见尼尔.舒斯特曼

Susan著 小哭译

今天我见到了我最喜欢的作者了！今年夏天，我开始阅读尼尔.舒斯特曼的书，现在，我已经成为了他的忠实粉丝了。他写的故事是那么地有趣儿并令人思考，我可以将它们很好地联系在一起，这一切是如此地神奇。所以，当听说他要来我们学校的时候，我超级地激动。

他来学校前的那天晚上，我开始紧张起来。妈妈说我能在早晨七点半到八点之间和他交谈，但是，他若是不喜欢我怎么办呢？妈妈还会给他看我写的跟他有关的写作内容，但是，如果他认为我误解了他的书怎么办呢？如果他认为我的那些写作很糟糕又该怎么办呢？我紧张，不是因为我害怕他或是我不知道去说什么，而是因为我担心他会如何看待我。以前我从来没有见过任何名人，我不想自己看起来对人家太有兴趣儿让人烦，也不想看起来对人家太没兴趣儿以致于让人家觉得和我说话是浪费时间。

第二天早晨，妈妈带着我七点半赶到了学校，但不幸的是，舒斯特曼先生没在那儿！原来他把闹钟定在了晚上六点而不是早晨六点，所以他迟到了。知道了甚至象他这样著名的作家也会犯这种低级错误挺不错。然而不幸的是，因为迟到导致他没有多少时间和我们交谈。最后，我不得不去教室，他和我妈妈谈了几句。

课前通告过后，我们不用上第一和第二节课，改成去参加舒斯特曼先生的报告会。以前，我总认为他是“写了那些真是很棒的书的男人”，不是哪个我真的将要见到或与之交谈的人。我有点惊讶于他与我们交谈的轻松方式。他让我们提问，他来回答。当他说这话的时候，我的大脑开始运转起来。我有这么多的问题，我应该问哪一个呢？！别人问了一个我也有点感兴趣的问题，于是我决定先听听，然后再问。

有人问舒斯特曼先生《分解人》的灵感来自于哪。我已经听过了他是如何从那三个无关的话题中得到这些灵感的基本概况（我妈妈给我看的一个视频），但是听到他亲自带着很多细节来讲解这件事儿，则很不同。我很惊讶于他怎么能够在那些新闻文章中看到这些潜在的故事并将它们揉合在一起的。还有，我很惊讶于“分解”的威胁是如此地真实。他告诉我们关于他在某处读到一篇新的文章，关于这些“恐怖的青少年”在英国正在造成的许多麻烦，一些人如何声称为了社会的安定想要杀死那些青少年的事儿。我不知道世界上发生过那些事情。（我不怎么看新闻，因为它们太令人沮丧了。晚间新闻经常始于“晚上好”，然后就开始告诉你为什么事实并非如此。）

我有一个问题是关于他是如何从有一个灵感到完成一本书的。他是如何知道这个灵感适不适合写一本书的？对他来讲，写作过程是怎么样的？在开始写之前他已经知道了这个故事的多少了，在写的过程中他又能够想出来故事的多少呢？他很好地回答了问题的第一部分，但是没有回答第二部分。舒斯特曼先生回答说，不论什么时候他有一个灵感，他会立即就把它写一本书。首先，他要弄清楚这个故事是否值得讲。他想讲一些特别的故事、一些有别于常规的书中的故事。他不讲吸血鬼的爱情故事，也不讲关于仙女或者关于龙的什么故事，他要讲一些新颖的东西。还有，他要他的故事能够以某种方式和现实生活关联。他希望他的读者能够和这些故事有关并觉得故事可信。还有，当他将一个故事写进书里时，这个故事通常正在对着他大声尖叫着让他去讲出来。最后一个问题是他写作的动力来自哪里。

我想他的回答相当地好。那些正是使他的书如此令人喜欢的原因，我真的羡慕他能够想得出来那些东西。然后，他开始告诉我们他的写作过程，说直到他觉得故事好到可以被称为“我的第一稿”之前，他通常会写一大堆草稿（我想可能是五稿……至少是四稿…….但是我没记清）。他说在他将每一章都写完之前，他从不回顾一个故事，也不会从头开始修改什么。那正是我总是很内疚地做着的事情。还有一件让我真的觉得很有趣儿的事情是他会在笔记本上先写下一些东西，然后再将它们敲进电脑，因为在他打字的时候，他通常都会做些编辑工作，使书变得更好。

