How Should One Read a Book?

by Virginia Woolf (1882-1941) from The Second Common Reader

Born in England, Virginia Woolf was the daughter of Leslie Stephen, a well-known scholar. She was educated primarily at home and attributed her love of reading to the early and complete access she was given to her father’s library. With her husband, Leonard Woolf, she founded the Hogarth Press and became known as member of the Bloomsbury group of intellectuals, which included economist¹ John Maynard Keynes, biographer Lytton Strachey, novelist E. M. Forster, and art historian Clive Bell. Although she was a central figure in London literary life, Woolf often saw herself as isolated² from the mains stream because she was a woman. Woolf is best known for her experimental, modernist novels, including Mrs. Dalloway(1925) and To the Lighthouse(1927) which are widely appreciated for her breakthrough into a new mode and technique--the stream of consciousness. In her diary and critical essays she has much to say about women and fiction. Her 1929 book A Room of One’s Own documents her desire for women to take their rightful place in literary history and as an essayist she has occupied a high place in 20th century literature. The common Reader (1925 first series; 1932 second series) has acquired classic status. She also wrote short stories and biographies. “Professions for Women” taken from The collected Essays Vol 2. is originally a paper Woolf read to the Women’s Service League, an organization for professional women in London.

In the first place, I want to emphasize the note of interrogation at the end of my title. Even if I could answer the question for myself, the answer would apply only to me and not to you. The only advice, indeed, that one person can give another about reading is to take no advice, to follow your own instincts, to use your own reason, to come to your own conclusions. If this is agreed between us, then I feel at liberty to put forward a few ideas and suggestions because you will not allow them to fetter³ that independence which is the most important quality that a reader can possess. After all, what laws can be laid down about books? The battle of Waterloo[1] was certainly fought on a certain day; but is Hamlet a better play than Lear? Nobody can say. Each must decide that question for himself. To admit authorities, however heavily furred and gowned, into our libraries and let them tell us how to read, what to read, what value to place on what we read, is to destroy the spirit of freedom which is the breath of those sanctuaries⁴. Everywhere else we may be bound by laws and conventions—there we have none.

But to enjoy freedom, if the platitude⁵ is pardonable, we have of course to control ourselves. We must not squander⁶ our powers, helplessly and ignorantly, squirting half the house in order to water a single rose-bush; we must train them, exactly and powerfully, here on the very spot. This, it may be, is one of the first difficulties that faces us in a library. What is “the very spot”? There may well seem to be nothing but a conglomeration⁷ and huddle⁸ of confusion. Poems and novels, histories and memoirs⁹, dictionaries and blue-books; books written in all languages by men and women of all tempers, races, and ages jostle each other on the shelf. And outside the donkey brays¹⁰, the women gossip at the pump, the colts gallop¹¹ across the fields. Where are we to begin? How are we to bring order into this multitudinous chaos¹² and get the deepest and widest pleasure from what we read?

It is simple enough to say that since books have classes--fiction, biography, poetry--we should separate them and take from each what it is right that each should give us. Yet few people ask from books what books can give us. Most commonly we come to books with blurred¹³ and divided minds, asking of fiction that it shall be true, of poetry that it shall be false, of biography that it shall be flattering, of history that it shall enforce our own prejudices. If we could banish¹⁴ all such preconceptions when we read, that would be an admirable beginning. Do not dictate¹⁵ to your author; try to become him. Be his fellow-worker and accomplice¹⁶. If you hang back, and reserve and criticize at first, you are preventing yourself from getting the fullest possible value from what you read. But if you open your mind as widely as possible, the signs and hints of almost imperceptible fineness, from the twist and turn of the first sentences, will bring you into the presence of a human being unlike any other. Steep yourself in this, acquaint yourself with this, and soon you will find that your author is giving you, or attempting to give you, something far more definite. The thirty-two chapters of a novel—if we consider how to read a novel first--are an attempt to make something as formed and controlled as a building: but words are more impalpable than bricks; reading is a longer and more complicated process than seeing. Perhaps the quickest way to understand the elements of what a novelist is doing is not to read, but to write; to make your own experiment with the dangers and difficulties of words. Recall, then, some event that has left a distinct impression on you—how at the corner of the street, perhaps, you passed two people talking. A tree shook; an electric light danced; the tone of the talk was comic, but also tragic¹⁷; a whole vision; an entire conception, seemed contained in that moment.

