Michael Lewis，American non-fiction author
Princeton University，June 3rd，2012
Don‘t be deceived by life’s outcomes.Life‘s outcomes，while not entirely random，have a huge amount of luck baked into them.
不要被生活的结果所蒙骗。生活的结果，虽不是完全随机的，但也确实掺杂了很多运气成分在其中。
Michael Lewis
背景故事
人生是否有固定模式，还是时常出现偶然，又或者，二者会同时发生。我们都像是在风中飘着的羽毛，因为风，我们注定要飘荡，也因为风，我们不知道下一秒要飘到哪里，那片羽毛忽高忽低，忽而疾驰忽而盘旋，这正是我们每个人人生的真实写照。人的一生是一个又一个的故事组合，因为这些故事，我们才能找到生命的意义。
幸运是人们追求最为强烈的东西，在迈克尔的讲演中阐述的却是另一种事实，静心聆听，体味其中的各种含义。
名人简介
迈克尔·刘易斯（Michael Lewis，1960年10月15日-），美国当代报告文学作家、财经记者，毕业于普林斯顿大学和伦敦经济学院。
大学主修艺术史。他所写的畅销书包括《说谎者的扑克牌》、《将世界甩在身后》、《魔球：逆境中制胜的智慧》和《弱点：比赛进程》《大空头》等。其中《说谎者的扑克牌》和《将世界甩在身后》同被福布斯评为“20世纪最具影响力的20部商业书籍”。目前他是《名利场》的特约编辑。在《大空头》中感受刘易斯独特的写作手法给人带来的阅读享受：除了实用的金融知识外，还有生动传神的人物描写以及扣人心弦的情节安排。让人感到更不可思议的是，这一切都是现实世界中发生过的事件的真实记录，而不是小说。在许多关于08年发生的美国次贷危机的书中，《大空头》应该是最有研究价值和阅读趣味性的一本。
演讲赏析
Don’t Eat the Fate of Biscuits
Michael Lewis，American non-fiction author
Princeton University，June 3rd，2012
Thank you，President Tilghman，Trustees and Friends，Parents of the Class of 2012wherever they put you，Members of the Class of 2012.Why don‘t you give yourself a round of applause？The next time you look around a church and see everyone dressed in black it’ll be awkward to cheer.Enjoy the moment.
Thirty years ago I sat where you sat.I must have listened to some older person share his life experience.But I don‘t remember a word of it.I can’t even tell you who spoke.What I do remember，vividly，is graduation.I‘m told you’re meant to be excited，perhaps even relieved，and maybe all of you are.I wasn‘t.I was totally outraged.Here I’d gone and given them four of the best years of my life and this is how they rewarded me，by throwing me out.
At that moment I was sure of only one thing：I was of no possible economic value to the outside world.I‘d majored in art history，for a start.Even then this was regarded as an act of insanity.I was almost certainly less prepared for the marketplace than most of you.Yet some how I have wound up，somehow rich and famous.Sort of.I’m going to explain，briefly，how that happened.I want you to understand just how mysterious careers can be，before you go out and have one yourself.I graduated from Princeton without ever having published a word of anything，anywhere.I didn‘t write for the Prince，or for anyone else.But at Princeton，studying art history，I felt the first twinge of literary ambition.It happened while working on my senior thesis.My adviser was a really gifted professor，an archaeologist named William Childs.The thesis tried to explain how the Italian sculptor Donatello used Greek and Roman sculpture，that’s actually totally beside the point，but I‘ve always wanted to tell someone.God knows what Professor Childs actually thought of it，but he helped me to become engrossed.More than engrossed：obsessed.When I handed it in，I knew what I wanted to do for the rest of my life：I want to write senior theses.Or，to put it differently：to write books.
Then I went to my thesis defense.It was just a few yards from here，in McCormick Hall.I listened and waited for Professor Childs to say how well written my thesis was.He didn’t.And so after about 45minutes I finally said，“So.What did you think of the writing？”“Put it this way，”he said.“Never try to make a living at it.”And I didn‘t—not really.I did what everyone does who has no idea what to do with themselves：I went to graduate school.I wrote at nights，without much effect，mainly because I hadn’t the first clue what I should write about.One night I was invited to a dinner，where I sat next to the wife of a big shot at a giant Wall Street investment bank，called Salomon Brothers.She more or less forced her husband to give me a job.I knew next to nothing about Salomon Brothers.But Salomon Brothers happened to be where Wall Street was being reinvented—into the place we have all come to know and love.When I got there，I was assigned，almost arbitrarily，to the very best job in which to observe the growing madness：they turned me into the house expert on derivatives.A year and a half later Salomon Brothers was handing me a check for hundreds of thousands of dollars to give advice about derivatives to professional investors.
Now I had something to write about：Salomon Brothers.Wall Street had become so unhinged that it was paying recent Princeton graduates who knew nothing about money，small fortunes，to pretend to be experts about money.I‘d stumbled into my next senior thesis.I called up my father.I told him I was going to quit this job that now promised me millions of dollars to write a book for an advance of 40grand.There was a long pause on the other end of the line.“You might just want to think about that，”he said.“Why？”“Stay at Salomon Brothers 10years，make your fortune，and then write your books，”he said.I didn’t need to think about it.I knew what intellectual passion felt like—because I‘d felt it here，at Princeton—and I wanted to feel it again.I was 26years old.Had I waited until I was 36，I would never have done it.I would have forgotten the feeling.