想看英语书，为了吸引兴趣，可以不那么有教育意义，好看就行。

其实我觉得读英文原著不一定非得选那些大家名著，真的不太适合入门者。我们英语研读课老师也是让我们先循着兴趣看。首先你得确定你喜欢哪种类型的爱情小说，然后去找相应类型的英文书。

• 初阶
  

1.青春/流行

Twilight系列。就是《暮光之城》系列，这是美国大火的青春小说系列，吸血鬼、狼人的狗血三角恋，语言高中生都基本上看得懂，主要是通俗啊，就跟国内言情小说一样。

The Hunger Gemes（《饥饿游戏》）系列，同上，都是超级容易看懂，虽说没什么营养，但是好玩有趣啊。

Divergent（《分歧者》）系列。

2.小清新

The Fault in Our Stars(《星运里的错》)同名电影大火，这部小说清新灵巧，就像少女的日记一样娓娓道来，主题与感情也比上面的要深刻一点，除了一些癌症的专有名词有些生涩外，基本不会妨碍到阅读。这也是我研读课的小说之一，所以认认真真看了，重点推荐。

Paper Town(《纸镇》)也是《星运里的错》作者John Green(约翰·格林)写的，文字同样小清新，只不过故事带一点悬疑色彩。

Flipped（《怦然心动》）也是改编成经典小清新电影，和电影对比着看，更能体会故事的美感。

Silver Linings Playbook（《乌云背后的幸福线》）没错又是一部改编成电影的小说，这部小说稍微比上面的要难一点，但是还是很容易，四级过了的都能看懂。

3.言情/苦情

这一部分我推荐Nicholas Charles Sparks（尼古拉斯·斯帕克思）的作品，这货被称为美国的琼瑶，擅长写言情苦恋。这货你可能没听说过，但是他的作品改编的电影你一定看过。（啥，你没看过！怪我咯~）

The Notebook《恋恋日记本》

Dear John《分手信》

The Lucky One《幸运者》

Nights in Rodanthe 《罗丹岛之恋》

Message in a Bottle《瓶中信》

• 进阶
  

1.Cold Moutain（《冷山》）叙述了南北战争时期一个受伤的士兵英曼，离开残酷的战场，穿过那片残破的、即将遭受败衄的南方土地，回到自己战前的心上人艾达身边的故事。重点是本书的改编电影同样超级精彩。

2.The Thorn Birds（《荆棘鸟》）这本书是一部澳大利亚的家世小说，以女主人公梅吉与神父拉尔夫的爱情纠葛为主线，描写了克利里一家三代人的故事，时间跨度长达半个多世纪之久。

3.The Great Gatsby(《了不起的盖茨比》)美国爵士时代的悲歌。名著，经典，语言优美。按我老师说的，一个字也不多一个字也不少。

4.Close Range：Wyoming Stories(《近距离：怀俄明故事集》)这本以《近距离：怀俄明故事》命名的短篇小说集收录了安妮?普鲁创作的11篇作品，其中包括被李安改编成电影的著名的《断背山》。所有故事均以怀俄名州为背景，讲述了在蛮荒严酷、狂暴无常的自然环境中，农场人生活的艰辛、凶险、孤寂与奋争。

• 高阶

其实到了这一部分基本上也不需要推荐了，我就列一下我感觉可读性比较强的，都是世界经典名著，不用多言。

1.Gone with the Wind(《飘》)

2.Jane Eyre（《简·爱》）

3.Pride and Prejudice（《傲慢与偏见》）

4.The English Patient（《英国病人》）

5.Anna Karenina（《安娜·卡列尼娜》）

以上是我按照我读的时候感觉上的难易程度排列的，因为口味和读的时候的知识水平不同所以难免有不合理之处，还请谅解。上面推荐的基本上都有相应的影视作品，看完原著看电影，文字语言与视听语言的碰撞，真的是不一样的感觉，也有助于理解。另外小小私心一下，可能不切题，我觉得入门读Harry Potter系列和A Song of Ice and Fire系列真真是极好的<(￣ˇ￣)/

