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书名：The Lost Continent: Travels in Small-Town America失落的大陆——美国小城之旅
作者：Bill Bryson比尔·布莱森
出版社名称：Harper Perennial
出版时间：1990
语种：英文
ISBN：9780060920081
商品尺寸：13.5 x 2.2 x 20.3 cm
包装：平装
页数：320
比尔·布莱森，当今英语世界非常多产且又“很能逗乐”的游记作家之一，其作品诙谐嘲谑的风格堪称一绝。本书The Lost Continent《失落的大陆》是布莱森的一本旅游类随笔，描述了作者阔别故乡二十年后重返美国，在美国驾车并徒步旅游，行走了38个洲，从西部的农场到大都市的街头，接触到从农场主到都市各等人物，了解了当今美国的世态和人文景观，处处记录下了作者的独特感悟。

An unsparing and hilarious account of one mans rediscovery of America and his search for the perfect small town.

Review
"The Lost Continent is paradoxically touching -- a melancholy memoir in the form of snide travelogue." --Newsweek

"Funny, biting, outrageous, and more truthful than we may care to admit. I love small towns... "  --Detroit Free Press
在英国生活了将近二十年后，一种奇怪的冲动牢牢地攥住了作者，他决定回到那块青春时的土地，重新认识他的祖国。布莱森画出一条绝妙的环形路线，足以带他走遍这块奇异而又广大的、半是异乡的土地。四十八个州中，除了十个南边的州，他游览了其余的三十八个州，驱车一万三千九百七十八英里。布莱森看到了许多想看的，也看到了许多不想看的：长得看不到尽头的洲际公路，令人蠢蠢欲动的大城市，被地图遗忘的破落小镇；各种稀奇古怪的博物馆，塞满旅行车的国家公园，让人瞠目结舌的大峡谷，一条可穿越树的路，还有诸多被商业化了的名人故居……在夹杂着陌生、矛盾、无聊和惊喜的过程中，布莱森找到了原以为早已失落的大陆，也在打开心门之后看到了真实的美国。
比尔·布莱森，世界知名的非虚构作家，1951年出生于美国艾奥瓦州。曾任职于伦敦《泰晤士报》与《独立报》，同时也为《纽约时报》、《国家地理杂志》等刊物撰文。作品主要包括旅游类随笔、幽默独特的科普作品——比如《万物简史》、《母语》等等，横跨多种领域，皆为非学院派的幽默之作。他的作品诙谐嘲谑的风格堪称一绝，整体上举重若轻，能让普通读者产生很强的认同感，不失为雅俗共赏的典范。布莱森擅长用不同的眼光来看待他所游历的世界，他真切地捕捉到了一个旅人的内心感受。自然地理、生活情趣、社会时态，布莱森信手拈来无不奇趣，他的尖刻加上他的博学，让他的文字充满了智慧、机敏和幽默。作为在英国生活了二十多年的美国人，他的作品又兼具了开朗风趣、绝不怕粗俗的美式调侃和冷峻犀利、一针见血的英式嘲讽。
Bill Brysons many books include, most recently In a Sunburned Country, as well as Im a Stranger Here Myself, A walk in the Woods, Neither Here Nor There, Made in America, and The Mother Tongue. He edited The Best American Travel Writing 2000. Born in Des Moines, Iowa, he lived in England for almost two decades. He now lives in Hanover, New Hampshire, with his wife and four children.

I COME FROM Des Moines. Somebody had to. When you come from Des Moines you either accept the fact without question and settle down with a local girl named Bobbi and get a job at the Firestone factory and live there forever and ever, or you spend your adolescence moaning at length about what a dump it is and how you can’t wait to get out, and then you settle down with a local girl named Bobbi and get a job at the Firestone factory and live there forever and ever.
Hardly anyone ever leaves. This is because Des Moines is the most powerful hypnotic known to man. Outside town there is a big sign that says, WELCOME TO DES MOINES. THIS Is WHAT DEATH Is LIKE. There isn’t really. I just made that up. But the place does get a grip on you. People who have nothing to do with Des Moines drive in off the interstate, looking for gas or hamburgers, and stay forever. There’s a New Jersey couple up the street from my parents’ house whom you see wandering around from time to time looking faintly puzzled but strangely serene. Everybody in Des Moines is strangely serene.
The only person I ever knew in Des Moines who wasn’t serene was Mr. Piper. Mr. Piper was my parents’ neighbor, a leering, cherry-faced idiot who was forever getting drunk and crashing his car into telephone poles. Everywhere you went you encountered telephone poles and road signs leaning dangerously in testimony to Mr. Piper’s driving habits. He distributed them all over the west side of town rather in the way dogs mark trees. Mr. Piper was the nearest possible human equivalent to Fred Flintstone, but less charming. He was a Shriner and a Republican—a Nixon Republican—and he appeared to feel he had a mission in life to spread offense. His favorite pastime, apart from getting drunk and crashing his car, was to get drunk and insult the neighbors, particularly us because we were Democrats, though he was prepared to insult Republicans when we weren’t available.