The Art of Reading　讀書的藝術(shù)

The Art of Reading

讀書的藝術(shù)

Lin Yutang

林語堂

作者簡介

林語堂（1895—1976），既是以英文寫作揚名海外的中國作家，也是集語言學家、哲學家、文學家、旅行家、發(fā)明家于一身的知名學者。他一生著述頗豐，曾主編《論語》半月刊，創(chuàng)辦《人間世》《宇宙風》，提倡“以自我為中心，以閑適為格調(diào)”的小品文，成為論語派主要人物。1935年后，他用英文創(chuàng)作了《吾國吾民》（My Country and My People）等文化著作和《京華煙云》（Moment in Peking）等長篇小說。

本文節(jié)選自1937年出版的《生活的藝術(shù)》（The Art of Living）。該書是林語堂旅美專事創(chuàng)作后的第一部書，位居美國暢銷書排行榜榜首達52周，后接連再版40余次，被譯成十余種外國文字。本文可謂字字珠璣，文中對“風雪之夜，閉戶翻書”的描寫尤其令人神往。

Reading or the enjoyment of books has always been regarded among the charms of a cultured life and is respected and envied by those who rarely give themselves that privilege. This is easy to understand when we compare the difference between the life of a man who does no reading and that of a man who does. The man who has not the habit of reading is imprisoned in his immediate world, in respect to time and space. His life falls into a set routine; he is limited to contact and conversation with a few friends and acquaintances, and he sees only what happens in his immediate neighborhood. From this prison there is no escape. But the moment he takes up a book, he immediately enters a different world, and if it is a good book, he is immediately put in touch with one of the best talkers of the world. This talker leads him on and carries him into a different country or a different age, or unburdens to him some of his personal regrets, or discusses with him some special line or aspect of life that the reader knows nothing about. An ancient author puts him in communion with a dead spirit of long ago, and as he reads along, he begins to imagine what that ancient author looked like and what type of person he was. Both Mencius and Ssema Ch'ien, China's greatest historian, have expressed the same idea. Now to be able to live two hours out of twelve in a different world and take one's thoughts off the claims of the immediate present is, of course, a privilege to be envied by people shut up in their bodily prison. Such a change of environment is really similar to travel in its psychological effect.

But there is more to it than this. The reader is always carried away into a world of thought and reflection. Even if it is a book about physical events, there is a difference between seeing such events in person or living through them, and reading about them in books, for then the events always assume the quality of a spectacle and the reader becomes a detached spectator. The best reading is therefore that which leads us into this contemplative mood, and not that which is merely occupied with the report of events. The tremendous amount of time spent on newspapers I regard as not reading at all, for the average readers of papers are mainly concerned with getting reports about events and happenings without contemplative value.

The best formula for the object of reading, in my opinion, was stated by Huang Shanku, a Sung poet and friend of Su Tungp'o. He said, “A scholar who hasn't read anything for three days feels that his talk has no flavor (becomes insipid), and his own face becomes hateful to look at (in the mirror).”What he means, of course, is that reading gives a man a certain charm and flavor, which is the entire object of reading, and only reading with this object can be called an art. One doesn't read to “improve one's mind,”because when one begins to think of improving his mind, all the pleasure of reading is gone. He is the type of person who says to himself:“I must read Shakespeare, and I must read Sophocles, and I must read the entire Five Foot Shelf of Dr. Eliot, so I can become an educated man.”I'm sure that man will never become educated. He will force himself one evening to read Shakespeare's Hamlet and come away, as if from a bad dream, with no greater benefit than that he is able to say that he has “read”Hamlet. Anyone who reads a book with a sense of obligation does not understand the art of reading. This type of reading with a business purpose is in no way different from a senator's reading up of flies and reports before he makes a speech. It is asking for business advice and information, and not reading at all.

