具体描述
This Is All: The Pillow Book of Cordelia Kenn
The story of Cordelia Kenn, told by herself, covering her life from the age of fifteen until the birth of her baby when she is almost twenty. The Pillow Book is an ancient Japanese form: "A notebook or collection of notebooks kept in some accessible but relatively private place, and in which the author would from time to time record impressions, daily events, poems, letters, stories, ideas, descriptions of people, etc." [Ivan Morris in the notes to The Pillow Book of Sei Shõnagon.] Cordelia intends to give her book to her daughter as a sixteenth birthday present, so that in this way they can share their teenage years. She includes in her book not only her first love affair and her ambitions and thoughts and everyday events that are important to her, but all sorts of things not usually told in stories. She attempts to include all aspects of her life. Not surprisingly, her book is long.
From a review by Peter Hollindale in School Librarian, Autumn 2005, Vol. 53 No. 3, pp 165-6:
[…] This is all is the most daring of Chambers' experiments so far. Cordelia Kenn, his first-person narrator, is 19 and pregnant. Because her vocation is poetry and writing is necessary to her life, she compiles what she intends to share with her unborn daughter when the child is 16: the narrative of her own life from just before her 16th birthday to the present, interspersed with the 'pillow book' she has assembled in these years. A 'pillow book', on a Japanese model, is defined here by Ivan Morris as a 'notebook or collection of notebooks...in which the author would from time to time record impressions, daily events, poems, letters, stories, ideas, descriptions of people, etc'. The narrative thread is thus accompanied by abundant deviations, digressions, interruptions, pauses, during which we gather insights into the hidden, true, complex Cordelia, in whose house of self are many rooms. What Cordelia the young writer intends as a way of being contemporary with her child is also in practice a kind of teaching and initiation. This story shall the woman teach her daughter. Cordelia loves her Shakespeare, and allusions to him are recurrent and plentiful: the novel is about many things besides Cordelia, one of them that a life lives on in language and writing and is recoverable. Which, as things turn out, is just as well.
The book is immense, in size, ambition, scope and reach. The torment, joy and intensity of sexual learning can rarely have been caught so vividly. Here is not only Cordelia's sexual, emotional and mental history in these years, recorded in intimate, self-interrogating detail, but also the life behind the life, where language quarries deeply to bring private order out of turbulence. This is 'all' of Cordelia, and only a vast book can contain it.
Every bit of Cordelia's long tempest-tossed journey is worth following with her. Just occasionally she seems briefly to make way for an authorial cadenza, a homily or joke, which even Cordelia could not believably achieve in her stormy youth. For instance, the elaborate displacement activities that mark school exam revision are not so perfectly or amusingly known at the time to those who perpetrate them! But for nearly all its length, this is Cordelia's book. Here is her space. This is all is a huge and wonderful act of imaginative empathy, for which all 16 year olds who might be Cordelia's daughters, or sons, have cause to be grateful, as does the art form of young adult fiction.
From a '*Star*' review by Michael Cart in Booklist, USA, Autumn 2006:
Arguably, the book offers the most complete character study in all of young-adult literature, showing readers the life, mind, and soul of a teenage girl, while also giving readers full-dress portraits of her baby's father, her friends, her family, and - most satisfyingly - her English teacher and mentor, Julie. Cordelia records not only her love for these people but also for Shakespeare, for poetry, for words. Unsparingly honest and candid, she never flinches from exploring the physical realities of her body (it appears that girls are flatulent - who knew?) or from recounting the sexually explicit details of her affair with an older man and her terrifying ordeal when she is kidnapped and threatened with rape. Cordelia records it all, because she wants to understand it all; she wants to know everything about herself, and her way of understanding is writing. Thus, she explores the why of things as well as the what and the how. In so doing, she is by turns captivating and maddening, for she loves to analyse and to discover ambiguities. And so her story challenges - but it will grow richer and larger with each reading. Ultimately, this novel is more than a mere pièce de résistance; it is the masterpiece of one of young-adult literature's greatest living writers.
