The Age of the Essay
September 2004 Remember the essays you had to write in high school?
2004 年 9 月 还记得高中时必须写的论文吗？
Topic sentence, introductory paragraph, supporting paragraphs, conclusion.
主题句、介绍性段落、支持性段落、结论。
The conclusion being, say, that Ahab in Moby Dick was a Christ-like figure.
结论是，《白鲸记》中的亚哈是一个类似基督的人物。
Oy.
哎哟。
So I'm going to try to give the other side of the story: what an essay really is, and how you write one.
因此，我将尝试讲述故事的另一面：论文到底是什么，以及如何写论文。
Or at least, how I write one.
或者至少，我是如何写的。
Mods The most obvious difference between real essays and
Mods 真正的论文和论文之间最明显的区别
the things one has to write in school is that real essays are not exclusively about English literature.
在学校必须写的事情是，真正的论文不仅仅涉及英国文学。
Certainly schools should teach students how to write.
当然，学校应该教学生如何写作。
But due to a series of historical accidents the teaching of writing has gotten mixed together with the study of literature.
但由于一系列的历史事故，写作教学与文学研究混在一起了。
And so all over the country students are writing not about how a baseball team with a small budget might compete with the Yankees, or the role of color in
因此，全国各地的学生所写的并不是预算有限的棒球队如何与洋基队竞争，也不是肤色在体育运动中的作用。
fashion, or what constitutes a good dessert, but about symbolism in Dickens.
时尚，或者什么构成了美味的甜点，而是关于狄更斯的象征主义。
With the result that writing is made to seem boring and pointless.
结果，写作显得枯燥无味、毫无意义。
Who cares about symbolism in Dickens?
谁关心狄更斯的象征主义？
Dickens himself would be more interested in an essay about color or baseball.
狄更斯本人会对有关颜色或棒球的文章更感兴趣。
How did things get this way?
事情怎么会变成这样呢？
To answer that we have to go back almost a thousand years.
要回答这个问题，我们必须追溯到近一千年前。
Around 1100, Europe at last began to catch its breath after centuries of chaos, and once they
1100年左右，欧洲在经历了几个世纪的混乱之后终于开始喘口气，一旦他们
had the luxury of curiosity they rediscovered what we call "the classics." The effect was rather as if we were visited by beings from another solar system.
凭借着丰富的好奇心，他们重新发现了我们所说的“经典”。这种效果就好像我们被来自另一个太阳系的生物拜访了一样。
These earlier civilizations were so much more sophisticated that for the next several centuries the main work of European scholars, in almost every field, was to assimilate what they knew.
这些早期的文明要复杂得多，以至于在接下来的几个世纪里，欧洲学者几乎在各个领域的主要工作就是吸收他们所知道的东西。
During this period the study of ancient texts acquired great
在此期间，古籍研究取得了长足的进步。
prestige.
威望。
It seemed the essence of what scholars did.
这似乎是学者们所做的事情的本质。
As European scholarship gained momentum it became less and less important; by 1350 someone who wanted to learn about science could find better teachers than Aristotle in his own era.
随着欧洲学术的发展，它变得越来越不重要。到 1350 年，想要学习科学的人可以找到比他那个时代的亚里士多德更好的老师。
[1] But schools change slower than scholarship.
[1] 但学校的变化比奖学金的变化慢。
In the 19th century the study of ancient texts was still the backbone of the curriculum.
在19世纪，古代文献的研究仍然是课程的支柱。
The time was then ripe for the question: if the study of
这个问题的时机已经成熟：如果研究
ancient texts is a valid field for scholarship, why not modern texts?
古代文献是学术的有效领域，为什么现代文献就不能呢？
The answer, of course, is that the original raison d'etre of classical scholarship was a kind of intellectual archaeology that does not need to be done in the case of contemporary authors.
答案当然是，古典学术的最初存在理由是一种知识考古学，而当代作家则不需要这样做。
But for obvious reasons no one wanted to give that answer.
但由于显而易见的原因，没有人愿意给出这个答案。
The archaeological work being mostly done, it implied that those studying the classics were, if not wasting their
考古工作已经基本完成，这意味着那些研究经典的人即使不是在浪费时间，也是在浪费时间。
time, at least working on problems of minor importance.
时间，至少致力于解决次要问题。
And so began the study of modern literature.
现代文学的研究就这样开始了。
There was a good deal of resistance at first.
起初存在很大的阻力。
The first courses in English literature seem to have been offered by the newer colleges, particularly American ones.
最早的英国文学课程似乎是由较新的大学提供的，尤其是美国的大学。
Dartmouth, the University of Vermont, Amherst, and University College, London taught English literature in the 1820s.
达特茅斯学院、佛蒙特大学阿默斯特分校和伦敦大学学院在 1820 年代教授英国文学。
<!--The newly founded University
<!--新成立的大学
of London had the first professor of English language and literature in 1828, and Lafayette College the second in 1857.--> But Harvard didn't have a professor of English literature until 1876, and Oxford not till 1885.
伦敦大学在 1828 年有了第一位英语语言文学教授，拉斐特学院在 1857 年有了第二位英语语言文学教授。--> 但哈佛直到 1876 年才出现英语文学教授，牛津直到 1885 年才出现。
(Oxford had a chair of Chinese before it had one of English.) [2] What tipped the scales, at least in the US, seems to have been the idea that professors should do research as well as teach.
（牛津大学在设立英语系之前就曾设立过中文系教授。） [2] 至少在美国，扭转局面的因素似乎是教授应该在教学的同时进行研究。
This idea (along with the PhD, the department, and
这个想法（连同博士、系和
indeed the whole concept of the modern university) was imported from Germany in the late 19th century.
