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撒马尔罕的金桃 豆瓣 Goodreads
The Golden Peaches of Samarkand: A Study of T'ang Exotics
9.1 (43 个评分) 作者: [美] 薛爱华 译者: 吴玉贵 社会科学文献出版社 2016 - 4
本书是薛爱华《撒马尔罕的金桃》最新修订译本,内含24页彩色图片,另保留原书风格20幅黑白题图。本书是西方汉学的一部名著,被视为西方学者研究中国古代社会、古代文化的必读之作。本书选取中华民族最值得骄傲的朝代——唐代为研究对象,详细研究了当时的世界文化交流和文明引进。内容涉及了唐朝生活的各个方面,家畜、野兽、飞禽、植物、木材、食物、香料、药品、纺织品、颜料、矿石、金属制品、世俗器物、宗教器物、书籍等,共18类170余种,举凡生活所需、日常所用,几乎无所不包。此书不仅展现了大唐时期的社会文化、物质生活的生动画面,为认识唐朝的社会生活史和文化史提供了极有价值的参考,也是了解中华文明和文明交流史的必读书籍。
本书可能是我们这个时代中,在研究中国方面资料最翔实、最博学精深,并且写得最赏心悦目的著作。
——《亚洲研究杂志》
完全是赏心乐事……薛爱华先生几乎没有漏掉唐代生活的任何一个方 面,以至于一点一滴地为整个文明建立起一幅合情合理的全景画卷……谢弗先生文笔优雅,睿智。他喜欢这些 天方夜谭式的故事,而且把它们讲得非常好。
——《星期六评论》
对唐代文化一次令人着迷的考察,这可以从唐代对舶来品的使用和需要中反映出来……我们很难得看到这么一本令人愉快而内容丰富翔实的书。
——《美国东方学会会刊》
美国学者薛爱华的《撒马尔罕的金桃》,是西方汉学的一部名著,被视为西方学者研究中国古代社会、古代文化的必读著作。……从本书我们可以看到,唐朝的外来物品是何等的丰富多彩,而这些外来物品对中国社会、中国原有的文化又发生着复杂的、多方面的影响,其中很多逐步溶入中国原有文化之中,最终成为中国文化的组成部分。今天的中国文化是多元的文化。中国文化既包含汉族的,也包含其他兄弟民族的;既有本土的,也有外来的成分。
——陈高华(中国社会科学院学术委员会委员,中国海外交通史研究会会长)
《撒马尔罕的金桃——唐朝的舶来品研究》是西方汉学的一部名著,被视为西方学者研究中国古代社会、古代文化的必读之作。本书选取中华民族最值得骄傲的朝代——唐代为研究对象,详细研究了当时的世界文化交流和文明引进。内容涉及了唐朝生活的各个方面,家畜、野兽、飞禽、植物、木材、食物、香料、药品、纺织品、颜料、矿石、金属制品、世俗器物、宗教器物、书籍等,共18类170余种,举凡生活所需、日常所用,几乎无所不包。此书不仅展现了大唐时期的社会文化、物质生活的生动画面,为认识唐朝的社会生活史和文化史提供了极有价值的参考,也是了解中华文明和文明交流史的必读书籍。
2018年3月25日 已读
看得我心花怒放。。。好好看。
看的方式有一点奇特。从镇上的公立图书馆拿到英文原版,摊开在桌上看,旁边有自己Kindle上下载的中文新译版。英文原文文笔流畅优美,但是中文版的人名地名和古文原文也是必不可少。尤其喜欢中文版把校注引用都放在正文每页下面,对照查看比英文版的统统放在书后要方便多了。
2018年3月26日 评论 盛大阅读 (完) - 零。缘起 最近因缘巧合摸到这本书。沉浸其中无法自拔。作者是加大伯克来的汉学教授Edward H. Schafer,中文名字薛爱华(这名字起得,真是淳朴!)主要内容就是从所有唐代外来物品这个角度来讲述唐代的物质文明。这书简直好玩极了。先看看目录就超级让人兴奋。世界上原来有这么好玩的书!历史书原来可以这么写! “。。。 第五章 飞禽 鹰与鹘 孔雀 鹦鹉 鸵鸟 频伽鸟 第六章 毛皮和羽毛 鹿皮 马皮 海豹皮 貂及貂类动物皮 豹皮 狮皮 其它兽皮 鲨鱼皮 兽尾 羽毛 孔雀尾 羽衣 虫饰 第七章 植物 保鲜与传播 枣椰树 菩提树 娑罗树 郁金香 那伽花 佛土叶 水仙 莲花 青睡莲 第八章 木材 紫檀 榈木 檀香 乌木 第九章 食物 葡萄与葡萄酒 诃子 蔬菜 珍馐美味 海味 调味品 糖 第十章 香料 焚香与香炉 沉香 紫藤香 榄香 樟脑 苏合香 安息香与爪哇香 乳香 没药 丁香青木香 广藿香 茉莉油 玫瑰香水 阿末香 甲香 。。。" 让我对这书有兴趣的引子之一是这篇古老的博客,作者当时19岁,写出了让我惊为天人的网络历史小说(耽美) 《有所思》 (以曹操和荀彧为蓝本) "翡翠屠苏鹦鹉杯 太阳出来,天气大好,但是却没什么去处,就窝在房间里看旧书。谢弗的《撒马尔罕的金桃》虽然一直(也理当)被归在学术著作里面,但是文笔实在是绮丽,说的人和事更绮丽,简直比小说和笔记都要好看。。。。 。。。里面的内容始终是好玩的。这次重读食物,香料,颜料三章,尤其是香料,看书中文字,简直有香味扑面而来。 这次顺带读了宝石一章,专列一目天青石。作者在文中提到,唐时诗文中一再出现的“瑟瑟”,即是蓝色的宝石,应该是天青石。但是看作者的形容,好像又是青金石,甚至其他各种各样的蓝色的宝石……汗,难道唐代人自己都糊涂了?" 一。翻译 最早的版本是1963年加州大学出版的英文版。整整400页,其中120页是注释!我一查旧金山市立图书馆就有货,虽然只有纸质书也立刻订了。 九十年代中国翻译过一版,但是不知道译者怎么想的,放着这么煽情美妙的原名不用,非得中规中矩的改叫“唐代的外来文明”。2016年又出了新版,终于改回了这个美丽的名字《撒马尔罕的金桃》。豆瓣上有人说新旧版对照新版的插页比旧版少了。所以我巴巴的下了新旧两版的中文版,想拿到英文版后对照一下少了哪些插页。 一开始本没有打算读英文原版。但是开看以后才发现中文翻译偏颇太大。几乎看不了几页就会看得一头雾水“这作者在说什么鬼?!”然后去看英文才发现译者理解错了或者干脆跳过不翻承上启下的句子。中文译者肯定是个学者,认真考古搜索(九十年代初互联网尚未有今日的规模,真的需要真书真文去翻),所有的人名地名古文古诗都还原,功夫做到了家。最好的是中文新版把所有注释都搬到每一页的下面(英文原版注释都在最后),对照查起来方便多了。另一面薛爱华老师的英文流畅优美,常暗戳戳的来点不动声色的幽古人一默的把戏,读着很享受。但是光看英文我的中文底子又不够厚,做不到看着英文译文就可以猜到中文原文的地步,所以还要常常打开中文版再读一遍才满意。所以这几天抱着两本大书啃,书桌上摊开也是一大片,数字化久了,很久没经历过这样的阅读排场了。 豆瓣上中文版评分8.9可见虽然翻译有种种不足(哇!读完了书评分涨到9.0了!),内容够结实,布局够有趣,读来依然享受。只是翻译要是像原文一样流畅优美就更好了。很可惜。 二。城市和外国人 我一直对古代多元大都市和繁华港口抗拒无能。以前记忆深刻的一段一战前的希腊港口城市士麦那(Smyrna,后来归属了土耳其,改名叫伊斯密尔) 的描写,百看不厌。 “我有没有告诉过你士麦那的夏天里,街道两旁摆满了装着玫瑰花瓣的篮子?城市里的每个人都会讲法语,意大利语,希腊语,土耳其语,英语,和荷兰语?我有没有告诉过你那些盛名远扬的无花果,被骆驼商队驮进城。。。混合在杏树,扶桑,月桂,桃子的香味里?狂欢节的时候大家都戴着面具,在三桅帆船甲板上享受丰盛晚餐?我想告诉你这些因为所有这一切曾经发生在这个无法定义的城市,发生在这个无法归属国界的地方,因为它属于全世界。我想告诉你这些因为如果现在你来到这里,你会看到现代化的高楼,没有时间痕迹的宽阔马路,大大小小的工场,一个北约总部,和一个写着伊兹密尔的牌子。” -Jean 译自 Jeffrey Eugenides的英文小说《Middlesex》, 一直以为这些城市属于地中海和爱琴海岸,没想到八世纪的中国不仅也有这样的城市,而且有至少四个:广州,扬州,洛阳,长安。那时的中国沿海从北到南挤满了来去五湖四海的船只,载着世界各地的物品。水手们也来自五湖四海但是都讲阿拉伯(中国古时叫大食)话。西安城里的酒馆会雇佣金发碧眼的侍女来招揽生意。市场上有卖各种“胡糕”。多么让人惊喜的大唐盛世!而且那时候(七八九世纪)好像欧洲处于罗马帝国粉碎后黑暗的中世纪。 书中描述大唐时(七八世纪)的扬州就是十四世纪的威尼斯: ”扬州的富庶与壮美,首先要归功于它处于长江与大运河的结合部的优越地理位置。。。由唐朝和外国商船运来的各种货物都要在扬州换船,装入北上的运河船只。所以这里也是亚洲各地商贾的聚集之所。从广州运来的盐(这是人人必需的消费品),茶(当时北方饮茶已近相当普遍),宝石,香料和药材,从四川沿着长江航道运来的珍贵的锦缎以及织花罩毯等,都集中在了扬州,然后再转输到各地。作为重要商品集散地的居民,扬州人的生活在当时也很富足。而且扬州还是重要的金融中心和黄金市场,。。。扬州是一座钱货流畅,熙熙攘攘的中产阶级城市。扬州还是一座工业城市,扬州以精美的金属制品(尤其是青铜镜),毡帽,丝织物,刺绣,苎麻布织品,精制蔗糖,造船,精良的细木工家具等特产而著称于世。扬州的毡帽当时在长安的年轻人中曾盛行一时。著名的扬州蔗糖是在七世纪以后根据从摩揭陀传入的工艺制作的。” 对接下来的翻译有意见,所以自己来翻。 “Yang-chou was a gay city, a city of well-dressed people, a city where the best entertainment was always available, a city of parks and gardens, a very Venice, traversed by waterways, where the boats outnumbered the carriages. It was a city of moonlight and lanterns, a city of song and dance, a city of courtesans. "Yang is first and I is second," went the epigram, placing the reputed elegance and bright frivolity of Ch'eng-tu in Szechwan, along with its solid prosperity, in an inferior position." “扬州是一座乐天的城,人们衣冠楚楚,娱乐节目昼夜不断;扬州是一座花园之城,像今天的威尼斯一样遍布水道,船数胜于车马。