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So this is an apt moment for three books about meeting strangers. Will Buckingham has written a moving memoir of finding solace, after the death of his life-partner, in travelling and talking in lands such as Myanmar that are culturally distant from his native England. Joe Keohane, an American journalist, argues that communicating empathetically with strangers is vital and potentially life-changing. Jon Yates, who runs a youth charity based in London, frets that deep fissures in Western societies are making it impossible for people to reach, even casually, between classes, religions, ethnicities and generations.
所以现在是这三本关于与陌生人相遇的书出现的合适时机。威尔·白金汉写了一本感人的回忆录，讲述了他在终生伴侣去世后，在缅甸等地旅行和交谈中寻求治愈的故事，这些地方在文化上与他的祖国英国有着很大差异。美国记者乔·基奥恩认为，与陌生人进行感情深入的交流至关重要，并且可能会改变生活。乔恩·耶茨在伦敦经营着一家青年慈善机构，他担心西方社会的深刻裂痕将使人们无法接触到不同阶层、宗教、种族和代际的人，即使是偶然的接触。
All three authors make sweeping generalisations about the evolution of human society, from hunter-gatherers to the age of Homer and beyond. But they are more interesting when they reflect, using personal experience or scientific research, on how people live and communicate now. In different ways, they all make two separate but related points. First, interacting meaningfully with a new person can bring huge rewards - but it is a skill that must be cultivated and can easily be lost. Second, the self-segregation of modern Western societies means that, for many people, conversing with some fellow citizens seems pointless, undesirable or outlandish. The second problem exacerbates the first: if you consider others beyond the pale, why make the effort to get to know them?
三位作者都对人类社会的演变进行了全面的概括，从狩猎采集者到荷马时代以及更久远的过去。但当它们用个人经验或科学研究来反思人们现在的生活和交流方式时，就更有趣了。他们都以不同的方式提出了两个独立但相关的观点。首先，与陌生人进行有意义的互动可以带来巨大的回报——但这是一项必须经过培养而且很容易丧失的技能。其次，现代西方社会的自我隔离意味着，对许多人来说，与某些同胞交谈似乎是毫无意义的、不可取的或奇怪的。第二个问题加剧了第一个问题：如果你认为其他人行为出格，怎么还会想要努力去了解他们呢？
As both Mr Keohane and Mr Yates emphasise, in Britain and America political divisions have ossified into tribal ones. Supporters and opponents of Brexit live in discrete clusters; Republicans and Democrats see each other as bad people, not fellow Americans whose opinions happen to differ. These opposing sides have become strangers to one another. Mr Buckingham focuses on the pleasures and pitfalls of encounters in remote places where the stakes are lower because the acquaintanceships are bound to be temporary—in a holiday flat-share in Helsinki or while travelling through the Balkans. But, like the other two, he notes that wariness of unfamiliar people is neither new nor insuperable.
正如基奥恩和耶茨所强调的那样，在英国和美国，政治分歧已经僵化为部落分歧。英国退欧的支持者和反对者生活在不同的圈子中;共和党人和民主党人相互视为坏人，而不是意见相左的美国同胞。这些对立的双方彼此都变得陌生起来。白金汉先生专注于在远方相遇的乐趣和诱惑，那里的风险较低，因为相识注定是短暂的——在赫尔辛基的度假公寓里或在巴尔干半岛旅行时。但是，与其它两位一样，他指出，对陌生人的警惕不是什么新鲜事，也不是不可克服的。
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