当我告诉国内熟人我在耶鲁学历史时，很多人的言谈话语中好像我是个懒人，想逃避自然科学与工程类的科目，或者是个学不了计算机与电子工程的失败者，还有人奇怪我为什么选择了这么一种不实用的学科。
1998年我得到了耶鲁大学本科的奖学金。在耶鲁的四年之中，我学习的课程范围很宽，经济学、德语与德国文学、数学、英语文学等，但在学业上我最投入的是历史。我在耶鲁选的十门历史课程包括古希腊史、古罗马史、欧洲中世纪史、宗教改革、18世纪与19世纪的欧洲思想史、俄罗斯现代史和德国现代史，当我告诉国内熟人我在耶鲁学历史时，很多人的言谈话语中好像我是个懒人，想逃避自然科学与工程类的科目，或者是个学不了计算机与电子工程的失败者，还有人奇怪我为什么选择了这么一种不实用的学科。
这两种看法反映了很多中国人对人文学科的根深蒂固的偏见——这是极为错误的。在美国的一所著名大学学习历史，既不轻松，也并非不实用。从某种意义上说，我是通过克服学习历史遇到的困难而学到了对我来说最重要的东西。比起我原来在清华大学生物化学专业上一年级时的经历，或是在清华附中理科实验班的课程，耶鲁的历史课赋予我的挑战要大得多。在耶鲁苦读四年之后，我的学识获得了极大的充实。
耶鲁的大多数历史课程每周都要上两三次大课，参加一次讨论课，还要完成残酷的200页乃至更多的阅读。每学期有期中和期末考试，还要提交两篇论文，开始时就连听课时记笔记和按时完成阅读都是令人望而生畏的挑战，写论文就像是恶梦一般。通常，从论文布置下来的那一刻起，我的麻烦就开始了，论文的题目是不确定的，比如：“自选有关古希腊史的任何一个题目”、从50本有关中世纪史的书中“自选一本写书评”，或是“从卡尔·马克斯的《资本论》与法国思想家阿列克西·德·托克维尔所写的《论美国的民主》中选出的章节进行比较与对照”。而最终要达到的是，一篇论文有着前后呼应的论点，这些论点从很多书籍或刊物文章中得到论据与相关思想。对于这样的作业，不言而喻的潜台词则是：你在论文中所说的一切，必须反映出你自己的思想，因此简单地重复某一教授的观点或是书里的什么内容，将不会使你获得好成绩。在耶鲁上学的第一周，我们就牢牢记住了剽窃在学术领域是一种重罪，每年都有学生因剽窃而受到惩罚。
当我看着布置下来的论文时，脑子里往往是一片空白：有关古希腊史的“任何”题目？但是哪一个？又从哪里开始呢？甚至在我把题目缩到了比如说是雅典政治家伯里克利的一生业绩，仍然有着关于他的数千本书和文章。我的主要论点应该是什么？我应该提出哪些要点？论文中应该包括哪些材料以支持我的论点？我常常在没有任何头绪的情况下花上几小时，几百页几百页地阅读；有多少晚上我在图书馆里踱来踱去，力图定下论文题目，并选择出我的论点。而我绝不是唯一面对这种困惑的人。耶鲁的学生抱怨论文就像伦敦人抱怨天气那样普遍。花上整夜整夜的时间完成论文则是耶鲁学生对“美好校园年华”的相同记忆中的一部分。
我渐渐认识到了这种看似缺乏指导性的教育的价值。在很大的范围内允许学生自己选择论文题目反映了西方对个人原动力的信任。学生们受到鼓励自己做出选择，他们的兴趣主导着他们随意发展。在各个不同层次上，在摸索论文题目的过程中，之后在筛选手中材料时，以及最后用这些材料构成睿智的论点，学生们学到了迅速处理以及批判性地利用大量信息资料这一重要能力，这是一种不仅用于历史研究的重要技能，而且用于学术领域以外的很多领域，在那些地方信息资料纵横交错地出现，而不是像清晰的教科书上的段落那样，准备一句句地喂给被动的学生。
我发现历史课中需要的语言技能与现实生活密切相关。因为历史包含的题材很宽——政治事件、社会变化、文化与艺术运动等等——历史系的学生必须掌握很宽的词汇面才能描述并分析这些不同的主题。对于我的历史课来说，我写过的论文有关于雅典与斯巴达在波斯战争中使用的军事战略、中世纪哲学家阿伯拉尔的自传、 19世纪60年代俄罗斯农民的起义、中国清代早期的生态环境危机，还有很多其他题目。大量的阅读、写作与讨论使我迅速地吸收并掌握了新的词汇与修辞技巧。而且令人高兴的是，很多历史学家也是优秀作家，他们对英语的精妙运用使他们的著作成为英语说明性散文的最好典范。
写作能力强是一项很好的技能，但它是否重要呢？是的，非常重要！很多来耶鲁大学招聘学生的公司，包括大多数众所周知的华尔街金融与咨询公司，公开声明他们首选那些有着坚实的写作能力的应聘者。每年这些公司都雇用大量的来自历史系、英语系、政治学系的毕业生，但他们都没有受到过正式的金融与商科的教育。令人感到好奇的是，在诸如耶鲁、哈佛、普林斯顿这样的名牌私立大学里，本科生的经济与金融课程带有极强的理论倾向，并不能马上应用于私人公司的业务。的确，多数名牌大学甚至不开设本科生的商科课程。在美国最有影响力收入也最高的职业之一就是律师，而这一行中写作技能是绝对必要的。因此，上法学院是耶鲁大学历史系毕业生最为普遍的目标之一并不奇怪。
很好地运用词语的能力在西方文化中受到高度的评价与尊重。在耶鲁校园中最“红”的两个人物大概就是耶鲁本科生院院长理查德·布洛德海德和汉学家乔纳森·斯彭斯了。他二人通过出色的写作与演讲，魔力般吸引了整个耶鲁。斯彭斯主讲的中国现代史课程一度在开学后的第一天的试听课上引来了650名学生，他不得不把人数限制在400名，也就是耶鲁最大的演讲厅所能容纳的人数。就我个人经验而言，能够出色地掌握英语的中国学生会受到美国人的极大尊重与重视。
因此，接受历史课的教育是非常有用的。然而，如果你问我们年级的204名历史专业的学生“为什么要学习历史？”他们很可能答道：“因为它有意思。”学历史确实有意思。学习历史在好几个层次上是很有乐趣的。演讲课常常是历史课的亮点，敢说拥有全美最优秀的历史系之一的耶鲁，有着很多具有超级名星地位的历史教授。常常是极棒的故事大王的教授们把演讲课变成了美妙的历史戏剧。乔纳森·斯彭斯的演讲以其对中国历史轶事的洞察而著称；在由唐纳德·卡根教授的著名课程古希腊史中，他每次演讲之后学生都报以掌声以感谢他那富有激情的雄辩。我个人最喜欢詹姆斯·海因森教授的现代俄国史。总的说来，过去200年中俄罗斯人民与命运的英勇抗争深深打动了我。
