Author: Zhang Fan Yuan Yabing
Contemporary writer Qiu Huadong's latest collection of novels, "Havana Waves", was officially launched by Beijing October Literature and Art Publishing House recently, which uses the experience of the era of globalization as the driving force for its creation, discovering and exploring new literary geography spaces with cosmopolitanism, regionality and personality, focusing on philosophical and practical topics such as life and death. Writer Qiu Huadong's vision and creative vision of "going to the world", as a way and method of literary practice, not only broaden the possibility of personal literary practice, but also reflect the consciousness and presentation of Chinese writers in the era of globalization to shape the image of Chinese people.
The new collection of novels "Havana Waves" consists of nine novels, "Looking at the Clouds", "Only the Sea Is Not Sad", "Crocodile Hunter", "Shadow of the Eagle", "São Paulo Raining", "Provencal Sunset", "Havana Waves", "HippoThe Massage Therapist" and "The End of Iceland", which involves nine geographical spaces with a grand vision, telling multiple stories about family redemption and emotional redemption. The collision and growth between exotic romance and extreme sports such as mountaineering, rock climbing, and diving reflect the wisdom and strength of individuals to enjoy nature and conquer nature. The protagonists of the nine novels have similar experiences, and the misfortunes of broken lives and the helplessness of life circumstances are all relieved in their relationship with nature. It has to be said that the writer Qiu Huadong has always taken the posture of "sharing time and space with life" to realize the character's spiritual redemption and the pursuit of life.
To the World: Chinese Coordinates and "Synchronic" Writing
All along, the writer Qiu Huadong has always expressed a profound and complex cultural connotation with a transcendent vision and personalized aesthetic taste. His delicate portrayal and depiction of the original experience of life in the collision of multiculturalism aims to express modern discourse and a cultural self-consciousness. Of course, when it comes to Qiu Huadong's transnational, cross-regional and cross-civilization writing and literary practice, it is necessary to mention the "Chinese Screen Series" novels, the four works of "The City of Giananda", "Telescope", "The Man Riding the Flying Fish", and "The Prisoner of Time" based on historical materials to be artistically conceived and imagined, writing the life experience of foreigners in Modern and Contemporary History in China, and shaping the image of many recipients and communicators of exchanges and collisions between Eastern and Western civilizations. The fullness of regional experience expression is closely related to the perspective of modernity and cosmopolitan literary creation. With the in-depth development of the era of globalization, Qiu Huadong's creative horizons are also expanding, and the writing of the collision of Eastern and Western civilizations has shifted from historical imagination to landscape writing with the characteristics of "common time and space", recording the diversity and richness of exchanges and dialogues between different cultures in the context of globalization with the attitude of travelers. Further, the author Qiu Huadong's creations on extreme sports and exotic humanities are based on multiculturalism in the era of globalization, transcending the limits of geography and time and space, and looking for Chinese coordinates in a global vision, thus exploring the various possibilities of literary practice in the context of modernity.
Of course, the presentation of the modern level of expression content and techniques, as well as the combination of Chinese elements and world elements in culture, weave a realistic network with aesthetic connotations for Qiu Huadong's works; and the interweaving of world scenery and life and death questions reflects Qiu Huadong's deeper cultural vision and world vision. The protagonists of the novel "Crocodile Hunter", "Sao Paulo Raining" and "Hippo TheRapist" are Du Fei living in Australia, He Dong living in São Paulo, and Gao Guang, who lives in Kenya, all of whom are far away from the country and hide from the suffering of the original life, but they have not forgotten the cultural depth behind the Chinese identity. From their bodies and their respective behaviors, we can see the consciousness and sincerity of the Chinese identity, Du Fei is not afraid of difficulties, spares no effort to find the murderer of asian girls; He Dong, as the coach of the Kung Fu Commune, inherits and carries forward Chinese kung fu to the world; Gao Guang continues to carry forward and expand the national essence of Chinese medicine in the african land. I have to say that these three protagonists can be described to a large extent as the conscious inheritors and external disseminators of Chinese culture, and they all have distinct cultural consciousness and deep national pride.
Redemption and Hope: An Exploration and Inquiry into the Philosophy of Life
Looking at the texts carefully, it is not difficult for us to find that the writer Qiu Huadong interprets life and death in nature, and explores the dimension or level of the philosophical expression of life from the relationship between man and nature and between people and people. The natural landscapes of the writer's foreign lands are not only unique, romantic or even dangerous in the intuitive sense, but also the yearning and expression of the characters' inner pursuit of spiritual freedom, the search for identity, and the challenge to the limits of life. The three novels "Looking at the Clouds", "Only the Sea Is Not Sad", and "The Shadow of the Eagle" focus on the topic of family redemption: The protagonist Zhang Ping in "Looking at the Clouds" chooses to send his daughter to North America to study by car, and the expression of affection between father and daughter during the long-distance journey and the experience of common adventure can finally eliminate the hidden barriers and resistance in their respective hearts. The discussion of the form of the cloud has not only become the key to the father and daughter breaking the freezing point of the relationship, but also the presentation of Zhang Ping's search for self-redemption from the original experience of life forms. Hu Shilei, the protagonist of the novel "Only the Sea Is Not Sad", lost three relatives in a short period of time, and the ensuing heavy blow shattered the last line of defense of his life. With free diving in the Pacific Ocean, he met friends from different countries and learned about the sadness and pain of different people. In his relationship with friends and the sea, he established new emotions with the sea that devoured his son, poured out his sorrow to the sea, and gradually healed his heart full of wounds and pains.
In the novel "Shadow of the Eagle", Lu Yingyong wrote his own mountaineering story, finding his own emotional home in the mountaineering, and the courage to redefine marriage. As mentioned above, it is not difficult to find that self-driving travel, diving, mountaineering, etc. have become the protagonist's redemptive behaviors to return to his heart. The novel "The End of Iceland" is a story about "searching", the story begins with the protagonist looking for his sick wife, and the story ends with the couple searching for the end of Iceland together. Just like "waiting" in "Waiting for Godot" and "escaping" in Monroe's "Escape", "searching" has always been a very philosophical concept, perhaps looking for love, perhaps looking for meaning in the race against life. The novel "Provencal Sunset" is the embodiment of romance and cruelty, originally a warm trip to France for a family of three, because of an accident, the husband and wife and children are separated from each other. The novel "Havana Waves" is also an insight into the impermanence and helplessness of life. Further, the writer Qiu Huadong's new collection of novels", "Havana Waves", presents the writer's respect and reverence for life, which is permeated with a transparent and transcendent sense of life.
Synthesizing the above, it can be seen that the protagonists of the nine novels in Qiu Huadong's new novel collection "Havana Waves" appear in North America, Australia, São Paulo, Provence, Havana, Kenya and other foreign countries as Chinese or as Chinese, and when they are narrated together with the "others" of different countries, "going to the world" is not only the cultural vision of today's era of globalization, but also the image of the Chinese people and the more profound Chinese cultural connotation behind them are highlighted and expressed to the greatest extent in literary works. Further, the novels of writer Qiu Huadong can be described as fully engaged in his tenacious sense of life and detached aesthetic pursuits.
China Young Writers Daily, December 28, 2021, 3rd edition
Source: China Youth Daily client