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《小公主》自1905年头次出版以来,一百多年间多次再版,流传于*世界,并多次被搬上银幕舞台。一个多世纪以来,一直是*世界家庭为陶冶子女情操必备的经典文学读物。由小说改编的同名电影,曾由好来坞 童星秀兰·邓波儿出演,风靡*球。本书为英文原版,同时随书附赠配套朗读CD,让读者在阅读精彩故事的同时,亦能提升英文阅读水平。
内容简介
《小公主》主要描述了小主人公英国女孩萨拉·克鲁在其父亲去世前后的生活。父亲去世前,她生活条件优越。克鲁上尉把女儿送到一所贵族学校,学校校长蝎尽*力为萨拉提供一切。她成了学校的“招牌学生”,从内向外都散发着公主的气息。克鲁上尉去世后,势力的校长把她赶到小阁楼,还要她干各种各样的杂活。对于生活的变故,周围同学的冷眼以及各种折磨,萨拉都以乐观的心态面对。即便衣衫槛楼,但她内心却表现得像个公主。本书自1905年头次出版后,一百多年来一版再版,流传于*世界,并多次被搬上银幕舞台。一个多世纪以来,一直是*世界家庭为陶冶子女情操必备的经典文学读物。由小说改编的同名电影,曾由好来坞 童星秀兰·邓波儿出演,风靡*球。本书为英文原版,同时随书附赠配套朗读CD,让读者在阅读精彩故事的同时,亦能提升英文阅读水平。 A Little Princess is a British children's novel by Frances Hodgson Burnett, first published as a book in 1905. It is an expanded version of Burnett's 1888 short story entitled Sara Crewe : or, What Happened at Miss Minchin's, which was serialized in St. Nicholas Magazine from 1887 to 1888. A Little Princess is full of good, strong female characters, and shows its readers that being a princess isn’t about being beautiful rich daughter of a king, trapped in a castle, waiting for her prince. It’s about being a virtuous, kind and generous person, no matter what your circumstances. Based on a 2007 online poll, the U. S. National Education Association named the book one of its “Teachers’ Top 100 Books for Children”. In 2012 it was ranked number 56 among all-time children’s novels in a survey published by School Library Journal. It was the second of two Burnett novels among the Top 100, with The Secret Garden number 15.
作者简介
弗兰西斯·H·伯内特,1849年生于英国曼彻斯特市,1865年随*家移民美国田纳西州。伯内特的父亲早逝,家境贫寒,写作成了她抒发情感、逃避现实的管道,也由于她在小说创作方面有着出色的表现,18岁起她便开始在杂志上发表故事,赚取稿费贴补家用。她的*一本畅销书是28岁时出版的《劳瑞家的那闺女》(That Lass O’Lowries),取材于幼年她在英国煤矿的生活。可是,真正让伯内特闻名于世的是她的儿童文学作品。1886年她发表了小说《小爵士》,这部小说写的是一个美国小男孩成为英国伯爵继承人的故事。“方特罗伊”从此成为英语词汇,指“过分盛装打扮的小孩”。这本书让伯内特成为当时畅销、*富有的流行作家之一。此书和1905年发表的《小公主》都曾被改编成话剧。1939年,电影《秘密花园(小孤女)》和《小公主》由当时红*一时的童星秀兰·邓波儿(Sherley Temper)主演。
内页插图
目录
Chapter 1 Sara /1
Chapter 2 A French Lesson /11
Chapter 3 Ermengarde /17
Chapter 4 Lottie /24
Chapter 5 Becky /33
Chapter 6 The Diamond Mines /43
Chapter 7 The Diamond Mines Again /53
Chapter 8 In the Attic /73
Chapter 9 Melchisedec /83
Chapter 10 The Indian Gentleman /94
Chapter 11 Ram Dass /106
Chapter 12 The Other Side of the Wall /115
Chapter 13 One of the Populace /123
Chapter 14 What Melchisedec Heard and Saw /133
Chapter 15 The Magic /138
Chapter 16 The Visitor /161
Chapter 17 “It Is the Child!” /176
Chapter 18 “I Tried Not to Be” /183
Chapter 19 Anne /194
精彩书摘
Once on a dark winter’s day, when the yellow fog hung so thick and heavy in the streets of London that the lamps were lighted and the shop windows blazed with gas as they do at night, an oddlooking little girl sat in a cab with her father and was driven rather slowly through the big thoroughfares.
She sat with her feet tucked under her, and leaned against her father, who held her in his arm, as she stared out of the window at the passing people with a queer old-fashioned thoughtfulness in her big eyes.
