Rumors About Me
Yasutaka Tsutsui
Yasutaka Tsutsui 筒井康隆1934年生於日本大阪。中學時代，經常翹課，愛看電影，並熱衷於漫畫創作。大學主修文學系心理學專業，後又轉入美術史專業。在學期間經常加入劇團演出話劇。畢業後，參加日活電影公司的演員選拔落選。當過幾年的工薪族，同時經營過設計事務所。
筒井康隆創作數量驚人，風格豐富多變。迄今出版將近80部小說及許多童話繪本、漫畫、戲曲，多部作品改編成電視劇與電影。其小說早年以科幻推理聞名，被譽為「日本後設小說（metafiction）大師」。作品多帶有無厘頭的諷刺隱喻，以及暴露人類本性的黑色幽默，並將兩者推展到淋瀝盡致。他擅長以充滿隱喻、反諷的辛辣筆調描繪出荒誕不羈的瘋狂世界。與小松左京、星新一並稱為日本三大科幻作家。
Wish Fulfillment
By Mary Gaitskill
Mary Gaitskill 生於1954年，美國作家。出版兩本長篇小說及三本短篇小說集。1998年獲美國筆會/福克納獎提名、2002年古根漢基金會研究獎金。長篇小說Veronica入圍2005年美國“國家書卷獎”決選。小說與散文散見《紐約客》雜誌（New Yorker）、《哈潑雜誌》（Harper's Magazine）及《老爺雜誌》（Esquire）。其作品典型主題是女性對內心衝突的處理，普遍吸收「禁忌」相關元素，比如賣淫、毒癮以及性虐待。
底下這篇作品靈感來自音速青春樂團Sonic Youth的一首歌Wish Fulfillment，作品當中時間與空間、思緒與感官知覺巧妙鋪疊。現實、超現實、童話幻想、人性慾望交錯迷離。其文字與意象表現曲折、美麗、詭異、優雅，令人讚嘆。
Rape Fantasies
Margaret Atwood
Margaret Atwood (1939-)生於加拿大首都渥太華，幼時，隨父親到加拿大各地進行森林昆蟲學研究，八年級才正式就學，已廣泛閱讀神話、童話、寓言及漫畫。六歲開始寫作，十六歲立定志向成為專業作家。獲多倫多大學文學學士、麻省拉德克利夫學院的文學碩士及哈佛大學博士學位。先後任教於數所知名大學，期間亦做過收銀員、餐廳服務生、市場研究員及電影編劇等工作。迄今已出版21本詩集、14本長篇小說、9本短篇小說集以及童書與文學評論。她獲獎無數，包括加拿大總督文學獎、英聯邦文學獎、義大利普雷米歐·蒙德羅獎、哈佛大學百年獎章、《悉尼時報》文學傑出獎、法國政府文學藝術勳章、曼．布克獎。被尊崇為當代最傑出作家之一，素有“加拿大文學女王”之稱。
Margaret Atwood寫作風格驚人地多樣，其小說敘述模式看似傳統小說，但在文本結構、敘事安排、文類並置的表現手法，卻製造出後現代的虛實、矛盾、質疑的感覺。作品結尾常模稜兩可，留給讀者許多自己想像空間。靈活運用象徵的技巧在傳統寫實主義與未來科幻小說間游走，讓讀者在意識到其諷刺、批評的嚴肅議題同時，亦沉浸在其有趣且豐富的文字創作中。
The Cold Outside
by John Burnside October 29, 2007
John Burnside (1955 – ) 蘇格蘭作家。他曾於劍橋文理學院研讀歐美思潮與文學。原擔任電腦軟體工程師，1996年後成為自由作家，目前於St Andrews大學教授創作、文學、生態學及美國詩。先後出版14本詩集和9本短篇小說選集，無論現代詩或短篇小說皆屢獲重要文學獎項。其2011年詩集Black Cat Bone同時獲頒T. S. Eliot 詩作獎及 Forward詩作獎。2013年出版最新短篇小說選集Something Like Happy亦有極高之文學評價。
When the cancer came back, I wasn’t surprised. I was upset1 for Caroline, knowing she’d have to be told eventually, and I was bothered about how Sall would take it, after last time2. I was even sorry for Malky, because finding reliable drivers was difficult, and he’d always been a good boss. Still, I wasn’t surprised, not when they told me. I’d been expecting something to go wrong since the summer, when Sall and I had talked about flying over to Montreal to see Caroline and meet her new boyfriend, then given up on the idea. Sall knew I was keen3, of course: Caroline had always been Daddy’s little girl, and, ever since she’d left, it had been an effort to hide how empty the house felt without her—an effort I’d sometimes failed to make. Sall probably knew as well as I did that I was on borrowed time4, so to begin with she had gone through all the motions5 of planning the trip, but then she’d started talking about how expensive it was and how tiring it would be for me, having to drive over to Glasgow, then sit on the plane for seven hours, and then, after all that, there was immigration and customs, which took forever6. The way she spoke, it was as if she’d made the journey herself, but she hadn’t. She’d never even left Scotland, and all that talk about the Montreal customs was just stuff she’d picked up from Caroline, who’d been back three times in the six years since she got the job in Montreal. Not long before her last visit, though, she had met this new boyfriend and had started making a big thing about7 how it was our turn to go over there.