Reading for the cultivation of personal charm of appearance and flavor in speech is then, according to Huang, the only admissible kind of reading. This charm of appearance must evidently be interpreted as something other than physical beauty. What Huang means by “hateful to look at”is not physical ugliness. There are ugly faces that have a fascinating charm and beautiful faces that are insipid to look at. I have among my Chinese friends one whose head is shaped like a bomb and yet who is nevertheless always a pleasure to see. The most beautiful face among Western authors, so far as I have seen them in pictures, was that of G. K. Chesterton. There was such a diabolical conglomeration of mustache, glasses, fairly bushy eyebrows and knitted lines where the eyebrows met! One felt there were a vast number of ideas playing about inside that forehead, ready at any time to burst out from those quizzically penetrating eyes. That is what Huang would call a beautiful face, a face not made up by powder and rouge, but by the sheer force of thinking. As for flavor of speech, it all depends on one's way of reading. Whether one has “flavor”or not in his talk, depends on his method of reading. If a reader gets the flavor of books, he will show that flavor in his conversations, and if he has flavor in his conversations, he cannot help also having a flavor in his writing.

Hence I consider flavor or taste as the key to all reading. It necessarily follows that taste is selective and individual, like the taste for food. The most hygienic way of eating is, after all, eating what one likes, for then one is sure of his digestion. In reading as in eating, what is one man's meat may be another's poison. A teacher cannot force his pupils to like what he likes in reading, and a parent cannot expect his children to have the same tastes as himself. And if the reader has no taste for what he reads, all the time is wasted. As Yüan Chunglang says, “You can leave the books that you don't like alone, and let other people read them.”

There can be, therefore, no books that one absolutely must read. For our intellectual interests grow like a tree or flow like a river. So long as there is proper sap, the tree will grow anyhow, and so long as there is fresh current from the spring, the water will flow. When water strikes a granite cliff, it just goes around it; when it finds itself in a pleasant low valley, it stops and meanders there a while; when it finds itself in a deep mountain pond, it is content to stay there; when it finds itself traveling over rapids, is hurries forward. Thus, without any effort or determined aim, it is sure of reaching the sea some day.

There are no books in this world that everybody must read, but only books that a person must read at a certain time in a given place under given circumstances and at a given period of his life. I rather think that reading, like matrimony, is determined by fate or yinyüan. Even if there is a certain book that everyone must read, like the Bible, there is a time for it. When one's thoughts and experience have not reached a certain point for reading a masterpiece, the masterpiece will leave only a bad flavor on his palate. Confucius said, “When one is fifty, one may read the Book of Changes,”which means that one should not read it at forty-five. The extremely mild flavor of Confucius' own sayings in the Analects and his mature wisdom cannot be appreciated until one becomes mature himself.

Furthermore, the same reader reading the same book at different periods, gets a different flavor out of it. For instance, we enjoy a book more after we have had a personal talk with the author himself, or even after having seen a picture of his face, and one gets again a different flavor sometimes after one has broken off friendship with the author. A person gets a kind of flavor from reading the Book of Changes at forty, and gets another kind of flavor reading it at fifty, after he has seen more changes in life. Therefore, all good books can be read with profit and renewed pleasure a second time. I was made to read Westward Ho! and Henry Esmond in my college days, but while I was capable of appreciating Westward Ho! in my teens, the real flavor of Henry Esmond escaped me entirely until I reflected about it later on, and suspected there was vastly more charm in that book than I had then been capable of appreciating.

Reading, therefore, is an act consisting of two sides, the author and the reader. The net gain comes as much from the reader's contribution through his own insight and experience as from the author's own. In speaking about the Confucian Analects, the Sung Confucianist Ch'eng YiCh'uan said, “There are readers and readers. Some read the Analects and feel that nothing has happened, some are pleased with one or two lines in it, and some begin to wave their hands and dance on their legs unconsciously.”

I regard the discovery of one's favorite author as the most critical event in one's intellectual development. There is such a thing as the affinity of spirits, and among the authors of ancient and modern times, one must try to find an author whose spirit is akin with his own. Only in this way can one get any real good out of reading. One has to be independent and search out his masters. Who is one's favorite author, no one can tell, probably not even the man himself. It is like love at first sight. The reader cannot be told to love this one or that one, but when he has found the author he loves, he knows it himself by a kind of instinct. We have such famous cases of discoveries of authors. Scholars seem to have lived in different ages, separated by centuries, and yet their modes of thinking and feeling were so akin that their coming together across the pages of a book was like a person finding his own image.

