Let's start with "Painted Skin......
Text/Wu Xihong
I watched the old version of the TV series "Liao Zhai" in my childhood, and those ghostly interpretations really became the psychological shadow of a generation, which once caused me to dare not go to the toilet alone and stay alone in the bedroom, and finally generalized to the point that I didn't dare to read Liao Zhai's books and dare not say the word Liao Zhai, because these words are full of ghosts that will float out at any time.
With the growth of age and experience, I also watched several versions of the story of Liao Zhai, and the missing story of "Painted Skin" in the childhood "Liao Zhai" was filled with various interpretations, and I carefully read the original story and various interpretations of "Painted Skin", and found that this story is really profound through time and space, and different ages can read different flavors and meanings.
The interpretation of the story of "Painted Skin" released on the screen at the earliest time is more in line with the original work, and the actors' interpretations are more realistic, so it is said that it was once banned because it scared the audience to death, and the later version did not dare to shoot on such a large scale.
When I was a child, I saw the horror of ghosts, and then I slowly understood the social reality that the author wanted to expose, and now I look at human nature, because this story can not only happen in ancient times, these stories still take place in today's society, and the truth still makes sense in today's society, human nature is through time and remains unchanged, this is the most terrifying, thousands of years of human evolution to the present, human nature is still unchanged, which shows the unique wisdom and insights of the ancients.
One of my favorite versions of the TV series is the 2005 version of "Painted Skin", the overall content has been modified on the basis of the original work, and I personally think that this modification is more in line with the contemporary social environment. The male protagonist Wang Sheng was greedy for wealth and wealth, abandoned his lover Mei Sanniang, and for his own future, he climbed Gao Zhi and burned Sanniang, who was in the way, to marry a rich lady. Sanniang's soul turned into a ghost for revenge, put on a beautiful woman's face and looked for an opportunity to find Wang Sheng, but I didn't expect Wang Sheng, who already had a family, to still change his lust and not change his demon, and found that it was Sanniang's revenge and then killed Sanniang again with the help of Taoist priests and his wife.
We all thought that the story should end like this according to the original book, but we didn't expect Wang Sheng to climb the princess again, and bribed the midwife to kill his wife when his wife gave birth. In the original work, Wang Sheng's heart was gouged out, and in order to save her husband, Wang Sheng's wife ran for help despite her husband's ruthless betrayal. I once didn't understand why Wang Sheng's wife endured humiliation and humiliation from beggars in order to save her husband and swallowed the beggar's filth, and this filth finally became a husband's heart. Now I finally understand the deep meaning of Mr. Pu Songling: You all say that ghosts are terrifying, show you people's hearts! It's really a ruthless human heart, more terrifying and filthy than ghosts! Although people are alive, such a heart is really disgusting! The scumbag's heart is so dirty, and the man's heart not only harms himself, but also humiliates his family. Pu Songling is really a generation of fable masters, and his imagination is really bold and magical, extraordinary.
Somehow, the story of "Painted Skin" always reminds me of Maupassant's "Pretty Friends", although there is no ghost in this novel, although it transcends countries and time, the two works are actually similar. "Pretty Friends" tells the story of a low-born, impoverished but handsome young man who relies on his beauty, rhetoric and opportunism to please all kinds of upper-class women and rises to the top of society. Because of his superior appearance, he was called a beautiful friend by his lovers, and he was indeed a friend who was willing to put his mind into women, and he only regarded these women as pawns for his own promotion, and he used the money of his first lover, Madame de Maraire, the talent and network of his first wife, Madeleine, to get news from Mrs. Walter, the proprietress of the newspaper, and finally married Susan, the simple and ignorant daughter of the boss, and his wealth and resources reached the peak. We always feel that the story will turn around, and this kind of hypocritical scumbag will get retribution, but he relied on the wealth and resources of women to reach the peak of his life, this beautiful friend is a full "painted skin", which is really more infuriating than Wang Sheng in "Painted Skin".
The men in the two works can be regarded as typical representatives of the despicable and shameless scumbags, the two writers are more than 200 years apart in age but they have written similar characters, it seems that human nature is similar regardless of borders and times. Pu Songling can be regarded as the novelist who loves to tell stories and is the best at telling stories in ancient times, and he can also be regarded as the novelist with the most ideological and artistic pursuits and the most literary brilliance.
Whether in the history of Chinese literature or in the scope of world literature, the position of "Strange Tales from Liao Zhai" is unassailable, and Pu Songling is also a well-deserved king of short stories. Scholars generally believe that the three major Western short story writers of the 19th century were Chekhov in Russia, Maupassant in France, and O. Henry in the United States. And our Pu Songling is two centuries earlier than them, and in terms of quantity, conception, and descriptive means, it is more profound than the novels of Chekhov, the head of the three. How many champions and scholars were there in ancient China, and how many people did Pu Songling dream of? There are thousands of them, and they are all flooded by the loess by the barren grass, and the name of Pu Songling, a poor talent who wrote "Strange Tales from Liao Zhai", has been written into the history of Chinese civilization in golden characters, which is really ironic and wonderful.
Three foreign short story writers have created a wealth of works, but they all died young in their forties, and Pu Songling, who had experienced the hardships of life, wrote only one "Strange Tales from Liaozhai" in his life, and died as an ascetic monk at the age of seventy-five, which is really a coincidence and wonder of fate. Regardless of the number of works or the length of their life, they are the greatest writers, and their names have shimmered in the literary sky for thousands of years as their works.
About the Author:
Wu Xihong, born in the 80s, graduate student, teacher, psychological counselor, member of Zhangjiakou Writers Association, has published many articles and papers, and her literary creations have been scattered in daily newspapers, evening newspapers and online self-media literary platforms.