2023年3月15日 星期三

The Story of Civilization, .《歷史的教訓》Will Durant's Fallen Leaves:Last Words on Life, Love, War, and God《落葉》;《美國名家書信選集》、WOn The Meaning Of Life



《歷史的教訓》有中文本、讀者文摘有文選



The Story of Civilization 《文明的故事》台北幼獅的翻譯本,成為中國的定本

"The trouble with most people is that they think with their hopes or fears or wishes rather than with their minds." ~ Will Durant
The Age of Voltaire: A History of Civilization in Western Europe from 1715 to 1756, With Special Emphasis on the Conflict Between Religion and Philosophy (The Story of Civilization, Vol. 9) Hardcover – January 1, 1997 by Will Durant

William Durant
William and Ariel Durant (1967)
William and Ariel Durant (1967)
BornWilliam James Durant
November 5, 1885
North Adams, Massachusetts, U.S.
DiedNovember 7, 1981 (aged 96)
Los Angeles, California
Occupation
  • Historian
  • writer
  • philosopher
  • teacher
NationalityAmerican
EducationSaint Peter's College (BA, 1907)
Columbia University (PhD, 1917)
Genrenon-fiction
SubjectHistory, philosophy, religion
Literary movementPhilosophy, etc.
Spouse
 
(m. 1913)

Selected books[edit]

See a full bibliography at Will Durant Online[23]

  • 1917: Philosophy and the Social Problem New York: Macmillan.
  • 1924: A Guide to Spinoza [Little Blue Book, No. 520]. Girard, KA: Haldeman-Julius Company.
  • 1926: The Story of Philosophy. New York: Simon & Schuster.
  • 1927: Transition. New York: Simon & Schuster.
  • 1929: The Mansions of Philosophy. New York: Simon & Schuster. Later with slight revisions re-published as The Pleasures of Philosophy
  • 1930: The Case for India. New York: Simon & Schuster.
  • 1931: A Program for America: New York: Simon & Schuster.
  • 1931: Adventures in Genius. New York: Simon & Schuster.
  • 1931: Great Men of Literature, taken from Adventures in Genius. New York: Garden City Publishing Co.
  • 1933: The Tragedy of Russia: Impressions From a Brief Visit. New York: Simon & Schuster.
  • 1936: The Foundations of Civilisation. New York: Simon & Schuster.
  • 1953: The Pleasures of Philosophy. New York: Simon & Schuster.
  • 1968: (with Ariel Durant) The Lessons of History. New York: Simon & Schuster.
  • 1970: (with Ariel Durant) Interpretations of Life. New York: Simon & Schuster.
  • 1977: (with Ariel Durant) A Dual Autobiography. New York: Simon & Schuster.
  • 2001: Heroes of History: A Brief History of Civilization from Ancient Times to the Dawn of the Modern Age. New York: Simon & Schuster. Actually copyrighted by John Little and the Estate of Will Durant.
  • 2002: The Greatest Minds and Ideas of All Time. New York: Simon & Schuster.
  • 2003: An Invitation to Philosophy: Essays and Talks on the Love of Wisdom. Promethean Press.
  • 2008: Adventures in Philosophy. Promethean Press.
  • 2014: Fallen Leaves. Simon & Schuster.

    Forbes Thought Of The Day
    “ The health of nations is more important than the wealth of nations. ”
    — Will Durant 這位認真寫作的史家,令人懷念




    Will  Durant's  Fallen Leaves:Last Words on Life, Love, War, and God《落葉》:本書有許多慧見和忠告,值得思考,譬如說,沒有讀過歷史名著的人是不懂得歷史是什麼;大學時期無法了解諸名著的真義.....




    ****

    翻譯偵探事務所: 張心漪:像媽媽一樣的譯者
    tysharon.blogspot.com/2014/09/blog-post_3.html

    Sep 3, 2014 - 張心漪(1916- )是名門之後,曾國藩的外曾孫女,出生於上海,念過當時名門閨秀雲集的中西女中,燕京大學畢業,臺大外文系教授,曾教過白先勇那一 ...