我忍不住要提及的是，阅读是快乐的另一个源泉。在一典型的历史课程中，教授在演讲历史发展时是粗线条的，而某一周的阅读，通常是某一主题的一本书，对于演讲中涉及的某些内容提供了生动的细节和更透彻的分析，进而补充了教授的演讲。阅读实实在在是课程的血与肉。比如，在我选的德国近代史课程中，享利·特纳教授的演讲集中在自俾斯麦以来德国社会政治的发展，而阅读则包括了由AG·泰勒所写的俾斯麦的生平、德国马克思主义者爱德华·伯恩斯坦的政论选以及19 世纪德国历史学家海因里赫·范·特来奇克的演讲记录、海因里赫·曼的小说《稻草人》，希特勒的《我的奋斗》的节录、麦克尔·艾伦的《纳粹攫取权力》，还有很多其他的书。尽管个别的书籍像希特勒的《我的奋斗》读起来是一种煎熬，大多数都是很吸引人的。很多周末我都是在图书馆里阅读有关历史的书籍，读一本好书则是我星期六“放松”的一项重要内容。
历史不仅仅对学习历史的人是有趣的，对在这一领域进行研究的人也是有趣的。当我与特纳教授谈起他的一本书时，他告诉我在他浏览苏联解体后新解禁的某些纳粹文件目录时萌生了写这本书的想法。在这些文件中有弗朗西·范·帕朋的私人信件，他是1933年1月希特勒被任命为总理的幕后关键人物之一。特纳想，这些信件有可能会透露出希特勒登上权力宝座前夕的权力之争，于是他请正在莫斯科进行研究的一位同事复印了这些信件中的一部分。这些信件，正如它所证实的，告诉了人们一个有关希特勒的权力攀升的故事，它与大多数人所相信的截然不同。基于这些以及其他文献，特纳写了一本书，使我们对这一历史时期的理解更加接近历史真实。在这本书出版几乎十年以后，这位上了年纪的教授谈起这本书依然很兴奋：“这是一本侦探性的书，写这本书时可有意思了。”
没有哪篇文章或哪本书充分地解释过为什么人们要学习历史，耶鲁大学古希腊史的著名教授唐纳德·卡根给出的答案抓住了问题的根本：“只有你学了历史以后才知道人们为什么应该学习历史。”
In 1998, I received a scholarship to study for an undergraduate degree at Yale University. During my four years at Yale, I explored a broad array of subjects: economics, German language and literature, mathematics, English literature, etc., but the subject I was most committed to intellectually was history. The ten history courses I took at Yale included ancient Greek history, Roman history, medieval European history, the Reformation, the European intellectual history of the 18th and 19th centuries, and the history of modern Russia and modern Germany. When I told other Chinese that I was studying history at Yale, many talked as if I were a slacker evading science and engineering programs, or a loser who couldn't make it in computer science or electrical engineering; others wondered why I had chosen such an impractical subject.
Both responses reflect the deeply ingrained prejudice of many Chinese against the humanities - and are grossly erroneous. Studying history at a great American university is neither easy nor impractical. In some sense, I learned my most important lessons through struggling with the difficulties of studying history. My history courses posed a much bigger academic challenge than my previous experience in Tsinghua as a freshman in biochemistry, or in Tsinghua Fuzhong's experimental accelerated science program. I came away from those four arduous years at Yale tremendously enriched.
