长篇小说
To The Lighthouse 豆瓣
所属 作品: 到灯塔去/伍尔夫作品集
作者: Virginia Woolf Vintage Classics 2016 - 10
The serene and maternal Mrs. Ramsay, the tragic yet absurd Mr. Ramsay, together with their children and assorted guests, are holidaying on the Isle of Skye. From the seemingly trivial postponement of a visit to a nearby lighthouse, Virginia Woolf constructs a remarkable and moving examination of the complex tensions and allegiances of family life. One of the great literary achievements of the twentieth-century, To the Lighthouse is often cited as Virginia Woolf's most popular novel.
Normal People 豆瓣 Goodreads
所属 作品: 正常人
7.5 (42 个评分) 作者: Sally Rooney Faber & Faber 2018 - 8
Connell and Marianne grow up in the same small town in rural Ireland. The similarities end there; they are from very different worlds. When they both earn places at Trinity College in Dublin, a connection that has grown between them lasts long into the following years.
This is an exquisite love story about how a person can change another person's life - a simple yet profound realisation that unfolds beautifully over the course of the novel. It tells us how difficult it is to talk about how we feel and it tells us - blazingly - about cycles of domination, legitimacy and privilege. Alternating menace with overwhelming tenderness, Sally Rooney's second novel breathes fiction with new life.
2023年1月4日 已读
很难说喜不喜欢的一本小说。可以学习的是两个角色对位的叙事和充满张力的亲密感描写,简洁短促的句子。前两天和22岁刚大学毕业的美国室友偶然聊到这本书,她说她是书和剧的忠粉,还曾经专门和朋友去都柏林“朝圣”。对和平国家Z世代的作家和读者而言,很多议题的扁平化和符号化也许正是真实时代体验的一部分。
#长篇小说
2023年1月4日 评论 A Generation of Symbolization - For a while after finishing this novel, I couldn't decide if I liked it or not. There were absolutely a lot of great moments in the story that touched me, but some settings and conflicts still seemed to flow on the surface of the real world. What the author addressed as "normal people" seemed more like a group of "normal privileged young people." I never once thought that the severity level of people's problems differed by their social class. A rich guy's problem couldn't be compared to a poor one's only because no pain and sorrow of any two individuals could be compared. Still, when these Irish elites talked about international politics and wars in Trinity, or when they regarded opinions and knowledge as a resource to show off (for most of them), a personality, an interest (for the protagonist, Marianne), I was pushed out of the story for a moment, feeling weirdly uncomfortable. Those faraway sufferings of people from the other end of the world became symbolic in these young people's lives. The experience was no longer a solid reaction to life but some qualification to look serious, some abstract reflection on self-demonstration. A similar symbolization even happened in the story's plot when it came to Marianna's background trauma. Being rich and broken, intelligent and lonely, worthy loving though suffering family violence, it seemed Marianna had to own all these features to win herself a strong personality to carry the story. A typical "upper-class family life could be much more unhealthy" tragedy. In fact, I was more moved by Connell's melancholy, even though he had less reason to suffer. Marianna and Connell always kept a beautiful symmetry in the story: when he was the school star, she was a misfit; when he couldn't fit in Trinity, she gained a reputation; when he found a normal girlfriend to maintain a healthy relationship, she found a jerk to degrade herself; when he fell into the depression for old friend's death, she even trapped herself in a sort of self-punishment. But their development and self-reflection in the story were not equally arranged since the college part. Connell's struggles were presented in detail and processed with motivated plots and twists; in some parts, we were allowed to sympathize with him, and in others, we were allowed to hate him. He was a convincible and vivid character to bring out the reader's complex feelings. But as for Marianna, she was always waiting there. All her flaws were presented in a victim's way -- compared to Connell, all her mistakes and weakness were more reasonable and forgivable in a reader's moral experience (though in the real world, it might be the opposite). It made the climax and resolution look like an artificial conclusion made by the author. "How strange to feel herself so completely under the control of another person, but also how ordinary. No one can be independent of other people completely, so why not give up the attempt, go running in the other direction, depend on people for everything, allow them to depend on you, why not." When the story reached Marianne's thoughts in the end, I found these words were beautifully and artificially written at the same time. Though the conclusion was so sincere that one could copy it as a motto, the resolution of Marianna's peace couldn't convince me at all. At the climax, when her brother hurt her, she also passively waited for Connell to lead the issue. That fitted her character and her self-denying inclination. But in the storyline, there was not enough motivation and evidence for her to bring up those life philosophies or make a huge decision. But after all, didn't Rooney know the inclination of symbolization in her story? Hadn't