In Chinese phraseology, we speak of these kindred spirits as reincarnations of the same soul, as Su Tungp'o was said to be the reincarnation of Chuangtse or T’ao Yüanming, and Yüan Chunglang was said to be the reincarnation of Su Tungp'o. Su Tungp'o said that when he first read Chuantse, he felt as if all the time since his childhood he had been thinking the same things and taking the same views himself. When Yüan Chunglang discovered one night Hsü WenCh'ang, a contemporary unknown to him, in a small book of poems, he jumped out of bed and shouted to his friend, and his friend began to read it and shout in turn, and then they both read and shouted again until their servant was completely puzzled. George Eliot described her first reading of Rousseau as an electric shock. Nietzche felt the same thing about Schopenhauer, but Schopenhauer a peevish master and Nietzche was a violent-tempered pupil, and it was natural that the pupil later rebelled against the teacher.

It is only this kind of reading, this discovery of one's favorite author, that will do one any good at all. Like a man falling in love with his sweetheart at first sight, everything is right. She is of the right height, has the right face, the right color of hair, the right quality of voice and the right way of speaking and smiling. This author is just right for him; his style, his taste, his point of view, his mode of thinking, are all right. And then the reader proceeds to devour every word and every line that the author writes, and because there is a spiritual affinity, he absorbs and readily digests everything. The author has cast a spell over him, and he is glad to be under the spell, and in time his own voice and manner and way of smiling and way of talking become like the author's own. Thus he truly steeps himself in his literary lovers and derives from these books sustenance for his soul. After a few years, the spell is over and he grows a little tired of his lover and seeks for new literary lovers, and after he has had three or four lovers and completely eaten them up, he merges as an author himself. There are many readers who never fall in love, like many young men and women who flirt around and are incapable of forming a deep attachment to a particular person. They can read any and all authors, and they never amount to anything.

Such a conception of the art of reading completely precludes the idea of reading as a duty or as an obligation. In China, one often encourages students to “study bitterly.”There was a famous scholar who studied bitterly and who stuck an awl in his calf when he fell asleep while studying at night. There was another scholar who had a maid stand by his side as he was studying at night, to wake him up every time he fell asleep. This was nonsensical. If one has a book lying before him and falls asleep while some wise ancient author is talking to him, he should just go to bed. No amount of sticking an awl in his calf or of shaking him up by a maid will do him any good. Such a man has lost all sense of pleasure of reading. Scholars are worth anything at all never know what is called “a hard grind”or what “bitter study”means. They merely love books and read on because they cannot help themselves.

With this question solved, the question of time and place for reading is also provided with an answer. There is no proper time and place for reading. When the mood for reading comes, one can read anywhere. If one knows the enjoyment of reading, he will read in school or out of school, and in spite of all schools. He can study even in the best schools. Tseng Kuofan, in one of his family letters concerning the expressed desire of one of his younger brothers come to the capital and study at a better school, replied that: “If one has the desire to study, he can study at a country school, or even a desert or in busy streets, and even as a woodcutter or a swineherd. But if one has no desire to study, then not only is the country school not proper for study, but even a quiet country home or a fairy island is not a proper place for study.”There are people who adopt a self-important posture at the desk when they are about to do reading, and then complain they are unable to read because the room is too cold, or the chair is too hard, or the light is too strong. And there are writers who complain that they cannot write because there are too many mosquitos, or the writing paper is too shiny, or the noise from the street is too great. The great Sung scholar, Ouyang Hsiu, confessed to “three on's”for doing his best writing: on the pillow, on horseback and on the toilet. Another famous Ch'ing scholar, Ku Ch'ienli, was known for his habit “reading Confucian classics naked”in summer. On the other hand, there is a good reason for not doing any reading in any of the seasons of the year, if one does not like reading:

To study in spring is treason;

And summer is sleep's best reason;

If winter hurries the fall;

Then stop till next spring season.

What, then, is the true art of reading? The simple answer is to just take up a book and read when the mood comes. To be thoroughly enjoyed, reading must be entirely spontaneous. One takes a limp volume of Lisao, or of Omar Khayyam, and goes away hand in hand with his love to read on a river bank. If there are good clouds over one's head, let them read the clouds and forget the books, or read the books and the clouds at the same time. Between times, a good pipe or a good cup of tea makes it still more perfect. Or perhaps on a snowy night, when one is sitting before the fireside, and there is a kettle singing on the hearth and a good pouch of tobacco at the side, one gathers ten or a dozen books on philosophy, economics, poetry, biography and piles them up on the couch, and then leisurely turns over a few of them and gently lights on the one which strikes his fancy at the moment. Chia Shengt'an regards reading a banned book behind closed doors on a snowy night as one of the greatest pleasures of life. The mood for reading is perfectly described by Ch'en Chiju (Meikung): “The ancient people called books and paintings ‘limp volumes' and ‘soft volumes'; therefore the best style of reading a book or opening an album is the leisurely style.”In this mood, one develops patience for everything. As the same author says, “The real master tolerates misprints when reading story, as a good traveler tolerates bad roads when climbing a mountain, one going to watch a snow scene tolerates a flimsy bridge, one choosing to live in the country tolerates vulgar people, and one bent on looking at flowers tolerates bad wine.”