But when you attempt to reconstruct it in words, you will find that it breaks into a thousand conflicting impressions. Some must be subdued¹⁸; others emphasized; in the process you will lose, probably, all grasp upon the emotion itself. Then turn from your blurred and littered pages to the opening pages of some great novelist—Defoe, Jane Austen, or Hardy¹⁹. Now you will be better able to appreciate their mastery. It is not merely that we are in the presence of a different person—Defoe, Jane Austen, or Thomas Hardy—but that we are living in a different world. Here, in Robinson Crusoe, we are trudging²⁰ a plain high road; one thing happens after another; the fact and the order of the fact is enough. But if the open air and adventure mean everything to Defoe they mean nothing to Jane Austen. Hers is the drawing-room, and people talking, and by the many mirrors of their talk revealing their characters. And if, when we have accustomed ourselves to the drawing-room and its reflections, we turn to Hardy, we are once more spun²¹ around. The other side of the mind is now exposed—the dark side that comes uppermost in solitude²², not the light side that shows in company. Our relations are not towards people, but towards Nature and destiny. Yet different as these worlds are, each is consistent with itself. The maker²³ of each is careful to observe the laws of his own perspective, and however great a strain they may put upon us they will never confuse us, as lesser²⁴ writers so frequently do, by introducing two different kinds of reality into the same book. Thus to go from one great novelist to another—from Jane Austen to Hardy, from Peacock[2] to Trollope,[3] from Scott to Meredith[4]—is to be wrenched²⁵ and uprooted²⁶; to be thrown this way and then that. To read a novel is a difficult and complex art. You must be capable not only of great finesse²⁷ of perception, but of great boldness of imagination if you are going to make use of all that the novelist—the great artist—gives you.

* * * *

“We have only to compare”—with those words the cat is out of the bag, and the true complexity²⁸ of reading is admitted. The first process, to receive impressions with the utmost understanding, is only half the process of reading; it must be completed, if we are to get the whole pleasure from a book, by another. We must pass judgment²⁹ upon these multitudinous impressions; we must make of these fleeting³⁰ shapes one that is hard and lasting³¹. But not directly. Wait for the dust of reading to settle; for the conflict and the questioning to die down; walk, talk, pull the dead petals³² from a rose, or fall asleep. Then suddenly without our willing it, for it is thus that Nature undertakes these transitions, the book will return, but differently. It will float to the top of the mind as a whole. And the book as a whole is different from the book received currently in separate phrases. Details now fit themselves into their places. We see the shape from start to finish; it is a barn, a pig-sty, or a cathedral. Now then we can compare book with book as we compare building with building. But this act of comparison means that our attitude has changed; we are no longer the friends of the writer, but his judges; and just as we cannot be too sympathetic as friends, so as judges we cannot be too severe. Are they not criminals, books that have wasted our time and sympathy; are they not the most insidious³³ enemies of society, corrupters, defilers, the writers of false books, faked books, books that fill the air with decay and disease? Let us then be severe in our judgments³⁴; let us compare each book with the greatest of its kind. There they hang in the mind the shapes of the books we have read solidified³⁵ by the judgments we have passed on them—Robinson Crusoe, Emma, The Return of the Native. Compare the novels with these—even the latest and least of novels has a right to be judged with the best. And so with poetry—when the intoxication³⁶ of rhythm has died down and the splendour of words has faded a visionary shape will return to us and this must be compared with Lear, with Phedre,[5] with The Prelude³⁷;[6] or if not with these, with whatever is the best or seems to us to be the best in its own kind. And we may be sure that the newness of new poetry and fiction is its most superficial quality and that we have only to alter slightly, not to recast, the standards by which we have judged the old.

