The picture shows the cover of the novel "Red Rock".
Pictured is a poster for the movie "Eternal Life in flames" released in 1965.
The picture shows Zhang Guimei leading the teachers and students of the girls' high school to relive the oath of joining the party and relive the red classics.
Core reading
I understand very well the authors of "Red Rock", they were not writers at the beginning, but in order to comfort the heroic souls of the martyrs, to commemorate the martyrs, and to let more people draw spiritual strength from those revolutionary martyrs who are not afraid of life and death for their ideals and beliefs, they are obligated to pick up the pen and show the spirit of the red rock forged by the blood of the heroes
The novel "Red Rock" was officially published in 1961, and it has been 60 years since today. I always have a special affection for it. In the 1950s and 1960s, I witnessed the process of the novel from conception and revision to finalization and publication.
"Red Rock" depicts the touching deeds of the revolutionary heroes in the enemy's prison on the eve of the liberation of Chongqing, and their firm ideals and convictions and fearless spirit of sacrifice are the true portrayal of the underground party members of the CPC. From them, I seemed to see the shadow of the comrades who had fought side by side. Unfortunately, many of them fell on the eve of dawn and did not have the opportunity to experience the rapid development and prosperity of our motherland, nor did they have the opportunity to witness the prosperity of the century-old party. And I, as a 107-year-old communist party member with 83 years of party experience, witnessed this dream come true for them. At such a moment, talking about "Red Rock" again and talking about the revolutionary past of those who were born and died is very emotional.
A "book written in blood" that took nearly 10 years and nearly 3 million words to write
Luo Guangbin, one of the authors of "Red Rock", and my father and I are friends in the same window, and the two families have close contacts. In the early 1940s, at the request of the party organization, I was admitted to the Southwest United University, where I studied and engaged in underground party work. Soon, the Luo family sent Luo Guangbin to Kunming and handed him over to me, hoping that he would also apply for the Southwest United University in the future. During his stay in Kunming, Luo Guangbin was successfully admitted to the middle and high school attached to the United Nations General Assembly, made great progress in his studies, actively participated in progressive activities, and became a member of the Democratic Youth League, a secret peripheral organization of our party at that time. Later, he returned to Chongqing and contacted Liu Guozhi, who led the student movement, and was introduced by Jiang Zhujun to join the Chinese Communist Party. Jiang Zhujun is the prototype of Sister Jiang in the novel "Red Rock".
In 1948, due to the betrayal of traitors, the ccp's underground party organization in eastern Sichuan was devastated, and Luo Guangbin was arrested and imprisoned in Chongqing Geleshan Baigongguan Prison. In prison, he participated in and witnessed the revolutionary struggle of his comrades-in-arms. On the eve of the liberation of Chongqing in 1949, Kuomintang agents massacred revolutionary volunteers imprisoned in baigongguan, zhazidong and other prisons on a large scale, and set fire to Zhadidong. Of the hundreds of revolutionary volunteers, only a very small number escaped.
Shortly after Luo Guangbin was released from prison, I met him in Chongqing, and he told me a lot about the situation in prison at that time. The heroic deeds of the revolutionary martyrs are touching. Soon after, he and other comrades who survived from prison made reports to the youth in Chongqing and Chengdu, which had a great impact. Many people, including me, encourage and urge them to write these specific deeds into books, so that more people can see them, and let the heroic deeds stay in heaven and earth for a long time. Therefore, Luo Guangbin made an appointment with Liu Debin, who escaped at the same time as him, and Yang Yiyan, who was released from prison before them, and worked together to write a memoir, "Eternal Life in the Fire".
After the memoir was published, it received a great response. With many concerns, there was a plan to rewrite it into a long novel, and the "Red Rock" we know now was born. "Red Rock" lasted nearly 10 years from conception to writing, with 400,000 words in the book and nearly 3 million words in the manuscript, and underwent three complete "reworks", five or six major changes, and countless minor repairs. During this period, the authors also gave more than a hundred reports to millions of young students and cadres. They told me that every report is a creative process, and it must be modified and improved in combination with feedback.
The author of "Red Rock" has said more than once: "The real author of the novel 'Red Rock' is those martyrs who sacrificed their lives for the revolution. "It's not modesty. The most moving plots and most admirable heroes in novels have realistic basis and character archetypes. The novel is condensed with the blood of martyrs, and it is truly a "book written in blood". The deeds and spirit of the revolutionary martyrs have finally received historical echoes. As soon as the novel "Red Rock" was published, it was read by readers across the country, and it was popular for a while, even overseas. It is said that the book has had a circulation of over 10 million to date, making it one of the most popular revolutionary historical novels.
Believe in victory and be prepared to sacrifice for the hard-won "comrades"
"Red Rock" reflects the spirit of struggle of the revolutionary volunteers in Chongqing at that time, and can be said to be the epitome of the underground party struggle work in the Kuomintang area. The final name of this novel is precisely because during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression and the War of Liberation, the Southern Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, which led the underground party work in the area south of the Yangtze River, was secretly set up in the Eighth Route Army Office in Hongyan Village, Chongqing. What we call the Spirit of Red Rock also stems from this.
I have worked under the leadership of the Southern Bureau of the CPC Central Committee. Decades have passed, and those stormy days often flood into my memory. At that time, every day in the white terror for the cause of the revolution, on the line of life and death with the enemy around the battle. Before going out in the morning, I was ready not to come back. "Believe in victory and be prepared to sacrifice" is the firm belief I made when I took the oath in front of the party flag. It is through this conviction that I can persevere in the struggle to the day of victory on this equally brutal front, which is free of smoke and smoke.
Unforgettable On December 29, 1949, Chengdu held a celebration of liberation and welcomed the People's Liberation Army into the city, and the alleys were empty. I sat in the car into the city and saw the underground party comrades I knew, and everyone had tears in their eyes. On the second day of entering the city, we held a public meeting of all underground party members for the first time, and the party members who were notified came from all directions. In the past, due to the work discipline of the underground Party, many comrades did not know each other, some of them may have known each other, but they did not know that they were their own comrades, and some may even have been suspected by other comrades. Many people first looked at each other with surprise on their faces, and then warmly hugged and shook hands.
When I announced the meeting and loudly uttered the words "comrades", the audience suddenly fell silent, followed by enthusiastic applause and cheers, a performance that only those who have lived in the white terror for a long time can understand. It's dawn! We underground Party members can finally get together in an open and honest manner! It's dawn! We can finally shout "comrade" without hesitation, and we can proudly declare ourselves as members of the Communist Party of China! How hard-won this is!
I understand very well the authors of "Red Rock", they were not writers at the beginning, but in order to comfort the heroic souls of the martyrs, to commemorate the martyrs, and to let more people draw spiritual strength from those revolutionary martyrs who are not afraid of life and death for their ideals and beliefs, they are obligated to pick up the pen and show the spirit of the red rock forged by the blood of the heroes.
I think that as a writer, I picked up my own pen and let more people know that at the time of the nation's peril, there was a group of communists who struggled heroically and were not afraid of sacrifice, who carried the suffering of the nation and the hopes of the people, who went to the soup and the fire, died tirelessly, and accumulated decades of arduous struggle to exchange for today's new China -- this is not only crucial at the time of the birth of "Red Rock", but also today and in the future. (Ma Zhitu)
(Hu Yanyan, a reporter of this newspaper, sorted out according to interviews and materials)
Drafted by: Zhao Kairu, People's Daily (2021-06-03 20 edition)
Source: People's Daily - People's Daily