事实上，现代大学的整个概念）是在 19 世纪末从德国引进的。
Beginning at Johns Hopkins in 1876, the new model spread rapidly.
1876 年，这种新模式从约翰·霍普金斯大学开始迅速传播。
Writing was one of the casualties.
写作是受害者之一。
Colleges had long taught English composition.
大学长期以来一直教授英语作文。
But how do you do research on composition?
但是如何进行构图研究呢？
The professors who taught math could be required to do original math, the professors who taught history could be required to
教授数学的教授可能会被要求做原创数学，教授历史的教授可能会被要求做原创数学。
write scholarly articles about history, but what about the professors who taught rhetoric or composition?
写关于历史的学术文章，但是教授修辞学或作文的教授呢？
What should they do research on?
他们应该研究什么？
The closest thing seemed to be English literature.
最接近的似乎是英国文学。
[3] And so in the late 19th century the teaching of writing was inherited by English professors.
[3] 因此，在19世纪末，写作教学由英语教授继承。
This had two drawbacks: (a) an expert on literature need not himself be a good writer, any more than an art historian has to be a good painter, and (b)
这有两个缺点：（a）文学专家本人不必是一位优秀的作家，就像艺术史学家不必是一位优秀的画家一样，（b）
the subject of writing now tends to be literature, since that's what the professor is interested in.
现在写作的主题往往是文学，因为那是教授感兴趣的。
High schools imitate universities.
高中模仿大学。
The seeds of our miserable high school experiences were sown in 1892, when the National Education Association "formally recommended that literature and composition be unified in the high school course." [4] The 'riting component of the 3 Rs then morphed into English,
我们悲惨的高中经历的种子是在1892年播下的，当时全国教育协会“正式建议在高中课程中统一文学和作文”。 [4] 3 Rs 的“riting”部分随后演变成英语，
with the bizarre consequence that high school students now had to write about English literature-- to write, without even realizing it, imitations of whatever English professors had been publishing in their journals a few decades before.
奇怪的后果是，高中生现在不得不写有关英国文学的文章——甚至在没有意识到的情况下，模仿几十年前英国教授在期刊上发表的任何内容。
It's no wonder if this seems to the student a pointless exercise, because we're now three steps removed from real work: the students are imitating English professors, who are imitating classical scholars, who are
难怪这在学生看来是毫无意义的练习，因为我们现在离真正的工作只有三步之遥：学生们在模仿英语教授，他们在模仿古典学者，而他们在模仿古典学者。
merely the inheritors of a tradition growing out of what was, 700 years ago, fascinating and urgently needed work.
只是700年前令人着迷且迫切需要的工作中产生的传统的继承者。
No Defense The other big difference between a real essay and the things they make you write in school is that a real essay doesn't take a position and then defend it.
不辩护 真正的论文和学校让你写的东西之间的另一个很大的区别是，真正的论文不会先表明立场，然后再捍卫它。
That principle, like the idea that we ought to be writing about literature, turns out to be another intellectual hangover of long
这个原则，就像我们应该写文学的想法一样，被证明是另一个长期的智力遗留问题。
forgotten origins.
忘记了起源。
It's often mistakenly believed that medieval universities were mostly seminaries.
人们常常错误地认为中世纪的大学大多是神学院。
In fact they were more law schools.
事实上，它们更多的是法学院。
And at least in our tradition lawyers are advocates, trained to take either side of an argument and make as good a case for it as they can.
至少在我们的传统中，律师是辩护者，受过训练，可以站在论点的任何一方，并尽其所能地提出充分的理由。
Whether cause or effect, this spirit pervaded early universities.
无论是因还是果，这种精神弥漫在早期的大学中。
The study of rhetoric, the art of arguing persuasively, was a third of the undergraduate curriculum.
修辞学，即有说服力的辩论艺术，占本科课程的三分之一。
[5]
[5]
And after the lecture the most common form of discussion was the disputation.
讲座结束后，最常见的讨论形式是辩论。
This is at least nominally preserved in our present-day thesis defense: most people treat the words thesis and dissertation as interchangeable, but originally, at least, a thesis was a position one took and the dissertation was the argument by which one defended it.
这至少在我们今天的论文答辩中名义上得到了保留：大多数人将论文和论文这两个词视为可以互换的，但至少最初，论文是一个人所采取的立场，而论文则是一个人为其辩护的论点。
Defending a position may be a necessary evil in a legal dispute, but it's not the best way to get at the truth,
在法律纠纷中捍卫自己的立场可能是必要的罪恶，但这并不是了解真相的最佳方式，
as I think lawyers would be the first to admit.
我认为律师会是第一个承认的。
It's not just that you miss subtleties this way.
这不仅仅是因为您以这种方式错过了微妙之处。
The real problem is that you can't change the question.
真正的问题是你无法改变问题。
And yet this principle is built into the very structure of the things they teach you to write in high school.
然而，这一原则已融入到高中教你写作的内容的结构中。
The topic sentence is your thesis, chosen in advance, the supporting paragraphs the blows you strike in the conflict, and the conclusion-- uh, what is the conclusion?
主题句是你事先选定的论文，支撑段落是你在冲突中受到的打击，结论——呃，结论是什么？
I was never sure
我从来不确定
about that in high school.
关于高中时的事情。
It seemed as if we were just supposed to restate what we said in the first paragraph, but in different enough words that no one could tell.
似乎我们只是应该重述我们在第一段中所说的内容，但用的措辞足够不同，以至于没有人能分辨出来。
Why bother?
