This was my own experience reading the two writers who have influenced me the most, Sigmund Freud and Ralph Waldo Emerson. They gave words to thoughts and feelings that I had never been able to render myself. They shone a light onto the world and what they saw, suddenly I saw, too. From Emerson I learned to trust my own thoughts, to trust them even when every voice seems to be on the other side. I need the wherewithal, as Emerson did, to say what's on my mind and to take the inevitable hits. Much more I learned from the sage—about character, about loss, about joy, about writing and its secret sources, but Emerson most centrally preaches the gospel of self-reliance and that is what I have tried most to take from him. I continue to hold in mind one of Emerson's most memorable passages: "Society is a joint-stock company, in which the members agree, for the better securing of his bread to each shareholder, to surrender the liberty and culture of the eater. The virtue in most request is conformity. Self-reliance is its aversion. It loves not realities and creators, but names and customs."
以下是我閱讀對我影響最深的兩位作家——西格蒙德·弗洛伊德和拉爾夫·沃爾多·愛默生作品的體驗。他們描述了我自己永遠無法描述的思想和感受，他們給世界投去一束光，照亮他們所看見的事物，突然，我也看見了。愛默生教會我相信自己的想法，甚至當所有的聲音似乎都在反對的時候依然相信它們。和愛默生一樣，我需要闡述自己想法并承擔無法避免的損失的能力。我從圣賢那兒學到更多的是——關于性格、失敗、快樂、寫作及其神秘源泉——但是愛默生集中宣揚的是自立的福音，而自立是我付出諸多努力想要從他那兒承襲來的品質。我依然記得愛默生最經典的一段話：“社會是一家股份制公司，每個成員之間都達成協議——為了向每個股東提供食物時能更有把握，就必須將其他吃飯的人的自由和教養消除。其中最必備的美德就是服從。自立卻是讓它深惡痛絕的東西。真相和創造者，這不是社會所喜歡的東兩，它喜歡的是名義和傳統的規矩。”
Emerson's greatness lies not only in showing you how powerful names and customs can be, but also in demonstrating how exhilarating it is to buck them. When he came to Harvard to talk about religion, he shocked the professors and students by challenging the divinity of Jesus and the truth of his miracles. He wasn't invited back for decades.
愛默生的偉大不僅僅在于向你們展示名義和規矩的力量之大，還在于向你們示范抵抗名義和規矩是多么令人振奮。當他前往哈佛大學對宗教這一話題展開演講的時候，教授們和學生們都被他嚇壞了，他竟然挑戰耶穌的神圣性和其神跡的真實性，此后幾十年，他再沒有收到哈佛的邀請。
From Freud I found a great deal to ponder as well. Freud was a speculative essayist and interpreter of the human condition. He challenges nearly every significant human ideal. He goes after religion. He says that it comes down to the longing for the father. He goes after love. He calls it "the overestimation of the erotic object." He attacks our desire for charismatic popular leaders. We're drawn to them because we hunger for absolute authority. He declares that dreams don't predict the future. They're disguised fulfillments of repressed wishes.
而從弗洛伊德那兒我也發觀了許多值得深思的事情。弗洛伊德善于推測并對人類狀態進行解讀。他幾乎對每一條重要的人類理想都提出挑戰，他追逐宗教，他說這歸根結底是對父親的熱切企盼。他研究愛情，將其稱作“對性愛對象的高估”。他抨擊我們對富有魅力、受歡迎的領導人的渴望，我們被他們吸引是因為我們渴求絕對的權力。他宣稱夢境無法預測未來，它們不過是被壓抑的欲望的偽裝。
評論
打印
