In the National Book Award–winning Let the Great World Spin, Colum McCann thrilled readers with a marvelous high-wire act of fiction that The New York Times Book Review called “an emotional tour de force.” Now McCann demonstrates once again why he is one of the most acclaimed and essential authors of his generation with a soaring novel that spans continents, leaps centuries, and unites a cast of deftly rendered characters, both real and imagined.
Newfoundland, 1919. Two aviators—Jack Alcock and Arthur Brown—set course for Ireland as they attempt the first nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean, placing their trust in a modified bomber to heal the wounds of the Great War.
Dublin, 1845 and ’46. On an international lecture tour in support of his subversive autobiography, Frederick Douglass finds the Irish people sympathetic to the abolitionist cause—despite the fact that, as famine ravages the countryside, the poor suffer from hardships that are astonishing even to an American slave.
New York, 1998. Leaving behind a young wife and newborn child, Senator George Mitchell departs for Belfast, where it has fallen to him, the son of an Irish-American father and a Lebanese mother, to shepherd Northern Ireland’s notoriously bitter and volatile peace talks to an uncertain conclusion.
These three iconic crossings are connected by a series of remarkable women whose personal stories are caught up in the swells of history. Beginning with Irish housemaid Lily Duggan, who crosses paths with Frederick Douglass, the novel follows her daughter and granddaughter, Emily and Lottie, and culminates in the present-day story of Hannah Carson, in whom all the hopes and failures of previous generations live on. From the loughs of Ireland to the flatlands of Missouri and the windswept coast of Newfoundland, their journeys mirror the progress and shape of history. They each learn that even the most unassuming moments of grace have a way of rippling through time, space, and memory.
The most mature work yet from an incomparable storyteller, TransAtlantic is a profound meditation on identity and history in a wide world that grows somehow smaller and more wondrous with each passing year.
Colum McCann is the internationally bestselling author of the novels Zoli, Dancer, This Side of Brightness, and Songdogs, as well as two critically acclaimed story collections. His fiction has been published in thirty languages. He has been a finalist for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award and was the inaugural winner of the Ireland Fund of Monaco Literary Award in Memory of Princess Grace. He has been named one of Esquire's "Best and Brightest," and his short film Everything in This Country Must was nominated for an Oscar in 2005. A contributor to The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, The Atlantic Monthly, and The Paris Review, he teaches in the Hunter College MFA Creative Writing Program. He lives in New York City with his wife and their three children.
