Three days later, on May 13, the China News Agency sent a message, simple to the extreme.
On the 14th, Literature and Art Daily came out with a story, a **** fifty words.
On the 16th, Shanghai's Xinmin Evening News also sent out a story - the source was actually Hong Kong.
Ba Jin was at home for several days looking through the newspapers in Shanghai and Beijing, and could not find the name of his old friend.
He was puzzled: was Shen Congwen's obituary too late?
He was puzzled: was Shen Congwen's obituary too late?
Some people say that the position in the history of literature may not have been ranked, can not find the appropriate title. Indeed, looking through the history of Chinese literature in that year, you can hardly find Shen Congwen three words.
Some people say, now need to revitalize the economy, who still cares about the death of a writer? The only way to get the production up is to have a pen.
Bajin could not answer.
The so-called history of literature, the so-called economy, is nothing more than a truth: the era is always not for the individual to stay.
Phoenix, in western Hunan, is the origin of Shen Congwen's life story.
Those who have read Shen Congwen will most likely imagine a Phoenix with beautiful scenery, independence and simplicity.
But it must have never occurred to them that the history of this small city is full of tyranny and bloodshed.
In order to pacify the Miao people, the Qing Dynasty sent a team of soldiers to station in Tunding. Around this lonely city, there are about four thousand to five thousand or so bunkers, densely packed, like a group of giant beasts to monitor and suppress the Miao people. Tyranny, and because of this tyranny and resistance, stained red over every official road, every bunker.
To Shen Congwen was born in 1902, most of the bunkers have been destroyed, the military residence into a civilian house, the Miao people also assimilated most of them. Only at dusk, standing to the lofty standing high up in the lonely city, looking at those near and far towers, can vaguely imagine the scene.
Shen Congwen's grandfather was a soldier, followed the Xiang army fought with the Taiping army, also fought the Hui people, Miao people, with military service for the family earned a property, and then was Shen Congwen's father lost.
Shen's father guarded the Dagu Fortress in his early years, and when the Eight-Power Allied Forces attacked Tianjin, the fortress was lost, which sent him to the end of his life and most of the industry. After the founding of the Republic of China, he wanted to run for the Hunan Provincial Council. After he failed in the election, he came to Beijing to take part in the assassination plot of Yuan Shikai. But he didn't realize that he had to run away and change his name to the end of the world.
In that turbulent era, people like Shen's father were looking for a way out, and I don't know how many.
In 1911, the Wuchang Uprising, and since then everywhere responded. Phoenix was no exception, and the Hmong masses began to revolt. However, in just one night, the insurgents were killed and defeated.
On that day, Shen Congwen woke up in the morning, and saw a pile of bloodstained heads on the flat ground at the entrance of the Daoyin Yamen, as well as on the antlers at the entrance of the Yamen, and on the yamen door, which was nowhere but human heads.
He found the human ear strung up in the corner, and an older relative asked him, "Little thing, are you afraid?"
Shen Congwen answered superbly, "Not afraid."
For the nine-year-old mountain town child, these are just the beginning.
The killing went on for a month. The city defense forces sent soldiers down to the countryside in different directions to arrest people, and they had to kill about a hundred people every day, sometimes without stripping their clothes or tying up the ropes, as if they were herding livestock. Kill to later, the killing party seems to be a little intolerant, thought of a way: commissioned the local people's respect for the letter of the heavenly kings, the prisoners led to the temple of the heavenly kings in front of the main hall, in front of the god throw bamboo oracle, life and death depends on a throw.
Other writers of the same generation spent their childhood playing with water, fighting, and stealing, while Shen Congwen's childhood was watching murder.
After the 1911 Revolution, China was dominated by warlords of all sizes, and western Hunan was no exception. At this time Shen Congwen grew up a little, also want to take the road of his grandfather. In the chaotic times, the only thing that ordinary people can trust is their courage, and this is a way out for young people, and perhaps the only way out for young people.
So he has seen more killings.
The army's business is to "clean up the countryside" and "eliminate bandits", and there is no difference between the army and the bandits, except for a legitimate name.
