Books can change people's destiny. Some people go all the way to remote foreign universities to be literature professors just because they read "The King in the Mountain". A "Demian" charmed thousands of young students with oriental philosophy; Hemingway's novels have produced many outdoor athletes; Dumas' works have taught countless women to fall into gloomy clouds. Fortunately, many of them have been able to recover their lives from the brink of suicide through cookbooks and cookbooks. Bruma is now a ghost under the book.
But she's not the only victim. An old professor who studies ancient Chinese, Leonard? Wood was once hit in the head by five volumes of Encyclopedia Britannica falling from the bookshelf in his study, causing paralysis; My friend Richard once tried to reach out and pull out a William book that was set too high. Faulkner's novel Absalom, Absalom! ",accidentally fell from the book ladder and broke a leg on the spot; Another friend who lives in Buenos Aires contracted tuberculosis because he spent a long time in the underground stacks of public archives. I even heard that there was a dog in Chile who ate the whole brothers karamazov like crazy one afternoon and choked to death on the page.
Every time my grandmother sees me reading in bed, she will say, "Put the book down quickly, it's dangerous." Over the past few years, I always thought that she was ignorant at all, but as I grew older, I gradually realized that grandma with German descent was really wise.
Most famous people from Cambridge University attended Bruma's funeral. Robert? Professor laurel read a eulogy at the farewell ceremony, which was later printed into a book because of its academic value. In his speech, he spoke highly of Bruma's extraordinary achievements in academic work and summed up his 40-year life with "astuteness and shrewdness". The eulogy praised her achievements in the research field of Anglo-Saxon influence on Latin American literature. However, the conclusion of the article has caused a lot of controversy: "Bruma devoted her life to literature, but she never imagined that literature would eventually take her life."
Some people accused laurel of ruining the whole speech with a "lame beat around the bush", so there was a deadlock and clear barriers between the two sides. A few days later, I heard John's voice at my friend's house. Benon flatly said to a group of laurel's protege:
"It was the car that killed her, not the poem."
"The speaker has no intention, but the listener has a heart." Not to be outdone, two young people and one of the most outspoken Jewish girls rudely retracted their words on the spot. "Everyone has the right to choose their own expression."
"There will be the right to screw up a good article. That's true, "the old man said angrily in his usual sarcastic tone. "At the moment, there are millions of cars rampaging through the streets of our city, which is only enough for you to choose good words."
Because of such an unwise remark, the whole campus was quarrelling as a bee. Some people even held a student composition contest on the topic of "the relevance between reality and language". Others ran to the sidewalk in Soho to measure how many steps Bruma had taken, and even the sonnet she was about to read when the accident happened was analyzed word for word. In view of the traffic semiotics in central London, and the moment when our beloved Bruma's insides were torn from the whole world by literature, a series of heated debates were launched on the text link relationship of culture, city and language. Because I was ordered to temporarily fill her vacancy in the Spanish-Portuguese literature department, I had to be stationed in her office, busy teaching her, and had no time to take care of the busy performances around me.
One morning, I received a package for my dead colleague. The postmark shows that it was sent from Uruguay, but it does not indicate the sender's name and address at all. I thought it was a book presented by the author. I hope she can write some comments in academic journals. Bruma doesn't even bother to open this book unless she knows in advance that it is a gift from a very famous and prosperous writer, and writing flattering articles can bring her some substantial benefits. She often writes a big word "can" directly on the paper bag (meaning "can't read"), and then asks me to stuff that thing into piles of files to be processed and never ask again.
There is a book in the package, but it is not the kind of book I expected. When I opened the parcel, I suddenly felt my heart tighten. I walked to the door first, closed the office door, and then went back to the table to study the old black and blue shadow line. I know Bruma is studying Joseph? Conrad's research project. What puzzles me is that this book is covered with dirty and coarse dirt from beginning to end. Three sides of the book mouth are covered with coarse gravel like cement. With a light touch, a thin layer of ash fell on the smooth desktop on the spot.
I took out my handkerchief and picked up a small piece of debris in fear and trembling. It is really ordinary cement. Judging from the traces on the book, the whole book was originally covered with cement, and then it was knocked down hard.
