Moonwalking with Einstein

　　2011年美國暢銷書排行榜
　　2011年3月Amazon網路書店最佳選書

　　記憶潛力比你想像得還大！

　　一個記憶力平平的記者喬許．佛爾，在採訪一年一度「美國記憶大賽」時，初遇二千五百年前即存在、如今卻只有極少數人還在使用的超強記憶術－－記憶宮殿。他以記者之筆和追根究柢的精神，探究人類大腦的記憶之謎，用最新的科學研究數據、鉅細靡遺的歷史資料，編織出一張廣而深的記憶脈絡史，細述數千年來人類的記憶在演化中發生了什麼事？是發展得更精細，還是被科技取代而退化？

　　本書記錄了作者在世界頂尖的記憶奇才指導下，學習使用記憶宮殿法，一年後他抱著「比個經驗」的心態，參加美國記憶大賽，卻跌破眾人眼鏡，一路過關斬將，比賽過程讓人驚呼連連，最後冠軍獎盃落袋的一連串真實過程。作者證明了人類確實可以擺脫死記硬背的記憶方式，只要經過訓練，人人都可以提升記憶力且效果驚人。

　　作者在接受記憶力特訓的同時，也分別到聖地牙哥採訪世界上最嚴重的失憶症患者；到鹽湖城跟背了九千多本書的「雨人」討論大腦記憶的祕密；在紐約某所高中，他認識一名老師教學生用記憶宮殿法通過紐約州會考，幫助學生有機會升學，擺脫貧窮。讀者可以從這些真實故事中，見證到記憶驚人的潛力，以及它如何改變我們的生活。

　　Foer's unlikely journey from chronically forgetful science journalist to U.S. Memory Champion frames a revelatory exploration of the vast, hidden impact of memory on every aspect of our lives.

　　On average, people squander forty days annually compensating for things they've forgotten. Joshua Foer used to be one of those people. But after a year of memory training, he found himself in the finals of the U.S. Memory Championship. Even more important, Foer found a vital truth we too often forget: In every way that matters, we are the sum of our memories.

　　Moonwalking with Einstein draws on cutting-edge research, a surprising cultural history of memory, and venerable tricks of the mentalist's trade to transform our understanding of human remembering. Under the tutelage of top "mental athletes," he learns ancient techniques once employed by Cicero to memorize his speeches and by Medieval scholars to memorize entire books. Using methods that have been largely forgotten, Foer discovers that we can all dramatically improve our memories.

　　Immersing himself obsessively in a quirky subculture of competitive memorizers, Foer learns to apply techniques that call on imagination as much as determination-showing that memorization can be anything but rote. From the PAO system, which converts numbers into lurid images, to the memory palace, in which memories are stored in the rooms of imaginary structures, Foer's experience shows that the World Memory Championships are less a test of memory than of perseverance and creativity.

　　Foer takes his inquiry well beyond the arena of mental athletes-across the country and deep into his own mind. In San Diego, he meets an affable old man with one of the most severe case of amnesia on record, where he learns that memory is at once more elusive and more reliable than we might think. In Salt Lake City, he swaps secrets with a savant who claims to have memorized more than nine thousand books. At a high school in the South Bronx, he finds a history teacher using twenty- five-hundred-year-old memory techniques to give his students an edge in the state Regents exam.

　　At a time when electronic devices have all but rendered our individual memories obsolete, Foer's bid to resurrect the forgotten art of remembering becomes an urgent quest. Moonwalking with Einstein brings Joshua Foer to the apex of the U.S. Memory Championship and readers to a profound appreciation of a gift we all possess but that too often slips our minds. 

　　★本書中譯版《記憶人人hold得住》由橡樹林出版。

作者簡介

喬許．佛爾（Joshua Foer）

　　目前是《國家地理雜誌》《君子雜誌》《紐約時報》《華盛頓郵報》及《頁岩》電子雜誌的撰稿人。

　　原本是一個老是忘記自己為什麼要開冰箱、忘東忘西、腦容量不怎麼大的平凡人，2005年採訪美國記憶大賽後，開始思考「人類大腦的侷限」這個問題。之後在艾德．庫克（Ed Cooke）的年輕記憶大師親自訓練下，開始練習二千五百年前人類的超強記憶術－－記憶宮殿，並一舉奪得2006年美國記憶大賽冠軍，在比賽過程中有多項成績刷新世界紀錄，成為一個名副其實的記憶達人。

　　Joshua Foer has written for National Geographic, Esquire, The New York Times, The Washington Post, and Slate.