The best description of the pleasure of reading I found in the autobiography of China's greatest poetess, Li Ch'ingchao (Yi-an, 1081-1141). She and her husband would go to the temple, where secondhand books and rubbings from stone inscriptions were sold, on the day he got his monthly stipend as a student at the Imperial Academy. Then they would buy some fruit on the way back, and coming home, they began to pare the fruit and examine the newly bought rubbings together, or drink tea and compare the variants in different editions. As described in her autobiographical sketch known as Postscript to Chinshihlu (a book on bronze and stone inscriptions):

“I have a power for memory, and sitting quietly after supper in the Homecoming Hall, we would boil a pot of tea and, pointing to the piles of books on the shelves, make a guess as to on what line of what page in what volume of a certain book a passage occurred and see who was right, the one making the correct guess having the privilege of drinking his cup of tea first. When a guess was correct, we would lift the cup high and break out into a loud laughter, so much so that sometimes the tea was spilled on our dress and we were not able to drink. We were then content to live and grow old in such a world! Therefore we held our heads high, although we were living in poverty and sorrow….In time our collection grew bigger and bigger and the books and art objects were piled up on tables and desks and beds, and we enjoyed them with our eyes and our minds and planned and discussed over them, tasting a happiness above those enjoying dogs and horses and music and dance.”

讀書或賞書一直是文明生活的雅事，那些不大有機會享受這種權(quán)利的人往往對此又羨又妒。將讀書者和不讀書者的生活兩相比較，便很容易理解這一點。沒有讀書習慣的人被禁錮于眼前的世界，無論時間上還是空間上都是如此。他的生活有一套常規(guī)，只限于與少數(shù)熟人接觸交談，只目睹鄰里周遭發(fā)生之事，而無法逃脫這個牢籠。但當他拿起一本書時，他會立刻進入一個不同的世界；如果那是一本好書，他會立刻結(jié)識世上最佳的健談者。這位健談者會引導他前進，帶領他進入不同的國度與年代，或是向他傾訴自己的悔恨，或是與他探討幾句妙語名言，或是與他討論他從前并不知曉的人生感悟。閱讀古時作家的著作，就像和多年前已逝的靈魂交談。隨著閱讀的進行，他開始想象那位古人相貌如何、性格怎樣。孟子和中國偉大的史學家司馬遷都表達過同樣的觀點。如果每12小時能在不同的世界生活兩小時，讓自己的思想完全逃離眼前的世界，這當然會讓困于軀體牢籠的人嫉妒。這樣的環(huán)境轉(zhuǎn)變就像在不同的心境中穿行。

不僅如此，書總能引發(fā)讀者思考。即使此書只談及現(xiàn)實場景，但親眼所見或親身經(jīng)歷與從書中所讀有所不同，因為書中場景往往成為一種景觀，讀者則是超然物外的觀察者。因此，最佳的閱讀體驗應將人帶入沉思的心境，而非只被事件報道占據(jù)。我認為，花大把時間讀報并不算是閱讀，因為普通的讀報者只關(guān)注事件報道，而這些事件并沒有深思的價值。

我認為，蘇東坡的好友、宋代詩人黃山谷1對閱讀目的的說法最妙。他說：“三日不讀，便覺語言無味，面目可憎”。當然，他指的是閱讀使人獨具風雅——這就是閱讀的全部目的所在。只有以此為目的的閱讀才可稱為藝術(shù)。閱讀不能以“提升心智”為目的。如果開始想著提升心智，閱讀的樂趣便喪失殆盡。如果一個人說“我必須讀莎士比亞、索福克勒斯的作品和查爾斯·艾略特的‘五英尺書架’2中的所有作品，如此一來，我就能成為有教養(yǎng)的人”，那么我確信他永遠不會變得有教養(yǎng)。他可以強迫自己挑燈夜讀莎士比亞的《哈姆雷特》，但讀完就像從噩夢中醒來，除了能說自己“讀過”《哈姆雷特》外，就再沒有任何益處。出于義務去讀書的人并不理解閱讀的藝術(shù)。這樣讀書和參議員在演講前閱讀文件和報告沒什么區(qū)別。那是尋求業(yè)務建議和收集信息，根本不是閱讀。