了不起的盖茨比

消失的爱人(gone girl)

漫长的告别

Gone with the Wind(《飘》)

文辞优美，易读易懂，故事紧凑，人物鲜明，能幽默能讽刺，能犀利能深情，能长句能短句，长句美而形象，形象还易懂，短句深邃而精妙，精妙还哲理。

不读，是学英文的一大损失。

这里是不是该说一句:吐血推荐哈哈~

看到这个问题忍不住过来答一发，想必很多人都经历过题主这个时期，想学习英文的同时阅读的是自己感兴趣的小说，而不是枯燥的文本和材料，所以我来给题主安利两个自己看过的英文小说，分别是《了不起的盖茨比》和《爱情笔记》，希望题主能够喜欢。

首先说说大家耳熟能详的The Great Gatsby.

上面不少答案都提到了，安利这个的原因首先就是，大部分人有电影基础，对故事比较熟悉，所以直接看原版入门比较快，不存在什么理解的问题；再者就是，作为村上春树最为推崇的小说，这本书不仅仅是一部爱情小说，更是一部描写阶级、人性和社会的作品，所以内涵比较丰富，故事性和文学性并存。

引一段经典的开头来说明一下：

In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I've been turning over in my mind ever since. ‘Whenever you feel like criticizing any one,’ he told me,’ just remember that all the people in this world haven't had the advantages that you've had.’

附中文翻译：

父亲在我年轻的时候对我的告诫，直到今天我还牢记于心。“每当你想批评别人的时候，”他对我说，“一定要记得并不是世界上每个人都曾拥有你所拥有的优势。”

不过需要提醒的是，不建议没有英文小说阅读基础的人一上手就读这本，因为菲茨杰拉德小说中景物描写还是比较多的，可能相对生词也比较多，句式也比较复杂，大家可以先读一节试试，不适合的话先放着，从一些简单易读的入手。譬如接下来推荐的这本。

Essays in Love，简单翻译成中文是“论爱情”，国内出版一般为《爱情笔记》，作者是英伦才子阿兰·德波顿。我买的是上海译文出版社的中英双语版，看的时候以英文版为主，中文版为辅。

这本书我非常喜欢，必须重点安利一下，推荐这本书的原因有以下几点：

1. 1993年写成，当时作者23岁，从时空背景和故事情节上来说比较现代，跟我们的爱情故事和爱情观相差不大，因此读者的共鸣感比读经典的英国爱情小说要强得多，你可以在其中读到自己在恋爱中的心理和感悟。

2. 有思考性和哲理性。简单说，这本书的故事情节比较简单，就是一男一女相识相恋然后女方移情别恋男主失恋消沉又遇上了新人的故事，但是很大的篇幅都是男主人公在经历爱情的各阶段时对爱情本身的历史、哲学以及心理学等方面的思考，其中涉及了宿命、美学、自我、身份焦虑、死亡等命题，而主人公也不是以说教的口吻提出，而用的是自省的态度，因此存在着大量的思索与讨论，有趣而不失内涵。如果你想在一部爱情小说中获得尽可能多的收获，这本一定是首选。

3. 文笔和词汇较为简单，阅读难度较小。这也是我在这个问题下推荐这本书的最大原因。虽然这本爱情笔记中夹杂着一些哲学内容，但是词汇本身并不复杂，作者也没有掉书袋、显摆自己的情结。德波顿的创作出发点就是简单朴素，尽力让人看得懂，使读者更有所受益，从自己的书中感受到人类所存在的一些共同心理和共同处境。不仅对于母语阅读的人如此，对于非母语阅读的其他读者，他的小说也充满了魅力。这本书不仅适合女性读者，更适合男性读者。

在这里也引一个开头分享一下吧。

The longing for a destiny is nowhere stronger than in our romantic life. All too often forced to share our bed with those who cannot fathom our soul, can we not be forgiven if we believe (contrary to all the rules of our enlightened age) that we fated one day to meet the man or woman of our dreams? Can we not be excused a certain superstitious faith in a creature who will prove the solution to our relentless yearnings? And though our prayers may never be answered, though there maybe no end to the dismal cycle of mutual incomprehension, if the heavens should come to take pity on us, then can we really be expected to attribute the encounter with this prince or princess to a mere coincidence? Or can we not for once escape rational censure and read it as nothing other than an inevitable part of our romantic destiny?

