It may surprise fans of Johanna Basford’s intricately hand-drawn coloring books that the artist is, by her own admission, “pretty bad” at coloring.
可能会让书迷感到惊讶的是，创作了精美的涂色本的乔安娜·巴斯福德(Johanna Basford)承认自己涂色“很差劲”。
“I can’t stay in the lines,” she said sheepishly.
她不好意思地说：“我老是涂出去”。
Not that it matters. Ms. Basford’s coloring book “Secret Garden,” a 96-page collection of elaborate black-and-white ink drawings of flowers, leaves, trees and birds, has become a global best-seller.
不过这根本不影响什么，重要的是她的96页涂色本《秘密花园》(Secret Garden)已成为全球畅销书。
Since its release in spring 2013, “Secret Garden” has sold more than 1.4 million copies in 22 languages. It shot to the top of Amazon’s best-seller list this month, overtaking books by authors like Harper Lee, Anthony Doerr and Paula Hawkins. Her follow-up, “Enchanted Forest,” which came out in February, is briskly selling through its first print run of nearly 226,000 copies.
从2013年春天出版以来， 这本满是细节丰富的花鸟虫鱼的书已经翻译成22种语言，销量超过140万册。本月它直登亚马逊(Amazon)的畅销书榜首位，击败了哈珀·李(Harper Lee)、安瑟尼·杜尔(Anthony Doerr)和宝拉·霍金斯(Paula Hawkins)的书。她的接下来的作品《魔法森林》(Enchanted Forest)在二月出版，首印轻松卖了近22.6万册。
What makes Ms. Basford’s breakout success all the more surprising is her target audience: adults who like coloring books.
而让巴斯福德的蹿红愈发显得惊人的是，她的目标受众是喜欢涂色本的成年人。
There are, it seems, a lot of them. Though it is tempting to describe the market for her books as niche, Ms. Basford, a 31-year-old illustrator in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, has quickly outgrown that label.
看起来这样的还不在少数。人们倾向于认为她所针对的是一个小众市场，但这位年方31岁的苏格兰阿伯丁郡插画家已迅速超越这个范畴。
Like Play-Doh, jungle gyms and nursery rhymes, coloring books have always seemed best suited for the preschool set. So Ms. Basford and her publisher were surprised to learn that there was a robust — and lucrative — market for coloring books aimed at grown-ups. When they first tested the waters with “Secret Garden” a year ago, they released a cautiously optimistic first printing of 16,000 books.
和橡皮泥、攀玩架、童谣一样，涂色本向来被认为是给学龄前儿童的东西。因此当巴斯福德和她的出版商得知针对成人的涂色本市场规模不小且利润丰厚时，他们是很意外的。一年前他们用《秘密花园》试水，本着谨慎乐观的态度决定首印1.6万册。
“I thought my mom was going to have to buy a lot of copies,” Ms. Basford said. “When the sales started to take off, it was a real shock.”
“我本来以为要让我妈去买一大堆回来了，”巴斯福德说。“销量往上冲的时候我真是被吓一大跳。”
Surging demand caught Ms. Basford and her publisher off guard. Fan mail poured in from busy professionals and parents who confided to Ms. Basford that they found coloring in her books relaxing. More accolades flowed on social media, as people posted images from their coloring books.
高涨的需求是巴斯福德和她的出版商始料未及的。忙碌的职场人士和家长纷纷给巴斯福德来信，坦陈给她的书涂色让他们感到放松。人们把涂色本上的手绘图发到网上，又在社交媒体中掀起一股热潮。
Hard-core fans often buy several copies of her books at a time, to experiment with different color combinations. Others have turned it into a social activity. Rebekah Jean Duthie, who lives in Queensland, Australia, and works for the Australian Red Cross, says she regularly gathers with friends for “coloring circles” at cafes and in one another’s homes.