It would be foolish, then, to pretend that the second part of reading, to judge, to compare, is as simple as the first—to open the mind wide to the fast flocking of innumerable impressions. To continue reading without the book before you, To hold one shadow-shape against another, to have read widely enough and with enough understanding to make such comparisons alive and illuminating³⁸—that is difficult; it is still more difficult to press further and to say, “Not only is the book of this sort, but it is of this value; here it fails; here it succeeds; this is bad; that is good.” To carry out this part of a reader’s duty needs such imagination, insight, and learning that it is hard to conceive any one mind sufficiently³⁹ endowed; impossible for the most self-confident to find more than the seeds of such powers in himself. Would it not be wiser, then, to remit⁴⁰ this part of reading and to allow the critics, the gowned and furred authorities of the library, to decide the question of the book’s absolute value for us? Yet how impossible! We may stress the value of sympathy; we may try to sink our own identity as we read. But we know that we cannot sympathise wholly or immerse ourselves wholly; there is always a demon⁴¹ in us who whispers, “I hate, I love,” and we cannot silence him. Indeed, it is precisely⁴² because we hate and we love that our relation with the poets and novelists is so intimate that we find the presence of another person intolerable. And even if the results are abhorrent⁴³ and our judgments are wrong, still our taste, the nerve of sensation that sends shocks through us, is our chief illuminating; we learn through feeling; we cannot suppress our own idiosyncrasy without impoverishing⁴⁴ it. But as time goes on perhaps we can train our taste; perhaps we can make it submit to some control. When it has fed greedily and lavishly⁴⁵ upon books of all sorts—poetry, fiction, history, biography—and has stopped reading and looked for long spaces upon the variety, the incongruity⁴⁶ of the living world, we shall find that it is changing a little; it is not so greedy, it is more reflective. It will begin to bring us not merely judgments on particular books, but it will tell us that there is a quality common to certain books. Listen, it will say, what shall we call this? And it will read us perhaps Lear and then perhaps Agamenon[7] in order to bring out that common quality. Thus, with our taste to guide us, we shall venture beyond the particular book in search of qualities that group books together; we shall give them names and thus frame a rule that brings order into our perceptions. We shall gain a further and a rarer pleasure from that discrimination. But as a rule only lives when it is perpetually broken by contact with the books themselves—nothing is easier and more stultifying⁴⁷ than to make rules which exist out touch with facts, in a vacuum—now at least, in order to steady ourselves in this difficult attempt, it may be well to turn to the very rare writers who are able to enlighten us upon literature as an art. Coleridge[8] and Dryden[9] and Johnson,[10] in their considered criticism, the poets and novelists themselves in their considered sayings are often surprisingly relevant; they light up and solidity the vague ideas that have been tumbling in the misty⁴⁸ depths of our minds. But they are only able to help us if we come to them laden⁴⁹ with questions and suggestions won honestly in the course of our own reading. They can do nothing for us if we herd⁵⁰ ourselves under their authority and lie down like sheep in the shade of a hedge. We can only understand their ruling when it comes in conflict with our own and vanquishes⁵¹ it.

If this is so, if to read a book as it should be read calls for the rarest qualities of imagination, insight, and judgment, you may perhaps, conclude that literature is a very complex art and that it is unlikely that we shall be able, even after a lifetime of reading, to make any valuable contribution to its criticism. We must remain readers; we shall not put on the further glory that belongs to those rare beings who are also critics. But still we have our responsibilities as readers and even our importance. The standards we raise and the judgments we pass steal into the air and become part of the atmosphere which writers breathe as they work. An influence is created which tells upon them even if it never finds its way into print. And that influence, if it were well instructed, vigorous and individual and sincere, might be of great value now when criticism is necessarily in abeyance⁵²; when books pass in review like the procession of animals in a shooting gallery, and the critic has only one second in which to load and aim and shoot and may well be pardoned if he mistakes rabbits for tigers, eagles for bar-door fowls⁵³, or misses altogether and wastes his shot upon some peaceful sow grazing in a further field. If behind the erratic⁵⁴ gunfire of the press the author felt that that there was another kind of criticism, the opinion of people reading for the love of reading, slowly and unprofessionally, and judging with great sympathy and yet with great severity, might this not improve the quality of his work? And if by our means books were to become stronger, richer, and more varied⁵⁵, that would be an end worth reaching.