以下是译文：

恋爱时我们最向往缘分天定。然而多数时候我们不得不与无法理解我们灵魂的人同榻共枕。如果我们相信（与这个理智时代的所有准则相反），终有一天，命运会安排我们与梦中情人相会；或者有些迷信地幻想：冥冥之中有一个正是我们无尽思念的人，难道我们不该得到理解和原宥？也许我们的祈祷永无回应，也许彼此的心灵永难沟通，如果上天对我们还有些许怜悯，难道我们不能期盼在一次邂逅中与心仪的王子或公主不期而遇？难道我们不能暂时摆脱理性的责难，仅仅把这当作是爱情的一次无可避免的缘分天定？

在这里贴一张作者的照片膜拜一下他的才华~

最后友情提醒一下，像我这样英文基础不够好的人，可以选择在kindle 上阅读，直接查生词很方便（The Great Gatsby 我就是在kindle上读完的），或者选择中英对照版，以英文为主，生词或句式难以理解时再翻到中文对照一下，再或者就是手边放一本词典了，就是相对麻烦一点。但是如果是纯粹出于阅读目的的话，非常不建议看了中文版后再去看英文版，或者是去读自己非常熟悉的英文版内容，毕竟题主想感受的是爱情小说，熟悉的内容和熟悉的行文方式会严重影响到你对英文小说的体验。

想说几个门槛低很感人的。

1.茨威格《一个陌生女人的来信》

语言门槛低篇幅不长但是语言到位情节引人入胜，十八岁时候一口气读完哭得一塌糊涂，用了一整包纸巾。

其实嘛，个人对爱情的态度一直挺干脆，我喜欢你，你喜欢我么？你要是喜欢我的话那我们就在一起；要是你不愿意，那就拉倒，你过你的，我也还是会过得好好的。“你若无心我便休”，爱情不过是生活的一部分，一个人还有着更多的有意义有价值的事去做，放眼山河，这天大地大自有我安然自得之处。

不过，关于这本书， 真的是被感动了，被其中的爱情感动了。茨威格真不愧是最了解女性的男作家，尽管每个人的感情经历是不一样的，但是多少都会在这本书里找到共鸣。 大概，这也是这本薄薄的小说为何能享誉如此高的盛名。

下面我来说小说。

回忆的开始，女孩十三岁。从第一眼开始，她就爱上了她的邻居——一个出色的作家，一个博学的学者，一个迷人的绅士。大概这个开端只是一种迷恋，但爱情确实降临了，从哪一个眼神，或许是从更早的某个时候。

“But I know the very day and hour when I consciously gave my whole heart to you. I had been for a walk with a schoolfellow, and we were standing at the door chattering. A motor drove up. You jumped out, in the impatient, springy fashion which has never ceased to charm me, and were about to go in. An impulse made me open the door for you, and this brought me in your path, so that we almost collided. You looked at me with a cordial, gracious, all-embracing glance, which was almost a caress. You smiled at me tenderly-yes, tenderly, is the word-and said gently, nay, confidentially: "Thanks so much."

That was all you said. But from this moment, from the time when you looked at me so gently, so tenderly, I was yours. Later, before long indeed, I was to learn that this was a way you had of looking at all women with whom you came in contact. It was a caressing and alluring glance, at once enfolding and disclothing, the glance of the born seducer. Involuntarily, you looked in this way at every showgirl who served you, at every maidservant who opened the door to you. It was not that you consciously longed to possess all these women, but your impulse towards the sex unconsciously made your eyes melting and warm whenever they rested on a woman. At thirteen, I had no thought of this; and I felt as if I had been bathed in fire. I believed that the tenderness was for me, for me only; and in this one instant the woman was awakened in the half-grown girl, the woman who was to be yours for all future time.