依黃山谷所言，為了讓自己外表優(yōu)雅、談吐風趣而讀書，是唯一可采納的閱讀方式。此處的“外表優(yōu)雅”顯然不是指相貌美麗。黃山谷所說的“面目可憎”亦非容貌丑陋。丑人也可能迷人，美人也可能令人生厭。我的中國朋友里有一位腦袋活像炮彈，但我卻總是很高興見到他。在我見過的西方作家肖像中，最美的臉孔當屬吉爾伯特·基思·切斯特頓。他的胡須、眼鏡、濃眉及眉間的川字紋組合起來簡直像魔鬼！我覺得他的頭腦里回旋著無數(shù)想法，隨時會從充滿疑惑的銳利的雙眼中噴涌而出。黃山谷會稱之為“美麗臉孔”，因為這張臉并非由脂粉裝扮，而是純粹由思想塑造。至于談吐風趣，則取決于一個人閱讀的方式。一個人的談吐是否“有趣味”，取決于他如何閱讀。如果讀者領悟了書的趣味，他的談吐就會有趣；如果他談吐風趣，筆下作品也會流露趣味。

因此，我認為趣味或品味是一切閱讀的關(guān)鍵。閱讀的趣味就像飲食的品味，必須按照自己的品味選擇要讀的。畢竟，最健康的進食方法是吃自己喜歡的東西，因為這些東西肯定能消化。閱讀正如進食，一個人的美食或許是另一人的毒藥。教師不能強迫學生讀自己喜歡的書，父母也不能盼著子女與自己品味相同。如果讀者對所讀之書毫無興致，那就只會浪費時間。正如袁中郎3所說：“己所不好之書，可令他人讀之。”

由此看來，世間并無必讀之書。因為我們對知識的興趣如樹木般生長，如河水般流淌。只要有適合的汁液，樹木便會茁壯生長；只要有鮮活的泉涌，河水便會向前流淌。水流若遇巖石阻擋，便繞石而行；若遇低洼溪谷，便曲折蜿蜒；若入深山池塘，便怡然停駐；若順急流而下，便奔騰向前。如此一來，水流并無明確目標，亦未費心勞力，但有朝一日必將抵達海洋。

世間并無人人必讀之書，只有一個人在某時某地、某種處境下、人生某個階段中必讀之書。我寧愿認為閱讀像婚姻一樣，由命運或姻緣決定。即使存在一本人人必讀的書，比如《圣經(jīng)》，閱讀此書也有一定的時機。如果一個人的思想和經(jīng)歷尚未達到閱讀經(jīng)典的程度，經(jīng)典只會讓他品出不好的滋味?？鬃釉?ldquo;五十以學易”，就是說一個人哪怕已經(jīng)45歲，尚不能去讀《易經(jīng)》?？鬃印墩撜Z》中的格言恬淡溫和，只有心智成熟的讀者才能欣賞其中深沉的智慧。

此外，同一位讀者讀同一本書，不同時期能讀出不同的滋味。例如，我們和作者當面交談，或是看過作者肖像之后，能更好地欣賞他寫的書。與作者絕交之后再看他的書，則另有一番滋味。40歲時讀《易經(jīng)》是一種味道，年屆半百、歷經(jīng)變故后再讀《易經(jīng)》則是另一番滋味。因此，所有好書第二次閱讀時都能獲得新的益處和樂趣。我大學時被逼著讀《西行記》和《亨利·埃斯蒙德》，盡管我少年時已能欣賞《西行記》的妙處，但《亨利·埃斯蒙德》的真諦我卻是多年之后才有所體會。我懷疑這本書里還有許多我不曾體察的趣味。

由此可見，閱讀的行為包含兩方面——作者和讀者。書能提供多少益處，取決于讀者和作者雙方的洞察和經(jīng)歷。宋代大儒程伊川談及孔子的《論語》時說道：“讀《論語》，有讀了后全然無事者，有讀了后其中得一兩句喜者，有讀了后知好之者，有讀了后不知手之舞之足之蹈之者。”

