具体描述
In the Dream House is Carmen Maria Machado’s engrossing and wildly innovative account of a relationship gone bad, and a bold dissection of the mechanisms and cultural representations of psychological abuse. Tracing the full arc of a harrowing relationship with a charismatic but volatile woman, Machado struggles to make sense of how what happened to her shaped the person she was becoming.
And it’s that struggle that gives the book its original structure: each chapter is driven by its own narrative trope―the haunted house, erotica, the bildungsroman―through which Machado holds the events up to the light and examines them from different angles. She looks back at her religious adolescence, unpacks the stereotype of lesbian relationships as safe and utopian, and widens the view with essayistic explorations of the history and reality of abuse in queer relationships.
Machado’s dire narrative is leavened with her characteristic wit, playfulness, and openness to inquiry. She casts a critical eye over legal proceedings, fairy tales, Star Trek, and Disney villains, as well as iconic works of film and fiction. The result is a wrenching, riveting book that explodes our ideas about what a memoir can do and be.
作者简介
Carmen Maria Machado is the author of the memoir In the Dream House and the short story collection Her Body and Other Parties. She has been a finalist for the National Book Award and the winner of the Bard Fiction Prize, the Lambda Literary Award for Lesbian Fiction, the Brooklyn Public Library Literature Prize, the Shirley Jackson Award, and the National Book Critics Circle's John Leonard Prize. In 2018, the New York Times listed Her Body and Other Parties as a member of "The New Vanguard," one of "15 remarkable books by women that are shaping the way we read and write fiction in the 21st century."
Her essays, fiction, and criticism have appeared in the New Yorker, the New York Times, Granta, Harper’s Bazaar, Tin House, VQR, Conjunctions, McSweeney's Quarterly Concern, The Believer, Guernica, Best American Science Fiction & Fantasy, Best American Nonrequired Reading, and elsewhere. She holds an MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and has been awarded fellowships and residencies from the Guggenheim Foundation, Michener-Copernicus Foundation, Elizabeth George Foundation, CINTAS Foundation, Yaddo, Hedgebrook, and the Millay Colony for the Arts. She is the Writer in Residence at the University of Pennsylvania and lives in Philadelphia with her wife.
目录信息
读后感
In the process of recounting her experience in an abusive lesbian relationship, the author occasionally cites a folklore motif in the footnote, suggesting a particular episode of her story has overlap with a common folkloric paradigm. The book is an authent...
In the process of recounting her experience in an abusive lesbian relationship, the author occasionally cites a folklore motif in the footnote, suggesting a particular episode of her story has overlap with a common folkloric paradigm. The book is an authent...
In the process of recounting her experience in an abusive lesbian relationship, the author occasionally cites a folklore motif in the footnote, suggesting a particular episode of her story has overlap with a common folkloric paradigm. The book is an authent...