何苦呢？
But when you understand the origins of this sort of "essay," you can see where the conclusion comes from.
但当你了解了这种“文章”的起源时，你就能明白结论从何而来。
It's the concluding remarks to the jury.
这是对陪审团的总结发言。
Good writing should be convincing, certainly, but it should be convincing because you got the right answers,
当然，好的写作应该令人信服，但它应该令人信服，因为你得到了正确的答案，
not because you did a good job of arguing.
不是因为你争论得很好。
When I give a draft of an essay to friends, there are two things I want to know: which parts bore them, and which seem unconvincing.
当我把论文草稿交给朋友时，我想知道两件事：哪些部分让他们感到厌烦，哪些部分似乎没有说服力。
The boring bits can usually be fixed by cutting.
钻孔钻头通常可以通过切割来固定。
But I don't try to fix the unconvincing bits by arguing more cleverly.
但我不会试图通过更巧妙的争论来解决那些不令人信服的问题。
I need to talk the matter over.
我需要谈谈这件事。
At the very least I must have explained something badly.
至少我肯定解释得很糟糕。
In that case, in the course of the conversation I'll be forced
那样的话，在谈话的过程中我就会被迫
to come up a with a clearer explanation, which I can just incorporate in the essay.
提出一个更清晰的解释，我可以将其纳入论文中。
More often than not I have to change what I was saying as well.
很多时候我也必须改变我所说的话。
But the aim is never to be convincing per se.
但目标本身绝不是令人信服的。
As the reader gets smarter, convincing and true become identical, so if I can convince smart readers I must be near the truth.
随着读者变得越来越聪明，令人信服和真实变得相同，所以如果我能说服聪明的读者，我一定接近事实。
The sort of writing that attempts to persuade may be a valid (or at least inevitable) form, but it's historically
试图说服的那种写作可能是一种有效的（或至少是不可避免的）形式，但从历史上看，它是
inaccurate to call it an essay.
称其为论文并不准确。
An essay is something else.
论文是另一回事。
Trying To understand what a real essay is, we have to reach back into history again, though this time not so far.
试图理解什么是真正的论文，我们必须再次回顾历史，尽管这次不是那么远。
To Michel de Montaigne, who in 1580 published a book of what he called "essais." He was doing something quite different from what lawyers do, and the difference is embodied in the name.
米歇尔·德·蒙田 (Michel de Montaigne) 于 1580 年出版了一本他称之为“essais”的书。他所做的事情与律师所做的事情完全不同，这种差异就体现在名字上。
Essayer is the French verb meaning "to try"
Essayer是法语动词，意思是“尝试”
and an essai is an attempt.
而essai是一种尝试。
An essay is something you write to try to figure something out.
论文是你为了试图解决某些问题而写的东西。
Figure out what?
弄清楚什么？
You don't know yet.
你还不知道。
And so you can't begin with a thesis, because you don't have one, and may never have one.
所以你不能从一篇论文开始，因为你没有，而且可能永远不会有。
An essay doesn't begin with a statement, but with a question.
一篇文章不是以陈述开始，而是以问题开始。
In a real essay, you don't take a position and defend it.
在真正的论文中，你不会表明立场并为其辩护。
You notice a door that's ajar, and you open it and walk in to see what's inside.
你注意到一扇门半开着，你打开它，走进去看看里面有什么。
If all you want to do is figure things out, why do you need to write anything, though?
如果你想做的只是弄清楚事情，那么为什么你需要写任何东西呢？
Why not just sit and think?
为什么不坐下来思考呢？
Well, there precisely is Montaigne's great discovery.
嗯，这正是蒙田的伟大发现。
Expressing ideas helps to form them.
表达想法有助于形成想法。
Indeed, helps is far too weak a word.
事实上，“帮助”这个词太弱了。
Most of what ends up in my essays I only thought of when I sat down to write them.
我论文中的大部分内容都是我坐下来写的时候才想到的。
That's why I write them.
这就是我写它们的原因。
In the things you write in school you are, in theory,
从理论上讲，在你在学校写的东西中，
merely explaining yourself to the reader.
只是向读者解释自己。
In a real essay you're writing for yourself.
在一篇真正的文章中，你是为自己写的。
You're thinking out loud.
你正在大声思考。
But not quite.
但也不完全是。
Just as inviting people over forces you to clean up your apartment, writing something that other people will read forces you to think well.
就像邀请别人来迫使你打扫你的公寓一样，写一些其他人会读的东西也会迫使你好好思考。
So it does matter to have an audience.
所以拥有观众确实很重要。
The things I've written just for myself are no good.
我只为自己写的东西是不好的。
They tend to peter out.
它们往往会逐渐消失。
When I run into difficulties, I find I conclude with a few vague
当我遇到困难时，我发现我会用一些模糊的结论来结束
questions and then drift off to get a cup of tea.
问题然后就去喝杯茶了。
Many published essays peter out in the same way.
许多发表的论文都以同样的方式逐渐消失。
Particularly the sort written by the staff writers of newsmagazines.
尤其是新闻杂志专职撰稿人写的那种。
Outside writers tend to supply editorials of the defend-a-position variety, which make a beeline toward a rousing (and foreordained) conclusion.
外部作家倾向于提供捍卫立场的社论，这些社论直奔令人振奋的（和注定的）结论。
But the staff writers feel obliged to write something "balanced." Since they're writing for a popular magazine, they start with the
但特约撰稿人觉得有必要写一些“平衡”的东西。由于他们正在为一本流行杂志写作，所以他们从
most radioactively controversial questions, from which-- because they're writing for a popular magazine-- they then proceed to recoil in terror.
