留学意味着陌生的国度，
全新的文化和生活方式，
出发前，除了一颗热忱的心，
还要做一些功课哦！
比如了解一些外国历史文化和人情世故，
今天给大家推荐
英美留学前必读的10本英文原著，
使你的出国行更有谱！
英国篇
1.《The English: A Portrait of a People》—Jeremy Paxman
《英格兰人：一个民族的肖像》 杰里米·帕克斯曼
英格兰人的自我感觉
简介：
(以下简介部分整理自网络）
In The English, the famously no-nonsense journalist and broadcaster Jeremy Paxman assesses what it means to be English today – specifically English, that is, not Welsh, Scottish, or Irish.
在《The English》里头，以坦爽著称的记者、主持人Jeremy Paxman开门见山地评估当代英格兰人对自我的认识，并且分析其与威尔士人、苏格兰人、爱尔兰等人的差别。
In this wide-ranging work, Paxman charts the rise of a peculiar stereotype of Englishness that arose abroad in response to British colonialism, and its subsequent obsolescence following the disintegration of Empire. Emphasising the pluralistic interconnections between England's regions, cultures, and classes, The English gives historical grounding to some of the country' scurious social quirks and places them in the context of its people’s fluctuating identities.
此作品内容广泛，Paxman在书中写道，大英帝国因在世界各地开拓殖民地，引起了当地人对英国人诸多的奇特偏见。如今，虽然大英帝国早已瓦解，但许多国家仍然保持着陈旧的偏见。通过描述英格兰各个地区、文化和社会阶级之间多样化的关系，Paxman描绘了英国社会的一些奇特怪癖的历史背景，并将它们和现代人变化多端的自我认知作比较。
2. White Teeth—Zadie Smith
《白牙》 查蒂·史密斯
一幅世纪末的英国写真
简介:
Treating a broad sweep of British post-war history,White Teeth deals with the issues of London's immigrant population and their often conflicting desires to both assimilate and preserve their indigenous cultural identities.
《白牙》以二战后的英国历史为背景，探寻了伦敦移民的困难境遇，他们陷入了既渴望融入英国社会、又想保留自己祖国文化的矛盾当中。
In an inimitable style that is now painfully funny, now heartrending, Smith also satirises the British middle and working classes while writing sensitively on such social issues as the generation gap in immigrant families, and even religious fundamentalism. A must-read for those seeking to know more about the diversity of Britain's cities.
Smith用一种笑中带泪的独特方式，讽刺了英国的中产阶级和工人阶级，同时还用细致入微的笔触描写了一些社会问题，例如移民家庭内部的代沟、宗教原教旨主义等等。如果你想了解英国城市中的多元文化，这是你的必读之物。
3. Porterhouse Blue—Tom Sharpe
《Porterhouse Blue》汤姆·夏普
嬉笑怒骂中的冷思考
内容节选：
简介:
Whether you're looking to throw yourself bodily into life at Britain's most traditional educational institutions, or searching for a stick to beat them with, look no further than Tom Sharpe's rip-roaring parody of life at the fictional Cambridge college, Porterhouse.
无论你是渴望去最传统的英国高校求学，还是想嘲笑它们不合实际的习俗，都得来读读汤姆·夏普的这部作品，他在书中创造了一所虚拟的剑桥学院——Porterhouse，里面的故事肯定会令你捧腹大笑。
Crippled by the need to adhere to its own traditions, Porterhouse is thrown into disarray when the College Master dies before naming his successor; meanwhile, research student Lionel Zipser's desperation to keep a lid on his attraction to his maid leads him through a series of preposterous plotlines towards a hilarious finale. A taste at the cordon bleu end of fine British humour.
按照Porterhouse学院悠久的传统，只有学院院长能够选定自己的接任者。现任院长的突然死亡使得整个学院陷入混乱之中。同时，研究生Lionel Zipser暗恋他的仆人，又要死命隐瞒，因而发生了一系列荒谬可笑的事件，结局也令人开怀大笑。读Porterhouse能让你体验最经典的英式幽默。
4. The Road to Wigan Pier—George Orwell
《通往威根码头之路》乔治·奥威尔
这里就是一片地狱
精彩节选：
It it curious how seldom the all-importance of food is recognized. You see statues everywher to politicians, poets, bishops, but not to cooks or bacon-curers or market-gardeners.
