The Pleasure of Reading閱讀的快樂

We can easily get all the wisdom of the ages， all the stories that have delighted mankind for centuries—but we must know how to use this treasure and how to get the most from it. The most unfortunate people in the world are those who have never discovered how satisfying it is to read good books.

Reading is a pleasure of mind. Your eagerness for knowledge and quickness make you a good reader. Reading is fun， not because the writer is telling you something， but because it makes your mind work. Your own imagination works along with the writers or even goes beyond his. Your experience， compared with his， brings you to the same or different conclusions， and your ideas develop as you understand his.

我們可以很容易地獲得各個(gè)時(shí)代的智慧，獲得許多世紀(jì)以來(lái)使得人類愉悅的所有故事——但我們必須知道如何使用這個(gè)寶庫(kù)，如何從中汲取最多的營(yíng)養(yǎng)。世界上最不幸的人，就是那些從來(lái)沒有發(fā)現(xiàn)讀好書是多么讓人滿足的人。

閱讀是一種心靈之樂。你求知的迫切愿望和思維的敏捷使你成為好的讀者。閱讀很有趣，不是因?yàn)樽髡吒嬖V你什么事情，而是因?yàn)樗鼓愕拇竽X活躍起來(lái)。你自己的想象力與作者的想象力相伴而行，甚至超出作者的想象力。你的經(jīng)驗(yàn)，跟作者的經(jīng)驗(yàn)進(jìn)行比較，使你得出跟作者相同或相反的結(jié)論，而當(dāng)你理解作者思想的時(shí)候，你自己的思想也發(fā)生著變化。

Every book stands by itself， like a one-family house， but books in a library are like houses in a city. Although they are separate， together they all add up to something; they are connected with each other and with other cities. The same ideas， or related ones， turn up in different places; the human problems that repeat themselves in literature， but with different solutions according to different writings at different times. Books influence each other; they link the past， the present and the future and have their own generations， like families. Whenever you start reading you connect yourself with one of the families of ideas， and finally you not only find out about the world and the people in it， you find out about yourself， too.

Reading can only be fun if you expect it to be. If you concentrate on books somebody tells you “you ought” to read， you probably wont have fun. But if you put down a book you dont like and try another till you find one that means something to you， and then relax with it， you will almost certainly have a good time， and if you become， as a result of reading， better， wiser， kinder， or more gentle， you wont have suffered during the process.

每本書都自成一體，就像獨(dú)門獨(dú)戶的宅院，但圖書館里的書就像城市的房屋。雖然這些書各自獨(dú)立，但這些書放在一起便作用非凡；它們互相聯(lián)系，也和其他城市聯(lián)系在一起。同樣的思想，或者相關(guān)的思想，在不同的地方出現(xiàn)；在文學(xué)作品中重復(fù)出現(xiàn)的人類問題，卻在不同的時(shí)代不同的作品中，有著不同的解決方案。書互相影響，它們連接著過去、現(xiàn)在和將來(lái)，并像家庭一樣，有自己的“后代”。每當(dāng)你開始閱讀的時(shí)候，你就把自己和思想之家中的一個(gè)成員聯(lián)系在一起。最后，你不但了解了世界和世界上形形色色的人，也了解了自己。

只有當(dāng)你期望閱讀能帶來(lái)樂趣的時(shí)候，閱讀才會(huì)有樂趣。如果你專注地讀別人告訴你“應(yīng)該”讀的書，你也許不能從中獲得樂趣。但是，如果你放下一本你不喜歡的書，試著讀另外一本，直到發(fā)現(xiàn)一本你感覺有價(jià)值的書，然后輕松地讀下去，幾乎可以肯定，你會(huì)讀得很愉快。如果閱讀后你變得更優(yōu)秀、更聰明、更友善或者更平和，那么在閱讀的過程中，你不會(huì)覺得痛苦。

Word Bank

delight /d?'la?t/ v. 使愉快；使高興

This news will delight his fans all over the world.

separate /'sepr?t/ adj. 獨(dú)立的；單獨(dú)的

He raises two separate issues.