Most history classes at Yale require attending two or three lectures a week, a weekly discussion section, relentless reading assignments of 200 or more pages a week, a midterm and final exam, and two papers. At the beginning, just taking notes on lectures and finishing the reading on time were daunting challenges; writing papers was nightmarish. My trouble with papers generally started the moment they were assigned. The topics were indeterminate, e.g. "write about any topic of your choice in ancient Greek history", "write a book review for a book of your choice" from a reading list of fifty books on medieval history or "compare and contrast selected passages from Karl Marx's Das Kapital and Alexis de Tocqueville's Democracy in America." The expected end result is a paper making a coherent argument that draws its supporting evidence or ideas from several books or journal articles. The subtext to such assignments is: whatever you say in the paper has to reflect your own thinking; hence simply repeating the professor's opinions or whatever is in the readings will not get you very far. In the first week of my Yale career it was hammered home to us that plagiarism was the capital crime in the academic world. Each year there are students who are punished for plagiarizing.
Looking at a paper assignment, my mind often went blank: ANY topics in ancient Greek history? But which one, andswheresto start? Even after I was able to narrow the topic down to, say, the career of Pericles, there were still thousands of books and articles written on it. What was my main argument to be? What points should I make? What information should I include in the paper to support my argument? I would spend hours going through hundreds and hundreds of pages of reading with no clue what to write on. I spent so many nights pacing back and forth in the library, trying to define a topic and choose my arguments. And I was hardly the only person with this problem: Yale students complain about papers as much as Londoners complain about the weather. Pulling all-nighters to finish a paper is part of the shared memory of those "bright college years".
I gradually realized the value of such seemingly unguided education. Allowing students great scope in choosing their own paper topics reflects the Western belief in individual initiative. Students are encouraged to make their own choices and go wherever their interests lead them. On a different level, in the process of groping for a topic, then screening the available material, and finally using it to make an intelligent argument, students learn the important lesson of rapidly processing and critically utilizing a large amount of information. This is an important skill not only in historical research, but in many careers outside the academic world,swheresinformation comes in the form of a tangled mess, not neat textbook passages to be spoon-fed to passive "learners".