很奇怪的是食物的重要性很少被认可。你会看到到处都是政治家、诗人、主教的雕像,却看不到厨师或市场园丁的。
This is the inevitable fate of the sentimentalist. All his opinions change into their opposites at the first brush of reality.
这是多愁善感的人不可避免的命运。他所有的观点一碰到现实现就变成了自己的对立面。
The modern English literary world, at any rate the high-brow section of it,is a sort of poisonous jungle wher only weeds can flourish.
现代英语文学界，即使它有高雅的部分，仍是一种有毒的丛林,只有杂草可以蓬勃发展。
简介:
In Wigan Pier, a middle-class writer composes one of the finest examples of working-class journalism ever set down on paper.
乔治·奥威尔是英国伟大的人道主义作家、新闻记者、社会评论家。他一生颠沛流离，但始终以敏锐的洞察力和犀利的文笔记录着他所生活的时代，致力于维护人类自由和尊严，揭露、鞭笞专制和极权主义，并提出了超越时代的预言，因此他被尊称为“一代人的冷峻良知”。这本书是关于工人阶级的有史以来最佳的调查研究报告之一。
The British are a nation acutely aware of social class, and navigating the proverbial minefield of class distinctions can often prove challenging for visiting students. Orwell documents living conditions for workers in the impoverished north of England in the late 1930s, before discussing the practical solutions to the problem. Very much a document of its time, but still one of great use for those interested in the roots of Britain’s ongoing class tensions英国人对社会阶级极端敏感，而错综复杂的阶级差别常令留学生感到莫名其妙。书的开头讲述了英国北部的劳动人民在30年代的艰苦生活条件，接着提出了解决该社会问题的几个实在的方案。作家的一些论点无疑已过时了，但本书仍能令人深入了解英国不同阶级之间长久矛盾的历史背景。
5. Great Expectations—Charles Dickens
《远大前程》查尔斯·狄更斯
爱你是我最灿烂的前程
精彩节选：
I love her against reason , against promise , against peace ,against hope , against happiness , against all discouragement that could be . once for all .
我爱她是违背常理，是妨碍前程，是失去自制，是破灭希望， 是断送幸福，是注定要尝尽一切的沮丧和失望的。可是，一旦爱上了她，我再也不能不爱她。
Pip：“Out of my thoughts? You are in every thought. You're part of my existence. Part of me. You are in every thought, in every line I have ever read since I first came here. You are in the river, the sails of ships, the sea, the clouds, the stones of London. Until the last hours of my life, you will remain in me. Part of the little good, part of the evil. And I will always think of the good.”
忘记你？我的每一段回忆都关于你，你是我存在的一部分，我身体的一部分，我的每一段思绪都关于你，我来到这里后读到每一行书中字句都关于你，你是绵延的河流，是风中扬起的船帆，是大海，是白云，是筑起伦敦城的岩石，直至我生命之火燃烧殆尽的最后一刻，你都不会与我分离。你是我善良的一面，也是我罪恶的一面，但我会永远记得善良的那个你。
简介:
Great Expectations may seem like an obvious choice, but it will do more than reward the Chinese penchant for Victorian high society. As well as being one of the most recognisable English-language stories, the novel explores social mobility, the contemporary class system, and empire, all backed up with a number of Dickens' larger-than-life characters and the first-person voice of the ever hopeful Pip.
《远大前程》（又名《孤星血泪》）是狄更斯最成熟的作品之一，是他比较晚期的作品。它的作用不只局限于满足中国人对维多利亚时代上流社会的兴趣。该小说不但是英文名著，还探究社会流动性、维多利亚时代的社会阶级系统和大英帝国的历史。此书始终用第一人称——永远充满希望的“皮普”来叙事，并充斥着诸多非同凡响的人物故事。
For the Chinese reader, it’s a cultural exploration of Britain at one of the most important points in her history, and a classic piece of literature by the second-most famous British writer of all time.
