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There was certainly no talk of comfort and joy, of the lively subculture of those of us who comprise the real clan of the book, who read not to judge the reading of others but to take the measure of ourselves. Of those of us who read because we love it more than anything, who feel about bookstores the way some people feel about jewelers. The silence about this was odd, both because there are so many of us and because we are what the world of books is really about. We are the people who once waited for the newest installment of Dickens' latest novel. We are the people who saw to it that Pride and Prejudice never went out of print.
显然没有人谈论我们这些真正的读书人的舒适与乐趣，谈论我们活跃的亚文化。我们读书不是为了评判他人的阅读，而是为了估量我们自己。我们这些人爱读书超过一切，看见书店的感觉就像有些人看见珠宝商一样，但人们不会谈论我们。这种沉默实在令人奇怪，因为我们人数众多，而且我们才是真正的读书界。我们就是当年翘首以望，等着狄更斯小说最新一期连载的那些人，我们就是那些永远不会让《傲慢与偏见》绝版的那些人。
Nothing had changed since I was a solitary child being given leather bookmarks by relatives for Christmas. It was still in the equivalent of the club chairs that we found one another: at the counters in bookstores with our arms full, at the front desks in libraries, at school, where teachers introduced us to one another—and, of course, in books, where book-lovers make up a lively subculture of characters. "Until I feared I would lose it, I never loved to read. One does not love breathing," says Scout in To Kill a Mockingbird.
从当年亲戚们在圣诞节送我这个爱独处的孩子皮制书签一直到现在，一切都没有改变。在书店柜台边抱着满怀书籍的人，在图书馆借书台前等待的人，在学校里老师为我们介绍认识的那些人，当然，还有在书本里构筑亚文化的众多读书爱好者，都是和坐在椅子里读书的人志同道合的人。在《杀死一只知更鸟》这本小说里，斯考特说过直到我害怕会失去一本书的时候才开始爱上读书。这就像人不懂得热爱呼吸一样。”
Reading is like so much else in our culture: the truth of it is found in its people and not in its pundits and its professionals. If I believed what I read about reading I would despair. But instead there are letters from readers to attend to, like the one from a girl who had been given one of my books by her mother and began her letter, "I guess I am what some people would call a bookworm."
读书与我们文化中很多东西都相似。它真正的意义在普通人心中，而不是在学术权威和专家学者身上。如果我相信我读过的关于阅读问题的文章，那我就要绝望了。好在我还有读者给我的来信要我回复。比如有个小姑娘，她妈妈送给她一本我写的书，她给我写了一封信，开头提到我想我就是人们所说的书呆子。”
"So am I," I wrote back.
我回信说我也是。”