扬州是一座月光与灯笼交映之城,歌舞升平,艺妓云集。有道是”扬一益二“,素来以优雅和奢华著称的四川成都也只能居于扬州之后。” 北方的洛阳和长安一样繁华多元。洛阳这里说的波斯拜火教好像也跟权力游戏里窄海对面的宗教有些相似。 “洛阳是武则天的’神都’--到了十一世纪,它会发展成中国最辉煌美丽的城市。这种繁华在唐代洛阳已经初露倪端。宫殿园林和大批的官员已经处处可见。还以水果花卉彩锦丝绉瓷器这些特产而出名。南市是洛阳著名的市场,占了整整两个街区(坊),其中包含一百二十分类市场街区,上千的摊位和货栈。因商务而留驻的外国人,在洛阳可以去供奉外国神祈的寺院,其中三座是波斯的拜火寺,证明了当时洛阳的波斯移民之众。“ 北边的都城跟今天的帝都有点像,外来人口构成跟南方的港口城市不同。我注意到另一个有趣的细节。Uigher 现在叫维吾尔,古文叫回鹘(念hu2), Tibetan现在叫西藏,古文叫吐蕃(念bo2). 古文跟英文都是更相似(注:下面回复里有 豆友 指出很可能Tibet是译自吐蕃),很奇怪为什么现代称呼要改。。。 大食前面说了是阿拉伯,林邑是越南,天竺是印度,粟特是伊朗。 “……与长安的人口相适应,居住在长安的外来居民的数量也相当庞大。长安城的外来居民的成分也与广州港的外来居民有较大的差异。长安的外来居民主要是北方人和西方人,即突厥人、回鹘人、吐火罗人和粟特人等,而聚集在广州城里的外来居民则主要是林邑人、爪哇人和僧伽罗人。但是在长安和广州两地都有许多大食人、波斯人和天竺人。在入居唐朝的外来居民中,来自伊朗的居民占有重要的地位,唐朝政府甚至专门为伊朗居民设置了「萨宝」这个官职来监管他们的利益*。萨宝(Sārthavāk)的字面意思是「商队首领」。” 一直以为冰火之歌里面窄海对岸的城市都是仿照中东或者非洲或者南地中海等地的城市写的。看了金桃才发现,大叔的灵感也许来自远东。比方这里的黑皮肤“骨论人”就非常像冰火里面说的Summer Islanders. 时俗语便,亦称骨论(Kurung), 南海洲岛中人也。其黑裸形,能驯伏猛兽,犀象等。种类数般,即有僧袛(Zanji), 突弥(Turmi), 故堂(Kurdang), 阁蔑(Khmer) 等,。。。善入水,竟日不死。 水性好,薛老师猜是因为从小训练下海捞珍珠的缘故(Pearl divers). 三。大唐时的亚洲地图 从下到上从右到左逆时针: Bnam/Chinrap - 扶南/真腊,古时的柬埔寨,Chinrap就是“被中国人征服”的意思 Champa-占城,现代位于南越南的一批独立小国,之前叫林邑 Annam/Chiao chou - 安南交州, 现代的越南 Canton - 广州 Nan-Chao - 南诏 当年段王爷的地盘!琅琊榜里穆王府镇守的。现在的云南 Yang-chou - 扬州 相当于中唐时的上海,因为位于水路交通要道,扬子江和大运河的接口处 Lo-Yang - 洛阳,唐朝的东都 Paekche - 百济(朝鲜半岛上三古国之一) Silla - 新罗(朝鲜半岛上三古国之二) P'o-hai Mo-Ho - 渤海靺鞨 (朝鲜半岛上三古国之三) Chiang -an - 长安,唐朝的帝都 Liang-chou - 凉州,边城要塞,葡萄美酒夜光杯那个凉州 Tun-huang - 敦煌! Qoco (Turfan) - (Q卡在地图边上)高昌,吐鲁番地区大唐重镇,唐朝官方也叫它“西州”,其他民族叫它“Cinanckan" (汉城) Uighurs - 回鹘 Serindia - 西域 Rome (Syria) - 拂林(叙利亚) Islam (Persia) - 大食(波斯) Lion Country - 斯里兰卡 四。崇洋媚外 “一片冰心在玉壶”真的是玉作的壶里面放着冰。并不仅仅是比喻。 某李小编 书评 里的片段,都是我看得开心的段落 要理解唐代文明,就绕不开理解唐代外国人:侍臣、僧侣和商人等,他们是当时亚洲各国政治、宗教和商业方面的代表。然而,并不是所有外来者都有好运。被解送到岭南的吐蕃和回鹘战俘、受到排挤的吐火罗国摩尼教徒、身在宫廷却地位低下的龟兹乐工、名为高官实为人质的萨珊朝王子……有别于政客和商人,他们的共性在于,“由于命乖运蹇,或是由于唐朝皇室成员一时的古怪念头”导致被迫来到了大唐。 外来人口的风俗习惯或多或少地为大唐的文化注入了新鲜与活力,甚至在两京文人中兴起对“胡风”的推崇——效仿突厥人和东伊朗人的服饰与生活起居,从穿着到打扮到饮食习惯。诗人白居易在自己的庭院里搭了两顶天蓝色的帐篷会客,唐太宗之子李承乾甚至宁愿说突厥语、坐在帐篷前用佩刀割吃羊肉以模仿游牧民族首领。当然,即便是富豪的餐桌上利用昂贵进口配料制成的菜肴,其烹饪方式也没有完全复制国外;文人一时仿效“胡风”的举动并没有乱了中华之纲纪,奇风异俗最终也都被唐文明以海纳百川的胸怀所融汇、成为唐文明的补充。 五。各种长知识 接下来各种小章节细腻又有趣。学到很多新知识。比方说, - 汗血宝马的汗血其实是源自某种寄生虫! - 菩提树其实是无花果的一种。 菩提的果子就是一种小号的无花果,叶子是心形的。湾区常见的无花果叶子都像梧桐叶子,有分叉。 而古诗中频频提到的“郁金香”其实是现代的藏红花(saffron crocus) 兰陵美酒郁金香,玉碗盛来琥珀光 -李白(这里的郁金香是指用saffron调过味的酒) 双燕双飞绕画梁,罗帷翠被郁金香。-卢照(这里是指用saffron熏过香的衣服和帘帏) 轻幌芳烟郁金馥,绮檐花簟桃李枝。-陈陶 (同上,熏香) 燕麦青青游子悲,河堤弱柳郁金枝.-李白(这里李白已经把郁金这个词从味道扩展到“浓重而明快的一种淡黄红色的黄色色调”) 藏红花的花型是有点像现代的郁金香。 -菠菜原名波斯草 -中国本土的“椒”叫秦椒,现在叫日本椒,跟花椒(蜀椒)是近亲。水路和陆路从东南亚或者丝路送过来的是“胡椒”(英文就是Pepper)。 这是秦椒(Zanthoxylum piperitum),也叫Japanese Pepper. 书中提到八世纪末的德宗曾经在茶里加凝乳(猪油?)和椒,而八世纪一个唐朝僧人寒山写过首诗提到“椒”:“蒸豚搵蒜酱,炙鸭点椒盐” 那时的僧人是不是也不忌荤腥,要不怎么对猪和鸭的吃法如此门儿清?至少也是一枚吃货僧人。“姑苏城外寒山寺,夜半肉香到客船。” :D -食物,动物植物这些章节都很短。说到大唐时的食物貌似很像现在的日餐,大多清淡,很多生吃。如今的中餐规模好像是唐朝以后发展起来的。也许跟大唐时进口的大批调料食材有关,激励了中国厨师们的想象力?【中文翻译不尽满意,自己来】 The monkish traveler, I-ching, who had much experience with the cookery of Indonesia and India, reported, with evident relish, on the richly prepared fare available in those lands, as contrasted with his own: “...in China, people of the present time eat fish and vegetables mostly uncooked; no Indians do this. All vegetables are to be well cooked and to be eaten after mixing with the asafoetida, clarified butter, oil, or any spice.”{1197} Probably we should accept this account of the character of the Chinese cuisine in the seventh century, since it is given by an excellent observer. But it goes against contemporary opinions of Chinese cooking, especially that of the south. I-ching’s description makes T’ang cookery sound like modern Japanese cookery—plain food, sometimes raw, with few savory mixtures or interesting sauces, we would guess. If so, the best of modern Chinese cooking has developed in relatively recent times, and we easily suppose, if that is so, that the rich character we find in it was only beginning to appear in T’ang times, undoubtedly under the influence of foreign taste and custom in foods, in particular those of India and the Indianized lands of the Desert and the Isles. 唐朝行僧义净对印尼和印度烹调有过切身体会,十分热情的报告了这些异乡烹饪的浓郁丰盛跟当时中国烹饪方式大相径庭:“冬夏时人,鱼菜多并生食,此乃西国咸悉不餐。凡是菜茹,皆经烂煮,如阿魏,酥油及诸香合,然后方啖。” 义净是个很可信的观察者,所以他笔下的七世纪中国烹饪特色应该是可靠的。但是这又和现代人所知的中国烹饪,尤其是中国南方烹饪相违。义净笔下的唐代饮食跟现代日本烹饪方式非常相近--清淡,有时生食,只用很少的调料或者简单的咸味提味。