When he went to the market in the daytime, he often saw such a horrible scene: a few soldiers in front of him, and in the middle of them a 12 or 13 year old child, picking up two heads, which is often the father of this child.
It's weird, scary, and rare.
If Lu Xun saw this scene, he would have cursed the executioner, as well as those who are numb to the spectators, and asked a painful question: "Never like this, is it right?"
Shen Congwen may be the spectator in Lu Xun's writing, he will not question or roar, but just calmly record it down.
He said this paragraph: "From there and some other places, I saw some ordinary people do not see the stupid things, listened to some ordinary people do not hear the shouts, and smelled some ordinary people do not smell the smell; so that I for the city people in the narrow and cowardly life of the concept of good and evil, can not cause much interest, the first to the city to live, make a melancholy and tough not like a 'good and bad', but also to the city, to make a good and bad. I was not able to arouse much interest in the concepts of good and evil that arise from the narrow and cowardly life of the city people, and once I came to live in the city, I became melancholy and strong and unlike the feelings of a 'man'."
After seeing so many killings, Shen Congwen was disgusted with something.
He remained unchanged throughout his life.
In 1922, a young man came to Beijing, carrying a roll of luggage, he walked out of the station at the front gate of Beijing, sat on a row of cars, and was pulled into a small inn along the West River.
He was registered in the traveler's book: "Shen Congwen, aged 20, a student, a native of Phoenix County, Hunan."
Life for this "northern drift" is not very friendly.
Shen Congwen wanted to be a scholar, so he has been at the University of Northern China. He was poor and had never been to a new school, so he couldn't get into a university. He enrolled in Peking University and other national universities, all failed; cast the University of China and France, admitted, the boarding fee of twenty-eight dollars, try to find ways to raise money, expired can only give up.
At that time, Beijing was like a whirlpool, and some people became dragons when they met the wind and clouds, but more people were swept into the bottom of the river. The reality is that he can't afford to keep dreaming such a stupid dream. He could only pick up the pen and start writing to find another way out.
He wrote as if he was playing with his life, and submitted articles all over the place, but basically, he just hit the nail on the head.
Sun Fuyuan, the famous editor of the Morning Post Supplement, once took out Shen Congwen's submission in public and joked: "This is the work of a big writer! Said, that is twisted into a ball, thrown into the waste paper basket.
When he was at the end of his rope, Shen tried to write to Yu Dafu for help. Yu Dafu visited this unknown youth. He took off his own scarf, leaving no winter clothes Shen Congwen; and invited him to lunch, took out five dollars to settle the bill, the remaining three dollars and two cents, also left him.
That night, Yu Dafu with indignation and injustice, wrote a "to a literary youth of the public plea". Shen Congwen's name is not written in the text, but you can see a young man who can not find a way out.
In the article, he gave Shen Congwen ideas, the top strategy is to find something to do - or revolution, making bombs. The middle strategy is to go back home. The next strategy is to enlist as a soldier, or become a thief. If you become a thief, "Why don't you come up to me and try to make a breakthrough? I have a few old books, but they can be sold for a few bucks. ...... If you come, your heart should be hardened a little bit, and don't cry because you didn't succeed in stealing them because of my books". .
Flirting and satirizing, Yu Dafu pointed to the cruel, let the youth have no way out of the reality. But this naked reality, full of ideals, Shen Congwen accepted it is too cruel.
Before coming to Beijing, Shen said to his relative, Huang Jingming, "I came to Beijing to find an ideal, and I want to read some books."
Huang Jingming mocked: "Why, reading, what is your ideal, how to read? You don't know, there are 10,000 college students in Beijing, and they have nothing to do after graduation. Can only be sad, do not know how to plan. University professor's salary ten fold one, only 36 dollars a month, or bowed to the joint strike, soft and hard to fight. The size of the nerd is either reading books or reading to death, which has you in the countryside as a boss have a future!
Shen Congwen retorted: "But how do I go on. Six years I watched at the foot of the killing of tens of thousands of innocent civilians, in addition to the people killed to leave a stupid cruel impression, what can not learn! There are a lot of smart people in the government, the smarter people are, the more they condone the rise of stupidity, and they are just like a high and mighty man, taking everything as a dog. I couldn't stay any longer, so I ran out. I want to read some books, read a good book to save the country, this country is really not to go on like this!"
