A Year in Reading: Backrooms, Backcountry, and Back Home
I’m writing this letter from a library that overlooks a church, just as the bells ring the hour.
我是在一个俯瞰教堂的图书馆里写这封信的，当时钟声正敲响。
The spire is tall and imposing against a gray sky, its lacework of brick and stone a testament to a master craftsman’s labor centuries ago.
塔尖高耸，在灰色的天空的映衬下显得雄伟，砖石的花边是几个世纪前工匠大师劳动成果的见证。
This is not my usual library.
这不是我平常的图书馆。
At home, the view from the local library is a mountain, millions of years old, capped with snow and towering over a valley in Canada’s Coast Mountains.
在家里，从当地图书馆看到的景色是一座有着数百万年历史的山，上面覆盖着积雪，高耸在加拿大海岸山脉的一个山谷上。
But this year, I’ve often found myself beneath this spire, spending time with family in the United Kingdom.
但今年，我经常发现自己处于这个尖塔之下，与英国的家人共度时光。
Looking back at my editor’s picks for 2025, I see my split between the UK and North America reflected in them.
回顾我的编辑对 2025 年的选择，我发现我在英国和北美之间的分歧反映在其中。
But the year’s big headlines didn’t catch my attention.
但今年的头条新闻并没有引起我的注意。
Politics and economics were set aside in favor of granular stories—ones that reveal the overlooked gears of society, the jobs we rarely think about.
政治和经济被搁置一边，取而代之的是细粒度的故事——这些故事揭示了社会中被忽视的齿轮，以及我们很少思考的工作。
My recommendations testify both to the two worlds tugging at me and to the brilliant writers on either side of the Atlantic that bring their hidden corners to life.
我的推荐既证明了两个世界对我的牵引，也证明了大西洋两岸才华横溢的作家将他们隐藏的角落带入生活。
The UK comes with its stock images: a cup of tea with a foot resting on a corgi, a lost but ever-so-polite young bear clutching a marmalade sandwich, Robin Hood riding through the glen.
英国有它的库存图片：一杯茶，一只脚踩在柯基犬上，一只迷失但非常有礼貌的小熊抓着果酱三明治，罗宾汉骑马穿过峡谷。
So I’ll begin in Sherwood Forest, with Matthew Ponsford’s fascinating piece for Noēma, “How to Build a Thousand-Year-Old Tree.” Sherwood is home to the Major, a hulking oak that sprouted from an acorn at least eight centuries ago.
因此，我将从舍伍德森林开始，欣赏 Matthew Ponsford 为 Noēma 创作的精彩作品“如何建造一棵千年古树”。舍伍德是梅杰橡树的故乡，这是一棵至少八个世纪前从橡子中发芽的巨大橡树。
Ponsford stands beneath the primeval canopy with arborist Reg Harris, who uses “veteranization” techniques to recreate the features of ancient trees—part of the surprising work to maintain forest ecology amid biodiversity loss.
庞斯福德与树木学家雷格·哈里斯 (Reg Harris) 站在原始树冠下，后者使用“退伍”技术来重现古树的特征——这是在生物多样性丧失的情况下维持森林生态的令人惊讶的工作的一部分。
Across the pond, Shi En Kim takes me to another forest, in the wilderness of Montana.
穿过池塘，施恩金带我去了蒙大拿州荒野中的另一片森林。
Kim’s piece, “The Horses and Mules That Moved Mountains and Hearts,” introduces the unsung workforce of the US Forest Service: equine pack teams who work in rugged backcountry where wheels can’t go.
金的作品《移山移心的马匹和骡子》介绍了美国林务局无名的劳动力：在车轮无法行驶的崎岖偏远地区工作的马群团队。
It’s a beautiful study of these animals’ big personalities, and a concerned examination of their future in a time of political uncertainty.
这是对这些动物巨大个性的精彩研究，也是对它们在政治不确定时期的未来的关切审视。
Skipping across the US, to North Carolina, biologists take the stage.
生物学家跨越美国来到北卡罗来纳州，登上舞台。
For Garden & Gun, Lindsey Liles meets scientists who are embracing active interventions, much like Reg Harris in Sherwood.