最具放射性争议性的问题，因为他们正在为一本流行杂志写作，然后他们就会因恐惧而退缩。
Abortion, for or against?
堕胎，支持还是反对？
This group says one thing.
这个小组说了一件事。
That group says another.
该小组说另一个。
One thing is certain: the question is a complex one.
有一点是肯定的：这个问题是一个复杂的问题。
(But don't get mad at us.
（但是不要生我们的气。
We didn't draw any conclusions.) The River Questions aren't enough.
我们没有得出任何结论。）河流问题还不够。
An essay has to come up with answers.
一篇文章必须给出答案。
They don't always, of course.
当然，他们并不总是如此。
Sometimes you start with a promising question and get nowhere.
有时你从一个有希望的问题开始，却一事无成。
But those you don't publish.
但那些你不发布的。
Those are like experiments that get inconclusive results.
这些就像得到不确定结果的实验。
An essay you publish ought to tell the reader something he didn't already know.
你发表的一篇文章应该告诉读者一些他还不知道的事情。
But what you tell him doesn't matter, so long as it's interesting.
但你告诉他什么并不重要，只要有趣就行。
I'm sometimes accused of meandering.
有时我被指责为曲折。
In defend-a-position writing that would be a flaw.
在捍卫立场的写作中，这将是一个缺陷。
There you're not concerned with truth.
在那里你不关心真相。
You already know where you're going, and you want to go straight there, blustering through obstacles, and hand-waving your way across swampy ground.
你已经知道你要去哪里，你想直接去那里，冲破障碍，挥手穿过沼泽地。
But that's not what you're trying to do in an essay.
但这不是你在论文中想要做的。
An essay is supposed to be a search for truth.
一篇文章应该是对真理的探索。
It would be suspicious if it didn't meander.
如果不是蜿蜒的，就会让人怀疑。
The Meander (aka Menderes) is a river in Turkey.
蜿蜒河（又名门德雷斯河）是土耳其的一条河流。
As you might expect, it winds all over the place.
正如你所预料的那样，它到处都是蜿蜒的。
But it doesn't do this out of frivolity.
但这样做并不是出于轻率。
The path it has discovered is the most economical route to the sea.
它发现的路径是最经济的出海路线。
[6] The river's algorithm is simple.
[6] 河流的算法很简单。
At each step, flow down.
每一步，都流淌下来。
For the essayist this translates to: flow interesting.
对于散文家来说，这意味着：有趣。
Of all the places to go next, choose the most interesting.
在接下来要去的所有地方中，选择最有趣的。
One can't have quite as little foresight as a river.
一个人不可能像一条河流那样缺乏远见。
I always know generally what I want to write about.
我总是知道我想写什么。
But not the
但不是
specific conclusions I want to reach; from paragraph to paragraph I let the ideas take their course.
我想要得出的具体结论；从一段到另一段，我让想法顺其自然。
This doesn't always work.
这并不总是有效。
Sometimes, like a river, one runs up against a wall.
有时候，就像河流一样，人会碰壁。
Then I do the same thing the river does: backtrack.
然后我会做河牌圈做的同样的事情：原路返回。
At one point in this essay I found that after following a certain thread I ran out of ideas.
在这篇文章中的某个时刻，我发现在遵循某一条线索之后我就失去了想法。
I had to go back seven paragraphs and start over in another direction.
我不得不返回七段并从另一个方向重新开始。
Fundamentally an essay is a train of thought-- but a cleaned-up
从根本上来说，一篇文章是一个思路——但是是一个清理过的文章
train of thought, as dialogue is cleaned-up conversation.
思路，因为对话是清理过的对话。
Real thought, like real conversation, is full of false starts.
真正的思想，就像真正的谈话一样，充满了错误的开始。
It would be exhausting to read.
读起来会很累。
You need to cut and fill to emphasize the central thread, like an illustrator inking over a pencil drawing.
你需要通过剪切和填充来强调中心线，就像插画家在铅笔画上涂墨一样。
But don't change so much that you lose the spontaneity of the original.
但不要改变太多，以免失去原始的自发性。
Err on the side of the river.
错在河边。
An essay is not a reference work.
论文不是参考书。
It's not something you read looking for a specific
这不是你为了寻找特定的东西而阅读的东西
answer, and feel cheated if you don't find it.
回答，如果找不到，就会感觉被骗了。
I'd much rather read an essay that went off in an unexpected but interesting direction than one that plodded dutifully along a prescribed course.
我宁愿读一篇以意想不到但有趣的方向展开的文章，也不愿读一篇尽职尽责地沿着规定的路线前进的文章。
Surprise So what's interesting?
惊喜 那么什么是有趣的呢？
For me, interesting means surprise.
对我来说，有趣意味着惊喜。
Interfaces, as Geoffrey James has said, should follow the principle of least astonishment.
正如杰弗里·詹姆斯所说，界面应该遵循最少惊讶的原则。
A button that looks like it will make a machine stop should make it stop, not speed up.
看起来会让机器停止的按钮应该让它停止，而不是加速。
Essays
随笔
should do the opposite.
应该做相反的事情。
Essays should aim for maximum surprise.
论文应该以最大程度的惊喜为目标。
I was afraid of flying for a long time and could only travel vicariously.
很长一段时间我都害怕坐飞机，只能代行。
When friends came back from faraway places, it wasn't just out of politeness that I asked what they saw.
当朋友从远方回来时，我询问他们看到了什么，不仅仅是出于礼貌。
I really wanted to know.