We don't know how long Shen Congwen stayed up, only know that he stayed up. From a ragged young man in western Hunan, by mistake, he became a well-known professional writer.
The dream of being a scholar, which should have died, is still glowing in the dark.
Beijing is not without its problems, at least its streets are "museums of the classical culture of two dynasties over the past 600 years", and there is no admission fee to visit these museums. To the west of the guesthouse where he stayed when he came to Beijing is the famous Liulichang, a street of cultural relics. He was afraid to go in, but once he saw the broken porcelain of the Tang and Song dynasties and the scrolls of paintings of the Ming and Qing dynasties displayed in the window, he immediately could not walk.
This is also a small joke of fate, when he understood the joke, has been years later.
Even as a professional writer, making a living is still a big problem.
With his already low pay and royalties often in arrears, as well as the debt he incurred when his previous publishing company collapsed, Shen drifted around the capital with his sick mother and young sister, and the pressure became more and more intense every day, making it difficult for him to continue.
In the end, he chose to teach to earn a living.
Then came Zhang Zhaohe, the most important woman in his life and a student of his.
It was around 1930 that the teacher began writing letters to his student, confessing his feelings for her.
"I have traveled many bridges in many places, seen clouds many times, and drunk many kinds of wine, but I have only loved one person who was at her best age."
Zhang Zhaohe didn't seem to be alarmed; she had seen this kind of scene many times. Her way of dealing with Shen Congwen was silence. No matter how many letters Shen wrote, they were all ignored.
After many failures, Shen Congwen was disheartened and decided to quit his job as a teacher. Before he left, he wanted to make a statement, so he approached Zhang Zhaohe's classmate Wang Hualian.
When Wang Hualian entered, Shen said, "I have something to ask you, but I can't say it, please read this."
He handed her two pieces of paper that he had written the day before, and then asked her many questions about Zhang Zhaohe. When he got to the sad part, he actually cried; and then again, he cried again.
"Because I love her, I am afraid that I have decided to go away, for I am afraid that I am still upsetting her here, and I do not want to oblige her in any way. But I am willing to go knowing her opinion."
From the beginning to now, Zhang Zhaohe's attitude has been very firm, as stubborn as a stone. But, Shen Congwen was equally stubborn in writing to her, showing respect for her stubbornness. Perhaps between the back and forth, ripples have long risen in her calm heart.
In the winter vacation of 1933, Shen wrote a letter to Zhang Zhaohe as usual, in which he politely said that he wanted to propose marriage. And said, if the parents agree, begged Zhang Zhaohe early telegram to inform him, let him this "countryman drink a cup of sweet wine.
Zhang Zhaohua telegram to Shen Congwen, only used a word "allow", that is, said the marriage "allow".
Zhang Zhaohe is a little uneasy, in case Shen Congwen do not understand? She quietly rode a rickshaw to the telegraph office, handing over their telegrams, "the countryside drink a cup of sweet wine, it Zhao". At that time, the message generally do not use the vernacular, I did not expect to add the word "bar".
In front of the raging love, Shen Congwen seems to have a new realization.
He became more and more disgusted with those high things - power, ideas, history ......
On January 7, 1934, he set off back to Phoenix. It was the first time he had returned to his hometown after leaving Xiangxi. Before the trip, he made a promise to his wife, Zhang Zhaohe, that he would write to her every day. He wrote nearly fifty letters, which he organized after returning to Peking, and converted the "San San Patent Reader" into a text for readers, which was later known as "Scattered Memoirs of a Journey to Hunan".
More than a decade ago, Shen Congwen, alone and unattached, traveling on a boat, was unsure of his future. Now, seeing the footstools of his hometown again, hearing the song by the river, and in front of the wild nature, he would like to ask himself: why do people live?
Most people live a mediocre life, eating and drinking, while a few can control their own destiny and even the fate of their country, and make their lives shine.
At this moment, he admits he was wrong.
