I will lend books to people, but of course, the rule is "Don't do that unless you never intend to see that book again."
我會借書給人,當然前提是: 「還想再看到那本書就不要借。」
[Small thing.]
[小事情]
[Big idea.]
[大想法]
The physical object of a book is almost like a person. I mean, it has a spine and it has a backbone. It has a face. Actually, it can sort of be your friend. Books record the basic human experience like no other medium can.
書的形體和人幾乎沒有兩樣。 我的意思是,書有書背,書有脊椎。 書有臉。 其實書也可以算得上是你的朋友。 書記錄人類基本的經驗, 沒有其他媒材做得到這點。
Before there were books, ancient civilizations would record things by notches on bones or rocks or what have you. The first books as we know them originated in ancient Rome. We go by a term called the codex, where they would have two heavy pieces of wood which become the cover, and then the pages in between would then be stitched along one side to make something that was relatively easily transportable. They all had to completely be done by hand, which became the work of what we know as a scribe. And frankly, they were luxury items.
在書出現之前, 古代文明記錄事情 會刻在骨頭、石頭或手邊的東西上。 我們所知最早一批書籍來自古羅馬。 我們稱之為手抄本, 手抄本會用兩片厚木板 做為書封, 其中的書頁會以針在一側相縫, 讓運送書相對容易一點。 這些書全都得用手寫, 因此產生了我們所知的抄寫員。 坦白講,書是奢侈品。
And then a printer named Johannes Gutenberg, in the mid-fifteenth century, created the means to mass-produce a book, the modern printing press. It wasn't until then that there was any kind of consumption of books by a large audience.
後來有一位名叫 約翰尼斯·谷騰堡的印刷商, 他在十五世紀中葉發明了 大量印刷書籍的方法, 也就是現代印刷機。 從那時開始, 書籍才開始有大批讀者。
Book covers started to come into use in the early nineteenth century, and they were called dust wrappers. They usually had advertising on them. So people would take them off and throw them away. It wasn't until the turn of the nineteenth into the twentieth century that book jackets could be seen as interesting design in and of themselves. Such that I look at that and I think, "I want to read that. That interests me."
十九世紀早期開始使用書皮, 當時稱為書封。 通常書封上會有廣告。 所以大家拆開書封之後就會丟掉。 直到十九、二十世紀轉換之際, 書衣才有機會被視為有趣的設計, 書衣本身就是一件設計。 有趣到我看書衣的時候會想: 「我想看那本書。 那本書吸引了我。」
The physical book itself represents both a technological advance but also a piece of technology in and of itself. It delivered a user interface that was unlike anything that people had before. And you could argue that it's still the best way to deliver that to an audience.
書的實體不僅展現了技術進步, 同時書本身也是一門技術。 書傳遞的使用者界面, 不像前人過去有的任何東西。 你可以說,直到現在書還是最好 傳遞使用者界面給讀者的方式。
I believe that the core purpose of a physical book is to record our existence and to leave it behind on a shelf, in a library, in a home, for generations down the road to understand where they came from, that people went through some of the same things that they're going through, and it's like a dialogue that you have with the author.
我相信實體書的核心價值 是要記錄我們的存在, 讓人留在書櫃、圖書館、家裡, 留給未來的世代, 讓他們了解我們從哪裡來, 大家共同經歷過某些事, 這些我們正在經歷的事, 就像你和作家的對話。
I think you have a much more human relationship to a printed book than you do to one that's on a screen. People want the experience of holding it, of turning the page, of marking their progress in a story. And then you have, of all things, the smell of a book. Fresh ink on paper or the aging paper smell. You don't really get that from anything else.
我想你和印刷書有更人性化的關係, 比你跟電子書相比還人性化多了。 人想要體驗拿著書、 打開書頁、在故事中留下進度的記號。 然後你在這之中就有了一本書的味道。 新鮮的墨印味,或是舊書頁的味道。 你從其它東西不會得到這些。
The book itself, you know, can't be turned off with a switch. It's a story that you can hold in your hand and carry around with you and that's part of what makes them so valuable, and I think will make them valuable for the duration.
書本身無法用一個開關關掉。 書是你可以握在手中的故事, 然後隨身帶著, 這也是讓書如此珍貴的原因, 我想只要書存在的一天就會很珍貴。
A shelf of books, frankly, is made to outlast you, (Laughs) no matter who you are.
坦白說,整櫃書 會活得比你久,(笑聲) 不管你是誰都一樣。