Hi everyone, and welcome back to酒馆. One piece of good news, 我们的新专辑上线了, Season Two of the Bluffer's Guide to English Literature. 【英文名著扫盲班】第二季.

Yeah, hi Anlan.

Hi, Lulu, hi everyone.

Did you enjoy recording about all those books with me？

Of course, I did. It was great to talk about some of these books, particularly the ones that I like, but I did actually learn a lot from the books that you like.

其实之前【英文名著扫盲班】第一季上线的时候, 我们就已经做了一个发刊对谈了, 对吧？发刊词.

We talked about why we enjoy reading, why we love literature and why literature is so important for language learners and for those who want to understand a little bit around the culture of the English speaking world.

So in this episode we're going to talk a little bit more about the books we have chosen. In particular, why we have chosen them.

因为我们在第一季的时候已经录了那种很正经的发刊词, 然后里面也说了我们各种各样的理念, philosophy.

So I thought season two, we can still use those philosophies, but we're going to add an extra episode, a little bit more fun episode to tell you how we've come to choose these ten books for the second season.

Yes. It involves lots of discussion, lots of arguments between Lulu and me.

Lots of fights.

Lots of fights, simply because there are so many books we want to choose. So what we do is each of us comes up with a list of ten books we want for the album.

Yeah.

Now Lulu's taste in books is a bit strange. Personally, some of these books I don't really quite understand, but my books are really, really good.

I could say the same thing.

我跟安澜在选书的时候, 基本上会同时考虑这种top booklists, and also our own preferences and our own experiences. And we do have very different tastes. After we share with each other, our ten book selections, we kept saying to each other, why did you choose that book？

Yes. So how we select them is after having arguments, we do try to choose an example of some of the most popular genres, not to mention the books that really have a following even to this day, so that they do appear in cultural references all the time.

Yeah. So you don't have to worry, although 安澜 and I have very, very different tastes in books but the books we've ended up choosing they're all very, very well-known books.

Basically the starting point as with the first album is if these books are parodied in TV shows like The Simpsons, we put them on the list.

只要是被辛普森一家恶搞过的, 就证明他足够的有名.

Yes.

The other thing that we talked about in the original intro was how we chose these books is we try to stay away from the books that are already very, very well-known, popular and read in China, like Jane Eyre or Pride and Prejudice because I thought everyone knows about them.

Yeah. Jane Austen, the Bront? Sisters, they're not actually on this list. So shall we actually compare our lists？

Yeah. 我觉得刚才也卖了足够的关子, I think what we’ll need to do now is we're going to own up to the books we have chosen.

Yes. So the first book for me is Gulliver's Travels.

Gulliver's Travels, 《格列佛游记》. I'll give you that one. I think it's an interesting book.

Yeah, is one of the first satires written in English, and it's never been out of print. Even though this was first written in the 18th century.

Yeah, it is still highly relevant, and I do like its comic but satirical style.比较这种反讽. 小孩可以看个热闹, 大人可以看到里面的政治反讽.

All right. So the book first book I have chosen, much heavier, Brave New World.

Yes. That was a very, very heavy book. But even though again Brave New World, it's not one of my favorite books, I read it, but it's not really my favorite. It's… had such a huge cultural impact.

《勇敢新世界》. Now this book is about a very bizarre dystopia, 就是反乌托邦或者敌托邦这种书. I love dystopian literature. They are basically kind of like futuristic horror stories.

And I'll give you that, Brave New World actually makes you think have we already reached that level?

So when you listen to our episode re. Brave New World, you might start thinking, Hang on, this sounds very, very familiar.

Are we actually in brave new world already?

Yes.

And also the thing is just a little bit more on dystopian literature or dystopian sci-fi works. Everybody now knows that I like horror genre, but all of these horror stories about supernatural, ghosts, spirit, they're not as scary as things like Westworld or The Handmaid's Tale, these dystopian literature, they are the ones that really scare me.

I do understand the themes and I do appreciate them, but I have to admit I do like a good horror story, mainly for the story and that is why I chose Dracula.

Dracula, 《德古拉》, who wouldn’t like vampire. Yeah, I concur that one I have no problem with.

Now some of you might be thinking, hang on, I know about Dracula, why are you wasting your time talking about Dracula?

Now many of you know the character of Dracula, but unless you read the book, you might not understand the themes and also some of the characters in this book. You’ll notice that Dracula in the book is very, very different from the Dracula you see on the screen.

Ain’t like Vampire Diaries.

Exactly. If you read Twilight or watch Twilight, it’s completely and utterly different.

It’s also the root of a lot of these vampire lore where they came from.

Yeah.

That’s fine.

I give you something that is also otherworldly, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.

Yes.

《爱丽丝梦游仙境》.

That is a childhood classic in many countries, not just in Britain.

It is supposedly a children's book, but it's so bizarre.

Mhm.

And it all depends on if you want to read into it or not.

Oh, yeah, and this is a book again I give you this because Alice or Alice in Wonderland, you can say Alice in Wonderland or Alice's adventures in Wonderland, they're pretty much synonyms now. It's had such a huge impact on popular culture…

True.

That we even say phrases, we even use idioms from this book.

Down the rabbit hole.

Down the rabbit hole.

Off with her head.

All of those all come from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.

Yeah, and it's not even just the themes. It's also the style that I really liked. It's this nonsensical style, like Lewis Carroll, Edward Lear, as we get into the styles a little bit.

And it's also about Alice growing up.