"The most important thing at this time is to be alive, not only to live in the flesh, but also to be healthy and healthy in body and mind. This is a very important thing, probably the only thing, otherwise it would really go crazy." This article was first published in Southern People Weekly Text | Reporter Sun Lingyu Intern reporter Chen Fan Edit | Rain monk The full text is about 4315, and it takes about 10 minutes to read carefully
Han Dong and his wife "are locked up in this house together" Photo / Courtesy of the interviewee
At 7:50 a.m., the alarm went off, and Han Dong got up and waited for breakfast to be delivered to the hotel room at 8 a.m. This is the 50th day that he and his wife are "locked up in this house together", and the days are no longer calculated by day, but are divided into 14 days of isolation, which he used to say is how many 14 days.
On January 21, they traveled from Nanjing to a county-level city below Yichang, Hubei Province, to visit his mother-in-law, and after staying in the Express Hotel for two days, Wuhan was locked down, and other counties and cities in Hubei also took action. The hotel was closed for prevention and control, and they moved to the "probably best local" four-star hotel where they lived today, more than 400 yuan a night. After another week, all the houses, communities, and units in the county were all blocked, and thirty or forty stranded outsiders poured into the hotel where Han Dong was staying.
On the day of the blockade, the elevator was no longer running and the stairs were stopped. There was no clear notice, and the waiter verbally told him not to go downstairs when he delivered the meal to the room. Since then, Han Dong has looked down from the glass window in the room every day, and as long as he sees that there are still three doormen standing guard in turn at the entrance of the hotel, and there is still no one in the courtyard, he knows that he will definitely not let him go. Even if there is not a single case of infection or suspicion in the hotel, the local area was classified as a low-risk area as early as half a month ago, more than sixty confirmed patients have all been cured and discharged from the hospital, the street is still missing, the traffic has not recovered, these days just more trucks carrying supplies.
The hotel is next to the road, with no buildings nearby, and you can see the countryside and farmland on the side of the road, and sometimes the egrets that fly by. When I first stayed, the window was still winter, dry yellow, and there was no snow. Gradually watching the rape blossoms, it turned to spring. Next, "there is something more terrible", last night, he heard mosquitoes flying, "I thought I heard wrong, and as a result my wife got up and told me that her hand was bitten by mosquitoes all night, and sure enough, there were mosquitoes!" He smiled bitterly, "From winter until there are mosquitoes." ”
Outside the window, the winter scene turns into a spring light of canola blossoms Photo / Provided by the interviewee
No one expected the blockade to be so long. Before coming, Han Dong booked a return ticket on January 31, bought february 7 after the flight was cancelled, "I think I should be able to go after a week", canceled again and bought February 17, still did not wait for the signal to unseal. After canceling three times, Han Dong was disheartened. A few days ago, he released the ticket for March 9th, this time, he did not buy, "I have experience, I will definitely not be able to go." ”
Expect to hang in this repeated anxiety, like a marathon runner who can't see the end, "You always feel that this thing will be flexible, there will be room, it will be treated differently, I didn't expect such a decision, all flights were cancelled, and the road was blocked." The whole life and economy of the citizens have been suspended, so I still feel that this matter is temporary and will be solved immediately. In the unknown waiting, he could not calm down, "whether it is reading or whatever, in general, it is a chaotic day." ”
He brought with him a copy of Kafka's complete short and medium stories, and when he saw it, he was tearful and "sleepy and tearful." "Kafka is my most admired and awesome writer, but he's really too poorly readable." He expected that he would not be able to finish reading it, so he only took this one with him. When I read it before, I was also more prone to drowsiness, and after coming here, it was "particularly difficult."
He didn't have a computer with him, he could only watch a little on his phone, "the effect is also very poor, dizzy." Although the pastime is very limited, Han Dong feels that time passes quickly, "If you don't do anything, there is nothing new every day, the day passes in a flash, of course, occasionally it feels very slow, the reason why you preset a time point of liberation, but how can not come that day."
Writing is even more difficult to sustain, occasionally typing two or three sentences of diary on the mobile phone, "unlike the fangfang, it is completely a running account." On weekdays, as long as he is in Nanjing, he will go to the studio in the alley near the Drum Tower at 6:30 every morning to write, and on weekends and even during the New Year, he does not easily interrupt, "Just like Pamuk said, I must take the pill of literature every day." You have to write every day, and if you don't write, you're sad." The place to "take medicine" cannot be a place to eat and live, and since he was in his twenties, even if he was alone at home, he could not write. "It's okay to work with small documents, but to write, whether it's the first draft or the first draft, whether it's final or revised, you have to concentrate, you have to go somewhere else."