From a *star* Kirkus Review, September 2006:
With profound respect for readers, Chambers again stretches the YA genre to its edges and beyond.[…] Characters are intricate and sometimes infuriating. Moments of horror stunning and unforeshadowed. Ambitious, imperfect, challenging and powerfully affecting.
From Dinah Hall, journalist, in John McLay's on-line 'Children's Books of the Year 2005':
Once I'd got over my initial queasiness at the idea of a seventy year old man writing about sex in the voice of a sixteen year old girl (sorry: ageism and sexism in one line) I couldn't - to coin a cliché - put Aidan Chambers' This Is All: The Pillow Book of Cordelia Kenn down: and given that the book is bloody heavy at 800 pages that is quite an achievement. I loved the characters. I loved the pontification. I loved the story (though I wasn't quite so keen on the ending) and I loved the fact that soon after reading it, my sixteen-year-old daughter dumped her boyfriend. Thank you, thank you, Aidan Chambers.
From Robert Dunbar in The Irish Times, 12 Nov. 2005:
…a fascinating depiction of what Cordelia at one point designates 'the uneasy, vulnerable, blossoming years of the early teens'. Its ambition, its complexity and its length demand a slow, close reading, but one which will be more than repaid by the power and depth of its insights.
First published by Bodley Head in 2005
ISBN: 0-370-32684-9
£14.99 hardback, 816 pp.
Definitions paperback, January 2007, ISBN 978-0-099-41776-7, £7.99
作者简介
目录信息
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这本书最令我着迷的地方，在于它所展现出的那种“留白”的艺术。作者似乎总是在最关键的时刻戛然而止，留下广阔的想象空间，让我去填补那些空白。它不像许多作品那样，将一切都解释得清清楚楚，而是留给你自己去思考，去解读，去创造。我常常在读完一个章节，或者一段描述后，会陷入沉思，去想象接下来会发生什么，去揣测人物内心的想法。这种“不确定性”反而激起了我更强的参与感，让我觉得我不仅仅是一个读者，更是这个故事的共同创作者。我发现，作者并非是不想写清楚，而是他深知，有些东西，是无法用语言完全表达的，有些情感，是需要读者自己去体会的。他提供了一个框架，一个引子，而真正的故事，则在我自己的脑海中，在我的体验中，被一点点地构建起来。这种阅读体验，让我感到非常振奋，因为它证明了，文字的力量，不仅仅在于其本身，更在于它能够激发读者的创造力。