我发现舒斯特曼回答提问答得非常周到仔细、很有帮助性。我应该在自己的写作中也试着应用他的一些方法。除了关于他是怎么写书的这类问题之外，也有一些关于他最喜欢的人物、他怎么想到了不同的人物、以及其它的我觉得有趣儿但是并不那么重要的问题。两节课后，我们都不得不上楼去上课了，我很高兴我见到了他，但是也很失望于我不能提问我想问的所有问题。

我认为舒斯特曼先生真的是一个伟大的作家。他显然从里到外地了解他的人物，他也有许多的天赋。如果我读了和他同样的资料，我永远也不可能想出来象《分解人》这样的一个故事来。我有大把的问题想问他（主要是因为他出给了这么好的回答）！我想（并且还在想）知道他是怎么展开他的人物的。不仅仅是关于他是怎么得到这些人物的灵感的，还有他是怎么让这些人物有血有肉、充满个性并如此真实的。我想知道他是如何面对当故事走到了尽头、写不下去的日子的（他肯定有这样的日子，对吗？）。我想知道他是怎么在写作上达到如此优秀的。我想知道他是否曾经有过觉得故事讲不下去了，完全是在浪费时间了的时候。我妈妈已经解释了一些在他并不确切地知道他的故事将会写到哪里的情况下，他是如何写作的，他是如何边写边创作故事情节的，但我还是想听他亲自讲讲他是怎么把这些不同的场景揉合在一个故事中的。如果他是在写作的过程中想到这些主意，并把这些主意写进去的话，那当他开始写的时候，故事的轮廓已经规划出来多少了呢？又有多少是后加进来的呢？我有这么多的问题想问他！

总之，我真的很高兴于见到舒斯特曼先生。我妈妈告诉我她有他的邮箱，所以我希望我能够以某种方式和他交流。他是一个真正的天才，了不起的人，我希望自己能从他身上学到很多东西。

【小哭介绍背景】我很高兴于Susan的ELA老师威尔基女士竟然是舒斯特曼一本书的编辑，因此可以连续几年将舒斯特曼先生请到学校来给学生们做报告！Susan早就告诉过我威尔基女士最喜欢的作者之一就是舒斯特曼，也讲过威尔基女士对写作中的低级错误简直是零容忍度的态度，而这与舒斯特曼讲他会在写了几稿之后才敢把东西拿出来给人看的“第一稿”的概念，基本上是类似的。真的是“物以类聚，人以群分”。在这一点上，我从来没有对Susan提出过真正的要求。这也源于波士顿那边的写作教练的观念，写作就是写作，你不能让孩子因为一些什么语法、拼写、书法或结构不合理而丧失了写作的兴趣！坚持写是最重要的事情！

我现在体会这两个老师的不同理念，大概是源于所面对学生的年纪！在很小的时候，培养兴趣是第一位的！同时也要和他们当时的语法与词汇课的进度相配。当学生们已经快升高中时，他们已经学过了语法，词汇量也很大了，这时低级错误就是不能容忍的了。学生们这时必须得认真地对待写作中的语法及拼写错这类不应该犯的错误了。这让我想起了我在博士论文草稿中，第一页就犯了一个低级错误（打错字），当时导师的导师（师爷）就在上面留下了一句“不可饶恕的错误！”。那时想着老先生可真严厉啊，这么点事犯得上用“不可饶恕”这个词儿吗？其实谁都看得出来是笔误嘛。不过看来大师都是这么训练弟子的，估计大师们也都是被这样训练出来的。