Yet who reads to bring about an end however desirable? Are there not some pursuits that we practice because they are good in themselves, and some pleasures that are final? And is not this among them? I have sometimes dreamt, at least, that when the Day of Judgment dawns and the great conquerors⁵⁶ and lawyers and statesmen come to receive their rewards—their crowns, their laurels⁵⁷, their names carved indelibly upon imperishable marble—the Almighty⁵⁸ will turn to Peter[11] and will say, not without a certain envy when He sees us coming with our books under our arms, “Look, these need no reward. We have nothing to give them here. They have loved reading.”

Questions for Comprehension and Consideration:

1. The title of the essay gives a sense of offering advice on reading and the author begins her essay by saying “In the first place, I want to emphasize the note of interrogation at the end of my title.” Why does the author start her essay in this way and what does she really want to point out in her first paragraph which serves as her starting point when she offers ideas and suggestions on reading.

2. How do you understand the author’s idea of “Do not dictate to your author; try to become him. Be his fellow-worker and accomplice” in paragraph 3. How does your reading experience agree or disagree with the author’s advice?

3. Virginia Woolf says “the quickest way to understand the elements of what a novelist is doing is not to read, but to write;” and she also gives an example to support it. What do you think of the example? Have you ever had such experience of “experimenting with dangers and difficulties of words” ? If you have how do you comment your experience?

4. The author mentions three writers in paragraph 4 and points out that although they depict⁵⁹ things totally different they share one same important element. What is it? Read at least one novel of each writer mentioned and try to understand the different worlds the authors created and see whether you agree to the comment Virginia Woolf made or not.

5. What is the true complexity of reading and what are the reading processes Virginia Woolf depicts⁶⁰? How do the processes agree or disagree to your reading experience?

6. In the difficult process of reading the author advises us to read some very rare writers who are able to enlighten us upon literature of art. To what extent and on what circumstance they are able to help us?

7. In what sense does Virginia Woolf think that common readers have responsibilities and importance in raising the standards and the judgment of reading?

8. How do you feel the author’s rhetoric⁶¹ question “Are there not some pursuits that we practice because they are good in themselves, … and is not this (reading) among them”? Write a passage with concrete examples to show your true understanding of it.

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注释：

[1] the battle of Waterloo Waterloo is a town in Belgium, the place where Napoleon Bonaparte(1769—1821) and his army was totally defeated.

[2] Thomas Love Peacock (1785--1866)，British novelist and poet.

[3] Anthony Trollope (1815—82), British novelist.

[4] George Meredith(1828--1909)，British novelist and poet.

[5] Phedre French tragic poet Jean Racine’s(1639—1699) works.

[6] The Prelude British poet William Wordsworth’s(1770—1850) long poem.

[7] Agamenon The ancient Greece great tragic poet Aischulos’(520 BC—456BC) works.

[8] Samuel Taylor Coleridge(1772—1834) British romantic poet.

[9] John Dryden(1631—1700) British poet and critic.

[10] Samuel Johnson(1709—1784) British writer.

[11] Peter one of the twelve disciple⁶² of Jesus Christ.