我認為，找到自己最喜歡的作家，是一個人智力發(fā)展過程中最重要的事件。世間確有性情相投一事，讀書人必須在古今作家中，找到與自己靈魂相通的一人。只有這樣，他才能從閱讀中得到真正的收獲。一個人必須獨立尋找自己的導師。誰是他最喜歡的作家？沒有人知道，或者他自己都不知道。這就像一見鐘情。不能要求讀者喜歡這個或那個作家，但當他發(fā)現(xiàn)自己喜歡的作家，自然會一見傾心。關(guān)于這一點有很多著名的例子。有些學者生活在不同時代，彼此相距幾個世紀，但思考方式和感覺卻如出一轍。在書中看到另一位學者的文字，就像一個人看見自己的倒影。

按照中國的說法，我們將這種精神的傳承稱為“靈魂轉(zhuǎn)世”，例如蘇東坡就被認為是莊子或陶淵明的轉(zhuǎn)世4，袁中郎則被認為是蘇東坡的轉(zhuǎn)世。蘇東坡說，自己第一次讀《莊子》時，覺得自己自幼年起就和莊子有同樣的思想。袁中郎夜讀同輩無名詩人徐文長5的一本小詩集，從床上一躍而起，大喊友人來讀，友人讀著也開始大喊。兩人喊復讀，讀復喊，直到把仆人完全弄糊涂了。喬治·艾略特將自己第一次讀盧梭的感覺描述為“觸電”。尼采第一次讀叔本華時也有同感。但叔本華是位暴躁的老師，尼采是個壞脾氣的學生，后來學生反叛老師是很自然的事。

只有發(fā)現(xiàn)心儀作家的閱讀才有益處可言。男子對他的愛人一見鐘情時，會覺得她的身高、臉孔、發(fā)色、嗓音、言笑都恰到好處；讀者遇上心儀的作家，也會覺得他的文風、品味、觀點、思考模式都恰到好處。接下來，讀者便開始貪婪地閱讀作家寫下的一字一句。由于雙方性情相投，他很快就消化吸收了一切。作者對他下了魔咒，他則樂于身陷魔咒。久而久之，他的聲音及言笑會和作者越來越相似。至此，他就完全投入了文學情人的懷抱，并從書中獲取自己所需的精神食糧。幾年之后，魔咒消失無蹤，他有點兒厭倦了舊情人，開始尋找新的文學情人。當有過三四個情人并將其“生吞活剝”之后，他自己也和作家融為一體。許多讀者從未墜入愛河，正如許多青年男女只會到處調(diào)情，卻無法鐘情于某個特定的人。他們可以讀所有作家的作品，卻永遠得不到收獲。

“閱讀的藝術(shù)”這個概念完全打破了“視閱讀為責任”的觀點。在中國，人們常常鼓勵學生“苦讀”。一位著名的苦讀學者在夜里讀書時，只要一打瞌睡就拿錐子刺股。另一位學者夜里讀書時讓丫鬟站在身邊，一見他打盹就馬上把他叫醒。這實在荒謬。如果一個人面前攤著一本書，古代智者娓娓道來時他竟然犯困，那他干脆上床睡覺好了。用錐刺股或讓丫鬟叫醒對他并無益處。這種人已經(jīng)完全失去了閱讀的樂趣。真正的學者從來不知道“磨煉”和“苦讀”所謂何物。他們純粹是喜歡書，情不自禁要往下讀。

這個問題解決之后，閱讀的時間、地點也有了答案。閱讀無需合適的時間地點。只要有閱讀的興致，無論何處都可以。如果一個人明白閱讀的樂趣，則無論進入何種學校、無論在上學還是已畢業(yè)，他都會讀書；即便在最優(yōu)秀的學校里，他也能讀書。針對小弟希望入京就讀好學校，曾國藩在一封家書中寫道：“茍能發(fā)奮自立，則家塾可讀書，即曠野之地，熱鬧之場，亦可讀書；負薪牧豕，皆可讀書。茍不能發(fā)奮自立，則家塾不宜讀書，即清凈之鄉(xiāng)，神仙之境，皆不能讀書。”有些人準備讀書時在桌前裝腔作勢，抱怨房間太冷、板凳太硬、光線太強害得自己沒法讀書；也有些作家抱怨蚊子太多、稿紙?zhí)垂狻⒔值捞[害得自己寫不出東西。宋代大學者歐陽修說自己的好文章都得于“三上”，即枕上、馬上、廁上。另一位清代著名學者顧千里則以夏天“裸體讀經(jīng)”而聞名。另一方面，如果一個人不愛讀書，則一年四季都有不讀書的好理由：