在《花园与枪》中，林赛·莱尔斯会见了积极干预的科学家，就像舍伍德的雷格·哈里斯一样。
“Inside the Fight to Save the World’s Most Endangered Wolf” takes us to North Carolina’s swampy Albemarle–Pamlico Peninsula, where Liles joins wildlife biologist Joe Madison as he tracks “the seventeen lone dots on a map that represent the beating hearts of the only wild red wolves in existence.” Madison’s team plays a red wolf dating game, pairing potential mates in acclimation pens.
《拯救世界上最濒临灭绝的狼的斗争》将我们带到了北卡罗来纳州沼泽的阿尔伯马尔-帕姆利科半岛，在那里，莱尔斯与野生动物生物学家乔·麦迪逊一起追踪“地图上的十七个孤立的点，这些点代表了现存唯一的野生红狼的跳动的心脏”。麦迪逊的团队玩红狼约会游戏，在适应圈中为潜在的配偶配对。
Drastic, but necessary.
激烈，但必要。
Heading south across the state to Boiling Spring Lakes, retired biologist Julie Moore fights to save something less photogenic but no less remarkable: the Venus flytrap.
退休生物学家朱莉·摩尔向南穿过该州前往沸泉湖，努力拯救一些不那么上镜但同样引人注目的东西：维纳斯捕蝇草。
In “Saving the Venus Flytrap: How One Woman Rallied a Town Around Its Weirdest Attraction,” Liles explains how Moore motivates residents to replant flytraps rooted in development zones.
在《拯救维纳斯捕蝇草：一名妇女如何在最奇怪的景点周围团结一个小镇》一文中，莱尔斯解释了摩尔如何激励居民重新种植植根于开发区的捕蝇草。
As the stakes rise, behind-the-scenes stewardship everywhere is becoming decidedly hands on.
随着赌注的增加，各地的幕后管理工作都变得明确起来。
After this tour of forests and swamps, let’s step inside.
参观完森林和沼泽之后，让我们走进去吧。
“If you start to see the world through its stains and messes you cannot give back this special insight,” writes Tom Lamont in “The Human Stain Remover.” Lamont’s essay for The Guardian profiles Ben Giles, a 49-year-old “extreme cleaner” who runs a biohazard firm from Cardigan, Wales.
汤姆·拉蒙特在《人类去污剂》中写道：“如果你开始透过污渍和混乱来看待世界，你就无法恢复这种特殊的洞察力。”拉蒙特为《卫报》撰写的文章介绍了本·贾尔斯 (Ben Giles)，他是一位 49 岁的“极端清洁工”，在威尔士卡迪根经营着一家生物危害公司。
Cleaning crime scenes and hoarders’ homes takes a strong stomach, but Giles’s pride in his craft shines through.
清理犯罪现场和囤积者的家需要强大的胃口，但贾尔斯对自己的手艺感到自豪。
A pride echoed in Jennifer Justus’s piece for The Bitter Southerner, “All Praise to the Lunch Ladies,” a tribute to the cafeteria workers who stretch thin budgets to feed children in the American South.
詹妮弗·贾斯特斯 (Jennifer Justus) 为《苦涩的南方人》 (The Bitter Southerner) 撰写的文章《对午餐女士们的赞美》中也体现了一种自豪感，这是对美国南部为养活儿童而预算紧张的自助餐厅工作人员的致敬。
These are wonderful stories that lean into the reality of uncelebrated yet essential work.
这些都是精彩的故事，讲述了不知名但重要的工作的现实。
And what about backstage at well-known institutions?
那么知名机构的后台呢？
In “‘The Ghosts Are Everywhere’: Can the British Museum Survive its Omni-Crisis?” Charlotte Higgins talks to staff inside a museum that has become “a sprawling, chaotic reflection of Britain’s psyche over 300 years,” driven by “a mania for hoarding that, in any human, would be regarded as a kind of illness.” Peeling back the grand pillared façade, she finds vast warehouses of artifacts—and human remains—often taken from other countries.
