what you saw is Nabokov

纳博科夫思考的是
meditating on how reader and writers meet,

读者与作家如何于作品中相遇
and so I just want to read to you a little bit from that.

我读一小段
If you still have it, you can get it out:

带了资料的同学把它拿出来
The real writer, the fellow who sends planets spinning

但是一个真正的作家会发射星球上天
and models a man asleep and eagerly tampers with the sleeper's rib,

会防止一个睡觉的人并急不可待的手去骚他的肋骨逗他笑
that kind of author has no given values at his disposal:

这样的作家手中是没有现成的观念可用的
he must create them himself.

他们必须自己创造
The art of writing is a very futile business if it does not imply first of all

写作的艺术首先应将这个世界视为潜在的小说来观察
the art of seeing the world as the potentiality of fiction.

不然这门艺术就成了无所作为的行当
The material of this world may be real enough(as far as reality goes)

我们这个世界上的材料当然是很真实的只要现实还存在
but it does not exist at all as an accepted entirety:

但却根本不是一般所公认的整体