欧.亨利短篇小说选(外国文学经典)(插图本)——欧？亨利的短篇小说合集，被誉为“美国生活的百科全书”

    《欧·亨利短篇小说选(插图本)》是欧·亨利的短篇小说合集，欧?亨利的作品中以描写纽约曼哈顿市民生活的作品*为著名。其作品的成功主要在于他善于捕捉和把握生活中的典型场面，在一个个生活的片段里，处于两难中的主人公必须面对抉择，这时不仅能集中刻画人物心理，也能充分展示生活中固有的矛盾。再加上欧·亨利具有把情节剪裁得恰到好处的本领，因而能在简短的篇幅内达到一种思想与艺术相结合的完美效果，给人以强烈的印象。
    《外国文学经典》系列汇集英文经典名著，版本精挑细选，装帧用心打造。作为*权威的英文原版图书，让广大英语及文学爱好者充分领略原汁原味的英语语言是该丛书经久不衰的魅力所在。

    《欧·亨利短篇小说选(插图本)》收录了欧·亨利的42篇经典短篇小说，包括《警察与赞美诗》、《麦琪的礼物》和《最后一片叶子》等。这些故事如此贴近生活，让你以为就发生在自己身边。可是，就在你忍不住对这种熟悉感感到厌倦之前，他又狠狠地抛出一个出人意料的结局，然后在你的目瞪口呆中扬长而去，只留下你独自思索，独自流泪，独自微笑。

作者：（美国）欧·亨利（Henry.O.）
欧·亨利(1862-1910)，原名威廉·西德尼·波特，美国著名批判现实主义作家，世界三大短篇小说大师之一，曾被评论界誉为曼哈顿桂冠散文作家和美国现代短篇小说之父。他出身于一个医师家庭，一生极富传奇性，做过药店学徒、牧场短工、土地局办事员、新闻记者和银行出纳员。他的代表作有《爱的牺牲》、《警察与赞美诗》、《麦琪的礼物》和《最后一片叶子》等。欧·亨利的作品构思新颖，语言诙谐，结局常常出人意料，以其幽默的生活情趣、“含泪的微笑”等特点被誉为“美国生活的幽默百科全书”。

欧·亨利是美国最杰出的短篇小说家之一，曾被评论界誉为曼哈顿桂冠散文作家和美国现代短篇小说之父。他的作品构思新颖，语言诙谐，结局总使人感到“既在情理之中，又在意料之外”；又因描写了.众多的人物，富于生活情趣，被誉为“美国生活的幽默百科全书”。欧·亨利对短篇小说的创作仍然具有惊人的持久影响。
　　——贝茨（英国短篇小说作家）

And now the dark-haired young man spoke to me, and it became evident that his mind also moved along its own set of grooves.
'I should like to be a periwinkle,' said he, mysteriously, 'on the top of a valley, and sing too-ralloo-ralloo.'
This was clearly too obscure, so I turned again to Coglan.
'I've been around the world twelve times,' said he. 'I know an Esqui-mau in Upernavik who sends to Cincinnati for his neckties, and I saw agoat-herder in Uruguay who won a prize in a Battle Creek breakfast-food puzzle competition. I pay rent on a room in Cairo, Egypt, and another in Yokohama all the year round. I've got slippers waiting for me in a tea-house in Shanghai, and I don't have to tell 'em how to cook my eggs in Rio de Janeiro or Seattle. It's a mighty little old world. What's the use of bragging about being from the North, or the South, or the old manor-house in the dale, or Euclid Avenue, Cleveland, or Pike's Peak, or Fairfax County, Va., or Hooligan's Flats or any place？ It'll be a better world when we quit being fools about some mildewed town or ten acres of swampland just because we happened to be born there.'
'You seem to be a genuine cosmopolite,' I said admiringly. 'But it also seems that you would decry patriotism.'
'A relic of the stone age,' declared Coglan warmly. 'We are all brothers——Chinamen, Englishmen, Zulus, Patagonians, and the people in the bend of the Kaw River. Some day all this petty pride in one's city or state or section or country will be wiped out, and we'll all be citizens of the world, as we ought to be.'
'But while you are wandering in foreign lands,' I persisted, 'do notyour thoughts revert to some spot——some dear and——'
'Nary a spot,' interrupted E. R. Cogl an flippantly. 'The terrestrial, globular, planetary hunk of matter, slightly flattened at the poles, and known as the Earth, is my abode. I've met a good many object-bound citi-zens of this country abroad. I've seen men from Chicago sit in a gondolain Venice on a moonlight night and brag about their drainage canal.