当我得到威尔基女士的邀请去在报告会正式开始前与舒斯特曼先生会面时，我同Susan一样即兴奋又紧张。我一是紧张于自己的英文不够好怕交流起来吃力，二是紧张于自己没有真正地阅读舒斯特曼的书，这如果被发现了会显得不够重视人家。不过一想有几乎读遍了他所有写给孩子们的书的Susan在旁边帮忙，心里还算有点依靠。走前我落实了几遍，确保Susan准备了足够的问题去提问，我要保证这半个小时能够得到最大化的效果。可惜的是作家迟到了，我想让Susan和作家近距离交流的指望泡汤了。好在我是大人，多少还是能够抓住一点机会的，我在报告会之前和舒斯特曼先生交流了几分钟，拿到了作家的邮箱，也介绍了我和Susan写的关于他和他的书的文章，并当场奉上。于是舒斯特曼先生说希望把我们的写作挂在他的网站上。大概，这也是我和Susan能够做到的最好了。舒斯特曼先生说他年底前会去深圳，要去位于东莞的国际学校讲演。我不知道是哪一间。因为珠三角国际学校那么多！但是我真的希望能够有机会进一步了解清楚，那样至少可以给我在广州的朋友们通个风报个信啥的哈：）

Susan说她在会场上只问了两个问题，因为学生们提高的热情一直都很高昂，直到最后一直都有人在举手提问。我是没有留在会场，但是我很喜欢Susan所描述的会场情况。而这个作家所受欢迎程度确实也可见一斑！

如果舒斯特曼不迟到的话，报告会之前还会有一个签名售书的活动。结果最后也是不得不取消了。Susan他们团购的书，最后由老师给全部收了回去，过了周末后再发回来，上面就有了作家的签名了：）这些事情本来是计划在现场进行的。如果大作家没迟到，如果我和Susan与他的单独交流也没被取消，可以想像，Susan得有多么地兴奋！就算是只剩下如Susan文中所述的这些，也已经让她非常地激动了！

不过，Susan说她从未见过名人，这一点让我觉得这孩子的记性真是没法讲。出国前两个月，我专门带她到扬州参加两天活动，主要也是为了见一见财经名人时寒冰。那两天时伯伯一直对她爱护有加，过后在博客中还大谈Susan多么地善解人意。Susan曾有一会儿不舒服，于是旁边的时伯伯赶紧抱起她，这时候她不顾自己难受，竟然问时伯伯“我是不是很沉啊？”让时寒冰着实感动了半天啊！现在时伯伯还关心着Susan呢，可Susan可能早把人家忘光光了，唉。也许，那是我眼里的名人，而舒斯特曼才是Susan眼里的名人吧。

我那天跟舒斯特曼先生合了一张影，Susan啥机会也没有捞着。本来那是她的偶像，我本来是计划帮她和作者合个影的，还想着合影时让她把那本新书举起来呢：）以后再说吧。我相信如果Susan能够提出来有价值的问题，给舒斯特曼发邮件过去，是会得到回应的。问题就在于，Susan她除了有崇拜偶像的心情之外，有没有让偶像回应她的本事。如同在她关于交友的文章中我所论述的，只有提升自己，才能交到自己所欣赏的朋友。我希望Susan通过这个见面会，看到差距，找到榜样，找到努力的方向。这个偶像真的是不错，Susan那天回家就说，妈妈，人家的书写了几稿才会拿给别人看，可是我，从来都懒得修正自己写作的错误，看来，我得改改。看看，偶像的力量是巨大的……看来，指责Susan的错误不如帮她找到好的榜样管用哈。

附上英文原文：

            Meeting Neal Shusterman

I met my favorite author today! This summer, I started reading Neal Shusterman’s books, and now, I’m a huge fan of his. It’s amazing how entertaining and thoughtful his stories are, and how well I can connect to them. So, when I heard that he was coming to my school, I was super excited.

The night before he came to our school, I started to get nervous. My mom said that I would be able to talk to him from 7:30 to 8:00, but what if he doesn’t like me? My mom was also going to show him what I wrote about his works, but what if he thinks I intepreted the book wrong? What if he thought those writings are really lame? I was nervous, not because I was scared of him or because I didn’t know what to say. I was nervous because I was worried about what he would think of me. I had never met a famous person before, and I didn’t want to seem too interested and annoy him, but nor did I want to seem too uninterested and make him feel like talking to me was a waste of his time.

