By masterminding $5 billion in-vestment in Goldman Sachs Sept. 24, Warren Buffett showed he still has the touch that has won him plaudits as the world's greatest investor. But a new biography, which will hit bookstores Sept. 29, reveals that in his personal life, the Oracle of Omaha can be something of a wreck.

透過9月24日策畫投資高盛公司50億美元，華倫‧巴菲特以行動證明，他還是很在行，不負他被封為世界上最偉大投資者的盛名。但一本即將在9月29日上市、最新出版的傳記披露，在私生活方面，有「奧瑪哈先知」之稱的巴菲特簡直一無是處。

The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life was written by Alice Schroeder, a onetime insur-ance-industry analyst who agreed at Buffett's request to chronicle his life. It's the first biography with which Buffett, 78, has cooperated.

《滾雪球：巴菲特的事業人生》（暫譯）由原任保險分析師的愛麗絲‧施羅德執筆，她是應巴菲特之請記錄他的一生。這是第一本取得78歲的巴菲特合作的傳記。

Buffett, the book reveals, isn't al-ways the calm, calculating figure we know as head of the storied invest-ment firm Berkshire Hathaway. He could be an emotionally needy hus-band and an absentee father, a man who purposely avoids people he fears might criticize him.

書中指出，巴菲特並非一直是眾所周知領導素負盛名的波克夏投資公司一個冷靜精明、工於心計的人物。他可能是情感上十分吝於付出的丈夫，一個經常缺席的父親，也是個對他擔心可能批評他的人、敬而遠之的男人。

Although Buffett revered his father, a stockbroker who became a four-term Congressman, he had a complex relationship with his mother. A model housewife to the outside world, his mother would "verbally lash" the young Buffett and his older sister for hours, until the children wept. Buffett says that when his mother died he cried not because he was sad but "because of the waste. She had her good parts, but the bad parts kept me from having a relationship with her."

雖然巴菲特很尊敬他出身股票經紀、後來四度連任國會議員的父親，他和母親的關係卻很複雜。在外人看來，他母親是個典型的家庭主婦，經常「嚴厲斥責」年輕的巴菲特和他姊姊數小時之久，直到兩個孩子痛哭流涕為止。巴菲特曾說，他母親過世時，他並非傷心難過而哭泣，而是「因為浪費人才。她有她的長處，但她的缺點使我無法親近她。」

Schroeder writes at length about the women who would later fill the void and care for Buffett. Primary among them was his wife of 52 years, Susie. During their early years together, set-tled into family life with their three children in Omaha, Neb., Buffett worked voraciously; Susie "knew that the main thing he needed was to feel loved and never criticized." In public, people noticed how affectionate the two were — Warren liked to hold Susie in his lap — but in private, his wife kept hoping that once they had enough money (between $8 million and $10 million, she figured), Buffett would cut back on work and finally pay attention to his family.

施羅德詳述後來填補這個空白並照顧巴菲特的幾個女人。其中，最重要的就是和他結縭52年的髮妻蘇西。剛開始共同生活那些年，他們和三個孩子在內布拉斯加州奧瑪哈展開家庭生活時，巴菲特瘋狂地工作，蘇西「知道他最需要的是覺得被愛，因此從不說他」。在公開場合，大家看到兩人有多恩愛，華倫‧巴菲特常抱著蘇西坐在膝上；但私下，他妻子一直希望，有朝一日，他們賺夠了錢（她估計應在800萬到1千萬美元之譜），巴菲特會減輕工作負擔，並開始注意照顧家人。

What she didn't realize was that the mission Buffett had embarked upon when he was 6 years old and selling gum and Coke to his neighbors would never stop. Once the kids were grown and gone, Susie decided to move out and left for San Francisco. She and Warren lived apart for 27 years, and while they still talked ex-tensively by phone, he was crushed by what he considered the biggest mis-take of his life. "He wandered aim-lessly around the house, barely able to feed and clothe himself," writes Schroeder. For a while, Susie thought she'd have to go back, but in the end she asked Astrid Menks, a restaurant hostess and sommelier she knew, to check up on her husband. Eventually, Astrid moved in. After Susie's death in 2004, Warren and Astrid got married.

