比密友更可靠的友誼就是書籍

雙語書話專欄

在這個世界上，有這樣一些人——他們一走進書店，心就怦怦亂跳，不管有多少瑣事纏身，總忍不住進店轉轉；見到一本心儀的書，不弄到手就坐立不安，哪怕買了書就要挨餓，也覺得心滿意足。許多名人亦為愛書人，他們會在文章中不經意流間流露愛書之情。而「雙語書話」專欄，將會每周截取一篇《新東方雙語書話譯叢》中的一部分和您一起分享西方大文豪的藏書趣聞或者是讀書歷程......

A Book That Brings Solace and Cheer

帶來安慰和愉悅的書

作者介紹

尤金.菲爾德

Eugene Field

尤金.菲爾德（Eugene Field，1850—1895），美國詩人和專欄作家，以創作兒童詩歌聞名，也是頗負盛名的藏書家。

1882年，他的第一部作品《先驅讀本》（The Tribune Primer）問世。這部作品諷刺了那些規勸教育孩子的書籍。他的其他作品包括《兒童情歌》（Love Songs of Children）、《搖籃曲》（Lullaby Land）、《讓人受益的故事》（A Little Book of Profitable Tales）和《書痴的愛情事件》（The Love Affairs of a Bibliomaniac）等。尤金.菲爾德藏書樓現屬聖路易斯市博物館，向全市公立學校的學生免費開放。

本文節選自1896年出版的尤金.菲爾德的遺作《書痴的愛情事件》。這本書寄託了作者對書的一腔柔情。文中，作者表達了自己對早年喜歡的書始終未變的愛。或許有些人會覺得難以置信，但愛書的你是否覺得心有戚戚焉？

我從不厭倦早年的愛書，也不疏遠它們。對此，奧雷爾醫生常常表示驚訝。他說，隨著時間的流逝，其他人會覺得年輕時的愛書已魅力不再。

他提出：「小時候，我們把友誼看得那麼珍貴，誰要是說我們終有一天會淡忘友人，我們便會愕然反駁。唉，但是隨著年齡的增長，我們便逐漸冷淡了最初的朋友，新朋友取代了老朋友。甚至有時我們會驚訝，自己怎麼會和這樣一個人如此親密。我們與一些人漸行漸遠，出於同樣的原因，我們與一些書也漸行漸遠。

一個人真的可能對曾經愛過的東西漠不關心嗎？我難以相信。至少，對我來說不是這樣。即便有朝一日我不能以舊時的激情享受親密老友的陪伴，但我依然會向其致以敬意，正如詩人朗費羅[1]晚年在環顧愛書時表達的那樣：

悲如中古老騎士，

凝望武器力不復；

華麗盾牌雙手劍，

堂上高懸在眼前；

昔日榮光仍期許，

沙場英姿難再現；

一念至此淚難掩，

白髮長髯亂胸前；

我輩持書亦如此，

文人刀劍在當年；

如今雖已不再用，

舊時深情價連城；

彼時少壯閒遊處，

但見迷雲在路途。

原文

Dr. O』Rell has frequently expressed surprise that I have never wearied of and drifted away from the book-friendships of my earlier years. Other people, he says, find, as time elapses, that they no longer discover those charms in certain books which attracted them so powerfully in youth.

「We have in our earlier days,」 argues the doctor, 「friendships so dear to us that we would repel with horror the suggestion that we could ever become heedless or forgetful of them; yet, alas, as we grow older we gradually become indifferent to these first friends, and we are weaned from them by other friendships; there even comes a time when we actually wonder how it were possible for us to be on terms of intimacy with such or such a person. We grow away from people, and in like manner and for similar reasons we grow away from books.」

Is it indeed possible for one to become indifferent to an object he has once loved? I can hardly believe so. At least it is not so with me, and, even though the time may come when I shall no longer be able to enjoy the uses of these dear old friends with the old-time enthusiasm, I should still regard them with that tender reverence which in his age the poet Longfellow expressed when looking round upon his beloved books:

Sadly as some old mediaeval knight

Gazed at the arms he could no longer wield—

The sword two-handed and the shining shield

Suspended in the hall and full in sight,

While secret longings for the lost delight

Of tourney or adventure in the field

Came over him, and tears but half concealed

Trembled and fell upon his beard of white;

So I behold these books upon their shelf

My ornaments and arms of other days;

Not wholly useless, though no longer used,

For they remind me of my other self

Younger and stronger, and the pleasant ways

In which I walked, now clouded and confused.

相關注釋

亨利.瓦茲沃思.朗費羅 (Henry Wadsworth Longfellow，1807—1882)，19世紀美國最偉大的浪漫主義詩人之一。

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