我真的很想知道。
And I found the best way to get information out of them was to ask what surprised them.
我发现从他们那里获取信息的最好方法就是询问他们感到惊讶的事情。
How was the place different from what they expected?
这个地方与他们想象的有什么不同？
This is an extremely useful question.
这是一个非常有用的问题。
You can ask it of the most unobservant people, and it will extract information they didn't even know they were recording.
你可以向最不善于观察的人询问，它会提取他们甚至不知道自己正在记录的信息。
Surprises are things that you not only didn't know, but that contradict things you thought you knew.
惊喜不仅是你不知道的事情，而且是与你自以为知道的事情相矛盾的事情。
And so they're the most valuable sort of fact you can get.
因此，它们是您可以获得的最有价值的事实。
They're like a food that's not merely healthy, but counteracts the unhealthy effects of things you've already eaten.
它们就像一种食物，不仅是健康的，而且可以抵消你已经吃过的东西的不健康影响。
How do you find surprises?
你如何发现惊喜？
Well, therein lies half
嗯，其中有一半
the work of essay writing.
论文写作工作。
(The other half is expressing yourself well.) The trick is to use yourself as a proxy for the reader.
（另一半是很好地表达自己。）诀窍是用你自己作为读者的代理人。
You should only write about things you've thought about a lot.
你应该只写你思考过很多的事情。
And anything you come across that surprises you, who've thought about the topic a lot, will probably surprise most readers.
任何你遇到的令你惊讶的事情，如果你已经对这个话题进行了很多思考，那么可能会让大多数读者感到惊讶。
For example, in a recent essay I pointed out that because you can only judge computer programmers by working with
例如，在最近的一篇文章中，我指出，因为你只能通过与计算机程序员一起工作来判断计算机程序员
them, no one knows who the best programmers are overall.
对于他们来说，没有人知道谁是最好的程序员。
I didn't realize this when I began that essay, and even now I find it kind of weird.
当我开始写那篇文章时我并没有意识到这一点，即使现在我也觉得这有点奇怪。
That's what you're looking for.
这就是您要寻找的。
So if you want to write essays, you need two ingredients: a few topics you've thought about a lot, and some ability to ferret out the unexpected.
因此，如果你想写论文，你需要两个要素：一些你思考过很多的主题，以及一些发现意想不到的能力。
What should you think about?
你应该考虑什么？
My guess is that it doesn't matter-- that anything can be interesting if you get deeply
我的猜测是，这并不重要——如果你深入了解，任何事情都会变得有趣
enough into it.
足够投入了。
One possible exception might be things that have deliberately had all the variation sucked out of them, like working in fast food.
一个可能的例外可能是那些故意吸走所有变化的事情，比如在快餐店工作。
In retrospect, was there anything interesting about working at Baskin-Robbins?
回想起来，在巴斯金罗宾斯工作有什么有趣的事情吗？
Well, it was interesting how important color was to the customers.
嗯，有趣的是颜色对顾客来说有多重要。
Kids a certain age would point into the case and say that they wanted yellow.
一定年龄的孩子会指着盒子说他们想要黄色。
Did they want French Vanilla or Lemon?
他们想要法国香草还是柠檬？
They would just look at you
他们只会看着你
blankly.
茫然地。
They wanted yellow.
他们想要黄色。
And then there was the mystery of why the perennial favorite Pralines 'n' Cream was so appealing.
还有一个谜团：为什么多年来人们喜爱的果仁糖和奶油如此吸引人。
(I think now it was the salt.) <!--And the mystery of why Passion Fruit tasted so awful.
（我想现在是盐的原因。）<！--以及为什么百香果尝起来如此难吃的谜团。
People would order it because of the name, and were always disappointed.--> And the difference in the way fathers and mothers bought ice cream for their kids: the fathers like benevolent kings bestowing largesse, the mothers
人们会因为名字而点它，但总是很失望。--> 父亲和母亲给孩子买冰淇淋的方式也有区别：父亲像仁慈的国王一样慷慨，母亲则像仁慈的国王一样慷慨。
harried, giving in to pressure.
苦恼，屈服于压力。
So, yes, there does seem to be some material even in fast food.
所以，是的，即使在快餐中似乎也有一些材料。
I didn't notice those things at the time, though.
不过当时我并没有注意到这些事情。
At sixteen I was about as observant as a lump of rock.
十六岁时，我的观察力就像一块石头一样敏锐。
I can see more now in the fragments of memory I preserve of that age than I could see at the time from having it all happening live, right in front of me.
现在，我能从我保存的那个时代的记忆碎片中看到的东西，比我当时从现场发生的一切中看到的更多。
Observation So the ability to ferret out the unexpected must not merely be an
观察 因此，发现意外情况的能力绝不仅仅是一种能力
inborn one.
与生俱来的一个。
It must be something you can learn.
这一定是你可以学到的东西。
How do you learn it?
你如何学习它？
To some extent it's like learning history.
在某种程度上，这就像学习历史。
When you first read history, it's just a whirl of names and dates.
当你第一次阅读历史时，它只是一堆名字和日期。
Nothing seems to stick.
似乎没有什么能粘住。
But the more you learn, the more hooks you have for new facts to stick onto-- which means you accumulate knowledge at an exponential rate.
但你学得越多，你就越能抓住新的事实——这意味着你以指数级的速度积累知识。
Once you remember that Normans conquered England in 1066, it will catch your attention when you hear
一旦您记得诺曼人于 1066 年征服了英格兰，当您听到以下内容时，您就会注意到
that other Normans conquered southern Italy at about the same time.
