Last winter, I was idle at home and read Ms. Xiao Hong's "The Legend of Hulan River".
"The sky is full of stars, the house is full of moons, how life is, why is it so sad." From beginning to end, I was wrapped up in such a cold narrative tone. The whole book is more like a memoir. From the perspective of a child looking at a kaleidoscope, Xiao Hong presents us with her childhood life and the customs and human feelings of her hometown of Hulan, a small northeastern county.
At the end of the book, Xiao Hong wrote: "There are no beautiful stories I have written above, only because they are full of memories of my childhood, but they cannot be forgotten, and they are difficult to forget, and they are recorded here." "This is the past years that belong to Xiao Hong, lonely and desolate.
Stills from The Golden Age
In the eighteen years of living in Hulan, Xiao Hong suffered from the cold treatment of family affection. Only her grandfather had given her selfless love and care, the only warmth in the cold memory. So, Xiao Hong said, "I know from my grandfather that in addition to coldness and hatred, there is love and warmth in life." ”
When she was eighteen years old, her grandfather died, and Xiao Hong had no thoughts, so she left Hulan alone and went to Harbin to begin a life of upheaval and displacement. It was a time of great nala, and Ibsen's Doll's House awakened many young women, and their sense of self prompted them to pursue independence and freedom.
During that time in Harbin, her father cut off her financial resources. Forced to make a living, she defected to her fiancé Wang Enjia, who had made a marriage contract for her. The two lived together at the Dongshun Hotel in Harbin, and Xiao Hong was even pregnant with Wang Enjia's child. However, Wang Enjia was not a person to be trusted, and after the two sat on the mountain for a period of time, Wang Enjia was unable to bear the double pressure of family and economy, and even did not say goodbye when Xiao Hong was about to give birth.
After Wang Enjia escaped, Xiao Hong was trapped in the hotel and was confined to a utility room on the top floor of the hotel. Pregnant with Liujia and lonely, she wrote bitterly in the midst of hunger and cold: Last May was the season when I ate green apricots in Beiping, and in May this year, the pain of my life was really like the taste of green apricots.
Later, it was Xiao Jun who rescued her from this taste. But the dilemma of life is like a Russian matryoshka doll, opening up one layer and another layer.
Xiao Jun also had no fixed economic income, and he struggled to survive by working as a tutor and friends. When the two lived in the Europa Hotel, they often went hungry because they didn't have money. But the sweetness of love can dilute part of the pain of life, and the days when Heleba is dipped in salty salt and fruit can also be ridiculed by Xiao Hong as honeymoon time. Even in such a cruel environment, Xiao Hong did not stop literary creation. Perhaps suffering is the breeding ground for breeding and nurturing talents, and Xiao Hong ushered in the golden period of her own creation during this time.
Ms. Xu Guangping, Mr. Lu Xun's wife, sighed after reading Xiao Hong's essay collection "Shangshi Street": "She is so good at writing about hunger and poverty, hunger and poverty who does not know, but no one is as shocking as she writes." Probably only those who walk barefoot on the tip of life can write that taste so vividly and vividly.
Mr. Lu Xun greatly admired Xiao Hong's talent and was her Bole in literary creation. When Xiao Hong published "The Field of Life and Death", Mr. Lu Xun also personally wrote the preface, which made Xiao Hong quickly become famous in the literary world. In addition to spiritual support and encouragement, Mr. Lu Xun and Ms. Xu Guangping also provided great material help to Xiao Hong and Xiao Jun, who had just arrived in Shanghai.
Later, a rift appeared in Xiao Hong and Xiao Jun's feelings. In order to seek relief and suspend contradictions, Xiao Hong traveled east to Japan alone and lived a lonely study abroad life. During this period, Mr. Lu Xun died of illness. After Xiao Hong learned of this news from the newspaper, she wrote to Xiao Jun with tears: "Jun, the fire has not been small in the past few days, and the lips have all been burned, in fact, a person's death is inevitable, but knowing that the truth is the truth, emotionally it is always impossible." Since then, Xiao Hong has written a series of articles to remember Mr. Lu Xun.