There is no letter attached to the parcel, but there is only such a tattered and almost invisible book inside. I carefully opened the cover with my fingers, and Bruma's autograph came into view. The green pen 100% is her handwriting, clean and tidy, just like her own consistent style. The handwriting is not difficult to read: "To Carlos, this novel has accompanied me to many places all the way. I want to use this book to commemorate our crazy time in Monterrey. Please allow me to say sorry for my good ability to foresee everything. I said from the beginning: nothing you do can surprise me. 1June 8, 996. "
I know Bruma's boudoir like the back of my hand: what food is in the refrigerator, the smell of sheets and the perfume on underwear. Two other directors in the department and I are guests of a student who somehow hooked up with her. Like others, I know that she took the opportunity to attend an academic seminar in Monterrey, had a lightning-fast love affair as usual to satisfy her vanity, make up for her fading youth and two unfortunate marriages, and had a dream that she couldn't extricate herself after reading One Hundred Years of Solitude: boating on the Macondo River. Why did this book return to Cambridge two years later? Where have you been these two years? If Bruma were alive now, what clues would she read from these cement residues?
I was kissed by William once? Butler? Preface by Ye Zhi and James? Illustrated collections of Irish legends and folktales in torrance, and unpublished letters from Marquis de Sade and his relatives and friends. I was lucky enough to read a batch of ancient books in the cradle and gently open their leaves page by page. Besides feeling their weight, I also tasted a unique taste. However, no book has ever fascinated me so much as the paperback book in front of me. Its pages, bent upward by moisture, seem to call me.
I put the book back in the paper bag, put it in my briefcase, and then secretly wiped the mud off the table like a thief.
The following whole week, I rummaged through Bruma's files, trying to find out the address book of the participating critics and writers that the organizer regularly sent to the participants. I found a list in an ochre folder with "Memories of Monterrey" on the cover. The names of the two Uruguayan writers attending the meeting were not Carlos, but I wrote down their contact information and email addresses one by one. Although I have repeatedly warned myself that I should not intrude into Bruma's personal privacy without authorization, at the same time, I also think that this bizarre book-which can't be interpreted from the rambling cement residue-should really be returned to the sender.
I put the book on the reading shelf on my desk for the time being. To tell the truth, I stared at it for several nights, both curious and anxious. Maybe it's because Alice always cleans the study spotless with a vacuum cleaner, not only the top bookshelf, but also every carpet and every inch of the desktop. This paperback book seems to upset the balance of the whole study on the spot, just like a beggar rushing into a state banquet. This book was published in June1946165438+10 by Emece publishing house in Buenos Aires. It took me some time to find out that it belonged to Borges and violette? One of the Ivory Gate series co-edited by casares. Under the cover of layers of marl, the unique nautical patterns of the book series are still discernible, and there seems to be a group of faint fish below, but I'm not sure.
In the next few days, Alice laid a rag under the reading stand to prevent the falling mud from staining the glass desktop, and changed a new rag every morning. It was so meticulous that it was no wonder that she won my heart after she came to help.
The first email from Nuevo Leon, Mexico, didn't provide any further information at all. I have got the list of members attending the meeting, the agenda and the road map. However, one of the Uruguayan writers revealed that one of them was Carlos? People from brower also attended the meeting at that time. Brower is a Uruguayan bibliophile. The author also claimed to have seen him leave a dinner party with Bluma in his arms. They are both too tired. They must have drunk a lot of tequila at the party and danced a few Colombian Bayenado. "Please keep quiet," he wrote, "or I will call a spade a spade."
I have a picture in my mind: On a typical sultry night in Mexico, Bruma danced by candlelight on the balcony of a mansion in South America, trying to prove that he could dance well even if he didn't have any Latin ancestry. She has a serious face and looks the same. Then, I seem to see her stumbling (happily? ), let a man hold hands and walk side by side on the cobblestone street. Then the two of them disappeared into a dark door.
The writer also revealed: brower has moved to Uruguayan Ricardo Roberto Barreto da Rocha province near the Atlantic Ocean, and has lost contact since then, but if I can wait a few days, he may try to ask a friend.
