文｜友鄰蘇辛
圖｜互聯(lián)網(wǎng)
他就是林語堂哨查，人稱 “幽默大師”，然而他是不是真的很幽默剧辐，很難講解恰。
喜歡林語堂的人，贊其中英文都爐火純青浙于，是文之至美护盈。
不喜歡他的人，如郭沫若羞酗，說他既無自知之明腐宋，又無知人之雅，東方既未通檀轨，西方也不懂胸竞，只靠懂得一點(diǎn)洋涇浜的外國文，撿拾一些皮毛來参萄，在這里東騙騙卫枝、西騙騙。
林語堂的文章究竟如何讹挎，親愛的你校赤，不妨和我們讀讀《生活的藝術(shù)》（The Importance of Living）。
1937年筒溃，林語堂用英文出版了以西方中產(chǎn)階級(jí)為讀者的《生活的藝術(shù)》马篮，講述中國人如何觀山、弄月怜奖、聽雨浑测、看云等，被譽(yù)為中國現(xiàn)代休閑文學(xué)的代表作歪玲。
80年過去了迁央，書里有些觀點(diǎn)，獨(dú)立自主的新時(shí)代女青年一定不同意滥崩，比方說：
Is it not true that marriage is the best profession for women?
婚姻是最適于女性的職業(yè)岖圈。
拋開一些不合時(shí)宜，大部分地方夭委，依然有點(diǎn)意思幅狮。
林語堂談吃
One of the most important consequences of our being animals is that we have got this bottomless pit called the stomach. This fact has colored our entire civilization.
凡是動(dòng)物便有這么一個(gè)叫做肚子的無底洞募强。這無底洞曾影響了我們整個(gè)文明。
Confucius reduced the great desires of human beings to two: alimentation and reproduction, or in simpler terms, food and drink and women.
他（孔子）把人生的大欲簡括于營養(yǎng)和生育二事之下崇摄，簡單說來擎值，就是飲食男女。
林語堂認(rèn)為逐抑，妻子會(huì)做飯鸠儿，非常重要，知道孔子為什么把老婆休了嗎厕氨？因?yàn)樗掀艧瞬缓贸浴?/p>
1929年进每，據(jù)說為了鼓勵(lì)兒童多吃菠菜的大力水手波派問世。林語堂一定看過命斧，他在成書于1937年的《生活的藝術(shù)》中寫道：
Spinach, the calamity of all children, is never cooked properly; it is cooked until it becomes mushy, whereas if it is fried on a very hot pan with oil and salt and taken away before it loses its crispness, it is one of the most palatable of foods.
菠菜從不好好地烹煮田晚，以致兒童見了就討厭。因?yàn)樗麄兛偘巡げ藷上€一團(tuán)国葬，而不知用油鹽在極熱的鍋中煎炒贤徒，在未爛之前起鍋才是最可口的吃法。
Instead of giving patients aspirin tablets, Chinese doctors would therefore ask them to take large bowls of medicinal tea to produce perspiration.
中國醫(yī)生對(duì)于病人并不給予阿司匹林片汇四，而給他喝一大碗藥茶以取汗接奈。
And instead of taking quinine tablets, the patients of the future world might conceivably be required to drink a bowl of rich turtle soup with mushrooms, cooked with pieces of cinchona bark.
所以將來的病人，或許不必再吃金雞納片通孽，而只需喝一碗加些金雞納樹皮的冬菇甲魚湯序宦。
It makes our pharmacopoeias resemble our cook books and our cook books resemble a pharmacopoeia, and it makes the rise of botany and zoology as branches of the natural science impossible,for the Chinese scientists are thinking all the time of how a snake, a monkey, or a crocodile's flesh or a camel's hump would taste. True scientific curiosity in China is a gastronomic curiosity.
我們身體中都有饕餮的精神，這使我們的藥方書類似我們的烹飪書背苦，使我們的烹飪書類似藥方書互捌，并使植物學(xué)和動(dòng)物學(xué)發(fā)展為自然科學(xué)的一支成為不可能。因?yàn)橹袊目茖W(xué)家看見一條蛇糠惫，一只猢猻疫剃，一條鱷魚或一個(gè)駝峰時(shí)，他始終只是想去嘗嘗它們滋味硼讽。真正的科學(xué)好奇心，在中國不過是一種烹飪藝術(shù)的好奇心而已牲阁。
林語堂談快樂
This present earth is the only heaven.
塵世是唯一的天堂固阁。
The Chinese idea of happiness is, as I have noted elsewhere, being “warm, well-filled, dark and sweet”, referring to the condition of going to bed after a good supper.
我曾在別處說過，中國人對(duì)于快樂的觀念是“溫城菊、飽备燃、黑、甜”凌唬，——指吃完了一頓美餐上床去睡覺的情景并齐。
明末清初的文學(xué)批評(píng)家金圣嘆，和朋友在10天的陰雨連綿中，住在一個(gè)廟里况褪，寫下了他覺得最快樂的33個(gè)瞬間撕贞。林語堂很推崇金圣嘆，在《生活的藝術(shù)》中一一列舉了 33 個(gè) “不亦快哉”测垛，摘錄一二捏膨。
To cut with a sharp knife a bright green watermelon on a big scarlet plate of a summer afternoon. Ah, is this not happiness?
夏日于朱紅盤中，自拔快刀食侮，切綠沉西瓜号涯。不亦快哉！
A magistrate orders the beating of the drum and calls it a day. Ah, is this not happiness?
