I saw the news the other day that Chongqing writer Hongying would direct his first film, Moonlight Samurai. The film is based on her own novel. So, this female writer who once burst into flames came to us again. There is also her famous work, the novel "Hungry Daughter", which floats in her memory.
"Hungry Daughter" was published in 1997 because news reports called "autobiographical" novels, "women writers write their own stories" and "privacy" became keywords, making a lot of noise. I had just come out of school at that time, and naturally I followed the excited people and went to read her with a certain strange mentality.
But at that time, many details could not be read through, and with a little curiosity mentality, the final feeling was a bit off. I think the book is very well written, but I haven't delved into what is so good about it.
Last month, I flipped it out and re-read it, and found that the level and value of this novel were too much higher than the understanding of that year.
The key word "privacy" obscures part of the novel's heaviness. But privacy, on the other hand, is part of the heaviness. Because the whole story is about the humblest part of the social tide, the unspeakable desire, repression and shame. It may not necessarily be the privacy of the author, but it must be the privacy and most depressing part of the novel's characters.
Chongqing, where mountains and rivers are interdependent, is a landscape from a distance, but countless details and daily routines are hidden between the undulating slopes and ladders. Standing in an alley on a hillside and hearing the steamship whistle rising far up the river, there is probably a kind of depression and numbness hidden outside the flood universe. Naturally, there may be another indescribable pleasure.
Therefore, when the daily life in the slums on the hillside of the South Shore district in the novel is presented, there is an innate sense of secrecy. Whether it is the calculation of small citizens, the numb affection, or the love and hate that cannot be spoken to others, but seems to be known to everyone, they are incompatible with the great rivers and rivers that rush to the far away. But everything is true, the humble truth in the torrent of the times.
Irresponsible traffic, rude insults, hatred brought about by poverty and hunger, are mercilessly pressed on everyone, and also on the thin and sensitive girl liu liu in the novel. In hopelessness and predicament, she carefully searched for gaps in survival, observed every possible trap, or fell involuntarily into it.
Everyone can't escape, but they try to break through. No matter how oppressive the living environment, in fact, it can not suppress people's pursuit of a better life and beautiful emotions, and even more stimulating. So whether it is a growing six or six, or a mother, adoptive father and biological father who have gone through the vicissitudes of the years, they have all erupted the most passionate emotions in hopeless repression. The difference is that after the outbreak, the fathers hopelessly chose to be patient, while the grown-up Liu Liu chose to run away...
And all this, whether it is the hunger of food, or the hunger of spirit and emotion, is actually only wrapped up in the dark tide of the times, and its roots come from the times themselves. So I think that the point of "Hungry Daughter" is not the privacy of individuals, but the privacy of the times, or rather, it is a hidden pain that all of us cannot dissipate for a long time.
When the humble fate of the little people is wrapped up in the ups and downs and sufferings of the times, it has long gone beyond the "privacy" hyped up for the sake of selling books, but carries a thick heaviness.
Such a feeling has long been discussed by people of insight. Today, I suddenly felt it, but it was a flood of memories. Some books can be read again and again, so that they will not forget the hidden corners and daily details outside the river.