铁杆粉丝经常一次买好几本她的书，尝试用不同的颜色组合。还有的人已经把它当成一种社交活动。家住昆士兰的瑞贝卡·简·达西(Rebekah Jean Duthie)在澳大利亚红十字会工作。她定期和朋友在咖啡馆或彼此的家中一起玩“转圈涂色”。
“Each page can transport you back to a gentler time of life,” she said of Ms. Basford’s books in an email.
“每一页都能让你回到一段更祥和的时光，”她在一封电子邮件中这么描述巴斯福德的书。
Ms. Basford has become something of a literary celebrity in South Korea, where “Secret Garden” has sold more than 430,000 copies, she says. The craze was kicked off in part, it seems, by a Korean pop star, Kim Ki-bum, who posted a delicately colored-in floral pattern from Ms. Basford’s book on Instagram, where he has 1.8 million followers.
在韩国，巴斯福德已经成为一位文学名流，她说在那里《秘密花园》销量已超过43万册。这种狂热是由韩国明星金起范拉开序幕，他把巴斯福德的花卉图案精心涂色，发到Instagram上，他在那里拥有180万粉丝。
Part of the apparent appeal is the tactile, interactive nature of the books, which offer respite to the screen-weary. “People are really excited to do something analog and creative, at a time when we’re all so overwhelmed by screens and the Internet,” she said. “And coloring is not as scary as a blank sheet of paper or canvas. It’s a great way to de-stress.”
一定程度上，这些书的吸引人之处显然在于它们的触感和互动性，给厌倦了屏幕的人带来一些缓解。“在被屏幕和互联网包围的时代，人们非常乐于去做一些模拟的、创造性的事情，”她说。“涂色不像在一张空白的纸或画布上画那么吓人。它是缓解压力的好方法。”
Ms. Basford started out in fashion, working on silk-screen designs. Then she opened a studio on her parents’ trout and salmon farm in Scotland, and began designing hand-drawn wallpaper for luxury hotels and boutiques. When the financial crisis hit, her business evaporated. She closed the studio and found work as a commercial illustrator for companies like Starbucks, Nike and Sony.
巴斯福德一开始从事的是时尚业，做丝网印刷设计。她的父母在苏格兰有一个鳟鱼和鲑鱼养殖场，她在那里开了一个工作室，为豪华酒店和精品店设计手绘壁纸。后来金融危机来袭，她的生意全没了。她关了工作室，开始做商业插画家，为像星巴克(Starbucks)、耐克(Nike)和索尼(Sony)这样的公司工作。
Her publishing break came in 2011, when an editor at Laurence King Publishing discovered her work online. The editor thought her graceful illustrations could work well as a children’s coloring book.
她在出版业的突破出现在2011年，当时劳伦斯·金出版社(Laurence King Publishing)的一位编辑在网上看到她的作品，认为她的这些优美的插图很适合用作儿童涂色本。
“I came back and said I would like to do a coloring book for grown-ups, and it got a bit quiet for a moment,” Ms. Basford said. “Coloring books for adults weren’t as much of a thing then.”
“我回答说，我想要为成年人画一本涂色本，当时有些冷场，”巴斯福德说。“那时候还不太有成人涂色书这种东西。”
To convince them that it was a viable market, she drew five sample pages of detailed, mosaic-like illustrations. The publishers were sold.
为了让他们相信这是一个可行的市场，她画了五幅样图，是有丰富细节的马赛克式插画。出版社被说服了。
“When Johanna first approached us with the idea, we knew that people would love her illustrations as much as we did, but could never have predicted just how big the adult coloring trend would be,” said Jo Lightfoot, editorial director of Laurence King Publishing.
劳伦斯·金出版社编辑部主任乔·莱特福特(Jo Lightfoot)说：“当乔安娜第一次向我们提出这个想法时，我们知道人们会跟我们一样喜爱她的插图，但我们绝对没料到成人涂色书能这么火。”
Ms. Basford spent the next nine months working on the book at night and freelancing as an illustrator during the day. Occasionally she had doubts. “I was worried that coloring for adults was silly and it was just me that wanted to do it,” she said.