应该怎样读书

弗吉尼亚·伍尔夫

首先我要特别提醒读者注意本文标题后面的问号，即便我能够回答这个问题，答案或许也只适合我自己而并不适合你。其实，指点别人怎样读书的唯一建议，就是别听从任何指点。遵循自己的直觉、运用自己的判断，去得出自己的结论。如果我们对此有共识，我就可以无拘束地提出一些看法和建议，因为这些看法和建议不至于会禁锢你的独立见解。而独立见解，正是读者应具备的最重要的品质。那么，关于读书，会有些什么规则呢？滑铁卢之战无疑是发生在某特定一天中的一场战役；《哈姆雷特》一剧是否就一定比《李尔王》更好呢？这问题想必很难回答，不同的读者会有不同的见解。如果让权威之说占据我们的图书领域，无论它们多堂皇、多严实，让它们指点我们怎么读、读什么和对所读之书做出评价，都无疑破坏了书之魂中所蕴涵的自由与开放精神。我们似乎在任何方面都有习俗和规范，惟独在读书方面没有。

要真正享受自由（恕我用这一陈词），就必须要有自我约束。我们不能徒劳而无益地滥用自己的精力和才智，就像为给一株玫瑰浇水而喷洒了半个花棚一样。我们应当适宜而扎实地善待自己的精力和才智，现在就立马开始。这也许是我们在图书馆首先面临的困难。何为“立马开始”？我们面对的似乎是庞杂繁纷的堆砌：诗歌、小说、历史、传记、词典、蓝皮书；不同种族不同年代的男女用不同语言写就的不同品位的书；它们一本本紧靠着排列在书架上。而院外，驴子在咴咴地嘶叫，女人在水井边叽喳地闲聊，小马驹在田野上自由地欢跳。我们从哪入手呢？我们怎么才能从纷繁的杂乱中理出头绪，进而从我们的所读中获取最深最广的欢愉呢？

无庸讳言，书籍有类别之分，比如小说，传记，诗歌等等。我们应该从各种不同类别的图书中获取不同的营养。然而，事实上，只有少数人能正确对待书籍，从中吸取其所能给予的一切。我们常常带着模糊而矛盾的观点来 ，要求小说该真实，诗歌应该不真实，传记必须充满溢美之词，历史得强化我们固有的观念。阅读时，如果我们能摒弃这些偏见，便是一个好的开端。不要强作者所难，而应与作者融为一体，作他的同路人和随行者。倘若你未开卷便先行犹豫退缩，说三道四，你绝不可能从阅读中最大限度地获取有用价值。但是，字里行间不易察觉的精妙之处，就为你洞开了一个别人难以领略的天地。沉浸其中，仔细玩味，不久，你会发现，作者给予你的，或试图给予你的，绝非某个确定意义。一部小说的三十二个章节--------如果我们先来讨论怎么阅读小说的话-------犹如建筑的构架，但词汇比砖头令人更难捉摸。阅读比之于观看，当然是个更为长久而复杂的过程。也许，最为快界地领略小说家工作的原理的方法，不是读，而是写；去冒险与词汇打交道。回忆一下某个曾给你留下独特印象的事件：街角处你碰到两个人正在交谈，当时周围的场景是，树在随风摆动；街灯灯光摇曳不定；说话人声调悲喜交集；那一刻你感受到的情景全然融合在一起。

可是，当你试图用语言来再现这一场景时，它却支离成上千个抵触的印象，有些得略述，有些得加强。就在你诉诸文字的当儿，当初的感受已荡然无存。抛开词不达意的支离碎片吧，去打开大师们的名著吧，比如笛福，简·奥斯丁，哈代。这时，你当能更好地领会他们的精妙。我们不只是站在不同的大师面前---笛福，简·奥斯丁，或者托马斯·哈代----实际上我们是置身于完全不同的世界。在《鲁宾逊漂流记》中，我们跋涉于久远的征途，一个事件接着一个事件发生，事件与事件之间顺序就足以构成其巨制。如果说户外和冒险之于笛福是大显身手的领地，那么，对于简·奥斯丁就无关紧要了。奥斯丁的世界是客厅，她通过活动于客厅里的任务的对话，反映人物性格。习惯了奥斯丁的客厅和通过客厅所反映的意向以后，我们再转向哈代，脑袋似乎有一次发晕了。我们置身于荒野之中，星星在我们头上闪烁。在这里，人类灵魂的另一面----孤寂中迸发的黑暗面，而不是处于凡世尘嚣时所表露的光明面----被充分解剖。这里展示的不是人与人的关系，而是人与自然和命运的关系。三位作家描述了三个不同的世界，他们各自的世界是个连贯一致的整体。他们谨慎地遵循着各自观察事物、描述事物的法则。无论作家倾向性多大，读者不会在其中迷失方向，不至于像读某些不在行的作者的作品那样，在同一本书里看到两个截然不同的现实。因此，阅读一个个伟大小说家----从简·奥斯丁到哈代，从皮科克到特罗洛普，从司各脱到梅瑞迪思----你简直就如翻江倒海，被一会儿扔到这里，一会儿抛向那边。读小说是一门艰难而复杂的艺术。要想利用小说家----伟大的艺术家----给予的一切，你不仅的具备洞察的策略，你还得具有勇敢的想象。