如此说来,享誉世界的中国烹饪很可能是近代发展起来的产物,而且我们可以大胆猜测一下如今中国烹饪中各种丰富调料也许是从唐代才开始初露倪端,都要归功于唐代大量进口的外来口味和特色食物,尤其是受印度影响的各种沙漠和海岛之国的食材。 看看这些土贡外贡单很让人流口水。 食物一章里葡萄和葡萄酒占了很大篇幅。最早的葡萄是汉朝张骞从西域带来的,朋友戏言“汉武帝为了卫青爱吃葡萄干赶紧发兵西域”,听得我直乐。如果是真的,汉唐在这一点上居然有点相似。金桃这书里真的说了唐太宗李二凤把高昌给征服,其中一个好事就是把他们的葡萄酒技术搬到太原去了!“吃货征服世界啊!” 六。香料 食物的篇幅小,香料这章就是洋洋洒洒了。说不完道不尽的各种妙香。看这个,唐朝时大家得有多香啊!见面就给熏一个跟头。 今天读到瑞龙脑香。是稀罕金贵的不得了的一种贡品,玄宗统统送给心爱的杨贵妃专用。可是。。。居然。。。就是樟脑!这是什么审美啊?!还是说此樟脑非彼樟脑,味道不同?! 这里讲的男士们斗香很有意思。翻译有点问题。原文其实是:"Men were as competitive in their perfumery as ladies nowadays with their cakes and jellies: at an elegant party of Chung Tsung's reign the choicest aromatics of his courtiers were displayed, and a kind of fagara paste took the prize."这里得了头筹的fagara paste 貌似是一种椒膏,因为fagara也是秦椒的称谓。 但是最后那段关于花香配熏香挺有趣的。木犀是桂花,龙脑是樟脑,酴醾是蔷薇(荼靡),沉水是沉香(木),含笑是玉兰,薝匐是白兰(Michelia). 红楼梦里出现过的百和香和安息香,书里也有讲到。 混合香料的成份有沉香一两半,白檀香五两,苏和香一两,甲香一两,龙脑半两,麝香半两,将各种配料“细挫捣为末,用马尾筛罗烁蜜溲和,得所用之”。这种混合香料在诗歌中通常称作“百和香”。。。杜甫有“花气浑如百和香”的诗句。 还有一种“香钟”,我以前没听说过,听上去很精致有趣。 “香钟”。。。用法是事先在一个平面上刻好用以区分不同时间的字样,然后将香末撒在平面上,形成精细的花格,细长的香末线将不同的时间标志连接起来。。。。随着香末一路燃烧过去,便可以读出时间。。。。王建就曾经做过这样一种用来消磨孤寂长夜的计时工具: 闲坐烧香印,满户松柏气。火尽转分明,青苔碑上字。 尽,已是黎明时分,诗人也就能够辨认园中碑上刻的字了。。。铺撒,焚烧香末的底盘一般都用木范。。。据记载:“用香末布篆文木范仲,急覆之,是为‘曲水香’ 。”(Jean注: 急覆之:就是快速把木板倒过来,勾勒出篆字的香末就被倒扣出来,变成用香写的字)但有些香钟用的底板是石范。正仓院。。。有一件石范为圆形的石板,石板镶嵌在一朵精雕细刻的木莲花之中,莲花花瓣上镀了金色,还绘有神话中的人物。。。刻的是天城体梵文。 七。药,工业矿石,纺织品,颜料,宝石 当当当,“郁金”这个词又出现了,少了一个香字就变成了药材,就是“姜黄”(turmeric),跟诗经里出现过的“蓬莪术”(zedoary)混着用. 工业矿石里面最有趣的是“钻石”那一节。中国古代对钻石无感,觉得它唯一的用途是用来刻玉,是工具算不得宝石。哈! 纺织品那章里面提到一种叫“朝霞”的红色棉布,来自东南亚。听上去很美丽。 -芳屏画春草,仙杼织朝霞。何如山水路,对面即飞花。--王勃 颜料那章读起来更美,主要是这些词太美了。青黛,苏方,雌黄,等。但是让我印象最深的是“猩猩血” Gibbon's Blood. 我们小朋友网上下的一堆中文有声书里有个赤毛猴的故事,我以前没听过。讲有一种猴子的血被当作颜料进贡,所以每年都要去抓猴子放血。猴子贪嘴喜欢酒,于是猎人就用酒坛来诱惑猴子进陷阱。听上去生动有趣,故事里赤毛猴也会说话,每次喝醉被抓醒来后都后悔莫及,但是下次依然耐不住酒香的诱惑。这次看书才知道这故事在古书里记录甚广,“全唐文”“湘潭记”都有它,历史悠久了。全唐文里的猴子也会说话。所以也不知道到底几分真。金桃书中最后说动物血液为颜料的红色可能是真的,因为西方(德国波兰)古代有一种红颜料来自一种“胭脂虫”(Kermes insect dye)。唐代书中指的“猩猩红”都是关于外来材料的一种红,本土没有,所以也许传播路途中演绎成了赤毛猴/猩猩血的故事,很有可能。这也是红楼梦里宝玉猩红斗篷的颜色名字来源吧。 宝石也是很长很有意思的一章。让我觉得又被古人骗了的是这一段,"蓝田美玉"原来只是大理石?! 八。世俗器具,书籍 正月十五用的灯树很像西方的圣诞树啊!“灯树”是七世纪中期来自吐火罗国的贡品(维基说吐火罗是Tocharians,曾经聚居于塔里木盆地的印欧人一支,高鼻蓝眼睛大胡子,后来消失了,有怀疑被维吾尔族同化了)。下文中玄宗被“坐地日行三百里”的故事很有科幻味道哦(teleporting!)! 网上找了很久,终于找到了书里提到的敦煌壁画里的灯树,大概是这个样子。 本子控膜拜一下那时候各国的新奇纸张 九,盛世挽歌 全书第一章“大唐盛世”结尾一节标题是 Exotic Literature。整章不过32页,最后这一节占了七页,将近四分之一的篇幅。作者用了这么大篇幅讲了什么些呢?讲的大多是酉(you3)阳杂俎(zu3)和杜阳杂编这些书里提到的段子。也就是大唐盛世急速衰败之后那个世纪里,人们已经看不到真实的盛世景象,只能自己编出一个想象的盛世。 书里引用了民国学者吴经熊的一段话, 我们看到的已经不再是一个现实的世界。我们已置身于梦境之中,灵魂像蜡烛之光,在梦境中微微闪烁。自然景致变成了一种“内在的特征”。世界淹没在了无边无际,朦朦胧胧的海洋之中,留下来的只有“一缕香魂“。 我更喜欢这段话的英文翻译, We are no longer in the world of flesh and blood. We are in the Dreamland in which the soul glimmers like the flame of a candle. The landscape has been transformed into an "inscape." The world is drowned in the immeasurable ocean of Darkness, and there remains only "an odorous shade." 接下来薛老师自己的一段话看得我大哭。 Many of the stories pretend to tell of the reign of Hsuan Tsung, the fabulous king, most glorious monarch of a cosmopolitan age, himself a connoisseur of the exotic, and a symbol of everything romantic even before his own death. In his day, one could hear the lutes of Kucha(龟兹的琵琶)! in the next century one might only dream of them. 很多故事讲述的都是想象中的唐玄宗治理的唐朝。玄宗本人幻化成了完美的帝王,建造了一个辉煌的多元时代,他成为一个精通于外来物事的专家,成为浪漫的代名词。在玄宗的时代,人们至少曾经亲耳听到龟兹的琵琶!玄宗后下一个世纪人们只能靠想象了。
中国历史 中文 唐史 海外汉学
射雕英雄传 豆瓣 Goodreads
射雕英雄传
8.9 (137 个评分) 作者: 金庸 生活·读书·新知三联书店 1994 - 5
《射雕英雄传》是金庸的代表作之一,作于一九五七年到一九五九年,在《香港商报》连载。《射雕》中的人物个性单纯,郭靖诚朴厚重、黄蓉机智狡狯,读者容易印象深刻。这是中国传统小说和戏剧的特征,但不免缺乏人物内心世界的复杂性。由于人物性格单纯而情节热闹,所以《射雕》比较得到欢迎, 被拍成各种语种的电影和电视剧在全球众多国家和地区热播。
活著為了見證 豆瓣
作者: 野夫 南方家園出版社
在這個世界裡,我們看到磨難,看到隱忍,也看到見證,看到希望。
本書由一篇篇散文組成,分為上下部。上部「我們的江湖」,如同《世說新語》,以情感豐沛的文筆,刻劃出周遭的奇人奇事,他們延續江湖精神,決不小隱隱於野,以生命見證歷史。下部「我們的時代」,記錄荒謬魔幻的事件,爬梳童年回憶與生命歷程,寫下對這時代的深刻體悟。
本書特色
◎曾獲台北國際書展大獎、獨立中文筆會自由寫作獎、當代漢語貢獻獎等多項大獎的作家野夫,帶來《看不見的江湖》續篇。
◎設計師何佳興操刀全書裝幀設計
Killers of the Flower Moon 豆瓣 Eggplant.place
8.9 (9 个评分) 作者: David Grann Doubleday 2017 - 4
From New Yorker staff writer David Grann, #1 New York Times best-selling author of The Lost City of Z, a twisting, haunting true-life murder mystery about one of the most monstrous crimes in American history
In the 1920s, the richest people per capita in the world were members of the Osage Indian nation in Oklahoma. After oil was discovered beneath their land, they rode in chauffeured automobiles, built mansions, and sent their children to study in Europe.