 張心漪的翻譯還曾經編入教材。國立編譯館1973年版的國中國文課本第三冊第十四課「寄子書」,修伍德安德生寫的,就是張心漪翻譯的。初版是香港今日世界(1968),原名「美國名家書信選集」,大地出版社1987年重出,改題「名人書信選集」。現在重看這封信,竟然還有點印象,只是當時對安德生一點印象都沒有,只記得他叫兒子多素描:

親愛的約翰:有件事我昨天信裡應該提的。是關於繪畫的事。不要因為一幅畫是現代的,是最新的就跟它學。到羅浮宮去,花多點時間鑑賞林布蘭、德拉克洛瓦的作品。學習素描,使你的手能不知不覺地熟練,能筆隨意走,然後你可想到你面前的東西。....關於顏色,你要小心。多到大自然裡去找,別到顏料店去找──那是別人的調色板──而在各種光線下看房屋的側面。
你不會一下子登峰造極。成功是吃盡辛苦得來的。
    我所企望的不是你的成功。我希望你對於人,對於工作,都抱著正確的態度。單是這一點也許就可以使你成為大丈夫了。


1968年「美國名家書信選集」


1987年大地版改題「名人書信選集」

Whither mankind: a panorama of modern civilization Charles Austin Beard
此書有漢譯本
原書主編是著名的史學家。名言:
All the lessons of history in four sentences: Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad with power. The mills of God grind slowly, but they grind exceedingly small. The bee fertilizes the flower it robs. When it is dark enough, you can see the stars.
Charles A. Beard  回信給:DurantWill (1885-1981)的部分:
"When we analyze ourselves we find conflicting motives. We have moments of shivering selfishness, when we think only of our personal gain. And we have moments of exaltation when we feel the thrill of the prodigious and hear the call to high action. That seems to be true of all men and women, high and low, and the outcome in each case is a matter of proportion.
"For myself I may say that as I look over the grand drama of history, I find (or seem to find) amid the apparent chaos and tragedy, evidence of law and plan and immense achievement of the human spirit in spite of disasters. I am convinced that the world is not a mere bog in which men and women trample themselves in the mire and die. Something magnificent is taking place here amid the cruelties and tragedies, and the supreme challenge to intelligence is that of making the noblest and best in our curious heritage prevail. If there was no grand design in the beginning of the universe, fragments of one are evident and mankind can complete the picture. A knowledge of the good life is our certain philosophic heritage, and technology has given us a power over nature which enables us to provide the conditions of the good life for all the earth's multitudes. That seems to me to be the most engaging possibility of the drama, and faith in its potentialities keeps me working at it even in the worst hours of disillusionment. The good life -- an end in itself to be loved and enjoyed; and intelligent labor directed to the task of making the good life prevail. There is the little philosophy, the circle of thought, within which I keep my little mill turning.
"This is the appearance of things as I see them, and even profound philosophers can merely say what they find here." (這篇的翻譯,請參考《美國名家書信選集》張心漪譯,香港:今日世界,1968,頁267-68。) 



Durant's On The Meaning of Life
Will Durant's On The Meaning Of Life is one of those great old books: hardbound without a jacket, no flashy images on the cover or overwrought blurbs in back; published by an obscure house no longer extant (Ray Long & Richard Smith, Inc., 1932); drab in appearance, gray and dusty around the edges -- and yet, every page sparkles with some scintillating insight into life and humanity. Durant was a prolific writer, widely respected educator, and an avid student of history and philosophy. 