"Don't we usually read history? What's a history book but a book that tells us that some of the dumbest people of another time killed each other? But the real history is a river. Out of that water, which flows day and night for ages and ages, stones and sand, decayed grass and trees, tattered planks, I am touched by the sorrows of ages and ages of mankind, which we have usually overlooked!"
"Did I not mention a moment ago the poor life, the life of these people who have nothing to do? No, San San, I was wrong. These people need not be pitied by us; we should honor and love."
"I am weak at this season because I have loved the world and mankind. San San, if we were two in the same place at this time, see how wet my eyes would be!"
Not long after returning to his hometown, "Border Town" came out. Many years later, the novel was selected as one of the top 100 Chinese novels of the 20th century, ranking second only to Lu Xun's "Scream".
After Japan launched a full-scale war of aggression against China, Shen Congwen followed the Southwest Associated University to Kunming.
The first bombing of Kunming, the sky has just been lit, the sound of explosions ringing in the surrounding area, the windows of the glass shattered, a piece of falling, dust flying, the crowd scattered ......
Shen Congwen, but the expression is unchanged, looking at the not far away from the smoke, murmured; "Which side of the bombing? The school just moved here, can't suffer any more. The school just moved here, can not suffer further losses!" This is the strong Shen Congwen.
And the fragile Mr. Shen will drink a little wine, downcast: "The country has become this way, everyone just fleeing for their lives, can not read, can not work ...... "Suddenly put the glass of wine, cried, like a child at a loss.
Childhood memories, the history of the Xiangjiang River, and the giant thunder of Kunming, intertwined in his heart. Under these circumstances, he wrote The Long River - a novel that was supposed to be the Chinese version of War and Peace.
"I was reminded of the emotions evoked thousands of years ago when people lived in caves and slept in a corner of the cave listening to the booming of thunder. And also thought of the emotions evoked by modern man in the midst of another artificially loud thunderclap. I find it very moving. Alas, life. This flood of sound is saddening to history because it is remaking it."
He was reminded again of the history of people killing each other, and the crowds of people drowned by that history.
Since the War of Resistance, the literati wanted to dedicate themselves to their country, but had no choice but to have only a pen to use, so they wanted to devote themselves to politics with their writings and do their best for the nation.
Shen Congwen glimpsed the hidden worries behind, fearing that politics would degrade literature, and wrote an article specifically against writers going into politics.
The left-wing literary world reacted violently, and a group of people wrote articles to refute it. The deeper the misunderstanding, the heavier the hostility, the more Shen Congwen's original intention is simplified, and even labeled. In the eyes of the outside world, salvation has been so urgent, but Shen Congwen is like a rambling old woman, reciting some anachronistic old words.
Until 1946, the siege against Shen Congwen began: "produced a kind of pretentious, but not willing to be lonely. Detached from reality in the lofty position to talk about sarcasm, the representative of such people is Shen Congwen."
Many more, denouncing his writings as only abstract and classless. "Accomplices," "helpers," "slander," "crime," has suddenly become the momentum of verbal attacks.
The most severe is Guo Moruo's "Repudiation of Reactionary Literature and Art", he described Shen Congwen as a representative of "peach color", "making literal nude paintings, and even writing literal Chun Gong".
The situation was such that the lonely Shen Congwen was almost killed.
The times moved on, and he was somewhat unable to keep up.
In the spring of 1949, Shen committed suicide.
After being rescued, he fell into an unprecedented tranquility, and he thought of Cuicui - the young girl he portrayed in Border Town.
"The night was strangely quiet. The Dragon Boat Festival is coming soon, there must still be dragon boats going down the river in my hometown. Cuicui, Cuicui, are you sleeping soundly in the little room of one-zero-four, or are you thinking of me in the sound of the cuckoo, and remembering me even after I am dead? Tsui Tsui, San San, have I gone mad again? I feel frightened, for everything is very silent, which is not the usual case. Shall I rest?"
But he had deep doubts about his ability to write.
"What do I write? What else can I write? The pen has frozen and so has life."
He wanted his family to burn his work before it was misused.
He used to lie in bed and listen to Beethoven, feeling compassion for life.