在“‘鬼魂无处不在’：大英博物馆能否渡过全方位危机？”夏洛特·希金斯 (Charlotte Higgins) 与博物馆内的工作人员交谈，该博物馆已成为“300 年来英国心理的杂乱无章的反映”，其驱动力是“对囤积的狂热，对任何人来说，这都会被视为一种疾病”。剥开宏伟的柱子外墙，她发现了巨大的文物仓库和人类遗骸，这些文物通常来自其他国家。
“If Britain itself is searching for meaning in a postcolonial world,” Higgins asks, “then why should not its most resonant, its most celebrated museum?” Another relic of Britain’s past: borstals, or juvenile detention centers, that operated from 1902 to 1982.
“如果英国本身正在寻找后殖民世界的意义，”希金斯问道，“那么为什么它最能引起共鸣、最著名的博物馆不应该呢？”英国过去的另一处遗迹：青少年拘留中心，1902 年至 1982 年运营。
In “Borstal Boys,” an essay for The Fence, Georgia Brown conjures the kind of place you’d “expect Miss Trunchbull to prowl, terrorizing children with maniacal joy.” Meanwhile, in the US, guinea pigs pulled me into the Bussey Institute at Harvard.
在为《栅栏》撰写的一篇文章《博斯塔尔男孩》中，乔治亚·布朗想象了这样一个地方：“特朗奇布尔小姐会四处游荡，用疯狂的快乐来恐吓孩子们”。与此同时，在美国，豚鼠把我拉进了哈佛大学布西研究所。
Zachary B.
扎卡里·B.
Hancock’s thought-provoking “Evolution and Guinea Pig Toes” for Nautilus follows geneticist Sewall Wright, who shaped an influential evolutionary idea while managing the institute’s guinea pig colony.
汉考克为鹦鹉螺号撰写的发人深省的《进化与豚鼠脚趾》追随遗传学家休厄尔·赖特 (Sewall Wright) 的脚步，他在管理研究所的豚鼠群体时形成了一个有影响力的进化思想。
To avoid all work and no play, I’ll finish with a couple of unexpected hobbies.
为了避免只工作不玩耍，我会以一些意想不到的爱好来结束。
This year, my reading took me to a Welsh hillside at 3 a.m.
今年，我在凌晨 3 点去威尔士的一个山坡上读书。
and to a 200-degree sauna in Brooklyn.
以及布鲁克林 200 度的桑拿房。
In “Another Rave Review” at The Fence, Patrick Galbraith explores a secret, rebellious corner of England’s free-party scene.
在 The Fence 的“Another Rave Review”中，帕特里克·加尔布雷斯 (Patrick Galbraith) 探索了英格兰自由派对场景中一个秘密的、叛逆的角落。
And in New York, Pat Cassels sweats his way into aufguss, which he explains in his Slate piece, “The New Hotness,” as competitive sauna-ing or “Eurovision with linens.” These stories paint two unique worlds, both running on communal joy tinged with absurdity.
在纽约，帕特·卡塞尔 (Pat Cassels) 通过汗水进入了 aufguss，他在他的 Slate 作品《The New Hotness》中将其解释为竞技性桑拿或“欧洲电视网亚麻布”。这些故事描绘了两个独特的世界，两个世界都充满着荒诞的共同欢乐。
Looking back at this year, my bias is obvious.
回顾这一年，我的偏见是显而易见的。
Living and traveling between two Anglophone countries, my muscle memory reaches for their familiar landscapes.
在两个英语国家之间生活和旅行，我的肌肉记忆触及了他们熟悉的风景。
It’s an intimacy that allows me to explore intricacies and to find astonishing stories from incredible writers, but one that also narrows my field of view.
这种亲密感让我能够探索错综复杂的事物，并从令人难以置信的作家那里找到令人惊叹的故事，但也缩小了我的视野。
In 2026, if you have recommendations from elsewhere in the world, I’d love to hear them.
2026 年，如果您有来自世界其他地方的建议，我很想听听。
While I don’t want to abandon what I know, I’d like to let it sit alongside what I don’t—so the hidden worlds I surface aren’t just mine, but ours.
虽然我不想放弃我所知道的东西，但我想让它与我不知道的东西并列——所以我所展现的隐藏世界不仅是我的，也是我们的。
But for now, please revisit and appreciate these stories from 2025.
但现在，请重新审视并欣赏这些 2025 年的故事。
After all, wherever we are in the world, we couldn’t run without the cogs we don’t always see.
毕竟，无论我们身在世界何处，如果没有我们不常见的齿轮，我们就无法运行。