对于中国读者而言，《远大前程》是一场文化之旅，探究英国历史中最重要的一章，同时也是英国第二大作家的名垂千古的经典之作。
美国篇
1.ON THE ROAD—JACK KEROUAC
《在路上》杰克·凯鲁亚克
漫漫路途上一座叛逆的丰碑
简介:
Published in 1957, Kerouac’s masterpiece captured the voice of America’s ‘Beat Generation’, an iconoclastic group of writers that sprung up in the post-war US as a reaction against mainstream social values:materialism, capitalist accumulation, passive acceptance of religious and ethical codes.
凯鲁亚克在1957年出版的这部杰作发出了美国“垮掉的一代”的声音，这一派作家的思想有悖于传统信仰，在二战后的美国迅速崛起，反应了对战后祖国主流价值观，即物质主义、资本积累、对宗教和道德准则的被动接受等的抗议。
On the Road describes the whistle-stop travels of Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarty. The story is enriched by the clarity of Kerouac’s spontaneous prose, yet has resounded with young readers to this day for its underlying values of exploration, experimentalism, and the (ultimately fruitless) search for true value in life.
《在路上》描绘了萨尔（Sal Paradise）与狄安（Dean Moriarty）的美国之行。凯鲁亚克的散文自然真切，也因为故事内在的价值观——探索、尝试、（虽说最后没有成功却）不断寻找生命的真实意义等一直引起年轻读者的共鸣。其疏狂漫游、沉思顿悟的人生成为“垮掉的一代”的一种理想。
2. THE GRAPES OF WRATH—JOHN STEINBECK
《愤怒的葡萄》约翰·史坦贝克
没有过高的希望，就不会被失望搞垮
“人类已被证明具有伟大的心灵和精神——面临失败的勇气，勇敢无畏的精神，宽恕和仁爱之心。作为一名作家，必须宣扬和赞颂这些。我认为，一个作家如果不能热忱地相信人类有自我提高的能力，就不会献身于文学，也不能算是文学界的一员。”——约翰·史坦贝克
简介:
Arguably Nobel Prize-winning American writer John Steinbeck’s greatest work, The Grapes of Wrath follows the fortunes of the Joads, a family of Oklahoman farmers forced to flee their Dust Bowl home during the Great Depression.
《愤怒的葡萄》可以说是诺贝尔文学奖获得者、美国作家约翰·史坦贝克最出色的长篇小说，故事描写了约德家族的兴衰。20世纪30年代大萧条时期，这个俄克拉荷马州的农家因为其农场位于美国中部的“灰盆”（当时因为气候原因频繁爆发大规模沙尘暴），被迫逃离家园。
On the road to California, they encounter hunger, poverty, abandonment, and exploitation, yet also great generosity, sacrifice, maturity, and finally rebirth.
在走向加州的路上，他们遭遇了饥饿，贫穷，被遗弃和剥削等悲惨经历，同时也见证了同胞的慷慨、牺牲、成熟和最后的重生。
Upon publication, the novel’s accessible prose and sensitivity to the plight of America’s labouring poor both resonated with the country’s working classes and aroused the ire of some of Steinbeck’s contemporaries. A true paean to the power of the human spirit, it is studied in high school English classrooms to this day.
小说刚刚出版时，因史坦贝克的文笔朴实感性，体恤民情，引起了美国工人阶级的共鸣，但同时也激起了一些同时代人士的怒火。这部小说歌颂了人文精神的力量，迄今都是美国学生英语课堂里的必学材料。
3. ZEN AND THE ART OF MOTORCYCLE MAINTENANCE—ROBERT M. PIRSIG,
《禅与摩托车维修艺术》罗伯特·梅纳德·波西格
万物皆有禅
精彩节选：
“佛陀或是耶稣坐在电脑和变速器的齿轮旁边修行会像坐在山顶和莲花座上一样自在。如果情形不是如此，那无异于亵渎了佛陀——也就是亵渎了你自己。”
简介:
Simultaneously a thrilling piece of travel literature and a philosophical treatise, Robert M. Pirsig’s 1974 novel Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance traces the author’s bike trip from Minnesota to California.