"Dear ________:
Will you interrupt your work for a moment and play the game of philosophy with me?
"I am attempting to face a question which our generation, perhaps more than any, seems always ready to ask and never able to answer -- What is the meaning or worth of human life? Heretofore this question has been dealt with chiefly by theorists, from Ikhnaton and Lao-tse to Bergson and Spengler. The result has been a kind of intellectual suicide: thought, by its very development, seems to have destroyed the value and significance of life. The growth and spread of knowledge, for which so many idealists and reformers prayed, has resulted in a disillusionment which has almost broken the spirit of our race.
"Astronomers have told us that human affairs constitute but a moment in the trajectory of a star; geologists have told us that civilization is but a precarious interlude between ice ages; biologists have told us that all life is war, a struggle for existence among individuals, groups, nations, alliances, and species; historians have told us that 'progress' is a delusion, whose glory ends in inevitable decay; psychologists have told us that the will and the self are the helpless instruments of heredity and environment, and that the once incorruptible soul is but a transient incandescence of the brain. The Industrial Revolution has destroyed the home, and the discovery of contraceptives is destroying the family, the old morality, and perhaps (through the sterility of the intelligent) the race. Love is analyzed into a physical congestion, and marriage becomes a temporary physiological convenience slightly superior to promiscuity. Democracy has degenerated into such corruption as only Milo's Rome knew; and our youthful dreams of a socialist Utopia disappear as we see, day after day, the inexhaustible acquisitiveness of men. Every invention strengthens the strong and weakens the weak; every new mechanism displaces men, and multiplies the horror of war. God, who was once the consolation of our brief life, and our refuge in bereavement and suffering, has apparently vanished from the scene; no telescope, no microscope discovers him. Life has become, in that total perspective which is philosophy, a fitful pullulation of human insects on the earth, a planetary eczema that may soon be cured; nothing is certain in it except defeat and death -- a sleep from which, it seems, there is no awakening.
"We are driven to conclude that the greatest mistake in human history was the discovery of 'truth.' It has not made us free, except from delusions that comforted us and restraints that preserved us. It has not made us happy, for truth is not beautiful, and did not deserve to be so passionately chased. As we look on it now we wonder why we hurried so to find it. For it has taken from us every reason for existence except the moment's pleasure and tomorrow's trivial hope.
"This is the pass to which science and philosophy have brought us. I, who have loved philosophy for many years, now turn back to life itself, and ask you, as one who has lived as well as thought, to help me understand. Perhaps the verdict of those who have lived is different from that of those who have merely thought. Spare me a moment to tell me what meaning life has for you, what keeps you going, what help -- if any -- religion gives you, what are the sources of your inspiration and your energy, what is the goal or motive-force of your toil, where you find your consolations and your happiness, where, in the last resort, your treasure lies. Write briefly if you must; write at length and at leisure if you possibly can; for every word from you will be precious to me.
Sincerely yours,
Will Durant

落葉:威爾.杜蘭的最後箴言

Fallen Leaves:Last Words on Life, Love, War, and God



 22篇宏觀又微觀的雅致散文,審視人類永恆的爭論
  關於生命、愛、戰爭與神


  普立茲獎得主、知名歷史學家杜蘭,一生致力於將艱澀的歷史與哲學論述大眾普及化。從1968年到1978年間,杜蘭曾幾度於訪問中提及自己正在寫一本名為《落葉》的書,杜蘭提到:「這是一本不太嚴肅,關於我對政府、生命、死亡與神的思索的書」,「試著回答所有重要的問題,用簡單、公正儘管不完美的方式」。即使到了九十多歲,杜蘭仍每日在黃色便條本上一點一點寫作。然而,1981年杜蘭過世時,包括家族後代在內,竟然沒有一個人知曉這本書究竟是否完成或存在。三十二年後,這份靜靜躺在孫女家閣樓木箱裡的手稿,才意外重見天日。

  《落葉》是杜蘭畢生最個人的書寫,書中縱論各種課題,從人的年輕、老年,到宗教、道德、性愛、戰爭、政治和藝術。是杜蘭鑽研哲學、宗教、藝術、科學和世界各大文明六十多年的結晶,表現著一位非凡學者的最高智慧,向世人展現出歷史足資為今日所借鏡。

  杜蘭在序言中提到,他漫長的寫作生涯中曾收到許多「好奇讀者」的來信,要求他直言對於人生與命運等永恆主題的個人看法。本書便是他對這些挑戰的回應。強而有力的觀點,雅致的字句,對人類處境深邃的領悟,並在最後的結論裡,揭露人類作為一個物種必須面對的永恆難題,與所能經驗的至高喜悅,在在顯示除杜蘭之外難以企及的高度。

