Do We Buy Books?我们是否购书？

I have recently been in the throes1 of a double removal， and in the course of the operation comments were made by one person or another concerned in it on the prominence of books in my belongings. The van-man， with a large experience of removals， paid the tribute of astonishment at the spectacle， and the people who came to look at the house gaped at the books as though they were the last thing they expected to see in a decent suburban residence. Hitherto I had been rather ashamed of my library. In the course of a longish life I have accumulated some 2，000 books. There is not much rubbish among them， for I have thinned them out periodically， but there are shameful blanks that are unfilled， and it had never occurred to me to think that they formed an unusual collection for a middle-class household.

我最近为搬出旧居迁入新宅忙得够呛，其间有一两个相关人员，见我的个人物品中书籍多得格外醒目，便议论了几句。货车司机呢，搬家经验丰富，面对满屋书籍的壮观景象，惊讶之余表示敬佩。前来看房的人目瞪口呆，仿佛怎么也料想不到会在一座雅致的郊区住宅里见到这么多的书。迄今为止，我一直为我的书房感到害臊。在稍显漫长的一生中，我积累了大约2000本书。其中，末流低劣的读物倒是不多，因为我会定期淘汰掉它们，但书架仍未摆满，令我为之蒙羞，而且我从没想过，对于一个中产阶级家庭而言，这样的藏书量已是异乎寻常了。

But the inquiries I have made since lead me to the conclusion that they do， and that in the average suburban home the last thing that is thought about is the furnishing of a library. People who will spend many hundreds and even thousands of pounds in the course of years in making their house beautiful never give a serious thought to books. They will ransack London for suitable fittings， for rugs and hangings， china and cut-glass， mirrors and what-nots， but the idea of providing themselves with a moderate and well-selected library does not occur to them. If they gather books at all， they gather them haphazard and without thought. A well-known publisher told me the other day that he was recently asked to equip a library in a new house in North London， and the instruction he received was to provide books that would fit the shelves which had been fixed. It was not the contents of the books that mattered， but the size.

然而，此后经过数次问询，我得出结论：这样的藏书量的确异乎寻常，而且在地处郊区的一般家庭里，布置书房是人们最不情愿考虑的问题。经年累月舍得花费数百甚至数千英镑把房子装得漂漂亮亮的人，从来不会认真考虑买几本书。他们会逛遍伦敦，挑选心仪的家具配件、地毯、挂饰、瓷器、雕花玻璃器皿、镜子等等，却从未想过精挑细选一些书籍，为自己布置一间舒适的书房。即便真的添置书籍，他们也是不假思索地随意搜罗几本。前几天，一位著名的出版商告诉我，最近有人要他为自己伦敦北部新居里的书房配备书籍，而他收到的指示是，挑选的书要能正好放进安装好的书架。重要的不是书的内容，而是大小。

This was no doubt an exceptional case， but it does represent something of the attitude of the average man to books. People who will spend one hundred and fifty pounds on a piano as a matter of course will not spend ten pounds a year or even five pounds a year in enriching their homes with all the best thought of all time. Go into any average provincial town and the last thing you will find is a decent book-shop. I recall more than one great industrial town of a population of over a hundred thousand which has only one such shop， and that is generally kept going by the sale of school-books. It is not because we cannot afford to buy books. We spend two hundred million sterling a year on beer， and I doubt whether we spend two hundred million pence on literature. Many people can afford to buy motor-cars at anything from two hundred pounds who would be aghast at the idea of spending half a guinea2 occasionally on a book. They think so meanly of their minds as that.

