转载：英文原著难度的科学评定：Lexile值

（测试某篇文章或者某本书的蓝思等级请登录http://www.lexile.com→Learn more about lexilemeasures→Tools→Lexile Analyzer，首次使用时注册用户名密码，导入一篇1000单词以内的文本文档即可测试该文章或书籍的蓝思等级。）

（以上为摘录材料）

如果你想知道某本书的蓝思值，可以上蓝思官网查。也可以直接将TXT文本上传到蓝思官网（1000词以下）进行测试。伍教练就尝试测试了发表在作文选、报纸、博客的4篇英文拙作，结果如下：

I was there

http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_4b5cb56b01009l0t.html

Lexile Measure 1090L

Mean Sentence Length 16.52

Mean Log Word Frequency 3.41

Word Count 347

A shaken family in a village

http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_4b5cb56b01009obs.html

Lexile Measure 1070L

Mean Sentence Length 17.96

Mean Log Word Frequency 3.62

Word Count 431

An introduction of Augustus and Dialysis English

http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_4b5cb56b01000889.html

Lexile Measure 1100L

Mean Sentence Length 16.38

Mean Log Word Frequency 3.37

Word Count 606

She's on Line

http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_4b5cb56b010007wr.html

Lexile Measure 400L

Mean Sentence Length 7.61

Mean Log Word Frequency 3.72

Word Count 411

◆蓝思值的缺点

WIKI对Lexile褒贬不一（http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lexile）

有教育专家用个别书的数字质疑这个评估体系，The Library Mouse, by Daniel Kirk, is a 32-page children’s picture book rated by Amazon.com as “for ages 4-8” and has a Lexile score of 830. However, Stephenie Meyer’s 498-page, young adult novel Twilight only garnishes a Lexile score of 720. Similarly, Beverly Cleary’s Ramona Quimby, Age 8, has a Lexile score of 860, while Michael Crichton’s Jurassic Park only has a score of 710. 无非是说，小孩读的书L值高，而一些难读的书L值反而低。

同一本书里头不同部分的L值变化范围太大：Within a single chapter of Pride and Prejudice, for example, 125-word excerpts of text (the unit of assessments used to obtain students’ Lexile levels) that were pulled from every 1,000 words had Lexiles that ranged from 670 to 1310, with an average of 952. The range of 640 on the LS [Lexile Scale] represents the span from third grade to college.”

还有学者指出，原著里如果多用句号，少用逗号，蓝思值也会变化，但这算是不同的难度么？伍教练查Oedipus the king，就发现三个版本的蓝思值从940到1070不等。

类似的还有Flesch-Kincaid Index，在WORD上就可以测试，但似乎挺麻烦的。还有许许多多更复杂的指标，例如Amazon上丹布朗的《数字城堡》的分析：

http://www.amazon.com/Digital-Fortress-Thriller-Dan-Brown/dp/sitb-next/B005Q8BBOK

Text Stats

These statistics are computed from the text of another edition of this book. (learn more)

Readability (learn more)		Compared with other books
Fog Index:	7.7	12% are easier 88% are harder
Flesch Index:	68.4	20% are easier 80% are harder
Flesch-Kincaid Index:	5.9	12% are easier 88% are harder
Complexity (learn more)
Complex Words:	11%	30% have fewer 70% have more
Syllables per Word:	1.5	35% have fewer 65% have more
Words per Sentence:	8.6	7% have fewer 93% have more
Number of
Characters:	610,362	72% have fewer 28% have more
Words:	101,853	74% have fewer 26% have more
Sentences:	11,797	92% have fewer 8% have more
Fun stats
Words per Dollar:	8,502
Words per Ounce:	21,219

（里头还有有趣的统计，例如每一块钱能买多少单词，书本每一磅重量有多少单词。晕！）

其实这些玩意都是为初学者起步的时候用的，读了几本原著的人哪里还需要挑低值的小朋友幼稚书来透析？

◆选书建议：蓝思与生词量一起考虑

蓝思是用了词汇重复频率、句子长度，而伍教练自家首创的“首万词不同单词数”则偏重生词数。之前的词汇量科学测试（http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_4b5cb56b0100ucck.html）发现，国内英语学习者的词汇量大多为美国几岁小孩的水平，同龄人对比，词汇量差了一大截，估计蓝思测量的时候对非英语读者的词汇量考虑不足，愚以为首万词生词数更符合国情！

以下是伍教练从一个超过3万本的蓝思数据包分解出来的原著蓝思值，对比伍教练首创的首万词生词数，一共55本。

蓝思/首万词不重复词数/原著名称/作者

570  1684      Daughter of Deceit Victoria Holt

660  2228      Death on the Nile   Agatha Christie

670  2115       Twilight 3 -Eclipse Stephenie Meyer

690  2021      Twilight 2 -New moon   Stephenie Meyer

690  2202      Twilight 4 -Breaking Dawn   Stephenie Meyer

710  1613      Little Prince    Antoine de Saint Exupéry

720  2120      Twilight 1       Stephenie Meyer

790  2024      Norwegian Wood   Haruki Murakami

790  1423      The Catcher in the rye    Jerome David Salinger

790  1490      The Chronicles of Narnia 1-The Magician's Nephew    C.S. Lewis

810  1715      Lord of the rings 2-The Two Towers     J.R.R. Tolkien

820  2179      Howards End  E. M. Forster

830  2244      Foundation     Issac Asimov

840  1629      The Chronicles of Narnia 5-The silver chair C.S. Lewis

850  2782      The Da Vinci Code Dan Brown

860  2600      Lord of the rings 1-The fellowship of the Rings   J.R.R. Tolkien

870  1663      The Chronicles of Narnia 3-Prince Caspian  C.S. Lewis

870  2344      The Hunt for Red October     Tom Clancy

880  1856      Harry Potter 1-Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone     J.K. Rowling