*****

“我们只要比较一下，”，事情就很清楚，阅读的奥秘就在于此。以尽可能的理解去感受，这只是阅读的前一半过程，如果想获得一本书的全部愉悦，还得完成另一个过程，即对各种感受进行梳理和鉴别；把变幻不定的印象固化为明确和坚实的感受。但这不必操之过急，应静待阅读的“尘埃落定”，你的困惑和质疑已经沉淀之后；出去走走，和朋友聊聊，拣去玫瑰花叶上的枯瓣，或者上床睡一觉。就这样，不经意间，造化之神在我们全然不知中完成了它内化转变的过程，书重又给我们带来全新的意义。它以其完整的意义浮现在我们心际。而完整地领会全书，和只领会它的片言只语，是不可同日而语的。书中的细节已各得其所，我们从头到尾看清了它的整体形象，正如谷仓、猪圈或教堂。现在我们就可以在书与书之间进行比较了，就像比较不同的建筑一样。这比较意味着我们的态度起了变化，我们不再是作者的朋友，而是他的审判者；正如作朋友我们不能不充满友情一样，作审判者我们就不能不严厉了。那些耗费我们时间和情感的书，其作者难道不能被看作是罪犯吗？那些充满谬误、捏造、腐朽与弊病的书，其作者难道不是社会最阴险的敌人，不是腐化者和堕落者吗？我们必须做出严厉裁判；我们把每本书都与其同类中最杰出的作品来做对比。这类作品的特点我们已经了解，我们对它们的裁决更加深了这种了解，比如〈鲁滨孙漂流记〉、〈爱玛〉与〈还乡〉等。把你读到的小说与它们相比----即便最新和最次的小说，也都应该与这些最杰出的小说进行对比评判。诗歌同样如此。当令人陶醉的韵律被淡忘，当诗中词语的美妙意象已经消失，一种视觉形象会出现在我们的脑际，不妨把它与〈李尔王〉、〈费德尔〉和〈序曲〉相比，即使不与它们相比，也要与别的最好的，或者我们认为最好的同类作品相比。可以肯定的是，新创作的诗歌和小说的新颖之处，就在于它们的肤浅，我们无须完全改变评判过去作品的那些标准，只要稍做变动即可。