名人推薦

  歷史教授 周樑楷 專文導讀
  清華大學、靜宜大學、暨南大學榮譽教授 李家同 誠摯推薦

作者介紹

作者簡介

威爾.杜蘭 Will Durant


  美國麻省北亞當斯人(North Adams),曾先後在聖彼得學院和哥倫比亞大學受高等教育,並擔任過報社實習記者。1911年成為中學教師,並與學校的一名學生(就是日後他的妻子愛麗兒.杜蘭)墜入情網,辭職後與她結婚。杜蘭後來進入哥倫比亞大學研究所專攻生物學,並向羅伯特.伍德沃(Robert S Woodworth)學習心理學,並在伍伯利(Woodbridge)和著名的杜威 (John Dewey)指導下專攻哲學。1917年為了獲得博士學位,撰寫了他的第一本書:《哲學與社會問題》 (Philosophy and the Social Problem),同年獲得博士學位,成為哥倫比亞大學講師。

  杜蘭自1914年即開始在紐約的一家長老會堂演講哲學及文學史,前後長達14年,為《西洋哲學故事》 (The Story of Philosophy)和《世界文明史》(The Story of Civilization)兩書做準備。 1921年籌辦了勞動學校( Labor Temple School)致力於成人教育。1926年,杜蘭持續地出版了十一本冊子後,集結成《西洋哲學故事》 並受到矚目,他以生動的文筆深入淺出地論述哲學家生平,介紹時代背景、一生境遇,並對每位思想家提出了中肯的評論。此書中,杜蘭將哲學以活潑的筆法寫成動人故事,廣為讀者喜愛,三十年間銷售逾兩百萬冊,並且被翻譯成各國文字。

  1929年起,杜蘭周遊列國,蒐集資料,了解許多國家的歷史典籍及傳統,便偕同他的妻子投注畢生精力撰寫《世界文明史》,以哲學家的敏銳目光審視世界文明遺產。第一卷於1935年出版,前後耗時四十年才完成此部曠世巨著。本書亦被譽為二十世紀 的《史記》、《漢書》,及人類文明的《離騷》,也獲得各國學者高度評價和尊重。

  他不但是最為著名的通俗哲學與歷史作家,更曾獲頒美國普立茲獎。一生著作等身,除了最知名的《世界文明史》、《西洋哲學故事》,尚包含:《歷史上的英雄》、《讀歷史,我可以學會什麼?》、Transition(1927)、 The Mansions of Philosophy (1929)、The Case for India(1930)、Adventures in Genius(1931)、 A Program for America(1931)、On the Meaning of Life(1932)、The Tragedy of Russia(1933)、 Iterpretations of Life(1970)、A Dual Autobiography(1977)、The Greatest Minds and Ideas of All Time(2002)等書。

  杜蘭一生深愛其妻,當他在1981年因心臟問題而住院時,愛麗兒似乎因害怕丈夫不會歸來而停止進食。之後當杜蘭得知深愛的妻子之死訊,心臟也停止了跳動,享年九十六歲。

譯者簡介

梁永安


  專職譯者,台灣大學哲學碩士,譯有《牛的印跡》、《來自深淵的吶喊:王爾德獄中書》、《小天使艾絲梅拉達:唐.德里羅短篇精選集》、《沒有神的宗教》等。

目錄

導讀

前言
作者序

第一章 我們人生的伊始
第二章 論年輕
第三章 論中年
第四章 論老年
第五章 論死亡
第六章 我們的靈魂
第七章 我們的神
第八章 論宗教
第九章 論一種不同的「再臨」
第十章 論宗教與道德
第十一章 論道德
第十二章 論種族
第十三章 論女性
第十四章 論性
第十五章 論戰爭
第十六章 論越戰
第十七章 論政治
第十八章 論資本主義與共產主義
第十九章 論藝術
第二十章 論科學
第二十一章 論教育
第二十二章 論歷史的洞察

註釋
索引

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