I find the language skills acquired from history classes highly relevant in the real world. Because of the broad spectrum of subjects that history encompasses - political events, social changes, intellectual and artistic movements, etc - the student of history has to command a wide vocabulary to describe and analyze these different subjects. For my history classes, I wrote papers on the military strategy that Athens and Sparta employed in the Persian War, the autobiography of the medieval philosopher Abelard, Russian peasant uprisings in the 1860s, the environmental crisis in the early Qing Dynasty, and numerous other topics. Intensive reading, writing, and discussion forced me to absorb and master new vocabulary and rhetorical tactics at a rapid pace. And happily, many historians are excellent stylists. Their precise and supple use of English makes their books models of English expository prose at its best.
Writing well is a fine skill, but is it important? Yes, very! Many companies that came to recruit at Yale, including most of the well-known Wall Street finance and consulting firms, made no secret of their preference for candidates with solid writing skills. Each year these firms hire a large number of new graduates with majors such as history, English, and political science, but no formal finance or business education. Curiously, the undergraduate economics or finance curriculum at elite private universities such as Yale, Harvard and Princeton has a strong theoretical bent and is not immediately applicable to a career in a private firm. Indeed, most elite universities don't even have an undergraduate business program. In the US one of the most influential and lucrative professions is law, a field in which writing skills are indispensable. Not surprisingly, law school is one of the most popular destinations for Yale grads majoring in history.
The ability to use words well is highly valued and respected in Western culture. The two most "popular" figures on the Yale campus are probably Richard Brodhead, dean of Yale College, and sinologist Jonathan Spence. Both cast their spell on the Yale community through the excellence of their writing and public speaking. Spence's course on modern Chinese history once drew a first-day crowd of 650. He had to limit enrollment to 400, the capacity of the largest lecture hall at Yale. From my experience, Chinese students with an excellent command of English receive a lot of respect and attention from Americans.
So a history education is useful. Yet if the question "Why study history?" had been put to the 204 history majors in my class, chances are that they would have replied, "Because it's fun." And it is!. The study of history is enjoyable on several levels. The lectures are often the highlight of a history course. Boasting one of the finest history departments in the US, Yale has many history professors of superstar status. Often superb story tellers, they turn lecturessintosgrand historical drama. Jonathan Spence's lectures are known for his insightful anecdotes from Chinese history. In the famous course on ancient Greek history taught by Donald Kagan, students would applaud at the end of each lecture to acknowledge Kagan's impassioned eloquence. My personal favorite was Prof. James Heinzen's history of modern Russia: on the grand level, the Russian people's heroic struggle with destiny over the past 200 years is deeply moving.
Reading is another great source of enjoyment that I cannot help mentioning. In a typical history course, the professor lectures on historical developments in broad terms, while the reading for a particular week, usually a book on a specific subject, supplements the professor's presentation with vivid details and a more thorough analysis of something touched on in the lectures. Reading is really the blood and flesh of the course. In the class I took on the history of modern Germany, for example, Prof. Henry Turner focuses his lectures exclusively on the socio-political development of Germany since Bismarck. The reading includes the biography of Bismarck by AG Taylor, excerpts from German Marxist Eduard Bernstein's political writing and 19th century German historian Heinrich von Treitschke's lecture notes, Heinrich Mann's novel Man of Straw, excerpts from Hitler's Mein Kampf, Michael Allen's The Nazi Seizure of Power, and many other books. While a few, such as Hitler's Mein Kampf, were torture to read, most were fascinating. I spent many weekends in the library doing my history reading, and a good book to read was an important part of my Saturday "relaxation".
History is not only fun for people who study it, but also for the people who research it. When I talked with Prof. Turner about one of his books, he told me that the idea for it arose as he was browsing through the catalogue of some Nazi documents newly released after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Among the documents were personal letters from Franz von Papen, one of the key figures behind Hitler's appointment as chancellor in January 1933. Turner thought that they might reveal something about the power struggle immediately before Hitler's rise to power, so he asked a colleague doing research in Moscow to photocopy some of the letters. These, as it turned out, told a story about Hitler's ascent to power quite different from what most people had believed. Based on these and other documents, Turner wrote a book that brought our understanding of this period closer to historical reality. Almost ten years after its publication, the aged professor still got very excited over his book: "It was detective work. I had a lot of fun working on it."
No essay or book fully explains why people study history. The answer given by Donald Kagan, Yale's celebrated professor of ancient Greek history, captures the essence of the problem: "You only know why people should study history after you have studied history.
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