Vast Hell
by Guillermo Martínez
Guillermo Martínez (1962 – ) 出生於阿根廷的Bahía Blanca。自布宜諾斯艾利斯大學獲得數理邏輯博士學位，曾於牛津大學數學系進行後博士班工作兩年，除數理邏輯外對哲學亦有相當程度的涉獵，他同時是位知名的長篇小說、散文、短篇小說作家。他兩部長篇小說都被翻譯成多國語言且拍成電影。短篇小說Vast Hell於2009年4月27日刊載於美國紐約客雜誌，繼Jorge Luis Borges之後，作品刊載於紐約客雜誌的第二位阿根廷作家。
A small town is a vast hell. 1
The Neighborhood
Aimee Bender
Aimee Bender 1969年生於洛杉磯。現於南加州大學教授創作，以超現實寫作風格聞名，常被歸類為美國魔幻寫實作家。自述師承安徒生童話及格林童話。於某次訪談中，被問到最想推薦給大家的一本小說，她說是村上春樹的發條鳥年代記。她於2010年出版的長篇小說The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake(檸檬蛋糕的特種憂傷)，與《追風箏的孩子》同獲美國圖書館協會ALEX獎，一出版便躍登《紐約時報》、《獨立書商協會》、《洛杉磯時報》等暢銷榜，更獲選美國獨立書商協會當月選書、南加州獨立書商協會最佳小說獎。
The barking does not stop even though neighbors have been throwing dog bones1 out their upstairs windows for awhile now. Everyone is afraid to leave their house and go see. It is a ragged bark2 and the word rabies3 has come up in over ten kitchens in the last hour, people looking it up in their never-before-used encyclopedias, searching down the page, index finger skating over the gloss, finding the words froth and lather4, shivering with fear, closing the book on the finger, looking out the window.5
Dogs can break through windows. Dogs don't care about alarms. If this dog wants, he can bite his way into any skin, make lather rise like a car wash.
Yesterday’s Garbage
by Jon Hassler
Jon Hassler (1933.3.30~2008.3.20) 生於美國明尼蘇達州Minneapolis市，1955年於聖約翰大學取得英文學士學位，先後在明尼蘇達州三所中學教書。1960年於北達科他州立大學取得英文碩士學位，繼續於中學教書直到1965年，才轉任教於Bemidji州立大學、Brainerd社區大學，最後成為聖約翰大學駐校作家及客座教授。Jon Hassler總計出版過12本長篇小說及2本短篇小說集，其短篇小說創作甚早，但成名若干年之後才得以出版。
The best grade of garbage in this city comes from the Hillcrest neighborhood, and on Thursdays when I make my run1 through the alleys of Hillcrest, my wife, Caledonia, rides beside me in the truck, admiring all those fancy2 backyards. Caledonia seldom climbs down out of the cab. She trusts me to inspect the garbage.
I know her taste. It’s jewelry and reading matter3. Now by jewelry I don’t mean diamonds and rubies. You won’t find precious stones in people’s garbage. I’m talking about the bigger, cheaper pieces—the kind a woman can pin on her coat. Last Thursday I came across two4. One was a big-eyed owl sitting on a silver moon crescent. One of the owl’s rhinestone eyes was missing, but we have scads5 of rhinestones in a box at home. We found one about the right size and glued it in the socket, and Caledonia wore it to bingo, where four people said how nice it looked. The other piece I found was a fancy letter of the alphabet, all complicated with curlicues6. Caledonia thought it might be a capital C, but at the wrestling matches Saturday night somebody told her it looked more like an E, so now she wears it upside-down and it looks great. It doesn’t look like anything.
Life is Sweet at Kumansenu
by Abioseh Nicol
Abioseh Nicol (1924.9.14~1994.9.20) 為西非獅子山國Sierra Leon的學者、外交官、內科醫師、作家及詩人，被譽為獅子山國最富學養的公民。1924年出生於獅子山國首都自由城 Freetown，小學就讀於奈及利亞Nigeria，於英國劍橋大學獲得博士學位。
1960年擔任自由城名校 Fourah Bay大學的首位本土校長，1969年被任命為獅子山國派駐聯合國的常務代表。1972年擔任聯合國副祕書長及聯合國訓練研究所所長。1987~1991於美國加州大學及南卡羅里納大學擔任國際研究的訪問教授。退休後定居於英國倫敦直到1994年去世。
The sea and the wet sand to one side of it; green tropical forest on the other; above it, the slow, tumbling clouds. The clean, round, blinding disk of sun and the blue sky covered and surrounded the small African village, Kumansenu.1