Han Dong's studio in Nanjing Photo / Courtesy of the interviewee
So he travels anywhere without a computer or writing, except for two months in 2013 when he was stationed in France. In addition, in his impression, he had never stayed in Hubei for such a long time as this time. After his stay in the local area was posted on the Internet by Hubei artist Wu Youming a few days ago, it attracted the attention of many people. The units he worked in ("Youth" Monthly) and the Writers' Associations in Hubei and Jiangsu, as well as the Propaganda Departments at all levels, expressed their intention to send him computers over, and Han Dong replied, "It is useless for you to send it, I am not in the mood to write, for me, writing should be fully concentrated, highly concentrated, and it is definitely not possible in this place." ”
He was also shaken at one point, knowing that he was going to stay for two or three months, and whether he should bring a computer and more books. After being "locked up" for a week, he figured it out, and if his psychological state was not adjusted, it would be useless to have material things. He realized that this was no longer a question of wasted time, saying that waste was because he could not write things, but on second thought, there was no waste, "As a writer, the experience itself will bring you a lot of wealth"; but he, like the people of the whole country, is in a long and severe absurd drama, and the most important thing at this time is to live, not only to live in the flesh, but also to be healthy and healthy. "It's a very important thing, probably the only thing, or it's going to really go crazy."
Maintaining physical and mental health has become the main axis of Han Dong's life. After a period of insomnia, I feel more valuable for a normal routine. In addition to catching up on sleep during the day, the indispensable thing is to do exercises, shake your arms and move your legs to pull the stretchers. Cigarettes are not smoked, usually a box a day, now trapped in less than 40 square meters, the window can only open a slit and in order to prevent the infection of the virus and dare not open the air conditioning to change the air, "if you smoke too much, you can't live here, simply don't smoke."
He is like a survivor who has escaped death, repeatedly lamenting the importance of being alive. "Staying alive here is the first, it is also very important for two people to get along well, many people say that they are going to divorce after being locked up, I am fine with my wife, there is no trouble." In fact, this is a very dangerous time, I am not exaggerating words, to be able to survive, physical and mental health, this is the most important. I'm still waiting, but I think my biggest result is that I'm in no hurry. Although the mentality has not yet settled enough to write, but at least there is no great compassion, no madness, and no space claustrophobia, I think it is already very good, as for the matter of writing or not writing, I figured it out one day, it is really not important. ”
Han Dong photo / ic photo
People Weekly: You say that this is also an asset for writers, how will it affect creation specifically?
Han Dong: I may use it as a background to do some related creations, but it is not so rushed. Ma Yuan kept joking with me, saying that he had never been in prison in his life, and Lao Han finally "went to jail once." For people who write, this experience is certainly an asset, but it is not clear how it has been used, or what changes have made my view of life and career. It's like reading a particularly profound book, and you eat it into your stomach, but it's not quite clear how it works.
People Weekly: What are some of the current shifts in perception?
Han Dong: Impermanence. In the past, the impermanence we talked about was life, old age, illness and death, something that was partial to the natural world. Even a plane crash can be understood as a matter of contingency in the natural world. Then in social life, we always feel that there are certain rules, there are always laws, rules, and there is always a sense of security. But now it is found that even if you live a normal life, it will suddenly push you somewhere, you can't believe the traffic rules, you can't believe in all the things that appear in the social structure that make you feel safe. In fact, there is no sense of security, and it is said that change will change, which is more deeply experienced.
Han Dong dines in a hotel room Photo / Courtesy of the interviewee
People Weekly: Does this impermanence motivate you to hurry up and realize some of your previous plans after everything is back to normal?
Han Dong: No, hahahahaha.
People Weekly: You once said you resisted writing "words that fit the scene", why?
Han Dong: I mean that in the face of these great social changes or catastrophes, the absence of excellent and excellent literary masterpieces is inevitable, and it just has a sense of distance. Anyway, as far as I know, it seems that only "Uncle Tom's Cabin" has an echo relationship with the total war in the United States that year, but it is also a generalized thing in the end, not above the literary level.