“情不知所起，一往而深。”大概这就是一见钟情吧。主人公也印证了一句经典的台词——“爱一个人需要一秒，忘记一个人却需要一生。”

十三岁的她开始通过门廊上的小孔去窥探自己的意中人。

“ I need hardly tell you that henceforward, in my restricted world, you were the only thing that interested me; that my life revolved round yours with the fidelity proper to a girl of thirteen. I watched you, watched your habits, watched the people who came to see you-and all this increased instead of diminishing my interest in your personality, for the two-sidedness of your nature was reflected in the diversity of your visitors. Some of them were young men, comrades of yours, carelessly dressed students with whom you laughed and larked. Some of them were ladies who came in motors. Once the conductor of the opera-the great man whom before this I had seen only from a distance, baton in hand-called on you. Some of them were girls, young girls still attending the commercial school, who shyly glided in at the door. A great many of your visitors were women. I thought nothing of this, not even when, one morning, as I was on my way to school, I saw a closely veiled lady coming away from your flat. I was only just thirteen, and in my immaturity I did not in the least realise that the eager curiosity with which I scanned all your doings was already love.

窥探不是件值得肯定和褒奖的事，可是对于一个情窦初开的小女孩而言，这种行为至少是可以理解的对么。因为太喜欢所以无法控制自己的已然脱缰的心，即便害怕即便知道大概是不道德的不好的会被厌恶的也还是这样做了。

十三岁到十六岁，男作家成了小女孩生活的全部，她默默地爱着，也默默幸福着。可是，幸福终归是短暂的。虽然新爸爸的出现意味着小女孩将一夕之间从穷丫头变成了富小姐，可是也意味着她要和这里说再见了。再之后的两年里，小女孩出落成美丽的少女，可是却闷闷不乐。

“ That is what I came to realise during those interminable two years in Innsbruck, from my sixteenth to my eighteenth year, when I lived with my people as a prisoner and an outcast. My stepfather, a quiet, taciturn man, was kind to me. My mother, as if eager to atone for an unwitting injustice, seemed ready to meet all my wishes. Those of my own age would have been glad to befriend me. But I repelled their advances with angry defiance. I did not wish to be happy, I did not wish to live content away from you; so I buried myself in a gloomy world of self torment and solitude. I would not wear the new and gay dresses they bought for me. I refused to go to concerts or to the theatre, and I would not take part in cheerful excursions. I rarely left the house. Can you believe me when I tell you that I hardly got to know a dozen streets in this little town where I lived for two years? Mourning was my joy; I renounced society and every pleasure, and was intoxicated with delight at the mortifications I thus superadded to the lack of seeing you. Moreover, I would let nothing divert me from my passionate longing to live only for you. Sitting alone at home, hour after hour and day after day, I did nothing but think of you, turning over in my mind unceasingly my hundred petty memories of you, renewing every movement and every time of waiting, rehearsing these episodes in the theatre of my mind. The countless repetitions of the years of my childhood from the day in which you came into my life have so branded the details on my memory that I can recall every minute of those long-passed years as if they had been but yesterday.

终于，征得了父母的同意，她只身一人返回维也纳。 旅途上，心潮澎湃，激动，甜蜜，紧张，还有些微的疼痛。

“Need I tell you whither my steps first led me that foggy autumn evening when, at last, at last, I found myself back in Vienna? I left my trunk in the cloakroom, and hurried to a tram. How slowly it moved!

