The reason for writing this novel was a painting by Renoir - "Seated Nude". His bright and loud warm tones depict the soft and elastic skin and plump body of young women in a traditional way. All of a sudden, I suddenly wanted to write about a woman, a woman who was amorous and graceful. I have an aunt who has five clothes, and I heard from my mother that she was beautiful when she was young. I have never seen her beauty when she was young, only the appearance of her when she was old, and it was the most beautiful old rural lady I have ever seen. She wore a white cloth and blue-edged handkerchief on her head, pinned behind her ears, wore a moon-white cross-shirt jacket, black silk trousers, and tightly tied trousers. So the image of the aunt fell on paper. Then my thinking became clearer and clearer, and I came up with a family, a small village, a small town. In this novel, I want to touch my hometown with my fingertips and soul. From the perspective of microhistory, it shows the weddings and funerals of the villagers, headaches and brain fever, and shows their normal life of firewood, rice, oil, salt, chickens and dogs. Some ancient objects or folk customs have gradually faded or even been lost in the process of modernization, and I want to record them with my memory, such as women spinning and weaving, grinding and making wine, children rolling hoops, jumping squares, and so on. Writing this, I feel as if I have returned to the past, to the time when I was happy and warm. Knowledge makes me not superstitious, and my experience since I was a child has always made me unable to explain the mysterious things that happened in my hometown, and sometimes I am skeptical. It's been many years since my dad died, and I often dream that he is alive and healthy, and for a while I dream almost every night. Actually, I don't have too deep feelings for my father. When I was a child, my mother and my brothers went to grind at night, and when I was in front of my father, I was so frightened that I cried when I saw his face that never smiled, and my father pinched my ass as punishment. I'd rather stay with my mom and brothers in the winter, sitting on a stool in a cold mill, napping constantly, even if I'm sleeping on a noodle table, I don't want to stay with my dad on a hot kang. Maybe my dad hit me, maybe it was the stories my brothers told when they were grinding that attracted me, or maybe I was afraid of my father's face that never smiled? My father has always been in good health, but when he was eighty-three years old, he fell and fractured his pelvis and collapsed on the kang, and his mother took care of him alone. Watching my mom lose weight day by day, listening to my dad moaning incessantly, I sometimes selfishly hope that my dad can end this pain. I know that I am very unfilial to think like this, and I am very sorry for my father. I'm glad my dad is gone, I think he won't be in pain there anymore. When my father left, I didn't cry like the other women in the village, and I couldn't learn the kind of performative crying and singing. I often wonder if he is blaming me when I dream of my father many times: Why didn't you cry when I died, I was your father, I raised you as an adult, why didn't you cry when I died? So my dad often came to my dreams, reminded me of my ruthlessness, and told me how he brought us brothers and sisters together in difficult years. In my dreams, my father was either harvesting wheat or pulling soil. Always wear pants with a big crotch covered in loess. He didn't speak, he just kept busy in the field. I told my mother about the dream, and my mother said you should burn some paper for your father, he cares about you, you are his old daughter! When you were a child, he really loved you, and often let you ride on his neck to watch a play in the village. I don't remember anything like that, but I remember that every time he came back from work, he always carried a big basket of grass on his shoulder. He closed the gate and spread the grass out into the courtyard, and my favorite apple or peach would always roll out of it. I took it and ate it, and my mother said to give your father a bite, but I said no. Mom said that if you don't give your dad food again, he won't bring it back to you next time. I'll give it to my dad so that he can only take one bite. He said with a gloomy face, take it! Go far. Sending grass under the guillotine with both hands, without even looking at me. In the dead of night, I came to the crossroads of the street, learned from the people in the village, first drew a circle in the direction of my hometown, burned paper money of different sizes, and said to my father, Dad, I sent you money, you don't want to be reluctant to spend, don't give you money like in the past, you are all in your underwear pocket. A knife of paper money was burned, but my father still often looked for me in his dreams. The Qin opera in my hometown is my addiction. When I sing at the theater, I go there. I like the excitement, the joy that comes from the farm. The dialects that relatives often speak, as I get older, the more I ponder them, the more I like