本书共选17篇散文，可供一学期使用，约18～20周。开头文章短小，后面文章偏难，涉及社会批评和文学批评等。本书选文分为三类：人生哲理类的美文(1～8单元)涉及友情、处人之道、爱情、友谊、老年生活、生活目标、为官之道和美的定义；社会生活类文章(9～14单元)涉及大学教育、女性职业、劳动、美容业、民族欺压和社会惩罚；文学创作理论类文章(15～17单元)涉及《麦克白》评论、口头文学要旨和《乌鸦》创作设计。本书尝试选入作家文学创作思想的文章。由于难度大，以前的同类书籍涉及较少。(This book consists of seventeen essays. It can be used for a semester, about eighteen to twenty weeks. The articles at the beginning are short, the ones at the back are difficult, involving social criticism and literary criticism, and so on. Essays selected in this book can be divided into three categories. Essays about philosophy of life (unit one to eight) involve friendship, attitudes towards life, love, companionship, life of seniors, life goals, leadership, definition of beauty. Essays about social life (unit nine to fourteen) involve university education, female occupation, labor, the beauty industry, ethnic oppression and social punishment. Essays about literary theory (unit fifteen to seventeen) involve comments on "Macbeth", oral literature gist and creation design of "the Raven". This book attempts to select articles about the author's literary creation. Few previous similar books involve this due to the great difficulty.)