THE GOLDEN MEAN

Book ID/图书代码： 12760011B48247

English Summary/英文概要： Quill & Quire

In her first novel, Annabel Lyon brilliantly re-imagines the real-life teacher/student relationship between Aristotle and a 13-year-old boy who would soon transform the world as Alexander the Great. The novel opens with Aristotle taking his wife and nephew to Pella, capital of Macedon. By the end of the first chapter, Aristotle encounters the young Alexander and learns that he is to become the boy’s tutor. The novel’s five-chapter structure is meant to remind us of the acts of a play, but it also acts as a classical rhetorical construct designed to persuade the reader, “winning the soul through discourse.” Lyon depicts Alexander as a bright, ostensibly rough-and-tumble teenager who must be physically trained for leadership and war, yet who is also internally frail and lonely. There is a tension between the public face Alexander puts on and the “different boy” Aristotle sees in their private sessions, who is “tense, intense . . . angry, curious, pompous, charming, driven.” For his part, Aristotle confesses, “I love to be on the inside, the backside, the underside of anything, and see the usually unseen.” Over the next six years, the worlds of this man and boy collide, combine, oppose, and complement each other. Aristotle’s narrative expands to include brief, delightfully realized diversions into history, biology, science, literature, medicine, politics, and philosophy. The novel is full of vivid descriptions and impressive imagery, as in Aristotle’s description of the season’s first snow, which “comes whispering late one gray evening.... It seems to fall from nowhere, bits of pure colour lessness peeled off from the sky and drifting down, thicker now.” Lyon’s singular gifts for description, character development, and plotting are on full display here, informing her unique and creative story. The novel is deep and rich in thought and accomplishment, yet it reads with the calming ease and influence of a cool summer breeze.

Chinese Summary/中文概要： 《The Golden Mean》是Annabel Lyon的第一本小說，出色地再現了亞裡斯多德與日後改變世界的亞歷山大大帝之間真實的師生關係。當時，他只有十三歲，亞里斯多德是他的導師。故事從亞里斯多德攜妻子和侄子來到馬其頓首都佩拉開始。隨後，他遇到了年輕的亞歷山大，得知自己將成為這個男孩的導師。小說總共五章，讓人覺得這是一台戲劇，同時還作為一個古典修辭結構，在於讓讀者認識到人們可以“通過語言獲知靈魂”。

Lyon描繪了亞里斯多德如何將表面上看起來莽撞，但內心卻彷徨和孤獨的少年，鍛造成一位統領戰局的指揮官。在亞里斯多德看來，“這個與眾不同的男孩”在與他私下交談和公眾面前卻大相徑庭，對他來說這是一個“緊張、激烈 … … 生氣、有強烈求知欲、傲慢、自我陶醉的，誘人的男孩”，亞里斯多德承認，“我喜歡看到平時所看不到的內在的，反面的，最深層次的東西。”在接下來的六年中，這位哲學家的世界和年輕王子間互相碰撞、融合、對立、互補。

亞里斯多德談論的主題擴展到歷史、生物、科學、文學、醫學、政治與哲學。小說充滿了生動的描述和令人印象深刻的意象，其中當亞里斯多德描述第一場雪時，寫道，“讓我們在暮色昏沉中耳語 … 仿佛遊走在天地之間，暢想於那無邊的天際中。那白色的屑片像是從天空剝落的，落在地上，越來越厚。”

這個故事完美展現了Lyon傑出的描述天賦，塑造人物的才能，和豐滿的構思，這些都造就了這個獨特而富有創意的故事。這部完美的小說不僅獨具深厚思想性，而且讀起來帶有一股沉穩、安逸和清新之風。 (Sandy&Celia)

Awards/获奖情况：版權熱賣美國、加拿大、英國、法國、土耳其、西班牙、巴西、葡萄牙、克罗地亚、芬兰、荷兰、意大利、以色列、捷克、波兰、希腊等20国。

加拿大三大文學獎都收入囊中：贏得羅傑斯作家信託小說獎,加拿大豐業銀行吉勒獎提名,國家總督小說獎、英聯邦作家獎提名.

“Lyon的小說公正地還原了西元前四世紀年輕的亞歷山大大帝。日常生活與宮廷生活交織到一起。戰爭、哲學論辯和亞里斯多德的住所都在作者謹慎、流暢的文章中得以體現，帶給讀者驚醒動魄和永恆的莊嚴。”——英國《衛報》

“Lyon能抓住古老社會的脈搏，並將其還原到現實社會。這是一場穿越時空的交流。”——《泰晤士報》

“This quietly ambitious and beautifully achieved novel is one of the most convincing historical novels I have ever read. Lyon makes her reader avid for every detail of this strange world, whether domestic or medical or military, and she has steeped herself in the thinking of the time. She makes her characters entirely solid and real, while respecting their otherness, the distance between us. That is what characterised Mary Renault’s novels, and I think that she would have deeply admired this book. [Lyon’s] judgment is sound and true, and the reader trusts her voice from the first paragraph.”— HILARY MANTEL, winner of the 2009 Man Booker Prize for Fiction
“The Golden Mean is more than a brilliant and beautifully told novel: it’s also a profound exploration of moral and philosophical issues that have troubled and perplexed us since Aristotle.”— RUSSELL BANKS, author of Cloudsplitter

“The 4th century BC and the youth of Alexander the Great are marvelously re-imagined in Lyon’s justifiably garlanded novel… The daily intrigues of the court, the visceral aspects of battle, philosophical discussion, and Aristotle’s household are all evoked in measured, burnished prose, which combines thrilling immediacy with a stately timelessness.” — THE GUARDIAN

“It takes chutzpah to make your main characters Aristotle and Alexander the Great, but Lyon pulls it off; she has the gift of finding the pulse of the ancient world and bringing it back to glorious life… gripping, with a powerful sense of time and place.” — THE TIMES, LONDON

About the Author/作者介绍： Annabel Lyon是著名的中篇小說《最美好的事物》和故事小說《擁有權》的作者，這部作品被提名威爾森小說獎，青少年小說《All-Season Edie》和《The Golden Mean》入圍了加拿大吉勒獎，總督獎，艾瑟爾威爾遜獎和英聯邦共和獎。還奪得羅傑斯作家的信任獎，《黃金分割》已經被翻譯成十四種語言，並成為加拿大排名第一的暢銷書。Annabel現在正在著手準備續篇。她最近為青年朋友撰寫的作品《Encore Edie》，於2011年2月發佈了相關評論。
Annabel研究古典音樂，哲學，和法律，在她決定成為全職作家前曾教授鋼琴課。她目前和伴侶及兩個孩子，住在加拿大不列顛省，溫哥華外的西海岸。那裡曾是她用八年時間撰寫出《黃金分割》的地方。她在加拿大英屬哥倫比亞大學創意寫作系授課，在那裡他接受了美術碩士學位。

Annabel Lyon’s story collection, Oxygen, and book of novellas, The Best Thing for You, were published in Canada to wide acclaim. The Golden Mean, her first novel, is a Canadian bestseller and is being published in six languages. It won the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize and was nominated for the Scotiabank Giller Prize, the Governor General’s Award for Fiction, and the commonwealth Writers’ Prize. Lyon lives in British Columbia with her husband and two children

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Rights Status/版权销售情况：Simplified Chinese/简体中文：AVAILABLE

Complex/Traditional Chinese/繁体中文：SOLD(非我们代理）

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