Alain de Botton 幸福建築及其他
紐約時報:Published: January 24, 2013:訪作家談書:Alain de Botton: By the Book
http://hcbooks.blogspot.tw/2012/02/consolation-of-philosophy.html
Are there any architects that you think are also particularly good writers? What are your favorite books on architecture?
Le Corbusier is an outstanding writer. His ideas achieved their impact
in large measure because he could write so convincingly. His style is
utterly clear, brusque, funny and polemical in the best way. His books
are beautifully laid out with captions and images. I recommend “Towards a
New Architecture.” It’s a deep pity that while Le Corbusier’s style has
been much copied by architects, very few have drawn the right lessons
from him about literature and prose style.
既然Alain de Botton選Le Corbusier
我們應該知道他在 幸福建築 一書中是如何介紹Le Corbusier的著名的Savoy 公寓的
似可用一組英文字眼來形容之.
幸福建築 台北:先覺2007/2013.1 第7刷
每一種建築樣式，都是一種對幸福的理解
除了幫我們遮風擋雨，
建築也邀請我們成為獨特的自己。
透過建築，我們看到理想的人生。
我們所欣賞的建築，用各種方式展現我們所重視的人生價值。
建築物以及我們在房屋內陳設的物品，對我們的影響其實超乎想像。
我們希望建築能平撫我們的心緒，或激發我們的活力；
發揮隔離的效果，或塑造和樂的氛圍。
我們也期待建築能保存歷史與記憶，甚至象徵未來。
對建築美感的需求，就是對美好人生的認知。
從生活中最細微的物事，到世界最偉大的建築，
狄波頓在這一場穿越建築哲學與心理學的迷人旅程中，
帶領我們探索建築與人之間密不可分的關係，
以及什麼樣的設計能讓我們獲得幸福的人生。
讀過本書，你將會以全新的眼光看待住家、街道，
以及你自己。
作者簡介
艾倫．狄波頓（Alain de Botton）
1969年生於瑞士蘇黎世，在瑞士和英國兩地受教育。會說法文、德文及英文。現居於倫敦。
狄波頓才氣橫溢，文章智趣兼備，使他不僅風靡英倫，外國出版社也爭相出版他的作品，目前已有二十多國語言的譯本。書評人康納立（Cressida
Connolly）讚嘆狄波頓是「英國文壇的奇葩」；另一位書評人葛雷茲布魯克（Philip
Glazebrook）認為：「這種奇才作家，恐怕連掃帚的傳記都寫得出來，而且這柄掃帚在他筆下絕對是活靈活現的。」
著有：《哲學的慰藉》（究竟出版）《我談的那場戀愛》《愛上浪漫》《吻了再說》《擁抱似水年華》《旅行的藝術》以及《我愛身分地位》（以上皆由先覺出版）。
個人網頁：www.alaindebotton.com
詳細資料
- 叢書系列：人文思潮
- 規格：平裝 / 320頁 / 25k / 普級 / 單色印刷 / 初版
- 出版地：台灣
目錄
推薦序
壹、建築的重要性
貳、我們該採取何種建築樣式？
參、會說話的建築
肆、理想的家
伍、建築的美感要素
陸、一片原野所蘊含的未來希望
附錄
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One of the great, but often unmentioned, causes of both happiness and
misery is the quality of our environment: the kind of walls, chairs,
buildings and streets we’re surrounded by.
And yet a concern for architecture and design is too often described as frivolous, even self-indulgent. The Architecture of Happiness
starts from the idea that where we are heavily influences who we can
be - and argues that it is architecture’s task to stand as an eloquent
reminder of our full potential.
Whereas many architects are wary
of openly discussing the word beauty, the book has at its centre the
large and naïve question: ‘What is a beautiful building?’ It amounts to a
tour through the philosophy and psychology of architecture, which aims
to change the way we think about our homes, streets and ourselves.
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How
Proust Can Change Your Life
http://www.alaindebotton.com/pages/content/index.asp?PageID=56
A concern for architecture has
never been free from a degree of suspicion. Doubts have been raised
about the subject’s seriousness, its moral worth and its cost. A
thought-provoking number of the world’s most intelligent people have
disdained any interest in decoration and design, equating contentment
with discarnate and invisible matters instead.
The Ancient Greek
Stoic philosopher Epictetus is said to have demanded of a heart-broken
friend whose house had burnt to the ground, ‘If you really understand
what governs the universe, how can you yearn for bits of stone and
pretty rock?’ (It is unclear how much longer the friendship lasted.)
Legend recounts that after hearing the voice of God, the Christian
hermit Alexandra sold her house, shut herself in a tomb and never looked
at the outside world again, while her fellow hermit Paul of Scete slept
on a blanket on the floor of a windowless mud hut and recited three
hundred prayers every day, suffering only when he heard of another holy
man who had managed seven hundred and slept in a coffin.
Such
austerity has been a historical constant. In the spring of 1137, the
Cistercian monk St Bernard of Clairvaux travelled all the way around the
Lake of Geneva without noticing it was even there. Likewise, after four
years in his monastery, St Bernard could not report whether the dining
area had a vaulted ceiling (it does), or how many windows there were in
the sanctuary of his church (three). On a visit to the Charterhouse of
Dauphiné, St Bernard astonished his hosts by arriving on a magnificent
white horse diametrically opposed to the ascetic values he professed,
but he explained that he had borrowed the animal from a wealthy uncle
and had simply failed to register its appearance on a four-day journey
across France.
Nevertheless, such determined efforts to scorn
visual experience have always been matched by equally persistent
attempts to mould the material world to graceful ends. People have
strained their backs carving flowers into their roof beams and their
eyesight embroidering animals onto their tablecloths. They have given up
weekends to hide unsightly cables behind ledges. They have thought
carefully about appropriate kitchen worksurfaces. They have imagined
living in unattainably expensive houses pictured in magazines and then
felt sad, as one does on passing an attractive stranger in a crowded
street.
We seem divided between an urge to override our senses and numb
ourselves to our settings and a contradictory impulse to acknowledge the
extent to which our identities are indelibly connected to, and will
shift along with, our locations. An ugly room can coagulate any loose
suspicions as to the incompleteness of life, while a sun-lit one set
with honey-coloured limestone tiles can lend support to whatever is most
hopeful within us.
Belief in the significance of architecture is premised on the
notion that we are, for better and for worse, different people in
different places – and on the conviction that it is architecture’s task
to render vivid to us who we might ideally be.
However, architecture is perplexing in how inconsistent is its
capacity to generate the happiness on which its claim to our attention
is founded. While an attractive building may on occasion flatter an
ascending mood, there will be times when the most congenial of locations
will be unable to dislodge our sadness or misanthropy.
We can feel anxious and envious even though the floor we’re
standing on has been imported from a remote quarry, and finely sculpted
window frames have been painted a soothing grey. Our inner metronome can
be unimpressed by the efforts of workmen to create a fountain or
nurture a symmetrical line of oak trees. We can fall into a petty
argument which ends in threats of divorce in a building by Geoffrey Bawa
or L
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