作縣官锯七，每日打退堂鼓時(shí)链快，不亦快哉！
To see someone's kite line broken. Ah, is this not happiness?
看人風(fēng)箏斷眉尸，不亦快哉久又！
林語堂談西方文化
Of all the ridiculous Western customs, I think that of shaking hands is one of the worst. I may be very progressive and able to appreciate Western art, literature, American silk stockings, Parisian perfumes and even British battleships,
我以為一切可笑的西方習(xí)俗當(dāng)中，以握手為最效五。我雖然是一個(gè)極前進(jìn)的人地消，也能領(lǐng)略西方的藝術(shù)文學(xué)、美國絲襪畏妖、巴黎香水脉执，甚至英國戰(zhàn)艦的好處，
but I cannot see how the progressive Europeans could allow this barbarous custom of shaking hands to persist to the present…I object to this custom for hygienic and many other reasons.
但我終不能懂極前進(jìn)的歐洲人何以竟會(huì)聽任這個(gè)握手的野蠻習(xí)俗存留到今日……我為了衛(wèi)生和許多別的理由戒劫，反對(duì)這個(gè)習(xí)俗半夷。
Many of my best friends have asked me why I wear Chinese instead of foreign dress. And those people call themselves my friends! They might just as well ask me why I stand on two legs.
常有許多好友問我為什么不穿西裝？他們問我這句話迅细，尚能算是我的知己嗎巫橄？這等于問我為什么用兩足直立……
The Chinese dress is worn by all Chinese gentlemen. Furthermore, all the scholars, thinkers, bankers and people who made good in China either have never worn foreign dress, or have swiftly come back to their native dress the moment they have "arrived" politically, financially or socially…
中國的紳士都穿中國衣服。此外如功成名就的中國高士茵典、思想家湘换、銀行家，有許多從來沒有穿過西裝统阿，有許多則于政治彩倚、金融或社會(huì)上獲得成就，立刻改穿中裝......
Who are the people wearing foreign clothes today in China ? The college students, the clerks earning a hundred a month…
你可知道中國現(xiàn)在穿西裝者是怎樣一些人嗎扶平？大學(xué)生帆离、賺百元一月薪俸的小職員.....
And then, of course, last but not least, we have Henry Puyi, who has the incomparably bad taste to adopt a foreign name, foreign dress, and a pair of dark spectacles. That outfit of his alone will kill all his chances of coming back to the Dragon Throne…
最后，當(dāng)然還有那亨利溥儀（溥儀給自己取了個(gè)英文名结澄，Henry）哥谷，極俗無比的題上一個(gè)外國名字岸夯，穿上一身西裝，還要加上一副黑眼鏡们妥。單是這身裝束猜扮，已足使他喪失一切復(fù)登大室的機(jī)會(huì)……
不管林語堂怎么評(píng)價(jià)西裝，反正他結(jié)婚儀式上穿的是西裝王悍。
It requires no imagination to see that for adjustment to varying climatic conditions, the Chinese dress is also the only logical mode.
在適合時(shí)令的調(diào)節(jié)上破镰，中國衣服也是顯而易見的最近情理。
While the Westerner is compelled to wear underwear, one shirt, perhaps one vest and one coat, whether the weather temperature is below zero or above a hundred, the Chinese dress is infinitely flexible.…
穿西裝不論寒暑表低到零攝氏度以下压储，或高到一百攝氏度以上鲜漩，總是限于一身內(nèi)衣褲，一件襯衫集惋，一件外衣孕似，連或不連馬甲。但中國衣服則可以加減隨心……
I am led to believe that the only thing - which saves the Chinese nation from extermination by tuberculosis and pneumonia is the cotton-padded gown.
我不能不信中國民族所以能夠不被肺癆和肺炎所滅盡刮刑，全靠那一件棉袍的力量喉祭。
民國大記者曹聚仁，曾奉勸廣大讀者雷绢，對(duì)林語堂吃夠了面包泛烙，抽夠了雪茄以后所發(fā)的癡語姑妄聽之，不可信以為真翘紊，除非你在美國銀行里存夠了美金蔽氨，也跟他到美國去。
但我想帆疟，即使我們沒有錢鹉究，依然可以有顆閑適的心，城頭看雪踪宠，燈前看月自赔，舟中看霞，月下看美人柳琢，依然可以在平淡生活中绍妨，發(fā)現(xiàn)很多樂趣。
就像林語堂所說染厅，自己沒有讀過洛克（John Locke痘绎，17世紀(jì)英國哲學(xué)家），也沒有讀過休謨（David Hume, 18世紀(jì)蘇格蘭哲學(xué)家）肖粮，直接拿人生當(dāng)做課本，理論根據(jù)大都是從下面這些人物來的：
老媽子黃媽......一個(gè)隨口罵人的蘇州船娘尔苦；
一個(gè)上海的電車售票員涩馆；
廚子的妻子行施；
動(dòng)物園中一只小獅子；
紐約中央公園里的一只松鼠魂那；
一個(gè)發(fā)過一句妙論的輪船上管事……
以及任何一個(gè)不毀滅我們?nèi)松闷嬉庾R(shí)的作家蛾号，
或任何一個(gè)不毀滅他自己人生好奇意識(shí)的作家。
本文參考自《生活的藝術(shù)》（越裔漢譯涯雅，陜西師范大學(xué)出版社2003版）鲜结、《值得商榷的“人生指南”——評(píng)林語堂著<生活的藝術(shù)>》、《林語堂與東西方文化》活逆、《林語堂的中國文化觀》等精刷。
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