The Birds

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Summary

The Birds is a novella by the British writer Daphne du Maurier, first published in 1952 in the collection The Apple Tree (published in the United States as The Birds and Other Stories). The story is set in the Cornish countryside where the author long lived: an ordinary man who farms for a living, having moved from the city, watches through a harsh winter as flocks of birds that should be harmless gradually change their behavior—first gathering in small numbers, then in swarms launching organized attacks on people, houses and livestock. As the attacks escalate, the outside world and its news are cut off together, and ordinary daily life—lighting fires, barricading doors and windows, caring for children, waiting for dawn—becomes the whole of existence. Du Maurier advances the panic in an extremely restrained, almost everyday tone, never explaining why the birds behave as they do or offering a scientist's answer, so that uncertainty itself becomes the source of fear. In 1963 Hitchcock adapted it into a film of the same name, moving the story to a seaside town in California and substantially rewriting the characters and plot; the film was added to the U.S. National Film Registry. The original and the film differ in temperament: the novella is colder, closer to rural life, and more insistent on humanity's helplessness and silence before an anomaly in nature. In the Chinese-speaking world, the story appeared under the title The Birds in a collection from New Rain Press in Taiwan, and in 2022 it met simplified-Chinese readers as the opening piece of Love Is Suspense (originally The Birds and Other Stories).

Editor's review

提起《群鸟》，多数人先想到希区柯克的电影，但原著小说值得单独一读。杜穆里埃的厉害之处在于：她不用怪物、不用血浆，只让最寻常的东西——屋檐下的鸟、田里的乌鸦、窗台上的麻雀——慢慢变得不可信任，恐惧便从日常缝隙里渗出来。她的写法极其节制， narrator 只是一个普通的农场男人，惦记着炉火、孩子的安危和邻居的收成，正因如此，读者才会跟着他一起被拖进那场没有解释的围困。这篇小说体现了杜穆里埃最擅长的手法：把哥特式的阴森安置在明亮的乡野里，把悬念交给氛围而非谜底。如果你喜欢《蝴蝶梦》里那种优雅的不安，或者想看看“灾难片”的文学原型长什么样，这篇短小精悍的作品是很好的入门。建议先读小说再看电影，你会更清楚地看到文字如何制造出银幕难以复制的压迫感。

Who it's for

A good fit for

喜欢希区柯克电影、想读原著小说的影迷
偏爱哥特氛围与心理惊悚的文学读者
阅读时间零散、想从短篇入手的外国文学爱好者
写作或叙事爱好者，想学习如何在日常中营造恐惧

Not a good fit for

期待看到鸟类为何袭击的科学解释的读者
偏好明确谜底、推理破案式结局的悬疑读者
对动物群集、困守情节易感不适的读者

Reading tips

先不看任何电影资料读完原著，保留“鸟为何如此”的悬念体验。
留意叙述者对柴火、门窗、食物等细节的反复描写，恐惧正是从这些日常物件里生长出来的。
读完可对照希区柯克电影，比较人物设定与结尾处理上的差异。
若时间充裕，可连同《苹果树》集中的其他短篇一起读，感受杜穆里埃短篇的整体风格。

FAQ

《群鸟》是一部长篇小说吗？

不是。它是杜穆里埃的中短篇作品，1952年首次收入短篇集《苹果树》（美国版题为《群鸟与其他故事》），篇幅不长，通常一两个小时可以读完。

原著和希区柯克电影差别大吗？

差别不小。电影把背景移到美国加州海滨小镇，并大幅改写人物关系与情节走向；小说更贴近英国康沃尔乡间生活，基调更冷静、更克制，也没有电影那样的情节收束。

简体中文版在哪里能读到这篇小说？

2022年北京日报出版社出版的短篇集《爱情就是悬疑》（庄惠敏译，原作名 The Birds and Other Stories）收录了《群鸟》，作为全书首篇；该书属读客悬疑文库。

读完会得到“鸟为什么攻击人”的答案吗？

不会。杜穆里埃有意不给解释，这种悬而未决正是作品的核心。小说关注的是人在异常面前的处境与心理，而非谜题解答。

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About the author

达芙妮·杜穆里埃 Author

Daphne du Maurier is a writer who has drawn considerable attention in the field of foreign literature and enjoys a steady readership among Chinese-language readers. The library currently holds one work by her, The Collected Works of Daphne du Maurier (8 volumes), which shows that her writing reaches Chinese readers in the form of a multi-volume collection. Because public information is limited, her nationality, dates of birth and death, full biography, and writing career cannot be described in detail at present. Judging from the size of the existing collection, however, her writing is sustained and coherent, and is well suited to concentrated reading as a series. Her works are classified as foreign literature, which usually implies attention to character portrayal, atmosphere, and narrative tension—qualities that match the way her collection is often presented as a whole. For readers who wish to understand this author systematically, this eight-volume collection can serve as the main entry point into her literary world.