如果认为阅读的第二个阶段，即评判和比较阶段（整理那一涌而至的众多印象），与第一个阶段一样简单，那是不明智的。搁下手中的书继续阅读，心中对种种意象进行比较，同时还要广泛阅读、充分领悟，以确保这样的比较能形象而富有意义----这无疑是困难的。如果再加上这样的要求，那就难上加难了：“不仅这类书如此，这种审视也很普遍；这里处理不够妥当；这里很成功；这地方是个败笔，这儿犹如神来之笔”，等等。想胜任这一职责的读者，必须具有非同凡响的想象力、洞察力和学识，这绝非易事，最自信者也恐难找到自身这样的潜能。那么，免去阅读的这一过程，让批评家、让图书馆里衣冠楚楚的权威来为我们决定书的最终价值这个问题，难道不更明智些吗？非也！我们可以强调同感的价值；我们可以在阅读中忘掉自己。但我们清楚，我们不可能与别人完全同感，也不可能完全忘掉自我，内心深处似乎总有一个无法平息的“魔鬼”在低语：“我恨！我爱！”。而正是这爱恨之情，密切了我们与诗人和小说家之间的关系，让我们无法容忍另一人横亘其中。即便结果不符，评判不对，但阅读中我们的品位，既震撼我们的感觉，无疑都深深打动和启迪了我们。我们通过感受获知；压抑个性会导致它的弱化和枯竭。而随着时间的推移，我们还可以培养自己的品位，使之得到某种调控。饱览各种书籍（诗歌、小说、历史、传记）之后，当你停下阅读，面对更广泛的空间，即真实大千世界中的各种矛盾时，你会发现，你的品位变化无几，它不急切，而是更加深思熟虑。它不仅令我们对具体书籍作出评判，还会告诉我们某些书所具备的类似的共同特点。注意，它会告诉我们什么是共同特点。它会引领我们去读《李尔王》，然后再读《阿伽门农》，从而去发现这共同特点。因此，有品位作向导，我们可以超越具体作品，去寻找把书籍归于一类的特点，然后为这些特点命名，并由此建构出帮助我们感知的规则。从这种辨别中，我们获得更深入、更珍贵的愉悦。然而，规则只有在与书籍本身碰撞过程中不断被打破，才会更有生命力，因此，没有什么比凭空制定规则更容易、也更笨拙了。为了能镇定地完成这一困难任务，我们不妨转向那些很独特的作家，是他们让我们认识了作为艺术的文学。柯尔律治、德莱顿和约翰逊在他们严谨的批评中，诗人和小说家在他们深思熟虑的表达中，均显出了惊人的英雄所见。他们展现并固化了我们内心混沌深处那些翻腾、模糊的思想。而只有当我们在阅读中真切产生了问题和获取了建议，才读有所获。如果只是一味顺从其权威，就像躺在灌木荫处的羊群那样，是别指望获得帮助的。只有当他们的规则与我们的发生碰撞并征服我们时，我们才能理解之。

如果读书之道就是如此，如果读书需要最珍贵的想象力、洞察力和评判力，你也许会得出这样的结论，既文学实在是一门非常复杂的艺术，即便读了一辈子的书，也很难对文学评论做出有价值的贡献。我们始终都是读者，我们不必戴上只属于被称为批评家的少数人才能戴上的荣耀桂冠。但作为读者，我们依然有自己的责任和重要地位。我们提出的标准和做出的评判，潜移默化地成作家进行创作的氛围的一部分。即便没有出版，它们也会对他们产生影响。而这影响，如果导引得好，有活力、有个性，且诚挚真切，会非常有价值。尤其是当批评正处于一种必需的搁置状态之时，情形更是如此。书籍进入评论，就像动物进入射击场，评论家只有短短一秒种时间装弹、瞄准和射击，所以如果他把兔子看成老虎，把老鹰看成百姓的家禽，或者完全脱靶，或者误中了正在附近田野里安详吃草的牧牛，都应该原谅他们。如果作者能在评论界变幻莫测的炮火之外感受到另一种批评，感受到那些因爱读书而读书的人们的看法----这些人的评论也许不很及时，不很专业，但却很共鸣，很认真----这难道不足以促使他提高作品的质量吗？如果通过我们的努力，图书的世界变得更有影响力，更丰富，更多样，这难道不是值得我们追寻的目标吗？

当然，谁又会在阅读时老想着实现一个目标呢？无论这个目标多么令人向往？生活中有些事我们追求，不就是因为这追求本身很值，而我们又乐在其中吗？而读书，难道不是这些乐事中的一个吗？我有时遐想，当世界审判日最终来临，那些伟大的征服者、律师、政治家前来领取他们的奖赏：王冠、桂冠和永久镂刻在不会磨灭的大理石上的名字时，上帝会转向圣·彼得，而当他看到我们夹着书向他走来时，他会不无妒意地说，“看啊，这些人不需要任何奖赏。我们这里也没有可以给他们的奖。他们热爱读书。”

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