People Weekly: Lu Xun's article on the shortcomings of the needle in the past is not counted?
Han Dong: Hu Shi praised Lu Xun's superiority, which probably means that he is good at creating and fiction, rather than writing something real. For example, "A Q Zheng Biography" or "Storm Wave" are only based on specific social events as the background. You said that with this epidemic as the background, there is an impulse to write, OK is no problem, but in the end this work is not an explanation of the epidemic, it will not fall on the epidemic, your purpose, standards or literature, art, not obsessed with whether to reflect reality, I think that kind of thing is not well written.
People Weekly: So you think very specific records like this are unnecessary.
Han Dong: Specific records are very necessary, but they are not within the scope of artistic concepts. It is also very necessary for specific poets and writers to speak in the face of this epidemic, but there is no need to speak as an artist, he as an ordinary citizen, a party, it is OK to express his feelings.
People Weekly: When you make related art creations in the future, will you mention Wuhan, or will you completely blur?
Han Dong: Of course, I will take this as the background, just like many of my books are based on the Cultural Revolution, but I am not writing about the Cultural Revolution, but about the survival of people, people's lives and human nature in the context of the Cultural Revolution, then I take Wuhan as the background, I write about human nature, write about human survival, this is no problem. But I'm not trying to find out about a social news or an indictment, I'm trying to mold it into a work of art, with artistic considerations, technical indicators.
Stills from the film "At the Docks", written and directed by Han Dong
People Weekly: Similar to the personal story of a frequently engaged hotel waiter, would you use it as fodder?
Han Dong: I really haven't dug into any material in particular, I think because we are not aliens, we are people living in this, so that is to say, in your experience, a lot of things will automatically come to you, there is no need to write something to go deep into his life. Of course, a journalist is a must, in order to find out a situation, you have to go to an interview to investigate, but a writer, I think unless it is to write a propositional essay, such as asking you to write a TV series, then you must turn over the information, or let you adapt a case, but also have to understand these things before and after. If it is purely a kind of independent creation, at least in my concept, there is no concept of so-called deep life, I have a life myself, why should I go deep into the lives of others.
People Weekly: You said in an interview that you were not in favor of reading The Plague now, so what do you suggest reading?
Han Dong: I didn't say disapproval, that is, free choice, you can read it, you can not read it. Because of some very drastic practices, it is recommended to watch movies and books related to the epidemic during the epidemic, as if individuals can get some nutrients, I think it is not exactly the concept. Just like some bad book design, for example, you give him a name, spring life, he will design a spring blossom, too much hope for the literary righteousness. "Plague" is also the theme of the epidemic, but it does not have much to do with the epidemic. I think it is only right for you to read such a great work of literature as a literary work, but it is not the best time to read the Plague under the current circumstances.
I think it should be the opposite now, I always give this example, a man's wife is pregnant, he walked down the street, think all he saw was a woman with a big belly. This kind of obsessive-compulsive disorder will form some prejudices, so at this time, can we distract ourselves a little and look at a little completely unrelated to the epidemic, such as history books, or literary masterpieces that we have always wanted to see but have no time to read. You have to know that there is another world outside of this world, and there is something else outside of this thing. I think it's more important to get a basic rational and objective attitude, not to be too nervous, not to be too relaxed. I understand the panic, but it's scary if everyone from top to bottom thinks this thing is the only thing. Fear and panic have cut off the hearts of many people, so that they can't see anything else.
People Weekly: In addition to watching the news related to the epidemic, what else do you usually pay attention to now?
Han Dong: I'll just take a look at it, than how to write a case analysis of socks, I read it all. I've known this guy before, but I haven't seen his stuff and it's well written. There are also articles by interested scholars, and sometimes they will focus on it.
Han Dong's works in the sifang Contemporary Art Museum's "Mao Yan Han Dong" exhibition
People Weekly: As a poet or writer, is there any different experience and observation in this matter?
Han Dong: I think everyone's experience and observation are definitely different, and there is no professional difference. My personal situation does not matter, the key is that there are many people who have more difficulties in survival, you see the "Yichang release" Weibo below the following post, many locals who are migrant workers can't go out, maybe their jobs are lost, and their mortgages are not paid. I think everyone is suffering from this suffering, this sin, it is like a senseless disaster, it falls on every specific person, it is definitely not directed at one person.