其他诺曼人大约在同一时间征服了意大利南部。
Which will make you wonder about Normandy, and take note when a third book mentions that Normans were not, like most of what is now called France, tribes that flowed in as the Roman empire collapsed, but Vikings (norman = north man) who arrived four centuries later in 911.
这会让你对诺曼底感到好奇，并注意第三本书提到诺曼人并不像现在所谓的法国的大多数人那样，是随着罗马帝国崩溃而流入的部落，而是四个世纪后的 911 年到达的维京人（诺曼=北方人）。
Which makes it easier to remember that Dublin was also established by
这让我们更容易记住都柏林也是由
Vikings in the 840s.
840 年代的维京人。
Etc, etc squared.
等等，等等平方。
Collecting surprises is a similar process.
收集惊喜是一个类似的过程。
The more anomalies you've seen, the more easily you'll notice new ones.
你看到的异常现象越多，你就越容易注意到新的异常现象。
Which means, oddly enough, that as you grow older, life should become more and more surprising.
奇怪的是，这意味着随着年龄的增长，生活应该变得越来越令人惊讶。
When I was a kid, I used to think adults had it all figured out.
当我还是个孩子的时候，我曾经以为大人已经把一切都弄清楚了。
I had it backwards.
我把它搞反了。
Kids are the ones who have it all figured out.
孩子们是那些已经弄清楚这一切的人。
They're just mistaken.
他们只是错了。
When it comes to surprises, the rich get richer.
当谈到惊喜时，富人变得更富。
But (as with wealth) there may be habits of mind that will help the process along.
但是（与财富一样）可能存在有助于这一过程的思维习惯。
It's good to have a habit of asking questions, especially questions beginning with Why.
养成提问的习惯是件好事，尤其是以“为什么”开头的问题。
But not in the random way that three year olds ask why.
但不是像三岁孩子那样随意地问为什么。
There are an infinite number of questions.
有无数的问题。
How do you find the fruitful ones?
你怎样才能找到那些富有成果的人呢？
I find it especially useful to ask why about things that seem wrong.
我发现对看似错误的事情询问原因特别有用。
For example, why should there be a connection between humor and misfortune?
例如，为什么幽默和不幸之间应该有联系？
Why do we find it funny when a character, even one we like, slips on a banana peel?
为什么当一个角色（即使是我们喜欢的角色）在香蕉皮上滑倒时我们会觉得很有趣？
There's a whole essay's worth of surprises there for sure.
那里肯定有整篇文章的惊喜。
If you want to notice things that seem wrong, you'll find a degree of skepticism helpful.
如果你想注意到那些看似错误的事情，你会发现一定程度的怀疑是有帮助的。
I take it as an axiom that we're only achieving 1% of what we could.
我认为这是一条公理：我们只实现了我们所能实现的 1%。
This helps counteract the rule that gets beaten into our
这有助于抵消我们所遵循的规则
heads as children: that things are the way they are because that is how things have to be.
孩提时代的头脑：事物就是这样，因为事情就必须如此。
For example, everyone I've talked to while writing this essay felt the same about English classes-- that the whole process seemed pointless.
例如，在写这篇文章时与我交谈过的每个人对英语课都有同样的感觉——整个过程似乎毫无意义。
But none of us had the balls at the time to hypothesize that it was, in fact, all a mistake.
但当时我们没有人有勇气假设这实际上完全是一个错误。
We all thought there was just something we weren't getting.
我们都以为只是有些东西我们没有得到。
I have a hunch you want to pay attention not just to things
我有预感你想要关注的不仅仅是事物
that seem wrong, but things that seem wrong in a humorous way.
这看起来是错误的，但以幽默的方式看起来错误的事情。
I'm always pleased when I see someone laugh as they read a draft of an essay.
当我看到有人读论文草稿时大笑时，我总是很高兴。
But why should I be?
但我为什么要这样呢？
I'm aiming for good ideas.
我的目标是好的想法。
Why should good ideas be funny?
为什么好的想法应该是有趣的？
The connection may be surprise.
这种联系可能会令人惊讶。
Surprises make us laugh, and surprises are what one wants to deliver.
惊喜让我们开怀大笑，而惊喜正是人们想要传递的。
I write down things that surprise me in notebooks.
我把令我惊讶的事情记在笔记本上。
I never actually get around to reading them and using
我从来没有真正抽出时间来阅读和使用它们
what I've written, but I do tend to reproduce the same thoughts later.
我已经写过这些内容，但我确实倾向于在以后重现相同的想法。
So the main value of notebooks may be what writing things down leaves in your head.
因此，笔记本的主要价值可能是写下来的东西留在你的脑海里。
People trying to be cool will find themselves at a disadvantage when collecting surprises.
想要表现得很酷的人会发现自己在收集惊喜时处于劣势。
To be surprised is to be mistaken.
惊讶就是错误。
And the essence of cool, as any fourteen year old could tell you, is nil admirari.
任何一个十四岁的孩子都会告诉你，酷的本质就是零崇拜。
When you're mistaken, don't dwell on it; just act like nothing's wrong and maybe no one
当你犯了错误时，不要纠缠不休；表现得好像什么事都没有，也许没有人一样
will notice.
会注意到的。
One of the keys to coolness is to avoid situations where inexperience may make you look foolish.
保持冷静的关键之一是避免出现因缺乏经验而显得愚蠢的情况。
If you want to find surprises you should do the opposite.
如果你想发现惊喜，你应该反其道而行之。
Study lots of different things, because some of the most interesting surprises are unexpected connections between different fields.
