《荊棘鳥》

澳大利亞暢銷書作家，《荊棘鳥》作者考琳·麥卡洛在與長期的疾病抗爭過后，于2015年1月29日在南太平洋諾福克島的一家醫院溘然長逝，享年77歲。全球最大的英文書籍出版商之一哈珀柯林斯出版集團澳大利亞分公司出版總監修納·馬丁對此這樣評價：“考林·麥卡洛對澳大利亞文學，對全世界讀者的貢獻意義深遠。她是第一個在世界舞臺上獲得成功的澳大利亞作家。”

Introduction About The Thorn Birds

《荊棘鳥》介紹

Published by Harper and Row in 1977， The Thorn Birds was a multi-generational sagai that traced a sheep-farming family and that featured a heroine， Meggie Cleary， who falls desperately and impossibly in love with a Catholic priest， Ralph de Bricassart. At the time of its publication， the novel was compared to Margaret Mitchells Gone with the Wind.

This is the story of the Cleary family， who moved to Australia in the early 1900s to work Drogheda， a vast sheep station. Employing on a large canvas that encompasses two world wars and the Great Depression2， McCullough lets the main characters take tums telling the story from 1915 to 1969. But the heart of the book is the forbidden love between Meggie-Fee and Paddy Clearys only daughter-and Ralph de Bricassart， the handsome parish priest. Meggie falls in love with Ralph de Briccasart， who is a good and ambitious man who certainly does nothing to encourage this love， but who certainly retums it as he regards Meggie as the daughter he can never have. As Meggie matures， he comes to regard her in a more romantic way. A great struggle arises between this love on the one hand and his ambition to become a cardinal3 or perhaps more， on the other. Family secrets， forbidden love， and the struggles of working in a hard new land intertwine in this novel. When published， it received rave reviews. It holds up just as well for new and retuming readers.

Tip：《荊棘鳥》由哈伯·羅于1977年出版，是一部跨越幾代人的英雄傳說。出版之初，它就被視作可與瑪格麗特·米切爾的《飄》相媲美的作品。小說以兩次世界大戰和大蕭條為背景，講述的是20世紀初，遷移到澳大利亞廣袤的德羅海達綿羊牧場的克利里家族的故事。故事的女主角梅吉·克利里，出身于一個牧羊家庭。她無法自拔地愛上了一位天主教神父拉爾夫。然而這段愛戀注定是不可能的。小說中的主要人物以各自的視角講述1915年到1969年發生的事情，然而小說的核心仍然圍繞梅吉和拉爾夫的禁忌之愛展開。《荊棘鳥》小說一問世就受到如潮的好評，備受新老讀者的青睞。

McCulloughs prose is simply outstanding， and her characters crackle with realism-they become utterly real people and the reader will become swept away with this wonderful story. The storyline never drags， and at no point does this novel ever fail to completely capture the readers attention. The books 500-plus pages became the 10-hour TV version that appeared on ABC in 1983， featuring Richard Chamberlain as Father Ralph， Rachel Ward as Meggie and Christopher Plummer as the archbishop. With tens of millions of viewers， The Thom Birds joined in the front rank of minise-ries juggemauts.

There is a legend about a bird， which sings just once in its life， more sweetly than any other creature on the face ot the earth. From the moment it leaves the nest， it searches for a thom tree， and does not rest until it has found one. Then singing among the savage branches， it impa/es itself upon the longest， sharpest spine. And， dying， it rises above its own ag-ony to out-carol the lark and the nightingale. One super/ative song， existence the price. But the whole worid stills to listen， and God in his heaven smdes for the best is only bought at the cost of great pain… Or so says the legend.