评分在我阅读《This is All》的过程中，我经历了一种非常奇特的“时间错觉”。有时候，我感觉自己仿佛在书中度过了漫长的岁月，与书中的人物一同经历了生命的起伏，而当我回过神来，却发现窗外的世界 apenas 过去了几个小时。这种感觉并非是源于情节的跌宕起伏，而是源于作者对细节的极致捕捉和对情感的细腻描绘。他能够用最简练的文字，勾勒出一个鲜活的场景，传递出人物内心最复杂的情绪。我时常会被书中某个微小的动作、一个眼神、一句无心的低语所打动，仿佛我就是那个身处其中的人，能够切身感受到其中的喜怒哀乐。这种沉浸感是如此强烈，以至于我常常在合上书本后，仍然久久无法抽离，脑海中不断回放着那些片段，思考着它们所带来的启示。它没有给我宏大的叙事，没有惊心动魄的情节，但它却能在最平凡的日常中，挖掘出最动人的力量。我开始意识到，真正的“故事”并非一定要有戏剧性的冲突，而在于对生命真实状态的还原和对人性细微之处的洞察。作者做到了这一点，并且是以一种我从未想过的方式。
评分《This is All》的叙事方式，对我来说，是一种前所未有的挑战。我习惯了有明确的时间线索、有清晰的人物关系、有层层递进的情节。然而，在这本书中，我发现自己常常需要在不同的时间点、不同的场景之间穿梭，去拼凑出完整的图景。作者并没有遵循传统的线性叙事，而是将时间打散，将空间模糊，让你在阅读时，需要不断地去调整自己的认知模式。刚开始，我有些不适应，觉得难以抓住重点，甚至有些迷失。但渐渐地，我发现这种“碎片化”的叙事，反而更能捕捉到生活的真实状态。生活本身就是如此，充满了各种各样的片段，它们交织在一起，构成了我们完整的经历。作者只是将这种真实的状态，用文字进行了最直接的呈现。我开始欣赏这种打破常规的勇气，以及它所带来的深刻的阅读体验。我不再纠结于“故事”的定义，而是去感受作者想要传达的那种“当下”的生命力。
评分我必须承认，《This is All》这本书，在阅读的过程中，对我构成了一种“认知挑战”。我习惯于在阅读时，寻找清晰的逻辑，寻找明确的因果关系，寻找可以被归纳和总结的“主题”。然而，这本书却让我不得不放弃这些习惯性的阅读方式。它并没有提供给我一条明确的路径，而是让我自己在文字的迷宫中摸索，去发现属于自己的出口。我时常会感到困惑，会怀疑自己是否真正理解了作者想要表达的意思。但渐渐地，我发现这种困惑本身，也是阅读的一部分。它迫使我去反思，去质疑，去探索更深层次的含义。我开始意识到，作者并非是要给我一个标准答案，而是要引导我去发现，去创造。他提供的是一种“可能性”，而我需要做的，是去捕捉这种可能性，并将其转化为属于我自己的理解。这种过程，虽然充满挑战，但却也让我收获了前所未有的成长。
评分这本书最让我感到惊喜的一点，是它所展现出的那种“不动声色的力量”。它没有激烈的冲突，没有跌宕起伏的情节，但它却能在平静的叙述中，触动人心最柔软的角落。我常常在读到某些日常的场景，某些寻常的对话时，突然被一种强烈的共鸣所击中，仿佛作者读懂了我内心深处的某些情感。它不像其他书籍那样，通过制造戏剧性的冲突来吸引我的注意力，而是通过对生活细微之处的捕捉，对人性深层体验的描绘，来引起我的共鸣。我发现，作者的语言非常克制，但他克制之下，却蕴含着巨大的情感张力。他并不直接告诉你应该如何感受，而是通过场景的描绘，通过人物的动作，让你自己去体会其中的情感。这种“不动声色的力量”，反而比那些喧嚣的表达，更具穿透力。它让我重新审视了生活的意义，以及那些被我们忽略的，但却至关重要的情感。
评分《This is All》的语言风格，对我来说，是一种全新的挑战，也是一种独特的享受。它不像我们常读到的那些优美流畅、修辞华丽的文字，反而显得有些疏离、有些直白，甚至有些“笨拙”。然而，正是这种“不加修饰”的语言，却赋予了作品一种前所未有的真实感和力量。我发现，作者并没有刻意去雕琢词句，而是让语言自然地流淌，就像生活本身一样，有时直白得令人心惊，有时又充满某种难以言喻的诗意。我常常在阅读时，会停下来，去体会每一个词语的份量，去感受它们组合在一起时所产生的奇妙化学反应。它没有给我“像”某种风格的提示，而是创造了一种属于它自己的语言。这种语言，有时锋利如刀，能瞬间刺破内心的防线，有时又柔软如棉，能抚慰心灵深处的创伤。我开始意识到，语言的魅力，并不在于其多么华丽，而在于其能否准确而有力地传达作者的思想和情感。作者在这方面做到了极致，他用最朴素的语言，触及了最深刻的灵魂。