Then, one by one, the Osage began to be killed off. The family of an Osage woman, Mollie Burkhart, became a prime target. Her relatives were shot and poisoned. And it was just the beginning, as more and more members of the tribe began to die under mysterious circumstances.
In this last remnant of the Wild West—where oilmen like J. P. Getty made their fortunes and where desperadoes like Al Spencer, the “Phantom Terror,” roamed—many of those who dared to investigate the killings were themselves murdered. As the death toll climbed to more than twenty-four, the FBI took up the case. It was one of the organization’s first major homicide investigations and the bureau badly bungled the case. In desperation, the young director, J. Edgar Hoover, turned to a former Texas Ranger named Tom White to unravel the mystery. White put together an undercover team, including one of the only American Indian agents in the bureau. The agents infiltrated the region, struggling to adopt the latest techniques of detection. Together with the Osage they began to expose one of the most chilling conspiracies in American history.
In Killers of the Flower Moon, David Grann revisits a shocking series of crimes in which dozens of people were murdered in cold blood. Based on years of research and startling new evidence, the book is a masterpiece of narrative nonfiction, as each step in the investigation reveals a series of sinister secrets and reversals. But more than that, it is a searing indictment of the callousness and prejudice toward American Indians that allowed the murderers to operate with impunity for so long. Killers of the Flower Moon is utterly compelling, but also emotionally devastating.
2017年11月1日 已读
Freshair上面听到作者访谈才知道这本书,对FBI的建成超感兴趣,刚看到40%
fbi non-fiction 英文
Jungle of Stone: The True Story of Two Men, Their Extraordinary Journey, and the Discovery of the Lost Civilization of the Maya 豆瓣
作者: William Carlsen William Morrow 2016 - 4
In 1839, rumors of extraordinary yet baffling stone ruins buried within the unmapped jungles of Central America reached two of the world’s most intrepid travelers. Seized by the reports, American diplomat John Lloyd Stephens and British artist Frederick Catherwood—both already celebrated for their adventures in Egypt, the Holy Land, Greece, and Rome—sailed together out of New York Harbor on an expedition into the forbidding rainforests of present-day Honduras, Guatemala, and Mexico. What they found would upend the West’s understanding of human history.
In the tradition of Lost City of Z and In the Kingdom of Ice, former San Francisco Chronicle journalist and Pulitzer Prize finalist William Carlsen reveals the remarkable story of the discovery of the ancient Maya. Enduring disease, war, and the torments of nature and terrain, Stephens and Catherwood meticulously uncovered and documented the remains of an astonishing civilization that had flourished in the Americas at the same time as classic Greece and Rome—and had been its rival in art, architecture, and power. Their masterful book about the experience, written by Stephens and illustrated by Catherwood, became a sensation, hailed by Edgar Allan Poe as “perhaps the most interesting book of travel ever published” and recognized today as the birth of American archaeology. Most important, Stephens and Catherwood were the first to grasp the significance of the Maya remains, understanding that their antiquity and sophistication overturned the West’s assumptions about the development of civilization.
By the time of the flowering of classical Greece (400 b.c.), the Maya were already constructing pyramids and temples around central plazas. Within a few hundred years the structures took on a monumental scale that required millions of man-hours of labor, and technical and organizational expertise. Over the next millennium, dozens of city-states evolved, each governed by powerful lords, some with populations larger than any city in Europe at the time, and connected by road-like causeways of crushed stone. The Maya developed a cohesive, unified cosmology, an array of common gods, a creation story, and a shared artistic and architectural vision. They created stucco and stone monuments and bas reliefs, sculpting figures and hieroglyphs with refined artistic skill. At their peak, an estimated ten million people occupied the Maya’s heartland on the Yucatan Peninsula, a region where only half a million now live. And yet by the time the Spanish reached the “New World,” the Maya had all but disappeared; they would remain a mystery for the next three hundred years.
Today, the tables are turned: the Maya are justly famous, if sometimes misunderstood, while Stephens and Catherwood have been nearly forgotten. Based on Carlsen’s rigorous research and his own 2,500-mile journey throughout the Yucatan and Central America, Jungle of Stone is equally a thrilling adventure narrative and a revelatory work of history that corrects our understanding of Stephens, Catherwood, and the Maya themselves.
The Handmaid's Tale 豆瓣
8.1 (33 个评分) 作者: Margaret Atwood Anchor 1998 - 3
From the bestselling author of Alias Grace and the MaddAddam trilogy, here is the #1 New York Times bestseller and seminal work of speculative fiction from the Booker Prize-winning author.
Now a Hulu series starring Elizabeth Moss, Samira Wiley, and Joseph Fiennes. Includes a new introduction by Margaret Atwood.
Offred is a Handmaid in the Republic of Gilead. She may leave the home of the Commander and his wife once a day to walk to food markets whose signs are now pictures instead of words because women are no longer allowed to read. She must lie on her back once a month and pray that the Commander makes her pregnant, because in an age of declining births, Offred and the other Handmaids are valued only if their ovaries are viable.
Offred can remember the days before, when she lived and made love with her husband Luke; when she played with and protected her daughter; when she had a job, money of her own, and access to knowledge. But all of that is gone now….
Funny, unexpected, horrifying, and altogether convincing, The Handmaid's Tale is at once scathing satire, dire warning, and literary tour de force.
2017年6月2日 已读
重读感觉没有了年轻时读的惊艳。虽然理解为什么那时候的自己这么喜欢。Cat's Eye还是更好的一本书。//大学时深爱的一本书。当时读过不止一遍。好像是我读的第一本Atwood?昨晚拿起来重读。。。
女性 小说 英文
Dark Money 豆瓣
作者: Jane Mayer Doubleday 2016 - 1
2017年2月19日 已读
"How did the US get here?" read this, then you will know. An Amazon reader says:"In terms of greed and evil, the billionaires detailed in this book make Trump look like a passing fart in the wind." i couldn't agree more.
政治 美国 英文
City of Fortune 豆瓣
作者: Roger Crowley Random House 2012 - 1
The rise and fall of the Venetian empire stands unrivaled for drama, intrigue, and sheer opulent majesty. In City of Fortune, Roger Crowley, acclaimed historian and New York Times bestselling author of Empires of the Sea, applies his narrative skill to chronicling the astounding five-hundred-year voyage of Venice to the pinnacle of power.
Tracing the full arc of the Venetian imperial saga for the first time, City of Fortune is framed around two of the great collisions of world history: the ill-fated Fourth Crusade, which culminated in the sacking of Constantinople and the carve-up of the Byzantine Empire in 1204, and the Ottoman-Venetian War of 1499–1503, which saw the Ottoman Turks supplant the Venetians as the preeminent naval power in the Mediterranean. In between were three centuries of Venetian maritime dominance—years of plunder and plague, conquest and piracy—during which a tiny city of “lagoon dwellers” grew into the richest place on earth.