she realized her protagonist was somehow floating on the lightest layer of life? Part of me thinks she did know. And part of me even echoes with that lightest layer. The generation she wrote about was protected so well that they could only take all these experiences as symbols for positive or negative usages for a certain period in their life. It doesn't mean the suffering was not actual. Sometimes being trapped in the bubble for too long and seeing more and more conflicts outside through a twisted lens, this generation might even go through more intolerable fear than those who could indeed suffer it. We fear we can't participate. We fear we will eventually have to participate. We fear we weren't and never would be prepared for this world. From this angle, the novel did reveal some real confusion, which was not wholly satisfying but challenging enough. As for a love story, Rooney did a great job of creating intimacy between protagonists. And she was SO good at sex sceneries. The teenage part was the best for me throughout the whole book. Their chemistry and struggle could be regarded as a tiny sketch of human weakness confronting society. I especially like how the author arranged twists to balance their relationship between sealing and breaking, privacy and publicity. And they reminded me of the reason why the love theme is too cheap to be written and too expensive to be well-written nowadays. In the crowds, we lose the self; in the solitude, we scatter the self. Only through love, a bridge to connect with another individual, are we able to locate the self. There's no more need to praise her clean, neat, and precise language. She was talented in pace and rhythm. I carefully examined her sentence length and vocabulary usage. She had a style I wanted to learn from. 2023.1.3
英文 长篇小说
A Wizard of Earthsea 豆瓣 谷歌图书
所属 作品: 地海传奇:地海巫师
9.1 (7 个评分) 作者: Ursula K. Le Guin HMH Books for Young Readers 2012 - 9
The first novel of Ursula K. Le Guin's must-read Earthsea Cycle. "The magic of Earthsea is primal; the lessons of Earthsea remain as potent, as wise, and as necessary as anyone could dream." (Neil Gaiman)Ged was the greatest sorcerer in Earthsea, but in his youth he was the reckless Sparrowhawk. In his hunger for power and knowledge, he tampered with long-held secrets and loosed a terrible shadow upon the world.This is the tumultuous tale of his testing, how he mastered the mighty words of power, tamed an ancient dragon, and crossed death's threshold to restore the balance.With stories as perennial and universally beloved as The Chronicles of Narnia and The Lord of The Rings--but also unlike anything but themselves--Ursula K. Le Guin's Earthsea novels are some of the most acclaimed and awarded works in literature. They have received accolades such as the National Book Award, a Newbery Honor, the Nebula Award, and many more honors, commemorating their enduring place in the hearts and minds of readers and the literary world alike.Join the millions of fantasy readers who have explored these lands. As The Guardian put it: "Ursula Le Guin's world of Earthsea is a tangled skein of tiny islands cast on a vast sea. The islands' names pull at my heart like no others: Roke, Perilane, Osskil . . ."The Earthsea Cycle includes: A Wizard of EarthseaThe Tombs of AtuanThe Farthest ShoreTehanuTales from EarthseaThe Other Wind
2022年12月5日 已读
会一遍一遍重读的小说。心目中最好的奇幻作家。无法用技巧来评价。
#长篇小说
英文 长篇小说
Sense and Sensibility Goodreads
Sense and Sensibility
7.1 (7 个评分) 作者: Jane Austen / Sam Ngo Penguin Books 2003 - 4
Marianne Dashwood wears her heart on her sleeve, and when she falls in love with the dashing but unsuitable John Willoughby she ignores her sister Elinor's warning that her impulsive behaviour leaves her open to gossip and innuendo. Meanwhile Elinor, always sensitive to social convention, is struggling to conceal her own romantic disappointment, even from those closest to her. Through their parallel experience of love—and its threatened loss—the sisters learn that sense must mix with sensibility if they are to find personal happiness in a society where status and money govern the rules of love.
This edition includes explanatory notes, textual variants between the first and second editions, and Tony Tanner's introduction to the original Penguin Classic edition.
织巢 豆瓣
所属 作品: 织巢
8.5 (8 个评分) 作者: 西西 四川文艺出版社 2020 - 5
【内容简介】
时间永远只有一个方向
时间不回流
而渐渐地
有些候鸟
像时间
也不再飞回自己的旧巢了
《织巢》是西西自传体小说《候鸟》的姊妹篇。继《候鸟》之后,在《织巢》中西西的家族故事得到延续,小说讲述了一家人在香港陌生的新环境中艰辛坚韧、守望相助的生活。它也是一个爱情故事,不过是广义的。作者分别用“姐姐素素”“妹妹妍妍”的口吻叙述,并编织糅合进母亲1960年代书写的自传小说、来自内地二姨的家书,用四种不同的女性视角将两代亲人间的家族故事细腻讲述。漂泊各地的亲人于离散后各自生活,重新筑巢成家。从二十世纪五十年代到九十年代,从这一普通市民家庭生活中,亦可看到香港历史的变迁。
【西西】《织巢》是《候鸟》的姊妹篇,也是一个爱情故事,不过是广义的。
这是个吵闹撕裂的年代,
大家说话时仿佛都要提高嗓门,声嘶力竭,
要证明关心社会,而如此这样的一套才能够改进社会。
我想,生活是否只容许一种模式?
我们又能否冷静下来,平实地说,耐心地听呢?
【编辑推荐】
☼莫言、余华、王安忆、梁文道推崇备至的香港作家——西西,耄耋之年重磅新作!
【莫言】西西是我的老朋友和老师,她对我的帮助很大。
【王安忆】西西是香港的说梦人。
【余华】她告诉你的似乎都是你所知道的,可听完以后你又觉得和你知道的不一样。这就是西西的写作方式。在西西那里,事实所展示的只是其存在而已,注视事实的目光才具价值可言。
【梁文道】曾经有一段日子,每有人问起,香港有文学吗?香港有了不起的小说家吗?我就说:“有,西西。”……西西是香港最有代表性的作家之一,我认为她是作家中的作家。
【马世芳】她写战争、死亡、贫穷、老病,也带着一副柔软的心肠,和一双洞烛人世、然而始终好奇的眼。
【连明伟】有所取舍,故有所得失,唯有透过心的沉淀与安定,才能孕育温柔。这是作家西西在回溯生命历程之际,希望让人看见的,一种珍贵日常所获得的凭依感。
☼西西长篇自传体小说《候鸟》姊妹续篇。2018Openbook 年度好书
☼《织巢》是一本献给母亲的书,讲述了一家人在香港的生活。小说采用多视角叙事,并选用四种字体表达,虚实交错。
☼台湾知名平面设计艺术家黄子钦书装设计,作品多次获得金蝶奖等设计大奖。