After that, he wrote a letter to his friend Ding Ling.
"To remedy the correction, or give up literature, to use the history of the Department of miscellaneous knowledge and for the arts and crafts of enthusiasm and understanding, so that it is well combined to study the history of ancient arts and crafts."
Giving up years of literature, regained the dream when he first came to Beijing, this is Shen Congwen's choice and self-redemption. This joke of fate has been lurking in his life for a long time, like a seed buried in the soil, and when the time comes, it will break through the ground.
His study of cultural relics is different, most concerned about those who were not treated as cultural relics fans, saddles, mirrors, clothing, cups and other daily necessities. He knew that behind these objects were the creations and stories of the laborers.
Later, he wrote the famous Study of Ancient Chinese Costumes with great effort.
This is the new Shen Congwen.
On May 8, 1982, the aged Shen Congwen set out on the road back to his hometown.
Nanhuashan, Guanjing Mountain, Magpie Slope, Bajiao Building ...... At the foot of Nanhuashan is Wenchangge Primary School, the alma mater where he read, and inside there came the children's morning song.
Walking in the ancient streets and alleys, three turns and two turns to a house, the house has been dilapidated, inside living five families. Shen Congwen held the broken door wall of the center hall and said, "This is my home, I was born here ...... houses have long been sold to others."
He wanted to listen to Nuo Tang opera, listen to the voice of childhood.
The artists in the accompaniment of gongs and drums, singing: "the first month of the Lantern Festival fireworks light, February hibiscus flowers and grasses fragrant ......" when sung to the "August 15 osmanthus", Shen Congwen also When it comes to "the fragrance of osmanthus flowers on the fifteenth day of the eighth month", Shen Congwen also sang along with his hands.
At the end, he stood up to see off, his eyes red behind the yellow frame lenses, already full of tears.
The time has been moving forward, fortunately, we can still see the human sorrow hidden behind the history.
No matter what the future holds, the faces, fears and hopes of the people should be recorded.
From a country boy who was eager to watch the killing, to an old gentleman who is now hurt everywhere and often in tears, his heart has long grown full of compassion and sorrow.
In the 1950s, Shen Congwen wrote this sentence full of sadness: "I and my readers, are **** with nearly old."
But when the dystopian era was far away, his works ushered in a new life.
After the 1980s, a number of modern writers reappeared in literary history from a previously obscured state: Zhang Eiling, Qian Zhongshu, and Shen Congwen. All of them insisted on a kind of "daily narrative" to fight against the "grand narrative", to fight against the long river with a small stream.
This is a belated proof that he was never a first-rate Chinese novelist.
His student Wang Zengqi once said that Shen Congwen's work is permeated by a single theme - the discovery and recreation of national character.
A few years after Shen's death, Swedish scholar Ma Yueran revealed the secret that in 1988, Shen made the final list for that year's Nobel Prize in Literature. "I am personally convinced that in 1988, if he had not passed away, he would have won the prize in October."
There is never a perfect ending, this is "very Shen Congwen".
On May 18, 1988, eight days after Shen Congwen's death, a farewell ceremony was held at Babaoshan with only a few people.
No wreaths, hanging scrolls, black veil, no eulogy, no mourning music, the scene sounded his favorite classical music - Beethoven's "Pathétique" sonata.
This may be Shen Congwen hope it: do not need the buzz of the news, do not need the era of remembrance, do not need to who to give him a "status", so quietly left the world.
Four years later, in 1992, Shen Congwen "back" to his hometown of Phoenix. Half of his ashes sprinkled into the Tuo River around the city, half buried directly into the cemetery soil. The tombstone is a large stone, on which Shen's handwriting is engraved in four lines:
According to my thoughts
Understand me
According to my thoughts
Know people
In the quiet rivers of western Hunan, a lot of things are no longer important. What is important is that, until now, we still read Shen Congwen, still miss him, and still shed tears for Cuicui and San San.
Not for the lofty ideas, not for the grand history, just because, he looked at all the small people with compassionate eyes.
There are countless Xiangxi in this world, but there is only one Shen Congwen.