Drawing on firsthand accounts of pitched sea battles, skillful negotiations, and diplomatic maneuvers, Crowley paints a vivid picture of this avaricious, enterprising people and the bountiful lands that came under their dominion. Defiant of emperors, indifferent to popes, the Venetians saw themselves as reluctant freebooters, compelled to take to the open seas “because we cannot live otherwise and know not how except by trade.” From the opening of the spice routes to the clash between Christianity and Islam, Venice played a leading role in the defining conflicts of its time—the reverberations of which are still being felt today. Only an author with Roger Crowley’s deep knowledge of post-Crusade history could put these iconic events into their proper context.
Epic in scope, magisterial in its understanding of the period, City of Fortune is narrative history at its most engrossing.
2017年1月26日 已读
一声叹息。//美第奇那书里屡屡提到威尼斯,这个意大利一片混乱的政局里唯一的共和国,而且实力强大。而且看过1453之后一直打算看的。。。
历史 威尼斯 英文
The Medici 豆瓣
作者: Paul Strathern Vintage 2007 - 10
Vivid and dramatic, this is a dazzling history of the modest family which rose to become one
of the most powerful in Europe.
The Medici is a remarkably modern story of power, money and ambition. Against the background of an age which saw the rebirth of ancient and classical learning, Paul Strathern explores the intensely dramatic rise and fall of the Medici family in Florence, as well as the Italian Renaissance which they did so much to sponsor and encourage. Interwoven into the narrative are the lives of many of the great Renaissance artists with whom the Medici had dealings, including Leonardo, Michelangelo and Donatello, as well as scientists like Galileo and Pico della Mirandola, both of whom clashed with the religious authorities.
In his enthralling study, Strathern also follows the fortunes of those members of the Medici family who achieved success away from Florence, including the two Medici popes and Catherine de Medici, who became Queen of France and played a major role in that country through three turbulent reigns.
Vivid and accessible, the book ends with the gloriously decadent decline of the Medici family in Florence as they strove to be recognized as European princes.
2017年1月15日 已读
非常喜欢。不仅很全面的讲了文艺复兴的历史,还介绍了意大利十五十六世纪的无比混乱的历史和欧洲的征战。意外之喜是把我最近读的狼厅和康斯坦丁堡的陷落都连贯起来。太满意了!
2017年1月15日 评论 文艺复兴和十五到十七世纪的意大利史 - 美国大选结束第二天,豆瓣朋友毛樱桃安慰我说, “文艺复兴时期的佛罗伦萨是一个多么动荡的地方,战争、黑死病、宗教狂烧书烧画、政府一年换一届,There must be more hateful characters seizing power, but arts and sciences flourished despite that. Let’s find solace and inspiration in this.” 当时看得我很感动,今夜重读依然忍不住流泪。心里记下有机会要去读一读那段历史。 然后一个星期前Netflix开始放”美第奇家族“第一季。我兴冲冲去看。结果只是一盘眼睛糖果的快餐。据说跟历史几乎没有任何关系。按说美第奇这么充满传奇的家族,跟着历史拍应该素材足够。不知道为什么反而大段大段的抄袭”教父“! 经朋友介绍开始读Paul Stratherrn的美第奇家族这书。好看的放不下。一个星期早晚班车上加上偶尔晚上不用工作的时间读完了。意外之喜是把我看过的狼厅里的亨利八世的种种狗血事件和1453那本关于康斯坦丁堡陷落的事件都连贯起来。心里开始对十四十五十六世纪的欧洲历史有了一个模糊的轮廓。 一边看书一边把七年前去意大利的照片和地图翻出来对照着看。疯狂的想念意大利。值得一去再去! 小时候历史课上肯定背过文艺复兴的定义。但是长大后也只看过一本Iring Stone的米开朗基罗传记(The Agony and The Estacy )。所以脑海里只记住了文艺复兴对艺术的影响。看完这书才明白,几乎我喜欢热爱的一切都要感谢文艺复兴,从绘画,雕塑,建筑,到人文主义(Humanism),到严谨的科学研究方法,到现代天文学,到歌剧,古典音乐,统统都是文艺复兴的产物。而如果没有美第奇家族的庇护和金钱,这一切都可能被扼杀在摇篮里!人类是有多么的幸运!除了家喻户晓的达芬奇,波提切利,米开朗基罗,伽利略,鲁本斯,拉斐尔,布鲁内莱斯基 (Brunelleschi), 皮科。看了这书还知道两个历史学家也跟这个家族息息相关:马基雅维利(Machiavelli) 和奎齐亚迪尼(Guicciardini)。 心潮澎湃,挑几条印象深刻的说几句。 1。金融和赋税 书开篇讲当时的银行业如何运作就看得我很嗨。十五世纪而已啊!已经有了现在金融业依赖的”交易中心“(exchange) 和信用的概念。然后那么多的银行倒闭因为借钱给皇家,数额太高结果自己资金无法运转等等,这么多有趣的细节,电视剧不去拍多可惜啊!更不要提美第奇在翡冷翠执政后开始推广的财产税(catasto “register of property”)这种有趣的赋税制度前因后果,多么好的素材! 2。中世纪(“黑暗时代”) Dark Age这个词我虽有听说,但是并没有甚解。Strathern这书言简意骇的讲述了它的前因后果。中世纪的黑暗成因有二,一是罗马帝国的突然陷落造成了文化断层。然后基督教的崛起选择性的限制了整个欧洲的视野(简直是明朝下令全民不得下海一个做派阿!所以基督教下面的欧洲也算是某种大一统吧?)。我这才明白为什么写“哈德良回忆录”的尤瑟纳尔 说哈德良的时代人们还是自由的。”This Second Century appeals to me because it was the last century, for a very long period of time, in which men could think and express themselves with full freedom. ” 而文艺复兴成为可能最大功臣其实是阿拉伯学者! “During the Dark Ages, much of this ancient learning [of Ancient Greece and Rome] had simply vanished from Europe; it was preserved only in the Middle East, where it would be enthusiastically taken up by Arabic scholars. In its early years, Islam encouraged philosophical and scientific speculation: to know how the world worked was to know the mind of God. In this way the works of Ancient Greek philosophers, especially the natural philosophers (that is, early scientists), spread throughout the Arabic Empire, which by the eighth century even extended far into Europe– occupying the whole of the Iberian peninsula, reaching into southern France and Italy. When in the thirteenth century great Arabic centres of learning, such as Cordoba and Seville in southern Spain, were retaken by Christian forces, many previously unknown works of the ancient philosophers were rediscovered by Christian scholars. ”…translations of Arabic interpretations of Aristotle by such Muslim philosophers as Averroes and Avicenna had cast doubt on the accepted Christian version of Aristotle. ..ironically the unimpeachable authority of Aristotle was being undermined by his own works. But the rediscovered works of the ancients for the most part included many other Ancient Greek and Roman authors – philosophers, poets, rhetoricians and historians – and these caused some to understand that there had once been an age that far outshone their own, one that emphasised the humanity of humankind, rather than its spirituality. As a result, there was now a new humanism in the air, which began to emphasise freedom of thought, rather than the selfless submission demanded by medieval philosopher-theologians. This humanism encouraged the exploration of human potential, and the expression of humanity, especially in literature, philosophy and all forms of art.“ 3。萨佛纳罗拉 (Savonarola)的”虚荣之火“ 我一直以为前进一步退两步的循环式历史是中国特色。看到萨佛纳罗拉才震惊的发现原来世界大同。古今中外的人民都热衷于这种暴力革命,而且一而再再而三,乐此不疲。有历史的教训在前依然飞蛾扑火,损人不利己的狂热总是非常的有感染力。连处在文艺复兴高潮的翡冷翠也会突然抽这种疯!最后弄得民不聊生,本来雄霸Tuscan的翡冷翠丢领土丢商业,饭都吃不上了。 ”在1497年,他和一群跟随者们在佛罗伦斯市政厅广场点起一堆熊熊大火,萨佛纳罗拉称之为“虚荣之火”。他派遣儿童逐家逐户搜集“世俗享乐物品”,包括:镜子,化妆品,画像,异教书籍,非天主教主题雕塑,赌博游戏器具,象棋,鲁特琴和其他乐器,做工精细的衣着,女人的帽子,和所有古典诗作,然后把搜集起来的这些东西一并扔进火里烧掉。很多文艺复兴时期伟大的艺术品都被这堆火永远的烧掉了。曾经热爱异教主题的著名文艺复兴画家桑德罗·波提切利,晚年也沈溺于萨佛纳罗拉的布道,亲自把很多晚期作品扔进火里。“ -维基百科萨佛纳罗拉 条目 这难道不是”破四旧“的老祖宗?判依萨佛纳罗拉狂热教的波提切利不就是很多文革时艺术家的先例? 4。马基雅维利(Machiavelli) 又一个耳熟而且大概知道意思但是读了这书才知道他到底是怎样一个人,他的理念又是如何形成的。比方纸牌屋的评论里经常会看到这个词被用来形容男女主角。”为达目的可以不择手段。““政治里面没有道德可谈。” 支持川普希特勒的选民和共和党们应该都是他的理论的信徒吧?”Make Italy Great Again!” 不过虽然实际的不能再实际的马基雅维利都说”… no prince is ever benefited by making himself hated.” 再看今天的美国“President-elect” … 书里还引了马基雅维利一句话,我看到赶紧画下来。 ”Machiavelli would later remark of these events in his History of Florence: ‘Let no one stir things up in a city, believing that he can stop them as he pleases or that he is in charge of what happens next.’“ 看Robert Harris的西塞罗三部曲里面,他也引用了一句西塞罗的话,大意是”暴民可以载舟亦可覆舟。“跟这个异曲同工。看得我心里总是略有安慰。领着暴民烧杀抢掠的都没有好下场,罗马共和国时有P. Clodius Pulcher,十四世纪的翡冷翠有第一代美第奇Giovanni的表兄”Salvestro de’ Medici”。横横! 5。歌剧的诞生 ”Most notably, the musicians of Florence were responsible for the birth of opera, which arose from two distinct sources. On the one hand, there was medieval liturgical drama: holy plays enacted publicly at various times in the Church calendar. Quite separate from these were the classical Greek dramas, with their choric interludes, which were revived and staged by the Florentine humanists. When these two forms were combined, the result was opera: non-religious work incorporating music and drama. The term takes its name from the Italian expression opera in musica (work in music); and the settings of these early operas were usually either legendary or mythical, requiring a new freer musical form such as that favoured by Vincenzo Galilei.“ 这个Vicenzo Galilei就是伽利略的爹!没错,伽利略的爹是个音乐家!而且对歌剧的诞生有贡献! 6。向意大利学习的法国 虽然当时国力最强的是法国,而翡冷翠在美第奇家族手里越来越破落。但是出自美第奇家族的两个法国王后凯瑟琳和玛利亚教会了法国人享受美食,使得法国菜系得以诞生。巴黎我喜欢的两个花园(Tuileries和Lexumbourg)原来都是她俩建的,仿照翡冷翠的贵族官邸。 7。文艺复兴 这段简短的总结真好。 ”Renaissance of ancient science showed how this humanism could realise itself in practical application. Renaissance humanism had created a new way of seeing ourselves, Renaissance science would create a new way of seeing the world.“
medici 历史 文艺复兴 英文
Carol 豆瓣 Goodreads
The Price of Salt
8.8 (8 个评分) 作者: Patricia Highsmith W. W. Norton & Company 2015 - 11
"A great American writer…Highsmith's writing is wicked…it puts a spell on you." ―Entertainment Weekly
Now a major motion picture.
