Ten Novels and Their Authors

In this classic guide, Maugham introduces and discusses what he considers to be the ten greatest novels and their authors. Here are some of the formulae of greatness in the genre, as well as the flaws and heresies that enfeeble it. Maugham's choice list: Fielding's "Tom Jones"; Dickens's "David Copperfield"; Flaubert's "Madame Bovary"; Balzac's "Old Man Goriot"; "Wuthering Heights" by Emily Bronte, "The Brothers Karamazov" by Dostoevsky; "The Red and the Black" by Stendhal, "Pride and Prejudice" by Austen; Melville's "Moby Dick"; Tolstoy's "War and Peace". 毛姆对十大小说家的生平及其代表作的研究，可说是文学批评的典范之作。此处所涉及的，既有此类体裁之所以伟大的一些标准，亦有削弱其力量的瑕疵与异端。由一位小说巨匠所著的《巨匠与杰作》，实在是一部独一无二、不可估量的文学指南。 毛姆评十大名著小说。实际上评小说的文字不算多，毛老师的功夫花在了寻找作者八卦上了，穷、欠钱、花各样女人等。看这本书，会让自己狼狈平庸的生活显得不那么令自己不齿。十年前江苏人民出版社出过另一个叫保罗·约翰逊的英国人写的《知识分子》，写了马克思、卢梭、罗素这些大知识分子，也是类似的八卦写法，此书的出版当在《巨匠与杰作》出版半个世纪后。不过中文版删掉了马克思一章。看来不仅英国媒体有八卦的嗜好，英国文人也有好为此道的传统。