研究许多不同的事物，因为一些最有趣的惊喜是不同领域之间意想不到的联系。
For example, jam, bacon, pickles, and cheese, which are among the most pleasing of foods, were all originally intended as methods of preservation.
例如，果酱、培根、泡菜和奶酪，这些最美味的食物，最初都是为了保存的目的。
And so were books and paintings.
书籍和绘画也是如此。
Whatever you study, include history-- but social and economic history, not political history.
无论你学习什么，都要包括历史——但要包括社会和经济史，而不是政治史。
History seems to me so important that it's misleading to treat it as a mere field of study.
在我看来，历史是如此重要，以至于将其仅仅视为一个研究领域是有误导性的。
Another way to describe it is all the data we have so far.
另一种描述方式是我们迄今为止拥有的所有数据。
Among other things, studying history gives one confidence that there are good ideas waiting to be discovered right under our noses.
除其他外，研究历史让我们相信，在我们眼皮子底下有好的想法等待被发现。
Swords evolved during the Bronze Age out of daggers, which (like their flint predecessors) had a hilt separate from the blade.
剑是在青铜时代从匕首演变而来的，匕首（像它们的燧石前身一样）有一个与刀片分开的刀柄。
Because swords are longer the hilts kept breaking off.
由于剑较长，剑柄经常折断。
But it took five hundred years before someone thought of casting hilt and blade as one piece.
但过了五百年才有人想到将剑柄和剑身铸成一体。
Disobedience Above all, make a habit of paying attention to things you're not supposed to, either because they're " inappropriate ,"
不服从 最重要的是，养成关注那些你不应该关注的事情的习惯，要么因为它们“不合适”，
or not important, or not what you're supposed to be working on.
或者不重要，或者不是你应该做的事情。
If you're curious about something, trust your instincts.
如果您对某事感到好奇，请相信您的直觉。
Follow the threads that attract your attention.
关注吸引您注意力的主题。
If there's something you're really interested in, you'll find they have an uncanny way of leading back to it anyway, just as the conversation of people who are especially proud of something always tends to lead back to it.
如果你真的对某件事感兴趣，你会发现他们总有一种不可思议的方式引导你回到它，就像那些对某件事特别自豪的人的谈话总是倾向于引导你回到它一样。
For example, I've always been fascinated by comb-overs, especially
例如，我一直对梳子很着迷，尤其是
the extreme sort that make a man look as if he's wearing a beret made of his own hair.
这种极端的方式让一个男人看起来就像戴着一顶用自己的头发制成的贝雷帽。
Surely this is a lowly sort of thing to be interested in-- the sort of superficial quizzing best left to teenage girls.
当然，这是一种值得感兴趣的低级事物——这种肤浅的测验最好留给十几岁的女孩。
And yet there is something underneath.
然而下面还有一些东西。
The key question, I realized, is how does the comber-over not see how odd he looks?
我意识到，关键问题是，梳头的人怎么看不出他看起来有多奇怪？
And the answer is that he got to look that way incrementally.
答案是他必须逐渐这样看。
What began as combing his hair a little carefully over a
开始时，他小心翼翼地梳理头发
thin patch has gradually, over 20 years, grown into a monstrosity.
二十多年来，这片薄薄的斑块逐渐成长为一个庞然大物。
Gradualness is very powerful.
循序渐进的力量是非常强大的。
And that power can be used for constructive purposes too: just as you can trick yourself into looking like a freak, you can trick yourself into creating something so grand that you would never have dared to plan such a thing.
这种力量也可以用于建设性的目的：就像你可以欺骗自己看起来像个怪胎一样，你也可以欺骗自己创造一些如此宏伟的东西，以至于你永远不敢计划这样的事情。
Indeed, this is just how most good software gets created.
事实上，这就是大多数优秀软件的创建方式。
You start by writing a stripped-down
你首先写一个精简的
kernel (how hard can it be?) and gradually it grows into a complete operating system.
内核（它能有多难？）并逐渐成长为一个完整的操作系统。
Hence the next leap: could you do the same thing in painting, or in a novel?
因此，下一步是：你能在绘画或小说中做同样的事情吗？
See what you can extract from a frivolous question?
看看你能从一个无聊的问题中提取出什么？
If there's one piece of advice I would give about writing essays, it would be: don't do as you're told.
如果我对写论文有一条建议，那就是：不要按照别人告诉你的去做。
Don't believe what you're supposed to.
不要相信你应该相信的事情。
Don't write the essay readers expect; one learns nothing from
不要写出读者期望的文章；从中一无所获
what one expects.
人们的期望是什么。
And don't write the way they taught you to in school.
并且不要按照他们在学校教你的方式写作。
The most important sort of disobedience is to write essays at all.
最重要的不服从就是写论文。
Fortunately, this sort of disobedience shows signs of becoming rampant .
幸运的是，这种不服从行为有愈演愈烈的迹象。
It used to be that only a tiny number of officially approved writers were allowed to write essays.
过去，只有极少数经过官方认可的作家才被允许撰写论文。
Magazines published few of them, and judged them less by what they said than who wrote them;
杂志很少发表这些文章，而且评判他们的标准更多的是作者的内容，而不是他们所说的内容。
a magazine might publish a story by an unknown writer if it was good enough, but if they published an essay on x it had to be by someone who was at least forty and whose job title had x in it.
一本杂志可能会发表一篇由不知名作家写的故事，如果它足够好的话，但如果他们发表一篇关于x的文章，那么它必须是由一个至少四十岁并且其职称中含有x的人写的。
Which is a problem, because there are a lot of things insiders can't say precisely because they're insiders.