Patricia Highsmith's story of romantic obsession may be one of the most important, but still largely unrecognized, novels of the twentieth century. First published in 1952 and touted as "the novel of a love that society forbids," the book soon became a cult classic.
Based on a true story plucked from Highsmith's own life, Carol tells the riveting drama of Therese Belivet, a stage designer trapped in a department-store day job, whose routine is forever shattered by a gorgeous epiphany―the appearance of Carol Aird, a customer who comes in to buy her daughter a Christmas toy. Therese begins to gravitate toward the alluring suburban housewife, who is trapped in a marriage as stultifying as Therese's job. They fall in love and set out across the United States, ensnared by society's confines and the imminent disapproval of others, yet propelled by their infatuation. Carol is a brilliantly written story that may surprise Highsmith fans and will delight those discovering her work.
This authorized edition includes an afterword by Patricia Highsmith. Previously titled The Price of Salt.
John Adams 豆瓣
作者: David McCullough Simon & Schuster 2001 - 5
Book Description
Publication Date: May 22, 2001
In this powerful, epic biography, David McCullough unfolds the adventurous life-journey of John Adams, the brilliant, fiercely independent, often irascible, always honest Yankee patriot -- "the colossus of independence," as Thomas Jefferson called him -- who spared nothing in his zeal for the American Revolution; who rose to become the second President of the United States and saved the country from blundering into an unnecessary war; who was learned beyond all but a few and regarded by some as "out of his senses"; and whose marriage to the wise and valiant Abigail Adams is one of the moving love stories in American history.
Like his masterly, Pulitzer Prize-winning biography Truman, David McCullough's John Adams has the sweep and vitality of a great novel. It is both a riveting portrait of an abundantly human man and a vivid evocation of his time, much of it drawn from an outstanding collection of Adams family letters and diaries. In particular, the more than one thousand surviving letters between John and Abigail Adams, nearly half of which have never been published, provide extraordinary access to their private lives and make it possible to know John Adams as no other major American of his founding era.
As he has with stunning effect in his previous books, McCullough tells the story from within -- from the point of view of the amazing eighteenth century and of those who, caught up in events, had no sure way of knowing how things would turn out. George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, John Jay, the British spy Edward Bancroft, Madame Lafayette and Jefferson's Paris "interest" Maria Cosway, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, the scandalmonger James Callender, Sally Hemings, John Marshall, Talleyrand, and Aaron Burr all figure in this panoramic chronicle, as does, importantly, John Quincy Adams, the adored son whom Adams would live to see become President.
Crucial to the story, as it was to history, is the relationship between Adams and Jefferson, born opposites -- one a Massachusetts farmer's son, the other a Virginia aristocrat and slaveholder, one short and stout, the other tall and spare. Adams embraced conflict; Jefferson avoided it. Adams had great humor; Jefferson, very little. But they were alike in their devotion to their country.
At first they were ardent co-revolutionaries, then fellow diplomats and close friends. With the advent of the two political parties, they became archrivals, even enemies, in the intense struggle for the presidency in 1800, perhaps the most vicious election in history. Then, amazingly, they became friends again, and ultimately, incredibly, they died on the same day -- their day of days -- July 4, in the year 1826.
Much about John Adams's life will come as a surprise to many readers. His courageous voyage on the frigate Boston in the winter of 1778 and his later trek over the Pyrenees are exploits that few would have dared and that few readers will ever forget.
It is a life encompassing a huge arc -- Adams lived longer than any president. The story ranges from the Boston Massacre to Philadelphia in 1776 to the Versailles of Louis XVI, from Spain to Amsterdam, from the Court of St. James's, where Adams was the first American to stand before King George III as a representative of the new nation, to the raw, half-finished Capital by the Potomac, where Adams was the first President to occupy the White House.
This is history on a grand scale -- a book about politics and war and social issues, but also about human nature, love, religious faith, virtue, ambition, friendship and betrayal, and the far-reaching consequences of noble ideas. Above all, John Adams is an enthralling, often surprising story of one of the most important and fascinating Americans who ever lived.
Amazon.com Review
Left to his own devices, John Adams might have lived out his days as a Massachusetts country lawyer, devoted to his family and friends. As it was, events swiftly overtook him, and Adams--who, David McCullough writes, was "not a man of the world" and not fond of politics--came to greatness as the second president of the United States, and one of the most distinguished of a generation of revolutionary leaders. He found reason to dislike sectarian wrangling even more in the aftermath of war, when Federalist and anti-Federalist factions vied bitterly for power, introducing scandal into an administration beset by other difficulties--including pirates on the high seas, conflict with France and England, and all the public controversy attendant in building a nation.
Overshadowed by the lustrous presidents Washington and Jefferson, who bracketed his tenure in office, Adams emerges from McCullough's brilliant biography as a truly heroic figure--not only for his significant role in the American Revolution but also for maintaining his personal integrity in its strife-filled aftermath. McCullough spends much of his narrative examining the troubled friendship between Adams and Jefferson, who had in common a love for books and ideas but differed on almost every other imaginable point. Reading his pages, it is easy to imagine the two as alter egos. (Strangely, both died on the same day, the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.) But McCullough also considers Adams in his own light, and the portrait that emerges is altogether fascinating. --Gregory McNamee
From Publishers Weekly
Here a preeminent master of narrative history takes on the most fascinating of our founders to create a benchmark for all Adams biographers. With a keen eye for telling detail and a master storyteller's instinct for human interest, McCullough (Truman; Mornings on Horseback) resurrects the great Federalist (1735-1826), revealing in particular his restrained, sometimes off-putting disposition, as well as his political guile. The events McCullough recounts are well-known, but with his astute marshaling of facts, the author surpasses previous biographers in depicting Adams's years at Harvard, his early public life in Boston and his role in the first Continental Congress, where he helped shape the philosophical basis for the Revolution. McCullough also makes vivid Adams's actions in the second Congress, during which he was the first to propose George Washington to command the new Continental Army. Later on, we see Adams bickering with Tom Paine's plan for government as suggested in Common Sense, helping push through the draft for the Declaration of Independence penned by his longtime friend and frequent rival, Thomas Jefferson, and serving as commissioner to France and envoy to the Court of St. James's. The author is likewise brilliant in portraying Adams's complex relationship with Jefferson, who ousted him from the White House in 1800 and with whom he would share a remarkable death date 26 years later: July 4, 1826, 50 years to the day after the signing of the Declaration. (June) Forecast: Joseph Ellis has shown us the Founding Fathers can be bestsellers, and S&S knows it has a winner: first printing is 350,000 copies, and McCullough will go on a 15-city tour; both Book-of-the-Month Club and the History Book Club have taken this book as a selection.