During her time in Japan, Xiao Hong also wrote to Xiao Jun: "Army, when the window is sprinkled with white moon, I am willing to turn off the lights, sit down, and be silent for some time." In this silence, suddenly like an alarm bell came to my heart, isn't this my golden age, this moment. "Yes, being yourself in Japan, free and comfortable, calm and at ease, without a little oppression of the economy, this is really a golden age. It was in a cage. ”
During this period, Xiao Hong, in a foreign country, did not worry about her livelihood, had no love bondage, and was lonely but free in her heart. A single female student who is not poor is probably the most ideal state of life.
Soon after, Xiao Hong returned to China. This separation did not fundamentally solve her and Xiao Jun's problems, and the relationship between the two people still came to an end. The reason is, on the one hand, that perhaps Xiao Jun's machismo is at work, and it is difficult for him to accept the reality that Xiao Hong is more talented than himself; on the other hand, Xiao Jun is really affectionate, and Xiao Hong finally loses patience with this ups and downs of this relationship.
After breaking up with Xiao Jun, Xiao Hong soon married her and Xiao Jun's mutual friend, the gentle Duanmu Hongliang. At the wedding, Xiao Hong was frank and honest: "I said that I did not have any romantic love history with Duanmu Hongliang, and I discovered Duanmu when I was separated from Xiao Jun forever. I don't have any high hopes for Duanmu, some... I just want to live a normal people-like married life. There was no quarrel, no fighting, no infidelity, no ridicule, just understanding, thoughtfulness, and love. ”
At that time, Xiao Hong was probably like a small boat tired of drifting, and Duanmu Hongliang just provided her with a harbor to dock. But the beauty of the good day is still short-lived, and the turmoil of the war makes people homeless. They drifted from Wuhan to Chongqing, and from Chongqing to Hong Kong.
After arriving in Hong Kong, Xiao Hong's health deteriorated, and she dragged her tired body to write the most important work of her life, "The Legend of Hulan River". The novel "Ma Bole" was forced to be suspended due to physical weakness. At this time, the Pacific War broke out and her life was once again in a state of chaos.
When Xiao Hong was hospitalized in Hong Kong for tuberculosis treatment, she could not bear the cold reception in the hospital and returned home to recuperate. But by this time, Duanmu Hongliang had already left her and arranged for Luo Binji, who was also an exiled writer in the northeast, to accompany her. Xiao Hong had long been mentally prepared for this. When she left Chongqing for Hong Kong, she predicted her fate to her friend Bai Lang, who had gone to bid farewell: "The future prospects are in front of me, and I will be lonely for the rest of my life."
The following year, Xiao Hong's condition worsened and she was admitted to the hospital, but because the quack doctor misdiagnosed it as a laryngeal tumor, the laryngeal tube was wrongly moved. As a result of the operation, Xiao Hong could not eat or drink, and her body was weak, and she died soon after. He is only 31 years old. The day before her death, Xiao Hong wrote on the paper: "I will be with the blue sky and clear water forever, leaving the half of the "Red Chamber" to write to others", "Half of my life was coldly treated with white eyes, and I died first, unwilling, unwilling." ”
In 1987, Duanmu Hongliang and his later wife went to Xiao Hong's tomb to offer a sacrifice and a poem, "Life and death are not forgotten, the moon is full of roof beams, the plum side of the willow, the Hulan River is also Xiao Xiang, washing away the thousand-year-old point, the ink is spotted with bamboo." The candle does not compete with the charm of light, the sword grows by itself, the wind and frost are infinite, and the mountains and water are the same string. The end of the world is not far away, and the Milky Way looks at each other at night. In this poem, there is thought, there is mourning, there is repentance. But Xiao Hong had gone to sleep forever.
After reading "The Legend of Hulan River", I watched "The Golden Age" directed by Xu Anhua. In the movie, Tang Wei played ms. Xiao Hong's short life, poverty and loneliness always accompanied her around, and I couldn't help but feel sad to see it. It is the torrent of the great era, the sand and stones like helpless tumbling people.