接下来九个月里，巴斯福德每晚都在画那本书，白天仍做自由职业插画师的工作。偶尔她也会怀疑。“我很担心成人涂色书是个傻主意，只有我才想这么做，”她说。
It turns out she was far from alone. Other entries to this small but growing category include Patricia J. Wynne’s lavish, nature-themed Creative Haven coloring books — discreetly described as being “designed for experienced colorists” — and the more explicitly titled “Coloring Books for Grownups,” released by Chiquita Publishing. A subspecies of these books promote the meditative aspects of coloring and doodling, including “Color Me Calm” (subtitle: “A Zen Coloring Book”) and books that promise “Easy Meditation Through Coloring.”
原来她一点也不孤单。这个小众但在不断扩大的门类中，还包括帕特里夏·J·韦恩(Patricia J. Wynne)的“创意港湾”(Creative Haven)，一个华丽的自然主题涂色本系列，被小心翼翼地描述为“针对经验丰富的涂色玩家”，而金吉达出版社(Chiquita Publishing)的“大人的涂色本”系列(Coloring Books for Grownups)就要明确很多。这种书有一个子类是宣扬涂色和涂鸦的冥想功能的，包括《我涂我平静》（Color Me Calm，副标题：“一本禅涂色本”），还有的承诺“用涂色实现简易的冥想”。
Major publishers are seizing on the trend. This year, Little, Brown will release four illustrated coloring books for adults, all subtitled “Color Your Way to Calm.” The books, “Splendid Cities” by the British artists Rosie Goodwin and Alice Chadwick and three titles by the French illustrator Zoé de Las Cases, feature detailed cityscapes with famous landmarks, cafes and street life. Promotional materials for the books emphasize the health benefits of “mindful coloring,” noting that the activity “has been shown to be a stress reliever for adults.”
大出版商正在赶这股潮流。今年，利特尔&布朗出版社(Little, Brown)将出版四本面向成人的插画涂色本，统一副标题为“涂色让你静下来”(Color Your Way to Calm)。包括由英国艺术家罗茜·古德温(Rosie Goodwin)与爱丽丝·查德威克(Alice Chadwick)画的“锦绣城”(Splendid Cities)系列，还有法国插画家祖依·德拉卡斯(Zoé de Las Cases)的三本书，详尽勾画了著名地标、咖啡馆和街道生活等城市景观。书的宣传材料强调“用心的涂色”对健康的好处，称这种活动“已被证明是成人的压力缓解法”。
Ms. Basford is now working on her third book, after soliciting suggestions for themes from fans. A vocal faction has requested an ocean-themed coloring book. “I’ve been drawing starfish and seahorses this afternoon,” she said.
巴斯福德目前正在为她的第三本书的主题征求书迷的建议。有一拨人强烈要求以海洋为主题的涂色本。“今天下午我一直在画海星和海马，”她说。
In the meantime, “Secret Garden” has sold out in many markets, to the consternation of fans. Laurence King is reprinting 75,000 copies for the United States.
与此同时，《秘密花园》在许多市场都卖光了，令书迷陷入恐慌。劳伦斯·金出版社为美国市场又印了7.5万册。
This month, Ms. Basford tried to calm her followers with a post on her Facebook page, promising that newly printed books would be shipping in a few weeks: “Don’t panic! New stock of Secret Garden and Enchanted Forest is on its way!”
为了安抚书迷，这个月巴斯福德在Facebook上承诺几周内会有加印到货：“不要惊慌！《秘密花园》和《魔法森林》补货马上到！”
Some were not placated. “WEEKS?” one frantic follower replied. “I can’t possibly wait WEEKS!”
有的人却没那么容易打发。“几周？”一个情绪激动的粉丝回贴说，“我根本等不了那么久！”