2016年12月18日 已读
64% 终于看到我期待的章节, Adams重返美国政坛(海外十年), 从副总统做起,以及美国政体的完善...看完罗马共和国的陷落和西塞罗的一生再来看这个,非常有连续性...
2016年12月16日 评论 国父们 (未完) - 准备一边看一边写. The Fury 64% - 1790, Adams returned from overseas after 10 years away serving in Paris, Holland, and London as one of the first US diplomat, now serving as first Vice President to Washington. Yesterday saw this tweet from Stephen Colbert To: New Energy Secretary Rick Perry- How bout we power the country with a turbine connected to the founding fathers rolling in their graves? 7:30 PM - 13 Dec 2016 This morning reading John Adams on the bus. John Adams was serving as the first Vice President of the young republic, a friend told Adams of how the southern aristocracies held him in contempt because he had no “advantage of pride and family”. Adams promptly disputed it by saying he couldn’t be prouder of his family, and started counting up the lineage of his family in Braintree, "The line I have just described makes about 160 years in which no bankruptcy was ever committed, no widow or orphan was ever defrauded, no redemptor intervened and no debt was contracted with England." This made me laugh out loud, our current president-elect violated every item listed by Adams here. "rolling in their graves", indeed! And quite a powerful turbine that would be, fueled with founding father's fury. no doubt. (to be continued...)
biography english history 传记 历史
Dictator 豆瓣 Goodreads
作者: Robert Harris Knopf 2016 - 1
With Dictator, Robert Harris brings the saga of Cicero's life to a time when some of the most epic events in human history occurred: the collapse of the Roman republic, the subsequent civil war, the murder of Pompey and the assassination of Julius Caesar. Yet the question it asks is a timeless one: how is political freedom to be safeguarded against the triple threat of unscrupulous personal ambition, of an electoral system dominated by vested financial interests, and of the corrupting impact of waging ceaseless foreign wars? And in the very human figure of Cicero--brilliant, flawed, frequently fearful, and yet ultimately brave--Harris gives us a hero for both his own time, and for ours.
2016年12月12日 已读
痛哭失声! 从Cato的自杀,Cicero给他写的悼文,到Cicero最后模仿Gladiator亮出脖颈求死。。。所有感动我的豪言壮语之中,最温暖的是Cicero关于搬家的一句话“I have put out my books and now my house has a soul."
2017年1月30日 评论 Cato the Younger 小加图的自杀 - 大选结束看完罗马共和国后期那些书后就想,千万千万不能有内战啊!否则共和就死定了。 可是看看这一个星期,这一个周末,就觉得对加图的对抗,自杀有了更深刻的感动。真的面临这种选择,怎么可能不选择战争呢?也许我原先的设想是错的,一旦选出了暴君做共和首领,那么内战就是必然的。一切都太晚了。 Robert Harris 那西塞罗三部曲最后一部里描写庞贝大军全军覆灭后,罗马统一到凯撒手下: For the first time we tasted life under a dictatorship: there were no freedoms any more; no magistrates, no courts; one existed at the whim of the ruler. (平生第一次在一个君主手下讨生活:再也没有了自由,没有法官,没有法庭,生死都在君主的一念之间) 这就是现在我没法继续读"Wolf Hall"的原因,那种全部朝廷大大小小都赔小心取悦一个国君的情形太震撼了。 加图是元老院里理想主义的领袖。虽然出生贵族但是布衣素食,一丝不苟,坚决不肯为任何事情妥协,不向任何人低头。他只认共和国的原则。西塞罗是个政客,他出身卑微,但是个政治天才,总是想找到两全其美的法子和平解决问题。 在凯撒如日中天的时日里,加图是唯一敢当众和他叫板的。一度西塞罗曾经私下羡慕又无奈的说加图只为自己的理想活,不为共和国的将来着想,不是不自私的。 凯撒跨过卢比孔河后,庞贝带着元老院逃离罗马,后来节节退败。庞贝死后。加图在北非带着一队反抗军继续和凯撒纠缠,最后战败自杀,加图选择了特别残忍的剖腹。很多人不解,认为加图疯了。但是西塞罗不这么想。 Cicero disagreed. "He could have had an easier death. He could have thrown himself from a building, or opened his veins in a warm bath, or taken poison. Instead he chose that particular method --exposing his entrails like a human sacrifice -- to demonstrate the strength of his will and his contempt for Caesar. In philosophical terms it was a good death: the death of a man who feared nothing. Indeed I would go so far as to say he died happy. Neither Caesar, nor any moan, nor anything in the world could touch him." 西塞罗不同意,“他本来可以选择更容易的死法。他可以跳楼,可以切腕,或者用毒药。但是他选择了这一种--掏心掏肺把自己做成一具祭品--来表白他意志之坚以及对凯撒的不屑。从哲学上讲这是一个”善终“:一个无所畏惧的人的死亡方式。我甚至可以再进一步说他含笑九泉。无人可及其项背,包括凯撒。” 熟知凯撒性情的西塞罗明知会激怒大首领还是给小加图写了悼词,最后一句总是能让我流泪。 Sinewy in thought and person; indifferent to what men said of him; scornful of glory, titles and decorations, and even more of those who sought them; defender of laws and freedoms; vigilant in the public interest; contemptuous of tyrants, their vulgarities and presumptions; stubborn, infuriating, harsh, dogmatic; a dreamer, a fanatic, a mystic, a soldier; willing at the last to tear the very organs from his stomach rather than submit to a conqueror --only the Roman Republic could have bred such a man as Cato, and only in the Roman Republic did such a man as Cato desire to live. 心坚体壮,我行我素;不屑荣耀和权名,以及追名逐利的肖小之徒;律法和自由的捍卫者;天下万众的守护者;鄙视暴君和他们的虚荣与放肆;固执, 疏狂,直白,武断;一个理想主义者,一个狂热分子,一个迷一样的人物,一个军人;在最后关头宁可抛肝剥腹也不向独裁者低头--加图,只有罗马共和国才可能孕育出的人物;他,也只肯活在罗马共和国。
历史 罗马 英文
Rubicon 豆瓣
作者: Tom Holland Anchor 2005 - 3
In 49 B.C., the seven hundred fifth year since the founding of Rome, Julius Caesar crossed a small border river called the Rubicon and plunged Rome into cataclysmic civil war. Tom Holland’s enthralling account tells the story of Caesar’s generation, witness to the twilight of the Republic and its bloody transformation into an empire. From Cicero, Spartacus, and Brutus, to Cleopatra, Virgil, and Augustus, here are some of the most legendary figures in history brought thrillingly to life. Combining verve and freshness with scrupulous scholarship, Rubicon is not only an engrossing history of this pivotal era but a uniquely resonant portrait of a great civilization in all its extremes of self-sacrifice and rivalry, decadence and catastrophe, intrigue, war, and world-shaking ambition.
2016年12月4日 已读
看完了!The Fruit of too much liberty is slavery! [哇哇大哭】唯一的安慰是貌似内战连连才是罗马共和国的死亡宣言。。。劳苦大众选择和平时期的奴役因为自由的内乱太苦了//Imperium 看完觉得不过瘾,转而来读 Rubicon, 开篇就让人眼睛一亮喜欢!虽然只看到7%。。。兴趣盎然!
history 历史 罗马 英文
Imperium 豆瓣 Goodreads
作者: Robert Harris Simon & Schuster 2006 - 9
<center>
FROM THE BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF FATHERLAND AND POMPEII COMES THE MOST PROVOCATIVE AND BRILLIANT NOVEL OF ANTIQUITY SINCE I, CLAUDIUS --
<font size="+1">IMPERIUM</font>
A CAUTIONARY TALE OF CICERO, THE GREATEST ORATOR OF ALL TIME, AND HIS EXTRAORDINARY STRUGGLE FOR POWER IN ROME.
</center>
When Tiro, the confidential secretary (and slave) of a Roman senator, opens the door to a terrified stranger on a cold November morning, he sets in motion a chain of events that will eventually propel his master into one of the most suspenseful courtroom dramas in history. The stranger is a Sicilian, a victim of the island's corrupt Roman governor, Verres. The senator is Marcus Cicero -- an ambitious young lawyer and spellbinding orator, who at the age of twenty-seven is determined to attain imperium -- supreme power in the state.
Of all the great figures of the Roman world, none was more fascinating or charismatic than Cicero. And Tiro -- the inventor of shorthand and author of numerous books, including a celebrated biography of his master (which was lost in the Dark Ages) -- was always by his side.
Compellingly written in Tiro's voice, Imperium is the re-creation of his vanished masterpiece, recounting in vivid detail the story of Cicero's quest for glory, competing with some of the most powerful and intimidating figures of his -- or any other -- age: Pompey, Caesar, Crassus, and the many other powerful Romans who changed history.
Robert Harris, the world's master of innovative historical fiction, lures us into a violent, treacherous world of Roman politics at once exotically different from and yet startlingly similar to our own -- a world of Senate intrigue and electoral corruption, special prosecutors and political adventurism -- to describe how one clever, compassionate, devious, vulnerable man fought to reach the top.