In the process of recounting her experience in an abusive lesbian relationship, the author occasionally cites a folklore motif in the footnote, suggesting a particular episode of her story has overlap with a common folkloric paradigm. The book is an authent...
In the process of recounting her experience in an abusive lesbian relationship, the author occasionally cites a folklore motif in the footnote, suggesting a particular episode of her story has overlap with a common folkloric paradigm. The book is an authent...
用户评价
如果用一个词来形容我的阅读感受，那一定是“压迫”。作者构建的世界观是如此真实可信，以至于让人感到无处遁形。那种环境带来的心理压力，不是通过直接的冲突来体现的，而是通过一种持续的、渗透性的氛围感营造出来的。空气里似乎弥漫着潮湿和霉味，光线总是昏暗的，每一个角落都潜藏着未言明的规训和审视。这种感觉非常像早期存在主义文学作品中对个体异化的描写，但又增添了现代都市生活中那种被数据和符号包围的冰冷感。文字的句式结构也常常是沉重而冗长的，模仿了角色在巨大压力下思维的缓慢与凝滞。读到某些段落时，我不得不放下书，深呼吸几次，才能平复那种被紧紧攥住心脏的感觉。它没有给我们一个明确的“出口”或“救赎”，而是把我们留在了那个令人窒息的空间里，去直面那些最难堪、最原始的生存困境。这是一本需要强大内心才能坚持读完的作品，但其带来的情感冲击力是无可替代的。
这本书的结构设计简直是一场智力上的冒险。它不像传统小说那样循规蹈矩地推进情节，而是充满了非线性的跳跃和碎片化的叙事手法。初看之下，可能会觉得线索有些散乱，人物关系也扑朔迷离，但随着阅读的深入，你会惊叹于作者如何将这些看似随机的片段巧妙地编织成一张密不透风的网。那些突然插入的、看似无关紧要的回忆片段，实则像夜空中闪烁的星星，最终汇聚成完整的星座图景。这种叙事上的“留白”处理得非常高明，它强迫读者调动自己的全部认知资源去参与到文本的构建过程中，而不是被动地接受既定信息。我花了很长时间才完全理清几条时间线之间的对应关系，但这种思考的过程本身，就是阅读体验的一部分，极大地提升了阅读的参与感和智力满足感。与其说是在读一个故事，不如说是在解构一个复杂的心理迷宫，每一次找到一个缺失的连接点，都带来巨大的成就感。作者在叙事上的大胆尝试，绝对值得文学爱好者深入研究和品味。
从纯粹的文学技艺角度来看，这本书在处理“声音”和“沉默”的辩证关系上，达到了一个极高的水准。很多关键的情节转折，都不是通过激烈的对话达成的，反而是通过一系列精心设计的“空档”来完成的。这些空档，可能是突然中断的电话铃声，可能是角色之间长时间的凝视，也可能是对某个背景噪音——比如远处的汽笛声或滴答作响的时钟——的反复强调。作者似乎深谙，在某些情境下，未说出口的话语比任何宣言都更有力量。他用大量的篇幅去描绘角色们如何回避彼此的目光，如何用琐碎的日常行为来填补那些本该坦诚相待的空白。这种对“未发声”的关注，使得文本充满了张力和悬念。我们读者必须仔细聆听那些被压抑的、被忽略的细微声响，去推断角色们真正的意图。这种处理方式，使得阅读体验变得极为私密和内省，仿佛我们被邀请进入了一间只有回音的密室，去聆听被时间消磨的秘密。
这部作品的语言风格简直是教科书级别的“精准的陌生化”。作者似乎对日常用语进行了一次彻底的解构和重组，使得一些我们习以为常的场景和情感，通过他的笔触重新焕发出令人不安的鲜活感。他擅长运用罕见但极其贴切的比喻，将抽象的情绪实体化，让你能“触摸”到忧郁、能“闻到”恐惧。举例来说，他对某种特定颜色的描绘，绝不是简单地叫出名字，而是通过光影、质地、温度等多个维度进行叠加，赋予这个颜色一种独特的、带有强烈个人印记的意义。这种语言的陌生化处理，一开始可能会让习惯于流畅阅读的读者感到一丝阻碍，但一旦适应，你会发现它极大地拓展了你对语言表达潜能的认知。它不是为了炫技而使用华丽的辞藻，而是为了更高效、更深刻地传达那种难以言喻的内心状态。读完后，我发现自己看世界的角度似乎也微微地偏离了原来的轨道，被植入了一种新的、更具批判性的透镜。
这本书的叙事张力真是令人屏息。作者以一种近乎自传体的坦诚，剖开了那些我们习惯性忽略的角落。它不是那种让你读完后觉得“啊，又是一个类似的故事”的流水账，而是像一把手术刀，精准地切割出现实生活中那些细微而又致命的矛盾。我尤其欣赏它在描绘人物心理活动时所用的那种近乎神经质的细腻。你仿佛能透过文字，感受到角色内心的每一次颤抖、每一次挣扎。那种在光明与阴影之间游走的状态，被刻画得淋漓尽致，没有刻意的煽情，却让人不自觉地沉浸其中，为那些无声的呐喊感到揪心。文字的密度很高，信息量爆炸，初读时可能会觉得有些吃力，但一旦适应了作者的节奏，你会发现每一个词语的选择都经过了千锤百炼，绝无冗余。它探讨的主题是宏大的，关于身份认同，关于归属感的缺失，但作者却将其安放在极其私人化的场景中进行展示，使得这种普世的探讨变得异常真实和触手可及。我合上书页时，感觉自己的呼吸都变得有些困难，仿佛刚刚经历了一场漫长而艰苦的内心跋涉，留下的除了震撼，还有对自身经验更深层次的反思。
碎片化的回忆录，非常规但是并不难follow 也挺容易理解的，喜欢书中的很多reference
"Dream House as Choose Your Own Adventure". No matter what you choose though, you're trapped in this abusive relationship and there's no lighter alternative. Carmen Maria Machado is brilliant.
Inventive structure of an abusive relationship told in many genres and devices (road trip, Chekhov's gun, queer villain)--had very low expectations of the 'gimmick' but turns out to be brilliant and fluid. An antidote to silence of queer abuse (is it homophobia if the abuser gets away with abusing the voiceless), entering the canon of folklore
"Dream House as Choose Your Own Adventure". No matter what you choose though, you're trapped in this abusive relationship and there's no lighter alternative. Carmen Maria Machado is brilliant.
喜欢作者解构这个题材的方式，很有启发性和想象力。文本语言缺点儿灵气。
