关于北京

千山：我觉得北京是一座人们希望厌恶的城市，但这也是喜欢北京的一种方式。北京有一种“反乌托邦的感觉”，很多人都喜欢，包括我自己。
这感觉让你始终警觉着周围的一切不美好，同时让人感到兴奋，又让人感到压迫和厌世。
（i think it's a city that people love to hate, but that is like loving it.
it has a "dystopian edge" that people like, including myself.
it keeps you alert when so many things are so obviously wrong
that can be exciting
but also overbearing and depressing）
一位长期住在北京的外国人 comment upon 千山's arrival: "(your Jiangsu students) surely know that in the end the only thing that truly draws men to beijing is the love of the big city (or, the love of Power). -- i have no doubt you will thrive."
                
                
千山 recounts the unwritten tale of Beijing through the eyes of this foreigner，who was also his mentor. part 1于2008年完稿。以下是摘译
某杂志曾说过，在中国待一周你会想写一部小说，待一个月你会想写短篇，一年之后你就什么都不想写了。
"after a week in china you want to write a novel -- after a month you want to write a short story, and after a year you don't want to write anything."
那位外国人还说，
80年代的北京，晚上基本没事做，简直就是重新回顾19世纪作家的最佳地点——陀思妥耶夫斯基、托尔斯泰、亨利·詹姆斯、狄更斯、(安东尼)特罗洛普、(威廉姆)萨克雷等……北京的无聊至极成就了我文学教养的一大块——同理，这里也是阅读经典的好地方——但丁、弥尔顿、荷马、维吉尔……
"-beijing in the 80s, with absolutely zilch to do in the evenings, was a great place to reconnect with the more massive works of the 19th century masters -- dostoevsky, tolstoy, henry james, dickens, trollope, thackeray, etc... i am indebted to the bleakness of beijing for the bulking out of my literary education -- by the same token, a great place for the classics -- dante, milton, homer, virgil... "