2012年3月20日星期二
the same words and reddened slightly as
"Please say that again," said her uncle, either because he hadnot heard or because he had not understood.
She repeated the same words and reddened slightly as she did so.
"Gibbon! What on earth d'you want him for?" he enquired.
"Somebody advised me to read it," Rachel stammered.
"But I don't travel about with a miscellaneous collectionof eighteenth-century historians!" her uncle exclaimed.
"Gibbon! Ten big volumes at least."Rachel said that she was sorry to interrupt, and was turning to go.
"Stop!" cried her uncle. He put down his pipe, placed his book on one side,and rose and led her slowly round the room, holding her by the arm.
"Plato," he said, laying one finger on the first of a row of smalldark books, "and Jorrocks next door, which is wrong. Sophocles, Swift.
You don't care for German commentators, I presume. French, then.
You read French? You should read Balzac. Then we come to Wordsworthand Coleridge, Pope, Johnson, Addison, Wordsworth, Shelley, Keats.
One thing leads to another. Why is Marlowe here? Mrs. Chailey,I presume. But what's the use of reading if you don't read Greek?
After all, if you read Greek, you need never read anything else,pure waste of time--pure waste of time," thus speaking half to himself,with quick movements of his hands; they had come round againto the circle of books on the floor, and their progress was stopped.
"Well," he demanded, "which shall it be?""Balzac," said Rachel, "or have you the _Speech_ _on_ _the__American_ _Revolution_, Uncle Ridley?""_The_ _Speech_ _on_ _the_ _American_ _Revolution_?" he asked.
He looked at her very keenly again. "Another young man at the dance?""No. That was Mr. Dalloway," she confessed.
"Good Lord!" he flung back his head in recollection of Mr. Dalloway.
She chose for herself a volume at random, submitted it toher uncle, who, seeing that it was _La_ _Cousine_ _bette_,bade her throw it away if she found it too horrible, and wasabout to leave him when he demanded whether she had enjoyed her dance?
订阅:
博文评论 (Atom)
没有评论:
发表评论