Every stop was a renewed vexation to me. In the end, I reached the house. My heart leapt when I saw a light in your window. The town, which had seemed so alien, so dreary, grew suddenly alive for me. I myself lived once more, now that I was near you, you who were my unending dream. When nothing but the thin, shining pane of glass was between you and my uplifted eyes, I could ignore the fact that in reality I was as far from your mind as if I had been separated by mountains and valleys and rivers. Enough that I could go on looking at your window. There was a light in it; that was your dwelling; you were there; that was my world. For two years I had dreamed of this hour, and now it had come. Throughout that warm and cloudy evening I stood in front of your windows, until the light was extinguished. Not until then did I seek my own quarters.

两年里，多少个日日夜夜千回百转间的思量啊，都在这一个秋日变为了现实。即便现实中深爱的人依旧离自己那么遥远，可毕竟，终于可以走过他走过的街道，可以站在他可能会探出头来的窗下。

终于，他们相遇了并且一夜温存。

“This was the first of such disappointments: the first time I had to endure what has always been my fate; that you have never recognised me. I must die, unrecognised. Ah, how can I make you understand my disappointment? During the years at Innsbruck I had never ceased to think of you. Our next meeting in Vienna was always in my thoughts. My fancies varied with my mood, ranging from the wildest possibilities to the most delightful. Every conceivable variation had passed through my mind. In gloomy moments it had seemed to me that you would repulse me, would despise me, for being of no account, for being plain, or importunate. I had had a vision of every possible form of disfavour, coldness, or indifference. But never, in the extremity of depression, in the utmost realisation of my own unimportance, had I conceived this most abhorrent of possibilities-that you had never become aware of my existence. I understand now (you have taught me!) that a girl's or a woman's face must be for a man something extraordinarily mutable. It is usually nothing more than the reflexion of moods which pass as readily as an image vanishes from a mirror. A man can readily forget a woman's face, because she modifies its lights and shades, and because at different times the dress gives it so different a setting. Resignation comes to a woman as her knowledge grows. But I, who was still a girl, was unable to understand your forgetfulness. My whole mind had been full of you ever since I had first known you, and this had produced in me the illusion that you must have often thought of me and waited for me. How could I have borne to go on living had I realised that I was nothing to you, that I had no place in your memory. Your glance that evening, showing me as it did that on your side there was not even a gossamer thread connecting your life with mine, meant for me a first plunge into reality, conveyed to me the first intimation of my destiny.

You did not recognise me. Two days later, when our paths again crossed, and you looked at me with an approach to intimacy, it was not in recognition of the girl who had loved you so long and whom you had awakened to womanhood; it was simply that you knew the face of the pretty lass of eighteen whom you had encountered at the same spot two evenings before. Your expression was one of friendly surprise, and a smile fluttered about your lips. You passed me as before, and as before you promptly slackened your pace. I trembled, I exulted, I longed for you to speak to me. I felt that for the first time I had become alive for you; I, too, walked slowly, and did not attempt to evade you. Suddenly, I heard your step behind me. Without turning round, I knew that I was about to hear your beloved voice directly addressing me. I was almost paralysed by the expectation, and my heart beat so violently that I thought I should have to stand still. You were at my side. You greeted me cordially, as if we were old acquaintances-though you did not really know me, though you have never known anything about my life. So simple and charming was your mariner that I was able to answer you without hesitation. We walked along the street, and you asked me whether we could not have supper together. I agreed. What was there I could have refused you?

但就像对待任何一段感情一样，作家很快忘却了女孩，尽管她那么迷人那么美丽。

幸运的是，她拥有了他的孩子，并决定生下他，并倾尽一切可能地爱他，因为那是他的孩子，是她爱的果她爱的延续。

最让我动容的就是下面这段了，尽管她做了交际花，出卖了自己的肉体，可是我无法不去敬仰她。

“You will wonder how I could manage to give the boy so costly an upbringing, how it was possible for me to provide for him an entry into this bright and cheerful life of the well-to-do. Dear one, I am speaking to you from the darkness. Unashamed, I will tell you. Do not shrink from me. I sold myself. I did not become a street-walker, a common prostitute, but I sold myself. My friends, my lovers, were wealthy men. At first I sought them out, but soon they sought me, for I was (did you ever notice it?) a beautiful woman. Every one to whom I gave myself was devoted to me. They all became my grateful admirers. They all loved me-except you, except you whom I loved.