她萬萬沒料到，巴菲特從六歲開始賣給鄰居口香糖和可樂開始展開的志業永遠不會停下來。等孩子長大離家，蘇西決定搬走，遠走舊金山。她和華倫分居兩地達27年之久，兩人雖仍時常通電話聊天，他卻被他自認一生最大的錯誤壓垮。施羅德寫道：「他漫不經心地在屋裡走來走去，幾乎無法自己吃飯穿衣。」蘇西一度想打道回府，但最後，她請她熟識的一家餐館女侍兼酒保艾絲翠‧孟克斯去看她丈夫。最後，艾絲翠登堂入室。等蘇西2004年去世後，華倫便和艾絲翠結婚。

There were other women keeping Buffett on track while "he ruled out paying attention to almost anything but business." There was Sharon Os-berg, the bridge player who first per-suaded Buffett to use a computer — a task even his good friend Bill Gates couldn't pull off. There was Carol Loomis, the writer at Fortune, who helped Buffett write his annual letter to shareholders. And, most vividly depicted of all, there was Katharine Graham, the publisher of the Wash-ington Post, in which Buffett was a major investor. Graham became Buf-fett's entree into high society , and Buffett became Graham's tutor in the ways of business. With Graham, Buf-fett the protected became Buffett the protector.

一路走來，巴菲特還得要其他幾個女人之助而未偏離正軌，「他則除了一頭栽入事業，其他一切幾乎一概不管。」他有個打橋牌的牌友莎倫‧奧斯伯格，她第一個說服巴菲特使用電腦，這個差事連巴菲特的摯友比爾‧蓋茲都辦不到。另外有位紅粉知己卡洛‧路米斯，她為財星雜誌撰文，得她之助，巴菲特才能年年寫信給股東。但最引人側目的則是華盛頓郵報發行人凱瑟琳‧葛蘭姆，巴菲特也是華郵大股東。葛蘭姆成為巴菲特打入高層社交圈的敲門磚；巴菲特則在經營之道上成為葛蘭姆名師。和葛蘭姆在一起，巴菲特從被保護者變成保護者。

Most riveting is the portrait Schroeder paints of the family's deal-ing with Susie's oral cancer. Buffett, who always expected his wife to out-live him, reels from the news. He is terrified of losing her and cries for hours. Buffett had always avoided hospitals and was squeamish about all things medical. And yet with his wife undergoing radiation after facial surgery, he overcomes his limitations, learns everything he can about oncol-ogy and sits by her bedside weekend after weekend in San Francisco, watching with her nearly 100 episodes of Frasier. When Susie can eat only a liquid diet, Warren cuts his own in-take to 1,000 calories a day. And yet when Susie eventually does die, Buf-fett can't cope. As his daughter is planning the funeral, she tells him he doesn't have to attend. "Warren was overcome with relief," Schroeder writes. "'I can't,' he said. To sit there, overwhelmed with thoughts of Susie, in front of everyone, was too much." There are some challenges even the world's greatest investor can't handle.

最令人動容的是施羅德對巴菲特家人面對蘇西口腔癌的側寫。一直希望妻子能比自己長壽的巴菲特，聽到噩耗天旋地轉。他深怕失去她，常常痛哭數小時。巴菲特通常不愛上醫院，對一切醫藥事物產生反感。但當他妻子臉部動手術後接受放療時，他克服自己的禁忌，盡可能了解有關腫瘤學的種種，每個周末到舊金山，坐在病榻旁，和她一起看了將近一百集的「歡樂一家親」。當蘇西只能攝取流體食物時，華倫把自己每天攝取的熱量也砍到一千卡。但當蘇西終於撒手人寰時，巴菲特手足無措。籌辦喪禮的女兒告訴他，他可以不參加時，「華倫鬆了一口氣，」施羅德寫道。「『我辦不到，』他說。坐在那邊，當著眾人的面被思念蘇西擊垮，實在太超過。」有些挑戰，顯然連世上最偉大的投資家都束手無策。

（取材自時代雜誌）