The following morning, my mom took me to school at 7:30, but unfortunately, Mr. Shusterman wasn’t there! It turned out that he set his alarm for 6 PM instead of 6 AM, which made him late. It was nice to know that even famous authors make silly mistakes like that too. However, it was unfortunate for us, because since he was late, he did not have that much time to talk to us. In the end, I had to get to class, and he exchanged a few words with my mom instead.

After advisory, we skipped 1^st and 2^nd period to attend Mr. Shusterman’s presention. Before, I’d always thought of him as “that dude that write these really awesome books”, not really as someone whom I would ever get to meet and talk to. I was a bit surprised by the casual way he talked to us. He told us that we can ask the questions and he’ll answer them. When he said that, my mind started spinning. I had so many questions, which one should I ask?! Somebody else asked a question that I was sort of interested in, so I decided to listen, and then ask later.

Somebody asked Mr. Shusterman where he got his ideas for “Unwind”. I’ve already heard the basic story of how he got his ideas from these three different unrelated sources (my mom showed me a video about it), but hearing him tell it himself, in detail, was different. I was amazed by how he was able to see the potential story in those news articles and piece them together. Also, I was surprised by how real the threat of unwinding is. He told us about how he read in a new article somewhere about these “feral teens” in Britain that were causing lots of trouble, and how some people were claiming that they want to kill those teenagers for the good of society. I had no idea that sort of stuff was happening in the world. (I don’t watch the news much, because they’re too depressing. Evening news always starts with “good evening”, and then proceed to tell you why it’s not.)

I had a question about how he get from an idea to a finished book. How does he know if the idea is good for a book? What’s the writing process like for him? How much of the story does he know before he starts and how much does he come up with on the spot? He answered the first part of the question well, but not the second. Mr. Shusterman said that whenever he gets an idea, he immediately write a book about it. First, he finds out if the story is worthy to be told. He wants to tell stories that are unique, story that are different from regular books. No vampire romances or fairies and dragons for him. He wants something that’s original. Also, he wants the story to be able to connect to reality in some way. He wants his readers to be able to connect with the story and find the story believable. Also, when he writes a story into a book, that story is usually screaming at him to be told. That last one is what gives him motivation to write.

I thought his answer was really good. Those were the things that made his books so likable, and I really admire him to be able to come up with stuff like that. Then, he proceeded to tell us his writing process, and about how he usually write a bunch of drafs (I think it was five… at least four… but I don’t remember very well) until he finds the story good enough to be called “my first draft”. He said he never looks back in a story and change stuff from before until he finishes writing every chapter. That’s something that I’m guilty of doing. Also, one thing I found really interesting was that he writes stuff down in a notebook first, then type it into the computer, because when he type things in, he usually make edits that would make the book better.

I found Mr. Shusterman’s answers to his questions very thoughtful and very useful. I should try using some of those methods in my own writings too. Aside from questions about how he wrote his books, there were questions about which character he liked best, how he came up with different characters, and other things that I considered interesting but not super important. Two class periods later, we had to all go upstairs for class, and I was glad that I got to meet him, but also dissapointed that I couldn’t ask all of the questions that I wanted to.

I think Mr. Shusterman is a really, really great author. He obviously knows his characters from the inside out, and he has a lot of talent too. I would never been able to think of a story like Unwind if I had read the same things he had read. I had so many more questions to ask him (mostly because he gave such good answers)! I wanted (and still want) to know how he developes his characters. Not just how he gets his ideas for them, but how he acutually flesh out their personalities and make them real. I want to know how he deal with those days when it just seems like the story is going to run into a wall and die (he must have those days, right?). I want to know how he got so good at writing. I want to know if he ever feels like the story is not going to work and that it had been a waste of time. My mom already sort of explained how he writes without really knowing where his story is going to go, creating the storyline as he goes along, but I want to hear it from himself about how he comes up with different scenes in the story. If he came up with ideas as he wrote the story and dropped those ideas in, how much of the story was outlined when he started, and how much was added on? I have so many questions to ask him!

Overall, I really enjoyed meeting Mr. Shusterman. My mom told me that she has his e-mail, so I’m hoping that I’ll be able to communicate with him in some way. He is a really talented and great person, and I’m hoping I can learn a lot from him.