Fifteen years is a long time, and it is also the time when I came to England far from my old country. Every three years, I will definitely go back to Buenos Aires to visit my mother and catch up with my old friends. I am also immersed in Buenos Aires, where all kinds of people are native speakers. However, I know almost nothing about Uruguay. I can only find a little vague memory in my mind: when I was five years old, I boarded the night ferry to Montevideo with my father and then disembarked with my father. Another time, a friend invited me to stay in Punta del Este for a few days, but I have never been to Ricardo Roberto Barreto da Rocha Province. I only know where it is.
The beaches in southern Argentina have never left me the impression that the windshield is dirty on rainy days. Perhaps it is because of the boundless sky, the vigorous sandstorm and Carlos' pursuit later? The process of brower, now as long as someone praises my library, I will immediately think of the coast of Ricardo Roberto Barreto da Rocha looking out from the windshield, which makes me feel uneasy. Every year, I always clean up at least 50 books for students. Even so, my books are inevitably arranged in two rows on the shelf. Books grow and spread silently in the room. There is nothing I can do about it.
I often ask myself: Why on earth should I keep books that may be of little use for a long time and completely out of touch with my career? What is the purpose of collecting so many books that have only been shelved once? Take off the exhibition next time (if there is a next time), God knows when! However, let's put it this way: once I lost the call of the wild, or the Greek Zoba, let me say goodbye to my bitter youth with tears, or the ghost in the war, didn't it ruin every brick and tile of my childhood? As for all the other books that moved to the top of the shelf with the passage of time, they have been motionless and silent since then, not to mention any books that faithfully guard the sacred pure land in our hearts.
Giving up books is often twice as difficult as getting them. Books are closely connected with us through the bonds of mutual need and forgetfulness. They have witnessed a lucky feather in our life, and we can never turn back. As long as the book is still there, it is a part of us. I have noticed that many people will write down that he read a book on a certain day in a certain year; They use it to leave personal records. Some people will sign their names on the title page before lending books to others. Some people will register which books are borrowed by whom in the address book, and even forget to mark the date and time. I also know that some booksellers follow the example of libraries, stamping books and attaching library cards. No one wants to borrow his books. Since then, he has been living abroad and has been slow to return. We would rather lose a ring, a watch or an umbrella than a book. Even if we never read that book again, those pages still retain the feeling that we may have forgotten it long ago.
After all, the number of books is really important. We put them out for testing, just like showing a huge, naked brain in public, revealing some humble excuses and some false reserve. I once knew a professor of ancient linguistics. He always takes advantage of the opportunity of making tea and coffee to stay in the kitchen for a while, so that visitors have enough time to read and appreciate the books on his bookshelf. When the goal is successfully achieved, he will reappear with a tray in his hand and a smile on his face.
Since we are all scholars, we will read our friends' books whenever we have the chance, even as a pastime. Sometimes it's because we want to find a book we've always wanted to read but can't have, and sometimes it's because we want to find out the special eating habits of this guy in front of us. If we are at home, if we leave our visiting colleague alone in the living room, when we look back, he will often stand in front of the bookshelf as expected and squint at our books carefully.
One day, when we accumulate more and more books and finally break through an invisible boundary, the original sense of superiority will all become a burden, because the space problem will be inseparable from now on. As early as the day before the shadow line reached my hand, I had racked my brains to find a place to put a new bookshelf. From that moment on, it became a lingering warning.
Fortunately, the school is in the exam season, and my mind can temporarily leave that book. It stands upright on the reading shelf, and I have to be busy with my teaching work with Bruma. The avalanche of papers and reports and endless class assignments made me breathless. Fortunately, the summer vacation came one after another, so I decided to go back to China to visit my mother in advance, and by the way, I also gave myself a chance to return the book to that person (he didn't mean anything to me at that time) and tell him about Bruma's death. To tell the truth, of course I want to know the ins and outs of this person.
(2)
A week later, I was in Buenos Aires. I suddenly found that the city was covered with glass curtains and became much more modern than before. My mother and friends are more depressed than before, like the deafening noise of the market, the flashing lights and neon lights and the creaking TV in the bar. Only the residents' depression can provide enough air to feed the lungs in the city.
……
Just part of it! Only books, no words.