She was such a little girl that one did not expect to see such a look on her small face. It would have been an old look for a child of twelve, and Sara Crewe was only seven. The fact was, however, that she was always dreaming and thinking odd things and could not herself remember any time when she had not been thinking things about grown-up people and the world they belonged to. She felt as if she had lived a long, long time.
At this moment she was remembering the voyage she had just made from Bombay with her father, Captain Crewe. She was thinking of the big ship, of the Lascars passing silently to and fro on it, of the children playing about on the hot deck, and of some young officers’ wives who used to try to make her talk to them and laugh at the things she said.
Principally, she was thinking of what a queer thing it was that at one time one was in India in the blazing sun, and then in the middle of the ocean, and then driving in a strange vehicle through strange streets where the day was as dark as the night. She found this so puzzling that she moved closer to her father.
“Papa,” she said in a low, mysterious little voice which was almost a whisper, “papa.”
“What is it, darling?” Captain Crewe answered, holding her closer and looking down into her face. “What is Sara thinking of?”
“Is this the place?” Sara whispered, cuddling still closer to him.
“Is it, papa?”
“Yes, little Sara, it is. We have reached it at last.” And though she was only seven years old, she knew that he felt sad when he said it.
It seemed to her many years since he had begun to prepare her mind for “the place,” as she always called it. Her mother had died when she was born, so she had never known or missed her. Her young, handsome, rich, petting father seemed to be the only relation she had in the world. They had always played together and been fond of each other. She only knew he was rich because she had heard people say so when they thought she was not listening, and she had also heard them say that when she grew up she would be rich, too. She did not know all that being rich meant. She had always lived in a beautiful bungalow, and had been used to seeing many servants who made salaams to her and called her “Missee Sahib,” and gave her her own way in everything. She had had toys and pets and an ayah who worshipped her, and she had gradually learned that people who were rich had these things. That, however, was all she knew about it.
During her short life only one thing had troubled her, and that thing was “the place” she was to be taken to some day. The climate of India was very bad for children, and as soon as possible they were sent away from it—generally to England and to school. She had seen other children go away, and had heard their fathers and mothers talk about the letters they received from them. She had known that she would be obliged to go also, and though sometimes her father’s stories of the voyage and the new country had attracted her, she had been troubled by the thought that he could not stay with her.
“Couldn’t you go to that place with me, papa?” she had asked when she was five years old. “Couldn’t you go to school, too? I would help you with your lessons.”
“But you will not have to stay for a very long time, little Sara,” he had always said. “You will go to a nice house where there will be a lot of little girls, and you will play together, and I will send you plenty of books, and you will grow so fast that it will seem scarcely a year before you are big enough and clever enough to come back and take care of papa.”
She had liked to think of that. To keep the house for her father; to ride with him, and sit at the head of his table when he had dinner parties; to talk to him and read his books—that would be what she would like most in the world, and if one must go away to “the place” in England to attain it, she must make up her mind to go. She did not care very much for other little girls, but if she had plenty of books she could console herself. She liked books more than anything else, and was, in fact, always inventing stories of beautiful things and telling them to herself. Sometimes she had
told them to her father, and he had liked them as much as she did.
“Well, papa,” she said softly, “if we are here I suppose we must be resigned.”
He laughed at her old-fashioned speech and kissed her. He was really not at all resigned himself, though he knew he must keep that a secret. His quaint little Sara had been a great companion to him, and he felt he should be a lonely fellow when, on his return to India, he went into his bungalow knowing he need not expect to see the small figure in its white frock come forward to meet him. So he held her very closely in his arms as the cab rolled into the big, dull square in which stood the house which was their destination.
……
前言/序言
I do not know whether many people realize how much more than is ever written there really is in a story—how many parts of it are never told—how much more really happened than there is in the book one holds in one’s hand and pores over. Stories are something like letters. When a letter is written, how often one remembers things omitted and says, “Ah, why did I not tell them that?” In writing a book one relates all that one remembers at the time, and if one told all that really happened perhaps the book would never end. Between the lines of every story there is another story, and that is one that is never heard and can only be guessed at by the people who are good at guessing. The person who writes the story may never know all of it, but sometimes he does and wishes he had the chance to begin again.