罗伯特•M. 波西格被誉为“70年代的梭罗”，这是一部很有意思的旅游文学作品，也可以被看作一篇哲学论文。波西格74年出版的长篇小说《禅与摩托车维修艺术》描绘了作者从美国明尼苏达州到加州的一段骑行之旅。该书还被选为美国大学“禅与现代美国文学”课程的必读参考书以及《时代》周刊20世纪70年代十本最有影响力的书之一。
Interspersed with vivid sweeps of the American prairies, each chapter also chronicles a series of philosophical discussions as a father recovering from electroconvulsive therapy gradually tries to reconcile his own worldviews with those of the people around him and liberation from a materialist spiritual vacuum.
除了对北美莽莽大草原的生动描述，每一章里，波西格还针对一系列哲理性话题进行了探讨。随着作者的讨论，主人公——一位从电痉挛治疗中逐渐恢复的父亲，不断尝试协调自己和周围人的世界观，并试图摆脱物质文化带给他的空虚感。
Drawing on both the Western and Eastern philosophical canon, this challenging read ultimately serves as a platform for Pirsig to introduce his own metaphysics of Quality.
波西格借用东西方的哲学论点，阐述了自己的“质量形而上学论”，虽然要看懂相当不易，一旦读完却绝对会受益匪浅。
4.THE COLOR PURPLE—ALICE WALKER,
《紫色姐妹花》 爱丽丝·沃克
此刻是我们最年轻的时刻
简介:
Alice Walker’s Pulitzer Prize-winning epistolary novel The Color Purple won huge acclaim for its sensitive exploration of the lives of African-American women in America’s Deep South during the 1930s.
由爱丽丝·沃克所著，曾获普利策文学奖的书信体小说《紫色姐妹花》，因其对30年代居住于美国南方腹地的非裔美国女性生活的感性探讨，备受称赞。
Set in rural Georgia, Celie, the novel’s protagonist, suffers immense abuse and victimisation as a black girl growing up in a racially segregated community. Later, her meeting with Shug Avery, a glitzy singer and magic-maker, helps Celie push back against the repressive society around her and take charge of her own destiny.
故事发生于乔治亚州的乡村地区，当时因种族隔离制度，小说的黑人女主角西丽（Celie）在成长过程中遭受了大量的虐待和迫害。后来，她认识了一位耀眼的歌手兼魔术师阿弗利（Shug Avery），由此开始抵抗这个压抑的社会并主动掌握自己的命运。
5.THE MAN IN THE HIGH CASTLE—PHILIP K. DICK,
《高堡奇人》菲利普·迪克
如果二战法西斯赢了会怎样？
简介:
A novel of diffuse influences and phenomenal imaginative power, Philip K. Dick’s The Man in the High Castle challenged the foundations of American exceptionalism. Dick postulates an alternate ending to the Second World War, one which witnessed the defeat of the Allies, the conquest of the American continent by the Japanese Empire and Nazi Germany, and the subsequent Cold War ‘fought’ between the two new Axis Powers.
菲利普·迪克是美国科幻文学界的传奇人物，在美国科幻黄金时代独树一帜。以其名字命名的菲利普•K.迪克奖是美国科幻界的主要奖项之一。这本小说的灵感集众家之长，作家的想象力也令人赞叹。
《高堡奇人》挑战了“美国例外主义”的基本原则。迪克在书中假设二战有了另外一种结局，反法西斯同盟被打败，全北美洲都被日本帝国和纳粹德国所征服，接下来这两大轴心国之间便开始“冷战”。
Suffused with East Asian philosophy, and featuring passages written in stunning Japanese-English creole, the book explores the veracity of the reality we live in, how we negotiate ‘true’ or ‘fake’ identities in the face of persecution, and how much true ‘value’ can be derived from any sense of national pride.
整本书充满了东亚哲学原理，还包含了迪克自编的令人惊叹的“日英混合语”。作者通过创造这个平行世界，探讨了现实世界的真实性，人们面对迫害表达个性的方式，以及从民族自豪感中到底能获得多少真实“价值”。
各位小伙伴，
喜欢哪一本呢？
快快行动起来！
Anyway,
你读过的书不会负你，
你走过得路不会骗你。
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