Tip：麥卡洛的文字十分出彩，她筆下的角色充滿現實感。小說人物血肉豐滿，故事情節毫不拖沓，在任何時候都能引人入勝。這本500多頁的小說被改編成10小時的電視連續劇，于1983年在ABC頻道播出。理查德·張伯倫飾演拉爾夫，蕾切爾·瓦爾德飾演梅吉，克里斯托弗·普盧默飾演大主教。該劇吸引了數百萬觀眾，位居迷你電視劇影響榜的前列。

Pain Breeds Talent

痛苦孕育才華

Colleen Margaretta McCullough was born on June lst， 1937， in Wellington， in outback central west New South Wales. She grew up during World War lI. The family moved frequently to find work for her father. “Get out and get a job as a mangle hand in a laundry，” she recalled her father tell-ing her. “Thats all youre good for-youll never get a hus-band， youre too big and fat and ugly.” Before entering ter-tiary education， she previously earned a Iiving as a teacher， librarian， and journalist. After what she described as a mis-erable childhood， she aspired to a career in medicine but was forced to discard that ambition when she developed intolerance to antiseptic scrub. Instead， she switched to neuroscience and her interest in neurophysiology took her to Yale University as a researcher.

McCullough spent ten years researching and teaching in the Department of Neurology at the Yale Medical School in New Haven， Connecticut， United States. Financial worries， along with her gnef over a failed relationship， propelled her to start writing there.“I have found that writing is the only thing I can do that obviates that kind of misery，” she once told an interviewer， according to the reference guide Current Biography. Ms. McCullough said that she wrote an early draft of The Thom Birds， her second book， in six weeks while hold-ing down her position at Yale. The title， she said， came from a Celtic legend about a bird that impales itself on a thom tree 8and inits dying agony sings out beautifully. she told an in-terviewer in 1977. “You know there are people like that. Their tragedies are self-induced. They bring it all on themselves and are terribly heroic about.”

Tip：考琳·瑪格麗塔·麥卡洛于1937年6月1日出生在新南威爾士州的中西部腹地惠靈頓。她成長于二戰期間。為了讓父親找到工作，全家經常搬遷。她的父親曾說她“又胖又丑，只配去洗衣店當幫手，而且根本找不到丈夫。”在上大學之前，她當過老師、圖書管理員、記者，以此謀生。在度過了被她形容為“悲慘的”童年期之后，她渴望做一名醫生的理想又因為對消毒劑過敏不得不放棄，轉而學習神經系統科學，并成為耶魯大學的一名研究員。麥卡洛在美國康涅狄克州紐黑文市耶魯大學醫學院神經科工作了10年，《荊棘鳥》就是在這段時間完成的，初稿僅用了六周。麥卡洛的寫作之路源于經濟上的窘迫，以及一段痛苦的愛情。根據《當代傳記》記載，她曾經這樣告訴一位采訪者，“我發現寫作是讓我忘記那些苦痛的唯一途徑。”。《荊棘鳥》的名字來源于一個凱爾特傳說，傳說中有種鳥會把身體扎進一棵荊棘樹，“它臨終前放開歌喉，唱出美妙的歌曲”。在1977年的一次采訪中她這樣說道：“你知道的，有些人就像這樣。他們的悲劇都是自己帶來的。他們親手帶來這些苦痛，并且無比勇敢地面對它們。”

Nothing if not industrious， Ms. McCullough said that she sometimes wrote as many as 20，000 words in a workday， which could last as long as 18 hours. She produced more than 20 books， including a seven-volume senes of historical fiction called Masters of Rome and a series of crime stories centered on the fictional detective Carmine Delmonico. Her first book， called 77m， was published in 1974 and became the 1979 movie starring actor Mel Gibson in the title role， a man modeled on one of Ms. McCulloughs patients who embarked on a romance with an older woman despite his developmen-tal disabilities. The most recent of her 25 works， Bittersweet， was published in 2013.

In the late 1970s she settled on Norfolk Island in the Pacific， where she met her husband， Ric Robinson， to whom she has been married since 1983.

Tip：麥卡洛女士極其勤勉，有時在一天之內可以書寫18個小時，完成兩萬字。她創作了20多本書，包括一套七卷的歷史小說《羅馬之主》。她的第一部作品《提姆》，于1974年出版，并于1979年拍成電影，由美國著名男演員梅爾·吉布森飾演男主角。在她的25部作品中，于2013年出版的《苦中有樂》是她最新的作品。