春天不是讀書天，

夏日炎炎最好眠，

等到秋來冬又至，

不如等待到來年。

那什么是真正的“讀書的藝術(shù)”？答案很簡單：興致起時，拿起書就讀。完全發(fā)自內(nèi)心才能徹底享受閱讀。一個人可以帶上一本《離騷》或奧瑪珈音6的書與愛人攜手出游，在河畔同讀詩篇。如果空中云彩飄動，亦可仰視浮云，忘卻手中之書，或是既看云也讀書。偶爾加上煙斗一柄、好茶一杯便更加完美?；蚴窃陲L雪之夜，靠爐而坐，爐上有沸水一壺，身邊有好煙一袋，將十幾本哲學、經(jīng)濟、詩歌、傳記堆在沙發(fā)上，然后隨心所致，翻而讀之。金圣嘆7認為“雪夜閉戶讀禁書”是人生最大的樂趣之一。陳繼儒（眉公）8對閱讀心境的描寫最為精彩：“古人稱書畫為叢箋軟卷，故讀書開卷以閑適為尚。”如此心境之下，一個人對一切皆有耐心。此作家還說過：“真學士不以魯魚亥豕為意，好旅客登山不以路惡難行為意，看雪景者不以橋不固為意，卜居鄉(xiāng)間者不以俗人為意，愛看花者不以酒劣為意。”

在中國最偉大的女詩人李清照（易安居士，1081—1141）的自傳中，我找到了對閱讀之樂的最佳描述。她的丈夫是太學學生。他每月領到俸祿后，夫妻倆便去相國寺（當時賣舊書和碑帖）購置碑帖?；丶业穆飞?，他們還會買些水果。回家之后，夫妻倆一邊剝水果一邊賞玩新買的碑帖，或是一邊品茶一邊比較不同版本。正如她在《金石錄后序》這篇自傳體序中所寫：

“余性偶強記，每飯罷，坐歸來堂，烹茶，指堆積書史，言某事在某書某卷第幾頁第幾行，以中否角勝負，為飲茶先后。中即舉杯大笑，至茶傾覆懷中，反不得飲而起，甘心老是鄉(xiāng)矣！故雖處憂患困窮，而志不屈。……于是幾案羅列，枕席枕藉，意會心謀，目往神授，樂在聲色犬馬之上。”

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我們對知識的興趣如樹木般生長，如河水般流淌。只要有適合的汁液，樹木便會茁壯生長；只要有鮮活的泉涌，河水便會向前流淌。

Lin Yutang 林語堂

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1．黃山谷（1045—1105），即黃庭堅，北宋書法家、文學家。他的詩書畫號稱“三絕”。其與蘇東坡齊名，人稱“蘇黃”。

2．查爾斯·艾略特的“五英尺書架”，指《哈佛經(jīng)典》，一套51卷本的經(jīng)典圖書匯集。他曾在一次演講中說，每天花15分鐘閱讀放在五英尺書架上的經(jīng)典圖書，就能獲得人文教育。出版商看見商機并邀請其選擇書目，《哈佛經(jīng)典》由此誕生。

3．袁中郎（1568—1610），即袁宏道，明代文學家。他在文學上反對“文必秦漢，詩必盛唐”的風氣，提出“獨抒性靈，不拘格套”的性靈說。

4．陶淵明是蘇東坡一生最崇拜的人，蘇東坡曾按照陶淵明詩集的韻寫了一本詩，并表示自己是陶淵明轉(zhuǎn)世。

5．徐渭（1521—1593），字文長，中國明代文學家，他的詩被袁中郎尊為明代第一。

6．奧瑪珈音（Omar Khayyam，1048—1131），波斯詩人，著有《魯拜集》。

7．金圣嘆（1608—1661），明末清初人，著名的文學家、文學批評家。

8．陳繼儒（1558—1639），字仲醇，號眉公、麋公，明代文學家、書畫家。