此例实属罕见，但确实多少反映了普通人对待书籍的态度。愿意斥资150镑购买一架钢琴的人觉得这钱花得理所当然，却不愿一年花费10镑甚或5镑购买书籍，用从古至今的思想精华充实自己的家。随便进入伦敦以外的任何一个普通城市，最难寻见的就是一家像样的书店。在我的印象中，人口超过10万却只有一家像样书店的工业化大城市不止一个，而且这家书店一般还得靠销售教材才能勉强维持经营。这不是因为我们买不起书。我们每年的啤酒消费金额高达两亿镑，但我怀疑用于购买文学书籍的费用都到不了两亿便士。许多人买得起200镑以上的任何一款汽车，但偶尔花半几尼买一本书的念头会把他们吓得不轻。他们就这样把自己的思想想得如此不值钱。

Yet， merely as furniture， books are a cheaper and better decoration than blue china or Chippendale3 chairs. They are better because they put the signature of individuality upon a house. The taste for Chippendale chairs and blue china may be a mere vanity， a piece of coxcombry4 and ostentation， a fancy that represents， not a genuine personal taste for beautiful things， but an artificial passion for rare or expensive things. But a row of books will give a house character and meaning. It will tell you about its owner. It is a window let into the landscape of his life. When I go into a stranger’s library， I wander round the bookshelves to learn what sort of a person the stranger is， and when he comes in I feel that I know the key to his mind and the range of his interests. A house without books is a mindless and characterless house， no matter how rich the Persian rugs and how elegant the settees and the ornaments. The Persian rugs only tell you that the owner has got money， but the books will tell you whether he has got a mind as well. I was staying not long ago in a Northern town with a man who had a great house and fine grounds， two or three motor-cars， a billiard-room， and a multitude of other luxuries. The only thing he had not got was books. And the effect left on the mind by all his splendours was that he was pauper. “And where are your books？” asked a famous bookman of my acquaintance who was being shown over a West-End palace by the owner， who， in the last twenty years， had made a colossal fortune. “In the City5，” was the plutocrat’s6 unblushing reply. He gloried in his poverty.

然而，即便仅仅作为家具，书籍的装饰效果也胜过青花瓷器或奇彭代尔式座椅，而且价格更低廉。它们之所以更好，是因为它们给房屋打上了个性的印记。人们偏好奇彭代尔式座椅和青花瓷器，可能只是出于虚荣，纯为浮夸和炫耀，如同一场幻想，体现的并非真实的个人审美，而是对稀缺或昂贵之物的故作喜爱。但一排书籍会赋予整栋房子个性和意义。它们为你介绍房主，犹如打开一扇窗，引导你领略他的生活风貌。走进一个陌生人的书房，我往往流连于一排排书架之间，希望据此了解他是怎样一个人。及至他走进书房，我便觉得自己已掌握打开他心扉的钥匙，知道他的兴趣范围有多广。一座没有藏书的房子是没有思想与个性的，无论房中的波斯地毯何等昂贵，布置和装饰何等考究。波斯地毯只能说明主人有钱，书却能告诉你他是否有思想。不久前，我住在位于北部某座城市的某人家中，他的家房屋宽敞，庭园美观，有两三辆汽车，一间台球室，还有许许多多的奢侈品。他唯独缺乏的就是书籍。他尽显豪奢的做派令人感到他思想的贫瘠。我认识的一位著名书商，一天在某位房主的引导下参观其位于伦敦西区的豪华宅邸。这位房主在近20年间聚敛了巨额财富。“你的书在哪儿呢？”书商问道。“在城里。”富豪毫无愧色地答道。他以他的思想贫瘠为荣。

It is not a question of money. I repeat that books are the cheapest as well as the best part of the equipment of a house. You can begin your library with the expenditure of a couple of shillings. Nearly all the best literature in the world is at your command at two shillings a volume. For five pounds you can get a library of fifty books which contain “riches fineless.” Even if you don’t read them yourself， they are a priceless investment for your children. Holmes7 used to say that it took three gener-ations of sprawling in a library to create a reading man; but I believe that any intelligent child who stumbles upon， let us say， Herodotus8 or Two Years Before the Mast9 or Prescott’s Conquest of Peru10 or any similar masterpiece， will be caught by the glamour of books and will contract the reading habit for life. And what habit is there to compare with it？ What delight is there like the revelation of books， the sudden impact of a master-spirit， the sense of windows flung wide open to the universe？ It is these adventures of the mind， the joy of which does not pass away， that give the adventure of life itself beauty and fragrance， and make it