评分《This is All》带给我的，是一种全新的“对话”方式。我感觉作者并不是在“讲”故事，而是在与我进行一场深入的“对话”。他抛出一些问题，一些场景，然后将如何解读，如何回应的主动权交给了我。我发现，我无法找到一个确切的“答案”，因为这本书本身就是一个开放式的提问。我时常在阅读时，会产生疑问，会思考作者为何要这样写，为何要这样表达。而当我继续往下读时，往往又会发现新的线索，新的理解，甚至是对我之前疑问的另一种解答。这种“对话”的过程，让我感到非常兴奋，因为它鼓励我独立思考，鼓励我形成自己的观点。我不再是被动地接受信息，而是主动地参与到文本的建构中。我发现，这本书的魅力，不仅在于作者的才华，更在于它能够激发读者的智慧，能够与读者共同完成一次精神的旅程。
评分《This is All》带给我的冲击，不仅仅在于其形式上的独特性，更在于它所触及的那些深层的情感和哲学思考。我发现，这本书并没有一个明确的“主题”，它更像是一面镜子，映照出每个读者内心深处的某些东西。当我沉浸其中时，我仿佛看到自己过往经历的影子，那些被遗忘的片段，那些未曾说出口的话语，都在作者精心编织的文字中重新浮现。它没有给我明确的答案，没有告诉我“应该”如何思考，而是提供了一种可能性，一种去连接、去反思的空间。我常常在读到某一段时，会突然停下来，陷入沉思，回味作者所描绘的场景，以及它在我心中激起的涟漪。有时候，我感觉它像是一种心灵的对话，作者通过文字与我交流，引导我走向内心更深处的角落。我曾尝试着去理解作者的意图，去揣测他想要表达的“深意”，但渐渐地，我意识到这种揣测本身就限制了这本书的魅力。它不是一个谜题，等待我去解答，而是一种开放式的体验，邀请我去感受，去与它共振。我发现，越是试图去“理解”它，反而越容易被它所困扰，但当我放下这种执念，只是纯粹地去“读”它，去允许它在我脑海中自由地延展时，一种全新的理解便油然而生。
评分《This is All》这本书，给我的感受，是一种“共生”的体验。我感觉自己不再仅仅是一个读者，而是与这本书，与作者，形成了一种奇特的共生关系。我不仅仅是在阅读文字，更是在感受文字背后的生命力。作者似乎将自己的某种情感，某种体验，某种思考，都融入到了文字之中，而这些融入的元素，又以一种我无法完全理解的方式，与我的内心产生了共鸣。我发现，这本书并没有明确的“情节”，也没有清晰的“主题”，但它却能够触动我内心最深处的某些东西。它就像是一种精神的催化剂，让我开始审视自己的生活，开始思考那些我曾经忽略的问题。我发现，这本书的价值，并不仅仅在于其文字本身，更在于它能够引发的思考，能够激发的共鸣。它不是一本“读完就结束”的书，而是一本会伴随我，在我的人生旅途中，不断给予我启示的书。
评分这本书，我可以说，它彻底颠覆了我对“故事”的理解。刚拿到《This is All》的时候，我以为这只是又一本寻常的叙事作品，或许会伴随我度过几个闲暇的下午。然而，事实证明，我的想法过于简单，甚至可以说是狭隘。当我翻开第一页，一个熟悉的场景，一段仿佛我亲身经历过的对话，就这样毫无征兆地闯入我的意识。我试图去捕捉它的脉络，去寻找作者设置的“开端”，却发现我所习惯的叙事结构在这里荡然无存。它不像我们通常读到的那些有明确情节发展、角色塑造清晰的书籍，反而更像是一系列碎片化的感受、思想的流淌，又像是对某个瞬间的极度放大和延展。我花了很长时间，在脑海中一遍遍地重塑那些零散的画面，试图连接它们之间的隐秘丝线。有时候，我感觉作者在玩弄我的期待，故意让我迷失在文字的迷宫里，但奇怪的是，这种迷失感并没有带来沮丧，反而让我对接下来会遇见什么充满了莫名的好奇。我开始意识到，作者似乎有意打破了“讲故事”的传统定义，将阅读变成了一种更为主动的探索。我不再是被动地接受信息，而是需要主动地去构建，去感受，去在那些看似无关紧ோருக்கு在一起的词语和句子之间寻找属于自己的意义。这种阅读体验是前所未有的，它迫使我走出舒适区，用一种全新的视角去审视文字的力量。
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