2016年11月21日 已读
美国最黑暗的时刻,重读。看看现在的美国到底有多像那时候的罗马共和国。//Robert Harris的书,一如既往的充满娱乐性,又能学到些古罗马历史。:)
2007年1月6日 评论 大人物与小人物 - 读《帝权》观《罗马》 - 感恩节刚看完 Robert Harris 的新书,以西赛罗(Cicero)为主人公写的《Imperium: A Novel of Ancient Rome》(帝权:一部关于古罗马的小说)。讲的是罗马共和国后期的事情。围绕西塞罗的崛起而写,从远赴希腊学习演说,到回罗马当律师,然后当选议员,之后拿到罗马的执政官的位子。罗马共和国的治国信条那时非常象现在的美国。就是讲究权力分享,互相制约。极其反对绝对并且没有制约的统治者。罗马最高的权力属于两个执政官,以便两个人互相制约,并且每两年就重新选举一次。西塞罗虽然十分信仰共和国的制度,他也向往拿到最高执政官的位子,这两者使他常常处于难以取舍的地段。为了在议院里建立自己的利益集团,他目睹并参与了刚出道的恺撒(那时恺撒是新议员)一手策划的一项具有决定性法律在元老院通过的谋划。这项法律看似为了当时如日中升的大将军庞培量身定造,允许罗马执政权在危机时刻归于一个人手下。其实是当时年青但是老谋深算的恺撒在为自己的将来铺路。埋下了罗马共和国最终被罗马帝国取代的种子。 《罗马》这部连续剧就是从 Harris 这本书里的事件发生后不久的时间开始。讲恺撒的崛起和陨落。这时恺撒已经是名声显赫独霸一方的将军了。在罗马的庞贝对他心有余悸。。。 和《帝权》相比,《罗马》关于当时的微妙政局,各路人物的钩心斗角讲的太浅,肥皂剧式的情节太多了些。所以看时很有些失望。但是和其他的电视剧相比,已经是很不错了。最地道的是整个剧目的场景,当时人物的生活细节都描绘设计的精细可信。很让人眼界大开。据说剧组搞设计的人做了很多考古研究,连当时罗马城里墙上涂鸦的颜色都研究了。力求符合史实。 高瞻远瞩的恺撒虽然巧妙耐心的布下了自己将来称帝的路,但是最终功亏一篑。连“大帝”的封号都没拿到就死去了。他栽好的树,最终由后人来乘凉。而共和国的命运却也无法挽回。虽然恺撒已去,他布下的阵剧却已成型,坚信共和国的议员们,沾了满手的鲜血,依然是无力回天,没法挡住罗马帝国的降临,罗马共和国的毁灭。好像《魔戒》里说的,人,总是无法抵制权力的诱惑。 跟恺撒和庞贝这样举重若轻的人物比起来,西塞罗好像就是个小人物了。在《帝权》这本书里,他其实是一个智慧的哲学家和政治家。但是在《罗马》电视剧里面,他变成个小丑样的人物,他内心的人天之争显得懦弱而可笑。是不是因为视角不同呢?
历史 古罗马 英文 英文小说
The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet Goodreads 豆瓣
作者: David Mitchell Random House 2010 - 6
The year is 1799, the place Dejima in Nagasaki Harbor, the “high-walled, fan-shaped artificial island” that is the Japanese Empire’s single port and sole window onto the world, designed to keep the West at bay; the farthest outpost of the war-ravaged Dutch East Indies Company; and a de facto prison for the dozen foreigners permitted to live and work there. To this place of devious merchants, deceitful interpreters, costly courtesans, earthquakes, and typhoons comes Jacob de Zoet, a devout and resourceful young clerk who has five years in the East to earn a fortune of sufficient size to win the hand of his wealthy fiancée back in Holland.

But Jacob’s original intentions are eclipsed after a chance encounter with Orito Aibagawa, the disfigured daughter of a samurai doctor and midwife to the city’s powerful magistrate. The borders between propriety, profit, and pleasure blur until Jacob finds his vision clouded, one rash promise made and then fatefully broken. The consequences will extend beyond Jacob’s worst imaginings. As one cynical colleague asks, “Who ain’t a gambler in the glorious Orient, with his very life?”

A magnificent mix of luminous writing, prodigious research, and heedless imagination, The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet is the most impressive achievement of its eminent author.
Slade House 豆瓣
作者: David Mitchell Random House 2015 - 10
From “one of the most electric writers alive” (The Boston Globe) comes a taut, intricately woven, spine-chilling, reality-warping short novel. Set across five decades, beginning in 1979 and coming to its electrifying conclusion on October 31, 2015, Slade House is the perfect book to curl up with on a dark and stormy night.
2016年9月7日 已读
全方位无死角(都是死角?)恐怖小说 看得我背后凉飕飕的。。。
english fantasy 英文
A Legacy 豆瓣
作者: Sybille Bedford Penguin Classics 1999 - 10
2016年9月5日 已读
看完了,很喜欢。开头有点晦涩,细节又微妙,可以理解不会是所有人都喜欢的调调。对话精炼让我想起海明威(那几本写的好的小说)。书里的人物有点光怪陆离的让人震惊。现实确实是比艺术更离奇啊!文笔很有英国的冷幽默。在犹豫要不要去看Jigsaw...
小说 英文
Seveneves 豆瓣
作者: Neal Stephenson William Morrow 2015 - 5
From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Anathem, Reamde, and Cryptonomicon comes an exciting and thought-provoking science fiction epic—a grand story of annihilation and survival spanning five thousand years.
What would happen if the world were ending?
A catastrophic event renders the earth a ticking time bomb. In a feverish race against the inevitable, nations around the globe band together to devise an ambitious plan to ensure the survival of humanity far beyond our atmosphere, in outer space.
But the complexities and unpredictability of human nature coupled with unforeseen challenges and dangers threaten the intrepid pioneers, until only a handful of survivors remain . . .
Five thousand years later, their progeny—seven distinct races now three billion strong—embark on yet another audacious journey into the unknown . . . to an alien world utterly transformed by cataclysm and time: Earth.
A writer of dazzling genius and imaginative vision, Neal Stephenson combines science, philosophy, technology, psychology, and literature in a magnificent work of speculative fiction that offers a portrait of a future that is both extraordinary and eerily recognizable. As he did in Anathem, Cryptonomicon, the Baroque Cycle, and Reamde, Stephenson explores some of our biggest ideas and perplexing challenges in a breathtaking saga that is daring, engrossing, and altogether brilliant.
2016年6月19日 已读
看完了,很多细节描写非常美,比方cradle。科幻机械情节设定也非常独出心裁。但是我好像无法接受宇航人类会那么和平民主。存活下来的人类社会更像digger的可能性更大。//刚看到33%。好看,有一点点三体的设定,加上火星救援似的硬科幻和细节描写。。。原书里有没有图纸什么的啊!好多空间站的描述读的痛苦死了,就不能画张图吗?!
2016年6月25日 评论 惊呆的人类 - 夜以继日的看完Neal Stephenson的七夏娃,很多话想说,一直没得空坐下来写读后感。然后昨晚看着英国脱欧公投结果,惊呆的感觉完全是书里的开篇描写。月球被无缘无故的打散成七块。地球人都惊呆了。 睡一夜醒来,英镑跳水之余道琼也跌了六百点。发现英国脱欧的结果和七夏娃的情节居然非常有可比性。 七夏娃的故事背景就是月球被打散,所以陨石互相撞击的频率以指数分布递增,结果就是两年内陨石数量大到要把地球完全砸毁。欧洲从欧盟变回一盘散沙又何尝不是同样的道理?把一个整体分散成小个体,彼此碰撞的频率增加,两次大战作为前车之鉴,第三次世界大战的可能性将跟被打散的月球一样以指数递增,陷世界于万劫不复之地。。。 看完七夏娃本来一直不以为然的就是书中对云方舟上存活下来的人类温情社会的乐观描写。但是现在面对残酷现实再回去看那个设定,不由得感激作者的慈悲。黑暗现实里的我们太需要这一点幸存的理想之光了。【泪。。。】 看三体三部曲的时候我常常感觉遗憾,这么新鲜有趣的情节思路和设定,却没有相应的文笔来让它完美。看七夏娃的感觉就是,对啦!这才是本来三体可以写成的样子啊!很喜欢七夏娃里面的细节描写,人物刻画。相比之下更喜欢五千年前的那群人。五千年后的人物都趋于脸谱化了。 貌似所有科幻都认为要想在宇宙中存活下来都需要军队似的管理方式。应该是因为生存环境恶略,资源稀少。没有可能养育民主宽厚的社会制度。所以怎么看都觉得三体三部曲里面最后的黑森林理论是正确的。 民主是一株奇葩。是异数,是偶然,不是必然。战争是必然。叹息。 &quot;战争不懂得道德为何物.胜利者撰写历史,作出审判,用绞索或者子弹结束战败者的生命.在战争里,其实只存在一种战争罪:战败.其它的都只是温情主义的喃喃自语,毫无疑义.--赫尔曼.沃克《战争风云》&quot; &quot;There is no morality in war. The winner wrote the history, passed the judgement, shot or hung the loser. In war, the only crime is to lose, the rest is sentimental nonsense. --Herman Wouk, Winds of War&quot;
科幻 美国 英文