Will you despise me now that I have told you what I did? I am sure you will not. I know you will understand everything, will understand that what I did was done only for you, for your other self, for your boy. In the lying-in hospital I had tasted the full horror of poverty. I knew that, in the world of the poor, those who are down-trodden are always the victims. I could not bear to think that your son, your lovely boy, was to grow up in that abyss, amid the corruptions of the street, in the poisoned air of a slum. His delicate lips must not learn the speech of the gutter; his fine, white skin must not be chafed by the harsh and sordid underclothing of the poor. Your son must have the best of everything, all the wealth and all the lightheartedness of the world. He must follow your footsteps through life, must dwell in the sphere in which you had lived.

That is why I sold myself. It was no sacrifice to me, for what are conventionally termed "honour" and "disgrace" were unmeaning words to me. You were the only one to whom my body could belong, and you did not love me, so what did it matter what I did with that body?

为了养育孩子而出卖自己的肉体——这是小说常见的套路，茨威格的故事也不例外，但例外的是，主人公的想法，她并不为此惭愧，就像她自己说的那样，“我身体唯一的主人就是你，但是你并不爱我，那这副躯壳属于谁又有什么关系呢？”是啊，连心都无所谓了，那这副身体又有什么所谓呢。

她拒绝了做贵夫人的机会，拒绝了一个更好的生活，只为了在任何她的爱人想起她需要她的时候可以立即见她。

“My companions' caresses, even their most ardent passion, never sounded my depths, although many of them were persons I could not but respect, and although the thought of my own fate made me sympathise with them in their unrequited love. All these men were kind to me; they all petted and spoiled me; they all paid me every deference. one of them, a widower, an elderly man of title, used his utmost influence until he secured your boy's nomination to the college. This man loved me like a daughter. Three or four times he urged me to marry him. I could have been a countess to-day, mistress of a lovely castle in Tyrol. I could have been free from care, for the boy would have had a most affectionate father, and I should have had a sedate, distinguished, and kindhearted husband. But I persisted in my refusal, though I knew it gave him pain. It may have been foolish of me. Had I yielded, I should have been living a safe and retired life somewhere, and my child would still have been with me. Why should I hide from you the reason for my refusal? I did not want to bind myself. I wanted to remain free-for you. In my innermost self, in the unconscious, I continued to dream the dream of my childhood. Some day, perhaps, you would call me to your side, were it only for an hour. For the possibility of this one hour I reject ed everything else, simply that I might be free to answer your call. Since my first awakening to womanhood, what had my life been but waiting, a waiting upon your will?

他们终于还是见到了，可是，这一次作家只是把她当做了某一个普通的妓女，尽管她多次暗示，可他依旧没有认出她。

这段心理描写可算极致了。

You took me in your arms . Again I stayed with you for the whole of one glorious night. But even then you did not recognise me. While I thrilled to your caresses, it was plain to me that your passion knew no difference between a loving mistress and a meretrix, that your spendthrift affections were wholly concentrated in their own expression. To me, the stranger picked up at a dancing-hall, you were at once affectionate and courteous. You would not treat me lightly, and yet you were full of an enthralling ardour. Dizzy with the old happiness, I was again aware of the two-sidedness of your nature, of that strange mingling of intellectual passion with sensual, which had already enslaved me to you in my childhood. In no other man have I ever known such complete surrender to the sweetness of the moment. No other has for the time being given himself so utterly as did you who, when the hour was past, were to relapse into an interminable and almost inhuman forgetfulness. But I, too, forgot myself. Who was I, lying in the darkness beside you? Was I the impassioned child of former days; was I the mother of your son; was I a stranger? Everything in this wonderful night was at one and the same time entrancingly familiar and entrancingly new. I prayed that the joy might last forever.

