这本书给我的阅读体验是难以名状的,它是那么温暖的柔弱,让我数次有想哭的冲动;它又是那么勇敢的真切,使我有种如被刺一刀的冷颤。故事其实很简单很纯净,但她却令我此类对真爱如对宗教一样始终抱有审慎悲观的人,感到无比的震撼——爱即信,信即爱。所有的犹豫、恐惧都要在付出的同时才能洗去……
本书作者保罗·科埃略是当今拉丁美洲最具影响力的作家之一。作品主要描写了女主人公皮拉尔与其初恋情人自小一起长大,在分别了十一年之后两人重逢的故事。皮拉尔随他一起布道、旅游,互诉爱慕之情。然而,男友要独自去承担宗教义务,皮拉尔十分伤心,在彼德拉河畔边哭泣、边写她那凄婉而动人的爱情故事。在她完稿后,男友终于来到河畔,找到了她。爱的力量使他们又重新在一起。皮拉尔在混混沌沌地生活了多年之后,面对男友突然表达的爱,感到的却是源自自身的重重疑虑和障碍。她在彼德拉河畔留下了泪水,用泪水清洗内心的恐惧,也在逐渐体味一种“全部付出”的爱……
本书令人耳目一新的现代爱情故事,借助戏剧性的故事,将凡间的“真爱”与神灵的“博爱”合二为一,颇具启迪意味。皮拉尔和她的男友是虚构的人物,不过,他们是我们在寻找自己另一半时所遇各种冲突的缩影。本选段是全书的开篇。首先倒叙了皮拉尔在河边哭泣的情景。
发音：英式发音 语速：150词/分钟 使用方法：精听+朗读
Thomas Merton once said that the spiritual life is essentially to love. One doesn’t love in order to do what is good or to help or to protect someone. If we act that way, we are perceiving the other as a simple object, and we are seeing ourselves as wise and generous persons. This has nothing to do with love. To love is to be in communion with the other and to discover in that other the spark of God.
May Pilar’s 1)lament on the bank of the river Piedra guide us toward such communion.
—Paulo Coelho
(修士)托马斯·默顿曾说:“精神生活归根到底就是爱。行行善事、帮助或保护他人,并不是爱。因为我们如果这样做,那我们只是在把他人当成简单的物品看待,自认为自己是明智慷慨之人。而这根本与爱无关。爱是与他人心灵相通,在他人身上发现神的光辉。”
愿皮拉尔在彼德拉河畔流下的泪水引导我们走上这心灵相通的道路。
——保罗·科埃略
By the river Piedra I sat down and wept. There is a legend that everything that falls into the waters of this river—leaves, insects, the feathers of birds—is transformed into the rocks that make the riverbed. If only I could tear out my heart and hurl it into the current, then my pain and longing would be over, and I could finally forget.
By the river Piedra I sat down and wept. The winter air chills the tears on my cheeks, and my tears fall into the cold waters that course past me. Somewhere, this river joins another, then another, until far from my heart and sight all of them merge with the sea.
May my tears run just as far, that my love might never know that one day I cried for him. May my tears run just as far, that I might forget the river Piedra, the 2)monastery, the church in the 3)Pyrenees, the mists, and the paths we walked together.
I shall forget the roads, the mountains, and the fields of my dreams; the dreams that will never come true.
I remember my “magic moment” that instant when a “yes” or a “no” can change one’s life forever. It seems so long ago now. It is hard to believe that it was only last week that I had found my love once again, and then lost him.
我坐在彼德拉河畔哭泣。传说所有掉进这条河里的东西——树叶、昆虫、小鸟的羽毛——都会变成石头积成河床。但愿我能掏出我的心投进流水中,这样,我就再也没有了痛苦,没有了思念,没有了回忆。
我坐在彼德拉河畔哭泣。冬天里的寒冷让泪水冰凉地贴在脸上,我的泪水滴入冰冷的河水中,顺流而下。这条河在某处与另一条河汇合,然后又与另一条河汇合,直到在远离我心灵和目光的地方汇入大海。
愿我的泪水如此这般流向远方,让我的爱人永远不知有一天我曾为他而哭泣。愿我的泪水流向远方,由此我将忘却这彼德拉河、修道院、比利牛斯山上的教堂、浓雾,还有我们两人共同走过的道路。
我终将忘却我梦中的道路、山峰和田野,我的梦,不会实现的梦。
我想起了我那“神奇时刻”,那时,一个“行”或者“不”就可以改变一个人的整个人生。这好像已经是很久远的事情了。然而,令人难以置信的是这仅仅发生在一个星期之前,我和我的爱人重逢了,然而我又失去了他。
I am writing this story on the bank of the river Piedra. My hands are freezing, my legs are numb, and every minute I want to stop.
“Seek to live. Remembrance is for the old,” he said.
Perhaps love makes us old before our time, or young, if youth has passed. But how can I not recall those moments? That is why I write to try to turn sadness into longing, 4)solitude into remembrance. So that when I finish telling myself the story, I can toss it into the Piedra. That’s what the woman who has given me shelter told me to do. Only then in the words of one of the saints will the water extinguish what the flames have written.