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这本书的魅力在于它对“身份”这一概念的解构与重塑,它没有提供任何简单的答案,反而将问题抛回给读者,让你不得不直面自身处境的复杂性。我发现自己不断地在阅读过程中停下来,思考书中人物的那些看似矛盾的选择。他们似乎总是在扮演着某种角色,既渴望融入,又本能地排斥被完全定义。这种内心的拉扯,被作者用极其冷静、近乎于科学观察般的笔触冷静地记录下来,但这种冷静之下,却涌动着令人不安的暗流。叙述者在不同视角间的切换非常流畅,但每一次切换都带来一种微小的、不和谐的音符,这种不和谐感恰恰是这本书保持其独特张力的关键。它拒绝一切平庸的舒适区,强迫你以一种审视的、甚至略带批判的眼光去看待我们习以为常的生活结构。这本书的结构本身就像一个精妙的谜团,每一章都是一个线索,但拼凑起来的图景却依然保持着某种令人着迷的模糊性,仿佛你永远只是站在迷雾的边缘。
评分如果用音乐来比喻,这本书无疑是一部结构宏大、充满变奏的交响乐,而不是一首简洁的流行歌曲。它的节奏感非常独特,有慢板的沉思,也有突如其来的、狂风暴雨般的叙事高潮。我特别留意到作者对细节的偏执,无论是对某种特定食物的描述,还是对某种天气现象的描摹,都带着一种几乎是痴迷的精确性。这些看似无关紧要的片段,实际上是构建其宏大主题的基石,它们共同编织出一种强烈的“在场感”。你会感觉自己不只是在阅读文字,而是在那个特定的时空维度里呼吸、感知。书中关于“记忆的不可靠性”的探讨,更是达到了教科书级别的深度。作者展示了时间如何扭曲、美化甚至彻底抹去某些关键的经历,而角色们则在这种被篡改的记忆之上继续前行,构成了一种深刻的悲剧性。这种对人类认知局限性的探讨,使得整部作品的份量远超一般的小说范畴,更像是一次关于存在本质的哲学漫游。
评分从纯粹的阅读体验上来讲,这是一次需要投入全部心神的旅程,毫不轻松,但回报丰厚。作者的语言驾驭能力令人叹服,他似乎总能找到那个最恰当、同时也是最出乎意料的词语来精准地描绘一种复杂的情感状态,那些短句的爆发力,如同冷水泼面般清醒,而那些长段的铺陈,则像是一条蜿蜒的河流,带着你深入到故事的核心地带。这本书最让我震撼的是它对“界限”的探讨——文化上的界限,情感上的界限,以及个人内在与外在世界的界限。书中人物不断地跨越或试图跨越这些界限,但每一次的跨越都伴随着巨大的代价。它没有贩卖廉价的励志或简单的团圆结局,而是提供了一种更为真实、更为耐人寻味的“和解”——不是与外部世界的和解,而是与自身永恒漂泊状态的和解。读完后,我感到一种清醒的疲惫,仿佛自己也经历了一次漫长而深刻的迁徙,虽然终点依然模糊,但过程本身已然意义非凡。
评分这本书的叙事结构着实令人耳目一新,它仿佛是一台精密的、不断自我校准的时钟,滴答声中充满了对时代变迁的深刻洞察。作者在处理多线索叙事时展现出一种近乎于古典主义的严谨与现代主义的破碎感之间的精妙平衡。你会被拽入一个又一个看似不相关的场景,从某个欧洲老城昏暗的咖啡馆,到北美大陆上熙熙攘攘的港口,这些地点的切换并非生硬的跳跃,而更像是心灵感应的连接,每一次场景的转换都像是对前一个场景情绪的某种回应或反驳。我尤其欣赏作者对于“等待”这一主题的反复挖掘。书中人物似乎总是在等待着什么——一封迟到的信件,一个错过的机会,或者仅仅是黎明的到来。这种等待不是消极的停滞,而是一种内在的张力,它驱使着角色做出那些最终塑造了他们命运的微小决定。文字的密度很高,初读时可能需要放慢脚步,细细品味那些如同雕塑般精准的动词和令人窒息的排比句。这本书更像是一张极其复杂的织锦,每一个线头都牵系着历史的重量,需要耐心才能完全领略其图案的宏大与精巧。它挑战了传统的线性时间观,迫使读者重新思考记忆、疏离与归属的真正含义。
评分读罢此书,我脑中萦绕的不是具体的情节转折,而是一种强烈的情感氛围,那种夹杂着怀旧、疏离和某种难以言喻的、对“失落美学”的迷恋。作者的笔触极富画面感,但这种画面感并非那种明亮清晰的纪实风格,而是带着一层薄薄的、仿佛被时间浸染过的、略显模糊的琥珀色滤镜。书中对特定历史时期的氛围营造达到了令人叹为观止的程度,即便不提及具体年份和事件,你也能清晰地感受到那种时代特有的焦虑与浮躁,那种介于繁荣与衰败之间的微妙平衡。角色们的对话常常是言简意赅,充满了未尽之意,每一次的寒暄背后都隐藏着巨大的、未被言说的情感鸿沟。这使得阅读过程像是在参与一场精妙的哑剧,你必须依靠语气的细微变化和环境的烘托来理解人物内心深处的翻涌。对我而言,这本书更像是一部关于“旅行者的心智地图”的散文诗,它描绘的远不止地理上的位移,更是精神层面上的流放与追寻。那些关于漂泊的论述,精准地击中了每一个在外漂泊过的心灵深处最隐秘的角落。
评分以前很爱的多片段时空视角转换叙述 这次觉得这样好像弱化了长篇应有整体性 称作中短篇小说集也无不可。不过他的短句排比真棒。
评分告诉我为什么这不是短篇小说集……
评分以前很爱的多片段时空视角转换叙述 这次觉得这样好像弱化了长篇应有整体性 称作中短篇小说集也无不可。不过他的短句排比真棒。
评分以前很爱的多片段时空视角转换叙述 这次觉得这样好像弱化了长篇应有整体性 称作中短篇小说集也无不可。不过他的短句排比真棒。
评分告诉我为什么这不是短篇小说集……
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