經典科幻文學:《 基本上無害 Mostly Harmless》 第9章12
‘A beach house,’ he said, ‘doesn’t even have to be on the beach. Though the best ones are. We all like to congregate,’ he went on, ‘at boundary conditions.’
“一棟海濱小屋。”他說，“甚至不必建在海濱上，儘管最好的那些都在那兒。我們都喜歡，”他繼續道，“臨界狀態下的派對。”
‘Really?’ said Arthur.
“當真？”阿瑟問。
‘Where land meets water. Where earth meets air. Where body meets mind. Where space meets time. We like to be on one side, and look at the other.’
“在大地遭遇海水的地方。在大地遭遇空氣的地方。在身體遭遇心靈的地方。在空間遭遇時間的地方。我們喜歡待在一邊，然後望着另一邊。”
Arthur got terribly excited. This was exactly the sort of thing he’d been promised in the brochure. Here was a man who seemed to be moving through some kind of Escher space saying really profound things about all sorts of stuff.
阿瑟激動萬分。旅遊手冊裏跟他承諾的就是這個。這人似乎活動在艾歇爾畫上的空間裏，而且對各式各樣的東西都能發表無比深刻的見解。
It was unnerving though. The man was now stepping from pole to ground, from ground to pole, from pole to pole, from pole to horizon and back: he was making complete nonsense of Arthur’s spatial universe. ‘Please stop!’ Arthur said, suddenly.
不過這真讓人有些精神崩潰——那老頭現在開始從杆子上走到地上，從地上走到杆子上，從一根杆子走上另一根杆子，從杆子上走到地平線然後再回來。阿瑟的三維宇宙被他搞得一團糟。“拜託你快停下。”他突然說。
‘Can’t take it, huh?’ said the man. Without the slightest movement he was now back, sitting cross-legged, on top of the pole forty feet in front of Arthur. ‘You come to me for advice, but you can’t cope with anything you don’t recognise. Hmmm. So we’ll have to tell you something you already know but make it sound like news, eh? Well, business as usual I suppose.’ He sighed and squinted mournfully into the distance.
“受不了了，呃？”老頭又回到四十尺之外的那根杆子上盤腿坐下，絲毫看不出任何活動的跡象，“你向我尋求建議，卻應付不來任何自己不明白的東西，那我只好跟你講些你已經知道的事兒，不過當然，要讓它聽起來好像很新鮮的樣子，呃？好吧，跟平時一樣，我就開始做生意吧。”他嘆了口氣，眯起眼睛，把悲傷的目光投向遠方。