这是一个问题，因为有很多事情内部人士无法准确地说出，因为他们是内部人士。
The Internet is changing that.
互联网正在改变这一点。
Anyone can publish an essay on the Web, and it gets judged, as any writing should, by what it says, not who wrote it.
任何人都可以在网络上发表一篇文章，就像任何写作一样，它会受到评判，评判标准是文章内容，而不是作者。
Who are you to write about x?
你是谁来写x？
You are whatever you wrote.
你就是你写的任何东西。
Popular magazines made the period between the spread of literacy and the arrival of TV the golden age of the short story.
流行杂志使识字普及和电视出现之间的这段时期成为短篇小说的黄金时代。
The Web may well make this the golden age of the essay.
网络很可能使现在成为论文的黄金时代。
And that's certainly not something I realized when I started writing this.
当我开始写这篇文章时，我当然没有意识到这一点。
Notes [1] I'm thinking of Oresme (c.
注释 [1] 我想到了奥雷斯姆（Oresme，c.
1323-82).
1323-82）。
But it's hard to pick a date, because there was a sudden drop-off in scholarship
但很难选择日期，因为奖学金突然下降
just as Europeans finished assimilating classical science.
正如欧洲人完成了古典科学的吸收一样。
The cause may have been the plague of 1347; the trend in scientific progress matches the population curve.
原因可能是 1347 年的瘟疫；科学进步的趋势与人口曲线相符。
[2] Parker, William R.
[2] 威廉·R·帕克
"Where Do College English Departments Come From?" College English 28 (1966-67), pp.
《大学英语系从何而来？》大学英语 28 (1966-67), pp.
339-351.
339-351。
Reprinted in Gray, Donald J.
重印于格雷，唐纳德·J.
(ed).
（编辑）。
The Department of English at Indiana University Bloomington 1868-1970.
印第安纳大学伯明顿分校英语系，1868-1970 年。
Indiana University Publications.
印第安纳大学出版物。
Daniels, Robert V.
丹尼尔斯，罗伯特 V.
The University of Vermont: The First Two Hundred Years.
佛蒙特大学：前两百年。
University of Vermont, 1991.
佛蒙特大学，1991。
Mueller, Friedrich M.
穆勒，弗里德里希·M.
Letter to the Pall Mall Gazette.
致《颇尔美尔公报》的信。
1886/87.
1886/87。
Reprinted in Bacon, Alan (ed).
重印于艾伦·培根（编辑）。
The Nineteenth-Century History of English Studies.
十九世纪英语研究史。
Ashgate, 1998.
阿什盖特，1998。
[3] I'm compressing the story a bit.
[3] 我稍微压缩了这个故事。
At first literature took a back seat to philology, which (a) seemed more serious and (b) was popular in Germany, where many of the
起初，文学退居于语言学之后，语言学（a）似乎更严肃，（b）在德国很流行，那里的许多人都喜欢文学。
leading scholars of that generation had been trained.
那一代的顶尖学者都接受过培训。
In some cases the writing teachers were transformed in situ into English professors.
在某些情况下，写作老师就地转变为英语教授。
Francis James Child, who had been Boylston Professor of Rhetoric at Harvard since 1851, became in 1876 the university's first professor of English.
弗朗西斯·詹姆斯·柴尔德 (Francis James Child) 自 1851 年起一直担任哈佛大学博伊斯顿修辞学教授，并于 1876 年成为该校第一位英语教授。
[4] Parker, op.
[4] 帕克，同上。
cit.
引用。
, p.
，p。
25.
25.
[5] The undergraduate curriculum or trivium (whence "trivial") consisted of Latin grammar, rhetoric, and logic.
[5] 本科生课程或琐碎课程（因此称为“琐碎”）包括拉丁语语法、修辞学和逻辑。
Candidates for masters' degrees went on to study the quadrivium of arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy.
硕士学位候选人继续学习算术、几何、音乐和天文学四门学科。
Together these were the seven liberal arts.
这些就是七门文科。
The study of rhetoric was inherited directly from Rome, where it was considered the most important subject.
修辞学的研究直接继承自罗马，在罗马它被认为是最重要的学科。
It would not be far from the truth to say that education in the classical world meant training landowners' sons to speak well enough to defend their interests
如果说古典世界的教育意味着训练地主的儿子说得好话以捍卫他们的利益，这句话并不完全是事实。
in political and legal disputes.
在政治和法律纠纷中。
[6] Trevor Blackwell points out that this isn't strictly true, because the outside edges of curves erode faster.
[6] Trevor Blackwell 指出这并不完全正确，因为曲线的外边缘腐蚀得更快。
<!--[9] When I first heard about blogs, I imagined they would be a complete waste of time.
<!--[9] 当我第一次听说博客时，我认为它们完全是浪费时间。
Blogging sounded like a long-play version of netnews.
博客听起来就像是网络新闻的长篇版本。
But I was mistaken; people care more about something that stays on their site, and the Web supplies a filter that's
但我错了；人们更关心留在他们网站上的东西，而网络提供了一个过滤器
missing in newsgroups.
新闻组中缺失。
The best writing online is not only better than netnews, but better than most print media.--> Thanks to Ken Anderson, Trevor Blackwell, Sarah Harlin, Jessica Livingston, Jackie McDonough, and Robert Morris for reading drafts of this.
最好的在线写作不仅比网络新闻好，而且比大多数印刷媒体好。--> 感谢 Ken Anderson、Trevor Blackwell、Sarah Harlin、Jessica Livingston、Jackie McDonough 和 Robert Morris 阅读本文的草稿。