All love stories are the same.
在彼德拉河畔我提笔写下这段故事。我的手冻得冰凉,我的腿坐得发麻,屡屡有停笔的冲动。
“得生活下去。回忆是上岁数人的事,”他曾经说道。
也许爱情使我们有早于年岁的成熟,又或者在青春逝去时,使我们变得年轻。然而如何能不回忆起那些时刻呢?因此,我就提笔写起来,希望让忧愁变为思念,让孤寂化为回忆。这是为了等我把这段情史讲给自己听后,我可以把它抛入彼德拉河中。这是那位给我住处的女人叫我做的。正如一位圣人所说的,水能泯灭火所写下的圣洁的文字。
所有的爱情故事都是一样的。
We had been children together. Then he left, like so many young people who leave small towns. He said he was going to learn about the world, that his dreams lay beyond the fields of Soria.
Years passed with almost no news of him. Every now and then he would send me a letter, but he never returned to the paths and forests of our childhood. When I finished school, I moved to Zaragaza, and there I found that he had been right. Saria was a small town, and as its only famous poet had said, roads are made to be traveled. I enrolled in the university and found a boyfriend. I began to study for a scholarship (I was working as a salesgirl to pay for my courses). But I lost the competition for the scholarship, and after that I left my boyfriend.
Then the letters from my childhood friend began to arrive more frequently and I was envious of the stamps from so many different places. He seemed to know everything, he sprouted wings, and now he roamed the world. Meanwhile, I was simply trying to put down roots.
Some of his letters, all mailed from the same place in France, spoke of God. In one, he wrote about wanting to enter a 5)seminary and dedicate his life to prayer. I wrote him back, asking him to wait a bit, urging him to experience more of his freedom before committing himself to something so serious.
But after I reread my letter, I tore it up. Who was I to speak about freedom or commitment? Compared to him I knew nothing about such things.
One day I learned that he had begun to give lectures. This surprised me; I thought he was too young to be able to teach anything to anyone. And then he wrote to me that he was going to speak to a small group in Madrid and he asked me to come.
So I made the four-hour trip from Zaragoza to Madrid.
我俩是从小一起长大的。像其他离开小城镇的年轻人一样,他也走了。他说他要出去见见世面,他说他的梦想早已飞出了索里亚(西班牙一座小城)。
他一走多年,杳无音信。后来偶尔能收到他的来信。但他再也没有回过我俩童年一起走过的道路和森林。中学毕业后我就搬到了萨拉戈萨(西班牙一个城市),在那儿我发现他是对的。索里亚太小了,正如该城唯一知名的诗人曾说过,路是用来走的。我上了大学,还交了男朋友。为了一份奖学金,我开始发奋学习(为了付学费我曾经做过售货员)。但是奖学金最终没有得到,之后我也和我的男朋友分手了。
我这发小朋友的信开始多了起来,看到信封上不同国家的邮票,我心生嫉意。他好像无所不知,他生出了双翅,在周游世界;而与此同时,我却在挣扎着站稳跟头。
(后来,)他的一些信,都是从法国某一地寄来的,当中总谈起上帝。在其中一封里他说他想进神学院,终身从事神职工作。我回信让他三思而行,请他在准备献身这么严肃的工作之前,再体验体验自由。
但当我读了自己写的信后,我却把它给撕了。我有何资格来谈论自由、谈论献身?比起他来说,我对此一无所知。
有一天我得知他开始在传教。我大吃一惊:因为在他这个年纪,传道还是太年轻了。然而不久,他写信给我,说是要去给马德里的一个团体布道,并且要我去一趟。
于是我花了四个小时从萨拉戈萨赶往马德里。
作者简介: 
保罗·科埃略,1947年出生于里约热内卢,是继加西亚·马尔克斯(《百年孤独》的作者)之后拉丁美洲最具影响力的作家,而且是世界十大畅销书作家之一。据目前最新资料统计,他已售出的书多达3200万册,其作品被译成54种语言,在140多个国家和地区发行,堪称全球商业上最成功的作家之一。
他少年时期便立志成为一个成功的职业作家,却三次被送入疯人院。在从事文学创作之前,曾担任过编剧、剧场导演和记者,为巴西最著名的摇滚乐歌星创作过60余首歌词。后沉迷于研究炼金术、魔法、吸血鬼等神秘事物,作为媒皮士周游世界。
1986年,保罗・科埃略沿中世纪三条朝圣路线之一,历时三个月,徒步行走近600公里的路程,从法国南部穿越比利牛斯山脉,抵达西班牙加利西亚地区孔波斯泰尔的圣地亚哥朝圣。他以这次朝圣之旅为素材,于翌年出版《朝圣卜书》,讲述了他在此次行程中的体验和启示,富有浓厚的宗教色彩。这部纪实性作品获得极大成功,至1999年已印行117版次。
之后凭借《一千零一夜》中一个故事的启发,他又创作出版了寓言故事《牧羊少年奇幻之旅》(原著名《炼金术士》)。正是这本书使他风靡全球,发行1800万册。他的其他著名作品有《韦罗妮卡决定去死》。