Clam Down: A Metamorphosis | 誠品線上

Clam Down: A Metamorphosis

內容簡介

內容簡介 當你把自己關進殼裡：一場離婚後的「蛤蜊化」變身寓言 從逃避、沉默到重新打開自己，一部融合回憶錄、自然書寫與自我修復的奇異之作離婚之後，她變成了一隻蛤蜊。至少，語言是這麼說的。在母親一次次傳來「clam down（冷靜下來）」的簡訊錯字後，作家意外被推向另一個問題：如果「冷靜」其實意味著像蛤蜊般閉合、退縮、沉默，把自己藏進殼裡呢？於是，她開始成為一隻「蛤蜊」。她探索那些選擇隱居、沉默與極端生活的人，也追索屬於自己的「蛤蜊家譜」——那位曾消失十年、埋首開發名為 Shell Computing 神祕會計軟體的父親。透過挖掘父親的過去，她逐漸理解遺棄、原諒，以及如何放下那些長久封存的傷口。本書以打破文類界線的結構，揉合回憶錄、自然史、藝術與文學書寫，在小說般流暢的筆觸中，展開一則關於人類與軟體動物共生、適應與生存的寓言。有時候，躲進殼裡是一種保護；但築起高牆，也有代價。 當那些牆已不再必要時，我們又該如何重新打開自己？ In this wondrously unusual memoir, a woman retreats into her shell in the aftermath of her divorce, and must choose between the pleasures and the perils of a closed-up life--a transformation fable from an acclaimed 5 Under 35 National Book Foundation honoree. "A marvel and a delight . . . This is a book that will stay with me forever."--Leslie Jamison, author of Splinters ONE OF CHICAGO TRIBUNE'S TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR - A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: VULTURE, ELECTRIC LIT, SHELF AWARENESS We've all heard the story about waking up as a cockroach--but what if a crisis turned you into a clam? After the dissolution of her marriage, a writer is transformed into a "clam" via typo after her mother keeps texting her to "clam down." The funny if unhelpful command forces her to ask what it means to "clam down"--to retreat, hide, close up, and stay silent. Idiomatically, we are said to "clam up" when we can't speak, and to "come out of our shell" when we reemerge, transformed. In order to understand her path, the clam digs into examples of others who have embraced lives of reclusiveness and extremity. Finally, she confronts her own "clam genealogy" to interview her dad, who disappeared for a decade to write a mysterious accounting software called Shell Computing. By excavating his past to better understand his decisions, she learns not only how to forgive him but also how to move on from her own wounds of abandonment and insecurity. Using a genre-defying structure and written in novelistic prose that draws from art, literature, and natural history, Anelise Chen unfolds a complex story of interspecies connectedness, in which humans learn lessons of adaptation and survival from their mollusk kin. While it makes sense in certain situations to retreat behind fortified walls, the choice to do so also exacts a price. What is the price of building up walls? How can one take them back down when they are no longer necessary?

作者介紹

作者介紹 Anelise Chen is the author of the novel So Many Olympic Exertions, a finalist for the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award. She is a 5 Under 35 Honoree from the National Book Foundation. Chen is currently an assistant professor of creative writing at Columbia University. She lives in New Haven, Connecticut, with her family.

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