Reading

北辰

Reading is a pleasure of the mind， which means that it is a little like a sport： your eagerness and 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 authors or even goes beyond his. Your experience， compared with his， brings you to the same or different conclusions①， and your ideas develop， as you understand his.

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. Books influence each other; they link the past， the present and the future and have their own generations②， like families. Wherever you start reading you connect yourself with one of the families of ideas， and， in the long run， 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 “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.

讀书是一种精神享受，这意思是说读书好像一种运动。你的渴望，你所掌握的知识以及你的机敏程度，这些都将使你成为一名善于读书的人。读书很有乐趣，这不仅仅是因为作者向你讲述了什么，也因为读书能使你开动脑筋思考。你自己的想象同作者的想象不谋而合，甚至超越作者的想象。你的经历同作者的经历相比较，会使你得出与作者相同或相异的结论。当你领会了作者的观点以后，你自己的观点便形成了。

每一本书如同一户人家的房子，孑然而立;而图书馆里的书就像城市中的建筑物一样，鳞次栉比。尽管每本书彼此互不相连，但是要把它们放在一起，意义就不同了。书籍相互间都是有联系的。彼城的书同此城的书也是有联系的，相同或相近的观点在不同的作品中表现出来。书籍之间互相影响，它们联系着过去、现在和未来，像家族一样，代代相传。无论你从哪里开始读起，你都会把自己同其中一族的观点联系起来，最后你不仅洞察了那个世界和生活在其中的人们，你也认识了自己。

只有把读书当成乐趣，它才会成为乐趣。如果你只集中精力阅读别人要求你读的那些书，那么你可能永远也不会以读书为乐。相反，如果你把自己不喜欢的书搁在一旁，试着去读另一本书，直到找到一本对你有意义的书，然后轻松愉悦地读起来，那么你一定会感到很惬意。假如因为博览群书，你变得更加高尚、更加聪慧、更加善良、更加文雅，那么，你就不会觉得读书是件苦差事了。