五六年前,我在纽约一个文艺酒会中与伯纳·马拉默德初遇.谈话给我留下的最深印象是他对中国短篇小说作家的“艳羡”.我告诉他一些他的作品(特别是短篇小说《魔桶》)中译本在中国受读者欢迎的情况.他向我询问中国作家所受的待遇.我说短篇小说特别吃香;文艺刊物均载短篇,而短篇小说集往往畅销,因为中国读者在传统上喜读短篇小说(相反的, Five or six years ago, I first met Bernie Malamud at a literary reception in New York. The deepest impression I had on the conversation was his “envy” of Chinese short story writers. I told him some of his (Especially the short story “Magic Barrel”) was welcomed by readers in China.He asked me about the treatment of Chinese writers.I said that the short stories are particularly popular. The literary journals are short, while the short stories Often popular because Chinese readers traditionally read short stories (on the contrary,