But morning came. It was late when we rose, and you asked me to stay to breakfast. Over the tea, which an unseen hand had discreetly served in the dining-room, we talked quietly. As of old, you displayed a cordial frankness; and, as of old, there were no tactless questions, there was no curiosity about myself. You did not ask my name, nor where I lived. To you I was, as before, a casual adventure, a nameless woman, an ardent hour which leaves no trace when it is over. You told me that you were about to start on a long journey, that you were going to spend two or three months in Northern Africa. The words broke in upon my happiness like a knell: "Past, past, past and forgotten!" I longed to throw myself at your feet, crying: "Take me with you, that you may at length came to know me, at length after all these years!" But I was timid, cowardly, slavish, weak. All I could say was: "What a pity." You looked at me with a smile-"Are you really sorry?"

For a moment I was as if frenzied. I stood up and looked at you fixedly. Then I said: "The man I love has always gone on a journey." I looked you straight in the eyes. "Now, now," I thought, "now he will recognise me!" You only smiled, and said consolingly: " One comes back after a time." I answered: "Yes, one comes back, but one has forgotten by then."

I must have spoken with strong feeling, for my tone moved you. You, too, rose, and looked at me wonderingly and tenderly. You put your hands on my shoulders: "Good things are not forgotten, and I shall not forget you." Your eyes studied me attentively, as if you wished to form an enduring image of me in your mind. When I felt this penetrating glance, this exploration of my whole being, I could not but fancy that the spell of your blindness would at last be broken. "He will recognise me! He will recognise me!" My soul trembled with expectation.

But you did not recognise me. No, you did not recognise me. Never had I been more of a stranger to you than I was at that moment, for had it been otherwise you could not possibly have done what you did a few minutes later. You had kissed me again, had kissed me passionately. My hair had been ruffled, and I had to tidy it once more. Standing at the glass, I saw in it-and as I saw, I was overcome with shame and horror-that you were surreptitiously slipping a couple of banknotes into my muff. I could hardly refrain from crying out; I could hardly refrain from slapping your face. You were paying me for the night I had spent with you, me who had loved you since childhood, me the mother of your son. To you I was only a prostitute picked up at a dancing-hall. It was not enough that you should forget me; you had to pay me, and to debase me by doing so.

I hastily gathered up my belongings, that I might escape as quickly as possible; the pain was too great. I looked round for my hat. There it was, on the writing-table, beside the vase with the white roses, my roses. I had an irresistible desire to make a last effort to awaken your memory. "Will you give me one of your white roses?"-"Of course," you answered, lifting them all out of the vase. "But perhaps they were given you by a woman, a woman who loves you?"-"Maybe," you replied, "I don't know. They were a present, but I don't know who sent them; that's why I'm so fond of them." I looked at you intently: "Perhaps they were sent you by a woman whom you have forgotten!"

You were surprised. I looked at you yet more intently. "Recognise me, only recognise me at last!" was the clamour of my eyes. But your smile, though cordial, had no recognition in it. You kissed me yet again, but you did not recognise me.

I hurried away, for my eyes were filling with tears, and I did not want you to see. In the entry, as I precipitated myself from the room, I almost cannoned into John, your servant. Embarrassed but zealous, he got out of my way, and opened the front door for me. Then, in this fugitive instant, as I looked at him through my tears, a light suddenly flooded the old man's face. In this fugitive instant, I tell you, he recognised me, the man who had never seen me since my childhood. I was so grateful, that I could have kneeled before him and kissed his hands. I tore from my muff the banknotes with which you had scourged me, and thrust them upon him. He glanced at me in alarm-for in this instant I think he understood more of me than you have understood in your whole life. Everyone, everyone, has been eager to spoil me; everyone has loaded me with kindness. But you, only you, forgot me. You, only you, never recognised me.