them. For example, the word "scenery", in the past, I only felt that it was dirty, but as I grew older, the more I pondered, the more I felt that the aftertaste was endless. When I read it in dialect, I felt as if I had touched the texture of my loved one's life. I can't remember who said that: there is a common problem with contemporary Chinese novels, which are too intense and focused, and the purpose is too simple and direct. A good novel should be like a forest, with layers, shrubs and weeds, small animals and insects, which form vivid details, so that they can have enough charm. It has also been said that the greatness of a novelist lies in the fact that he spends a long time sculpting everything that does not matter in this world, whether it is the color of a sofa, the shade of light entering the room, or even the coffee cup on the coffee table. As I wrote this novel, I had Thomas Wolfe's novel "Angels, Looking Home" next to my pillow. It mobilizes the memories of my whole body sensory system, laying out the sounds, smells, colours, tastes and dynamics of the past, evoking the smells, sounds, colours, shapes and touches of things with their concrete vividness. I hope that my novel can record the mottled shadows of the trees in the yard of my home, the smell of the fields, the fragrance of the acacia flowers, and the tranquility of the village at noon...... I just want to say that in my mind, rural life is not idyllic as some novels describe, nor is it as backward and poor as some writers write, like hell on earth. The so-called countryside is the same as the people in the city, there are happiness, sourness, and the yearning family-like friendship of the village. As small as a family, as big as a village, as soon as the villagers come out, it represents a kind of family affection, a kind of family alliance, which I really like, but there are few in the city. When I was young, every house didn't lock the door, people worked in the yard, you needed a basket or something, and you could take it when you opened the door. Whoever is in trouble, almost the whole village is dispatched. French director Agnès Varda's documentary "Face, Village" is as casual as a personal diary, but in the quiet tenderness of Varda and JR, there is a story behind each face presented. When the featureless faces are magnified and posted in the corner of the village, people are no longer tiny molecules submerged in the group, but become independent individuals with artistic qualities. It seems to be scattered and wandering, but in the end, it is all a shining display of the individual spiritual value and little emotions of ordinary people, which makes it full of emotional and great power. It's just that I don't know if I'm a scavenger from my hometown, qualified?
Finalized on 9 October 2018
(This article is excerpted from "Scenery" by Wen Qingli)
《Scene》
Author: Wen Qingli
Publisher: Literature and Art Branch of Guangxi Normal University Press
Publication date: June 2020
Brief introduction: "Scenery" is a history of women's growth spanning half a century. The novel focuses on the 50-year life changes of the Wang family in a village in the Northwest Plateau, and depicts "mortal trivialities" in ink against the magnificent historical background, outlining a sketch of a cross-section of rural life. The amorous and graceful aunt Yumo yearns for freedom, regards love as life, and pursues true love bravely and fearlessly. Dad is stubborn, serious, and regards the land as his life. Uncle is selfish and strong, but he admires knowledge...... The novel depicts the unique personalities of many characters and shows the daily life of the countryside. Aunt Yumo is just an ordinary small-town worker, and under her spiritual inspiration, the fate of her brother and their children has completely changed. This is a small-town woman illuminated by dreams. Because of her, the hard, bitter and simple life of the family has a continuous affection and endless bright colors, which makes people have a new thinking and understanding of family and love again. At the same time, her vigorous vitality makes the novel deeply lament the situation of women.
Wen Qingli, female, born in 1968, is a native of Changwu, Shaanxi, and is currently the editor-in-chief of "People's Liberation Army Literature and Art". He joined the army in 1986 and graduated from the Department of Literature of the People's Liberation Army Academy of Arts, the Department of Arts of Peking University, and the 3rd and 28th Senior Seminars for Young and Middle-aged Writers of the Lu Xun Academy of Literature. He has published more than 6 million words of works in journals such as "People's Literature", "October" and "Beijing Literature", and many of his works have been reprinted in "Selected Novels" and "Beijing Literature and Novella Monthly". Bay Lake", three novels including "Paper Dream", a long non-fiction "Weibei Family", and a novel "Love Negative" and "Scenery". He has won the Fangyuan Cup Novel Award of "Yangtze River Literature and Art", the first prize of the 4th Urban Fiction Biennial Award of "Guangzhou Literature and Art" and other awards.