When I wrote the story of “Sara Crewe” I guessed that a great deal more had happened at Miss Minchin’s than I had had time to find out just then. I knew, of course, that there must have been chapters full of things going on all[vi] the time; and when I began to make a play out of the book and called it “A Little Princess,” I discovered three acts full of things. What interested me most was that I found that there had been girls at the school whose names I had not even known before. There was a little girl whose name was Lottie, who was an amusing little person; there was a hungry scullery-maid who was Sara’s adoring friend; Ermengarde was much more entertaining than she had seemed at first; things happened in the garret which had never been hinted at in the book; and a certain gentleman whose name was Melchisedec was an intimate friend of Sara’s who should never have been left out of the story if he had only walked into it in time. He and Becky and Lottie lived at Miss Minchin’s, and I cannot understand why they did not mention themselves to me at first. They were as real as Sara, and it was careless of them not to come out of the story shadowland and say, “Here I am—tell about me.” But they did not—which was their fault and not mine. People who live in the story one is writing ought to come forward at the beginning and tap the writing person on the shoulder and say, “Hallo, what about me?” If they don’t, no one can be blamed but themselves and their slouching, idle ways.
After the play of “A Little Princess” was produced in New York, and so many children went to see it and liked Becky and Lottie and Melchisedec, my publishers asked[vii] me if I could not write Sara’s story over again and put into it all the things and people who had been left out before, and so I have done it; and when I began I found there were actually pages and pages of things which had happened that had never been put even into the play, so in this new “Little Princess” I have put all I have been able to discover.
FRANCES HODGSON BURNETT
