贝克(Michel Houellebecq)、菲利普o罗斯(Philip Roth)和尼克尔森o贝克。 And if you had to give a young person a list of books to be read above all others to prepare for adulthood, what would you include? 如果要你给一个年轻人列一个书单，供他/她做好步入成年的准备，你会选哪些书？ I’d give them Theodore Zeldin’s “Intimate History of Humanity,” a beautiful attempt to connect up the large themes of history with the needs of the individual soul. I’d point them to Ernst Gombrich’s “Art and Illusion,” which opens up the visual arts and psychology. There’s a lot of despair in adolescence, so I’d recommend comfort from pessimists like Pascal and Cioran. I’d especially give them a sad, poignant, questing little book called “The Unquiet Grave” by Cyril Connolly (written under the alias Palinurus). 我会选西奥多o泽尔丁(Theodore Zeldin)的《情感的历史》(Intimate History of Humanity)，这本美丽的书尝试把历史的宏大主题与个人心灵的需求联系起来。我还会推荐恩斯特o冈布里奇(Ernst Gombrich)的《艺术与幻觉》(Art and Illusion)，这本书探索的是视觉艺术和心理学。人在青春期会经常产生绝望的情绪，所以我建议他/她读一些像帕斯卡和乔兰(Cioran)这样的悲观主义者的作品，以获得慰藉。我特别推荐一本悲伤、辛酸、探索性的小书，名叫《不平静的坟墓》(The Unquiet Grave)，作者是西里尔o康诺利（署的是他的笔名Palinurus）。 What are you planning to read next? 你接下来计划读什么书？ I’d love to read Chris Ware’s new book, “Building Stories,” which was unfortunately out of stock (an extraordinary oversight) and has just become available again. In the meantime, I feel I’m going to have a great time with Douglas Coupland’s new little book about Marshall McLuhan. 我想读克里斯o韦尔(Chris Ware)的新书《构筑故事》(Building Stories)，不幸的是这本书一度脱销（这是一个极大的疏忽），最近才又有供货。同时，我觉得道格拉斯o库普兰(Douglas Coupland)写的关于马歇尔o麦克卢汉(Marshall McLuhan)的最新小书，会给我带来一段美好时光。 本文最初发表于2013年1月27日。 翻译：王艳 |
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