880  2172      Harry Potter 3-Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban    J.K. Rowling

880  2067      Harry Potter 4-Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire     J.K. Rowling

880  1396      Who moved my cheese? Spencer Johnson

880  2929      Wuthering Heights  Emily Bronte

890  2522      Jane Eyre       Charlotte Bronte

890  1573      The Chronicles of Narnia 7-The last battle    C.S. Lewis

920  2626      Lord of the rings 3-The Return of the King        J.R.R. Tolkien

940  2079      Harry Potter 2-Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets     J.K. Rowling

940  1724      Oedipus the king    Sophocles

940  1419      The Chronicles of Narnia 2-The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe    C.S. Lewis

940  1554      The Old Man And The Sea    Ernest Hemingway

950  2179      Harry Potter 5-Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix  J.K. Rowling

950  2295      The adventures of Tom Sawyer     Mark Twain

960  2246      The three musketeers     Alexandre Dumas, père

970  1892      The Chronicles of Narnia 4-The Voyage of the Dawn Treader     C.S. Lewis

970  1778      The Chronicles of Narnia 6-The horse and his boy      C.S. Lewis

980  2376      Harry Potter 7-Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows  J.K. Rowling

980  2277      Sister Carrie   Theodore Dieiser

990  2015      Crime and Punishment Fyodor Dostoyevsky

990  2571      The Thorn Birds     Colleen McCullough

1000       1958      Lord of the rings 0-The Hobbit     J.R.R. Tolkien

1030       2111       20,000 Leagues Under the Sea      Jules Verne

1030       2113       Harry Potter 6-Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince      J.K. Rowling

1040       1915      The moonstone       Wilkie Collins

1070       1954      David Copperfield  Charles Dickens

1070       2167      The Great Gatsby   F. Scott Fitzgerald

1100       2240      Gone with the wind       Margaret Mitchell

1100       1684      Pride and prejudice Jane Austen

1160       2537      Tess of the D'urbervilles Thomas Hardy

1190       2204      A short history of nearly everything    

1270       2354      Vanity Fair     William Thackeray

1320       1730      Robinson Crusoe    Daniel Defoe

1340       2526      The Hunchback of Notre Dame     Victor Hugo

1410       2371      One Hundred Years of Solitude     Gabriel García Márquez

1500       2294      The Decameron      Giovanni Boccaccio

用SPSS做了首万词不同词数与蓝思值的相关分析，发现相关系数只弱爆的0.23。

建议词汇量很小的国人先参考首万词不同词数，然后再看看蓝思值，两者都低说明的确比较容易阅读！最让伍教练惊奇的是，在我读的第一本英文原著Daughter of Deceit只有560L，难度是我读过的书里头有蓝思数据者之中最简单的，生词量也很少——这是天大的幸运，让伍教练从一本相当容易读的言情小说开始了透析大业。然而，《欺骗的女儿》不是流行畅销书，只有电子版（可向伍教练索取），不算很容易获得。

（此书的透析初体验http://blog.sina.com.cn/u/4b5cb56b010007sx）

按照蓝思值推荐，首选《尼罗河上的惨案》、《暮光之城》系列——这些书对中国读者而言生词可能偏多。综合考虑，推荐最容易的书变成《小王子》，其次是《麦田里的守望者》，而不再是《谁动了我的奶酪？》（880L偏高，居然比肩单词王《呼啸山庄》？？？）。

蓝思没有The Bridges of Madison County、Lady Chatterley's lover、The Godfather之类成人读物的数据，看来真的是为了小盆友而设计的。但古代著名黄书The Decameron居然有，而且难度超高——1500L！可能是蓝思认为《十日谈》太难，不会有小盆友看的——其实伍教练觉得这本书的句子不算难，毕竟是翻译过的，特此推荐有心学坏的孩子拜读！

最简单的是BR级别，即0L，蓝思建议这些书不宜独自阅读，而是由家长朗读，或者家长孩子一起读。伍教练想这些书用来透析可能也是太简单了，如果还读不懂，我也只能无语。例如这本No Kiss for Grandpa，情节灰常简单：

When Grandpa visits his grand-kitten, Louis refuses to give his grandfather a kiss. When Grandpa wants to build a sandcastle, Louis again refuses. But Grandpa is patient and clever, and he finally wins a kiss from his grand-kitten. Full-color illustrations（原来是儿童图画书）.

最难的是1890L的书，例如这本：

http://www.lexile.com/book/details/9780520240322/

有志者不妨挑战一下。