好的,这是一份不包含《小公主:A LITTLE PRINCESS》(英文原版)内容的图书简介,力求详尽,力求自然流畅,字数在1500字左右。 --- 璀璨星辰下的迷途灯塔:《银月之城的挽歌》 卷首语:时间的沙漏与记忆的尘埃 在这座被永恒的银月光辉所笼罩的城市——维斯塔利亚,时间似乎拥有了实体,它以冰冷的月光为刻度,缓慢而无情地流逝。这里的一切都闪耀着一种颓败的华美,高耸入云的尖塔穿透常年不散的雾霭,每一块精雕细琢的石板下,都深埋着一个被遗忘的契约和一曲未完成的挽歌。这不是一个关于王室荣耀或骑士传奇的故事,而是一场关于身份的错位、灵魂的囚禁以及在绝对秩序下对自由微弱渴望的深刻描摹。 第一部分:月光下的孤儿——伊莱亚斯的诞生与困境 我们的故事始于一个晦暗的冬夜,圣索菲亚大教堂的钟楼敲响了第十二下,象征着新一轮月周期在维斯塔利亚的开始。主角,伊莱亚斯·维恩,一个身份神秘的少年,被发现遗弃在冰冷的圣堂阶梯上。他唯一的物件,是一枚刻有奇异符文的琥珀吊坠,它散发着微弱的、仿佛被禁锢的生命热量。 维斯塔利亚由“铸光议会”严格统治,这个由术士和古代贵族组成的统治阶层,将秩序看得比生命本身更为重要。伊莱亚斯被收容进了“静默之院”,一个专门收留和培养孤儿的机构。与那些被培养成未来城市工程师或书记员的同伴不同,伊莱亚斯似乎拥有一种与生俱来的“异质性”。他敏感、沉默,常常在无人察觉时凝视着天空中的那轮永恒的银月,仿佛那里藏着他失落的记忆碎片。 他的童年是在刻板的教条和无休止的学业中度过的。他学习古老的星象学、晦涩的城市法典,以及如何完美地隐藏自己的情感。然而,他始终感到自己像是一个被错误放置的拼图,格格不入。他的记忆从七岁之后便是一片空白,每当他试图触碰那段空白时,琥珀吊坠便会灼痛他的胸膛。 第二部分:裂缝中的低语——禁忌的知识与背叛的阴影 随着伊莱亚斯逐渐成长,他展现出了惊人的学习能力和一种罕见的、对“光影流动”的直觉把握。这引起了首席执政官塞拉菲娜的注意。塞拉菲娜,一位以冷酷和绝对理性著称的女性,接纳伊莱亚斯进入了她的私人图书馆——那里存放着维斯塔利亚最古老、最危险的文献。 在那些泛黄的羊皮纸和被魔法封印的卷轴中,伊莱亚斯开始接触到被禁止的历史:关于城市建立之初的那场“大寂静”,以及铸光议会如何通过某种“契约”来束缚城市的力量,以维持其永恒的“稳定”。他发现,维斯塔利亚的光明并非自然产生,而是某种被消耗的生命力的结果。 更令人不安的是,伊莱亚斯结识了图书馆的夜班看守者,一位年迈的、被流放的前学者——老学者卡西乌斯。卡西乌斯看穿了伊莱亚斯眼中的迷茫,并向他透露了一个惊人的秘密:伊莱亚斯的父母并非普通人,他们是“月裔”,一族被指控叛乱并被彻底抹除的族群。他的琥珀吊坠,是开启某种古代遗迹的钥匙。 卡西乌斯将伊莱亚斯引入了一条地下密道,这条密道通向城市的底层——那些被遗忘的、被称为“灰烬区”的贫民窟。在那里,他遇到了与上层社会截然不同的生活:挣扎、反抗和对“打破银月诅咒”的渴望。 第三部分:抉择的十字路口——忠诚、爱恋与预言的重量 在灰烬区,伊莱亚斯邂逅了莉安娜,一位坚韧的地下反抗组织“挽歌者”的领袖。莉安娜不相信书本上的历史,她相信行动的力量。她教会了伊莱亚斯如何用双手去争取,而不是依赖书本上的知识。两人在共同的危险中建立了一种深刻的、超越友谊的情感联结。 然而,伊莱亚斯的双重生活令他身心俱疲。一方面,他必须在塞拉菲娜面前扮演一个顺从、有前途的继承人;另一方面,他又必须在地下世界与莉安娜一起策划一场针对议会的行动。 矛盾在一次关键的仪式上爆发。铸光议会准备进行一年一度的“光能汲取仪式”,这将使城市维持运转,但代价是底层的生命力被大幅削弱。伊莱亚斯被要求站在仪式台前,作为“光之子”接受力量的洗礼。 就在仪式进行到高潮时,伊莱亚斯明白了琥珀吊坠的真正意义。它并非是开启遗迹的钥匙,而是封印他自身力量的容器。他的血脉中流淌着与维斯塔利亚建立之初签订契约的力量相悖的、纯粹的“自由之光”。 他面临着决定性的抉择: 1. 服从议会,成为稳定秩序的维护者,获得权力和高位,但必须眼睁睁看着城市在虚假的繁荣下继续腐朽。 2. 相信莉安娜和卡西乌斯,打破封印,释放他体内被压抑的力量,这股力量足以摧毁议会的统治核心,但也可能让整个维斯塔利亚陷入不可逆转的黑暗与混乱。 第四部分:挽歌的终章——自由的代价 故事的高潮发生在中央观测塔上。伊莱亚斯在塞拉菲娜面前撕开了琥珀吊坠。瞬间,一股纯净、灼热的白光冲破了维斯塔利亚千百年来被月光所主导的灰色调。 塞拉菲娜试图用她毕生的知识来压制这股力量,但伊莱亚斯体内的力量是她所不知的“本源之光”。在短暂而残酷的对决中,他没有选择杀死塞拉菲娜,而是用光芒照亮了城市所有的秘密档案——那些关于压迫、谎言和被牺牲者的记录,瞬间被投射到了全城的每一个角落。 议会的权威轰然倒塌。然而,伴随着秩序的瓦解,长久被压抑的地下能量开始反噬。城市的天空不再是稳定的银月,而是闪烁着不定的电弧。莉安娜领导的挽歌者们涌入核心区,他们必须立即建立新的结构,防止社会彻底崩塌。 伊莱亚斯,虽然拯救了人们于欺骗,却也成为了不稳定因素的中心。他意识到,真正的自由并非一蹴而就的解放,而是需要承担随之而来的沉重责任。他没有选择成为新的统治者,而是选择与卡西乌斯一同,深入地下,去修复被他力量无意中撕裂的“城市根基”。 尾声:曙光的微弱希望 小说在伊莱亚斯和莉安娜最后一次于晨曦中相望的场景中结束。那天的阳光是久违的、带着橙色的暖意,而不是冰冷的月光。伊莱亚斯将他所掌握的关于“稳定与自由平衡”的知识留给了莉安娜,他选择退居幕后,成为一个引导者,一个在黑暗中探索修复之道的“守夜人”。 维斯塔利亚的挽歌已经唱完,新的、充满不确定性的黎明正在艰难地升起。这本书探讨的,不是正义如何轻易战胜邪恶,而是当一个人发现自己是打破世界平衡的关键时,他将如何选择继承或摧毁这份力量的重量。它是一曲关于身份认同、集体记忆与个人觉醒的复杂交响乐。 --- 核心主题: 极权下的个人异化、知识的权力与滥用、秩序与自由的永恒悖论、以及在历史迷雾中追寻真实身份的艰辛旅程。