女人离去了。“忧伤而离局，孤独以终老”

所幸，孩子抚慰了她心灵的疲倦与苦楚。

可是几年后，无情的流感夺走了她最后的慰藉，她的孩子死了，而这位母亲也终于绝望，所以即便知道自己已经染病却也不再想抵抗。临死前将自己那份从未说出口的爱写在了纸上。

“I cannot write any more. My head is so heavy; my limbs ache; I am feverish. I must lie down. Perhaps all will soon be over. Perhaps, this once, fate will be kind to me, and I shall not have to see them take away my boy. . . . I cannot write any more. Farewell, dear one, farewell. All my thanks go out to you. What happened was good, in spite of everything. I shall be thankful to you till my last breath. I am so glad that I have told you all. Now you will know, though you can never fully understand, how much I have loved you; and yet my love will never be a burden to you. It is my solace that I shall not fail you. Nothing will be changed in your bright and lovely life. Beloved, my death will not harm you. This comforts me.

But who, ah who, will now send you white roses on your birthday? The vase will be empty. No longer will come that breath, that aroma, from my life, which once a year was breathed into your room.

I have one last request-the first, and the last. Do it for my sake. Always on your birthday-a day when one thinks of oneself-get some roses and put them in the vase. Do it just as others, once a year, have a Mass said for the beloved dead. I no longer believe in God, and therefore I do not want a Mass said for me. I believe in you alone. I love none but you. Only in you do I wish to go on living-just one day in the year, softly, quietly, as I have always lived near you. Please do this, my darling, please do it. . . . My first request, and my last . . . . Thanks, thanks. . . . I love you, I love you. . . . Farewell. . . .

她并不是想去诉说自己的委屈或者指责作家的行为，就像信中她无数次重申的那样。相反的，她唯一想说的市感谢，感谢她的一生因为爱而丰厚。

十几岁时候听人说“爱一个人就会爱他的全部”，总不那么明白，看过这篇之后有点懂了。其实并不是爱他的全部，而是因为太爱所以理解他的所有动机与期许，所有好的与不好的。 那样深的爱足以为他任何一个行为找到适当的理由，就像一个母亲对她的孩子一样，不仅仅是爱了，还感同身受了，所以会心疼他甚至超过自己。

最后，女人死了，而作家甚至努力也回忆不起女人的音容，直到最后一刻，她对他而言依旧是个陌生人。

“The letter fell from his nerveless hands. He thought long and deeply. Yes, he had vague memories of a neighbour's child, of a girl, of a woman in a dancing hall-all was dim and confused, like the flickering and shapeless view of a stone in the bed of a swiftly running stream. Shadows chased one another across his mind, but would not fuse into a picture. There were stirrings of memory in the realm of feeling, and still he could not remember. It seemed to him that he must have dreamed of all these figures, must have dreamed often and vividly-and yet they had only been the phantoms of a dream. His eyes wandered to the blue vase on the writing-table. It was empty. For years it had not been empty on his birthday. He shuddered, feeling as if an invisible door had been suddenly opened, a door through which a chill breeze from another world was blowing into his sheltered room. An intimation of death came to him, and an intimation of deathless love. Something welled up within him; and the thought of the dead woman stirred in his mind, bodiless and passionate, like the sound of distant music.

“山有木兮木有枝，心悦君兮君不知。”这是世界上最远的距离吧。

尽管，结局是伤感的，可是我觉得这样的结局也可以称作一种幸福。求仁得仁又何怨？爱过了，并且一生无悔，心存感激，也不枉来世一遭啊。

若果说什么是爱得真挚，大概就是这样吧，简单又宽容。

然后，这本书在很多时候让我想起今敏的《千年女优》。

女主人公穷尽一生都在追逐着自己年轻时代带的爱人，直至人生尽头。

这一步看到最后也哭得岔气了，同样的，就像看《一个陌生女人的来信》，不是感动大于悲伤，甚至升腾出了某种温暖的幸福感。

其实我们或许没办法评判某一种爱情是所谓真爱还是所谓执念，是对是错，只能说所有真实的情感都值得尊重吧。

毕竟，也许在某一刻我们多多少少都是爱上了爱情。

2. 奥黛丽·尼芬格《时间旅行者的妻子》

明日下班继续更～先去睡觉啦