When I was sixteen I was already writing articles and offering them to any kind of editor whose address I could discover. These articles were of two kinds. The first， which I signed portentously “J.Boynton Priestley”， were serious， very serious indeed， and were full of words like “renaissance” and “significance” and “aftermath”， and suggested that their author was about a hundred and fifty years old. And nobody wanted them. They could not be given away. No editor had a body of readers old enough for such articles. The other kind were skits and burlesquesburlesque n.作戏， 滑稽表演 adj.滑稽的， 可笑的 and general funny work， written from the grimly determined humorous standpoint of the school magazine. One of these was accepted， printed and paid for by a London humorous weekly. I had arrived. （And my father， not to be found wanting on such an occasion， presented me with one of his four-penny cigars， with which， as I fancy he guessed， I had been secretly experimenting for some months.） The issue of the weekly containing my article burst upon the world. Riding inside a tram from Duckworth Lane to Godwin Street， Bradford， I saw a middleaged woman opening this very copy of the weekly， little knowing， as I made haste to tell myself， that one of its group of brilliantbrilliant adj.灿烂的， 闪耀的， 有才气的 contributors was not two yards away. I watched her turn the pages. She came to the page； she hesitated； she stopped， she began to read my article. Ah - what delight！ But mine， of course， not hers. And not mine for long， not more than a second， for then there settled on her face an expression I have noticed ten thousand times since， and have for years now tried not to notice - the typical expression of the reader， the audience， the customer， the patronpatron n.（对某人， 某种目标， 艺术等）赞助人， 资助人. How shall I describe this curious look？ There is in it a kind of innocence - and otherwise I think I would have stopped writing years ago - but mixed a trifle sourly with this admirable innocence is a flavoring of warinesswariness n.谨慎， 注意， 小心， perhaps a touch of suspicion itself. “Well， what have we here？” it inquires dubiously. And then the proud and smirkingsmirky adj.假笑的，傻笑的，得意地笑的 Poet and Maker falls ten thousand feet into dubiety. So ever since that tram ride I have never caught a glimpse of the reader， the audience， the customer， the patron， without instantly trying to wedge myself into the rocks above the black tarn of doubt. As I do this， there is the flash of a blue wing - and the bird of delight has flown.
我的第一篇文章
约·博·普里斯特利
我十六岁就已写文章，发现哪位编辑的地址就把文章投给那位编辑。这些文章有两类。第一类，签上“J. Boynton Priestley”的大名，写得严肃，非常严肃，满篇是诸如“复兴”“意义”以及“后果”之类的词，暗示文章的作者年事已高。这类文章谁也不要。白送都送不掉。没有哪个编辑拥有的读者是老得可以看这类文章的。另一类是些讽刺文、游戏文章和一般的趣味作品，均按学校刊物那种严格确定的幽默观点写成。其中一篇为伦敦一家幽默周刊所采用、所刊登、所付酬。我获得成功。（这回我父亲应付难局颇为得法，将他四便士一支的雪茄烟送给我一支，我其实偷偷地以他的雪茄做试验已经长达数月，我看我父亲是早有所料的。）登我的文章的那一期周刊突然问世。我乘上从德克沃思巷开往布雷德福的葛德温街的电车，看见一位中年妇女翻开的正是那份周刊，我赶紧对自己说，她有所不知，该刊的卓越撰稿人之一就近在咫尺。我看着她一页一页地翻。她翻到了那一页；她犹豫了一下；她停下不翻了，开始看我的文章。啊——好高兴啦！高兴的当然是我而不是她。我也没高兴多一会儿，不过一刹那，因为她脸上露出一种我至今注意过千万次而且多年来尽力不予注意的表情——读者、听众、顾客以及资助人所特有的——否则我几年前就不写了——不过跟这种可钦佩的天真单纯夹杂在一起而显得有点难堪的却是一丝谨慎意味，或许就是疑心本身的一点表现。它半信半疑地在问：“嗯，看看这是什么名堂？”于是傲慢、自满而痴笑的堂堂诗人跌进了怀疑的万丈深渊。所以，自那次坐电车以后，我只要望读者、听众、顾客、庇护人一眼，就恨不得挤到黑黝黝的怀疑之湖上空的峻岩空隙里躲起来。当我这样做时，蓝色的翅膀一闪——欢乐之鸟早已飞去了。
What Is Real
A. Munro
Whenever people get an opportunity to ask me questions about my writing， I can be sure that some of the questions asked will be these：
“Do you write about the real people？”
“Did those things really happen？”
“When you write about a small town are you really writing about Wingham？” （Wingham is the small town in Ontario where I was born and grew up， and it has often been assumed， by people who should know better， that I have simply “fictionalized”fictionalize v.把（历史事件等）编成小说，使小说化 this place in my town. Indeed， the local newspaper has taken me to task for making it the “butt of a soured and cruel introspectionintrospection n.内省， 反省， 自省.”）
The usual thing， for writers， is to regard these either as very naive questions， asked by people who really don，t understand the difference between autobiography and fiction， who can，t recognize the device of he firstperson narrator， or else as catchyouout questions posed by journalists who hope to stir up exactly the sort of dreary （and to outsiders， slightly comic） indignationindignation n.愤慨， 义愤 voiced by my hometown paper. Writers answer such questions patiently or crossly according to temperament and the mood they，re in. They say， no， you must understand， my characters are composites； no， those things didn，t happen the way I wrote about them； no， of course not， that isn，t Wingham （or wherever other place it may be that has had the queer unsought - after distinction of hatching a writer）. Or the writer may， riskily， ask the questioners what is real， anyway？ None of this seems to be very satisfactory. People go on asking these same questions because the subject really does interest and bewilder them. It would seem to be quite true that they don，t know what fiction is.
And how could they know， when what it is， is changing all the time， and we differ among ourselves， and we don，t really try to explain because it is too difficult？
What I would like to do here is what I can，t do in two or three sentences at the end of a reading. I won，t try to explain what fiction is， and what short stories （assuming， which we can，t， that there is any fixed thing that it is and they are）， but what short stories are to me， and how I write them， and how I use things that are “real”. I will start by explaining how I read stories written by other people. For one thing， I can start reading them anywhere； from beginning to end， from end to beginning， from any point in between in either direction. So obviously I don，t take up a story and follow it as if it were a road， taking me somewhere， with views and neat diversions along the way. I go into it， and move back and forth and settle here and there， and stay in it for a while. It，s more like a house. Everybody knows what a house does， how it enclosesenclose vt.放入封套， 装入， 围绕 space and makes connections between one enclosed space and another and presents what is outside in a new way. This is the nearest I can come to explaining what a story does for me， and what I want my stories to do for other people.
